A NATURALIST. 1 1 1 



About a quarter of a mile above the house I lived in 

 on Curtis's creek, the shore was a sand bank or bluff, 

 twenty or thirty feet high, crowned with a dense young 

 pine forest to its very edge. Almost directly opposite, 

 the shore was flat, and formed a point extending in the 

 form of a broad sand bar, for a considerable distance 

 into the water, and when the tide was low, this flat af- 

 forded a fine level space, to which nothing could approach 

 in either direction, without being easily seen. At a 

 short distance from the water, a young swamp wood of 

 maple, gum, oaks, &c. extended back, towards some 

 higher ground. As the sun descended, and threw his 

 last rays in one broad sheet of golden effulgence over 

 the crystal mirror of the waters, innumerable compa- 

 nies of crows arrived daily, and settled on this point, for 

 the purpose of drinking, picking up gravel, and uniting 

 in one body prior to retiring for the night to their accus- 

 tomed dormitory. The trees adjacent and ah" the shore 

 would be literally blackened by those plumed marauders, 

 while their increasing outcries, chattering and screams, 

 were almost deafening. It certainly seems that they 

 derive great pleasure from their social habits, and I of- 

 ten amused myself by thinking the uninterrupted clatter 

 which was kept up, as the different gangs united with 

 the main body, was produced by the recital of the adven- 

 tures they had encountered during their last marauding 

 excursions. As the sun became entirely sunk below the 

 horizon, the grand flock crossed to the sand bluff on the 



