EXPULSION OF THE ROOKS
Positions of the rook and crow compared--Gray's Inn Gardens
rookery--Break-up of the old, and futile attempt of the birds to
establish new rookeries--The rooks a great loss to London--Why the
rook is esteemed--Incidents in the life of a tame rook--A first
sight of the Kensington Gardens rookery--The true history of the
expulsion of the rooks--A desolate scene, and a vision of London
beautified.
We have seen how it is with the carrion crow--that he is in the balance,
and that if the park authorities will but refrain from persecuting him
he will probably be able to keep his ancient place among the wild birds
of London. To what has already been said on the subject of this bird I
will only add here that there is, just now, an unfortunate inclination
in some of the County Council's parks to adopt the policy of the royal
parks--to set too high a value on domestic and ornamental water-fowl,
which, however beautiful and costly they may be, can never give as much
pleasure or produce the same effect on the mind as the wild bird. The
old London crow is worth more to London than many exotic swans and ducks
and geese.
[Illustration: LONDON CROWS]
We have also seen that the case of the jackdaw is not quite hopeless;
for although the birds are now reduced to an insignificant remnant, the
habits and disposition of this species make it reasonable to hope that
they will thrive and increase, and, in any case, that if we want the
daw we can have him. But the case of the rook appears to me well nigh
hopeless, and on this account, in this list of the corvines, he is put
last that should have been first. There are nevertheless two reasons why
a considerable space--a whole chapter--should be given to this species:
one is, that down to within a few years ago the rook attracted the
largest share of attention, and was the most important species in the
wild bird life of the metropolis; the other, that it would be well that
the cause of its departure should not be forgotten. It is true that
in the very heart of the metropolis a rookery still exists in Gray's
Inn Gardens, and that although it does not increase neither does it
diminish. Thus, during the last twenty years there have never been
fewer than seventeen or eighteen, and never more than thirty nests
in a season; and for the last three seasons the numbers have been
twenty-five, twenty-three, and twenty-four nests. Going a little farther
back in the history of this ancient famous colony, it is well to relate
that, twenty-three years ago, it was well-nigh lost for ever through
an unconsidered act of the Benchers, or of some ignorant person in
authority among them. It was thought that the trees would have a better
appearance if a number of their large horizontal branches were lopped
off, and the work was carried out in the month of March, just when the
rooks were busy repairing their old and building new nests. The birds
were seized with panic, and went away in a body to be seen no more for
the space of three years; then they returned to settle once more, and
at present they are regarded with so much pride and affection by the
Benchers, and have so much food cast to them out of scores of windows,
that they have grown to be the most domestic and stay-at-home rooks to
be found anywhere in England.
With the exception of this one small colony, it is sad to have to say
that utter, irretrievable disaster has fallen on the inner London
rookeries--those that still exist in the suburbs will be mentioned in
subsequent chapters--and although rooks may still be found within our
gates, go they will and go they must, never to return. The few birds
that continue in constantly diminishing numbers to breed here and there
in the metropolis, in spite of its gloomy atmosphere and the long
distances they are obliged to travel in quest of grubs and worms
for their young, are London rooks, themselves hatched in parks and
squares--the town has always been their home and breeding place; and
although it is more than probable that some of these town birds are from
time to time enticed away to the country, it is indeed hard to believe
that rooks hatched in the rural districts are ever tempted to come to
us. During the last dozen years many attempts at founding new colonies
have been made by small bands of rooks. These birds were and are
survivors of the old broken-up communities. All these incipient
rookeries, containing from two or three to a dozen nests (as at
Connaught Square), have failed; but the birds, or some of them, still
wander about in an aimless way in small companies, from park to park,
and there is no doubt that year by year these homeless rooks will
continue to decrease in number, until the ancient tradition is lost,
and they will be seen no more.
It is no slight loss which we have to lament; it is the loss to the
millions inhabiting this city, or congeries of cities and towns, of a
bird which is more to us than any other wild bird, on account of its
large size and interesting social habits, its high intelligence, and
the confidence it reposes in man; and, finally, of that ancient kindly
regard and pride in it which, in some degree, is felt by all persons
throughout the kingdom. The rook has other claims to our esteem and
affection which are not so generally known: in a domestic state it is
no whit behind other species in the capacity for strong attachments, in
versatility and playfulness, and that tricksy spirit found in most of
the corvines, which so curiously resembles, or simulates, the sense of
humour in ourselves.
I recall here an incident in the life of a tame rook, and by way of
apology for introducing it I may mention that this bird, although
country bred, was of London too, when his mistress came to town for
the season accompanied by her glossy black pet. I will first relate
something of his country life, and feel confident that this digression
will be pardoned by those of my readers who are admirers of the rook, a
bird which we are accustomed to regard as of a more sedate disposition
than the jackdaw.
