The Descent of Man

it probable that most of them were females;
though, as I hear from Mr. Fox, the male will sit
on the eggs when the female is killed.
Sir J. Lubbock's gamekeeper has repeatedly
shot, but how often he could not say, one of a
pair of jays (Garrulus glandarius), and has never
failed shortly afterwards to find the survivor
re-matched. Mr. Fox, Mr. F. Bond, and others
have shot one of a pair of carrion-crows
(Corvus corone), but the nest was soon again
tenanted by a pair. These birds are rather
common; but the peregrine-falcon (Falco peregrinus)
is rare, yet Mr. Thompson states that in
Ireland "if either an old male or female be killed
in the breeding-season (not an uncommon circumstance),
another mate is found within a
very few days, so that the eyries, notwithstanding
such casualties, are sure to turn out their
complement of young." Mr. Jenner Weir has
known the same thing with the peregrinefalcons
at Beachy Head. The same observer