232 THE OPEN AIR. 



with long deliberate steps and outstretched neck. 

 ''Ee-aw! Ee-aw! What's this? What's this?" he 

 inquired in bird-language. "Ee-aw! Ee-aw! My 

 friends, see here ! " Gravely, and step by step, he came 

 nearer and nearer, slowly, and not without some fear, 

 till curiosity had brought him within a yard. In a 

 moment or two a peahen followed and also stretched 

 out her neck — the two long necks pointing at the 

 black flapping wing. A second peacock and peahen 

 approached, and the four great birds stretched out 

 their necks towards the dying rook — a "crowner's 

 quest " upon the unfortunate creature. 



If any one had been at hand to sketch it, the 

 scene would have been very grotesque, and not with- 

 out a ludicrous sadness. There was the tall elm 

 tinted with yellow, the black rooks high above flying 

 in and out, yellow leaves twirling down, the blue 

 peacocks with their crests, the red barn behind, the 

 golden sun afar shining low through the trees of the 

 park, the brown autumn sward, a gray horse, orange 

 maple bushes. There was the quiet tone of the 

 coming evening — the early evening of October — such 

 an evening as the rook had seen many a time from 

 the tops of the trees. A man dies, and the crowd 

 goes on passing under the window along the street 

 without a thought. The rook died, and his friends, 

 who had that day been with him in the oaks feasting 

 on acorns, who had been with him in the fresh-turned 

 furrows, born perhaps in the same nest, utterly for- 

 got him before he was dead. With a great common 

 caw— a common shout — they suddenly left the tree in 

 a bevy and flew towards the park. The peacocks 



