248 
RAVEN. 
The Moor of Venice says, — 
“ It comes o’er my memory, 
As doth the raven o’er the infected house, 
Boding to all.” * 
The last quotation alludes to the supposed habit of this 
bird’s flying over those houses which contain the sick, whose 
dissolution is at hand, and thereby announced. Thus Marlowe, 
in the Jew of Malta, as cited by Malone : — 
“ The sad presaging raven tolls 
The sick man’s passport in her hollow beak ; 
And, in the shadow of the silent night, 
Doth shake contagion from her sable wing.” 
But it is the province of philosophy to dispel these illusions 
which bewilder the mind, by pointing out the simple truths 
which nature has been at no pains to conceal, but which the 
folly of mankind has shrouded in all the obscurity of mystery. 
The raven is a general inhabitant of the United States, but 
is more common in the interior. On the lakes, and particu- 
larly in the neighbourhood of the Falls of the Niagara river, 
they are numerous ; and it is a remarkable fact, that where 
they so abound, the common crow (C. corone) seldom makes 
its appearance ; being intimidated, it is conjectured, by the 
superior size and strength of the former, or by an antipathy 
which the two species manifest towards each other. This I 
had an opportunity of observing myself, in a journey during 
the months of August and September, along the lakes Erie 
and Ontario. The ravens were seen every day, prowling 
about in search of the dead fish which the waves are continu- 
ally casting ashore, and which afford them an abundance of a 
favourite food ; but I did not see or hear a single crow within 
several miles of the lakes, and but very few through the whole 
of the Genesee country. 
The food of this species is dead animal matter of all kinds. 
* Othello, Act. iv. scene 1. 
