THE NUTCRACKERNUCÍFRAGA CARYOCATACTESPlumage sooty brown, spotted on the back and under parts with white; tail black, barred with white at the extremity; beak and feet horn-colour; iris brown. Length thirteen inches. Eggs light buff, with a few greyish brown spots.The Nutcracker Crow, a rare straggler, must not be confounded with the Nuthatch, which we have already described; the formeris a large bird, as big as a Jay, and is only an occasional visitor in this country, and whose habits partake of those of the Crows and Woodpeckers. The propriety of its name is questionable, according to Yarrell, who says that 'it cannot crack nuts'. Here perhaps there may be some little mistake. Its name is evidently a translation of the FrenchCassenoix. In England we mean by 'nuts' filberts or hazel-nuts; but the French wordnoixis applied exclusively to walnuts, our nuts beingnoisettes, or 'little nuts'; and French authors are agreed that its food consists of insects, fruits, and walnuts; that is, the ordinary diet of its relative, the Rook, whose fondness for walnuts is notorious. It lays its eggs in the holes of trees, and, except in the breeding season, is more or less gregarious in its habits.THE JAYGÁRRULUS GLANDÁRIUSFeathers of the crest greyish white, streaked with black; a black moustache from the corners of the beak; general plumage reddish grey, darker above; primaries dingy black; secondaries velvet-black and pure white; inner tertials rich chestnut; winglet and greater coverts barred with black, white, and bright blue; upper and under tail-coverts pure white; iris bright blue; beak black; feet livid brown. Length thirteen and a half inches; breadth twenty-two inches. Eggs dull green, minutely and thickly-speckled with olive-brown.There exists among gamekeepers a custom of selecting a certain spot in preserved woods, and there suspending, as trophies of their skill and watchfulness, the bodies of such destructive animals as they have killed in the pursuit of their calling. They are generally those of a few stoats or weasels, a Hawk, a Magpie, an owl, and two or three Jays. All these animals are judged to be destructive to game, and are accordingly hunted to the death, the Jay, perhaps, with less reason than the rest, for though it can hardly resist the temptation of plundering, either of eggs or young, any nest, whether of Partridge or Pheasant, that falls in its way, yet it does not subsist entirely upon animal food, but also upon acorns and various other wild fruits. Its blue feathers are much used in the manufacture of artificial flies. Nevertheless, owing to their cautious and wary habits, there are few wooded districts in which they are not more or less numerous. Their jarring unconnected note, which characterizes them at all seasons, is in spring and summer varied by their song proper, in which I have never been able to detect anything more melodious than an accurate imitation of the noise made by sawyers at work, though Montagu states that 'it will, sometimes, in the spring utter a sort of song in a soft and pleasing manner, but so low as not to be heard at any distance; and at intervals introduces the bleating of a lamb, mewing of a cat, the note of a Kite or Buzzard, hooting of an Owl, or even neighing of a horse. These imitations are so exact, even in a natural wild state, that we have frequently been deceived.' The Jay generally builds its nest in a wood, either in the top of a low tree, or against the trunk of a lofty one, employing as material small sticks, roots, and dry grass, and lays five eggs. There seems to be a difference of opinion as to the sociability of the family party after the young are fledged, some writers stating that they separate by mutual consent, and that each shifts for itself; others, that the young brood remains with the old birds all the winter. For my own part, I scarcely recollect ever having seen a solitary Jay, or to have heard a note which was not immediately responded to by another bird of the same species, the inference from which is that, though not gregarious, they are at least social.When domesticated, the Jay displays considerable intelligence; it is capable of attachment, and learns to distinguish the hand and voice of its benefactor.Plate_13Plate_14THE MAGPIEPICA RÚSTICAHead, throat, neck, and back velvet-black; scapulars and under plumage white; tail much graduated and, as well as the wings, black, with lustrous blue and bronze reflections; beak, iris, and feet black. Length eighteen inches; breadth twenty-three inches. Eggs pale dirty green, spotted all over with ash-grey and olive-brown.The Magpie, like the Crow, labours under the disadvantage of an ill name, and in consequence incurs no small amount of persecution. Owing to the disproportionate length of its tail and shortness of its wings its flight is somewhat heavy, so that if it were not cunning and wary to a remarkable degree, it would probably well-nigh disappear from the catalogue of British Birds. Yet though it is spared by none except avowed preservers of all birds (like Waterton, who protects it 'on account of its having nobody to stand up for it'), it continues to be a bird of general occurrence, and there seems indeed to be but little diminution of its numbers. Its nest is usually constructed among the upper branches of a lofty tree, either in a hedge-row or deep in a wood; or if it has fixed its abode in an unwooded district, it selects the thickest thorn-bush in the neighbourhood and there erects its castle. This is composed of an outwork of thorns and briers supporting a mass of twigs and mud, which is succeeded by a layer of fibrous roots. The whole is not only fenced round but arched over with thorny sticks, an aperture being left, on one side only, large enough to admit the bird. In this stronghold are deposited generally sixeggs, which in due time are succeeded by as many young ogres, who are to be reared to birds by an unstinted supply of the most generous diet. Even before their appearance the old birds have committed no small havoc in the neighbourhood; now, however, that four times as many mouths have to be filled, the hunting ground must either be more closely searched or greatly extended. Any one who has had an opportunity of watching the habits of a tame Magpie, must have observed its extreme inquisitiveness and skill in discovering what was intended to be concealed, joined, moreover, to an unscrupulous habit of purloining everything that takes its roving fancy. Even when surrounded by plenty and pampered with delicacies it prefers a stolen morsel to what is legally its own. Little wonder then that when it has to hunt on its own account for the necessaries of life, and is stimulated besides by the cravings of its hungry brood, it has gained an unenviable notoriety as a prowling bandit. In the harrying of birds' nests no schoolboy can compete with it; Partridges and Pheasants are watched to their retreat and plundered mercilessly of their eggs and young; the smaller birds are treated in like manner: hares and rabbits, if they suffer themselves to be surprised, have their eyes picked out and are torn to pieces; rats, mice, and frogs are a lawful prey; carrion, offal of all kinds, snails, worms, grubs, and caterpillars, each in turn pleasantly vary the diet; and, when in season, grain and fruit are attacked with as much audacity as is consistent with safety; and might, whenever available, give a right to stray chickens and ducklings. The young birds, nurtured in an impregnable stronghold, and familiarized from their earliest days with plunder, having no song to learn save the note of caution and alarm when danger is near, soon become adepts in the arts of their parents, and, before their first moult, are a set of inquisitive, chattering marauders, wise enough to keep near the haunts of men because food is there most abundant, cautious never to come within reach of the fowling-piece, and cunning enough to carry off the call-bird from the net without falling themselves into the snare. Even in captivity, with all their drollery, they are unamiable.Magpies, though generally distributed, are far more numerous in some districts than others. In Cornwall they are very abundant; hence I have heard them called Cornish Pheasants. In Ireland they are now very common. It is stated that they are in France more abundant than in any other country of Europe, where they principally build their nests in poplar-trees, having discovered, it is said, 'that the brittle nature of the boughs of this tree is an additional protection against climbers!' 'In Norway', says a writer in theZoologist,[10]'this bird, usually so shy in this country, and so difficult to approach within gunshot, seems to have entirely changed its nature: it is there the most domestic andfearless bird; its nest is invariably placed in a small tree or bush adjoining some farm or cottage, and not unfrequently in the very midst of some straggling village. If there happens to be a suitable tree by the roadside and near a house, it is a very favourable locality for a Norwegian Magpie's nest. I have often wondered to see the confidence and fearlessness displayed by this bird in Norway; he will only just move out of your horse's way as you drive by him on the road, and should he be perched on a rail by the roadside he will only stare at you as you rattle by, but never think of moving off. It is very pleasant to see this absence of fear of man in Norwegian birds; a Norwegian would never think of terrifying a bird for the sake of sport; whilst, I fear, to see such a bird as the Magpie sitting quietly on a rail within a few feet, would be to an English boy a temptation for assault which he could not resist. I must add, however, with regard to Magpies, that there is a superstitious prejudice for them current throughout Norway; they are considered harbingers of good luck, and are consequently always invited to preside over the house; and, when they have taken up their abode in the nearest tree, are defended from all ill; and he who should maltreat the Magpie has perhaps driven off thegenius loci, and so may expect the most furious anger of the neighbouring dwelling, whose good fortune he has thus violently dispersed.' Faith in the prophetic powers of the Magpie even yet lingers in many of the rural districts of England also.