ok shooting:" a terrible slaughter of the innocents. The squire, of
course, prohibits all invasion of the kind on his territories; but I am
told that a lamentable havoc takes place in the colony about the old
church. Upon this devoted commonwealth the village charges "with all its
chivalry." Every idle wight that is lucky enough to possess an old gun
or a blunderbuss, together with all the archery of Slingsby's school,
take the field on the occasion. In vain does the little parson
interfere, or remonstrate in angry tones, from his study window that
looks into the churchyard; there is a continual popping from morning to
night. Being no great marksmen, their shots are not often effective; but
every now and then a great shout from the besieging army of bumpkins
makes known the downfall of some unlucky, squab rook, which comes to the
ground with the emphasis of a squashed apple-dumpling.

Nor is the rookery entirely free from other troubles and disasters. In
so aristocratical and lofty-minded a community, which boasts so much
ancient blood and hereditary pride, it is natural to suppose that
questions of etiquette will sometimes arise, and affairs of honour
ensue. In fact, this is very often the case: bitter quarrels break out
between individuals, which produce sad scufflings on the tree tops, and
I have more than once seen a regular duel take place between two doughty
heroes of the rookery. Their field of battle is generally the air: and
their contest is managed in the most scientific and elegant manner;
wheeling round and round each other, and towering higher and higher to
get the vantage-ground, until they sometimes disappear in the clouds
before the combat is determined.

They have also fierce combats now and then with an invading hawk, and
will drive him off from their territories by a _posse comitatus_. They
are also extremely tenacious of their domains, and will suffer no other
bird to inhabit the grove or its vicinity. There was a very ancient and
respectable old bachelor owl that had long had his lodgings in a corner
of the grove, but has been fairly ejected by the rooks, and has retired,
disgusted with the world, to a neighbouring wood, where he leads the
life of a hermit, and makes nightly complaints of his ill-treatment.

[Illustration: The Hermit Owl]

The hootings of this unhappy gentleman may generally be heard in the
still evenings, when the rooks are all at rest; and I have often
listened to them of a moo