370 THE YOUNG 



(the names have escaped our memory) 

 how at a certain time of year, large 

 number of birds — Books we believe — 

 used to assemble, how a great deal of 

 cawing and chattering went on, and 

 how at the end, one or more of the birds 

 were set upon by the others and pecked 

 to pieces. The assumption, of course, 

 was that the birds had offended in some 

 way against " Bird Law," had been 

 tried by their peers, condemned, and 

 executed. After a time we began to 

 see birds and notice their ways for our- 

 selves; we never saw anything of the 

 sort, nor did we ever meet with any 

 one who had; so after a period of doubt, 

 this pretty story was relegated to the 

 region of fiction in our mind, it was a 

 "Travellers' Tale," decidedly too goodto 

 be true. Now after years of disbelief, it 

 has been brought before us again, and 

 there are positively men worthy of 

 credence who say that the tale, is true, 

 that they have been present at trials, 

 heard the evidence for the prosecution, 

 heard it, if they did not quite understand 

 the language, heard the prisoners de- 

 fence, heard the judgment pronounced, 

 saw the sentence executed, andthe court 

 adjourn, and even picked up after- 

 wards the dead body of the condemned 

 criminal. A few weeks ago the Daily 

 Telegraph published a paragraph from 

 which we make the following extract : — 

 "In the leading journal of Geneva a 

 well-known Alpine tourist publishes an enter- 

 taining account of the proceedings of a 

 raven-tribunal, accidentally witnessed by him 

 during a recent excursion in the SAviss moun- 

 tains. Descending from the region of glaciers, 

 he came upon a small secluded glen, surrounded 



NATURALIST. 



by thick cover, concealed in which he was en- 

 abled to contemplate a strange spectacle. From 

 sixty to seventy Ravenshad formed a circleround 

 one of their fellows, obviously a misdemeanant, 

 whose alleged delinquencies they were eagerly 

 engaged in discussing with infinite clatter of 

 croaking and wing-flapping Every now and 

 then they interrupted their debates for a brief 

 space to listen to the energetic representations 

 of the prisoner, who conducted his own defence 

 with amazing fervour, the judges breaking out 

 into a deafening chorus of comments and refu- 

 tations after his every statement. Presently 

 having arrived at the unanimous conclusion that 

 the arraigned bird had failed to exculpate itself 

 they suddenly flew upon him from all sides, and 

 tore him to pieces with their powerful beaks. 

 Having thus summarily executed their own sen- 

 tence, they dispersed, leaving the remains of the 

 dead offender bestrewing the very seat of jus- 

 tice, as a dread warning to all immorally-dis- 

 posed ravens. 



This was followed by a letter quoting 

 " The Pioneers: a Narrative of the 

 Bengal Mission," in which its de- 

 scription is given of one of these Bird 

 Trials. The birds on this occasion, 

 were not Rooks or Ravens, but 

 Flamingoes, those strange, long legged, 

 long necked birds, whose bill seems to 

 be upside down, and whose body is small 

 out of all proportion to their height. 

 He says ; — 



"The flamingo crane ( Phceni copter us rubra) is 

 common in the low, marshy land of Bengal, where 

 it finds abundance of food in the small fish 

 abounding in the lakes and running streams, j 

 My friend, Mr. Lacroix (the well-known 

 missionary of the London Missionary Society), 

 when once sailing in his boat up the Hooghly, 

 owing to the turn of the tide, was obliged to 

 anchor off a low, open country, without any 

 appearance of human habitations. In the 

 early part of the evening he went on shore, and 

 walked about for some time. His attention! 



