160 VERTEBRATE FAUNA OF LAKELAND 



in some most inaccessible spot.' It would be unhandsome to 

 jeopardise the safety of the eggs or young of any of our Lake- 

 land Ravens by publishing the whereabouts of the precipices in 

 which they rear their young. These are only too well known 

 already to shepherds and keepers, who sometimes stone the 

 fledgelings in the nest if they cannot be taken out alive. There 

 are more Eavens in Westmorland than in Cumberland, if the 

 whole of our area, from the Yorkshire border, be considered; 

 though, when we leave the precipices of the Lake mountains 

 proper, the cliffs and valleys in which they breed are highly 

 isolated. Dr. Heysham commented on the tenacity with which 

 Ravens adhere to their traditional breeding stations, a remark 

 which is illustrated by a pair which have long bred in the 

 neighbourhood of Alston. In a letter written to T. C. Heysham 

 on May 9, 1831, William Dodd volunteers the remark : 'The 

 Raven breeds upon Crossfell. I could send you a young one 

 taken out of a nest there a week or so ago, if you request it.' 



The Raven has made its mark for all time in the place-names 

 of Lakeland ; not only in those which are self-evident, but in 

 some that are less obvious. Renwick, for instance, is a con- 

 traction of Eavens' wick. Mr. J. A. Harvie-Brown has else- 

 where drawn attention to the habit which obtains in some 

 regions, of Ravens assembling numerously to roost together in 

 some favourite locality. A single hint that such a rendezvous of 

 Ravens may formerly have been adopted in Lakeland is supplied 

 by a remark in Mrs. Howard's Reminiscences, in the course of 

 which the lady remarks of Corby, ' the farthest point is called 

 the Raven Clint, as Ravens flock there for shelter' (p. 98). The 

 allusion recalls the fact that Ravens naturally nested in the 

 larger trees of the Eden valley, until compelled by persecution to 

 seek a safer asylum among the lofty crags of our mountain passes. 

 This is not a mere conjecture. Sandford, writing about 1675, 

 tells us that Crosbie Ravensworth was so called ' of the Rauens 

 Timbring in the Timber Trees ther, but now not a timber Tree 

 standing.' 1 The only point of the N.W. coast upon which Ravens 

 ever nest is identical with the sandstone cliffs of Sandwith. 

 A pair nested there in 1888; in 1891 they had left the locality. 

 1 Sandford MS. , p. 32. 



