adage "every rock has its raven" indicates their favourite haunts. When a tree is once fixed on, it is rarely abandoned by the birds of their own accord; age after age passes on, but still it is “a

raven's tree."

The too near approach of man, or the woodman's axe, may cause the bird to abandon the home of its ancestors; and in this manner, indeed, many a raven tree has become tenantless; for the raven, being a hardy and enterprising bird, will not submit to inconveniences or insult in his ancient home, but hies him away to another district.

His geographical range is, indeed, most ample; and well does he bear the vicissitudes of climate, from the frosts of the Arctic circle to the glowing heats of the equator; no bird, indeed, except the snipe, inhabits so large a portion of the earth.

He

There can be no doubt that birds often differ much in quickness; but amongst the most clever we must place the raven. may be trained to a variety of purposes; to hawk after birds like the falcon, to speak like the parrot, and even to sing popular songs. When tamed he soon makes himself respected, and compels all rivals to avoid the unpleasant proximity of his beak. Then, for exquisite curiosity he is unequalled. No corner is left unexplored; not the highest room is safe from his visits; boxes are peeped into, drawers ransacked, and workbags emptied. The raven may be called a good-tempered bird, having much of comic feeling in his nature; he is nevertheless quick in resenting insult. A tame one had long been on familiar terms with some ducks in his owner's grounds; but one unlucky or restive duck offended the raven's dignity by seizing a coveted morsel of food, upon which he of the black coat, looking for a moment as if confounded by the unexpected insolence of the duck, darted upon the offender, and strangled him in a few minutes. The habits of the raven cannot be often observed in his wild state, as the bird is so rare in populous and cultivated districts. In the south of England it may be sometimes found, in the open and hilly parts, where it is, in fact, more numerous than the careless observer, or hasty traveller, would imagine.

We must remember that the raven does not thrust himself upon man's notice, rather, indeed, avoiding the observation of his persecutor; yet these birds are sometimes near us when we little suspect their presence. The traveller who is journeying across an open and thinly peopled district towards evening, sometimes comes all at once upon the bird, and frequently observes the raven following, and, as it were, dogging his steps. This often happens in the northern counties, especially in the wilder parts of Yorkshire; but in the south the bird is becoming more rare and wary every year. The tall cliffs along the coasts, and especially the rocky line of Flamborough Head, are favourite haunts of the raven. There the superstitious fisherman oft hears

the melancholy croak from some dark overhanging cliff, or listens timidly to the sound, as the dark bird flies over the boat. One cause of the decrease of the raven amongst us is the hostility of gamekeepers, who deem the slaughter of one a most meritorious act, entitling them to rise in the good graces of the squire. The keeper is always ready to ascribe a scarcity of game to any cause except his own ignorance or errors; and consequently the raven comes in for a due share of abuse. He destroys eggs, forsooth, as if he always knew the exact locality of every partridge's and pheasant's nest on the estate; he is also represented as a constant destroyer of young game, as if he were a hawk or an eagle. The raven may, at some periods, destroy a few birds, but he is not strictly a bird of prey, and has choice of many a good dinner from reptiles of various kinds, insects, seeds, fruits, and decaying animal matter. For the last he has a strong liking, and is therefore protected in Egypt like the vulture, in consideration of his services as a cleanser and purifier. The raven has, therefore, no such desperate liking for game as some ignorant keepers may suppose, whilst it is capable of destroying vermin which may do much mischief. They are determined foes to rats, which, indeed, some have been trained to hunt. It is recorded that the Bermudas became at one period miserably infested with rats, which were at length reduced without any apparent cause, except that a great number of ravens had appeared in the rat district, and soon after the pest ceased. The inference was, that the ravens had destroyed the rats. The reader will conclude from some of the previous remarks, that the raven is as courageous as powerful. He will offer battle to the fiercest bird in defence of his young, and his bravery is often shewn in desperate conflicts with rooks, between which birds and ravens endless war is waged. This arises from a liking manifested by the raven for the flesh of young rooks; a taste which the parent birds are not willing to see gratified. He will also attack the puffin, which so few birds assail, and sometimes succeeds in killing his foe; his prize consisting of the eggs or young. In these fights the great object of the raven is to seize upon the puffin's neck with his powerful bill, in which case he generally gains the battle. Ravens do not flock together, for, though not unsocial when tamed, they dislike much society in their natural state. Under certain circumstances, this habit is somewhat modified, as they have been seen in flocks near some of the great rivers; but this is a clear exception to their usual habits.

This bird is of course best studied in the neighbourhood of its nest, where its movements and habits can be constantly noted. Their attachment to their first nesting-place secures for the naturalist in its vicinity ample time for observation, as year after year he perceives the same pair busied in their various works. The raven is among the basket-making birds; that is, the nest

is formed something like a basket, being made from sticks fastened together; not, however, by interweaving, but by plastering with mud. The basket-maker may smile at the pretensions of the raven to rival him in his trade, and certainly the Corvidæ have not highly advanced the basket-maker's art. Nevertheless, the nest is comfortably lined with wool and dry vegetable matter. If we look into such a nest before hatching, we shall find, in all probability, four or five dark greenish eggs, covered with numerous dark irregularly shaped marks. The young of all this family are hatched blind, and present at first a most unattractive sight; when they leave their nests, they are not clothed in the glossy black which adorns the elder birds, a dull brown being then the colour of their coat.

The term raven is supposed to come from an old word, signifying to tear away or snatch, and is used to designate a voracious bird, or one addicted to steal and plunder. The peasants in some parts call it corby, a name not very remote from the Latin epithet corvus.