[10]Vol. viii. p. 3085.THE JACKDAWCORVUS MONÉDULACrown of the head and upper parts black, with violet reflections; back of the head and nape grey; lower parts duller black; iris white; beak and feet black. Length thirteen inches; breadth twenty-seven inches. Eggs very light blue, with scattered spots of ash-colour and dark brown.This lively and active bird, inferior in size as well as dignity to the Rook, yet in many respects resembles it so closely that it might be fabled to have made the Rook its model, and to have exercised its imitative powers in the effort to become the object of its admiration. A vain effort, however; for nature has given to it a slender form, a shriller voice, a partially grey mantle, and an instinct which compels it to be secretive even in the placing of its nest. Its note, which may be represented either by the syllable 'jack' or 'daw', according to the fancy of the human imitator, sounds like an impertinent attempt to burlesque the full 'caw' of the Rook; it affects to be admitted into the society of that bird on equal terms; but whether encouraged as a friend, or tolerated as a parasite whom it is less troublesome to treat with indifference than to chase away, is difficult to decide. Most probably the latter;for although It is common enough to see a party of Jackdaws dancing attendance on a flock of Rooks, accompanying them to their feeding-grounds, and nestling in hollow trunks of trees in close proximity to rookeries, they are neither courted nor persecuted; they come when they like and go away when they please. On the other hand, no one, I believe, ever saw a flock of Rooks making the first advances towards an intimacy with a flock of Jackdaws, or heard of their condescending to colonize a grove, because their grey-headed relatives were located in the neighbourhood. On the sea-coast, where Rooks are only casual visitors, the Jackdaw has no opportunity of hanging himself on as an appendage to a rookery, but even here he must be a client. With the choice of a long range of cliff before him, he avoids that which he might have all to himself, and selects a portion which, either because it is sheltered from storms, or inaccessible by climbers, has been already appropriated by Sea-mews.The object of the Jackdaw in making church-towers its resort is pretty evident. Where there is a church there is at least also a village, and where men and domestic animals congregate, there the Jackdaw fails not to find food; grubs in the fields, fruit in the orchards, and garbage of all kinds in the waste ground. Here, too, it has a field for exercising its singular acquisitiveness. Wonderful is the variety of objects which it accumulates in its museum of a nest, which, professedly a complication of sticks, may comprise also a few dozen labels stolen from a Botanic Garden, an old tooth-brush, a child's cap, part of a worsted stocking, a frill, etc. Waterton,[11]who strongly defends it from the charge of molesting either the eggs or young of pigeons, professes himself unable to account for its pertinacious habit of collecting sticks for a nest placed where no such support is seemingly necessary, and, cunning though it is, comments on its want of adroitness in introducing sticks into its hole: 'You may see the Jackdaw', he says, 'trying for a quarter of an hour to get a stick into the hole, while every attempt will be futile, because, the bird having laid hold of it by the middle, it is necessarily thrown at right angles with the body, and the Daw cannot perceive that the stick ought to be nearly parallel with its body before it can be conveyed into the hole. Fatigued at length with repeated efforts, and completely foiled in its numberless attempts to introduce the stick, it lets it fall to the ground, and immediately goes in quest of another, probably to experience another disappointment on its return. When time and chance have enabled it to place a quantity of sticks at the bottom of the hole, it then goes to seek for materials of a more pliant and a softer nature.' These are usually straw, wool, and feathers; but, as we have seen, nothing comes amiss that catches its fancy. In additionto rocks, towers, and hollow trees, it sometimes places its nest in chimneys or in rabbit-burrows, but never, or in the rarest instances, among the open boughs of a tree. It lays from four to six eggs, and feeds its young on worms and insects, which it brings home in the pouch formed by the loose skin at the base of its beak. When domesticated, its droll trickeries and capability of imitating the human voice and other sounds are well known. By turns affectionate, quarrelsome, impudent, confiding, it is always inquisitive, destructive, and given to purloining; so that however popular at first as a pet, it usually terminates its career by some unregretted accident, or is consigned to captivity in a wicker cage.[11]Essays on Natural History.First Series, p. 109.THE RAVENCORVUS CÓRAXPlumage black with purple reflections; tail rounded, black, extending two inches beyond the closed wings; beak strong, black as well as the feet; iris with two circles, the inner grey, the outer ash-brown. Length twenty-five inches; width four feet. Eggs dirty green, spotted and speckled with brown.The Raven, the largest of the Corvidæ, and possessing in an eminent degree all the characteristics of its tribe except sociability, is the bird which beyond all others has been regarded with feelings of awe by the superstitious in all ages. In both instances in which specific mention of it occurs in Holy Writ, it is singled out from among other birds as gifted with a mysterious intelligence. Sent forth by Noah when the ark rested on the mountains of Ararat, it perhaps found a congenial home among the lonely crags strewed with the carcases of drowned animals, and by failing to return, announced to the patriarch that a portion of the earth, though not one fit for his immediate habitation, was uncovered by the waters. At a subsequent period, honoured with the mission of supplying the persecuted prophet with food, it was taught to suppress its voracious instinct by the God who gave it. The Raven figures prominently in most heathen mythologies, and is almost everywhere regarded with awe by the ignorant even at the present time. In Scandinavian mythology it was an important actor; and all readers of Shakespeare must be familiar with passages which prove it to have been regarded as a bird of dire omen.The sad presaging Raven tollsThe sick man's passport in her hollow beak.And in the shadow of the silent nightDoth shake contagion from her sable wing.Marlowe.In the Judgment of others, its friendly mission to the Tishbite invested it with a sanctity which preserved it from molestation.Apart from all traditional belief, the Raven derives its ill-omened character as a herald of death from the rapidity with which it discerns, in the vicinity of its haunts, the carcase of any dead animal. In the coldest winter days, at Hudson's Bay, when every kind of effluvium is greatly checked if not arrested by frost, buffaloes and other beasts have been killed when not one of these birds was to be seen; but in a few hours scores of them have been found collected about the spot to pick up the blood and offal. 'In Ravens', says a writer in theZoologist,'the senses of smell and sight are remarkably acute and powerful. Perched usually on some tall cliff that commands a wide survey, these faculties are in constant and rapid exercises, and all the movements of the bird are regulated in accordance with the information thus procured. The smell of death is so grateful to them that they utter a loud croak of satisfaction instantly on perceiving it. In passing any sheep, if a tainted smell is perceptible, they cry vehemently. From this propensity in the Raven to announce his satisfaction in the smell of death has probably arisen the common notion that he is aware of its approach among the human race, and foretells it by his croakings.' The same observant author, as quoted by Macgillivray, says again: 'Their sight and smell are very acute, for when they are searching the wastes for provision, they hover over them at a great height; and yet a sheep will not be dead many minutes before they will find it. Nay, if a morbid smell transpire from any in the flock, they will watch it for days till it die.'To such repasts they are guided more by scent than by sight, for though they not unfrequently ascend to a great height in the air, they do not then appear to be on the look-out for food. This duty is performed more conveniently and with greater success by beating over the ground at a low elevation. In these expeditions they do not confine themselves to carrion, but prey indiscriminately on all animals which they are quick enough to capture and strong enough to master. Hares, rabbits, rats, mice, lizards, game of various kinds, eggs, and the larger insects, all of these enter into their diet, and, wanting these, they resort to the sea-shore for refuse fish, or ransack dunghills in villages, before the inhabitants are astir, for garbage of all sorts. Pliny even relates that in a certain district of Asia Minor they were trained to hawk for game like the noble Falcons. Few of these qualifications tend to endear them to mankind; and as they are dreaded by shepherds on account of their being perhaps more than suspected of making away with sickly lambs when occasion offers, and of plundering poultry yards, Ravens are become, in populous districts, almost unknown birds. I have only seen them myself on the rocky sea-shore of Devon and Cornwall, in the wilds of Dartmoor, and the Highlands of Scotland. There was for many successive years a nest built on a ledge of granite near the Bishop Rock, in Cornwall, a huge mass of sticks, andwhat appeared to be grass, inaccessible from below, but commanded by a venturous climber from above. Where it still continues to breed inland, it places its nest, constructed of sticks and lined with the wool and fur of its victims, either on an inaccessible rock, or near the summit of a lofty tree, the ill-omened 'Raven-tree' of romances. In the north of Scotland, in the Orkneys and Hebrides, where it is still abundant, it builds its nest in cliffs which it judges to be inaccessible, both inland and on the sea-shore, showing no marked preference for either. Two pairs never frequent the same locality, nor is any other bird of prey permitted to establish itself in their vicinity. Even the Eagle treats the Raven with respect, and leaves it to its solitude, not so much from fear of its prowess, as worn out by its pertinacious resistance of all dangerous intruders. Hence, in some districts, shepherds encourage Ravens, because they serve as a repellent to Eagles; while in others, where Eagles are of unusual occurrence, they allow them to build their nests undisturbed, but when the young are almost fledged, destroy them by throwing stones at them from above. Nevertheless the original pair continues to haunt the same locality for an indefinite term of years, and it is not a little singular that if one of them be killed, the survivor will find a mate in an incredibly short space of time.The geographical range of the Raven is very extensive. Throughout all the zones of the Northern Hemisphere it is to be found; and having this wide range, its physical constitution is strong, and it lives to a great age, amounting, so the ancients tell us, to twenty-seven times the period