OF SELBORNE. 381 



evening after it is dark, from the uplands of the hill 

 and North Field, away down towards Dorton; where, 

 among the streams and meadows, they find a greater 

 plenty of food. Birds that fly by night are obliged to 

 be noisy ; their notes often repeated become signals or 

 watch-words to keep them together, that they may not 

 stray or lose each the other in the dark. 



The evening proceedings and manceuvres*of the rooks 

 are curious and amusing in the autumn. Just before 

 dusk they return in long strings from the foraging of the 

 day, and rendezvous by thousands over Selborne Down, 

 where they wheel round in the air, and sport and dive 

 in a playful manner, all the while exerting their voices, 

 and making a loud cawing, which, being blended and 

 softened by the distance that we at the village are 

 below them, becomes a confused noise or chiding; or 

 rather a pleasing murmur, very engaging to the imagi- 

 nation, and not unlike the cry of a pack of hounds in 

 hollow, echoing woods, or the rushing of the wind in 

 tall trees, or the tumbling of the tide upon a pebbly 

 shore. When this ceremony is over, with the last 

 gleam of day, they retire for the night to the deep 

 beechen woods of Tisted and Ropley. We remember 

 a little girl who, as she was going to bed, used to remark 

 on such an occurrence, in the true spirit of physico-the- 

 ology, that the rooks were saying their prayers; and 

 yet this child was much too young to be aware that the 

 scriptures have said of the Deity that " he feedeth the 

 ravens who call upon him." 



I am, &c. 



