A TRAINED RAVEN 81 



There is no worse vermin than the common house cat when 

 she takes to hunting, and I have known them go completely 

 wild and breed in the woods. The custom in the farm-house 

 and cottage is, when the hour at night for shutting up comes, 

 to give the cat a kick, and turn her out into the barn-yard or 

 garden to catch rats, or, in fact, to shift for herself. A cat soon 

 finds that leverets and rabbits are not only better eating, but 

 that they do not bite when caught, so, instead of ratting or 

 mousing, she repairs to the preserve of game. While living 

 at the Inn at Cranford Bridge, I knew a cat to bring into the 

 kitchen, one by one, a whole covey of partridges. For cats, the 

 hutch-trap is good, but a steel trap, with the paunch of a rabbit 

 suspended about six inches from the ground against the butt of 

 a tree, the trap set within an inch of the bait, so that if a fox 

 came to take it, which is very unlikely, he could do so over the 

 trap without being caught, is the best ; the fence twigs on either 

 side the bait also, though high enough to guide a cat, are so 

 low that a fox would reach over them. To these traps I added 

 the call-boy services of a tame raven, which was chained, as is 

 customary with a macaw. When fastened out in a field between 

 the woods, within shot of the gun, the raven makes a very good 

 decoy, for kites and hawks will take a stoop or two close over 

 his head, and crows, jays, and magpies come to mob him. I had 

 a raven, while at Cranford, which was so tame that I could toss 

 him up (he was pinioned) on to the nearest bough, and he would 

 ascend to some bare branch to sun himself or plume his feathers, 

 and croak at every large bird he saw. So used to the killing of 

 other vermin was he, and so pleased with it, that whatever fell 

 to the gun, he would descend the tree in the most amusing hurry 

 to get to the ground, and with his ponderous beak hammer the 

 head of the fallen victim. When the decoy for the place was 

 over, a lure of meat would always bring him to hand. This 

 puts me in mind of a story told me of a raven. The bird was 

 tame and pinioned, and had strayed from his owner's house into 

 the orchard of the village curate. A lot of rooks having visited 

 the parson^s cherries, the reverend gentleman kept his gun in 



