HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



i75 



though it only needed one of the foot-stones to be 

 loosened for it to come thundering; down. But if 

 nothing else had repaid our labours, certainly the 

 sight of the magnificent cavern into which we now 

 entered, did so most amply. When we had all got 

 together, we looked around us, and the surrounding 

 scenery was most impressive. The wide vault, hid 

 by the blackest darkness above our heads, the masses 

 of rock at our feet, made us feel like pigmies when 

 gazing upon this work of nature. The effect was 

 more striking when we burnt a Bengal light, which 

 threw out the light and shade of the overhanging 

 masses into splendid relief: the thousands of crystals 

 of various shapes and colours, which reflected the 

 dazzling light in a thousand coruscations, left us 

 almost speechless with astonishment and delight. 

 After attempting to make our way in other directions 

 we had to give up, owing to the passages narrowing 

 so much as to prevent us even from crawling along. 

 In fact, all the hills hereabout are quite hollow, and 

 the subterranean passages extend for miles, widening 

 and narrowing alternately as they run along. De- 

 scending in safety we found the boat moored as we 

 had left it, and another quarter of an hour brought 

 us into the clear starlight. 



HOW TO FOUND A ROOKERY. 

 By Mrs. Tilt. 



IN answer to the question that has been asked in 

 your columns as to the best means of founding a 

 rookery, I can mention an instance in which a large 

 one was established by the kindness shown to a 

 solitary rook one severe winter. For many years it 

 had been our great ambition to have a rookery ; there 

 were several large ones in other parts of Cheshire, 

 and what was considered to be the mother-rookery 

 was about two miles from us. The keeper had 

 obtained rooks' eggs, placed them in nests in tall 

 trees thought likely to attract them, but all to no 

 purpose. But one severe winter there came regularly 

 every day, with some pet bantams that were fed by the 

 house-keeper out of the window, a solitary rook and fed 

 with them, becoming at last so tame as to hop on the 

 window-sill. In the spring this tame rook brought a 

 mate, and together they began to build in a small 

 Spanish chestnut tree, so close to the house that from 

 the upper windows we could see quite into the nest. 

 It made great excitement watching the progress of 

 this nest, as it is considered to bring good luck to a 

 house when rooks build near it. The nest was about 

 half finished, when, one morning, a great noise was 

 heard, and we saw about a dozen strange rooks 

 violently attacking the old pair, and tearing the nest 

 to pieces. They did not attempt to build again that 

 year, but the next spring the same thing occurred. 

 They got so far as to lay their eggs, when the female 

 bird was suddenly attacked one morning when she 



was sitting by a dozen and more of rooks, and the 

 noise was such as to collect the whole household to 

 watch the battle. She made a stout defence, and it 

 was some time before they beat her off the nest, 

 dashing it with its contents to the ground. This was 

 repeated a third year, when we began to despair of 

 having our rookery, but on consulting a book on 

 natural history we found it stated that it was generally 

 four years before a pair were allowed to establish 

 themselves independently from the mother rookery. 

 At all events it was so in this case, for the following 

 year they not only brought up a brood of young birds 

 without being molested, but each year after the nests 

 in the same tree increased in number, and eventually 

 they spread to other trees close by. It was so far 

 satisfactory to have established our rookery, but un- 

 fortunately, the grateful rook had chosen the nearest 

 tree to the window where he had been fed, and their 

 close vicinity to the house proved at last so objection- 

 able that it was found necessary to drive them further 

 off, by gradually cutting down the trees they had 

 chosen. With the curious instinct that rooks are 

 supposed to have with regard to trees that are 

 destined to come down, though they were left in 

 peaceful possession of the original tree they had 

 chosen, and which had nine nests in it, they wisely 

 left it, and established themselves in a clump of large 

 trees at a more convenient distance. Every year after 

 this the rookery increased in size, and in the space of 

 ten years, from the time the parent birds made their 

 first attempt to build, the rookery has grown so large 

 that we have been advised to shoot some of them in 

 the spring, for fear the rooks, "becoming too nume- 

 rous," should fight and break up the colony. 



This is only one more instance of the power of man 

 over animals, and shows that the secret of that power 

 is kindness. 



ODDITIES AMONG SEA-BIRDS. 

 By P. Q. Keegan, LL.D. 



A STRANGE, odd, fantastic, eccentric appear- 

 ance or deportment exhibited on the part of a 

 human being, or by one of the lower animals, is, 

 under ordinary ciu.. nstances, if not pitifully, at least 

 ludicrously interesting. We are deeply conscious 

 that something is wrong somewhere or somehow, 

 that the ordinary rules and dispensations of nature 

 are, in this instance, violated or replaced, their pro- 

 visions unduly restricted, or inordinately and ab- 

 surdly overstrained, and the contrast thus furnished, 

 being generally striking, our risible faculties are 

 excited, and we indulge in a burst of laughter. 

 Sometimes in the midst of an accompaniment of 

 differences, we perceive a strange resemblance to 

 some external object. Thus, for instance, when we 

 witness the pranks, gambols, and extravagances of a 

 monkey, we all the while perceive therein a certain 