He was picked up injured in a park in Oxfordshire, taken in and nursed
by the lady of the house until he was well and able to fly about once
more; but he elected to stay with his benefactress, although he always
spent a portion of each day in flying about the country in company with
his fellows. He had various ways of showing his partiality for his
mistress, one of which was very curious. Early every morning he flew
into her bedroom by the open window, and alighting on her bed would
deposit a small offering on the pillow--a horse-chestnut bur, a little
crooked stick, a bleached rabbit bone, a pebble, a bit of rusty iron,
which he had picked up and regarded as a suitable present. Whatever
it was, it had to be accepted with demonstrations of gratitude and
affection. If she took no notice he would lift it up and replace it
again, calling attention to it with little subdued exclamations which
sounded like words, and if she feigned sleep he would gently pull her
hair or tap her cheek with his bill to awake her. Once the present
was accepted he would nestle in under her arm and remain so, very
contentedly, until she got up.
Here we get a delightful little peep into the workings of the rook's
mind. We ourselves, our great philosopher tells us, are 'hopelessly'
anthropomorphic. The rook appears to be in as bad a case; to his
mind we are nothing but bigger rooks, somewhat misshapen, perhaps,
featherless, deprived by some accident of the faculty of flight, and
not very well able to take care of ourselves.
One summer day the rook came into the daughter's bedroom, where she was
washing her hands, and had just taken off a valuable diamond ring from
her finger and placed it on the marble top of the washing-stand. The
rook came to the stand and very suddenly picked up the ring and flew
out at the open window. The young lady ran down stairs and on to the
terrace, calling out that the bird had flown away with her ring. Her
mother quickly came out with a field glass in her hand, and together
they watched the bird fly straight away across the park to a distance
of about a third of a mile, where he disappeared from sight among the
trees. The ring was gone! Two hours later the robber returned and flew
into the dining-room, where his mistress happened to be; alighting on
the table, he dropped the ring from his beak and began walking round
it, viewing it first with one, then the other eye, uttering the while a
variety of little complacent notes, in which he seemed to be saying: 'I
have often admired this beautiful ring, but never had an opportunity of
examining it properly before; now, after having had it for some time in
my possession and shown it to several wild rooks of my acquaintance, I
have much satisfaction in restoring it to its owner, who is my very good
friend.'
During his summer visits to London this rook met with many curious and
amusing adventures, as he had the habit of flying in at the open windows
of houses in the neighbourhood of Park Lane, and making himself very
much at home. He also flew about Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens every
day to visit his fellow-rooks. One day his mistress was walking in the
Row, at an hour when it was full of fashionable people, and the rook,
winging his way homewards from the gardens, spied her, and circling down
alighted on her shoulders, to the amazement of all who witnessed the
incident. 'What an astonishing thing!' exclaimed some person in the
crowd that gathered round her. 'Oh, not at all,' answered the lady,
caressing the bird with her hand, while he rubbed his beak against her
cheek; 'if you were as fond of the birds as I am, and treated them as
well, they would be glad to come down on to your shoulders, too.'
This happened when the now vanished rooks had their populous rookery in
Kensington Gardens, where they were to be seen all day flying to and
from the old nesting-trees, and stalking over the green turf in search
of grubs on the open portions of Hyde Park. And we should have had them
there now if they had not been driven out.
* * * * *
The two largest London rookeries were those at Greenwich Park and
Kensington Gardens. In the first-named the trees were all topped over
twenty years ago, with the result that the birds left; and although the
locality has much to attract them, and numbers of rooks constantly visit
the park, they have never attempted to build nests since the trees were
mutilated. This rookery I never saw; that of Kensington Gardens I knew
very well.
