3o6 ADVENTURES AMONG BIRDS 



hovered, until in anger and disgust he flew away out of 

 sight while the starlings, their object gained, dropped 

 down to the meadow and started feeding. The action 

 may have been inspired by a love of fun or a spirit 

 of mischief complicated with a sense of irritation at 

 the sight of a bird who was not of their society, whose 

 ways were not their ways — a feeling akin to that which 

 occasionally prompts a person of primitive order of 

 mind to heave half a brick at a stranger. The feeling 

 is quite common among birds, only the heaving process 

 is performed with such a precision and so gracefully 

 that it is a pleasure to witness it. 



In marked contrast with this spiteful behaviour was 

 another act of a flock of starlings I witnessed at the 

 same spot, showing the different feelings entertained 

 toward a stranger like the kestrel and a comrade of the 

 feeding ground — a wild goose. A small gaggle or com- 

 pany of a dozen or fourteen geese came flying from 

 the sea across the meadows on their way inland to the 

 feeding ground, and at the same time a flock of about 

 a hundred starlings, travelling at a much greater height 

 than the geese, came flying by, their course crossing that 

 of the geese at right angles. Just as the flocks crossed 

 about thirty starlings detached themselves from the 

 flock and dropping straight down joined the geese. 

 They did not merely place themselves alongside of the 

 big birds; they mixed and went away among them, 

 accommodating their flight to that of the geese. Yet 

 they must have been uncomfortably placed among such 

 big and powerful birds fanned by their wings and in 



