Secondly, there are the "mounting" larks, which go up and try to keep the air. The original ambition of these larks is to fairly out-fly the hawk, and never let her get above them. But at moulting-time they can seldom hope to accomplish this if the hawk is a fast one in really good condition. Sometimes, going wide of them, and making an upper-cut, she will bind to them at the first shot. But this is rare. Generally there are several stoops; and the whole business very accurately resembles a coursing match. The stoops are made from all sorts of distances,--short and long, upwards and downwards, with the wind and against it. I have seen a stoop by a trained merlin--a jack, rather--which was 300 yds. long, measured along the ground, to which must be added something for the height. Very often, when the lark has escaped one stoop by a hair's-breadth, and feels a conviction that next time he will not escape at all, he drops headlong towards a place of supposed shelter, with the hawk close at his heels. The harder he is pressed, the more indifferent will be the hiding-place with which he is fain to be content. Before a first-rate hawk he will go to a bare hurdle, a flat-sided rick, or a tuft of grass, whereas if he has less trouble in shifting, he will pass over all these attractions, and continue to throw out the pursuer--though with exhausting efforts--till he can get to a thick hedge or a substantial spinny. With this kind of lark you may have more flights, more running, and more excitement with a moderate merlin than with those of the very first quality. The latter are a bit too good for the work, and make the flight too short. Strangers who come out hawking and see a mounting lark so taken, are apt to say: "What a bad lark to be caught so soon!" It is often not the badness of the lark, but the goodness of the hawk, which makes short work of the flight. The mounting lark would always be a ringer if the hawk was not fast enough to get above him quickly.