| feathers. 
ChOW. 
The Hleuteria species or sea-side balsam, Ovo- 
ton Hleuteria, furnishes the cascarilla bark of the 
drug shops. See the article Cascarinia.—The 
dyer’s species, Croton tinctoria, is a hardy annual, 
—the only hardy species known; and was brought 
from the south of Europe in the latter part of 
the 16th century. But Wildenow separated it 
from the crotons, and assigned it to a new genus. 
See the article CrozopHora.—Four other species 
which have been introduced to Britain are un- 
interesting hothouse annuals; four or five are 
| somewhat handsome, hothouse, evergreen shrubs; 
and the rest, amounting to about twenty-five, 
are tender evergreen shrubs of very little inter- 
est.—Upwards of 120 unintroduced species have 
been described by botanists; and some of these 
are known to exude gummy or resinous matters, 
of either curious properties or considerable mer- 
cantile value. . 
CROW. A genus of birds remarkable for their 
gregarious and predatory habits, distinguished by 
the following characters: The bill is straight, 
convex, and compressed, being covered at its base 
by incumbent, bristly feathers; the upper man- 
dible is curved at tip, the lower is alittle shorter, 
carinated on both sides, and slightly ascending 
at the extremity; the nostrils are placed on the 
_base of the bill, and are patulous, though cover- 
ed by the incumbent feathers; the tongue is 
short, cartilaginous, acute and bifid at tip; the 
tarsus scarcely exceeds the middle toe in length; 
the toes are separated almost to the base, and the 
middle one is the longest; the nails are moder- 
ate, pointed, hollow beneath, and sharp-edged, 
the hind one being generally longest ; the wings 
are subelongated, acute, the first primary short, 
third or fourth longest ; the tail consists of twelve 
The members of the genus are very 
extensively spread over the globe, and are almost 
equally distinguished for their remarkable saga- 
city, and the amount of mischief which they oc- 
casion where they are very numerous. 
The husbandman, or farmer, is often uncon- 
scious of the good these industrious birds do for 
| him at all seasons, except only in long-continued 
drought, when the insects descend into the earth, 
and when its surface becomes so hard as to defy 
the efforts of the rooks to dig the larvee out. At 
, such times, indeed, when their natural instincts 
appears another unpardonable offence. 
are neutralized, and when hunger craves, they 
will in troops fall upon a field of wheat or barley 
just ripening, and where they will do consider- 
able damage if not scared-off by a sentinel with 
his racket, or by hanging rags, dipped in melted 
brimstone, on sticks about the field. But the 
farmer is unwilling, for this their thievish crime, 
to agree that they are otherwise serviceable to 
him, because he can see where the rooks have 
been at work; single plants of wheat or grass 
actually pulled out of the ground, which to him 
But if 
he would examine such depredations closely, he 
| would find that the bird had only pulled up a 
905 
sickly plant, to reach the grub that was feasting 
on its roots, and which, but for the rook, would 
have disrooted many more. The farmer knows 
well the injury he suffers from the wire-worm, an 
insect more or less plentiful in every season, es- 
pecially in old leas when newly broken up. Now, 
the larvee of this beetle, together with those of 
all the chafers, are in the estimation of the rook 
the sweetest morsels he can meet with, and, led 
by his keen sense of scent, he will dig them out 
of the ground though an inch or two below the 
surface. And as the question concerning the 
good or bad properties of the rook to the farmers 
is very differently believed, let any one who has 
doubts shoot, or have one shot for him, when the 
bird ison his way home from the feeding ground. 
Let him open the provision pouch and look at 
the contents; this he will find consists entirely 
of the larvae of insects, which are bred and fed 
on the roots of plants in the ground. In this 
great and good service the rook is assisted by the 
jackdaw and starling, which are almost always 
seen associated on places where grubs abound. 
Mr. Knapp, in his ‘Journal of a Naturalist,’ 
has taken a pleasing and favourable view of the 
rook.—Gesner—he says—‘“‘has called the com- 
mon rook, Corvus frugilegus, ‘a corn-eating bird,’ 
Linnzeus has somewhat lightened this epithet by 
considering it only as a gatherer of corn; to nei- 
ther of which names do I believe it entitled, as it 
appears to live solely upon grubs, various insects, 
and worms. It has at times great difficulty to 
support its life, and in a dry spring or summer 
most of these are hidden in the earth beyond its 
reach, except at those uncertain periods when 
the grub of the chaffer is to be found; and in a 
hot day we see the poor birds perambulating the 
fields, and wandering by the sides of the high- 
ways, seeking for and feeding upon grasshoppers, 
or any casual nourishment that may be found. 
At those times, were it not for its breakfast of 
dew worms, which it catches in the grey of the 
morning, as it is appointed the earliest of risers, 
it would commonly be famished. In the hot 
summer of 1825, many of the young brood of the 
season perished from want; the mornings were 
without dew, and consequently few or no worms 
were to be obtained; and we found them dead 
under the trees, having expired on their roost- 
ings. It was particularly distressing, for no re- 
lief could be given, to hear the constant clamour 
and importunity of the young for food. The old 
birds seemed to suffer without complaint; but | 
the wants of their offspring were expressed by 
the unceasing cry of hunger, and pursuit of their 
parents for supply, and our fields were scenes of 
daily restlessness and lament. Yet, amid all this 
distress, it was pleasing to observe the persever- 
ance of the old birds in the endeavour to relieve 
their famishing families, as many of them re- 
mained out searching for food quite in the dusk, 
and returning to their roosts long after the usual 
period for retiring. In this extremity 3b becomes 
