Identifier: eveningsathomeor00inaiki (find matches)
Title: Evenings at home, or, The juvenile budget opened : consisting of a variety of miscellaneous pieces for the instruction and amusement of young persons
Year: 1839 (1830s)
Authors: Aikin, John, 1747-1822. cn Barbauld, Mrs. (Anna Letitia), 1743-1825. cn Corbould, Henry, 1787-1844. cn Heath, Charles, 1785-1848. cn
Subjects: Didactic fiction Conduct of life
Publisher: London : James Cornish & Co.
Contributing Library: University of Pittsburgh Library System
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Pittsburgh Library System

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pair of rooks, who never Avent outto get sticks for themselves, but made a practiceof watching when their neighbours were abroad,and helped themselves from their nests. Theyhad served most of the community in this man-ner, and by these means had just finished theirown nest; when all the other rooks in a ragefell upon them at once, pulled their nest in pieces,beat them soundly, and drove them from theirsociety. Fr. That was very right—I should have likedto have seen it. But why do they live togetherif they do not help one another 1 Mr. St. They probably receive pleasure fromthe company of their own kind, as men and va-rious other creatures do. Then though they donot assist one another in building, they are mu-tually serviceable in many ways. If a largebird of prey hovers about a rookery for the pur-pose of carrying off any of the young ones, theyall unite to drive him away. When they arefeeding in a flock, several are placed as sentinelsupon the trees all round, who give the alarm if
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THE KOOKERY. 117 any danger approaches. They often go a long-way from home to feed ; but every evening thewhole flock returns, making a loud cawing asthey fly, as if to direct and call in the stragglers.The older rooks take the lead ; you may distin-guish them by the whiteness of their bills, occa-sioned by their frequent digging in the ground,by which the black feathers at the root of thebill are worn off. Fr. Do rooks always keep to the same trees ?Mr. St. Yes — they are much attached tothem ; and when the trees happen to be cutdown, they seem greatly distressed, and keephovering about them as they are falling, andwill scarcely desert them when they lie on theground. Fr. Poor things ! I suppose they feel as weshould, if our town was burned down or over-thrown by an earthquake. Mr. St. No doubt! The societies of animalsgreatly resemble those of men; and that ofrooks is like those of men in a savage state, suchas the communities of the North American In-dians. It is a sort of league

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