Habits of Rooks 237 



than in any other ; that is, a line drawn northwards from 

 the remaining wood passes through a belt of well-timbered 

 country. On either side of this belt there is much less 

 timber; so that the rooks that desired to build nests 

 beyond the limits of the enclosed wood still found in the 

 old places the best trees for their purpose. Here may be 

 seen far more rookeries than in any other direction. 

 Hardly a farmhouse lying near this belt but has got its 

 rookery, large or small. Once these rookeries were 

 established, an inducement to follow this route would 

 arise in the invariable habit of the birds of visiting their 

 nesting-trees even when the actual nesting time is 

 past. 



Thirdly, if the inquiry be carried still farther back, it 

 is possible that the line taken by the rooks indicates the 

 line of the first clearings in very early days. The clearing 

 away of trees and underwood, by opening the ground and 

 rendering it accessible, must be very attractive to birds, 

 and rooks are particularly fond of following the plough. 

 Now although the district is at present chiefly meadow 

 land, numbers of these meadows were originally ploughed 

 fields, of which there is evidence in the surface of the fields 

 themselves, where the regular ' lands ' and furrows are 

 distinctly visible. 



One or all of these suggestions may perhaps account 

 for the course followed by the rooks. In any case it seems 

 natural to look for the reason in the trees. The same idea 

 applies to the other stream of rooks which leaves the wood 

 for the eastward every morning, flying along the downs. 

 In describing the hill district, evidence was given of the 

 existence of woods or forest land upon the downs in the 

 olden time. Detached copses and small woods are still to 

 be found ; and it happens that a part of this district, in 



