22O Wild Life in Wales 



and at what period (if at all) does the sufferer cease to feel 

 pain ? are questions not easily answered. The sufferings 

 that go on daily around us are more than enough to make us 

 shudder, such tenacity of life becoming often incomprehen- 

 sible. Nature has rightly been described as a stoic. Was 

 she in this case standing idly by, gloating over her handi- 

 work, visiting upon one of her children the punishment 

 that rightly belonged to another, and ridiculing man's in- 

 capacity to cope with the problem he had set himself ? She 

 did not intend that one class of animals should occupy the 

 land to the exclusion of others ; and since her insurgent son 

 had decreed it otherwise, was she mocking his inability to 

 prevent the evils her simple cure for which he had taken 

 upon himself to remove ? 



The flight of the Raven, like that of many other large 

 birds, is very powerful, and at the same time very deceptive. 

 Though generally given to soaring, he can, upon occasion, 

 move through the air a great deal more rapidly than we are 

 apt to give him credit for ; a fact that especially impresses 

 itself upon us when he is seen chasing a rival, or an intrud- 

 ing Falcon, from the neighbourhood of his nest. When he 

 happens to pass close to us, too, the swish of his wings is 

 very considerable, and quite comparable to that made by 

 such a bird as a Wild Goose. On a calm evening, when 

 the birds were going to roost, I have sometimes lain in 

 wait for them, on the route they were known to take, 

 and the approach of a bird, or a pair of them, is then 

 frequently announced by the steady flap, flap of their 

 wings, some time before the birds themselves become 

 visible in the gathering twilight. Some years ago, a 

 flock of fifty or sixty Ravens used to roost together, 

 regularly, at Craig-yr-ogof ("the crag of the cave"), 

 on Bwlch-y-groes ; but from having been so much shot 

 at there, they have now deserted it for a quieter retreat 

 across the valley. There, I have sometimes seen con- 

 siderably more than that number come in to roost at 

 night, a body which must have represented the collected 

 birds from a large area of country. 



Sometimes, though not often, when they are circling 



