288 BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



piece who must labour hard and incessantly to 

 make enough to keep themselves alive; their 

 winter life is accordingly in startling contrast to 

 that of the daw — one that lives on his wits and 

 fares better and altogether has an easier and more 

 amusing time. 



It was the habit of the three species named to 

 quit the wood where they roosted as soon as it 

 was light enough for them to feed, the time vary- 

 ing according to the state of the weather from 

 half-past eight to ten o'clock, the mornings being 

 usually wet and dark. The rooks that had their 

 rookery in the village numbered forty or fifty 

 birds, and these would remain at the village, get- 

 ting their food in the surrounding fields for the 

 rest of the day. The daws would appear in a 

 body of two or three hundred birds, but after a 

 little while many of them would go on to their 

 own villages further away, leaving about sixty to 

 eighty birds belonging to the village. Last of all 

 the starlings would appear in flocks and continu- 

 ous streams of birds often fighting their way 

 against wind and rain, leaving about a couple of 

 hundred or more behind, these being the birds 

 that had settled in the village for the season, and 



