The Rook's Tenacity of Habit. 285 
descends upon some favourite field, till by degrees, 
spreading out like a fan, the army melts away. In 
the evening the various companies, which may by 
that time have worked farto the right or to the left, 
gradually move into line. By-and-by the vanguard 
comes sweeping up, and each regiment rises from 
the meadow or the hill, and takes its accustomed 
place in the return journey. 
So that although if you casually observe a flock 
of rooks in the daytime they seem to wander hither 
and thither just as fancy leads, or as they are driven 
by passers-by, in reality they have all their special 
haunts; they adhere to certain rules, and even act in 
concert, thousands upon thousands of them at once, 
as if in obedience to the word of command, and as 
if aware of the precise moment at which to move. 
They have their laws, from which there is no devia- 
tion: they are handed down unaltered from generation 
to generation. Tradition, indeed, seems to be their 
main guide, as it is with savage human tribes. They 
have their particular feeding grounds; and so you 
may notice that, comparing ten or a dozen fields, one 
or two will almost always be found to be frequented 
by rooks while the rest are vacant. 
Here, for instance, is a meadow close to a farm- 
stead—what is usually called the home-field, from its 
proximity to a house—here day after day rooks alight 
and spend hours in it, as much at their ease as the 
nag or the lambs brought up by hand. Another 
