OF CORNWALL. 243 
hawk quite Ipent, brought it into the houfe to a gentleman then 
fteward to his Lordfhip. The hawk was armed as ufual with filver 
plates on its legs and neck, and Mr. Church (To the fteward was 
called) perceiving an infcription engraved, quickly difcovered the 
name of an Irifh gentleman, and the place he lived at ; upon this 
he took great care of the hawk, and wrote immediately to the gen- 
tleman : The bird was a favourite, and the gentleman lent a fervant 
from Ireland into Cornwall on purpole to fetch it. 
Among our Cornifh birds, the coracias of Willughby, or thecornifh 
pyrrhocorax, deferves principal notice. It is found but rarely and Chough ’ 
at times in other countries, but conftantly in this county, and there- 
fore defervedly among the moderns it has obtained the name of the 
Cornifti Chough. Pliny (lib. x. chap, xlviii.) thought it peculiar 
to the Alpes, but Aldrovandus (lib. xii. chap, vm.) informs us, 
that it is only feen there among the Rhasti in the winter : It is 
found alfo in the illand of Crete, in the Cyclades, on the 
fea-coafts of Cork in Ireland, in Wales, and elfewhere : there 
is a pyrrhocorax in Africa called the Crow of the Defart, but 
bigger than our raven, and therefore called the larger Coracias b . 
To the faithful defcription of this bird in Ray’s Willughby, page 
126, nothing need be added; as to its defeats and merits, fome- 
thing, and not improperly, may. It is taken much with glitter, 
very agile and meddling, and therefore not to be trufted alone 
where fire, money, or papers of confequence lye ; but in both thefe 
particulars, as I have often experienced, not near lo milchievous as 
the jack-daw, (the monedula of authors) whofe faults by miftake 
have been too often imputed to our chough ; a great enemy to 
houfes covered with thatch, the moift and rotten parts of which, 
by its long bill in fearching for worms it difperfes, and quickens the 
decay ; it will alfo pick out the lime-pointing of walls in fearch of 
fpiders and flies. Thefe tricks have procured this bird a bad cha- 
racter ; Camden calls it incendiaria avis , and Mr. Carew, page 36, 
the flander of our country ; but certain it is that our anceftors 
thought of it (and very defervedly too) in a different manner. 
Upton, who writ de re milk art , about the middle of the fifteenth 
century, obferves to the praife of the Cornifti, that fome of their 
moft ancient families bore thefe birds in their coat-armour \ Now, 
to fhew that thefe gentlemen made no contemptible choice of their 
bearing , it muft be remembered, that the Cornifti chough is the 
moft graceful, flender, and genteel of the crow kind, for which 
b Shaw’s Trav. page 25 r. dem antiquiffimi nobiles ipfius patriae iftas aves in 
c Sic ergo in laudem gentis & patriae Cornubi- armis fuis portant, quae quidem aves [graculi 
enfis (quae gens recte a Trojanis traxit originem fcilicet quae in roftris et tibiis rubefcunt] Ipeciali- 
& ab imitatione ut creditur, adhuc perfeverat) qui- ter in ilia patria funt repertaj. Edit. BylT. p. 195. 
reafon 