of a man's life. The note of the Raven is well described by the word 'croak', but it is said by those who have had the opportunity of observing it under various circumstances, to utter another sound, resembling the word 'whii-ur'. With this cry it very commonly intermixes another, sounding like 'clung', uttered very much as by a human voice, only a little wilder in the sound. From the crycroakthe Raven no doubt derives its Latin nameCorvusthe FrenchCorbeau, and its common Scotch appellationCorbie.THE CARRION CROWCORVUS CORÓNEBlack, with green and violet reflections; tail slightly rounded, extending an inch and a quarter beyond the closed wings; iris dark hazel; lower part of the beak covered with bristly feathers; beak and feet black. Length nineteen inches; breadth three feet. Eggs bluish green, spotted and speckled with ash-grey and olive.Breeding early in the year, like the Raven, the Carrion Crow builds its nest in some tree which, from its loftiness or other reason, is difficult of ascent, where its young ones are hatched about thetime that most other birds are laying their eggs, and when the lambing season is at its height. Then, too, its habits are most fully developed. Its young are clamorous for food, and will not be satisfied with a little. So the old bird sallies forth to scour the districts least frequented by man, and makes every living thing its prey, provided that by force or cunning it can overpower it. If Grouse are plentiful, it is said that one pair, what with stealing the eggs and carrying off the young, will in a season destroy more of them than the keenest sportsman. It will pounce on the leveret and bear it screaming from the side of its mother. It watches sheep which have strayed from the fold, and mangles the newly-born or weakly lambs, carrying them piece-meal to the young ones at home. If mowers are at work, the wary birds alight on some lofty tree, taking care to keep at a safe distance, and when a nest has been laid bare by the scythe, their incredibly sharp eye discerns the prize which, whether it consist of eggs or callow young, is borne off in triumph. Lest their depredations should be discovered by the accumulation of egg-shells, feathers and bones, which are the natural consequence of these raids, they carefully carry to some distance everything that would tend to betray them, so that one might pass directly beneath the scene of these enormities unsuspicious of the evil existing overhead. Keen as this bird is in pursuit of such delicate fare, he can be, when occasion serves, as unclean a feeder as the Vulture, and he can, on the other hand, make a meal off corn. Mr. Knox states that in the Weald of Sussex, where the Raven is common, it resorts to the brooks and ponds, which abound in fresh-water mussels (Anodon), and feeds on them most voraciously, especially after floods, when they lie scattered on the mud. The same author states that in winter it resorts to the sea-shore, and feeds on the oysters, mussels, small crabs, marine insects, worms, and dead fish which are cast up by the waves during the prevalent south-westerly storms. It has been frequently observed, he adds, to ascend to a great height in the air with an oyster in its claws, and after letting it fall on the beach, to descend rapidly with closed pinions and devour the contents. A similar instance of apparent reasoning is recorded of the same bird by Pliny, but with the substitution of walnuts for oysters.With such wandering habits, it seems at first sight strange that the phrase 'as the Crow flies' should be adopted to mark distances in a straight line across the open country; yet when it is borne in mind how many persons confound the Crow with the Rook, and even talk of the 'Crows in a rookery', the suggestion will at once occur to the mind that the term owed its origin to its far gentler and more respectable relation, the Rook, whose evening flights from the feeding-ground are among the most familiar sights of the country, and are invariably performed in a line so straight, that if a whole flock could be tracked through the air on any one eveningit would be found scarcely to deviate from that of the preceding or the following. It is to be feared that this inaccurate application of names has done the Rook ill service; yet the two birds are totally distinct; Crows are solitary birds, rarely being seen in more than pairs together; Rooks are eminently sociable. Crows shun the haunts of men; Rooks court the vicinity of his dwellings. Crows are carnivorous; Rooks feed principally on the grubs of beetles, worms, and noxious insects, rewarding themselves occasionally for their services by regaling on corn and fruits, but rarely touching carrion or molesting living animals. In appearance the two birds are much alike; the Crow, however, is somewhat smaller, the beak is stouter at the point and encircled at the base with numerous short feathers, while the bill of the Rook is encroached on by a white membrane which is almost bare of feathers. Both are noted for their intelligence; the Crow has been known to remove its eggs from its nest when apprehensive of danger; it was held in high consideration in the days of augury, and certain of its movements were considered to be indicative of changes in the weather. It builds its nest of sticks, and lines it with moss, straw, hair, and wool, and lays from four to six eggs. Like the Raven, it is a widely-diffused bird, and attains a great age, outliving (the ancients said) nine generations of men, showing great attachment to any spot in which it has once fixed its home, and suffering neither its own progeny nor any other large birds to nestle in its vicinity.This Crow is becoming more numerous of late in the close vicinity of London. It comes constantly to some of our suburban gardens.THE HOODED CROW, GREY OR ROYSTON CROWCORVUS CORNIXHead, throat, wings and tail black, the rest of the plumage ash-grey; tail rounded; beak and feet black; iris brown. Length nineteen and a half inches; breadth three feet two inches. Eggs bluish green, mottled with ash-grey and olive.The Hooded Crow closely resembles the Carrion Crow, scarcely differing from it in fact except in colour. They are, however, perfectly distinct species, and for the most part exercise their calling in separate haunts. In Norway Hooded Crows are very abundant, to the almost total exclusion of the Carrion Crow and Rook, and, though not congregating so as to form a society like the last-named bird, they may be seen simultaneously employed in searching for food in groups which collectively amount to a hundred or more. Though numerous in the winter at Newmarket Heath and Royston (where they are sometimes called Royston Crows), and annually resorting to many parts of the sea-coast, they rarely breed so far south. In the Isle of Man, the Orkneys, Hebrides,and in all but the south of Scotland they are of more frequent occurrence than any other of the tribe, essentially belonging to the 'Land of the mountain and the flood'. It is on the increase in Ireland and very unwelcome there. One can scarcely traverse the shores of the salt-water lochs of Scotland without seeing a pair, or, in the latter part of the year, a small party of four or five of these birds, gravely pacing the shingle and sand in quest of food. As far as my own experience goes, I should consider the Hooded Crow as 'half sea-bird', but it is said to be met with, in summer, in the very centre of the Grampians and other inland districts. Its proper diet consists of the smaller marine animals, such as crabs, echini, and molluscs, alive or dead, fish and carrion. At high-water it retires inland, and skulks about the low grounds in quest of the eggs and young of Moor-fowl, thereby gaining the execrations of gamekeepers; takes a survey of any adjacent sheep-walks, on the chance of falling in with a new-born lamb, or sickly ewe, whence it has but an ill name among shepherds; and returns when the tide has well ebbed, to finish the day's repast on food of a nature light and easy of digestion. It is less wary of man than the Carrion Crow, and often comes within shot, but, being far too numerous to admit of being exterminated, is but little assailed. In the comparatively mild climate of the Scottish sea-coast, these birds find an abundant supply of food all the year round and as there is no sensible diminution of their numbers in winter, it is supposed that those which frequent the English coast from October to March have been driven southwards by the inclement winters of high latitudes. They are then frequently observed on the coast of Norfolk and Sussex in parties of thirty or more, and it has been remarked that the hunting grounds of the two species are defined by singularly precise limits, the neighbourhood of Chichester being frequented by the Carrion Crow, that of Brighton by its congener. It is abundant on the sea-coast of Norfolk in the winter, where I have seen it feeding with Gulls, Plovers, etc. In musical capabilities it is inferior even to its relative, its solitary croak being neither so loud nor so clear. The nest of the Hooded Crow is large, composed of twigs, sea-weeds, heath, feathers, and straws, and is placed on rocks, tall trees, low bushes, and elsewhere, according to circumstances.Plate_15Plate_16THE ROOKCORVUS FRÚGILEGUSPlumage black, with purple and violet reflections; base of the beak, nostrils; and region round the beak bare of feathers and covered with a white scurf, iris greyish white; beak and feet black. Length eighteen inches; breadth three feet. Eggs pale green, thickly blotched with olive and dark-brown.As the Hooded Crow is essentially the type of the Corvidæ in Scandinavia and the Isles of Scotland, where the Carrion Crow and Rook are all but unknown, so in England the representative of the tribe is the Rook, a bird so like the Crow that it is called by its name almost as frequently as by its own, yet so different in habits that, instead of being under a perpetual and universal ban, it is everywhere encouraged and indeed all but domesticated. There are few English parks that do not boast of their rookery, and few proprietors of modern demesnes pretending to be parks, who would not purchase at a high price the air of antiquity and respectability connected with an established colony of these birds. Owing to their large size and the familiarity with which they approach the haunts of men, they afford a facility in observing their habits which belongs to no other birds; hence all treatises on Natural History, and other publications which enter into the details of country life in England, abound in anecdotes of the Rook. Its intelligence, instinctive appreciation of danger, voracity, its utility or the reverse, its nesting, its morning repasts and its evening flights, have all been observed and more or less faithfully recorded again and again; so that its biography is better known