216 Bm/s. 



ture of his beak and talons indicate his carnivorous nature ; and we 

 find in the days of falconry he was trained to that sport : but he does 

 hot seem to have recourse to rapine and murder unless irritated, or 

 hard pressed by hunger, for he prefers camon just entering on a pu- 

 trid state to a victim recently slain. He is known throughout the old 

 continent, from the Arctic seas to the Cape of Good Hope ; and in 

 America, from Hudson's Bay to Mexico.* He is seen in the remotest 

 isles of the polar seas, and within the torrid zone ; and is the only 

 fowl whose character remains unchanged by the extremes of heat and 

 cold. He constantly traverses the mountain regions ; and, breathing 

 a pure atmosphere, he lives to a great age, and is able to make the 

 most laborious flights from one country to another. 



The corbie is well known to the shepherd on all the hilly tracts of 

 Scotland. His common cry is croak, but when in a state of excite- 

 ment he utters another sound, which, if I could manage to express by 

 letters, I should spell thus — whii-ur : this is repeated with great ra- 

 pidity, a strong accent being laid on the two ih, and the ur or last 

 syllable seeming to proceed from a collapsing of the throat after its 

 distension in pronouncing the first. With this cry he very commonly 

 intermixes another, something like clung, uttered very much as by a 

 human voice, only a little wilder in the sound. The ravens are ex- 

 cited to these cries w^hen the shepherd or his dog seems likely to dis- 

 cover a carcass on which they have been rioting and feasting. 



In ravens, the senses of sight and smell are remarkably acute and 

 powerful. Perched usually on some tall cliff that commands a wide 

 survey, these faculties are in constant and rapid exercise, and all the 

 movements of the bird are regulated in accordance with the informa- 

 tion thus procured. The smell of death is so grateful to them, that 

 they utter a loud croak of satisfaction instantly on perceiving it. In 



* The reader is referred to the Prince of Musignano's * Comparative List of the 

 Birds of Europe and North America.' It will be there seen that the talented author 

 considers the American representative of our corbie or raven to be the Corvus Catototl 

 of Wagler, and that the " southern parts'' of N. America alone are assigned to it as a 

 locality, (p. 28) : but Mr. Wilson speaks of the raven as being numerous at the falls 

 of Niagara; Dr. Richardson says it is abundant in the fur countries of North Ame- 

 rica ; and Mr. Audubon states that it occasionally breeds in the mountainous parts of 

 South Carolina. We are therefore inclined to agree with our correspondent in consi- 

 dering the true raven common to both continents, and to doubt whether the Corvus 

 Corax of Wilson be identical with the Mexican raven, as supposed by the Prince of 

 Musignano. There are apparently two American species; for it seems scarcely pro- 

 bable that the wedge-tailed or Mexican raven is the bird noticed so far north. See 

 also Mr. Yarrell's ' History of British Birds,' ii. 123.— jFrf. 



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