568 



Adult Male (Falster, Denmark, 22nd January). Entire plumage black, richly glossed with steel-blue and 

 purple, these colours being most apparent on the upper parts of the body, the head, neck, and the upper 

 surface of the wings ; feathers on the throat lanceolate, much elongated, and richly glossed with purple ; 

 tail rounded, and almost wedge-shaped, the central rectrices being much longer than the lateral ones ; 

 . bill and legs shining black ; iris brown. Total length about 26 inches, culmen 3*7, height of the bill at 

 base 1-1, wing 16"2, tail 10 - 1, tarsus 2'65 ; fourth primary longest, the third being only a trifle shorter, 

 the second 1 inch less than the third, and the first 3 inches less than the second. 



Female. A trifle less in size than the male, and not quite so bright in plumage. 



Young (Archangel, 25th May) . Duller in colour than the adult bird ; and the feathers on the throat are 

 loose in texture, and not lanceolate. 



The Raven is a widely distributed species, being found throughout both the Palsearctic and 

 Nearctic Regions, rather more numerously, however, in the northern than in the southern 

 portions of Europe, Asia, and America. 



In Great Britain it is more numerous in the northern portions of the islands, being but 

 rare in the south ; and its numbers are gradually diminishing. Mr. More gives but some few 

 details respecting its breeding-haunts in England, and says that it is nearly extirpated in 

 many of the midland and eastern counties. That it is not extinct in the southern counties is 

 evident from the following extract from a letter received from Mr. J. Gatcombe, of Plymouth : — 

 " Ravens breed annually on the coasts of Devon and Cornwall, and would rapidly increase were 

 it not for the good price offered by the dealers in live birds for every young one that can be 

 obtained during the nesting-season. One dealer living at Plymouth received no less than 

 twenty-five young birds during the past spring (most of them from Cornwall), and nearly as 

 many last year. All these birds I myself saw, also three or four others belonging to a friend of 

 mine in Plymouth. Several pairs breed annually on the coast near Plymouth, also in the vicinity 

 of Dartmoor ; and on the 23rd of July last I observed no less than ten Ravens in a flock at 

 ' Wembury,' on the coast a few miles from Plymouth. The price asked by a dealer for a fine 

 healthy young bird is from fifteen to twenty shillings ; and most of them are sent to London. 

 I am sorry to say that the gamekeepers, too, kill many Ravens in this neighbourhood ; and the 

 bird-stuffers get their share." 



In the midland as well as the eastern counties it has become very rare ; and Mr. Stevenson 

 states (B. of Norf. i. p. 257) that he has been unable to ascertain the existence of more than a 

 pair or two of Ravens in any part of Norfolk as actual residents in a wild state ; and Mr. Cordeaux 

 says that it has long ceased to exist in North Lincolnshire and Holderness. In Scotland, according 

 to Mr. Robert Gray, it is, in spite of all persecution, still common on some parts of the mainland 

 and on both groups of islands, extending to the Haskeir rocks and St. Kilda. Up to 1870, he 

 says, " it continues breeding at the Mull of Galloway, Ailsa Craig, the Island of Arran, Jura, 

 Mull, Islay, Skye, and, it may be added, all the other islands of the Inner Hebrides, where there 

 are suitable cliffs for its protection." Dr. Saxby says that it is common and resident in Shetland. 

 In Ireland it is stated by Thompson to be generally distributed. In Greenland it is found 

 throughout the country up to very far north, and breeds there. On the last German Arctic 

 expedition it was met with at all places which were visited, always being seen in pairs. 