than that of any other British bird. It would be no difficult task to compile from these materials a good-sized volume, yet I doubt not that enough remains untold, or at least not sufficiently authenticated, to furnish a fair field of inquiry to any competent person who would undertake to devote his whole attention to this one bird for a considerable period of time. Such a biographer should make himself master of all that has been recorded by various authorities, and should then visit a large number of rookeries in all parts of the kingdom, collecting and sifting evidence, making a series of personal observations, and spreading his researches over all seasons of the year. Such an inquiry, trivial though it may seem, would be most useful, for the Rook, though it has many friends, has also many enemies, and, being everywhere abundant, its agency for good or evil must have serious results. The following account being imperfect from want of space, the reader who wishes to know more about this interesting bird must refer to our standard works on Ornithology, and, above all, record and compare his own personal observations.In the early spring months Rooks subsist principally on the larvæ and worms turned up by the plough, and without gainsay, they are then exceedingly serviceable to the agriculturist, by destroying a vast quantity of noxious insects which, at this period of their growth, feed on the leaves or roots of cultivated vegetables. Experience has taught them that the ploughman either has not the power or the desire to molest them; they therefore approach the plough with perfect fearlessness, and show much rivalry in their efforts to be first to secure the treasures just turned up. During the various processes to which the ground is subjected in preparationfor the crop, they repeat their visits, spreading more widely over the field, and not only pick up the grubs which lie on the surface, but bore for such as, by certain signs best known to themselves, lie concealed. I need not say that in all these stages the wisdom of the farmer is to offer them every inducement to remain; all that they ask is to be let alone. Not so, however, when the seed-crop is sown. Grain, pulse, and potatoes are favourite articles of diet with them, and they will not fail to attack these as vigorously as they did the grubs a few days before. They are therefore undeniably destructive at this season, and all available means should be adopted to deter them from alighting on cultivated ground. About the second week in March they desert the winter roosting places, to which they had nightly congregated in enormous flocks, leave off their wandering habits, and repair as if by common consent to their old breeding places. Here, with much cawing and bustling, they survey the ruins of their old nests, or select sites for new ones, being guided by their instinct to avoid all those trees the upper branches of which are too brittle for their purpose either because the trees are sickly or in an incipient state of decay. Hence, when it has occasionally happened that a nestless tree in a rookery has been blown down, the birds have been saluted as prophets, while in reality the tree yielded to the blast before its fellows because it was unsound, the Rooks knowing nothing about the matter except that signs of decay had set in among the upper twigs while as yet all seemed solid beneath. How the birds squabble about their nests, how they punish those thievishly disposed, how they drive away intruders from strange rookeries, how scrupulously they avoid, during building, to pick up a stick that has chanced to drop, how the male bird during incubation feeds his mate with the most luscious grubs brought home in the baggy pouch at the base of his bill, how every time that a bird caws while perched he strains his whole body forward and expands his wings with the effort, all these things, and many more, I must pass over without further notice, leaving them to be verified by the reader with the help of a good field-glass. I must, however, mention, in passing, the custom so generally adopted by sportsmen, of shooting the young birds as soon as they are sufficiently fledged to climb from their nests to the adjoining twigs, or to perform their first tentative flight over the summits of the trees. It is supposed to be necessary to keep down their numbers, but this is a disputed point. I have, however, little doubt that Rooks during the whole of their lives associate the memory of thesebattueswith the appearance of a man armed with a gun. Many people believe that Rooks know the smell of powder: they have good reason to know it; but that they are as much alarmed at the sight of a stick as a gun in the hand of a man, may be proved by any one who, chancing to pass near a flock feeding on theground, suddenly raises a stick. They will instantly fly off, evidently in great alarm.While the young are being reared, the parent birds frequent corn-fields and meadows, where they search about for those plants which indicate the presence of a grub at the root. Such they unscrupulously uproot, and make a prize of the destroyer concealed beneath. They are much maligned for this practise, but without reason; for, admitting that they kill the plant as well as the grub, it must be borne in mind that several of the grubs on which they feed (cockchafer and daddy-longlegs) live for several years underground, and that, during that period, they would if left undisturbed, have committed great ravages. I have known a large portion of a bed of lettuces destroyed by a single grub ofMelolontha, having actually traced its passage underground from root to root, and found it devouring the roots of one which appeared as yet unhurt. Clearly, a Rook would have done me a service by uprooting the first lettuce, and capturing its destroyer.I must here advert to a peculiar characteristic of the Rook which distinguishes it specifically from the Crow. The skin surrounding the base of the bill, and covering the upper part of the throat, is, in the adult birds, denuded of feathers. Connected with this subject many lengthy arguments have been proposed in support of two distinct opinions: one, that the bareness above mentioned is occasioned by the repeated borings of the bird for its food; the other, that the feathers fall off naturally at the first moult, and are never replaced. I am inclined to the latter view, and that for two reasons: first, if it be necessary (and that is not at all clear) that the Rook, in order to supply itself with food, should have no feathers at the base of its bill, I believe that nature would not have resorted to so clumsy a contrivance, and one so annoying to the bird, as that of wearing them away bit by bit: and, secondly, the bare spot is, as far as I have observed, of the same size and shape in all birds, and at all periods of the year, a uniformity which can scarcely be the result of digging in soils of various kinds, and at all seasons. I cannot, therefore, but think that the appearance in question is the result of a law in the natural economy of the bird, that the feathers are notrubbedoff, butfalloff, and that they are not renewed, because nature never intended that they should grow there permanently; if not, why is there no similar abrasion in the Crow? The number of lambs eaten by Crows is very small after all, and birds' eggs are not always in season, nor is carrion so very abundant; so that, during a great portion of the year, even Crows must dig for their livelihood, and the great distinction between a Crow and a Rook is, that the former has actually no bare space at the base of his bill. But the question is still open, and the reader may make his own observations, which in Natural History, as well as in many other things, are far better than other people's theories.In very dry summer weather, Rooks are put to great shifts in obtaining food. Grubs and worms descend to a great depth to get beyond the influence of the drought, and the soil is too parched and hard for digging; they then retire to the sea-shore, to marshes, fresh-water and salt, to cabbage and potato gardens, and in the last-named localities they are again disposed to become marauders. To fruit gardens they are rarely permitted to resort, or they would commit great ravages. As the season advances, ripe walnuts are a very powerful attraction, and when they have discovered a tree well supplied with fruit, a race ensues between them and the proprietor as to which shall appropriate the greater share, so slyly do they watch for opportunities, and so quick are they in gathering them and carrying them off in their beaks. In long winter frosts, or when the ground is covered with snow, they are again reduced to straits. Some resort to the sea-shore and feed on garbage of all kinds, some to turnip-fields where they dig holes in the bulbs. They have also been observed to chase and kill small birds, which, as near starvation as themselves, have been unable to fly beyond their reach, and I have even seen a Rook catch a small fish.I must not conclude this imperfect sketch without noticing a peculiar habit of Rooks, which is said to portend rain. A flock will suddenly rise into the air almost perpendicularly, with great cawing and curious antics, until they have reached a great elevation, and then, having attained their object, whatever that may be, drop with their wings almost folded till within a short distance of the ground, when they recover their propriety, and alight either on trees or on the ground with their customary grave demeanour. Occasionally in autumn, as White of Selborne remarks,Sooth'd by the genial warmth, the cawing RookAnticipates the spring, selects her mate,Haunts her tall nests, and with sedulous careRepairs her wicker eyrie, tempest torn.Similar instances of this unseasonable pairing are recorded by modern ornithologists.Efforts are sometimes made, and not always unsuccessfully, to induce Rooks to establish a colony in a new locality. One plan is to place some eggs taken from a Rook's nest in that of some large bird which has happened to build in the desired spot, that of a Crow for instance, a Magpie, Jackdaw, Jay, or perhaps a Mistle Thrush. If the young are reared, it is probable that they will return to breed in the same place in the following year. Another plan which has been tried with success is to place several bundles of sticks, arranged in the form of nests, among the highest branches of the trees which it is desired to colonize. Stray Rooks in quest of a settlement, mistaking these for ruins of old nests, accept the invitation and establish themselves if the locality suits them in other respects.During 1907-1908 the economic rôle played by the Rook has been thoroughly investigated by ornithologists and farmers all over Hungary, with the results that this bird stands as a friend rather than a foe to agriculture.
