Page:BirdWatchingSelous.djvu/330

292 But I see no other bird yawning, nor do I notice any toilette, any preening of the feathers.

"Now, at close on 7, the flight out is preceded by a flight of the birds inside the plantation, from one tree to another, and this, passes, gradually, into the full forth-streaming. Just above the trees, now, they pass in endless flakes of a black and living snowstorm. Their flight is swift, hurrying, joyous. They flap, but there are, often, long sweeps on outspread wings, between the flaps. And ever, as they fly, they greet the cold, stern morning with their joy-song of 'chowhow, a-chuck, a-chuck, a-chuck, a-chuck, a-chuck-a.'

"Nearly a month later, a smaller, but still numerous, body of the birds had chosen a new roosting-place—a clump of Scotch firs on a lonely heath, which had stood vacant all the winter, a point interesting in itself, but which—for the old reason—I am unable to discuss.

"March 4th.—I got to the plantation towards the end of the afternoon, and resolved to wait there, in order to see wood-pigeons fly into it in the evening. Not many came, but at six o'clock I saw what I thought was a large band of them fly into an oak-tree which I had noticed just outside the plantation, where they remained for a minute or two. They then flew on to the plantation, sweeping over it once or twice before settling, and I saw that they were rooks. As will be seen from this, they had hitherto been silent. When they had settled in the trees there was some talking, but strangely little, I thought, for rooks, and very soon afterwards there was hardly a sound. They remained thus, for some little time. All at once, with extraordinary suddenness, with a sound of wings so compact and instantaneous that it was almost like the