Method of Snaring a Goshawk with the Aid of a Lamp.—Should you happen to see a goshawk (t̤arlān) settle on a tree towards sunset, keep a careful watch on it from a distance till three or four hours after dusk, and see that it is not disturbed. Then take a long light pole of sufficient length to reach the hawk, and firmly bind to one end a horse-hair noose; a span’s distance below the noose fasten a lighted wax-candle. Take this pole and proceed alone towards the tree on which the goshawk is sleeping, till within thirty yards of it. Now, with noiseless steps, advance very slowly for ten yards; and then halt for seven or eight minutes: next extinguish the candle and remain in the dark for two or three minutes. Re-light the candle and advance ten yards more, very very slowly; and then halt for some minutes: then extinguish the candle and wait another two or three minutes in the dark. Re-light the candle, and, holding it aloft, advance stealthily to the foot of the tree.
Keep the lighted candle in front of the goshawk’s face. Now, my son, pull yourself together and keep your eyes open; let hand and foot be steady; don’t get flurried: think not you are after a goshawk. Say to yourself: “It is a leaf of a tree, or a barn-door fowl.” Don’t let your hand shake. This is the advice I give you: I cannot myself act up to it, nor do I believe that any falconer can. Well, hold the light[309] close to the goshawk’s breast. If she is asleep, head under wing, gently, ever so gently, stroke her breast with the horse-hair noose to awaken her, but have a care your nervous hand does not tremble but keeps the pole well away from her breast, or else she is off. Stroke her breast with the noose, ever so gently, till she withdraws her head from under her wing. Then pass the noose on to her neck, and pull her down to you.[310] On the spot, “seel” her eyes with blue[311] thread, using a fine needle,[312] and “mail”[313] her tightly.
[308] Nād-i ʿAlī for the Arabic Nādi ʿAlīyan (“call on ʿAlī”), a prayer to ʿAlī much used by Shiahs: an amulet on which the following prayer is inscribed, is also so-called:—
Colonel J. P. Hamilton, in his Reminiscences of an Old Sportsman, writes: “The following superstitious ceremonies are mentioned in a book on falconry, supposed to be in the time of Edward the Confessor:—After a hawk has been ill and is sufficiently recovered to pursue the game, the owner has this admonition given to him: On the morrow tyde when thou goest out hawking, say, ‘In the name of the Lord, the birds of heaven shall be beneath thy feet.’ Also if he be hurt by the heron, say, ‘The lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has conquered. Hallelujah.’ And if he be bitte of any man, say, ‘He that the wicked man doth bind, the Lord at his coming shall set free’.”
In the middle ages, at the festival of St. Hubert, “dogs and falcons were brought into the church to receive the priest’s benediction, to the sound of horn and trumpet:....”: vide Science and Literature in the Middle Ages, by Paul Lacroix.
[309] Chirāg͟h in m. c. is often incorrectly used in the sense of ‘light’ instead of ‘lamp.’
“Looke Where an hawke perchith for all nyght: in any maner place. and softe and layserly clymbe to her With a sconce or a lanterne that hath bot oon light. in yowre hande and let the light be towarde the hawke so that she se not yowr face and ye may take hir by the leggys or oder Wise as ye lyst. and in lyke Wise all other maner fowle.”—Boke of St. Albans.
[311] That is with thread dyed with indigo: indigo is good for wounds.
[312] Hawk-catchers are careless about the manner they “seel” a hawk’s eyes: they generally use a coarse, large, needle and not infrequently a thorn.