218 TALKS ABOUT BIRDS 



common starlings, though he finds even these 

 lively birds dull and slow compared with his 

 own kind. In the winter months these pink 

 starlings have a very merry time ; they eat 

 all sorts of food insects, fruit, and even corn, 

 and often do a great deal of harm to the 

 farmers. But they do a great deal of good as 

 well, for if there is one thing they like more 

 than another it is locusts, and they devour 

 any number of these great destructive grass- 

 hoppers. In the spring they go off, still in 

 flocks, to settle their nesting affairs ; and 

 their nesting colonies may be found almost 

 anywhere in Western Asia and south-eastern 

 Europe. Generally they fix on a place where 

 there is a plague of locusts, and so they have 

 been known for centuries as useful birds and 

 man's allies against some of his worst enemies. 

 The furthest west one of their nesting colonies 

 has reached was in Verona in Italy ; a few 

 came to reconnoitre the ruins of an old castle 

 there, and a few days later the main army 

 arrived in their thousands. All the birds that 

 had lodgings in that castle then had notice 

 to quit ; the rosy pastors wanted all the room 

 there was, and even then some of them had 



