286 



return in long strings from the foraging of the day, and ren- 

 dezvous by thousands over Selborne-down, where they wheel 

 round in the air, and sport and dive in a playful manner, all 

 the while exerting their voices, and making a loud cawing, 

 which, being blended and softened by the distance that we 

 at the village are below them, become a confused noise or 

 chiding, or rather a pleasing murmur, very engaging to the 

 imagination, and not unlike the cry of a pack of hounds in 

 hollow echoing woods, or the rushing of the wind in tall 

 trees, or the tumbling of the tide upon a pebbly shore. "When 

 this ceremony is over, with the last gleam of day, they retire 

 for the night to the deep beechen woods of Tisted and Eopley. 

 We remember a little girl, who, as she was going to bed, 

 used to remark on such an occurrence, in the true spirit of 

 physico-theology, that the rooks were saying their prayers ; 

 and yet this child was much too young to be aware that the 

 Scriptures have said of the Deity, that " he feedeth the ravens 

 who call upon him." 



LETTEE CIV. 



TO THE SAME. 



IN reading Dr. Huxham's Observations de Aere, written at 

 Plymouth, I find, by those curious and accurate remarks, 

 which contain an account of the weather from the year 1727 

 to the year 1748, inclusive, that though there is frequent rain 

 in that district of Devonshire, yet the quantity falling is not 

 great ; and that some years it has been very small ; for in 

 1731, the rain measured only 17'266 inches, and in 1741, 



rooks, more especially, have not escaped the notice of poets both ancient and 

 modern : 



" The sable tenants of five hundred years, 

 That on the high tops of yon ancient elms, 

 Pour their hoarse music on the lonely ear." J. H. JESSE. 

 Virgil also, like Mr. White, noticed the noise rooks make on returning in 

 the evening from feeding : 



u Et e pastu decedens agmine magno 

 Corvorum increpuit densis exercitus alis." 



