I1.] THE HISTORY OF A ROOK. 75

 

equally applicable to all birds. The parrot, ignomi-
niously seated upon his perch, looks to man for his
daily pittance of food, screeches out that which they
suppose to be his gratitude in inharmonious accents,
and seeks no higher aim than occasionally to imitate
the tones and words of his enslavers. The starling,
the magpie, and other kindred birds, from time to time
own the dominion of man. The unhappy thrush too
often languishes in his wicker cage, suspended before
the cottage door of his unfeeling master; and even
the crafty jackdaw frequently becomes the pet and
plaything of the human race. But who ever heard of
a tame rook? My noble race loves, indeed, to domicile
itself near the haunts of men; but this is rather with
the object of proving to our young, by the force of
daily contrast, our innate and immense superiority
over the unfeathered bipeds who walk the earth from
which they cannot rise, and pass a wingless life in a
conceited belief in their own greatness. Often and
often have I seen them walking near, though not asa
rule beneath, my native rookery, and wondered to
myself how such tame crawling creatures could have
the arrogance to deem themselves ‘the lords of that
creation which contains so many nobler races. But
asmy intention to-day is not to point a moral, but to
relate a history, I will proceed at once to the per-
formance of my task.

I am a rook of old family. . All rooks are rooks of
old family. Unlike human beings, who depend upon
the preservation of written records, without which they
are not supposed among their fellows to have esta-
blished a claim to good family and high descent, we