and congeniality of soul I shall ever cherish with feelings of the deepest gratitude and affection.

With you, too, gentle reader, I must part. If I have contributed to your amusement or information, I am abundantly satisfied. It is a subject which many may think trite and antiquated; but it is hoped none will venture to criticise, but he who, after the enjoyments of a summer holiday, is confined once more to the narrow precincts and the routine labours of a dismal, dusty office, with the ghost of a sunbeam on his ledger, and the yellow tinge of autumn on the flowerless geraniums of his summer dreams.

Alcohol.-Speaking of alcohol, Liebig describes it as a bill drawn on the workman's health, which he is incessantly compelled to renew, as he has not the funds to meet it. The bankruptcy of the body is, of course, the inevitable result.

Antiquity of British Manufactures.-The oldest seats of the woollen manufactures in England are Worstead in Norfolk, Leeds, and Halifax, Yorkshire, and Newbury, Berkshire. The latter was famed in very early times. In the reign of Henry VIII., one John Winchcomb, better known by the name of "Jack of Newbury," kept a hundred looms in his own house. The same individual marched a hundred men to Flodden field, all armed and clothed at his own expense. This man was also a great benefactor to Newbury. In the reign of Henry I., a number of Flemings settled at Worstead; and, in 1365, the city of Norwich invited a number of manufacturers from the low countries, of whom about a thousand came over, and introduced the making of baizes, sages, and arras. In 1575, they first made bombazines, and, since then, crapes and hosiery in large quantities. The monks of the Border monasteries used to ship wool to these early manufacturers from the port of Berwick. Individual manufacture was of early domestic origin, the natural colour of the wool sometimes sufficing, without the use of dye-stuffs. And most countries, foreign and British, had a manufacture of domestic clothing peculiar to themselves. On the Borders the great manufacturing towns are Hawick, Selkirk, Galashiels, and Innerleithen. The first enjoys a large trade in blankets, flannels, and general hosiery, besides a flourishing business in shawls, tweeds, and fancy woollens. The latter are in much note for the manufacture of tartans, plaids, shawls, and dress-goods, which, as well as their excellent tweeds, and other woollen fabrics, find their way into every market at home and abroad. Well sings the poet of this particular district, as it now is

"Thy hills are gemm'd with Cheviot's silv'ry fleece,
Thy valleys jocund with the songs of peace,
Thy sons of toil have learnt, with equal pride,
To speed the shuttle, and the plough to guide."

"Merry Carlisle" is still famous, as of old, for its manufactures; and Kendal and Durham, in carpets and coverlets, drive a bustling trade.

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NOTES ON BORDER BIRDS.

FIRST PAPER.

HE Border-land-from the seclusion of its wild uplands, its great breadth of woodland, and the finely-sheltered and tangled banks of most of the rivers and small streams that so numerously intersect it, both in upland and lowland districts—affords good protection, and a suitable retreat for a large and varied number of the bird family. The resident natives number nearly fifty, and we can number some forty migrant natives, and upwards of twenty occasional visitors. During the present century, however, a number of changes have taken place in the population of several species of birds in some of the Border counties, and the habits, even, of one or two kinds of the corvine family have undergone considerable change.

Wallis, in his "Natural History of Northumberland," informs us that, in the early part of last century, the golden eagle had its eyry on the Cheviots. In the early part of the present century, it was not uncommon for shepherds on the higher fells to see more than one of these birds in a season; but some years have passed since this king of birds was last seen in these regions; and, from the cultivation so rapidly spreading hillwards, many are of opinion it will never again become even an occasional visitor of these realms. Even in Upper Moffatdale, where the hills are steeper and wilder, and the corries numerous, eagles have not been seen for a number of years, although, some thirty years ago, they regularly frequented that locality. The eagles that frequented the Cheviot and Moffatdale hills must, we opine, have chiefly been of the white-tailed species, which includes the great erne, the lesser erne, and the bald eagle. The white-tailed species inhabits all the northern parts of Europe, whereas the golden eagle generally inhabits the warmer regions only.

