Anglesey 



When one of the jackdaws perched upon a tower 

 where a thrush was waiting to deliver some food * 

 to its young, the thrush made a demonstration of 

 attack. There is a power which " makes for 

 righteousness " among birds as well as among 

 men, for, let a bird be as big as he will, if he be 

 a crooked dealer, a thief or a murderer, conscience 

 makes a coward of him, and I have seldom known 

 such a bird to stand his ground against the righteous 

 indignation of even incomparably smaller birds. The 

 smallest birds will mob the cuckoo ; I have seen 

 blackbirds keep an old owl on the run until it only 

 escaped from them by bolting down a hollow tree ; 

 meadow-pipits will have their say to the kestrel ; the 

 little ringed plover will dart up at the marauding 

 black-backed gulls, and these in their turn will attack 

 that master among thieves, the carrion crow. A 

 rook will go a long way round to avoid nesting lap- 

 wings, and if it is made the object of attack, its 

 companions profit by the diverted attention of the 

 attackers to cut round at top speed by another way. 

 But this jackdaw stood his ground stolidly before 

 the excited thrush. Evidently he had a clear con- 

 science, or no conscience at all. 



The Menai Strait, about eighteen miles long, lies 

 on a north-east and south-west line. About five 

 miles broad at its northern entrance, it gradually 

 contracts throughout the first six miles until, at a 

 point about a couple of miles above Beaumaris, it 

 measures only a mile and a half across. Here, 



'73 



