February 



large, greyish white patch on each wing, giving it to 

 some degree the appearance of a magpie. This is 

 due to faulty secretion, and sometimes rooks are 

 wholly white from this cause, as well as jackdaws, 

 and that contradiction in terms, the white blackbird. 

 Sparrows also may at times be observed with a white 

 patch in some part of their bodies. 



After breakfast, some of the more meditative 

 spirits perch alone, preferably on a high dead branch, 

 a habit I have noted in birds of this kind in various 

 parts of the world. 



It is at such times that the rook, feeling, possibly, 

 that he is beyond the reach of criticism, breaks forth 

 into song ! Whatever may be thought of the song 

 of the rook from the point of view of art, the bird 

 itself evidently finds no small satisfaction in it. 

 From his solitary perch he delivers himself, with 

 sundry antics, of a series of little consequential 

 gabblings, punctuated from time to time by a 

 strident " Caw ! " as he dips his head and cocks his 

 tail to one of the black colony sailing past his singing 

 perch. Genial weather, and probably a well-filled 

 stomach, are accountable for this lapse from corvine 

 gravity ; and when the inspiration is on him, a rook 

 may be approached more closely than at more prosaic 

 moments, as is the case with many other birds with 

 equal pretension to wariness. 



After weeks of unusually mild weather, with a 

 temperature between fifty and sixty degrees Fahr. 

 in the shade, there came a sudden snap of frost on 



73 



