out in flats to the other rooks. Then what they don't want they
fling down again. Suppose we built on such a principle? Suppose a
human husband and wife were to start erecting their house in Piccadilly
Circus, let us say; and suppose the man spent all the day steadily
carrying bricks up the ladder while his wife laid them, never asking
her how many she wanted, whether she didn't think he had brought
up sufficient, but just accumulating bricks in a senseless fashion,
bringing up every brick he could find. And then suppose, when evening
came, and looking round, they found they had some twenty cart-loads of
bricks lying unused upon the scaffold, they were to commence flinging
them down into Waterloo Place. They would get themselves into trouble;
somebody would be sure to speak to them about it. Yet that is precisely
what those birds do, and nobody says a word to them. They are supposed
to have a President. He lives by himself in the yew tree outside the
morning-room window. What I want to know is what he is supposed to be
good for. This is the sort of thing I want him to look into. I would
like him to be worming underneath one evening when those two birds are
tidying up: perhaps he would do something then. I have done all I can. I
have thrown stones at them, that, in the course of nature, have returned
to earth again, breaking more glass. I have blazed at them with a
revolver; but they have come to regard this proceeding as a mere
expression of light-heartedness on my part, possibly confusing me with
the Arab of the Desert, who, I am given to understand, expresses himself
thus in moments of deep emotion. They merely retire to a safe distance
to watch me; no doubt regarding me as a poor performer, inasmuch as I do
not also dance and shout between each shot. I have no objection to their
building there, if they only would build sensibly. I want somebody to
speak to them to whom they will pay attention.

You can hear them in the evening, discussing the matter of this surplus
stock.

"Don't you work any more," he says, as he comes up with the last load,
"you'll tire yourself."

"Well, I am feeling a bit done up," she answers, as she hops out of the
nest and straightens her back.

"You're a bit peckish, too, I expect," he adds sympathetically. "I know
I am. We will have a scratch down, and be off."

"What about all this stuff?" she asks, while titivating herself; "we'd
better not leave it about, it looks so untidy."

"Oh