2o8 ENGLISH BIRD LIFE 



soft green moss, and in every embrasure, grasses 

 grow, sometimes intermingling with the sprays of 

 the wild-rose. Within the dim aisles, the wings 

 of the Stock-Dove gleam as she sails through the 

 carved window to seek her nest. Many Starlings 

 fly busily in and out or alight chattering on the 

 ledges, and from the overhanging trees the " coo- 

 roo-roo " of the Wood Pigeon comes softly. Find- 

 ing foothold in the grass-grown masonry far 

 aloft, a mountain-ash grows horizontally, and here, 

 as well as upon the walls and turrets, the Jackdaws 

 swarm in noisy hordes. Sometimes they crowd 

 upon the limb and rest for a time in comparative 

 silence; then, as though at some prearranged 

 signal, they all burst into the air, making the 

 monastic solitudes ring with their reiterated cries. 



To mv mind the Jackdaw never appears in his 

 true habitat save when he is surrounded bv shattered 

 towers and by ivy-covered walls. 



With many jackdaw-like qualities, yet with char- 

 acteristics altogether his own, the ^Magpie has a 

 notable place in bird-historv. He is a familiar 

 figure in many countries, and wherever he appears, 

 legends have been woven about him by the super- 

 stitious. L^nlike the Raven, he is not a constant 

 bringer of ill-luck, his influence on futurity depend- 

 ing, somev.hat curiously, on the numbers in which 

 he chances to be seen— 



" One for sorrow and two for mirth, 

 Three for a wedding and four for a birth ; '"' 



and although in certain localities odd and even 