These birds are believed to live to a great age, but the usual period is not easily ascertained, as the age to which the tame bird arrives is no criterion by which to calculate the longevity of the raven in his natural freedom. It is, however, thought that many have reached the age of one hundred years, a range of life far beyond that of birds in general. We, in this country, are not accustomed to use the raven for domestic purposes; living, he is hated, and when dead, forgotten. But the Greenlanders make garments from the skin, form the wings into good brushes, and split the feathers into a material from which fishing-lines are manufactured.

In closing our account of the raven it may be necessary to state, that the term corax, which follows the generical name corvus, is derived from the Greek, in which language it signifies a raven. The appellation Corvus corax may therefore be translated by the words crow-raven.

THE CARRION-CROW (Corvus corone).

This bird might not improperly be called a smaller raven, as its resemblance to that bird is obvious in every particular except size. It is, however, a little larger than the rook, which it may be said to connect with the raven. This crow has not the fine. bluish-black of the raven, being wholly black, which sombre hue is relieved by some greenish colouring in the upper part of the body.

This bird shares with the raven the hatred of mankind, who either resent certain supposed injuries committed by the crow

or dislike the bird from his carrion-feeding habit,—a disposition which he has received from the Author of nature. This hatred has actually gone so far as to provoke the whole legislature of England to take the field against the carrion-crow. Such a solemn spectacle was exhibited in the twenty-fourth year of Henry VIII., when an act was passed to promote the destruction of the crow. How the unhappy bird managed to survive the storm is a mystery, but weather it he did, as there are now more crows in Britain than in any other European country: a singular triumph of the persecuted over the persecutor. Much of this hostility arises from the notion that the crow eats up the farmer's seed, and damages his grass lands. No doubt the crow has a judicious liking for a bit of choice grain when other food fails, but as to his injuring meadows, it is a mistake. What is sometimes seen in these said meadows? Great quantities of grass pulled up and scattered about. "Ah, those thievish, plundering crows!" cries the farmer, and away he posts for his best double-barrelled gun, looking daggers at the bold crows as they fly about with incessant Caw, caw, caw. Now the fact is, that the crows did pull up the grass-that must be admitted; but every such blade had been previously injured by a grub eating up the roots. The crow knows from experience the localities of these grubs, and detects their presence by pulling at those blades of grass which have a sickly colour; if these are loose, he knows there is a grub at the root, and down goes the beak in search; if the blades are firm, the bird does not pull up such, but proceeds to others. In all this there is positive good to the farmer: the blades which the crows pull up would have died from the operation of the grub — so far the crow does no harm; but that same grub would go on to destroy more grass,—this the crow prevents by destroying the lurking pest. For this service he is reviled and shot at! The gamekeeper has also his charge, and here the carrion-crow is, we fear, in a bad case. He certainly does linger about preserves with a most suspicious, poacher-like air, in search of young birds and eggs. The latter he carries off in so ingenious a manner, that it proves him an adept at the trade. Inserting the tip of his bill into the shell, away he goes, poising the egg as he flies, in a manner most satisfactory to himself and his young. He does also sometimes make sad havoc with unprotected poultry. Waterton resolved to test this propensity, and placed ten ducklings in a pond near to a carrion-crow's nest. One by one did the voracious bird swoop them off, till nine had been borne away, when the naturalist, thinking the experiment conclusive, interposed to save the last. No marvel, then, that the dames of the farmyard give this bird an ugly name. Sometimes quadrupeds are attacked, especially young rabbits. On one occasion, a person walking near a plantation heard a shrill cry, and on running to see whence it arose, discovered a crow fastening itself on a young rabbit,

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weighing nearly three-quarters of a pound, which was making great efforts to relieve itself, but in vain, for the crow succeeded in bearing it over two or three fields."

On the sea-shore the crow varies his diet by feeding on the fish cast upon the beach by the waves, and also upon muscles and crabs, which it is said he tries to break by dropping them from great heights. These birds are surprisingly fond of ripe cherries, on which they will feed most voraciously, risking all the dangers of the gun to secure such food. As for carrion, this is not often met with by the crow in these times, when the lambs are so carefully tended in the fold, and few parts of a dead animal are left to decay in the open fields. In ruder times, the bird was doubtless fitly named, and then fed much on carrion.

This bird is called a voracious feeder, which is true; but then he works hard for his daily fare, being the earliest of our birds on the wing in the morning, and the last at night, excepting the owl. The rook is not a bad riser, but the crow is at work before him. Often is his hollow croak heard when the first faint dawn is on the east, and that sound reaches the cotter when all besides is hushed in the quiet hour of eve. The following lines from a recent publication allude to these late evening journeyings of the

crow:

"Say, weary bird, whose level flight,
Thus, at the dusky hour of night,
Sends through the midway air,
Why yet beyond the verge of day
Is lengthen'd out thy dark delay,

Adding another to the hours of care?
Haste, bird, and nurse thy callow brood,
They call on Heaven and thee for food,
Bleak,-on some cliff's neglected tree;
Haste, weary bird, thy lagging flight,
It is the chilling hour of night,

Fit hour of rest for thee !"

The crows are shy during winter, but become bold at the approach of spring, often venturing within a few yards of human habitations. This change is caused by the desire of procuring food for the young, which are voracious enough to tax the unremitting industry of the parents. The nests are generally built on the old branches of the oak or fir, which trees are preferred by the bird for nesting purposes.

The crow has little home-love in it, as the nest once used is never visited again; a remarkable contrast to the local habits of the raven and rook.

Though the carrion-crows usually keep in pairs through the year, they have a tendency to become gregarious in autumn and winter, when forty or fifty are sometimes seen in a flock.

The name "carrion-crow" is sufficiently clear, and tolerably correct, as expressive of the bird's natural habit; in some parts