In the early part of this century the common buzzard (falco buteo) was pretty numerously distributed over the Cheviots, especially upon Carterfell and the upper hills of Liddesdale. Now, however, this beautiful bird, one of the largest of the falcon family, is seldom seen in these haunts; and yet the district remains nearly as wild as it was a hundred years ago. But in Upper Liddesdale the whistle of the locomotive may now be heard above the solitary cry of the curlew and blackcock.

Though the common buzzard is possessed of strength and weapons of defence, it is by most naturalists accounted a cowardly bird, and has been seen to fly from the sparrow-hawk. We once saw one, however, that shewed strong signs of pluck; and its "position" would, we are certain, have been highly prized as a study by either Landseer or Wolf, not to mention enthusiasts of the Volunteer force. The bird had been captured on Carterfell, and, when we saw it, was sitting, with a plucked wing, in the corner of a gunmaker's work

VOL. I.-No. I.

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shop. A terrier entered the place, and in a moment bird and dog were in a position for combat or defence. The buzzard fell back on its outspread tail, and presented its extended talons and open beak in line, the head of course in the centre; the wings were outstretched, the body feathers set on end, and the eyes looked so fierce and wicked, that they seemed almost to emit flame. The dog mettled in regular Dandie style, also with flashing eyes, and a timely cry and kick alone prevented an encounter.

The most common of the falcon tribe are the kestril, sparrowhawk, and hen-harrier, which are numerous. Of owls, the most common in the Border counties are the white or barn owl, and the tawny or wood owl. The tawny owl has increased considerably in number of late years. Perhaps this may be accounted for from the great increase, within the last thirty or forty years, of plantations in the Borders, by which the birds enjoy a relative increase of protection and solitude. In some large woods known to us, consisting almost solely of Scotch and spruce fir, we have occasionally seen half-adozen of these birds in a single day, having been startled into flight by the repeated discharge of a fowling-piece. In June 1862, we saw three old birds shot in one day in a small plantation, and some three or four others were seen that escaped. Bewick and other writers say the eyes of the tawny owl are dark blue. This is incorrect; they are of a brazen yellow, strongly resembling the yellow band that encircles the frog's eye.

The raven or corbie (corvus corax) was once a well-known bird to gamekeepers and upland farmers; but it is now exceedingly scarce. Many years ago, Ruberslaw was frequented by ravens, which bred in the district; but from this and several rugged upland districts on the Cheviots they have departed. The only place we know where they still remain resident during the year, is Henshole, the wildest, most solitary and rugged glen in the Cheviots. In the high and precipitous rocks there, a pair or two have nested, it is believed, for centuries. In 1861, we saw three of these birds in the neighbourhood of the glen. They fly at an immense elevation, and swoop on their prey with great velocity; and when their haunts are disturbed by either sportsman or shepherd, they will curve and float in circles at a great height overhead for half-an-hour at a time, giving at intervals a deep croak.

In some parts of England and the north of Scotland, ravens are still comparatively numerous; and in Greenland they are so plentiful, that the natives capture and eat them in considerable numbers. They also make use of the skins for clothing, wearing them with the feathered side next the body. What would a certain class of the Scotch and Irish think of this, with their superstitious aversion to the use of crow feathers in pillows, and such like? A few years ago, a friend of the writer's saw an Irishman take a pillow stuffed with the feathers of domestic fowls from beneath the head of his dying son, in case (as he said) some evil or wild bird feathers should, by chance, be among the others, and thereby cause "the poor boy an unaisy death.” The patient, therefore, so that he

might die uninfluenced by spirits of darkness, had to breathe his last with his head pillowed on a log of wood.

Rooks have fluctuated in population during the present century, in proportion to the treatment, for or against, which they have received at the hands of proprietors and others. Some thirty years ago, a number of Border proprietors, urged by the repeated complaints of tenants, caused the spoliation of a number of large rookeries. Since that, however, the tables have turned, so far as regards tenants at least; and rooks are at the present time on the ascendant, and are more numerous perhaps than they ever were in the Borders. They are yearly becoming more numerous, too, and every season new habitations are found, and additional nesting more or less commenced. It is a fact, however, that nesting has in almost no instance been tried in the woods from which rooks were formerly driven, although forty years have elapsed since some of the rookeries were cleared, and the trees are still in fine order for nesting operations.

