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He i ee | i | nt IMA sO Ad asttd test HERA RTS i Hiatt PHRMA NEAR RADA RRA NEES vn een tai ai ie eh st aii Ge aa dni Hh ana itt int ri it i a | fn ‘itt inc ! i An a uit tiie Hi ar EE Ae Haat a a a alot itt et ctateteletetelerebetalsic. tlle Le eee Sin! feenpeeesee = Foe ote er eters ey Sons. = <<. == ct ee a dat HH ths al sn sammeencene ene I fate areata sae Mt i i 234 se —S (IN BIRD ‘IN BIRD LAND " | BY of LEANDER S..KEYSER Hast thou named all the birds without a gun? Loved the wood-rose, and left it on its stalk? RALPH WALDO EMERSON: forbearance Teach me half the gladness That thy brain must know, Such harmonious madness From my lips would flow The world should listen then, as I am listening now! Percy B. SHELLEY: Zo a Skylark CHICAGO A. C. MCCLURG AND COMPANY 1894 h\ . eee a. aoe be, Oh Z ) . t e ' = R — = fae” « = « , e , we y 5 = 5 ree! ‘a ; 1 i \ He ? 7 ' - 7 “> . f ¥ ‘ eke ra i fs pe - 2 ? a { ; . § : h Fy os igi e : . t 1 P > s n ’ -* \ oe = 5 % A 3 M 4 yt 2 Lae | ’ ' A a % = . : 5 te ._ ' nei - ¢ A Fi - “§ 3 ¥ a ‘Ad a a9 * i a a _ ’ > ‘ F we | Ke 1 > Le Bae 2.5) oe _ Copyricut 5 at | By ALC. McCture anp Co. ¢ 4 Ae ai Ps nes ta j ma I a <= . , D, 2 op ¢ “ee S } th aay Ce ee Spi e . : | NO TE: THE articles comprising this volume having been previously published in various periodi- cals of the country, I would desire to tender my grateful acknowledgments to the several publishers and editors for their uniform cour- tesy In permitting me to reprint the papers. My observations on birds have been made, except when otherwise indicated, in various haunts in and about Springfield, Ohio, —a region well adapted for ornithological research or pastime. i AUGUST, 1804. CON TEN TS: CHAPTER PAGE eV AYSIDE, RAMBLES 3). 0 0 gy elitr ca.) esa Gad « 9 MME Rn CURIOSN Yoo ee ek eee Gr 24 MBE NVINTER FROLICS ar ON io es ee! AS PPE EERUARY OUTINGS) (0 io f600 6) eo Seu ete ee, SO Maer RRIVAC Ob THE BIRDS << fa bos Kew on OF Ree AVINGED) VOVNGERS’ oye 66 8 CS a FO Pei PLUMAGE OF VOUNG: BIRDS ai ia7 se 3) a 87 en VESI-ELUNTING 4 ~ 5's do jen WM GAe Sch ey 2 2 PS eels MeR | MELODIES ¢ 60 aja oe «FIO Pee euERe, BIRDS ROOST s. 6 (es, ous se yie) be. REO Ble tate VWOOD-PEWER 6... 6. Sook sn ee AF Petre EAD OF INIGHT-HAWKS. SOF tw 135 Pati AouRDS GALA-DAVY 9.0 2 8 a Oe 4 es CO TAL Peer torre WITEO DERDS 2 eee eile Se 8) oat EG XV. VARIOUS PHASES OF BIRD LIFE: ele Pigel@ Ourksaip Gaile & eek ue No ceo Bi Bisa Wurseries ss age is Ve ie a Fe OG Bite bied) Elish Schools .5 3.00. seen on, BOG HVA inds VV Ors se ee ets ce ol i Tato LOS Wier PIA iene O ites ete ees Datel wus. 2 Wale Bind MCAtNSHia i sc au marcus 6 2 e 3 267 iit} Why I if if | Hi] q This way would I also sing, My dear little hillside neighbor ! A tender carol of peace to bring To the sunburnt fields of labor Ls better than making a loud ado ; Trill on, amid clover and yarrow! There’s a heart-beat echoing for you, And blessing you, blithe little sparrow! Lucy LARCOM. = IN BIRD LAND. eee E WAYSIDE RAMBLES. OOKING out of my study window one fair spring morning, I noticed a friend — a pro- fessional man — walking along the street, evidently taking his ‘“‘constitutional.”” Having reached the end of the brick pavement, he paused, glanced around a moment undecidedly, and then, instead of walk- ing out into the beckoning fields and woods, turned down another street which led into a thickly popu- lated part of the city. Surely, I mused, we are not all cast in the same mould. While he carefully avoided going beyond the suburbs and the beaten paths, as if afraid he might soil his polished shoes, I should have plunged boldly into the country, “across lots,” to find some sequestered nook or grass-grown by-way, “far from human _ neighbor- hood,”’ to hold undisturbed converse with Nature. My friend’s conduct, however, did not put me in a critical mood, but rather stirred some grateful reflections on the wise adaptation of all things in 10 IN BIRD LAND. the world of being. How fortunate that men are so variously constituted! If some did not naturally choose the bustle and stir and excitement of the city, where would be our philanthropists, our How- ards and Peabodys and Dodges? On the other hand, if others did not voluntarily seek quiet and solitude in Nature’s unfrequented haunts, the world would never have been blessed with a Wordsworth, an Emerson, or a Lowell; and in that case, for some of us at least, life would have been bare and arid. It is true, we cannot accept Pope’s dictum, “ What- ever is, is right.””. We know that many things that are, are wrong; but doubtless more things in this paradoxical old world are right than moralists some- . times suppose. To the genuine lover of Nature, and especially to the lover of her unbeaten pathways, the ringing lines of Emerson come home with thrilling power: — “If I could put my woods in song And tell what ’s there enjoyed, All men would to my gardens throng, And leave the cities void.” Yet I doubt if any spot in Nature’s domain could be made so attractive as to overcome most persons’ natural love of human association. Mayhap even if this could be done, it would not be desirable. Should all men hie to the woods and leave the cities void, it would spoil both the woods and the cities. The charm of the woods is their quiet, their solitude; the enchantment of the city, its WAYSIDE RAMBLES. iI _ thronging life and. activity. While I may be lone- some in a crowd, my neighbor is almost sure to feel lonesome in the marsh or the deep ravine. If all men loved Nature with a passion that could not be controlled, much work would be left undone that is indispensable to human life and happiness. I am glad, therefore, that there are many birds of many kinds ; glad, too, that there are many men of many minds. ‘The apostle does well to remind his breth- ren in the church that there are “ diversities of gifts” and “ diversities of operations,” even if all do spring from “the same Spirit.” Albeit, as for me, give me “‘ A secret nook in a pleasant land, Whose groves the frolic fairies planned.” Emerson voices my own feeling when he sings : — : * A woodland walk, A quest of river-grapes, a mocking thrush, A wild rose, or rock-loving columbine, Salve my worst wounds ; ” for, * What friend to friend cannot convey, Shall the dumb bird instructed say.” And it is true that a wayside ramble will often do, by way of self-revelation and conviction, what no human voice of chastisement can accomplish. Mr. Howells says, in one of his most trenchant analytical novels : “If you ’re not in first-rate spiritual condition, you ’re apt to get floored if you undertake to com- mune with Nature.’’ There are times when the very 12 IN BIRD LAND. immaculateness of the sky, or the purity of a wood- land flower, rebukes one, gives one a keen sense of one’s sins, and makes one long for absolution; or when the pensive moaning of the wind through the gray, branchless trees on a winter’s day forces on the mind a prevision of a judgment about to be visited upon one’s misdoings. Yet this is seldom my own experience while idling in out-of-the-way places. Usually I feel soothed and comforted, or, at most, a sort of glad melancholy steals over me, which is as enchanting as a magician’s spell; while I often win exhilaration from the whispering breezes, as if they carried a tonic on their pulsing wings. On the spring morning on which my friend so studiously avoided Nature’s by-paths, my stint of ‘labor for the day was soon despatched, and then, flinging my lunch-bag over my shoulders, I hurried across the fields, anxious to put a comfortable dis- tance between myself and bothering human tene- ments. By noon I had reached a green hollow at the border of a woodland, where Nature, to a large extent at least, has had her own sweet way. Here, on the grassy bank of a rivulet, I sat down to eat my luncheon. ‘The spring near by filled my cup with ale that sparkles, but never burns;. that quenches thirst, but never creates it. Not a human habita- tion was in sight; nothing but the tinkling brook, the sloping hills, the quiet woods, and the overarch- ing sky. The haunt was not without music. The far-away cadences of the bush-sparrows on the hill- side filled the place like melodious sunshine. A WAYSIDE RAMBLES, 13 short distance down the hollow a song-sparrow thrummed his harp, while a cooing dove lent her dreamy threnody to the wayside trio. Although engaged in the prosaic act of eating my luncheon, I breathed in an atmosphere of poetry and romance, - and half expected a company of water-witches and dryads to leap upon the greensward before me and dance to the music of bird and brook. A pagan I am not, — at least, such is my hope; but moods subjunctive sometimes seize me when I do not blame the Greeks — aye, rather, when I praise them — for peopling the woods with Pan and his feumsae; for | feel the imfluence of | a~ strange, mystical, and more than impersonal presence. Yes, one’s dreams sometimes take on a specula- tive cast, even on a day that seems to be “the bridal of the earth and sky.” In this unfrequented spot _ the birds sing their sweetest carols, be there a human ear to hear or not. Do they sing merely for their own delectation, these little creatures of a day? Is there not far too much sweetness wasted on the desert air? Would there not be more purpose in Nature could these dulcet strains be treasured in some way, so that they might be poured into man’s appreciative ear? Why has Nature made no pho- nographs? Wherefore all this waste of ointment? Does Nature encourage the habits of the spend- thrift? I recall a summer day when I strolled along a deep, lonely ravine. It was at least a mile to the nearest human dwelling. Suddenly a clear, melodious trill from a song-sparrow’s lusty throat 14 IN BIRD LAND. rippled through the stillness, making my pulses flutter. Here, doubtless, the little Arion had sung his roundels all summer long, and perhaps I had been the only person who had heard him, and. then I had caught only a few tantalizing strains — simply enough to give a taste for more. Why was the peerless triller apparently burying his talents in this solitary haunt? | It may be true of bird song, as of the recluse flower, that “beauty is its own excuse for being;” but I am not ashamed to record my confession of faith, my creed, on this matter; not my dreamy cogitations with z/s and mayhags. ‘There is a divine ear which catches every strain of wayside melody, . and appreciates it at its true value. Thus, no beauty or sweetness is ever lost, no bird or flower is really an anchorite. A bird may flit away in alarm at the approach of a human intruder, and may not lisp a note until he is well out of the haunt; but the same songster will unconsciously pour his dithyrambs all summer long into the ear of God. Nature was not made for man alone; it was also made for its Cre- ator. Never has the brown thrasher sung with such enchanting vigor and abandon as he did the other day at the corner of the woods when he thought no human auditor within ear-shot. He was singing for God, albeit unconsciously. It is high time to get back to my waysiding, if I may coin a word. You must go to an out-of-the- way resort, far from the din of loom and factory, to feel the quaint, delicate fancy of Sidney Lanier’s lines, — WAYSIDE RAMBLES, 15 ‘Robins and mocking-birds that all day long Athwart straight sunshine weave cross-threads of song, . Shuttles of music.” The wayside rambler often is witness of delight- ful bird-pranks that must escape other eyes. On a bright day in February I strolled to the hollow to which I have already referred. The sun was melt- ing the ice-mantle from the brook, and causing the snow to pour in runlets down the banks. In a broad, shallow curve of the stream the tree-sparrows and song-sparrows were taking a bath. I watched them for a long time. Some of them would remain in the ice-cold water for from three to five minutes, fluttering their wings and tails in perfect glee, and sending the pearl-drops and spray glimmering into the air. Their ablutions done, they would fly up to the saplings near by, and carefully preen and dry their moistened robes. It was in the depth of the woods that my saucy black-cap, the titmouse, clambered straight up the vertical bole of an oak sapling, as if he had learned the trick from the brown creeper or the white- breasted nuthatch. No less interesting was the conduct of the downy woodpecker, that little drum- major of the woods. He is the tilter par excellence of the woodpecker family. He flings himself in the most reckless manner from trunk to branch, and from branch to twig, often alighting back-downward on the slenderest stems. Shall I describe one of his odd tricks? I had often seen him clinging to the slender withes of the willows at the border of i} | 16 IN BIRD LAND. the swamp, and had wondered how he could hold himself with his claws to so meagre a. support. It was a problem. How much I longed to solve it! However, for a long time the bird so completely i baffled me that I felt like another Tantalus. One \ | winter day, however, he happened to be quite near | the ground as I stood beneath the willows, so that | I could see just how he accomplished the mysteri- | ous feat. Imagine my surprise! He did not cling to the withes with his c/aws at all, as he clings to a tree-trunk or a large bough, but grasped the slender perches with his /ee¢, precisely as if they were hands, flinging his long toes, like fingers, clear around the | stems, one foot above the other. In ascending, he ial . would go foot over foot; in descending, he would | simply loosen his hold slightly and slip down. Sir | Isaac Newton may have made more important dis- | coveries, but he did not feel prouder or happier | | when he solved the binomial theorem than did I | when my little avian problem was solved. I am not i aware that any one else has ever described this | performance, and am strongly tempted to announce | it as an original discovery. Yet a certain writer once declared, patronizingly, that there are some writers — himself excepted, of course — on natural history themes who proclaim as original discoveries many facts that are perfectly familiar to every tyro in science. Spite of the scornful reflection, however, it is my modest opinion that there are very few observers who have seen a woodpecker ascending a willow-withe foot over foot. WAYSIDE RAMBLES. Ey Many, many a cunning bird prank would have been missed had I kept, like the majority of pedes- fens ita the beaten track. There, for example, is that odd little genius in mottled robes, the brown creeper, who has performed a sufficient number of quaint gambols to repay me for all the time and effort expended in pursuing my wayside rambles. He is always su generis, apparently priding himself on his eccentricities, like some people you may know. A genuine arboreal creeper, he almost in- variably coasts up hill. Unlike his congeners, the nuthatch and the creeping warbler, he never goes bhead-downward. Dear me, no! Whether it is because it makes him light-headed, or he regards mas bad form, | am unable to say. He does not even hitch down backward after the manner of the woodpeckers, but marches up, up, up, until he thinks it time to descend, which he does by taking to wing, bounding