THE ROOK AND JACKDAW 47 



while the latter lay slowly dying close by outside the nest with their 

 mother's unseeing eyes fixed steadily upon them. 1 



The tragedy in the life of the young rook just described is, how- 

 ever, nothing compared to that greater tragedy which each year fills 

 many a rookery with din, and smoke, and bullets, and strews the 

 ground with lifeless or wounded fledglings. This massacre of the 

 innocents may occasionally be necessary. But to kill, when killing is 

 necessary, is one thing; to make this killing, though necessary, a 

 matter for sport is another. Unhappily primitive instincts die hard 

 even among the cultured. 



It is generally in the latter half of May that the young rooks 

 who have survived the massacre are induced to quit the trees, their 

 parents using to effect this end the device of making them fly a 

 certain distance before they are rewarded with a wireworm. When 

 in the fields they are still fed for a time. 



Let us now turn to the breeding habits of the jackdaws, which 

 will not detain us long, partly because they have received compara- 

 tively little attention, and partly because, so far as observed, they 

 resemble very closely those of the rook. The courtship of the two 

 species appears to be much the same. But, besides fanning its tail, 

 the daw has also been observed to raise the feathers of the crown, at 

 the same time pressing the beak down upon the breast, and so bring- 

 ing the grey hood into play, a performance which it accompanies with 

 a lively chattering, no doubt intended to gain the attention of its 

 mate. 2 



The daws also have a song, heard in spring, probably at other 

 times, and described as a sort of little prattle, " qui n'a rien de des- 

 agreable." Like the rooks, they quarrel much, especially about 

 nesting sites. They build their nests of the same material, and are 



1 The evidence I have from various rookeries goes to show that young rooks that have 

 tumbled from the tree-tops are at least occasionally fed by the parents, but this appears to 

 be only when they are nearly fledged, that is, nearing the stage when the parents are accus- 

 tomed to feed them away from the nest. 



- For these particulars respecting the daws' courtship I am indebted to Mr. Stanley Lewis 

 of Wells. 



