364



Mr. A. B. Williams,



animal and vegetable kingdom for his food. Of slugs, grubs, worms,

and other creatures of the earth he eats an enormous quantity, as

he does also of acorns.


Coming up a bank suddenly to a sloping field, we disturbed a

rook. He flew up with a rush, bearing something between his claws.


In his haste he had not secured his prize, and it dropped. I went

and picked it up. It was a big potato. In it there were two or

three holes pecked and claw marks. My companion, a local country¬

man, informs me that rooks are very partial to potatoes.


Talking of acorns brings us to the subject of wild pigeons,.


“ quiests ” or “ quises ” as they are called about here.


The pigeon is the farmer’s bete noir • The pigeon has no word

said in its favour. It takes toll of everything vegetable, prefers

crops and leaves pests strictly alone. So it is shot whenever

possible, but flourishes nevertheless, and seems to be increasing,

although it is exempted from the Wild Birds’ Protection Acts, as is

also the sparrow.


“Quiests” eat large quantities of grain, peas, and beans.

They have a still more culpable weakness. It is for young clover.

They bite it off close to the ground, often so closely as to prevent

further growth. In fact, they will eat anything green and tender,

and any kind of seeds. Their voracity for acorns is astonishing-

My friend assures me that he has taken as many as nineteen acorns j

from the crop of one pigeon.


This part of the country is a perfect birds’ paradise. The

prevalence of large farms, the fertility of the soil, the abundance of

woodland, covert, and hedge row, and the sparsity of population, all

favour birds, and they take full advantage of these opportunities.


Man, as farmer, curses many of the birds, and tries to reduce

their numbers, but with little success. The two he hates most, the j

sparrow and the wild pigeon, are the commonest, and their numbers j

seem to increase.


Pigeons have some peculiar habits. They are very fond of

larch trees, and will spend hours in them, perched cooing and preen¬

ing, hut never build there. The nests are usually in woodland trees,

beech being shown a preference.


The sparrows are ubiquitous. They swarm everywhere, and



