FISH-CROW. 269 



last for hours, during the cahn of a fine morning, after which the whole 

 would descend toward the water, to pursue their more usual avocations 

 in all the sociability of their nature. When their fishing, which lasted 

 about half an hour, was over, they would alight in flocks on the live oaks 

 and other trees near the shores, and there keep up their gabbling, plu- 

 ming themselves for hours. Once more they returned to their fishing- 

 grounds, where they remained until about an hour from sunset, when 

 they made for the interior, often proceeding thirty or forty miles, to roost 

 together in the trees of the Loblolly Pine. They scarcely utter a single 

 note during this retreat, but no sooner does the first glimmer of day ap- 

 pear than the woods around echo to their matin cries of gratulation. They 

 depart at once for the sea-shores, noisy, lively, and happy. Now you 

 find them busily engaged over the bays and rivers, the wharfs, and even 

 the salt-ponds and marshes, searching for small fry, which they easily 

 secure with their claws as they pass close over the water, and picking up 

 any sort of garbage suited to their appetite. 



Like the Raven, the Common Crow, or the Grakle, the Fish-Crow 

 robs other birds of their eggs and young. I observed this particularly 

 on the Florida Keys, where they even dared to plunder the nests of the 

 Cormorant (Carbo Graculus) and White Ibis, waiting with remarkable 

 patience, perched in the neighbourhood, until these birds left their charge. 

 They also frequently alight on large mud flats bordering the salt-water 

 marshes, for the purpose of catching the small crabs called Fiddlers. This 

 they do with ease, by running after them or digging them out of the 

 muddy burrows into which they retire at the approach of danger. I have 

 frequently been amused, while standing on the " Levee"" at New Orleans, 

 to see the alacrity and audacity with which they pursued and attacked the 

 smaller Gulls and Terns, to force them to disgorge the small fish caught 

 by them within sight of the Crows, which, with all the tyrannical fierceness 

 of the Lestris, would chase the sea birds with open bill, and extended feet 

 and claws, dashing towards their victims with redoubled ardour, the far- 

 ther they attempted to retreat. But as most gulls are greatly superior 

 in flight to the Crow, the black tyrants are often frustrated in their at- 

 tempts, and obliged to return, and seek their food in the eddies by their 

 own industry. They are able to catch fish alive with considerable dex- 

 terity, but cannot feed on the wing, and for that purpose are obliged to 

 retire to some tree, stake, or sandbank, and like the Common Crow, the 

 Magpie, and the Cow Bunting, they sometimes alight on the backs of 



