British Birds in Their Haunts

by C. A. Johns

The sad presaging Raven tolls

The sick man's passport in her hollow beak.

And in the shadow of the silent night

Doth shake contagion from her sable wing.

Marlowe.

In the Judgment of others, its friendly mission to the Tishbite invested it with a sanctity which preserved it from molestation.

Apart from all traditional belief, the Raven derives its ill-omened character as a herald of death from the rapidity with which it discerns, in the vicinity of its haunts, the carcase of any dead animal. In the coldest winter days, at Hudson's Bay, when every kind of effluvium is greatly checked if not arrested by frost, buffaloes and other beasts have been killed when not one of these birds was to be seen; but in a few hours scores of them have been found collected about the spot to pick up the blood and offal. 'In Ravens', says a writer in the Zoologist,'the senses of smell and sight are remarkably acute and powerful. Perched usually on some tall cliff that commands a wide survey, these faculties are in constant and rapid exercises, and all the movements of the bird are regulated in accordance with the information thus procured. The smell of death is so grateful to them that they utter a loud croak of satisfaction instantly on perceiving it. In passing any sheep, if a tainted smell is perceptible, they cry vehemently. From this propensity in the Raven to announce his satisfaction in the smell of death has probably arisen the common notion that he is aware of its approach among the human race, and foretells it by his croakings.' The same observant author, as quoted by Macgillivray, says again: 'Their sight and smell are very acute, for when they are searching the wastes for provision, they hover over them at a great height; and yet a sheep will not be dead many minutes before they will find it. Nay, if a morbid smell transpire from any in the flock, they will watch it for days till it die.'

To such repasts they are guided more by scent than by sight, for though they not unfrequently ascend to a great height in the air, they do not then appear to be on the look-out for food. This duty is performed more conveniently and with greater success by beating over the ground at a low elevation. In these expeditions they do not confine themselves to carrion, but prey indiscriminately on all animals which they are quick enough to capture and strong enough to master. Hares, rabbits, rats, mice, lizards, game of various kinds, eggs, and the larger insects, all of these enter into their diet, and, wanting these, they resort to the sea-shore for refuse fish, or ransack dunghills in villages, before the inhabitants are astir, for garbage of all sorts. Pliny even relates that in a certain district of Asia Minor they were trained to hawk for game like the noble Falcons. Few of these qualifications tend to endear them to mankind; and as they are dreaded by shepherds on account of their being perhaps more than suspected of making away with sickly lambs when occasion offers, and of plundering poultry yards, Ravens are become, in populous districts, almost unknown birds. I have only seen them myself on the rocky sea-shore of Devon and Cornwall, in the wilds of Dartmoor, and the Highlands of Scotland. There was for many successive years a nest built on a ledge of granite near the Bishop Rock, in Cornwall, a huge mass of sticks, and what appeared to be grass, inaccessible from below, but commanded by a venturous climber from above. Where it still continues to breed inland, it places its nest, constructed of sticks and lined with the wool and fur of its victims, either on an inaccessible rock, or near the summit of a lofty tree, the ill-omened 'Raven-tree' of romances. In the north of Scotland, in the Orkneys and Hebrides, where it is still abundant, it builds its nest in cliffs which it judges to be inaccessible, both inland and on the sea-shore, showing no marked preference for either. Two pairs never frequent the same locality, nor is any other bird of prey permitted to establish itself in their vicinity. Even the Eagle treats the Raven with respect, and leaves it to its solitude, not so much from fear of its prowess, as worn out by its pertinacious resistance of all dangerous intruders. Hence, in some districts, shepherds encourage Ravens, because they serve as a repellent to Eagles; while in others, where Eagles are of unusual occurrence, they allow them to build their nests undisturbed, but when the young are almost fledged, destroy them by throwing stones at them from above. Nevertheless the original pair continues to haunt the same locality for an indefinite term of years, and it is not a little singular that if one of them be killed, the survivor will find a mate in an incredibly short space of time.

The geographical range of the Raven is very extensive. Throughout all the zones of the Northern Hemisphere it is to be found; and having this wide range, its physical constitution is strong, and it lives to a great age, amounting, so the ancients tell us, to twenty-seven times the period of a man's life. The note of the Raven is well described by the word 'croak', but it is said by those who have had the opportunity of observing it under various circumstances, to utter another sound, resembling the word 'whii-ur'. With this cry it very commonly intermixes another, sounding like 'clung', uttered very much as by a human voice, only a little wilder in the sound. From the cry croak the Raven no doubt derives its Latin name Corvus the French Corbeau, and its common Scotch appellation Corbie.

THE CARRION CROW
CORVUS CORÓNE