FOREHEAD OF THE ROOK. 
49 
an intolerable nuisance, the farmers in the district 
said that I should freely have their good-will to do 
so, provided I would only destroy a large rookery 
in a neighbouring wood. On the other hand, the 
villagers deplored this proposed destruction, as it 
would deprive them of their annual supply of about 
two thousand young rooks. Now the gardener 
abominated them. He called them a devouring set ; 
said that they spoiled all the tops of the trees ; and 
that, for his part, he hoped they would all of them 
get their necks broken. I myself, for divers reasons, 
was extremely averse to sign their death-warrant. 
Were I not fearful of being rebuked by grave and 
solemn critics, I would here hazard a small quota- 
tion : — 
« Mulciber in Trojam, pro Troja stabat Apollo; 
JEqua Venus Teucris, Pallas iniqua fuit." 
However, at present, it is not my intention to 
I write the life of the rook, or even to inquire inci- 
dentally into its vices or its virtues. I merely take 
up the pen to-day, to show that the nudity on the 
forehead of the rook, and at the base of both man- 
; dibles, cannot be caused by the bird's thrusting its 
bill into the ground. 
Bewick is the only one in Professor Rennie's long 
and fanciful list of " rudimental naturalists," « lite- 
I rary naturalists," and "philosophic naturalists, and 
I original observers," who gives us any thing satis- 
factory concerning this nudity. He, sensible na- 
turalist, cuts the knot through at one stroke, by 
telling us that it is an " original peculiarity." Mon- 
E 
