476 REPTILES AND BIRDS. 
consequently enormous. Ravens, not content with levying a tribute 
on moles, field-mice, leverets, and young game, frequently enter 
poultry-yards, and without ceremony appropriate chickens, ducklings, 
&c. Buffon even asserts that in certain countries they fasten upon the 
backs of buffaloes, and after having put out their eyes, devour them. 
According to Lewis, Carrion Crows attack the flocks in Scotch and 
Irish pastures. Lastly, all Crows delight in digging up newly-sown 
ground, eating with avidity the germinating seed. On this account 
the agricultural population are generally their bitterest .enemies, 
destroying them when opportunity offers. In certain parts—Nor- 
way, for instance—laws were made ordering their extermination. But 
this policy was short-sighted: if they did harm, they also did good, 
by devouring grubs and larve, formidable foes to agriculture. How 
is it that men will not use their brains? that they actually destroy 
the animals provided by a bounteous Creator, and whose utility is 
most conspicuous ? 
The flesh of the Raven and the Carrion Crowexhales a disagreeable 
smell, doubtless caused by the quantities of putrid animal matter 
they consume ; consequently, it is unfit for human food. Not so, 
however, with the Rook. This bird, when taken young, is not only 
eatable, but by some deemed a delicacy. 
Crows possess a vigorous and sustained flight ; they have a keen 
sense of smell and excellent vision. By exercising these latter 
qualities they become aware where food is to be obtained, and as 
they wing their way towards it they constantly utter their cry, as if 
inviting their companions to join them ; this croak, as it is called, is 
harsh and dissonant. Their plumage being of a sombre funereal 
black, and their voice so unmusical, have doubtless been the reasons 
why they have long been considered birds of ill omen. When taken 
young, they are tamed with great facility, for they will neither rejoin 
their own race nor desert the neighbourhood where they have been 
kindly treated. True, they may go into the fields to seek for food, 
but when the increasing shadows predict the approach of night, 
their familiar resting-place in the house of ther protector will be 
sought. They become much attached to those who take notice of 
them, and will recognise them even in a crowd. Their audacity and 
their malice are incredible. When they take an antipathy to any 
one, they immediately show it. They suffer neither cats nor dogs to 
approach them, but harass them incessantly, tearing from them their 
very food. Finally, they choose secret places, where they store up 
all that tempts their cupidity or excites their covetousness. They 
even learn to repeat words and phrases, and to imitate the cries of 