Over twenty years ago, on arriving in London, I put up at a City hotel,
and on the following day went out to explore, and walked at random,
never inquiring my way of any person, and not knowing whether I was
going east or west. After rambling about for some three or four hours,
I came to a vast wooded place where few persons were about. It was a
wet, cold morning in early May, after a night of incessant rain; but
when I reached this unknown place the sun shone out and made the air
warm and fragrant and the grass and trees sparkle with innumerable
raindrops. Never grass and trees in their early spring foliage looked
so vividly green, while above the sky was clear and blue as if I had
left London leagues behind. As I advanced farther into this wooded space
the dull sounds of traffic became fainter, while ahead the continuous
noise of many cawing rooks grew louder and louder. I was soon under the
rookery listening to and watching the birds as they wrangled with one
another, and passed in and out among the trees or soared above their
tops. How intensely black they looked amidst the fresh brilliant green
of the sunlit foliage! What wonderfully tall trees were these where
the rookery was placed! It was like a wood where the trees were
self-planted, and grew close together in charming disorder, reaching a
height of about one hundred feet or more. Of the fine sights of London
so far known to me, including the turbid, rushing Thames, spanned by
its vast stone bridges, the cathedral with its sombre cloud-like dome,
and the endless hurrying procession of Cheapside, this impressed me the
most. The existence of so noble a transcript of wild nature as this tall
wood with its noisy black people, so near the heart of the metropolis,
surrounded on all sides by miles of brick and mortar and innumerable
smoking chimneys, filled me with astonishment; and I may say that I
have seldom looked on a scene that stamped itself on my memory in
more vivid and lasting colours. Recalling the sensations of delight
I experienced then, I can now feel nothing but horror at the thought
of the unspeakable barbarity the park authorities were guilty of in
destroying this noble grove. _Why_ was it destroyed? It was surely worth
more to us than many of our possessions--many painted canvases, statues,
and monuments, which have cost millions of the public money! Of brick
and stone buildings, plain and ornamental, we have enough to afford
shelter to our bodies, and for all other purposes, but trees of one or
two centuries' growth, the great trees that give shelter and refreshment
to the soul, are not many in London. There must, then, have been some
urgent reason and necessity for the removal of this temple not builded
by man. It could not surely have been for the sake of the paltry sum
which the wood was worth--paltry, that is to say, if we compare the
amount the timber-merchant would pay for seven hundred elm-trees with
the sum of seventy-five thousand pounds the Government gave, a little
later, for half a dozen dreary canvases from Blenheim--dust and ashes
for the hungry and thirsty! Those who witnessed the felling of these
seven hundred trees, the tallest in London, could but believe that the
authorities had good cause for what they did, that they had been advised
by experts in forestry; and it was vaguely thought that the trees, which
looked outwardly in so flourishing a condition, were inwardly eaten up
with canker, and would eventually (and very soon perhaps) have to come
down. If the trees had in very truth been dying, the authorities would
not have been justified in their action. In the condition in which trees
are placed in London it is well nigh impossible that they should have
perfect health; but trees take long to die, and during decay are still
beautiful. Not far from London is a tree which Aubrey described as very
old in his day, and which has been dying since the early years of this
century, but it is not dead yet, and it may live to be admired by
thousands of pilgrims down to the end of the twentieth century. In any
case, trees are too precious in London to be removed because they are
unsound. But the truth was, those in Kensington Gardens were not dying
and not decayed. The very fact that they were chosen year after year by
the rooks to build upon afforded the strongest evidence that they were
the healthiest trees in the gardens. When they were felled a majority
of them were found to be perfectly sound. I examined many of the finest
boles, seventy and eighty feet long, and could detect no rotten spot in
them, nor at the roots.
The only reasons I have been able to discover as having been given for
the destruction were that grass could not be made to grow so as to form
a turf in the deep shade of the grove; that in wet weather, particularly
during the fall of the leaf, the ground was always sloppy and dirty
under the trees, so that no person could walk in that part of the
grounds without soiling his boots.
It will hardly be credited that the very men who did the work, before
setting about it, respectfully informed the park authorities that they
considered it would be a great mistake to cut the trees down, not only
because they were sound and beautiful to the eye, but for other reasons.
One was that the rooks would be driven away; another that this tall
thick grove was a protection to the gardens, and secured the trees
scattered over its northern side from the violence of the winds from the
west. They were laughed at for their pains, and told that the 'screen'
was not wanted, as every tree was made safe by its own roots; and as to
the rooks, they would not abandon the gardens where they had bred for
generations, but would build new nests on other trees. Finally, when it
came to the cutting down, the men begged to be allowed to spare a few of
the finest trees in the grove; and at last one tree, with no fewer than
fourteen nests on it: they were sharply ordered to cut down the lot. And
cut down they were, with disastrous consequences, as we know, as during
the next few years many scores of the finest trees on the north side of
the gardens were blown down by the winds, among them the noblest tree in
London--the great beech on the east side of the wide vacant space where
the grove had stood. The rooks, too, went away, as they had gone before
from Greenwich Park, and as in a period of seventeen years they have not
succeeded in establishing a new rookery, we may now regard them as lost
for ever.
Seventeen years! Some may say that this is going too far back; that in
these fast-moving times, crowded with historically important events, it
is hardly worth while in 1898 to recall the fact that in 1880 a grove
of seven hundred trees was cut down in Kensington Gardens for no reason
whatever, or for a reason which would not be taken seriously by any
person in any degree removed from the condition of imbecility!