around in an arc as if he were an animated rubber ball. You may almost imagine him saying: ‘ Pah! such vulgar sport as creeping head-downward may be well enough for mere plebeians like the nuthatches and the striped creepers, but it is quite beneath the caste of a parmmeian like myself! Zseem/ tseem/”. At rare intervals he will slip down sidewise for a short distance, ina slightly oblique direction, especially when he comes to a fork of the branches. However, he does not think it beneath his dignity to take a promenade on the under side of a hori- zontal bough. One day as I watched him doing 2 18 IN BIRD LAND. this, he reached a point where the limb made an obtuse angle by bending obliquely downward. Now what would he do? Would he really hitch down that branch head-foremost, only for once? By no means. Catch him committing such a breach of creeper decorum! He suddenly spread his wings and hurled himself to the lower end of that oblique section of the branch, and then ambled up to the angle in regular orthodox fashion. You will never find him doing anything to give employment to the heresy hunters ! ! | Have any of my fellow-observers ever seen this merry-andrew convert himself into a whirligige I once witnessed this droll performance, which seemed _ almost like a vagary. A creeper was clinging to a large oak-tree near the base, when he took it into his crazy little pate, for what earthly —or unearthly — reason I know not, to wheel around like a top several 1 Some months after the foregoing had appeared in the columns of a popular journal I had occasion to modify one assertion. For many years I had been studying the creeper, and had never seen him descend a tree or bough head-first until one autumn day while loitering in the woods. A creeper was hitching up the stem of a sapling in his characteristic manner; as I drew near, he seemed to catch a glimpse of a tidbit in his rear, near the sapling’s root. In his extreme haste to secure it before I drove him away, he wheeled around, scuttled down over the bark head-foremost a distance of perhaps two feet, picked up his morsel, and then dashed out of sight, as if ashamed of his breach of creeper etiquette, probably to eat humble pie at his leisure. That was in the autumn of 1892. Since then no creeper, to my knowledge, has been guilty of a similar offence against the convenances. WAYSIDE RAMBLES. 19 times in quick succession. He rested a moment, and then repeated the comedy. On another occasion a creeper was preening his ruffled feathers, having evidently just taken a bath ; and how do you suppose he went about it? In quite a characteristic fashion, you may rest assured. Instead of sitting crosswise on a perch, as most birds would have done, he clung to the vertical bole of a large oak-tree, holding himself firmly against the shaggy bark, and daintily straightening out every feather from his breast to his flexible tail. Growing tired of this position— apparently so, at least — he shuffled up to a fork made by the trunk and a large limb, where he found a more comfortable slanting perch on which to complete his toilet. Once, after- ward, I saw a creeper arranging his plumes in the same way. But the quaintest exploit of this bird still remains to be described. One autumn day, while rambling along the foot of arange of steep cliffs, I caught sight of one of these birds darting from a tree toward the perpendicular wall of rock. For a few moments I lost him, but followed post-haste, muttering to my- self, “ What if I should find the little clown climbing up the face of the cliff! That would be a perform- ance worth describing to my bird-loving friends, wouldn’t it?’ (Surely a monomaniac may talk aloud to himself.) I could scaicely believe my eyes, for the next moment my happy presenti- ment was realized; there was the creeper scaling the vertical face of the cliff, with as much ease and 20 IN BIRD LAND. aplomb, apparently, as a fly creeping up the smooth surface of a window-pane! Then he flew ahead a short distance, and began mounting the cliff where its face was quite smooth and hard. Presently he encountered a bulging protuberance, and tried to creep along the oblique under side of it; but that feat proved to be beyond his skill, agile as he was, and so he abandoned the attempt, and swung away to another part of the vertical wall. I have never seen, in any of the manuals which [have con- sulted, a description of a similar performance ; and if any of my readers have ever witnessed such a “ coruscation’”’ of creeper genius, I should be glad to hear from them. va In one’s out-of-the-way saunterings, one dashes “up against many a faunal problem that defies, even while it challenges, solution. On a cold day of early winter I was strolling along the bare, wind- swept banks of a river, keeping my eyes alert, as usual, for bird curios. In the small bushes that fringed the bank were some cunningly placed nests. In the bottom of one of them lay many seeds of dogwood berries, with the kernels bored out, — the work, no doubt, of the crested tits. But there were no dogwood-trees within twenty-five rods of the place! Why had the birds carried the shells to this nest, and dropped them into it? This is all the more curious because it was not a tit’s nest, but very likely a cat-bird’s. One can only surmise that the tits had gathered these seeds in the fall, and stowed them away in the nest for winter use, and WAYSIDE RAMBLES. 2% then had eaten out the kernels when hunger drove them to it. That would be in perfect keeping with the habits of these thrifty little providers for the morrow. During the winter of 1892-1893 a red-bellied woodpecker, often called the zebra-bird, took up his residence in my woodland. (I call it mine by a sort of usufruct, because I ramble through its pleasant archways or sit in its quiet boudoirs at all hours and in all seasons.) With the exception of several brief absences, for which I could not account, the woodpecker remained until the following spring, giving me some delightful surprises. It was the first winter he had shown the good grace to keep me company. Perhaps he was lazy; or he may Haye been a clumsy fliér; or-+perchance he got separated from his fellows by accident, and so was left behind in the autumn when the southward pil- grimage began. | | He was, by all odds, the handsomest woodpecker I had ever seen. His entire crown and hind-neck were brilliant crimson, which fairly shimmered like a flambeau when the sun peeped through a rift in the clouds and shone upon it; and then his back was beautifully mottled and striped with black and white, while his tail was bordered with a broad band of deep black. What a splendid picture he made, too, whenever he spread his wings and bolted from one tree to another! I wish an artist could have caught him on the-wing, and transferred him to canvas. He performed a trick that was new to — ——— a aS = TSS a=: 22 IN BID, LANTZ. me, and did it several times. He would dash to some twigs, balance before them a moment on the wing, pick a nit or a worm from a dead leaf-clump, and then swing back to his upright perch. Once he found a grain of corn in a pocket of the bark, placed there, perhaps, by a nuthatch; but he did not seem to care for johnny-cake, and so he dropped it back into the pocket. How cunningly he canted his head and peered into the crannies of the bark for grubs, calling, Chack / chack / 7 During the entire winter he uttered only this harsh, stirring note, half jocose, half spiteful; but, greatly to my surprise, when spring arrived, espe- cially if the weather happened to be pleasant, he began to call, K-t+7-r/ k-t-r-r/ precisely like a red-headed woodpecker; indeed, at first I laid siege to every tree, looking in vain for a red-head come prematurely northward, until I discovered the trick of my winter intimate, the red-bellied wood- chopper. Why it should have been so I cannot explain ; but whenever a cold wave struck this lati- tude during the spring, he would invariably revert to his harsh Chack/ chack/ and then when the breezes grew balmy again, he would resume his other reveille, making the woods echo. I also dis- covered —it was a discovery to myself, at least — that the red-bellied is a drummer, like most of his relatives; but not once did he thrum his merry ra-ta-ta before spring arrived,— another avian conundrum for the naturalist to beat his - brains against. WAYSIDE RAMBLES. 