48 THE ROOK. 
plished this, should their vultures pine in famine, 
by continuing to mistake canvass for carcass, why, 
rot 'em, they may die, for aught I care to the 
contrary. 
REMARKS ON THE NUDITY ON THE FORE- 
HEAD AND AT THE BASE OF THE BILL OF 
THE ROOK. 
" Quse causa indigna serenos 
Foedavit vultus, aut cur hasc nuda patescunt ?" 
I HAVE more than once nearly made up my mind to 
sit me down, some dismal winter's evening, and put 
together a few remarks on the habits of the rook. 
His regular flight, in congregated numbers, over my 
house, in the morning to the west, and his return at 
eve to the east, without the intermission of one single 
day, from the autumnal to the vernal equinox, would 
be a novel anecdote in the page of his biography. 
To this might be added an explanation of the cause 
of his sudden descent from a vast altitude in the 
heavens, which takes place with such amasing rapi- 
dity that it creates a noise similar to that of a rush- 
ing wind. His mischief and his usefulness to man- 
kind might be narrowly looked into, and placed in 
so clear a light, that nobody could afterwards have 
a doubt whether this bird ought to be protected as 
a friend to a cultivated country, or banished from it 
as a depredating enemy. 
I remember, some fifteen years ago, when I wSiS 
very anxious to divert a footpath which had become 
