EVICTION OF ROOKS 379 



of the solicitude of the older generation of birds for 

 the younger, whom they have enjoined or allowed 

 to settle in their neighbourhood. A young colony 

 of some thirty pairs of rooks, an offshoot of a much 

 larger rookery also in his grounds, had taken 

 possession of some trees under which ran a zigzag 

 path, leading from his garden down to a stream 

 which falls into the Spey, two miles off, at 

 Craigellachie. This path he was anxious to keep 

 spick and span ; but no expenditure of powder 

 underneath the trees was accepted by the young 

 colonists as notice to quit. It was suggested that 

 the firing of some signal-rockets towards the nests 

 after dark, might answer the purpose. A couple of 

 dozen rockets, discharged in succession, seemed 

 likely, with their loud explosions and showers of 

 fiery stars, to be awe-inspiring enough in any 

 well-regulated community of rooks. But the birds 

 took no notice. They slept or appeared to sleep 

 on, and not so much as a solitary caw evinced any 

 alarm. The same expedient was tried the next 

 night, with the same result. On the third night, 

 double the number of rockets were fired, with no 

 better success ; but at sunrise, next day, it was clear 

 that the fathers of the original rookery had made 

 up their minds that the triple night attack meant 



