D'Arcussia's Falconry

"Charles d'Arcussia, a Provençal nobleman, was descended from Neapolitan ancestors, two of whom had supplied hawks to the Holy Roman Emperors and had left a note-book on falconry matters which was still in the family four hundred years later. Charles had been brought up in the court of le Comte de Tende, Governor of Provence, who kept a hawking establishment on the grand scale. With these antecedents it is not surprising that falconry was his ruling passion, but he had the educated and orderly mind that allowed him to create this masterly treatise on falconry that was a best-seller in his day, running to eleven editions within forty-five years, and still valued by 19th Century English falconers.