With the Winter Birds. 253 



lution has not yet made them what they should be, 

 a httle wiser in their day and generation. But the 

 hawk has gone. Far-sighted and quick-witted crows 

 have spied him out, and give him no peace. Their 

 cries accord with the wild outlook of the day, and 

 no one should ask for sweeter music. It is as deep 

 as the baying of the hound which many profess to 

 fancy ; and how full of meaning are these battle- 

 cries from far overhead ! for the hawk has risen to a 

 great height, but not so high that the crows cannot 

 look down and pounce upon him. 



Why is it that there is always a quarrel when crows 

 find a hawk ? These birds lead very different lives. 

 There is no real clashing of interests. Are the crows 

 jealous because not quick enough to catch a mouse ? 

 I do not find that crows annoy other large birds. 

 In a little wood, filling a sink-hole in an upland field, 

 was a heronry. Five pairs of green herons nested 

 there, and each pair raised their brood. During the 

 early summer, when the young birds were small and 

 helpless, crows continually came and went, but never 

 offered to molest the young, and never chased the 

 old birds. I watched the spot for five months, 

 almost daily, and saw only evidence of good will. 

 Late in August there were more than twenty herons 

 nightly roosting there ; all day long they were con- 

 tinually passing to and fro from the sink-hole to the 

 meadow, and it was seldom that a heron made the 

 trip without meeting a crow. They may have nodded 

 good-naturedly in passing ; nothing further ever oc- 

 curred, I am sure. But in November, when the 



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