WHITE FOREHEAD OF THE ROOK. 293 



The Rook also feeds upon berries and various fruits, being especially fond of oak-nuts, 

 and having a curious habit of burying them in the earth before eating them, by which means, 

 no doubt, many a noble oak-tree is planted. It also eats walnuts, and is fond of driving 

 its bill through them and so taking them from the tree. The cones of the Scotch fir are also 

 favorite food with the Rook, which seizes them in its beak, and tries to pull them from 

 the bough by main force ; but if it should fail in this attempt, it drags the branch forcibly 

 upwards, and then suddenly releases it, so as to jerk the cones from their stems by the 

 recoil. 



The practice of terrifying Rooks by means of scarecrows has already been mentioned, 

 together with its usual failure. Even the bodies of slaughtered Rooks suspended from sticks 

 have but little effect on these audacious birds, who may be seen very unconcernedly searching 

 below the carcases for the beetles and other carrion-eating insects that are always found in 

 such localities. The surest way to frighten the Rooks by means of dead comrades is not to 

 hang them up in a position which every Rook knows is not likely to be assumed by any of its 

 friends, and therefore conveys no intimation of alarm to its logical mind, but to lay them flat 

 upon the earth with outstretched neck and spread wings as if they had fallen dead from some- 

 thing evil in the locality. Another useful method is to post a number of sticks in double rows 

 and connect them with each other by strings tied in zigzag fashion, when it will be found that 

 the Rooks are so suspicious of a trap, that they will not venture to enter any of the angles so 

 formed. 



The second subject of controversy is the presence of a bare white skin upon the forehead 

 of the adult Rook and the base of its neck, those portions being clothed with feathers during 

 the bird's youth. 



The general opinion was that the bird, by constantly delving in the soil, wore off all the 

 feathers, only leaving the white skin behind. This solution of the problem was current for a 

 long time, until some observer remarked that the base of the bill showed no particular marks 

 of hard wear ; that the bald space extended behind the line of the eyes, so that the bird could 

 not possibly plunge its beak to so great a depth ; that the white skin was evidently an inten- 

 tional arrangement, and was too well defined at the edges to have been produced by the 

 operation of digging, and must in that case always vary with the soil and the kind of food ; 

 moreover, there are many other birds which have bald spaces on their persons, such as the 

 vultures and the turkey, and that in their case no theory of friction is required by which the 

 phenomenon can be accounted for. 



Matters having proceeded thus far, dissection was next employed, and it was observed 

 that although feather bulbs could be found within the white skin, they were shrivelled and 

 useless for the production of feathers. Experiments were then tried, wherein sundry young 

 Rooks were kept caged, and denied access to any earth or mouldy substances ; and in every 

 case except one (and probably in that case also when the bird had attained maturity) the 

 feathers with which the base of the back were covered fell off in the course of moulting, and 

 were never replaced by fresh plumage. Every ornithologist knows well that many birds when 

 young are distinguished by feathery or hairy tufts, as in the case of the Leatherhead, described 

 on page 160 of this work, which, when young, is decorated with a tuft of plumy hair upon its 

 head ; but after the moult, loses its cranial ornament. Mr. Simeon pertinently remarks, in 

 allusion to this controversy, that a similar phenomenon may be seen in the human race, the 

 forehead of a baby being often covered with fine downy hairs, which fall off as the child 

 grows ; and that in the elephants of Ceylon, the young is often clothed with a thick woolly 

 fur over its head and fore parts when born, but loses its covering as it approaches maturity. 

 Altogether it seems that those who advocate the naturally bare forehead and beak have the 

 best of the argument. 



The habits of the Rook are very interesting, and easily watched. Its extreme caution is 

 very remarkable, when combined with its attachment to human homes. A colony of a thou- 

 sand birds may form a rookery in a park, placing themselves under the protection of its 

 owner ; and yet, if they see a man with a gun, or even with a suspicious-looking stick, they 

 fly off their nests with astounding clamor, and will not return until the cause of their alarm 



