One old gray-headed rook, who is always the first to arrive on the ground when feeding time has come, and who hops about with an uncommonly consequential air, from all accounts appears to be a perfect reprobate among his fellows. The number of wives he has cruelly injured, and the number of children he has kicked out of the nest have acquired for him the evil reputation of being the ringleader of the badly disposed of the feathered tribe. Unfortunately, also, there is reason to fear that so bad an example has perverted several of the younger husbands and fathers. Infanticide has indeed of late so much increased, that it has now become a matter of grave consideration whether it will not be advisable to inflict the extreme punishment of the law upon the chief criminal. It is feared that it will be necessary to put this venerable gray head to death, as a terrible example to all rooks, and as a warning to all intending sinners. Unhappily it must be admitted that the diminution of these interesting inhabitants of the higher regions is not altogether owing to their domestic delinquencies. It is, no doubt, partly caused by the rapid growth of London, and the great distance the rooks have now to traverse in order to arrive at their natural feeding grounds. Another and deplorable cause arises from the decay and unavoidable destruction of some of the oldest trees. In former years there was a very large rookery in the gardens of Gray's Inn. In 1875, however, storms and severe winters had so broken and damaged many of the largest trees that it was necessary to cut them down. This was done in March, and in April, to the consternation of the inhabitants of the Inn, the rooks departed in a body, as if indignant at being thus despoiled of a portion of their dominions. For nearly a month not a bird appeared; then about six pair shyly returned, as if unwilling to quit for ever so fair and so peaceful a dwelling. The other wanderers have never come back; but the little colony, though so much diminished from what it was in days of yore, still flourishes and indeed prospers. There are more nests this spring than there have been for several past years, and it may therefore be hoped that this ancient rookery may long continue to be one of the charms and attractions of Gray's Inn. Its existence undoubtedly mainly depends upon the durability of the grand and beautiful dwelling-places of the birds, the noble old elms, and unhappily such old elm trees are dangerous neighbours. With age their wood becomes not only brittle, but peculiarly liable to internal decay. After the heavy rains that so often succeed dry summers, huge branches, sometimes the tree itself, will fall without warning. Such accidents not unfrequently occur in calm and quiet weather when danger is not suspected; the vicinity of elm trees is therefore perilous to life as well as to neighbouring buildings.