The rooks are old established
housekeepers, high-minded gentlefolk, that have had their hereditary
abodes time out of mind; but as to the poor crows, they are a kind of
vagabond, predatory, gipsy race, roving about the country without any
settled home; "their hands are against every body, and every body's
against them;" and they are gibbeted in every corn-field. Master Simon
assures me that a female rook, that should so far forget herself as to
consort with a crow, would inevitably be disinherited, and indeed
would he totally discarded by all her genteel acquaintance.
The Squire is very watchful over the interests and concerns of his
sable neighbours. As to Master Simon, he even pretends to know many of
them by sight, and to have given names to them; he points out several,
which he says are old heads of families, and compares them to worthy
old citizens, beforehand in the world, that wear cocked hats, and
silver buckles in their shoes. Notwithstanding the protecting
benevolence of the Squire, and their being residents in his empire,
they seem to acknowledge no allegiance, and to hold no intercourse or
intimacy. Their airy tenements are built almost out of the reach of
gun-shot; and, notwithstanding their vicinity to the Hall, they
maintain a most reserved and distrustful shyness of mankind.
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