ROOK. 101 



winters peck holes in turnips or potatoes. There is reason 

 to believe that the visits of Rooks to turnips may be in 

 some degree beneficial. Farmers have frequently suffered 

 great injury, particularly in Hertfordshire and Essex, 

 from the attack of a large brown grub, the larva of a very 

 common grey moth, called the corn rustic, Agrotis segetum 

 of entomologists ; from four to seven of which I have known 

 to be found eating their way into the bulb of one turnip. 



On the balance between injury or benefit derived from 

 birds, Prince C. Bonaparte has made the following remarks, 

 in his history of the Great Crow Blackbird of North 

 America : " The species of this genus are gregarious and 

 omnivorous ; their food being composed of insects, corn, 

 and small grain, thus assisting and plundering the agricul- 

 turist at the same time. When the first European settle- 

 ments were formed in North America, the havoc made by 

 these birds and the Troopials in the grain-fields was so 

 great, that a premium was given for their heads. Their 

 destruction was easily effected, as they are not shy, and 

 are more easily approached as their numbers decrease ; 

 but the evil which resulted from exterminating so many of 

 these birds was as unexpected as irremediable. The corn 

 and pastures were so devoured by worms and insects, that 

 the inhabitants were obliged to spare the birds, in order to 

 avert a scourge which had been previously unknown." 



Mr. Gosse, in his Canadian Naturalist, has the follow- 

 ing remark in further illustration of this subject: " I 

 once saw a gentleman of wealth and intelligence in the 

 South busily engaged in picking off from his cotton, and 

 destroying the Ladybirds. On my inquiring the reason, 

 he informed me that the cotton was infested with hosts of 

 Aphides, and that they were produced from these beetles. 

 He was confirmed in this opinion by the two being always 

 associated together wherever the Aphides were, there 



