VERMIN AND TRAPPING 85 



of the neat little bird sitting on her treasures, 

 and gives a gleeful squawk ; then, with a regular 

 fanfare of squawking, its egg-thirsty companions 

 gather round the nest. Yet somehow or another 

 they seem to hesitate to start on their unholy feast, 

 though they strut around with a great show of bold- 

 ness and much more squawking. The partridge 

 has hissed at them ! A little partridge hen, save 

 for a bit of a beak weaponless, but full of quiet 

 pluck, has refused to leave her post at the demand 

 of a score or so of robbers, each with a bill powerful 

 enough to brain her at a blow, but each in a blue- 

 black funk. Again the partridge hisses and ruffles 

 her feathers. The foremost of the besieging throng 

 feels it an unwise honour to lead the attack, and 

 flops into the air to take a safer place behind its 

 clamouring comrades, and squawks the more vigor- 

 ously that the business should be proceeded with. 

 At last, worn out by the cowardly buffetings of the 

 merciless throng, the partridge is evicted from her 

 nest, and with a wrangling chorus of triumphant 

 squawks the villains guzzle the eggs. That is when 

 I could use an automatic gun. When I did get a 

 chance at a rookery, much as I hated the job as 

 sport, I did things thoroughly. This reminds me 

 of a lucky coincidence. The owner of a rookery 

 had let too many young rooks fly away at least, I 

 thought so and as I was passing a clump of trees 

 in one of my fields in the late evening out flopped a 