THE NUTCRACKERNUCÍFRAGA CARYOCATACTES
Plumage sooty brown, spotted on the back and under parts with white; tail black, barred with white at the extremity; beak and feet horn-colour; iris brown. Length thirteen inches. Eggs light buff, with a few greyish brown spots.
The Nutcracker Crow, a rare straggler, must not be confounded with the Nuthatch, which we have already described; the formeris a large bird, as big as a Jay, and is only an occasional visitor in this country, and whose habits partake of those of the Crows and Woodpeckers. The propriety of its name is questionable, according to Yarrell, who says that 'it cannot crack nuts'. Here perhaps there may be some little mistake. Its name is evidently a translation of the FrenchCassenoix. In England we mean by 'nuts' filberts or hazel-nuts; but the French wordnoixis applied exclusively to walnuts, our nuts beingnoisettes, or 'little nuts'; and French authors are agreed that its food consists of insects, fruits, and walnuts; that is, the ordinary diet of its relative, the Rook, whose fondness for walnuts is notorious. It lays its eggs in the holes of trees, and, except in the breeding season, is more or less gregarious in its habits.
THE JAYGÁRRULUS GLANDÁRIUS
Feathers of the crest greyish white, streaked with black; a black moustache from the corners of the beak; general plumage reddish grey, darker above; primaries dingy black; secondaries velvet-black and pure white; inner tertials rich chestnut; winglet and greater coverts barred with black, white, and bright blue; upper and under tail-coverts pure white; iris bright blue; beak black; feet livid brown. Length thirteen and a half inches; breadth twenty-two inches. Eggs dull green, minutely and thickly-speckled with olive-brown.
There exists among gamekeepers a custom of selecting a certain spot in preserved woods, and there suspending, as trophies of their skill and watchfulness, the bodies of such destructive animals as they have killed in the pursuit of their calling. They are generally those of a few stoats or weasels, a Hawk, a Magpie, an owl, and two or three Jays. All these animals are judged to be destructive to game, and are accordingly hunted to the death, the Jay, perhaps, with less reason than the rest, for though it can hardly resist the temptation of plundering, either of eggs or young, any nest, whether of Partridge or Pheasant, that falls in its way, yet it does not subsist entirely upon animal food, but also upon acorns and various other wild fruits. Its blue feathers are much used in the manufacture of artificial flies. Nevertheless, owing to their cautious and wary habits, there are few wooded districts in which they are not more or less numerous. Their jarring unconnected note, which characterizes them at all seasons, is in spring and summer varied by their song proper, in which I have never been able to detect anything more melodious than an accurate imitation of the noise made by sawyers at work, though Montagu states that 'it will, sometimes, in the spring utter a sort of song in a soft and pleasing manner, but so low as not to be heard at any distance; and at intervals introduces the bleating of a lamb, mewing of a cat, the note of a Kite or Buzzard, hooting of an Owl, or even neighing of a horse. These imitations are so exact, even in a natural wild state, that we have frequently been deceived.' The Jay generally builds its nest in a wood, either in the top of a low tree, or against the trunk of a lofty one, employing as material small sticks, roots, and dry grass, and lays five eggs. There seems to be a difference of opinion as to the sociability of the family party after the young are fledged, some writers stating that they separate by mutual consent, and that each shifts for itself; others, that the young brood remains with the old birds all the winter. For my own part, I scarcely recollect ever having seen a solitary Jay, or to have heard a note which was not immediately responded to by another bird of the same species, the inference from which is that, though not gregarious, they are at least social.
When domesticated, the Jay displays considerable intelligence; it is capable of attachment, and learns to distinguish the hand and voice of its benefactor.
Plate_13
Plate_14
THE MAGPIEPICA RÚSTICA
Head, throat, neck, and back velvet-black; scapulars and under plumage white; tail much graduated and, as well as the wings, black, with lustrous blue and bronze reflections; beak, iris, and feet black. Length eighteen inches; breadth twenty-three inches. Eggs pale dirty green, spotted all over with ash-grey and olive-brown.
The Magpie, like the Crow, labours under the disadvantage of an ill name, and in consequence incurs no small amount of persecution. Owing to the disproportionate length of its tail and shortness of its wings its flight is somewhat heavy, so that if it were not cunning and wary to a remarkable degree, it would probably well-nigh disappear from the catalogue of British Birds. Yet though it is spared by none except avowed preservers of all birds (like Waterton, who protects it 'on account of its having nobody to stand up for it'), it continues to be a bird of general occurrence, and there seems indeed to be but little diminution of its numbers. Its nest is usually constructed among the upper branches of a lofty tree, either in a hedge-row or deep in a wood; or if it has fixed its abode in an unwooded district, it selects the thickest thorn-bush in the neighbourhood and there erects its castle. This is composed of an outwork of thorns and briers supporting a mass of twigs and mud, which is succeeded by a layer of fibrous roots. The whole is not only fenced round but arched over with thorny sticks, an aperture being left, on one side only, large enough to admit the bird. In this stronghold are deposited generally sixeggs, which in due time are succeeded by as many young ogres, who are to be reared to birds by an unstinted supply of the most generous diet. Even before their appearance the old birds have committed no small havoc in the neighbourhood; now, however, that four times as many mouths have to be filled, the hunting ground must either be more closely searched or greatly extended. Any one who has had an opportunity of watching the habits of a tame Magpie, must have observed its extreme inquisitiveness and skill in discovering what was intended to be concealed, joined, moreover, to an unscrupulous habit of purloining everything that takes its roving fancy. Even when surrounded by plenty and pampered with delicacies it prefers a stolen morsel to what is legally its own. Little wonder then that when it has to hunt on its own account for the necessaries of life, and is stimulated besides by the cravings of its hungry brood, it has gained an unenviable notoriety as a prowling bandit. In the harrying of birds' nests no schoolboy can compete with it; Partridges and Pheasants are watched to their retreat and plundered mercilessly of their eggs and young; the smaller birds are treated in like manner: hares and rabbits, if they suffer themselves to be surprised, have their eyes picked out and are torn to pieces; rats, mice, and frogs are a lawful prey; carrion, offal of all kinds, snails, worms, grubs, and caterpillars, each in turn pleasantly vary the diet; and, when in season, grain and fruit are attacked with as much audacity as is consistent with safety; and might, whenever available, give a right to stray chickens and ducklings. The young birds, nurtured in an impregnable stronghold, and familiarized from their earliest days with plunder, having no song to learn save the note of caution and alarm when danger is near, soon become adepts in the arts of their parents, and, before their first moult, are a set of inquisitive, chattering marauders, wise enough to keep near the haunts of men because food is there most abundant, cautious never to come within reach of the fowling-piece, and cunning enough to carry off the call-bird from the net without falling themselves into the snare. Even in captivity, with all their drollery, they are unamiable.
Magpies, though generally distributed, are far more numerous in some districts than others. In Cornwall they are very abundant; hence I have heard them called Cornish Pheasants. In Ireland they are now very common. It is stated that they are in France more abundant than in any other country of Europe, where they principally build their nests in poplar-trees, having discovered, it is said, 'that the brittle nature of the boughs of this tree is an additional protection against climbers!' 'In Norway', says a writer in theZoologist,[10]'this bird, usually so shy in this country, and so difficult to approach within gunshot, seems to have entirely changed its nature: it is there the most domestic andfearless bird; its nest is invariably placed in a small tree or bush adjoining some farm or cottage, and not unfrequently in the very midst of some straggling village. If there happens to be a suitable tree by the roadside and near a house, it is a very favourable locality for a Norwegian Magpie's nest. I have often wondered to see the confidence and fearlessness displayed by this bird in Norway; he will only just move out of your horse's way as you drive by him on the road, and should he be perched on a rail by the roadside he will only stare at you as you rattle by, but never think of moving off. It is very pleasant to see this absence of fear of man in Norwegian birds; a Norwegian would never think of terrifying a bird for the sake of sport; whilst, I fear, to see such a bird as the Magpie sitting quietly on a rail within a few feet, would be to an English boy a temptation for assault which he could not resist. I must add, however, with regard to Magpies, that there is a superstitious prejudice for them current throughout Norway; they are considered harbingers of good luck, and are consequently always invited to preside over the house; and, when they have taken up their abode in the nearest tree, are defended from all ill; and he who should maltreat the Magpie has perhaps driven off thegenius loci, and so may expect the most furious anger of the neighbouring dwelling, whose good fortune he has thus violently dispersed.' Faith in the prophetic powers of the Magpie even yet lingers in many of the rural districts of England also.
[10]Vol. viii. p. 3085.
THE JACKDAWCORVUS MONÉDULA
Crown of the head and upper parts black, with violet reflections; back of the head and nape grey; lower parts duller black; iris white; beak and feet black. Length thirteen inches; breadth twenty-seven inches. Eggs very light blue, with scattered spots of ash-colour and dark brown.
