Early Clearings. 259 



side of this belt there is much less timber ; so that 

 the rooks that desired to build nests beyond the 

 limits of the enclosed wood still found in the old 

 places the best trees for their purpose. Here may 

 be seen far more rookeries than in any other direction. 

 Hardly a farmhouse lying near this belt but has got 

 its rookery, large or small. Once these rookeries 

 were established, an inducement to follow this route 

 would arise in the invariable habit of the birds of 

 visiting their nesting-trees even when the actual 

 nesting time is past. 



Thirdly, if the inquiry be carried still farther 

 back, it is possible that the line taken by the rooks 

 indicates the line of the first clearings in very early 

 days. The clearing away of trees and underwood, 

 by opening the ground and rendering it accessible, 

 must be very attractive to birds, and rooks are par- 

 ticularly fond of following the plough. Now al- 

 though the district is at present chiefly meadow land, 

 numbers of these meadows were originally ploughed 

 fields, of which there is evidence in the surface of 

 the fields themselves, where the regular ' lands ' and 

 furrows are distinctly visible. 



One or all of these suggestions may^ perhaps ac- 

 count for the course followed by the rooks. In any 

 case it seems natural to look for the reason in the 

 trees. The same idea applies to the other stream of 

 rooks which leaves the wood for the eastward every 

 morning, flying along the downs. In describing the 

 hill district, evidence was given of the existence of 

 woods or forest land upon the downs in the olden 

 time. Detached copses and small woods are still 

 to be found ; and it happens that a part of this dis- 



