FOOTPATHS. 23 



of it, having travelled through and left his prey with 

 his brood in the nest there. Assured by his success 

 his mate follows now, and once having done it, they 

 continue to bring caterpillars, apparently as fast as 

 they can pass between the trees and the bush. They 

 always enter the bush, which is scarcely two yards 

 from me, on one side, pass through in the same 

 direction, and emerge on the other side, having thus 

 regular places of entrance and exit. 



As I stand watching these birds a flock of rooks 

 goes over, they have left the nesting trees, and fly 

 together again. Perhaps this custom of nesting 

 together in adjacent trees and using the same one 

 year after year is not so free from cares and jealousies 

 as the solitary plan of the little white-throats here. 

 Last March I was standing near a rookery, noting the 

 contention and quarrelling, the downright tyranny, 

 and brigandage which is carried on there. The very 

 sound of the cawing, sharp and angry, conveys the 

 impression of hate and envy. 



Two rooks in succession flew to a nest the owners 

 of which were absent, and deliberately picked a great 

 part of it to pieces, taking the twigs for their own use. 

 Unless the rook, therefore, be ever in his castle his 

 labour is torn down, and, as with men in the fierce 

 struggle for wealth, the meanest advantages are seized 

 on. So strong is the rook's bill that he tears living 

 twigs of some size with it from the bough. The 

 white-throats were without such envy and contention. 



From hence the footpath, leaving the copse, 

 descends into a hollow, with a streamlet flowing 

 through a little meadow, barely an acre, with a pollard 



