BIRDS IN LONDON 271 



than I began to think that there was no better 

 way of spending my leisure time than in revisiting 

 the parks and other open spaces, to find out how 

 the birds were getting on. Insensibly I resumed 

 my old habits : I watched the little grebes' efforts 

 to establish new colonies in difficult circum- 

 stances, and took note of the moorhens' in- 

 crease ; of the growth, evening by evening in 

 summer, of the cloud, of starlings at some 

 favourite roosting -place ; the autumnal exodus 

 of the wood-pigeons, and other yearly-recurring 

 events in the bird life of London. This seems 

 a suitable time, and the present volume the best 

 place, in which to put on record the most interest- 

 ing of the facts I have observed, or picked up 

 from others, during the last half of the year 

 1898. 



One October evening, walking by the Serpen- 

 tine, I observed a carrion crow perched on the 

 dead branch of a tree on the island close to the 

 boathouse, looking big and very black against 

 the level large -orbed crimson sun and flame of 

 yellow clouds. Swelling out his throat and 

 flirting his wings and tail, he poured forth a 

 series of raucous caws, addressed apparently to 



