CARRION CROW. 523 



out her neck and beak to reach the moorfowl. But her efforts 

 were in vain. A small ravine abruptly entered the main 

 stream, and the grouse, no doubt balancing itself in the air to 

 enter this hollow, hastily skimmed up its bottom. The Crow, 

 by the rapidity of her flight, was carried quite down the glen. 

 I saw her turn to reconnoitre ; but by this time the moorfowl 

 had regained its native heaths. As it passed me, it was now 

 and then uttering a cry of Uk^ uk ; but when struggling 

 with the glede, its screech was like that emitted by a domestic 

 hen when suddenly laid hold of. 



" The Carrion Crow never soars to any great height in the air, 

 and I think, very little traverses a mountainous district, the 

 elevated tracts being occupied by the Raven, who, on the other 

 hand, seldom descends into the low country, unless food be 

 scarce, or the hills covered with deep snow. Then they are ob- 

 liged to scour the low parts, where animal life is more abun- 

 dant, and where incessant casualties are constantly leaving some 

 carcases on the field. Both the Raven and the Carrion Crow 

 build with us on trees ; the former on a withered trunk in 

 the most inaccessible part of a rock or linn. The eggs may 

 be broken, or the young killed, w^ith stones at a distance, but 

 it is seldom that they can be won at and carried away. But 

 the Carrion Crow chooses a crooked birch or mountain-ash, in 

 the bottom of the glen, and not unfrequently an old disbranched 

 fir, in the neighbourhood of the farm-stead. There she knows 

 she is ready for any offal that goes to the dunghil, or for a 

 piece of rejected tripe which the kitchen-maid may leave at the 

 stream. Nay, I have often seen them feeding on the excre- 

 ment voided by sheep in the stell during the night, but this 

 only when a heavy storm of snow was on the ground, and when 

 the creatures had a presentiment of still more pinching weather. 

 And here I may notice that this bird's internal perception of 

 changes in the weather seems to be very keen and correct. If 

 they feed with greediness, if they fly speedily and along the 

 lower edges of the glen, but especially if they be sitting in a 

 sheltered place when the tempest is beginning, it is a certain 

 indication that it will increase to a hurricane. 



'' The Raven and the Carrion Crovr employ half-rotten twigs 



