ig4 Wild Life in Wales 



carelessly, and often noisily, at any time after the middle of 

 the afternoon ; the Crows arrived in pairs, generally rather 

 late, and, warned by previous experience, assembled at 

 distant points of vantage, sometimes away on the other side 

 of the lake, whence they called to, and answered one another, 

 till dusk and the already settled Rooks seemed to bespeak 

 safety. They then discounted all their previous prudence 

 by an excess of caution that cost more than two or three of 

 them their lives. Had they joined the Rooks and, coming 

 in with them, kept silence, it would have been exceedingly 

 difficult to distinguish them in the crowd ; but, in place of 

 doing that, they always came by themselves, and not content 

 with the scouting already done by the Rooks, must needs 

 take a few turns round and over the trees, advertising their 

 presence by their raucous cries, and thus giving their hidden 

 foe just the opportunity for which he was waiting. 



The Jays crept into some dark fir top, or holly bush, 

 with the stealth that always characterises their summer 

 movements, and were never heard, and seldom seen, unless 

 when they chanced to be accidentally disturbed. The 

 Magpies were almost as cautious in entering the wood, and 

 displayed even greater dexterity than the Jays in escaping 

 on the other side of a tree, or branch, if compelled to leave 

 it. But of all the visitors, none turned his talents to better 

 account than the Hawk, which, though he (it was an adult 

 male) probably roosted there every night throughout the 

 winter, never offered even the ghost of a chance to the gun. 

 On a still night his arrival on the outskirts of the wood was 

 generally announced by the silence that, of a sudden, fell on 

 the noisy small birds, or the warning call of a Chaffinch, 

 always one of the most certain indications of the presence of 

 a Sparrow-Hawk ; but he never very closely approached 

 his lodging till the light had faded considerably. He then 

 came with the directness of an arrow, and on such silent 

 wing, that he was scarcely more visible than a vague grey 

 shadow flickering through the trees. He always roosted 

 somewhere near the same spot, but apparently never two 

 nights consecutively on the same tree ; though the perch 

 for which he was making seemed to have been definitely 



