Food of the Rook. 1 1 3 



appearing as if they were enveloped by a thin transparent 

 covering. 



[ The Skill of the Messrs. Reynolds, The ford, Norfolk, in 

 sttiffing and setting Skins of Birds for Preservation.'] — The 

 superior manner in which these young men have set up their 

 specimens, their attention to every slight variation in the mark- 

 ings, &c, have obtained for their performances the appro- 

 bation of all who have seen them. In giving to the specimens, 

 too, the character of expression proper to the species, I have , 

 never seen them excelled, and but very rarely equalled. They 

 are richly deserving the patronage of those who prefer to 

 see animation maintained, as it were, in their specimens, to 

 the formal, stiff, and unnatural postures which at present dis- 

 figure so many of the specimens in our public museums. — 

 J. D. Salmon. Thetford, Norfolk, Dec. 8. 1834. 



See, in p. 41 — 43., Mr. Blyth's generalisations on instances 

 of the albino condition in animals. 



The Rook is both Insectivorous and Granivorous (VII. 459.) : 

 it is more Insectivorous than Granivorous. — Mr. Bree has drawn, 

 I think, a conclusion, in p. 461., from a passage in my Glean- 

 ings in Natural History, which the passage itself does not 

 warrant. The passage is this : — "In order to be convinced 

 that these birds (rooks) are beneficial to the farmer, let him 

 observe the same field in which his ploughman and his sower 

 are at work. He will see the former followed by a train of 

 rooks, while the sower will be unattended, and his grain re- 

 main untouched." Mr. Bree concludes, from this statement, 

 that I acquit rooks of the crime of eating grain. I am not 

 only aware that they do eat grain, but had distinctly men- 

 tioned the fact in the first series of my Gleanings. My only 

 object, in the passage referred to, was to show that rooks prefer 

 grubs when they can get them, and this I am persuaded is 

 the case. I also w T ished to show the incalculable benefit they 

 are of to the farmer, greatly overbalancing any injury they 

 may do to his corn. Indeed it is his own fault if they do any, 

 as there are plenty of boys to be had for a trifle a week to 

 drive them away. 



During the late very dry spring and summer, rooks might 

 find it very difficult to procure a sufficiency of grubs for them- 

 selves and their young, as I know from my own observation that 



During the dry Weather Grubs penetrated much deeper into 

 the Earth than usual, and the Common Earthworm rarely made 

 its Appearance. — This may account for disgorged pellets of 

 oat husks being found under a rookery [460., and note *]. I 

 must, however, add, that perhaps one of the most extensive 

 rookeries in England is that amongst the avenues of Hampton 



Vol. VIII. --No. 46. i 



