542 CORVUS FRUGILEGUS. 



mined to believe nothing, and thus we still have essays and 

 observations on the subject, one recommending this and another 

 that mode of treatment, and many deploring the lamentable 

 failure of the constitution of the potatoe. Let them dung and 

 prepare their fields in the ordinary way, plant the sets entire 

 and at a proper depth, in the beginning of May ; and let the 

 soil and the weather be what they may, we shall hear no com- 

 plaints as to the failure of the sets. I have tried the experi- 

 ment of planting beside each other whole tubers and dry shri- 

 velled cuts, and while some of the latter never sent out stems, 

 all the former sprouted luxuriantly. No instance of the fail- 

 ure of entire sets has been recorded, and yet the farmers will 

 not try them, because each has a theory of his own, and the 

 rooks or the worms, or something else, are accused of an injury 

 which is to be attributed solely to the knife of the potatoe- 

 cutter. 



" Early to bed, early to rise,'"* is a good maxim, if received 

 with latitude ; but he who would imitate the Rooks in their 

 bedding and rising would be a fool for his pains ; for in sum- 

 mer he would retire to rest at ten and be up by two, and in 

 winter would sleep from four in the evening to eight next 

 day. Rooks and other birds labour incessantly all day long 

 in winter, and rest two thirds of their time, and in summer, 

 w^hen the day is twenty hours long, they devote part of it 

 to repose ; while in the intermediate seasons, they proportion 

 their labour and rest to the occasion, always, however, going 

 early to bed, and bestirring themselves at dawn. It would 

 appear that in all climates, taking the average of the w^hole 

 year, birds spend at least one half of their time in repose. 



In autumn, the labours of incubation and rearing their young 

 over, and their old plumage exchanged for a new suit, the 

 Rooks appear to live a happy life, shifting about from field to 

 pasture, searching the potatoe and turnip grounds, spreading 

 over the recently inundated meadows, examining the stubble- 

 fields, and if extensive mud-flats or sandy beaches are not too 

 distant, making daily or at least occasional visits to them. The 

 food of the Rook consists essentially of larvae and worms, to 

 obtain which it digs up the roots of plants in which they are 



