118 BIRDS AND MAN 



Birds of Wiltshire, " is no mean ornament to a 

 park, and speaks of a wide domain and large 

 timber, and an ancient family ; for the raven is 

 an aristocratic bird and cannot brook a confined 

 property and trees of a young growth. Would 

 that its predilection were more humoured and a 

 secure retreat allowed it by the larger proprietors 

 in the land ! " 



The wide domains, the large timber, and the 

 ancient famihes survive, but the raven has 

 vanished. It occasionally takes a young rabbit. 

 But the human ravens of Somerset — to wit, the 

 men and boys who have as Uttle right to the 

 rabbits — do the same. I do not suppose that 

 in this way fewer than ten thousand to twenty 

 thousand rabbits are annually "picked up," or 

 " poached " — if any one likes that word better — 

 in the county. Probably a larger number. The 

 existence of a pair of ravens on an estate of 

 twenty or thirty thousand acres would not add 

 much to the loss. No doubt the raven kUls 

 other creatures that are preserved for sport, but 

 it does not appear that its -extermination has 

 improved things in Somerset. Thirty years ago, 

 when black-game was more plentiful than it is 



