126 A ROOK STORY 
for a place, screaming with excitement and tearing 
at the flesh. He said it was a most extraordinary 
spectacle; it fascinated him; he watched it by the 
hour and would not allow the carcass to be taken 
down. The next day the birds returned in greater 
numbers and continued their sanguinary feast until 
nothing but the suspended skeleton remained. 
This incident throws no light on the question of 
scent; I have related it just to show the rook as a 
crow, and as an introduction to another incident 
one of the uncanny sort. 
This case too is given at second hand, nor was 
it actually witnessed by my friend and informant 
himself; but I have every faith in him; he is a 
naturalist, a worker now in marine biology, and 
was staying at the time in Essex, close to where it 
happened; he had a full account of it from those 
who witnessed the scene, and was much impressed 
in his mind about it. 
It happened at a manor-house in Essex with an 
old and populous rookery on a group of elm trees 
near the dwelling. The squire, an old man, was dying, 
and on the day of his death the birds all at once rose 
up with excited cawings and came streaming down to 
the house to hover in a dense crowd before the win- 
dows of the sick man's room, beating on the windows 
with their wings, and screaming as if they had gone 
mad. Naturally their action had a disturbing and 
even terrifying effect on the inmates, and its uncanny 
significance was increased when the birds rose up and 
rushed away as if in terror, and when it was found 
