his followers. Sir Thomas More, writing in
the reign of Henry VIII., describing the state of manhood, makes a young
man say:

"Man-hod I am, therefore I me delyght
To hunt and hawke, to nourish up and fede
The greyhounde to the course, the hawke to th' flight,
And to bestryde a good and lusty stede."

[224] See Strutt's "Sports and Pastimes," 1876, pp. 60-97, and
"Book of Days," 1863, vol. ii. pp. 211-213; Smith's "Festivals,
Games, and Amusements," 1831, p. 174.

In noticing, then, Shakespeare's allusions to this sport, we have a good
insight into its various features, and also gain a knowledge of the
several terms associated with it. Thus frequent mention is made of the
word "haggard"--a wild, untrained hawk--and in the following allegory
("Taming of the Shrew," iv. 1), where it occurs, much of the knowledge
of falconry is comprised:

"My falcon now is sharp, and passing empty;
And, till she stoop, she must not be full-gorged,[225]
For then she never looks upon her lure.
Another way I have to man my haggard,
To make her come, and know her keeper's call;
That is, to watch her, as we watch these kites
That bate, and beat, and will not be obedient.
She eat no meat to-day, nor none shall eat;
Last night she slept not, nor to-night she shall not."[226]

[225] "A hawk full-fed was untractable, and refused the
lure--the lure being a thing stuffed to look like the game the
hawk was to pursue; its lure was to tempt him back after he had
flown."

[226] In the same play (iv. 2) Hortensio describes Bianca as
"this proud disdainful haggard." See Dyce's "Glossary," p. 197;
Cotgrave's "French and English Dictionary," sub. "Hagard;" and
Latham's "Falconry," etc., 1658.

Further allusions occur in "Twelfth Night" (iii. 1), where Viola says of
the Clown:

"This fellow is wise enough to play the fool;
And to do that well craves a kind of wit:
He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
The quality of persons, and the time;
And, like the haggard, check at every feather
That comes before his eye."

In "Much Ado About Nothing" (iii. 1), Hero, speaking of Beatrice, says
that:

"her spirits are as coy and wild
As haggards of the rock."

And Othello (iii. 3), mistrusting Desdemona, and likening her to a hawk,
exclaims:

"if I do prove her haggard,--
I'd whistle her