23 But hold! I might go rambling on in this way forever, like Tennyson’s brook, — or, possibly, like Ixion revolving on his wheel, — describing the odd pranks witnessed in my wayside rambles. It is high time, however, to call a halt; yet, after a brief breathing-space, these miscellanies will be resumed in the next chapter, which may, with some degree of propriety, be entitled “ Bird Curios.” 24 IN BIRD LAND, i]. BIRD CURIOS: VERY observer of birds and animals has doubtless amassed many facts of intense interest —at all events, of intense interest to him- self — which he has not been able to adjust to any systematic arrangement he may have made of his material. ‘That is true of the incidents described in this chapter. It will, therefore, necessarily partake of the nature of bric-a-brac. If it were not so self- complimentary, I should dub it bird mosaic, and have done. ‘The reader will perhaps be more dis- posed to trace a resemblance to an eccentric old woman’s “ crazy quilt ;”’ andif he prefers the home- lier and less poetical title, I shall not complain. But even a bit of patchwork must be begun somewhere, and so I shall plunge at once zz medias ves. The day was one of the fairest of early spring. How shall I describe it? No sky could have been bluer, no fields greener. The earth smiled under the favoritism of the radiant heavens in happy recognition. My steps were bent along the green banks of a winding creek in northern Indiana. Suddenly a loud, varied bird song fell on my ear BIRD CURIOS. 25 and brought me to a full stop. It swept down lilt- ingly from a high, bushy bank some rods back from the stream, and at once proclaimed itself as the thapsody of the cat-bird. Anxious to watch the brilliant vocalist in his singing attitudes, I ap- proached the acclivity, and soon espied him in the midst of the dense copse, which was not yet covered with foliage. He redoubled his efforts when he saw an appreciative auditor standing near. Presently a quaint impulse seized his throbbing, music-filled bosom. He swung gracefully to the ground, picked up a fragment of newspaper, leaped up to his perch again, and then, holding the paper harp in his beak, resumed his song with more vigor than before. All the while his beady eyes sparkled with good-natured raillery, as if he expected me to laugh at his unique performance ; and, of course, I was able to accom- modate him without half an effort. An errant gust of wind suddenly wrenched the bit of paper from his bill and bore it to the ground. The minstrel darted after, and straightway recovered his elusive prize, flew up to his perch, and again roused the echoes of woodland and vale with his rollicking song, the paper harp imparting a peculiar resonance to his tones; while his air of banter seemed to challenge me to a musical contest. I laughingly declined in the interest of my own reputation. He was one of the choicest minstrels of bird land I have ever heard, — barring the sex, a Jenny Lind or an Adelina Patti, — his voice being of excellent timbre, his tones pure and liquid, and his technical 26 IN BIRD LAND. execution almost perfect. Ever since that day I have been the avowed friend of the catbird, — in truth, his champion, ready at any moment, in season and out, to take up the glove in his defence against every assailant. Some very self-conscious human performers — people who themselves live in glass houses — have accused him of singing to be heard, making him out vain and ambitious. Well, what if he does? Why do his human compeers j sing or speak or write? Certainly not purely for ; their own delectation, but also, in part at least, to : catch the appreciative ear and eye of the public, and | win a bit of applause. ‘ Let him that is without sin 4 among you first cast a stone.’”” He who scoffs at = my plumbeous-hued choralist makes me his enemy, —not the choralist’s, but the scoffer’s. So let the latter beware ! I leave the cat-bird, however, to his own resources | — he is well able to take care of himself —to tell q what the birds were doing during a recent spring, ; which fought in a very desultory manner its battle | with the north winds. Special attention is called to the laggard character of the season because a tardy spring is a sore ordeal to the student of bird life, postponing many of his most longed-for investiga- tions. The spring to which I refer (1892) was pro- vokingly slow in its approach, and yet it developed 4 some traits of bird character that were interesting. ! For instance, the first week in April was a seducer, being quite bland, starting the buds on many trees, and putting the migrating fever into the veins of a BIRD CURIOS. 27 number of species of birds. But the snow-storms and fierce northern blasts that came later were very hard on both birds and buds. Many a chorus was sung during the pleasant weather, but on more than one day afterward the cheerful voices of the feathered choir were hushed, while the songsters themselves sought refuge from the storm in every available nook, where they sat shivering. One cannot always repress the interrogatory why Nature so frequently stirs hopes only to blast them; but it is not the business of the empirical observer to question her motives or her manners,—rather to study her as she is, without asking why. Cold as April was, some birds were hardy enough to go to nest-building. Among these were the robins, whose blushing bosoms could be seen everywhere in grove and field. On the seventh of the month a robin was carrying grass fibres to a half-finished nest in the woodland near my house. A week later she was sitting on the nest, hugging her eggs close beneath her warm bosom, while the tempests howled mercilessly about her roofless homestead. It seemed to me, one cold morning after a snow-storm, that her body shivered as she sat there, and I feared more than once that she would freeze to death; but no such fatality befell her, and she resolutely kept her seat in her adobe cottage. And this reminds me of a bird tragedy described to me by a professor in the college located in my town. He said that a number of years ago a robin built a nest in a tree not far from the site on which 28 IN BIRD LAND. some workmen were erecting a new college building. In May a very fierce snow-storm came. One day the workmen noticed a half-dozen robins darting about the nest on which the hatching bird sat, flying at her with sharp cries, striking her with their wings, and making use of various other devices to dislodge her from the nest. They seemed to realize that she was in peril of her life through long inactivity and exposure to the cold. But.their efforts were unsuc- cessful: she would not leave her nest; her eggs or young must have her care at whatever cost. How- ever, the poor bird paid dearly for her devotion. The next morning — the night had been very cold —the workmen found her dead upon the nest. My informant vouches for the truthfulness of the story, and says that he himself saw the faithful mother on the nest after she had been frozen stiff. On the twentieth of April I saw another robin sitting close on her nest, which was built on a horizontal branch of a willow-tree, not more than eight feet from the ground. The raw east wind lifted the feathers on her back, as if determined to creep through her thick clothing to the sensitive skin. A few days earlier a blue jay was seen carry- ing lumber to her partly erected nursery in the crotch of an oak-tree. A pair of bluebirds, sigh- ing out their sorrows and joys, began building in one of my bird-boxes during the pleasant early April weather; but when the cold spell came, they wisely suspended operations until the storms were overpast and they could proceed with safety. A _ killdeer BIRD CURIOS. 