THE CARRION CROW. 245 



distance, and when a nest has been laid bare by the scythe, 

 their incredibly sharp eye discerns the prize which, whether 

 it consist of eggs or callow young, is borne off in triumph. 

 Lest their depredations should be discovered by the accu- 

 mulation of egg-shells, feathers and bones, which are the 

 natural consequence of these raids, they carefully carry to 

 some distance everything that would tend to betray them, 

 so that one might pass directly beneath the scene of these 

 enormities unsuspicious of the evil existing overhead. 

 Keen as this bird is in pursuit of such dehcate fare, he can 

 be, when occasion serves, as unclean a feeder as the Vulture, 

 and he can, on the other hand, make a meal off corn. Mr. 

 Knox states that in the Weald of Sussex, where the Eaven 

 is common, it resorts to the brooks and ponds, which abound 

 in fresh-water muscles {Anodon\ and feeds on them most 

 voraciously, especially after floods, when they lie scattered 

 on the mud. The same author states that in winter it 

 resorts to the sea-shore, and feeds on the oysters, muscles, 

 small crabs, marine insects, worms, and dead fish which 

 are cast up by the waves during the prevalent south-westerly 

 storms. It has been frequently observed, he adds, to ascend 

 to a great height in the air with an oyster in its claws, 

 and after letting it fall on the beach, to descend rapidly 

 with closed pinions and devour the contents. A similar 

 instance of apparent reasoning is recorded of the same bird 

 by Pliny, but with the substitution of walnuts for oysters. 

 With such wandering habits, it seems at first sight strange 

 that the phrase " as the Crow flies " should be adopted to 

 mark distances in a straight line across the open country ; 

 yet when it is borne in mind how many persons confound 

 the Crow with the Rook, and even talk of the " Crows in a 

 rookery," the suggestion will at once occur to the mind that 

 the term owed its origin to its far gentler and more 

 respectable relation, the Eook, whose evening flights from 

 the feeding ground are among the most familiar sights 

 of the country, and are invariably performed in a line so 



