THE LOOP OF THE ROOK 



infinite talk, the pert note of the jackdaw coming 

 clear out of the turmoil. 



I touched lately on the stately curves and 

 glidings of the homing rooks over their nest-trees. 

 But there is an exercise of rooks at sunset perhaps 

 distinct from this, and full of the lyric of motion. 

 Birds of more than one rookery have been foraging 

 together during the day. At sunset, they spire 

 slowly to a great height. Their wings laid flat and 

 spread out to the utmost extent, apparently motion- 

 less, it is as though they were sucked up into the 

 heights with no exertion of their own, or at most 

 one slight stroke of the wing keeps the flyer going 

 for many seconds together. 



Having reached the desired height, the rooks 

 drift apart, lingeringly divide into two or more 

 parties, and fly away in different directions to the 

 chosen roost trees, which now they can, no doubt, 

 sight. But the separation does not at once lead to a 

 plain flight home. For some minutes the rooks 

 loop their way, each rook performing a separate 

 loop, or rather a series of loops. Necessarily pro- 

 gress is slow during this stage, for the loop takes 

 the bird backward as well as carrying it forward 

 each time it is cut. It exactly resembles the loop 

 cut on the outside edge by a deft and powerful 

 skater ; he, like the bird, can go on cutting a long 

 series of loops at apparently the minimum of effort. 

 A hundred rooks all looping at the same time in a 

 sky flushed by sunset are truly an engaging sight. It 

 surpasses, 1 think, even that thin rippling line of 



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