CHAPTER X 

 Watching Rooks 



IN this chapter I will give a few scenes from rook 

 life, as I have watched it from late autumn to early 

 spring, linking them together by a remark now and 

 again of a general nature, or, possibly, some theory 

 which my observations may have suggested to me, 

 and seemed to illustrate. Were I to put into general 

 terms what I have jotted down at all times and in 

 all places, in the darkness before morning when the 

 rookery slept about me, in the dim dawn whilst it 

 woke into life, to stream forth, later, on wings of joy 

 and sound, in the long day by field and moor and 

 waste, and at evening again, or night, when the birds 

 swept home and sank to sleep amidst their own 

 sinking lullaby, I might make a smoother narrative, 

 but the picture would be gone. I think it better, 

 therefore, to make a preliminary general apology for 

 all roughnesses and repetitions, triviality of matter, 

 R 257 



