ACROSS THE OPEN FIELDS AND DOWNS. 85 



there is scarcely a field that the ROOK and the 

 STARLING do not frequent every month in the 

 year almost all the food of these two birds is 

 obtained upon them. During every ramble over 

 the fields we may see the blue-black Rooks and 

 the purple, glossy Starlings walking about the 

 pastures or new-tilled lands. The Rooks are 

 wary enough, and take wing before we can get 

 near them, but the Starlings are tamer, and admit 

 of closer scrutiny. If in autumn or winter, the 

 latter birds are generally in flocks which fly off 

 in compact bunches, or gyrate in the air like 

 animated network, ere they settle again with 

 wonderful precision, like well-drilled troops. Then 

 the pert, lively JACKDAW comes to the fields and 

 mingles with the Rooks. Repeatedly, too, the 

 black and white MAGPIE settles on the pastures, 

 and with long tail erect hops about the dung- 

 heaps, or even saucily perches on the back of 

 a grazing sheep. All the summer through the 

 CUCKOO beats about the downs and fields, and 

 often we may see the long- tailed, Hawk-like bird 

 fly across the pastures from the trees in one 

 hedgerow to those in another, whilst his merry 

 note is one of the commonest sounds heard 

 within them. Then the KESTREL in slow and 

 stately flight wings his way across the pastures 

 and the stubbles, hovering on trembling pinions 

 as he scans each foot of ground below for the 

 field mice on which he fares. Then, does not 

 the BARN OWL visit them in the evening's dusk 

 and take up the chase where the Kestrel left it, 

 harrying the meadows and the stubbles for similar 

 creatures ? Again, all day long during spring 



