68 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



the people who only viewed the present, regretted the loss of the 

 grackles. In a few years afterwards, a few pairs were again 

 introduced ; their preservation and breeding were made a State 

 affair ; the laws held out protection to them, and the physi- 

 cians, on their part, declared their flesh to be unwholesome. 

 The grackles accordingly multiplied, and the locusts were 

 destroyed." 



Kalm remarks, in his " Travels in America," that after a 

 great destruction made among tlie purple grackles and crow 

 blackbirds, for the legal reward of three pence per dozen, the 

 Nortliern States, in 1749, experienced a complete loss of the 

 grass and grain crops, from the devastation of insects and 

 their larva. The crows of North America were likewise, 

 some years since, in consequence of premiums offered for their 

 destruction, so nearly exterminated, that the increase of insects 

 became alarmingly great ; and the States were obliged to offer 

 counter-rewards for the protection of crows. The same incident 

 has frequently happened in other countries. 



The protection afforded in Europe to rooks, a species allied 

 to our common crow, and resembling it exactly in its habits of 

 feeding, may be quoted as a lesson to Americans, who consider 

 the crow as only a mischievous marauder. The rook feeds 

 upon corn and all kinds of grain, but he is protected, on 

 account of his services as a consumer of insects in all their 

 forms. Rooks are often seen in such numbers upon newly 

 ploughed land in England, as to blacken it with their plumage. 

 Yet the laborers in the field do not molest them, though they 

 must be watched to prevent their doing mischief by destroying 

 green corn. In spite of all this, they are reckoned among the 

 farmer's friends, and are exempted from molestation. Crows 

 do the same kind of mischief, and they are also equally 

 serviceable to agriculture ; but they are destroyed without 

 mercy. John Randolph was so well satisfied of their utility 

 that he would not allow a crow to be shot upon his farm ; and 

 to prevent their depredations, he fed them liberally at such 

 times as his young corn was likely to be injured by them. 



" On account of the propensity of rooks to consume grain 

 and other seeds," Mr. Sclby remarks, " they have erroneously 

 been viewed in the light of an enemy by most husbandmen, 

 and in several districts in England, attempts have formerly 



