106 PHEASANTS FOR COVERTS AND AVIARIES. 



And there a weasel is watching, popping his head at intervals 

 out of different holes in the neighbouring bank, undeterred 

 by the fate of several of his family, who have already been 

 trapped there and gibbeted. But more dangerous than hawk 

 or weasel are the jackdaws. For, as these vociferous birds 

 bear comparatively respectable characters, they are more 

 likely to be indulged with a licence they abuse. We know 

 them to be bavards : we cannot deny the family tendency ta 

 kleptomania. But we are in the way of believing chattering 

 to be the sign of a frank, shallow nature, and we are apt to- 

 condone the thefts that are perpetrated with no view to 

 profit. In reality, the jackdaw is a deep hypocrite a robber 

 and a bloody-beaked murderer. He chatters his way from 

 branch to branch above the coops with the most unconcerned 

 air in the world just as a human thief walks, whistling, 

 with his hands in his pockets, towards the prey he means to 

 make a snatch at. Then, when he sees himself unnoticed, 

 the jackdaw stills his chatter and makes his stealthy swoop ; 

 and in this way, watching while your watcher's back is 

 turned, he massacres a whole family of your innocents, and 

 the hawks and weasels get the credit of the crime. But,, 

 after all, a gun kept upon the spot generally inspires a 

 salutary dread. 



"Many of your young birds survive the perils of their 

 cheeperhood ; then the long grass in the neighbouring bits 

 of covert becomes alive with them, and once in that stage 

 they are comparatively safe. Thenceforward till the autumn 

 they feed and thrive, strengthen and fatten. And, sport, sale, 

 and the autumn game course out of the question, what can be 

 pleasanter or prettier in the way of sounds or sights than 

 the young birds learning to crow in your coverts as you 

 saunter out before breakfast, or scattered about your lawn as 

 you dine, with open windows, of a summer evening ? " 



The most successful mode of rearing pheasants is to adopt, 

 in those situations where the conditions are favourable, what 

 may be termed the more natural system, such as has been 



