PETS. igi 



The European stork seems naturally so fond of human 

 society that he prefers the roof of a Dutch farm-house 

 to the best nest-tree, and where he can be sure of good 

 winter-quarters he has even been known to forego his 

 yearly trip to the tropics, though his powerful wings 

 would carry him in four days from North Holland to 

 the rush-meadows of the Senegal. All intelligent birds 

 can be domesticated, and the most intelligent of all, the 

 common crow, is one of the kw creatures that can be 

 equally well tamed at any age. The old ones are harder 

 to catch than any other birds of our latitude, but once 

 boxed up they forthwith surrender at discretion, and in 

 a day or two follow their captor all over the house and 

 treat rival pets with vigilant jealousy. I have often won- 

 dered how tame crows and monkeys would probably be 

 if they had been under civilizing influences for as many 

 generations as some of our domestic animals, — chickens, 

 for instance. The dawn-heralding cock is mentioned in 

 the Sama-Veda; but sixty centuries of domestication 

 have only half cured the innate shyness of his tribe. 

 " Rushing around like a scared chicken," is an often-used 

 phrase of the German language : corner a barn-yard fowl 

 in a narrow lane, and see how it will illustrate the fitness 

 of the simile. A tame crow under such circumstances 

 would probably hop on your shoulder or step aside and 

 let you pass. Anatomists could suggest one reason for 

 the difference : in proportion to its size, a raven has about 

 five times as much brains as a gallinaceous fowl. 