These birds have made a considerable change in their diet during the present century; and this fact, any one who has paid attention to their habits, in Border districts at least, can testify.

Some of the standard writers on natural history characterise the rook as a purely granivorous bird; some of the more recent writers as entirely insectivorous; and a number consider it a partaker of both kinds of diet.

worms.

The principal food, however, on which the rook subsists, is of the grub kind,—from earthworms down to the smallest weevils and wireBut although we believe grubs to be its chief food, we know that it occasionally partakes of potatoes and grain, especially of the latter, in seed-time and in the winter season, when it is in stack; but its peculations in grain and roots are comparatively small; and for these the farmer is amply repaid by the numerous soil grubs it annually devours.

Over and above the kinds of food just noted, the rook of the present day feeds greedily on carrion, is an egg-eater, and an occasional bird of prey.

This is a serious charge, but one of easy proof. On the upland pastoral farms of the Cheviots, when a sheep dies, its eyes are generally pecked out by rooks—not crows— ere the carcass is cold; and if in the nesting season, entrails and flesh soon follow. Many years ago, an old Northumberland shepherd, to whom we expressed surprise at finding a sheep with the sockets of its eyes tenantless, and which we had seen die not ten minutes before, informed us that this was a character he had never seen rooks display until within a few years of the time at which we were conversing. In his younger days, he said, only the blacknebs (or carrion-crows proper) fed on quarry; and he was greatly at a loss to understand how the "au'd corn craw" had taken to butcher-meat. In the nesting season the carcass of a dead horse is much prized by the rooks; and if it be in a somewhat open locality, where the gunner cannot approach without being seen, the fetid remains are soon

gobbled or carried to the rookery, and doubtless afford a dainty treat for the young. May this account for the peculiar flavour so much praised by the lovers of rook pie?

In May 1862, when walking on a retired country road with two friends, a terrier killed a rabbit, which we left lying on the road where it was killed, and on returning in less than an hour we saw a number of rooks feeding voraciously on its remains. They sat until we were within a few yards of them, and we distinctly saw their scabrous beaks, which plainly told that they were rooks; and besides there was a rookery in the immediate neighbourhood. The entrails of the rabbit were gone, and every particle of flesh was eaten from the hind legs, the back, and one of the sides, the bones being left white and clean. This rabbit must have been eaten warm.

It

We know some places where, in the pheasant nesting season, rooks generally hunt up and gobble the first, and sometimes the second set of eggs; and in some of these places it is only by keepers gathering the eggs and placing them under domestic fowls that a fair number of pheasants can be reared. Of the eggs of partridges the rook is also very fond, and they yearly destroy great numbers. is unnecessary to give proof of this, because every gamekeeper and preserver in the lower or partridge grounds of Roxburghshire know that such is the case; and we number more than one man of velvet of our acquaintance who on account of this egg-pilfering propensity would willfully proclaim death to all rooks and their fellows the blacknebs.

The rook, as we have said, is also occasionally a bird of prey. We have known it attack leverets and young rabbits; and a friend of the writer's last summer saw one flying within a few yards of him with a young well-feathered blackbird in its beak, while one of the parent birds, wildly screaming, pursued it. The rook dropped the bird, and our friend picked it up alive. We also know a preserve from which in 1859 nearly twenty young pheasants were carried off alive by a few rooks; and the keeper, in the presence of two people known to the writer, shot several of the birds when flying off with the young in their beaks. The pheasants were small, but covered with feathers. In the same season, a larger number of partridges were similarly carried off from the same preserve.

Rooks are so constituted that they require a certain amount of animal food—the young especially require it; and remembering this, and the present immensity of their number, and the occasional scarcity of the grub-food upon which they naturally prey, their poaching propensities should not be too harshly censured. We have perhaps twice the number of rooks in the Border districts that we had forty years ago; but, unlike the case of the wood-pigeon, in place of their natural food having increased during that period, it has diminished; hence they may from time to time be driven of necessity to prey on food hitherto considered foreign to their nature. Lime, and the other thousand and one grub-killing manures, annually destroy the insects on which they naturally prey over thousands of Lands, for instance, that we once knew abounding with

acres.