Head covered with feathers, bill strong, short, generally bending from its base, which is covered with a naked and coloured cere. Nostrils round or oval, lateral, and placed in the cere. Tongue in most species fleshy and divided by a slit. Upper orbit of the eye projecting. Legs feathered to the toes, or naked. Toes three forwards and one behind, the middle toe connected with the outer one, as far as the first joint. Claws short and very hooked, strong and retractile. Female superior in size to the male.—_Montagu._ FALCON, _s._ A hawk trained for sport; a bird of immense flight. _Vide_ HAWK. [Illustration: THE FALCON.] It is recorded, that a falcon belonging to a Duke of Cleves, flew out of Westphalia into Prussia in one day; and in the county of Norfolk, a hawk has made a flight at a woodcock near thirty miles in an hour. But what are these compared to the actual velocity and continuance of the flight of a falcon, that is recorded to have belonged to Henry IV., King of France, which escaped from Fontainbleau, and in twenty-four hours after was found in Malta, a space computed to be not less than 1350 miles? a velocity equal to fifty-seven miles an hour, supposing the hawk to have been on wing the whole time. But as such birds never fly by night, and allowing the day to be at the longest, or to be eighteen hours light, this would make seventy-five miles an hour. It is probable, however, that he neither had so many hours of light in the twenty-four to perform the journey, nor that he was retaken the moment of his arrival, so that we may fairly conclude much less time was occupied in performing that distant flight.—_Vide_ FLIGHT OF BIRDS. FALCONER, _s._ One who breeds and trains hawks. The village of Falconswaerd, near Bois le Duc, in Holland, has for many years furnished falconers to the rest of Europe. I have known many falconers in England, and in the service of different princes on the Continent, but I never met with one of them who was not a native of Falconswaerd. It has been the practice of these sober and industrious men to stay with their employers during the season for hawking, and to pass the remainder of the year with their families at home. * * * * * A falconer, whose province it was to tame, manage, and look after falcons and other hawks, was formerly as great and conspicuous a character as the most celebrated huntsman of the present day. The influence of fashion and the changes wrought by time have, however, so obscured both sport and sportsmen in this way, that neither hawk, falcon, or falconer, are to be seen or heard of, unless in the northern parts of the kingdom, where it is also nearly buried in oblivion.—_Sebright_—_Daniel._ FALCONRY, _s._ _Vide_ HAWKING. FALLOW, _a._ Pale red, or pale yellow; unsowed, left to rest after the years of tillage; ploughed, but not sowed; unploughed, uncultivated. FALLOW DEER, _s._ The domestic or park deer. [Illustration]