92 CORVID.E. 



return to their nests. Rooks are at once distinguislied from 

 the other species of this family, ah'eady described, by their 

 habits of constantly living in flocks together at all seasons of 

 the year, and further evincing the sociability of their disposi- 

 tions by appearing to prefer situations in the immediate vici- 

 nity of the abodes of man. There are not wanting instances 

 ■where long-established rookeries near a mansion have been 

 deserted by these birds, when it has happened that the house 

 has been pulled down, or even abandoned as a habitation. 



Their partiality to building their nests on any trees suffi- 

 ciently lofty, that are occasionally to be found in various 

 parts of crowded cities, must have been observed, not only in 

 London, but elsewhere. In the spring of 1838, a pair of 

 Rooks began to form a nest on the crown which surmounts 

 the vane of St. 01ive''s church, in Hart Street, Crutched 

 Friars ; and many persons remember the nest built on a 

 single and not very lofty tree near the corner of Wood Street 

 and Cheapside. This nest, though not used by the Rooks 

 since 1836, still remains in the tree. A few years since a 

 pair built their nest between the wings of the dragon of Bow 

 Church, and remained there till the steeple required repairs. 

 In the gardens of two noblemen in Curzon Street, May Fair, 

 a considerable number of Rooks have built for many years, 

 and these probably received an addition at the destruction of 

 the rookery in the gardens of Carlton House. Mr. Black- 

 wall has recorded in the Zoological Journal, that three pairs 

 of Rooks built on some low black Italian poplars in a central 

 part of the town of Manchester, and returned to the same 

 place the following year. Mr. Bewick has noticed the 

 nest of a pair of Rooks which was built on the top of the 

 vane of the Exchange in Newcastle-upon-Tyne ; and though 

 the nest and its inhabitants were turned about with every 

 change of wind, it was tenanted for ten successive seasons 

 till the spire was taken down ; and Mr. Macgillivray men- 



