320 BIRD BEHAVIOUR 



Cockatoo, a specimen of which, known to be 

 ninety-six years of age, was exhibited at a bird- 

 show at the Horticultural Hall in London in 1913, 

 while another has recently died in Australia at the 

 record age of a hundred and nineteen; or of the 

 well-known London Swan, " Old Tom," killed by 

 accident at the age of seventy. The Game-birds 

 are not usually notorious for longevity, but some 

 years ago a record was published in ?he Field of a 

 Peacock killed by accident at ninety-six, and Lady 

 Warwick in recent years has possessed a white one 

 which, as recorded in Country Life, must have been 

 nearly a century old, since the oldest man on the 

 estate, it seems, said that his father, who died a 

 very old man, could remember knowing this bird 

 as an adult in his own boyhood. 



There are no records of the Raven tending to 

 confirm the extreme length of days traditionally 

 attributed to it, no captive specimen having even 

 reached the three-score years and ten allotted to 

 man ; but the smaller Passerine birds are certainly 

 very long-lived for their size, the Canary commonly 

 living ten years and sometimes twenty, while a 

 tame cock-Sparrow of seventeen years old is re- 

 corded by Mr. Hudson in his " London Birds." 

 These celibate birds, however, very likely have their 

 lives unnaturally prolonged by never breeding ; and 

 a bird in captivity, in spite of the drawback of 

 want of exercise, has a chance of surviving many 

 years after its constitution has become too weak to 

 bear the violent exercise of escaping from Hawks 



