Sister Teresa

hawks. As a boy he had dreamed of training hawks, and remembered one taken by him from the nest, or maybe a gamekeeper had brought it to him, it was long ago; but the bird itself was remembered ver

member, but what he did remember, and very well, was the moment when the bird fluttered towards the window; he could see it resting on the sill, hesitating a moment, doubting its power of flight. But it had ventured out

and he had continued to dream of hawking, of the mystery whereby the hawk could be called out of the sky by the lure-some rags and worsted-work in the shape of a bird whirled in the air at the end of a string. Why should the hawk leave its pr

mystery for him any longer; and as he lay in his tent, trying to get a few hours' sleep before dawn, he asked himself if the realisation of his dream would profit him much, only the certain knowledge that hawks stooped at their prey and returned to the lure; another mystery wou

han to return to civilisation. Of civilisation it seemed to him that he had had enough, and he wondered if it were as valuable as many people thought; he had found more pleasure in speaking with his dragoman, learning Arabic from him, than in talking to educated men from the universities and such like. Riches dry up the soul and are an obstacle to the development of self. If he had not inherited Riversdale and its many occupations and duties, he would be to-day an instinctive human being instead of a scrapbook of culture. For a rich man there is no escape fro

have passed between

their horses or would fail to catch them, and indifferent he stood watching the moon hanging low over the landscape, a badly drawn circle, but admirably soft to look upon, casting a gentle, mysterious light down the lake. The silence was filled with the lake's warble, and the ducks kept awake by the moon chattered as they dozed, a soft cooing chatter like women gossiping; an Arab came

, he saw at least twenty coming through the blue dusk, white bournous, scimi

he true Saharian," his

to his tent, thinking

wrists, and how hawki

teenth century. But

o-day is the sa

first." The quarrel waxed louder, and then suddenly ceased, and when Owen came out of his tent he saw an Arab take the latchet of a bird's hood in his teeth and pull the other end with his right hand. "A noble and melancholy bird," he said, and he

rd, down the morning sky, which had begun in orange, and was turning to crimson. "N

he air for a moment, at the end of a string. A moment was sufficient; the clear round eye ha

up. And they flew, the terrible hawk in pursuit, fearing their natural enemy above them more than any rain of lead. Owen pressed his horse in

oner, who explained that the moment was always an anxious one, for were the hawk approached from behind, or approached suddenly, it "might carry"-that is to say, might bear away its prey for a hundred yards, and when it had done this on

wards him, knowing the hawk would not leave it; and when he had hold of the jesses, the head was cut from the partridge and opened, fo

yond good and evil,

ptured; so the mystery of hawking was at an end for him, the mystery had been unravelled, and now there was not

s hung lifeless and melancholy, every leaf distinct at the end of its stem, weary of its life, "

, only a few yards above the ground, too idle to mount the sky, to get at pitch; and as the bird passed him, Owen admired th

is hawk when it alighted in the branches, and stood there preening itself in the vague sunlight. But

ll have some better

man to translate wha

fine kill. He is p

h is even more difficult for the hawk to overtake, for it rises easier than the duck; but if the hawk be at pitch it will strike down the quick teal. One of the Arabs reined in his horse, and following the line of the outstretched finger Owen saw far away in a small pool or plash of water three teal swimming. As soon as

ail feathers it would not be able to fly again that season unless the feather was replaced; and the falconer showed Owen a supply of feathers, all numbered, for it would not do to supply a missing third feather with a fourth; and the splice was a needle inserted into the ends of the feathers and bound fast with fine thread. The bird's beauty had not escaped Owen's notice, but he had been so busy with the peregrines all the morning that he had not had time to ask why this bird wore no hood, and why it had not been flown. Now he learnt that the gosshawk is a short-winged hawk, which does not go up in the air, and get at pitch, and stoop at its prey like the peregrine, but flies directly after it, capturing by

rd and will not hang by her l

tween themselves, and the falconers, and each other, if the bird going eastward had not been frightened by the Arabs coming up from the lake, and, losing its head, it turned back, and flying heavily over the hawking party, gave the goshawk her single chance, a chance which was nearly being mi

cried, seeing his hawk now flying with determinat

autiful, six or seven pounds in weight, the size of a small turkey, and covered with the most beautiful feathers, pale yellow speckled with brown, a long neck and a short, strong beak, long black legs with three toes, the fourth, the spur, missing. That a hawk should knock over a bustard had not happened often, and he regretted that he knew not how to save the bird's skin, for though stuffed bir

lure, and presently the hawks came back; it was then only that the heron divined his danger, and instead of trying to outdistance his pursuers as the other birds had done, and at the cost of their lives, he flopped his wings more vigorously, ringing his way up the sky, knowing, whether by past experience or by instinct, that the hawks must get above him. And the

e watched the birds now well above the heron.

s long neck and beak, and the trailing legs. The second hawk stooped. "Ah! now he is doomed," Owen cried. But again t

orse to pick his way. Again a hawk had reached a sufficient height and stooped; again the heron dodged, and so the battle continued, the hawks stooping again and again, but always missing the heron, until

een the heron and hawks falling, he galloped, regardless of every obstacle, forgetfu

ained but the outlying streets, some doorways, and many tombs, open every one of them, as if the dead had already been resurrected. Before him lay the broken lid of a sarcophagus and the sarcophagus empty, a little sand from the desert replacing the ashes of the dead man. Owen's hor

is dragoman-as if falcon or heron could interest him at that moment-and he continued to peer into the inscription, leaving the Arabs to find the birds. And th