1. The Peregrine, 2. The Hobby, 3. The Merlin, 4. The Golden Plover, 5. The Pochard, 6. The Blue Rock Pigeon, and the fastest game bird is undoubtedly the blackcock. I do not know, however, if a capercailzie would not beat him if you could get them both to take a long flight across the open, because, generally speaking, in the case of birds of similar shape and species, the heaviest bird is the fastest flying one.” Captain G. S. Blaine, another falconer of long and varied experience, has also been so kind as to give me his opinion on this question. He writes: “I cannot say whether a peregrine falcon could overtake and kill a swift, but I do not think it would ever attempt the feat. Falcons do not, as a rule, attack small birds. The male or tiercel will sometimes stoop at them, but more in play than in earnest. The female, I should think, would never attempt to catch anything smaller than a thrush or starling. “It is very difficult to estimate the relative speed of different birds. To do so, one would have to judge correctly of the time taken in passing a measured distance on a straight course. Very few birds, especially swifts, fly absolutely straight ahead. “A hobby has been known to catch swifts and swallows, and possibly a merlin would do the same. “A peregrine can fly faster than a merlin, but it would not be so quick in turning and following a bird. “I think a peregrine can fly faster than a teal or golden plover, though, as you observe, the latter are quicker off the mark.” There are very few recorded instances, as far as I have been able to ascertain, in which a hawk has killed the common swift. In two of these there was no evidence as to whether the hawk had not taken the swift by surprise. But there is at least one recorded instance in which a swift has been killed by a hobby in fair flight. This is to be found in that delightful book, _Field Studies of some Rarer British Birds_,[15] by Mr. William Walpole Bond. The description of the race is so vivid that, with the author’s kind permission, I reproduce it here. “On June 14, 1907, as I lay in a spacious clearing of a big Sussex woodland, a sudden swirl of wings gave me instant pause in my meditations. Looking up, my eyes were held by a swift coasting earthwards in frantic haste, hotly pursued by a hobby not many yards in his wake. I literally held my breath with excitement, for here was an occurrence of dreamland only. Speeding on about a level with the tree-tops both birds measure the length of the long glade in fractional time, and the hawk gains almost imperceptibly.