sea O F I N S T I N C T. SECT. XVL I ji 



The following extract from a Letter of the Rev. 

 IVJr. J. Darwin, of Carleton Scroop in Lincolnfhire, 

 authenticates a curious fact of this kind. " When 

 I mentioned to you the circumftance of crows or 

 frooks building in the fpire of Welbourn church, 

 you expreiTed a defire of being well informed of the 

 certainty of the fact. Welbourn is fituated in the 

 road from Grantham to Lincoln on the Cliff row ; I 

 yefterday took a ride thither, and enquired of the 

 re&or, Mr. Ridgehill, whether the report was true, 

 that rooks built in the fpire of his church. He af- 

 fured me it was true, and that they had done fo time 

 immemorial, as his parifhioners affirmed. There was 

 a common tradition, he faid, that formerly a rookery 

 in fome high trees adjoined the church yard, which 

 being cut down (probably in the ipring, the building 

 ieafon), the rooks removed to the church, and built 

 theiy nefts on the outfide of the fpire on the tops of 

 windows, which by their projection a little from the 

 fpire made them convenient room, but that they 

 built a Ho on the infide. I faw two nefts made with 

 /licks on the outfide, and in the fpires, and Mr. 

 Ridgehill faid there were always a great many. 



Ct Ifpent the day with Mr. Wright, a clergyman, 

 at Fulbeck, near Welbourn, and in the afternoon Dr. 

 Ellis of Headenham, about two miles from Weibourn, 

 drank tea at Mr. Wright's, who faid he remembered, 

 when Mr. Welby lived at Welbourn, that he received 

 a letter from an acquaintance in the weft of England, 

 defiring an anfwer, whether the report of rooks 

 building in Welbourn church was true, as a wager 

 was depending on that fubject : to which he returned 

 an anfwer ascertaining the fact, and decided the 

 wager." Aug. 30, 1704. 



So the jackdaw (corvus monedula) generally 

 builds in church-fteeples, or under the roofs of 

 high houfes ; but at Selbourn, in Southamptonihire, 

 where towers and fteeples are not fufficiently nu- 

 merous, 