This lively and active bird, inferior in size as well as dignity to the Rook, yet in many respects resembles it so closely that it might be fabled to have made the Rook its model, and to have exercised its imitative powers in the effort to become the object of its admiration. A vain effort, however; for nature has given to it a slender form, a shriller voice, a partially grey mantle, and an instinct which compels it to be secretive even in the placing of its nest. Its note, which may be represented either by the syllable 'jack' or 'daw', according to the fancy of the human imitator, sounds like an impertinent attempt to burlesque the full 'caw' of the Rook; it affects to be admitted into the society of that bird on equal terms; but whether encouraged as a friend, or tolerated as a parasite whom it is less troublesome to treat with indifference than to chase away, is difficult to decide. Most probably the latter;for although It is common enough to see a party of Jackdaws dancing attendance on a flock of Rooks, accompanying them to their feeding-grounds, and nestling in hollow trunks of trees in close proximity to rookeries, they are neither courted nor persecuted; they come when they like and go away when they please. On the other hand, no one, I believe, ever saw a flock of Rooks making the first advances towards an intimacy with a flock of Jackdaws, or heard of their condescending to colonize a grove, because their grey-headed relatives were located in the neighbourhood. On the sea-coast, where Rooks are only casual visitors, the Jackdaw has no opportunity of hanging himself on as an appendage to a rookery, but even here he must be a client. With the choice of a long range of cliff before him, he avoids that which he might have all to himself, and selects a portion which, either because it is sheltered from storms, or inaccessible by climbers, has been already appropriated by Sea-mews.
The object of the Jackdaw in making church-towers its resort is pretty evident. Where there is a church there is at least also a village, and where men and domestic animals congregate, there the Jackdaw fails not to find food; grubs in the fields, fruit in the orchards, and garbage of all kinds in the waste ground. Here, too, it has a field for exercising its singular acquisitiveness. Wonderful is the variety of objects which it accumulates in its museum of a nest, which, professedly a complication of sticks, may comprise also a few dozen labels stolen from a Botanic Garden, an old tooth-brush, a child's cap, part of a worsted stocking, a frill, etc. Waterton,[11]who strongly defends it from the charge of molesting either the eggs or young of pigeons, professes himself unable to account for its pertinacious habit of collecting sticks for a nest placed where no such support is seemingly necessary, and, cunning though it is, comments on its want of adroitness in introducing sticks into its hole: 'You may see the Jackdaw', he says, 'trying for a quarter of an hour to get a stick into the hole, while every attempt will be futile, because, the bird having laid hold of it by the middle, it is necessarily thrown at right angles with the body, and the Daw cannot perceive that the stick ought to be nearly parallel with its body before it can be conveyed into the hole. Fatigued at length with repeated efforts, and completely foiled in its numberless attempts to introduce the stick, it lets it fall to the ground, and immediately goes in quest of another, probably to experience another disappointment on its return. When time and chance have enabled it to place a quantity of sticks at the bottom of the hole, it then goes to seek for materials of a more pliant and a softer nature.' These are usually straw, wool, and feathers; but, as we have seen, nothing comes amiss that catches its fancy. In additionto rocks, towers, and hollow trees, it sometimes places its nest in chimneys or in rabbit-burrows, but never, or in the rarest instances, among the open boughs of a tree. It lays from four to six eggs, and feeds its young on worms and insects, which it brings home in the pouch formed by the loose skin at the base of its beak. When domesticated, its droll trickeries and capability of imitating the human voice and other sounds are well known. By turns affectionate, quarrelsome, impudent, confiding, it is always inquisitive, destructive, and given to purloining; so that however popular at first as a pet, it usually terminates its career by some unregretted accident, or is consigned to captivity in a wicker cage.
[11]Essays on Natural History.First Series, p. 109.
THE RAVENCORVUS CÓRAX
Plumage black with purple reflections; tail rounded, black, extending two inches beyond the closed wings; beak strong, black as well as the feet; iris with two circles, the inner grey, the outer ash-brown. Length twenty-five inches; width four feet. Eggs dirty green, spotted and speckled with brown.
The Raven, the largest of the Corvidæ, and possessing in an eminent degree all the characteristics of its tribe except sociability, is the bird which beyond all others has been regarded with feelings of awe by the superstitious in all ages. In both instances in which specific mention of it occurs in Holy Writ, it is singled out from among other birds as gifted with a mysterious intelligence. Sent forth by Noah when the ark rested on the mountains of Ararat, it perhaps found a congenial home among the lonely crags strewed with the carcases of drowned animals, and by failing to return, announced to the patriarch that a portion of the earth, though not one fit for his immediate habitation, was uncovered by the waters. At a subsequent period, honoured with the mission of supplying the persecuted prophet with food, it was taught to suppress its voracious instinct by the God who gave it. The Raven figures prominently in most heathen mythologies, and is almost everywhere regarded with awe by the ignorant even at the present time. In Scandinavian mythology it was an important actor; and all readers of Shakespeare must be familiar with passages which prove it to have been regarded as a bird of dire omen.
The sad presaging Raven tolls
The sick man's passport in her hollow beak.
And in the shadow of the silent night
Doth shake contagion from her sable wing.
Marlowe.
In the Judgment of others, its friendly mission to the Tishbite invested it with a sanctity which preserved it from molestation.
Apart from all traditional belief, the Raven derives its ill-omened character as a herald of death from the rapidity with which it discerns, in the vicinity of its haunts, the carcase of any dead animal. In the coldest winter days, at Hudson's Bay, when every kind of effluvium is greatly checked if not arrested by frost, buffaloes and other beasts have been killed when not one of these birds was to be seen; but in a few hours scores of them have been found collected about the spot to pick up the blood and offal. 'In Ravens', says a writer in theZoologist,'the senses of smell and sight are remarkably acute and powerful. Perched usually on some tall cliff that commands a wide survey, these faculties are in constant and rapid exercises, and all the movements of the bird are regulated in accordance with the information thus procured. The smell of death is so grateful to them that they utter a loud croak of satisfaction instantly on perceiving it. In passing any sheep, if a tainted smell is perceptible, they cry vehemently. From this propensity in the Raven to announce his satisfaction in the smell of death has probably arisen the common notion that he is aware of its approach among the human race, and foretells it by his croakings.' The same observant author, as quoted by Macgillivray, says again: 'Their sight and smell are very acute, for when they are searching the wastes for provision, they hover over them at a great height; and yet a sheep will not be dead many minutes before they will find it. Nay, if a morbid smell transpire from any in the flock, they will watch it for days till it die.'
To such repasts they are guided more by scent than by sight, for though they not unfrequently ascend to a great height in the air, they do not then appear to be on the look-out for food. This duty is performed more conveniently and with greater success by beating over the ground at a low elevation. In these expeditions they do not confine themselves to carrion, but prey indiscriminately on all animals which they are quick enough to capture and strong enough to master. Hares, rabbits, rats, mice, lizards, game of various kinds, eggs, and the larger insects, all of these enter into their diet, and, wanting these, they resort to the sea-shore for refuse fish, or ransack dunghills in villages, before the inhabitants are astir, for garbage of all sorts. Pliny even relates that in a certain district of Asia Minor they were trained to hawk for game like the noble Falcons. Few of these qualifications tend to endear them to mankind; and as they are dreaded by shepherds on account of their being perhaps more than suspected of making away with sickly lambs when occasion offers, and of plundering poultry yards, Ravens are become, in populous districts, almost unknown birds. I have only seen them myself on the rocky sea-shore of Devon and Cornwall, in the wilds of Dartmoor, and the Highlands of Scotland. There was for many successive years a nest built on a ledge of granite near the Bishop Rock, in Cornwall, a huge mass of sticks, andwhat appeared to be grass, inaccessible from below, but commanded by a venturous climber from above. Where it still continues to breed inland, it places its nest, constructed of sticks and lined with the wool and fur of its victims, either on an inaccessible rock, or near the summit of a lofty tree, the ill-omened 'Raven-tree' of romances. In the north of Scotland, in the Orkneys and Hebrides, where it is still abundant, it builds its nest in cliffs which it judges to be inaccessible, both inland and on the sea-shore, showing no marked preference for either. Two pairs never frequent the same locality, nor is any other bird of prey permitted to establish itself in their vicinity. Even the Eagle treats the Raven with respect, and leaves it to its solitude, not so much from fear of its prowess, as worn out by its pertinacious resistance of all dangerous intruders. Hence, in some districts, shepherds encourage Ravens, because they serve as a repellent to Eagles; while in others, where Eagles are of unusual occurrence, they allow them to build their nests undisturbed, but when the young are almost fledged, destroy them by throwing stones at them from above. Nevertheless the original pair continues to haunt the same locality for an indefinite term of years, and it is not a little singular that if one of them be killed, the survivor will find a mate in an incredibly short space of time.