20 plover’s nest was found by my farmer neighbor on the ninth of April. It was on the ground in an open field, with not so much as a spear of grass for protection. That year the crow blackbirds arrived from the south in February, all bedecked in holiday attire, the rich purple of their necks scintillating in the sunshine. You have perhaps observed the droll an- tics of these birds as they sing their guttural O-g/-ee. It is amusing to see them fluff up their feathers, spread out their wings and tails, bend their heads forward and downward with a spasmodic movement, and then emit that queer, gurgling, half-musical note. It would seem that the little they sing re- quires a superhuman — more precisely, perhaps, a super-avian — effort, coming aqueously, one might almost say, from some deep fountain in their wind- pipes. These contortions do not invariably accom- pany their vocal performances, but certainly occur quite frequently. The red-wings also often behave in alike manner; and both species always spread out their tails like a fan when they sing, whether they fluff up their plumes and twist their necks or not. Another bit of bird behavior gave me not a little surprise during the same spring. It started this query in my mind: Is the white-breasted nuthatch asap-sucker? It has been proved by Mr. Burroughs and Mr. Frank Bolles, I think, that the yellow- bellied woodpecker is. But how about the frisky nuthatch, so versatile in ways and means? Here is Om 30 IN BIRD LAND, an incident. One day I saw a nuthatch thrusting his slender bill into a hole in the bark of a young hickory-tree. Nuthatches often hunt for grubs in that way, but something about this fellow’s conduct prompted me to watch him closely for some minutes. He bent over the hole with a lingering movement, as if sipping something. Presently I slowly ap- proached the tree, keeping my eye intent on the bird. | Of course, he flew away on my approach, but my eye was never taken from the spot to which he had been clinging. Being forced to climb the trunk of the tree a few feet, what discovery do you sup- pose awaited me? There was a small hole pierced through the bark from which the sap was flowing down the crannies, and into that fount the little was- sailer had been thrusting his bill, with a sort of lin- gering motion, precisely as if he had been sipping the sweet liquor. The evidence was sufficient to convince me that he had been doing this very un- orthodox thing. The real sap-suckers, no doubt, had dug the well, for there were a number of them in the woods, and the nuthatch had been stealing the nectar. Perhaps, however, I wrong him; he may have asked permission of the owner to drink from the saccharine fountain. | The next autumn I took occasion to pry into the affairs of my beloved intimates of the woods, and had more than one surprise. Some species of birds, like some other animals, lay by a supply of food for winter, proving that they do take some thought for BIRD CURIOS. 31 the morrow. So far as my observation goes, this pro- vident care is displayed only by those birds that are winter residents in our more northern latitudes. I have never seen any of the vast company of migrants making such provision for the proverbial rainy day ; and, indeed, it would be unnecessary. ‘To them suf- ficient unto the day is the care as well as the evil thereof, and so they take their “daily bread” as they happen to find it. Our winter residents, however, are more thrifty, as I have observed again and again. Here is an instance which once came under my eye. While sauntering along the border of the woods one day in September, I noticed several nuthatches and _ black- capped titmice busily gathering seeds from a clump of sunflower stalks, and flying with them to the trees near by. I found a seat and watched them for a long while. A nuthatch would dart over to a sun- flower stalk, cry, Yak / yak / in his familiar way, as if talking affectionately to himself, deftly pick out a seed from its encasement, fly with it to the trunk of an oak-tree, and then thrust it into a crevice of the bark with his long slender beak. He would then hurry back for another seed, which he would treat in the same way. The behavior of one of these little toilers was especially interesting. By mistake he pushed a seed into a cranny which seemed to be too deep for his purpose, and so he proceeded in his vigorous way to pry and chisel it out. He seemed to say to himself: “That would be too hard to dig out ona 32 IN BIRD LAND, cold winter day; I think I’d better get it out now.” When he had secured it, he put it into another crevice, which also proved too deep; and so his dainty had to be recovered once more. The third attempt, however, proved a charm, for that time he found a little pocket just to his liking. To make very sure he did not eat the seed, I did not take my eye from him for a single moment. ‘The fact is, during the entire time spent in watching the birds, I did not see them eat asingle seed. ‘The titmice flew farther into the woods with their winter “ goodies,” where the foliage was so dense, while the birds were so quick in movement, that it was impossible to see just where they hid their store; but they returned too soon for a new supply to allow time for eating the seeds. One autumn I spent a week in a part of Ken- tucky where beechnuts were very plentiful, and saw the hairy and red-headed woodpeckers putting | away their hoard of “mast” for the winter, indus- trious husbandmen that they were. A farmer said that he had often seen the woodpeckers carrying these nuts to a hole in a tree and dropping them into it. He once found such a winter store that must have contained fully a quart of beechnuts. In my own neighborhood the hairy woodpecker often hides tidbits in gullies of the bark, after the man- ner of the nuthatch. The crested tit also stows corn and various kinds of seeds in some safe niche for a time of exigency. Several times in the winter, when the ground was covered with snow, I have BIRD CURIOS. Be surprised this bird eating a corn grain in the very depth of the woods, a considerable distance from the neighboring cornfields. | One winter day a nuthatch picked three grains of corn in succession from the fissures of an oak, and greedily devoured them. On another occasion one of these nuthatches was seen diving into a hole on the under side of a limb, Presently he emerged with a nut of some kind in his bill, and flew away, remaining just about long enough to eat it, when he returned for another. ‘This he repeated until his dinner was finished. No doubt, when cold and stormy weather comes, these birds have many a luscious mouthful because of their forehandedness, and no doubt they enjoy their well-kept stores as much as the farmer and his family relish their dish of mellow apples around the glowing hearth