CEO WS. 67 



three or four red or green feathers are stuck a style of 

 borrowed plumage comical in the extreme the unfortunate 

 birds being a laughing-stock, not only to their biped enemies 

 on the ground, but to their friends amongst the boughs, if 

 one may judge by the clamour with which they are received 

 aloft. 



Shakespeare speaks of the crow as " ribald ; " Prior, 

 " foreboding ; " Dyer, " lurking ; " Churchill and Gay, 

 " strutting ; " Dryden, " dastard ; " and so on. In every land 

 they have a bad name. " Yet they do not wear their colour 

 with humility, or even common decency. On the contrary, 

 they swagger in it, pretending they chose that exact shade 

 for themselves. ... In the verandahs, they parade the 

 reverend sable which they disgrace ; sleek as Chadband, wily 

 as Pecksniff. Their step is grave, and they seem ever on 

 the point of quoting scripture, while their eyes are wandering 

 towards carnal matters. Like Stiggins, they keep a sharp 

 look out for tea-time, and hanker after flesh-pots." Hiawatha 

 knew of a land of dead crow men, and in Thibet the 

 wandering pilgrims say there is an evil city of crows. Those 

 who have dipped into northern fiction must remember the 

 Swedish "Place of crows and devils," and the Norwegian 

 " Hill of Bad Spirits," where the souls of wicked men fly 

 about in the likeness of the same unfortunate bird. In the 

 latter country the crow is an undoubted nuisance, and a 

 terrible poacher ; so he is shot and trapped without mercy, 

 but (as usual) seems to thrive on persecution. The " crow 

 pen " is a common sight in the Scandinavian backwood 

 villages. It is nothing but a huge birdcage, but formed of 

 slender saplings seven or eight feet in length, and about four 

 feet high above the ground. The spaces on top are left 

 pretty wide open for a time, until the crows have become 

 used to going in and out to get the bait and there are few 

 places where their kind will not go for that purpose and 

 then when familiarity has bred hardihood the top pieces are 

 put close together, leaving only a hole through which the 