The geographical range of the Raven is very extensive. Throughout all the zones of the Northern Hemisphere it is to be found; and having this wide range, its physical constitution is strong, and it lives to a great age, amounting, so the ancients tell us, to twenty-seven times the period of a man's life. The note of the Raven is well described by the word 'croak', but it is said by those who have had the opportunity of observing it under various circumstances, to utter another sound, resembling the word 'whii-ur'. With this cry it very commonly intermixes another, sounding like 'clung', uttered very much as by a human voice, only a little wilder in the sound. From the crycroakthe Raven no doubt derives its Latin nameCorvusthe FrenchCorbeau, and its common Scotch appellationCorbie.
THE CARRION CROWCORVUS CORÓNE
Black, with green and violet reflections; tail slightly rounded, extending an inch and a quarter beyond the closed wings; iris dark hazel; lower part of the beak covered with bristly feathers; beak and feet black. Length nineteen inches; breadth three feet. Eggs bluish green, spotted and speckled with ash-grey and olive.
Breeding early in the year, like the Raven, the Carrion Crow builds its nest in some tree which, from its loftiness or other reason, is difficult of ascent, where its young ones are hatched about thetime that most other birds are laying their eggs, and when the lambing season is at its height. Then, too, its habits are most fully developed. Its young are clamorous for food, and will not be satisfied with a little. So the old bird sallies forth to scour the districts least frequented by man, and makes every living thing its prey, provided that by force or cunning it can overpower it. If Grouse are plentiful, it is said that one pair, what with stealing the eggs and carrying off the young, will in a season destroy more of them than the keenest sportsman. It will pounce on the leveret and bear it screaming from the side of its mother. It watches sheep which have strayed from the fold, and mangles the newly-born or weakly lambs, carrying them piece-meal to the young ones at home. If mowers are at work, the wary birds alight on some lofty tree, taking care to keep at a safe distance, and when a nest has been laid bare by the scythe, their incredibly sharp eye discerns the prize which, whether it consist of eggs or callow young, is borne off in triumph. Lest their depredations should be discovered by the accumulation of egg-shells, feathers and bones, which are the natural consequence of these raids, they carefully carry to some distance everything that would tend to betray them, so that one might pass directly beneath the scene of these enormities unsuspicious of the evil existing overhead. Keen as this bird is in pursuit of such delicate fare, he can be, when occasion serves, as unclean a feeder as the Vulture, and he can, on the other hand, make a meal off corn. Mr. Knox states that in the Weald of Sussex, where the Raven is common, it resorts to the brooks and ponds, which abound in fresh-water mussels (Anodon), and feeds on them most voraciously, especially after floods, when they lie scattered on the mud. The same author states that in winter it resorts to the sea-shore, and feeds on the oysters, mussels, small crabs, marine insects, worms, and dead fish which are cast up by the waves during the prevalent south-westerly storms. It has been frequently observed, he adds, to ascend to a great height in the air with an oyster in its claws, and after letting it fall on the beach, to descend rapidly with closed pinions and devour the contents. A similar instance of apparent reasoning is recorded of the same bird by Pliny, but with the substitution of walnuts for oysters.
With such wandering habits, it seems at first sight strange that the phrase 'as the Crow flies' should be adopted to mark distances in a straight line across the open country; yet when it is borne in mind how many persons confound the Crow with the Rook, and even talk of the 'Crows in a rookery', the suggestion will at once occur to the mind that the term owed its origin to its far gentler and more respectable relation, the Rook, whose evening flights from the feeding-ground are among the most familiar sights of the country, and are invariably performed in a line so straight, that if a whole flock could be tracked through the air on any one eveningit would be found scarcely to deviate from that of the preceding or the following. It is to be feared that this inaccurate application of names has done the Rook ill service; yet the two birds are totally distinct; Crows are solitary birds, rarely being seen in more than pairs together; Rooks are eminently sociable. Crows shun the haunts of men; Rooks court the vicinity of his dwellings. Crows are carnivorous; Rooks feed principally on the grubs of beetles, worms, and noxious insects, rewarding themselves occasionally for their services by regaling on corn and fruits, but rarely touching carrion or molesting living animals. In appearance the two birds are much alike; the Crow, however, is somewhat smaller, the beak is stouter at the point and encircled at the base with numerous short feathers, while the bill of the Rook is encroached on by a white membrane which is almost bare of feathers. Both are noted for their intelligence; the Crow has been known to remove its eggs from its nest when apprehensive of danger; it was held in high consideration in the days of augury, and certain of its movements were considered to be indicative of changes in the weather. It builds its nest of sticks, and lines it with moss, straw, hair, and wool, and lays from four to six eggs. Like the Raven, it is a widely-diffused bird, and attains a great age, outliving (the ancients said) nine generations of men, showing great attachment to any spot in which it has once fixed its home, and suffering neither its own progeny nor any other large birds to nestle in its vicinity.
This Crow is becoming more numerous of late in the close vicinity of London. It comes constantly to some of our suburban gardens.
THE HOODED CROW, GREY OR ROYSTON CROWCORVUS CORNIX
Head, throat, wings and tail black, the rest of the plumage ash-grey; tail rounded; beak and feet black; iris brown. Length nineteen and a half inches; breadth three feet two inches. Eggs bluish green, mottled with ash-grey and olive.
The Hooded Crow closely resembles the Carrion Crow, scarcely differing from it in fact except in colour. They are, however, perfectly distinct species, and for the most part exercise their calling in separate haunts. In Norway Hooded Crows are very abundant, to the almost total exclusion of the Carrion Crow and Rook, and, though not congregating so as to form a society like the last-named bird, they may be seen simultaneously employed in searching for food in groups which collectively amount to a hundred or more. Though numerous in the winter at Newmarket Heath and Royston (where they are sometimes called Royston Crows), and annually resorting to many parts of the sea-coast, they rarely breed so far south. In the Isle of Man, the Orkneys, Hebrides,and in all but the south of Scotland they are of more frequent occurrence than any other of the tribe, essentially belonging to the 'Land of the mountain and the flood'. It is on the increase in Ireland and very unwelcome there. One can scarcely traverse the shores of the salt-water lochs of Scotland without seeing a pair, or, in the latter part of the year, a small party of four or five of these birds, gravely pacing the shingle and sand in quest of food. As far as my own experience goes, I should consider the Hooded Crow as 'half sea-bird', but it is said to be met with, in summer, in the very centre of the Grampians and other inland districts. Its proper diet consists of the smaller marine animals, such as crabs, echini, and molluscs, alive or dead, fish and carrion. At high-water it retires inland, and skulks about the low grounds in quest of the eggs and young of Moor-fowl, thereby gaining the execrations of gamekeepers; takes a survey of any adjacent sheep-walks, on the chance of falling in with a new-born lamb, or sickly ewe, whence it has but an ill name among shepherds; and returns when the tide has well ebbed, to finish the day's repast on food of a nature light and easy of digestion. It is less wary of man than the Carrion Crow, and often comes within shot, but, being far too numerous to admit of being exterminated, is but little assailed. In the comparatively mild climate of the Scottish sea-coast, these birds find an abundant supply of food all the year round and as there is no sensible diminution of their numbers in winter, it is supposed that those which frequent the English coast from October to March have been driven southwards by the inclement winters of high latitudes. They are then frequently observed on the coast of Norfolk and Sussex in parties of thirty or more, and it has been remarked that the hunting grounds of the two species are defined by singularly precise limits, the neighbourhood of Chichester being frequented by the Carrion Crow, that of Brighton by its congener. It is abundant on the sea-coast of Norfolk in the winter, where I have seen it feeding with Gulls, Plovers, etc. In musical capabilities it is inferior even to its relative, its solitary croak being neither so loud nor so clear. The nest of the Hooded Crow is large, composed of twigs, sea-weeds, heath, feathers, and straws, and is placed on rocks, tall trees, low bushes, and elsewhere, according to circumstances.
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THE ROOKCORVUS FRÚGILEGUS
Plumage black, with purple and violet reflections; base of the beak, nostrils; and region round the beak bare of feathers and covered with a white scurf, iris greyish white; beak and feet black. Length eighteen inches; breadth three feet. Eggs pale green, thickly blotched with olive and dark-brown.
