14 THE CROW FAMILY 



by which it seeks to display at once its agility and its charms, the most 

 remarkable being the habit of suddenly closing the wings in flight and 

 rolling round sideways, sometimes with a croak. The turn is either 

 completed, or else arrested half-way, in the latter case the bird shoot- 

 ing for a space through the air with its back downwards. This feat 

 has not a sexual meaning only, for the species is wont to indulge in it 

 at all periods of the year ; sometimes apparently in mere playfulness. 

 It also serves certain utilitarian purposes. Gilbert White in his letter 

 of August 7, 1778, to Barrington, notes that, when moving from one 

 place to another, " ravens turn on their backs with a loud croak, and 

 seem to be falling to the ground. When this odd gesture betides 

 them, they are scratching themselves with one foot, and thus lose the 

 centre of gravity." The habit has, however, a further use as a method 

 of defence against foes even more to be feared than the one which 

 caused the birds observed by Gilbert White to lose the centre of 

 gravity. When in the Lake District, I once saw a raven attacked by 

 a pair of hawks into whose nesting area it had trespassed in search 

 of food. The two assailants rose high above the intruder with 

 excited, angry screams, and, one after the other, came down like 

 bolts from the blue to strike into the soft sable back that seemed to 

 offer so easy a target. But the raven paid not the slightest apparent 

 heed to the coming attack until the moment when I looked to see it 

 mercilessly struck down. Then, it suddenly turned on its back and 

 presented a menacing array of claws and beak that caused each hawk 

 to swerve aside without a second's hesitation, and with lightning 

 rapidity, only to rise again and renew the inglorious assault. The 

 black veteran continued for some time to pursue with dignified 

 tranquillity his researches into the natural history of the fellside, 

 interrupting them only to assume, when needed, his sudden and 

 most effectively disconcerting posture of defence. 1 



It must not be supposed that the raven is always equally bold in 



1 Miss E. L. Turner informs me that a raven, which she kept in an aviary and which had 

 its wings clipped, used, when attacked by one of its fellow captives, a magpie, to turn over on 

 its back on the ground and grip its assailant with its claws. 



