After a few weeks the crow became very tame, and took possession of the garden. He dug worms from our choicest flower-beds, nipped off the tops of growing plants, and did them far more damage than Rover the dog. But my grandmother would not have him checked in anything.
"Poor creature!" she said, sympathetically, "he can never fly again; let him get what pleasure he can out of life."
I was often sorry for him when the pigeons passed overhead. He would flap his one long, beautiful wing, and his other poor stump of a thing, and try to raise himself from the ground, crying, longingly, "Caw! Caw!"
Not being able to fly, he would go quite over the garden in a series of long hops,—that is, after he learned to guide himself. At first when he spread his wings to help his jumps, the big wing would swing him around so that his tail would be where he had expected to find his head.
Many a time have I stood laughing at his awkward attempts to get across the garden to grandmother, when she went out with some bits of raw meat for him. She was his favourite, the only one that he would allow to come near him or to stroke his head.
He cawed with pleasure whenever he saw her at any of the windows, and she was the only one that he would answer at all times. I often vainly called to him, "Hallo, Jim Crow,—hallo!" but the instant grandmother said, "Good Jim Crow—good Jim!" he screamed in recognition.
He had many skirmishes with the dog over bones. Rover was old and partly blind, and whenever Jim saw him with a bone he went up softly behind him and nipped his tail. As Rover always turned and snapped at him, Jim would seize the bone and run away with it, and Rover would go nosing blindly about the garden trying to find him. They were very good friends, however, apart from the bones, and Rover often did good service in guarding the crow.