OF HARTING. 263 



industry he might collect from the trunks of trees, the 

 fences, or any other object against which the deer has 

 been rubbing himself, he actually has the supreme 

 effrontery to tear off fragments of the worn out coat 

 from the very person of the owner, the latter, mean- 

 while, calmly watching the process of denudation as 

 if it really ministered to his comfort. It is not 

 unusual here in the nesting season to see from the 

 drawing room windows, several jackdaws at a time 

 busily engaged on the backs of the deer, as they 

 leisurely chew the cud while basking in the sunshine, 

 and it is only when three or four of them, alighting on 

 an old buck, pick a quarrel with each other and try 

 conclusions on the spot, that they get a gentle ad- 

 monition from one of the horns of the animal. For 

 several seasons a pair of stock doves had occupied a 

 spacious cavity in an old beech tree in the park, and 

 probably succeeded in rearing their young there, but 

 on examining the tree this season, I found it tenanted 

 by a pair of jackdaws, and as the interior was very 

 wide and deep, they had resorted to a most ingenious 

 expedient for excluding any intruder larger than one 

 of their own species, they had defended the entrance 

 with a perfect cJievaux de frise of sticks, leaving an 

 aperture just large enough for the passage of one bird, 

 the nest and eggs being a foot or eighteen inches 

 below. Among other curiosities of my nesting ex- 

 perience, I am tempted to mention another jackdaw's 

 nest, which was built in an old disused chimney. The 

 sticks which formed the foundation of this bulky affair 

 were so judiciously selected for their length and 

 strength, placed so horizontally, and fitted in to such 

 a nicety, that it was exceedingly difficult, almost im- 

 possible, to remove them without breaking them, and 

 the effect might naturally have suggested the idea that 

 among the first measures taken by the architects, when 

 about to erect their mansion, the importance of duly 

 testing the timbers on which it was to rest was not 

 overlooked by them." 



