Page:BirdWatchingSelous.djvu/319

Rh wings, falls in a drizzle from the branches. Joyous, excited cries, 'chu, chu, chac, chac' The whole dark grove is a cry, a music. Still other bands, they burden the air. Band after band—now with a pause between each. They fly swiftly and steadily up, at a not much greater height than the trees, not descending into them out of the sky.

"A longer pause, followed by another hurrying band. And now the moon is shining through the larches, and the black, ceaseless pinions go hurrying across its face. Groans, moans, shrieks almost, yells amongst the larches, all mingled and blending—but sinking now. A marvellous medley, a wonderful hoarse harmony! Here are shoutings of triumph, chatterings of joy, deep trills of contentment, hoarse yells of derision, deep guttural indignations, moanings, groanings, tauntings, remonstrances, clicks, squeaks, sobs, cachinnations, and the whole a most musical murmur. Loud, but a murmur, a wild, noisy, clamorous murmur; but sinking now, softening—a lullaby.

When the rooks sweep down, thus, into their roosting-trees they frequently do so with a peculiar whirring or whizzing noise of the wings, but although this sound is in perfect consonance with the motion which it accompanies—insomuch that one has to use the same words to describe each—yet it does not seem to be produced by it. At least, it bears no relation to the height from which the birds swoop, nor—as would seem to follow from this—with the