132 PASSERES. CORVID^E. 



the shepherd, on account of certain bloody de- 

 signs against his fleecy charge, whenever driven 

 by hunger to the attack, makes his nest in the 

 deepest retirement, in solitude the most inaccessi- 

 ble. He selects a leafless, sapless branch of some 

 stunted tree, a mountain-birch or service, jutting 

 out from the face of a perpendicular rock, and 

 hanging over an abyss hundreds of fathoms deep, 

 the bottom often beset with sharp and pointed 

 rocks. It makes one shudder to think of a living 

 creature being precipitated from the top ; yet 

 here the female Corbie sits secure, and far more 

 fearless, in far less agitation of spirits, than if 

 her nest were placed in a flowery meadow. The 

 nest is constructed of the decayed stems of 

 heather, skilfully and carefully wattled together 

 with twigs of other trees. A layer of moss is 

 next supplied to fill the interstices, and thus 

 render the mass more compact; this layer is 

 thickest at the bottom, and in places, where the 

 outwork of heather has been made too slight, the 

 inside is partially lined with sprigs of the fly- 

 bent, but principally with wool. Here are de- 

 posited the eggs, and here the ca]low brood are 

 fed and nourished, and kept dry and warm. The 

 eggs are five, six, or seven in number, of a bluish 

 colour, blotched with irregular spots of brown. 

 The order in which they are deposited is scarcely 

 ever seen, for it rarely happens that a human 

 being can approach sufficiently near for that pur- 

 pose. The young Corbies, however, are seldom 

 permitted to escape ; for the shepherd, seeking 

 the spot, perilous though it be, smashes the eggs 

 with stones hurled from above, and batters the 

 nest to pieces. He sometimes postpones his re- 



