The interesting, and I think significant, fact is that although some of these stalkers with whom I have discussed the question think that the peregrine probably flies faster than the eagle, every one of them who has seen the eagle kill its quarry in this way (and I know several) has told me that in his opinion the eagle in its final rush is faster than the peregrine. It is also important in this connection to bear in mind the fact on which Major Radclyffe lays such stress—that it is an optical illusion to imagine that a smaller-sized bird is flying faster than a larger bird of similar shape and make, and that, as he says, ninety-nine sportsmen out of a hundred would probably tell you that a snipe flies faster than a woodcock—whereas the converse is true. An old keeper in the North, whom I have known for many years, told me that he had seen the eagle stoop at and strike his quarry in this way on two occasions, and that it moved in its final downward flight with the same lightning-like rapidity as the peregrine.

John Finlayson, the head stalker at Killilan, wrote to me last February as follows: “I have once plainly seen the eagle driving after grouse and striking it down very similar like what the peregrine falcon does. It happened at the north end of Corrie-ach. I was going up to Patt from Mulbuie way. A covey of grouse came tearing down from the low end of Aonachbuie in front of me, about 300 yards away, and an eagle in hot pursuit, wings gathered up, and making a swishing noise; going through the air it struck one down, with a cloud of feathers knocked out when it did so. The eagle glided up a little, then balanced and dropped down where the bird fell; it was a little over a ridge out of my view; when I got up to the place I saw the eagle well up the glen going fast with the bird in its talons.”

My gamekeeper, Donald McIver, who has lived all his life in Ross-shire, on one occasion saw an eagle strike and kill a blackcock. This is his account of it. “In the forest of Strathconan, where I was for a number of years, I once saw a very fine sight of an eagle pursuing a blackcock. The blackcock got up at the head of a very deep corrie and came over at a very great height. The eagle was about and soon after it. I could see him overtake the bird, and I would say that he struck him the same way as the peregrine does with his claw. I saw something drop, but could not make out what it was at the time; then the eagle doubled in the air and caught the bird before it reached the ground. None of the other eagles I have seen after their prey have struck it like this in the air. They have always clutched at their prey, but this time the eagle struck the bird and went right past him. I was not far off, and could hear a tremendous noise of the wings. When the eagle doubled back and caught the bird in the air I would judge that the bird would be as high up as three hundred feet, and when he doubled back I should think he was not fifty.

“Perhaps the narrowness of the corrie might be the reason for him taking the bird in the way he did—I went to the place and found the head of the blackcock; there was about three inches of skin hanging to the head, a tear like what would be done with the claw. This is the only time I ever saw an eagle kill a bird in the air, but it was a grand sight. This happened in January 1895, in Corrie Vullin, Strathconan.”

This amazing feat in aerial gymnastics is no doubt also performed on rare occasions by the peregrine. One of the most experienced of living falconers wrote to me as follows: “I have seen a very celebrated falcon which I owned for years bring off a remarkable trick several times. She used to strike at the back of the grouse’s head, and I have seen her just scalp the grouse, taking a piece out of its skull not as large as a pea, and thus killing the bird in mid-air just as if it was shot; often, when the grouse was high above the ground, I have seen the falcon then take a sharp turn in the air as the grouse was falling, like a spinning leaf, and pick it up in her feet before it could touch the ground—a very wonderful sight.”

An old friend of mine, who is head stalker in one of our best-known deer forests and whose veracity I have every reason to accept, told me an interesting story which further illustrates what fine feats in the air the peregrine falcon can perform. He said that on one occasion he saw a falcon strike and carry off a crow. As the falcon was circling higher and higher up, carrying off this crow, it was mobbed by a considerable number of other crows. For some time it ignored them, continuing its steady upward circling flight until one crow, becoming rather bolder than the rest, provoked the falcon into retaliation. Dropping the crow it was carrying, the falcon stooped on the troublesome crow, struck and killed it and, turning with extraordinary rapidity, caught in the air the dead crow which it had been carrying, and then recommenced its upward flight without further trouble from the crows.

“To my mind one of the fastest things I have ever witnessed is the last effort of a peregrine in chase of a wild duck when, fast as is the accelerated speed of a mallard, it seems almost to be standing still in the air when the peregrine stoops over it.”

Any one who has seen this, as I am glad to say I have, will assuredly echo these words.

It is of course pure speculation whether, in the comparatively short flight of an eagle or falcon stooping in its final downward rush at its prey, its speed exceeds the maximum speed of the spine-tailed swift. Those, however, who have seen the last effort of the eagle or falcon in a flight of that unique kind will never believe, without scientific demonstration to the contrary, that any other bird in the British Isles can fly faster.