CORVUS CORAX. 519 



herd, or his ''page," set a trap and caught one of the pair by a toe ; but he did 

 not dare to kill it, and so let it go ; first, however, taking a strip of white rag, 

 he made a slit near one end, through which he passed the other end, and then 

 slipped the loop over the bird's head, so that the loose end hung down in front. 

 That bird was never again seen alive. I heard of what had happened, and saw 

 its disconsolate mate, the hen as 1 believed. Some time after, I found tlie 

 dead bird on the ground in the Icklingham Belt. It had seemingly worried 

 itself to death, and was wasted to a skeleton. It turned out that that season's 

 lambing proved very disastrous— never had so many ewes been known to warp. 

 It was hard on the flock-owner, but I think that shepherd never set a trap 

 for a Raven again, and he certainly did not like being asked about the 

 business. The surviving bird was sitting at the time, but she forsook her 

 nest. She found another mate and a second nest was built, but of that more 

 presently. 



It was in 1848 that we first came to know that a pair of Ravens had a nest 

 in a " hurst" ' on Icklingham Heath. A warrener there told my brother that 

 formerly, and for many years, they had built on one of the high poplar trees 

 near the village of that name, but were driven away by Rooks, which took 

 possession of the trees and established a rookery there ^. By the then game- 

 keeper at Elveden, from the boundary of which this hurst was only about a 

 mile distant, they were looked upon as fresh arrivals, and he much wished to 

 destroy them. This, however, he could not do without leave from the owner 

 of the ground, at that time Mr. Daniel Gwilt, who, I am glad to sav, 

 was always inclined to afford the old birds a modified protection. They 

 certainly bred that year, for my brother was able to calculate when tln'ir 

 first egg was laid ; but what became of the brood I know not. I think 

 it possibly got ofij and some damage was alleged to have ensued. Be this as 

 it may, the next year the nest was in the same place, and, as will be imme- 

 diately seen, my brother obtained two eggs from it. In 1850 we did not 



' Hurst is not an East-Anglian word, and in Suffolk I only know it as applied to 

 certain clumps of Scotch fir-trees, cruciform or triradiate in shape, which then stood, 

 four on Icklingham Heath and three on Elveden. These were planted, on what at 

 the time must have been almost a treeless tract, as shelter for sheep in lanibing-time, 

 the flock being folded, according as the wind might blow, in the leeward angle. 

 The trees were at least as old as, if not older than, those which formed the two 

 well-kuown Elden Gaps planted by Admiral Keppel in or about 1768, when the 

 Act of Parliament (8 Geo. III.) for making the tm'upike-road from Thetford to 

 Barton Mills, and so to Newmarket, was passed. The Icklingham Belt above 

 named was a narrow plantation running for about a mile and a half along the 

 boundary between the two parishes of Icklingham and Elveden. It was also of 

 Scotch firs, but not quite so old. The Duke's Ride Plantation, so called from a 

 green road used by a former Duke of Grafton that ran partly by its side, and 

 presently to be mentioned, was in Elveden, and mostly of Scotch fir, but planted 

 still later. 



^ This was no doubt the current story ; but it was also said that the Raven-tree 

 had been blown or cut down. 



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