on a winter evening. It is no fancy flight, but a literal truth, that many a niche and cleft is made to do duty as larder for the feathered and furred tenants of the woods. | With the birds that migrate, autumn is the season for gathering in large convocations, holding “ windy congresses in trees,’ as Lowell aptly puts it. The aerial movements of some of these feathered armies are often worthy of observation. Memory lingers fondly about a day in autumn when two friends and myself were clambering up the side of a steep hill or ridge that bounded a green hollow on the south. We had gone half-way to the top when we turned to admire the panorama spread out picturesquely 3 34 IN BIRD LAND. before us. Our exclamations of pleasure at the scene were soon interrupted by a shadow hurtling across the hollow, and on looking up, we saw a vast army of crow blackbirds sweeping overhead, moving about fifty abreast. How long the column was I cannot say, but it extended over the hollow from hilltop to hilltop and some distance beyond in both directions. ‘The odd feature about the ebon army’s evolutions was this: The vanguard had gone on far beyond the ravine, and was. pushing over the oppo- site ridge, when there was a peculiar swaying move- ment near the centre directly above the hollow; then that part of the column dropped gracefully downward toward the trees below them; at the same moment those in the van swung lightly around to the right and returned, while the rear part of the column advanced rapidly, and then all swept grandly down into the tops of the tall trees in the ravine. It was a splendid military pageant, and might well start several queries in the interrogative mind. Where was the commander-in-chief of that sable army? Was he near the centre of the column? If so, why should he station himself there instead of at the head? Again, how could the message to return be sent so speedily to the vanguard? Do birds employ some occult method of telegraphy? But these are questions more easily asked than answered ; for no one, so far as I know, has yet given special attention to the i tactics of the armies in feathers. It may be a somewhat abrupt transition from a BIRD CURIOS. 36 crowd to an individual, but the reader must bear in mind that a close logical unity cannot be pre- served in a chapter composed of bric-a-brac; and, besides, is not every crowd made up of individuals ? How great was my surprise, one summer day, to see a purple grackle stalking about in his regal manner on the flat rocks of a shallow woodland stream, and then suddenly wheel about, pull a crab out of the water, and fly off with it to a log, where he beat it to pieces and devoured it! I doubt if many persons are aware that this bird dines on crab. On the same day another grackle, striding pompously about in the shallow water, suddenly sprang up into the air, some six or eight feet, and caught an insect on the wing. ‘This was a perform- ance on the part of a crow blackbird never before witnessed by me. One day in the woods my saucy little madcap, the crested titmouse, was tilting about on the twigs of a sapling like a trapeze performer in a circus. Sometimes he hung lightly to the under side of a spray, and pecked nits and other dainties from the lower surface of a leaf. While doing so, he hap- pened to catch sight of an insect buzzing by; he flung himself at it like a feathered arrow; but for some reason he missed his mark, and the insect, in its efforts to escape, let itself drop toward the ground. An interesting scuffle followed; the tit- mouse whirled around and around, dashing this way and that like zigzag lightning, in hot pursuit, flutter- ing his wings very rapidly until he alighted on the 36 IN BIRD LAND. ground on the dry leaves, where he at last succeeded in capturing his prize. He gulped it down with a sly wink, as much as to say: “ Was n’t that a clever trick, sir? Beat it if youcan!’’ Then he picked up a seed and flew with it to a twig in a dogwood sapling, where he placed it under his claws, holding it firmly as he nibbled it with his stout little beak. His meal finished, he suddenly pretended to be greatly alarmed at something, called loudly, Chick, chick-a-da! chick-a-da-da/ and darted away like an Indian’s arrow. | On the same day a golden-crowned kinglet — my Lilliputian of the woods—surprised me by drop- ping from a twig above me to the ground, right at my feet, passing within two or three inches of my face. Quick as a flash he leaped to a sapling before me, and I saw that he held a worm in his tiny bill. Of course, that was the prize for which he had dashed in such a headlong way to the ground. Few birds have charmed me more than the jolly red-headed woodpecker, and many a quaint antic has he performed with all the nonchalance of a sage or a stoic. He has a queer way of taking his meals. The first time it came to my notice I was walking home, on a hot summer day, along a railway, when a red-head bounded across the track before me, holding a ripe, blood-red cherry in his beak. He made a handsome picture with his pure white and velvety black coat and vest, his crimson cap and collar, and his—here my tropes fail, and I am forced to become literal — long, black beak, tipped BIRD CURIOS. 37 with the scarlet berry. Swinging gracefully across the railway, he presently alighted on a stake of the meadow fence, where he seemed to place the cherry me Sort of crevice, and then sip from it in~a somewhat dainty, half-caressing way, as if it were rarely billsome. My curiosity being excited, I eyed him awhile, and then, determined to reconnoitre, climbed the wire fence over into the meadow, and drove him away from his menu. ‘There, in a small pocket of the fence-stake, apparently hollowed out, at least partially, by the bird himself, lay the cherry, its rind punctured in several places, where the diner-out had thrust in his bill to sip the juicy pulp underneath, —a sort of woodpecker’s fable @héte. The crevice had a rank odor of cherries dried in the sun,—a proof that it had been used for a dining-table for some time. The legs and wings of several kinds of insects were also strewn about. Since that day I have found many of these pockets in fence-stakes, posts, dead tree-boles, and old stumps, where woodpeckers have placed their dainties to be eaten at their convenience. You have doubtless seen these red-heads catching insects on the wing. This they do with as much agility as the wood-pewee, sometimes performing evolutions that are little short of marvellous. From my study window I once watched one of these aeronauts as he sprang from the top of a tall oak- tree in the grove near by, and mounted up, up, up in graceful terraces of flight, until he had climbed at least twice the height of the tree, when he sud- 38 IN BIRD LAND. denly stopped, poised a moment airily, wheeled about, and plunged downward headlong with a swiftness that made my head swim, closing the de- scent with a series of bounds, as if he were going down an aerial stairway. Whether he performed this feat in pursuit of an insect, or to display his skill, or only to give vent to his exuberance of feeling, I am unable to say. The red-head has an odd way of taking a bath during a light shower, which he does by clinging lengthwise to an upright or oblique branch, fluffing up his plumes as much as possible, and then flapping his wings slowly back and forth, thus allowing the refreshing drops thoroughly to percolate and rinse his handsome feathers. And, by the way, the subject of bird baths is one of no small degree of interest to the ogler of the feathered creation. It has been my good fortune to see a brilliant company of warblers of various species — lyrics in color, one might call them — performing their ablutions at a small pond in the woods. How their iridescent hues flashed and danced in the sunshine, as they dipped their dainty bosoms into the water, twinkled their wings, and fluttered their tails, sending the spray like pearl-mist into the air! One sylvan pic- ture like that is worth many a mile’s tramping. I once saw several myrtle warblers taking a dew- bath. Do you wonder how they did it? They leaped from a twig in the trees upon the dew-covered leaves, —it was early morning, — and fluttered about until their plumes were thoroughly drenched, then BIRD CURIOS. 