268 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



the tree I found four eggs of the Jackdaw in the nest, which had evidently 

 been built by Magpies this spring. The Jackdaws had much enlarged the 

 hole in the roof, and had lined the nest according to their own ideas. 

 About half a mile away another pair of Magpies have been ejected by a pair 

 of Kestrels: this happened before the nest was completed. — E. W. H. 

 Blagg (Cheadle, Staffordshire). 



Thrush's Nest without the usual Lining.— When birdnest^ng last 

 week I found three Thrush's nests lined with grass instead of rotten wood ; 

 they all contained eggs, and were well made and much thicker than usual. 

 I have seen many hundreds of Thrush's nests, but never one lilve these. 

 If they had been on a moor, or in a town garden where rotten wood was 

 scarce, I should not have been so much surprised, but they were in a wood 

 of eight hundred acres, where abundance of the usual lining-material might 

 be found. — J. Whitaker (Rainworth, near Mansfield). 



Habits of Rooks. — In 1885 my brother, Mr. J. S. B. Borough, reared 

 a young Rook, which had fallen or been blown from a nest in the rookery 

 in the park here. The freedom of this bird had never been in any way 

 interfered with, but he is very tame with the few persons with whom he is 

 on intimate terms, and rarely has missed coming daily to be fed in the 

 outhouse in which he was reared. Last year we had every reason to 

 believe that he nested and had a nest in the rookery in the park where he 

 was hatched. This year, however, he and his mate belong to the thirty-six 

 pairs or so which foira the rookery round the house, and they built a nest 

 in the smaller of two contiguous elms. I ought to say here that my brother 

 and I know this tame bird when on the wing by a slight space about 

 midway in his left wing, and on the perch by a small division in his tail- 

 feathers, which prevents the tail from presenting the usual evenly rounded 

 appearance. On April ILth my brother noticed that his bird carried food to 

 and fed a bird sitting on a nest in the larger elm. He had also previously 

 observed him carrying sticks to a nest other than his own. Since that day — 

 which was I presume one of the first on which his second hen began to sit — 

 the tame Idrd has fed both the sitting birds, as a rule, but not invariably, 

 alternately. Yesterday (April 17lh) I watched the two nests from 10 a.m. 

 to 1.10 p.m., noting down all that occurred. During that time I observed 

 that the tame bird fed his mates twelve times. His earlier mate, in the 

 smaller elm, he fed seven times and the other five times. On four occasions 

 certainly, and possibly on more, he took food — i.e., raw meat or bread and 

 milk — from the outhouse in which he is usually fed, but on one occasion I 

 watched him fly into ihe meadows and return with a |)0uch full of food in a 

 quarter of an hour's time. No other bird fed the two sitting hens or either 

 of them during the whole of this time. On each occasion of his feeding 

 them I identified our bird as he arrived or departed. The above facts show, 