To the nation at large the destruction of this grove may not have been
an important event, but to the millions inhabiting the metropolis, who
in a sense form a nation in themselves, it was exceedingly important,
immeasurably more so than most of the events recorded each year in the
'Annual Register.'
It must be borne in mind that to a vast majority of this population of
five millions London is a permanent home, their 'province covered with
houses' where they spend their toiling lives far from the sights and
sounds of nature; that the conditions being what they are, an open
space is a possession of incalculable value, to be prized above all
others, like an amulet or a thrice-precious gem containing mysterious
health-giving properties. He, then, who takes from London one of these
sacred possessions, or who deprives it of its value by destroying its
rural character, by cutting down its old trees and driving out its bird
life, inflicts the greatest conceivable injury on the community, and is
really a worse enemy than the criminal who singles out an individual
here and there for attack, and who for his misdeeds is sent to Dartmoor
or to the gallows.
We give praise and glory to those who confer lasting benefits on the
community; we love their memories when they are no more, and cherish
their fame, and hand it on from generation to generation. In honouring
them we honour ourselves. But praise and glory would be without
significance, and love of our benefactors would lose its best virtue,
its peculiar sweetness, if such a feeling did not have its bitter
opposite and correlative.
* * * * *
In conclusion of this in part mournful chapter I will relate a little
experience met with in Kensington Gardens, seventeen years ago. I was
in bad health at the time, with no prospect of recovery, and had been
absent from London. It was a bright and beautiful morning in October,
the air summer-like in its warmth, and, thinking how pleasant my
favourite green and wooded haunt would look in the sunshine, I paid a
visit to Kensington Gardens. Then I first saw the great destruction that
had been wrought; where the grove had stood there was now a vast vacant
space, many scores of felled trees lying about, and all the ground
trodden and black, and variegated with innumerable yellow chips, which
formed in appearance an irregular inlaid pattern.
As I stood there idly contemplating the sawn-off half of a prostrate
trunk, my attention was attracted to a couple of small, ragged,
shrill-voiced urchins, dancing round the wood and trying to get bits
of bark and splinters off, one with a broken chopper for an implement,
the other with a small hand-hatchet, which flew off the handle at every
stroke. Seeing that I was observing their antics, one shouted to the
other, 'Say, Bill, got a penny?' 'No, don't I wish I had!' shouted the
other.
'Little beggars,' thought I, 'do you really imagine you are going to get
a penny out of me?' So much amused was I at their transparent device
that I deliberately winked an eye--not at the urchins, but for the
benefit of a carelessly dressed, idle-looking young woman who happened
to be standing near just then, regarding us with an expression of slight
interest, a slight smile on her rosy lips, the sunshine resting on her
beautiful sun-browned face, and tawny bronzed hair. I must explain
that I had met her before, often and often, in London and other towns,
and in the country, and by the sea, and on distant seas, and in many
uninhabited places, so that we were old friends and quite familiar.
Presently an exceedingly wasted, miserable-looking, decrepid old woman
came by, bent almost double under a ragged shawl full of sticks and
brushwood which she had gathered where the men were now engaged in
lopping off the branches of a tree they had just felled. 'My! she's got
a load, ain't she, Bill?' cried the first urchin again. 'Oh, if we had
a penny, now!'
I asked him what he meant, and very readily and volubly he explained
that on payment of a penny the workmen would allow any person to take
away as much of the waste wood as he could carry, but without the penny
not a chip. I relented at that and gave them a penny, and with a whoop
of joy at their success they ran off to where the men were working.
Then I turned to leave the gardens, nodding a good-bye to the young
woman, who was still standing there. The slight smile and expression of
slight interest, that curious baffling expression with which she regards
all our actions, from the smallest to the greatest, came back to her
lips and face. But as she returned my glance with her sunny eyes, behind
the sunniness on the surface there was a look of deep meaning, such as I
have occasionally seen in them before. It seemed to be saying sorrowful
and yet comforting things to me, telling me not to grieve overmuch at
these hackings and mutilations of the sweet places of the earth--at
these losses to be made good. It was as if she had shown me a vision
of some far time, after this London, after the dust of all her people,
from park ranger to bowed-down withered old woman gathering rotten
rain-sodden sticks for fuel, had been blown about by the winds of many
centuries--a vision of old trees growing again on this desecrated spot
as in past ages, oak and elm, and beech and chestnut, the happy, green
homes of squirrel and bird and bee. It was very sweet to see London
beautified and made healthy at last! And I thought, quoting Hafiz, that
after a thousand years my bones would be filled with gladness, and,
uprising, dance in the sepulchre.