39 flitted to a perch to dry their bedraggled feathers and carefully arrange their dainty toilets.1 Besides, it has been my chance to witness my little confidant, Bewick’s wren, taking a dust-bath, which he did in this manner: he would squat flat on his belly on the ground in the lane, completely hiding his feet, and then glide about rapidly and smoothly over the little undulations, stirring the dust in volatile cloudlets. Never have I seen any per- formance, even in the bird realm so varied and versatile, more absolutely charming; so charming, indeed, that I believe my brief description of it will fittingly bring this rambling chapter on “ Bird Curios” to a close. 1 Long after this statement had appeared in print, Mr. Bradford Torrey described, in the “ Atlantic Monthly,” a similar performance which he witnessed in Florida; and, rather oddly, myrtle warblers were also the actors in this instance. 40 IN BIRD LAND. i WINTER FROLICS. AD Mr. Lowell never written anything but “A Good Word for Winter,’ he would stili have deserved a place in the front rank of American writers. What a genuine appreciation of Nature, even in her sterner and more unfriendly moods, breathes in every line of his manfully written mono- graph! Blessed be the man whose love for Nature is so leal and deeply rooted that he can say, “ Even though she slay me, yet will I trust in her!”” When the storm howls dismally, and the icy gusts strike you rudely in the face ; when the cold rain or sleet pelts you spitefully ; when, in short, Nature seems to frown and scold and bluster, —the loyal lover of her feels no waning of affection, but knows that beneath all her bluster and apparent harshness she carries a tender, maternal heart in her bosom that responds to his wooing. No, Thomson is in error when he says that winter is the “inverted year.” Winter, as well as summer, is the year right end up, standing squarely on its feet; or, if it does some- times turn a somersault, it quickly wheels about again into an upright position. Nor is Cotton’s dictum correct that winter is “our mortal enemy.” WINTER FROLICS. 4I It has been much misunderstood, and therefore much abused, for there are persons who will ever and anon malign that which is above their com- prehension. It is just possible that the weather may sometimes become too cold in the winter for open-air exercise ; but the winter of 1890-1891, with its occasional snow-storms, its alternating days of rain and clear sunshine, was an almost ideal one for the rambler. There were times when the woods were clad in robes more beautiful than the green of spring or the brown of autumn; when I was compelled to exclaim with a Scottish poet, — ** Now is the time To visit Nature in her grand attire.” I mean those days when every twig and branch was “ridged inch-deep with pearl,’ making the woodland a perfect network of marble shafts and columns. | As to the feathered tenants of the woods, they were almost as light-hearted and gay as in the season of sunshine and flowers, save that they were not so prolific of song. Quite a number of interest- ing species were the constant companions of my winter loiterings, and several of them occasionally regaled me with snatches of melody. Among our winter songsters is the hardy Carolina wren. On December and January days when the weather was quite cold, his vigorous bugle echoed through the woods, Chil-le-lu, chil-le-lu, or, Che-wish-year, che- 42 IN BIRD LAND. wish-year, giving one the feeling that at least one brave little heart was not discouraged on account of the dismal moaning of the wintry storm. He is every inch a hero, and I wonder Emerson did not celebrate his praise as well as that of the black- capped chickadee, in verse. ‘The wren is somewhat more of a recluse than most of my winter intimates. He has not been quite as sociable as I should have liked. Whether it was modesty or selfishness that made him a sort of eremite could not be deter- mined. Most of his contemporaries, such as the chickadees, kinglets, nuthatches, and woodpeckers, prefer to go in straggling flocks; so that, as soon as I see one bird or hear his call, I feel sure that he is simply the sentinel of a bevy of feathered tilters and coasters at my elbow. No, they do not believe in monasteries or nunneries; they do not believe that it is good for a bird to be alone, whatever may be said of man or woman. Listen to that kinglet, the malapert, hanging head-downward on a spray and making his disclaimer: ‘No, sir, we birds are sociable beings, as men are, and like to hold commerce with one another. What good would it do to sing so sweetly or tilt so gracefully were there no auditors or spectators to admire our per- formances?’”? And all his plumed comrades cry, “Aye! aye!’’ by way of emphatic endorsement. The division of these tenants of the woods into communities or colonies is a matter of unique interest to the ornithologist. For instance, there seemed to be at least two of these groups, one WINTER FROLICS. 43 dwelling chiefly in the eastern part of the woodland not far from a farm-house, and the other occupying the western part. Sometimes, too, another com- munity was found in the partly cleared section at the northern extremity of one arm of the timber belt. These several groups reminded one of the nomadic tribes of Oriental countries, who rove from one locality to another within certain loosely defined boundaries. ‘True, it is merely a matter of speculation; but I have often wondered if feuds and jealousies ever arise among these various feathered tribes, as is so conspicuously the case in the human world. I doubt it very much, for my woodland birds dwell together in comparative harmony, and are not half so quarrelsome and envious as many communities of men and women. Bird nature is evidently not so depraved as human nature. Perhaps, as the birds had no direct hand in the first transgression, the curse did not fall so blightingly upon them. My western bird colony were somewhat erratic in their movements. During December and the first week in January I found them almost invari- ably in a secluded part of the woods about half-way between the northern and southern extremities ; but when, about the middle or possibly the twen- tieth of January, I visited the haunt, not a bird of any description could be found. MHad all of them gone to other climes? I felt a pang as the thought came. But there was no occasion for solicitude. Near the southern terminus of the woods, although AA IN BIRD LAND. still in a dense portion of them, the colony had taken up a temporary abode. Here they remained for over a week, and then, on the twenty-ninth of the month, which was a rainy day, they shifted back to their old tryst, while scarcely a bird was to be found in the locality they had just left. Thus by caprice, or on account of the exigencies of food, they oscil- lated from place to place. : There were some birds here all winter that were | not found during the previous winter — that of 1889-1890. ‘The golden-crowned kinglet was one. Every day, rain or shine, warm or cold, he flitted about so cheerfully and with so innocent an air that I often spoke to him as if he were a real person; and he appreciated my words of praise, too, without doubt, for he would come scurrying near, disporting his head so that I could catch the gleam of his amber coronal, with its golden patch for a centre-piece. ‘Then there was that quaint little genius, the brown creeper, hugging the trunks of the trees and saplings, and tracing the gullies of the bark as he sought for such food as he relished. See him turn his cunning head from side to side to peer under a loose scale! | Among my most pleasant winter companions were the black-capped chickadees or tomtits. Not for anything would I cast a reflection upon these en- gaging birds, but candor compels me to say that they seem to be somewhat fickle; that is, I cannot always tell where to find them, or if they will let themselves be found at all. Early in the spring of WINTER FROLICS. 