WILD LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY. 275 



stick only, you may pass within thirty yards sometimes, 

 and they take little notice, provided you use the stick 

 in the proper way. But now lift it, and point it at the 

 nearest rook, and in an instant he is up with a " caw " 

 of alarm though he knows it is not a gun and flies 

 just above the surface of the ground till he considers 

 himself safe from possibility of danger. Often the 

 whole flock will move before that gesture. It is notice- 

 able that no wild creatures, birds or animals, like any- 

 thing pointed at them ; you may swing your stick 

 freely, but point it, and off goes the finch that showed 

 no previous alarm. So, too, dogs do not seem easy if 

 a stick is pointed at them. 



Rooks are easily approached in the autumn, when 

 gorging the acorns. They may often be seen flying 

 carrying an acorn in the bill. Sometimes a flock will 

 set to work and tear up the grass by the roots over 

 a wide space perhaps nearly half an acre in search 

 of a favourite beetle. The grass is pulled up in little 

 wisps, just about as much as they can hold in their 

 beaks at a time. In spring they make tracks through 

 the mowing-grass not in all the meadows, but only 

 in one here and there, where they find the food they 

 prefer. These tracks are very numerous, and do the 

 grass some damage. Besides following the furrows 

 made by the plough, and destroying grubs, beetles, 

 wireworm, and other pests in incalculable numbers, 

 they seem to find a quantity of insect food in unripe 

 corn ; for they often frequent wheatfields only just 

 turning yellow, and where the grain is not yet devel* 



