270 BIRDS OF NORFOLK. 



The question as to the predominance of good or 

 bad qualities in the rook is one which has attracted 

 the attention of most naturalists, and certainly the 

 verdict of more recent observers is decidedly in favour 

 of the utility of the species. If one examines the 

 evidence, for and against, of such trust-worthy author- 

 ities as Macgillivray, Yarrell, St. John, Stanley, Knapp, 

 and others, the conclusion undoubtedly arrived at is, 

 that a maximum of good is effected for a minimum 

 of mischief, and no stronger evidence can be offered as 

 to the benefits conferred by the rook upon agriculturists 

 than the necessity which has arisen in some places for 

 re-establishing their colonies where the ignorant pre- 

 judices of their persecutors had rendered them extinct. 

 Though easy enough to destroy the birds, man finds 

 himself powerless to arrest the inroads of those insect 

 swarms, which his feathered allies have had no credit 

 for suppressing. Amongst the chief delinquencies laid 

 to their charge are the pilferings of the fresh-sown 

 grain and the soft ears of the ripening corn ; attacking 

 the freshly planted potatoes, sucking the eggs of game 

 and poultry, and robbing the herons' nests if near the 

 rookery ; occasionally also destroying young birds, and a 

 general partiality for dessert, including cherries, straw- 

 berries, apples, walnuts, &c., &c.. This looks perhaps, 

 at first sight, rather a black list, but there is much to be 

 said in palliation, and still more as a set-off against 

 many peccadilloes ; whilst nothing can justify the cruel 

 system, of late years adopted, of using poisoned wheat in 

 the breeding season, whereby the old birds in dozens 

 have returned home to die, and their young thus de- 

 prived of parental care, have suffered the horrors of 

 starvation. With regard to their attacks upon the 

 growing corn, the farmer, who knows the temptation 

 afforded by his waving crops, must take the ordinary 

 precautions to drive off the depredators, and if thus a 



