Rev. D. Landsborough on the Rook. 275 



to zoology, both for the sake of rendering the question less conijalex, 

 and because we conceive that the botanical nomenclature of the 

 present day stands in much less need of distinct enactment than the 

 zoological. The admirable rules laid down by Linnaeus, Smith, 

 Decandolle, and other botanists (to which, no less than to the works 

 of Fabricius, Illiger, Vigors, Swainson, and other zoologists, we 

 have been much indebted in jireparing the present document), have 

 always exercised a beneficial influence over their disciples. Hence 

 the language of botany has attained a more perfect and stable con- 

 dition than that of zoology ; and if this attempt at reformation may 

 have the effect of advancing zoological nomenclature beyond its 

 present back^vard and abnormal state, the wishes of its promoters 

 will be fully attained. 



(Signed) H. E. Strickland. J. S. Henslow. 



June 27, 1842. John Phillips. W. E. Shuckard. 



John Richardson. G. R. Waterhouse. 



Richard Owen. W. Yarrell. 



Leonard Jenyns. C. Darwin. 



W. J. Broderip. J. O. Westwood. 



XL. — On the History and Habits of the Rook, Corvus fru- 

 gilegusj Linn. By the Rev. David Landsborough. 



To the Editors of the Annals of Natural History. 



Gentlemen, 

 Though birds were my early favourites, I have never made 

 much progress in ornithology. In some future communica- 

 tion, however, I may attempt to give a list of the birds found 

 in the south-west of Scotland. Before doing so I shall ven- 

 ture to give you some notices of a few of them, though they will 

 be unworthy of appearing even as short addenda to the highly 

 interesting ornithological articles, furnished from time to time 

 by that accurate observer of the works of nature — Mr. W. 

 Thompson of Belfast. I have little leisure for such pursuits, 

 and I shall merely subjoin a brief sketch of a pet Rook with 

 which I have the pleasure of being acquainted. 



I visited him a few days ago at Ardrossan, and was glad to 

 find, that though a dozen -winters have passed over his head, 

 he has all the vivacity of early life. He is a crow of aristocratic 

 extraction ; at all events he is of high descent, having been 

 reared on one of the highest trees at Shieldhall, where his an- 

 cestors, it is believed, had their favourite residence for many 

 generations. When he was well fledged he was brought down 

 to the abodes of men by one of the aspiring youths of Shield- 

 hall (George Oswald, Esq., now in India) as a present to his 

 aunt Miss Oswald, and by her the pet crow, prized for his 

 T 2 