As the Hooded Crow is essentially the type of the Corvidæ in Scandinavia and the Isles of Scotland, where the Carrion Crow and Rook are all but unknown, so in England the representative of the tribe is the Rook, a bird so like the Crow that it is called by its name almost as frequently as by its own, yet so different in habits that, instead of being under a perpetual and universal ban, it is everywhere encouraged and indeed all but domesticated. There are few English parks that do not boast of their rookery, and few proprietors of modern demesnes pretending to be parks, who would not purchase at a high price the air of antiquity and respectability connected with an established colony of these birds. Owing to their large size and the familiarity with which they approach the haunts of men, they afford a facility in observing their habits which belongs to no other birds; hence all treatises on Natural History, and other publications which enter into the details of country life in England, abound in anecdotes of the Rook. Its intelligence, instinctive appreciation of danger, voracity, its utility or the reverse, its nesting, its morning repasts and its evening flights, have all been observed and more or less faithfully recorded again and again; so that its biography is better known than that of any other British bird. It would be no difficult task to compile from these materials a good-sized volume, yet I doubt not that enough remains untold, or at least not sufficiently authenticated, to furnish a fair field of inquiry to any competent person who would undertake to devote his whole attention to this one bird for a considerable period of time. Such a biographer should make himself master of all that has been recorded by various authorities, and should then visit a large number of rookeries in all parts of the kingdom, collecting and sifting evidence, making a series of personal observations, and spreading his researches over all seasons of the year. Such an inquiry, trivial though it may seem, would be most useful, for the Rook, though it has many friends, has also many enemies, and, being everywhere abundant, its agency for good or evil must have serious results. The following account being imperfect from want of space, the reader who wishes to know more about this interesting bird must refer to our standard works on Ornithology, and, above all, record and compare his own personal observations.
In the early spring months Rooks subsist principally on the larvæ and worms turned up by the plough, and without gainsay, they are then exceedingly serviceable to the agriculturist, by destroying a vast quantity of noxious insects which, at this period of their growth, feed on the leaves or roots of cultivated vegetables. Experience has taught them that the ploughman either has not the power or the desire to molest them; they therefore approach the plough with perfect fearlessness, and show much rivalry in their efforts to be first to secure the treasures just turned up. During the various processes to which the ground is subjected in preparationfor the crop, they repeat their visits, spreading more widely over the field, and not only pick up the grubs which lie on the surface, but bore for such as, by certain signs best known to themselves, lie concealed. I need not say that in all these stages the wisdom of the farmer is to offer them every inducement to remain; all that they ask is to be let alone. Not so, however, when the seed-crop is sown. Grain, pulse, and potatoes are favourite articles of diet with them, and they will not fail to attack these as vigorously as they did the grubs a few days before. They are therefore undeniably destructive at this season, and all available means should be adopted to deter them from alighting on cultivated ground. About the second week in March they desert the winter roosting places, to which they had nightly congregated in enormous flocks, leave off their wandering habits, and repair as if by common consent to their old breeding places. Here, with much cawing and bustling, they survey the ruins of their old nests, or select sites for new ones, being guided by their instinct to avoid all those trees the upper branches of which are too brittle for their purpose either because the trees are sickly or in an incipient state of decay. Hence, when it has occasionally happened that a nestless tree in a rookery has been blown down, the birds have been saluted as prophets, while in reality the tree yielded to the blast before its fellows because it was unsound, the Rooks knowing nothing about the matter except that signs of decay had set in among the upper twigs while as yet all seemed solid beneath. How the birds squabble about their nests, how they punish those thievishly disposed, how they drive away intruders from strange rookeries, how scrupulously they avoid, during building, to pick up a stick that has chanced to drop, how the male bird during incubation feeds his mate with the most luscious grubs brought home in the baggy pouch at the base of his bill, how every time that a bird caws while perched he strains his whole body forward and expands his wings with the effort, all these things, and many more, I must pass over without further notice, leaving them to be verified by the reader with the help of a good field-glass. I must, however, mention, in passing, the custom so generally adopted by sportsmen, of shooting the young birds as soon as they are sufficiently fledged to climb from their nests to the adjoining twigs, or to perform their first tentative flight over the summits of the trees. It is supposed to be necessary to keep down their numbers, but this is a disputed point. I have, however, little doubt that Rooks during the whole of their lives associate the memory of thesebattueswith the appearance of a man armed with a gun. Many people believe that Rooks know the smell of powder: they have good reason to know it; but that they are as much alarmed at the sight of a stick as a gun in the hand of a man, may be proved by any one who, chancing to pass near a flock feeding on theground, suddenly raises a stick. They will instantly fly off, evidently in great alarm.
While the young are being reared, the parent birds frequent corn-fields and meadows, where they search about for those plants which indicate the presence of a grub at the root. Such they unscrupulously uproot, and make a prize of the destroyer concealed beneath. They are much maligned for this practise, but without reason; for, admitting that they kill the plant as well as the grub, it must be borne in mind that several of the grubs on which they feed (cockchafer and daddy-longlegs) live for several years underground, and that, during that period, they would if left undisturbed, have committed great ravages. I have known a large portion of a bed of lettuces destroyed by a single grub ofMelolontha, having actually traced its passage underground from root to root, and found it devouring the roots of one which appeared as yet unhurt. Clearly, a Rook would have done me a service by uprooting the first lettuce, and capturing its destroyer.
I must here advert to a peculiar characteristic of the Rook which distinguishes it specifically from the Crow. The skin surrounding the base of the bill, and covering the upper part of the throat, is, in the adult birds, denuded of feathers. Connected with this subject many lengthy arguments have been proposed in support of two distinct opinions: one, that the bareness above mentioned is occasioned by the repeated borings of the bird for its food; the other, that the feathers fall off naturally at the first moult, and are never replaced. I am inclined to the latter view, and that for two reasons: first, if it be necessary (and that is not at all clear) that the Rook, in order to supply itself with food, should have no feathers at the base of its bill, I believe that nature would not have resorted to so clumsy a contrivance, and one so annoying to the bird, as that of wearing them away bit by bit: and, secondly, the bare spot is, as far as I have observed, of the same size and shape in all birds, and at all periods of the year, a uniformity which can scarcely be the result of digging in soils of various kinds, and at all seasons. I cannot, therefore, but think that the appearance in question is the result of a law in the natural economy of the bird, that the feathers are notrubbedoff, butfalloff, and that they are not renewed, because nature never intended that they should grow there permanently; if not, why is there no similar abrasion in the Crow? The number of lambs eaten by Crows is very small after all, and birds' eggs are not always in season, nor is carrion so very abundant; so that, during a great portion of the year, even Crows must dig for their livelihood, and the great distinction between a Crow and a Rook is, that the former has actually no bare space at the base of his bill. But the question is still open, and the reader may make his own observations, which in Natural History, as well as in many other things, are far better than other people's theories.
In very dry summer weather, Rooks are put to great shifts in obtaining food. Grubs and worms descend to a great depth to get beyond the influence of the drought, and the soil is too parched and hard for digging; they then retire to the sea-shore, to marshes, fresh-water and salt, to cabbage and potato gardens, and in the last-named localities they are again disposed to become marauders. To fruit gardens they are rarely permitted to resort, or they would commit great ravages. As the season advances, ripe walnuts are a very powerful attraction, and when they have discovered a tree well supplied with fruit, a race ensues between them and the proprietor as to which shall appropriate the greater share, so slyly do they watch for opportunities, and so quick are they in gathering them and carrying them off in their beaks. In long winter frosts, or when the ground is covered with snow, they are again reduced to straits. Some resort to the sea-shore and feed on garbage of all kinds, some to turnip-fields where they dig holes in the bulbs. They have also been observed to chase and kill small birds, which, as near starvation as themselves, have been unable to fly beyond their reach, and I have even seen a Rook catch a small fish.
I must not conclude this imperfect sketch without noticing a peculiar habit of Rooks, which is said to portend rain. A flock will suddenly rise into the air almost perpendicularly, with great cawing and curious antics, until they have reached a great elevation, and then, having attained their object, whatever that may be, drop with their wings almost folded till within a short distance of the ground, when they recover their propriety, and alight either on trees or on the ground with their customary grave demeanour. Occasionally in autumn, as White of Selborne remarks,
Sooth'd by the genial warmth, the cawing Rook
Anticipates the spring, selects her mate,
Haunts her tall nests, and with sedulous care
Repairs her wicker eyrie, tempest torn.
Similar instances of this unseasonable pairing are recorded by modern ornithologists.
Efforts are sometimes made, and not always unsuccessfully, to induce Rooks to establish a colony in a new locality. One plan is to place some eggs taken from a Rook's nest in that of some large bird which has happened to build in the desired spot, that of a Crow for instance, a Magpie, Jackdaw, Jay, or perhaps a Mistle Thrush. If the young are reared, it is probable that they will return to breed in the same place in the following year. Another plan which has been tried with success is to place several bundles of sticks, arranged in the form of nests, among the highest branches of the trees which it is desired to colonize. Stray Rooks in quest of a settlement, mistaking these for ruins of old nests, accept the invitation and establish themselves if the locality suits them in other respects.
During 1907-1908 the economic rôle played by the Rook has been thoroughly investigated by ornithologists and farmers all over Hungary, with the results that this bird stands as a friend rather than a foe to agriculture.