92 THE LAND'S END 



full length on the bed of moss with a jackdaw sitting 

 on his ribs busily searching for ticks or parasites of 

 some kind and picking them from his skin. The 

 other two donkeys were standing by, gazing at the 

 busy bird and probably envying their comrade his 

 good luck. My sudden appearance at a distance of 

 two or three yards greatly alarmed them. Away 

 flew the daw, and up jumped the recumbent donkey, 

 and then all three stared at me, not at all pleased at 

 the intrusion. 



It seemed to me on this occasion that in the daw, 

 the friend and helper of our poor slave the donkey, 

 the bird that in its corvine intelligence and cunning 

 approaches nearest to ourselves among the avians, we 

 have yet another link uniting man to his wild fellow- 

 creatures. 



There is a good deal of rough weather but little 

 frost in this district ; behind the cliffs, sheltered by 

 stone hedges and thickets of furze, the green field is 

 the chief feeding-ground of the birds ; there with the 

 rooks and daws and gulls and peewits you find field- 

 fares the bluebird of the natives and missel- 

 thrushes in flocks, and the greybird, as the song- 

 thrush is called, the blackbird and small troops of 

 wintering larks. Most abundant is the starling, a 

 winter visitor too, for he does not breed in this part 

 of Cornwall. You will find a flock in every little 

 field, and the sight of your head above the stone wall 

 sends them off with a rush, emitting the low guttural 

 alarm note which sounds like running water. 



The yellowhammer is a common resident species 



