The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-06-14

with another bird lover, wanted to set tie the knotty question whether the curfeW bird within the area of a certain county, and was on the point of giving
 up what had so far been an intellectual
 search. Suddenly, while resting on the | side of an old barrow, thrown up years ago as one of the county boundaries, l his attention was arrested by the dip ping and wavering flight of an old
 crow, evidently on the scout, and just as the bird was skirting the edge of a small pool full of quiet little sedge cov- cred retreats, up flew curfdw. In a trice 1t was at the crow, tbuffeting it and scolding it with all the harsh notes
 of obJurgation at it's disposal It was
 a cry of Thief, stop thief! with a ven- geance, and the protest of the curlew was taken up and re-echoed by other birds. 1t was a regular old fashioned
 hue and cry" and the peeeant crow
 disappeared over the county boundary l into another county and into another
 hundred. The best plan was to sit still
 and watch for the return of the curlew,
 and, with the aid of binoculars. mark
 1t down, all of which peaceful process
 es were successfully accomplished. and the ornithological fact established that
 the curlew did breed in the county.
 But, as far as the writer is concerned,
 this interesting fact would have been yelled in obscurity uness the curew had
 raised it's. cry of Stop thief" On an- other occasion and esewhere the writer l witnessed a similar encounter on the
 moorand between a curew and heron,
 which points to the fact that heron
 with it's ong bill pointing downward as
 it stands on one leg is not always doing
 penance by catching and eating fish.
 The jackdaw, it may also be noted,
 acts up to it's bad character of being a
 thief, and on March 19 last the writer
 discovered a missel-thruslls S, or, as 1t 1 is locally termed, a sholmscreech,"
 nest, all but complete on the firm
 branch of an Hex tree, Next day an
 jackdaw made a stealthy advance upon { it from church tower,}of all places in
 the world to mask his villainy! First,
 he perched on a small poplar, then on another tree and finally dived into the | evergreen ambush of the ilex, as crafty
 as a Boer marksman stalking a British
 convoy. But the helmscreech was la
 vigilant scout, and, although the first I egg had not yet been laid ,Ithe. bird pro-
 claimed in a particular harsh and stri- i dent note-such as the holmscreech
 alone seems able to compass-the vile
 character of the jackdoW and the base
 ness of It's intentions. With an air of injured innocense and unctuous piety the jackdaW beat a nasty retreat to the
 church tower, and, perching for a sec-
 ond on a tweather ebeaten gargoyle, which ought to have reminded him that the church itself was no harbor for evil
 sporits and interruptions thieves such i as he was in his bad ntention-popped
 inside as if to defy not only the written
 laws and placards of the county coun- cils, but to violate the unwritten laws of friendship and hospitality which
 should link bird life together in an
 amicable league. What is the use of mankind-whether keen ornithologists
 or oologists- making laws and forming { leagues for bird preservation when there is so much treachery at home and
 so much bird burglary unpunished?- 1 Pail Mall Gazette.