45 last year they made their appearance in these woods, remaining a week or more, and then were not seen until about the middle of August. Again they dis- appeared, returning in October, and then hied away once more and did not come back until January. Besides, at one time they associated with the eastern colony of birds and at another with the western. Like some “ featherless bipeds, ’? — Lowell’s expres- sion,— they seemed to be of a roving disposition. A winter ago they occasionally stirred the elves and brownies of the woodland into transports by their sweet, sad minor whistle, but this winter they were provokingly chary of their musical performances. For ever-presentness, however, both summer and winter, the crested titmice and white-breasted nut- hatches bear off the palm. Many droll tricks they perform. One day in January a titmouse scurried from the ground into a sapling; he held a large grain of corn between his mandibles, and, after flitting about a few moments, hopped to a dead branch that lay across the twigs, and deftly pushed the-erain into the end of the bough... 1 stepped closer, when he tried to secure the hidden morsel ; but my presence frightened him away, and I climbed the sapling, drew the broken branch toward me, and peered into the splintered end; yes, there was the grain of corn wedged firmly into a crevice. The provident little fellow! He had secreted the morsel for a stormy day when it would be impossible to procure food on the ground. If Solomon had watched these thrifty, industrious birds, as they 46 IN BIRD LAND. pursue their untiring quest for food, he doubtless would have written in his Proverbs: “Go to the titmouse, thou sluggard ; consider his ways, and be wise.”’ 7 Associated with the titmice, kinglets, and nut- hatches were the downy woodpeckers, which belong to the artisan family of the bird community, being hammerers, drillers, and chisellers all combined. They pursue their chosen calling most sedulously. “What ’s the use of having a vocation if you don’t follow it?’’? you may almost hear them say as they cant their heads to one side and peep under the bark for a tidbit, or hammer vigorously at a crevice in which a worm is embedded. The hairy wood- peckers, which are somewhat larger, are more erratic in their movements, none having been seen from the autumn until the latter part of January. At this date I heard their loud, nervous Chz-2-2-7-7, as they dashed from tree to tree apparently in great excitement. | I cannot forbear contrasting this winter with the previous one. In the winter of 1889-1890 the song- sparrows never left us at all, but sang on almost every pleasant day when I went to the woods or marsh ; but this winter, which was somewhat colder, they went to other climes, and left the fringes of the pools and the thickets in the swamp tenantless, songless, and desolate. In 1889-1890 the cardinal grossbeaks whistled every month, making the woods ring even in January; this winter not a single note was heard from their resonant throats. I had just WINTER FROLICS. 47 begun to fear that the pair which had greeted me so frequently the previous winter had been slaughtered by some caterer to the shameful fashions of the day, when, on the twenty-eighth of January, I was gladdened by the sight of them in company with several of their relatives or acquaintances and a bevy of tree-sparrows. Where had the grossbeaks been since November? And if they had gone south, why did they return from their visit so early in the season? Or perhaps a still more pertinent inquiry would be, Why had they gone away at all? It is difficult, however, to explain grossbeak caprice or ratiocination. What do the birds do when it rains? No doubt, when the rain pours in torrents, they find plenty of coverts in the thick bushes or in the cavities of trees; but when the rain falls gently, and I make my way to their haunts, as I often do, they flit about as industriously as ever in their quest for food, only stopping now and then to shake the pearly drops from their water-proof cloaks. In such humid weather the wood-choppers in the forest —the human ones—stop their work and seek shelter. Not so these feathered workers, who gayly continue their playful toil, and exclaim exultingly, pieat this a jolly rain?” In another chapter mention has been made of the provident habits of certain birds, especially the titmice and nuthatches, in laying by a winter store. As if to confirm what has been said, one winter day a nuthatch went scudding up and down the trunk of 48 IN BIRD LAND. a large oak-tree at the border of the woods. Pres- ently he cried, Yank/ yank / as if to announce a discovery. Then he pecked and pried with all his might, until at length he drew a grain of corn out of acrevice of the bark, placed it in a shallow pocket on the other side of the tree, and began to pick it to pieces, swallowing the fragments as he broke them off. When this grain had been disposed of, he found another, and then another, until his hunger seemed to be appeased, when he darted off into the woods. , Other pedestrians and observers may differ from me both in temperament and habits, but to my mind nothing could be more delightful than a ramble in a snow-storm. Let the wind blow-a gale from the west, driving the cold pellets blindingly into your face, and trying to rob you of your over- coat and cap; yet, if you have the spirit of the genuine rambler, your blood will tingle with delight, as well as with a sense of masterly overcoming, as you plod along; while you feel that every fierce gust that strikes you is only one of Nature’s love-taps, — a little rough, it is true, but for that very reason all the more expressive of affection. Stalking forth into the teeth of a winter storm develops the hardy traits of character, and puts the ingredients from which heroes are made into the pulsing veins. Many atime, as I have pushed my way triumphantly through the pelting wind, I have answered with a shout of joy Emerson’s vigorous challenge, — WINTER FROLICS. 49 * Come see the north wind’s masonry. Out of an unseen quarry, evermore Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer Carves his white bastions with projected roof Round every windward stake, or tree, or door.” My winter saunterings have never been solitary, although often taken in haunts “far from human neighborhood.” ‘The birds have afforded me all the companionship I have really craved. One is never lonely when one can see the flutter of a wing or hear the calls of the blithe commoners of the wildwood. When your soul is fretted by the daily round of strifes and jealousies in the human world, you can hie to the woods, and learn a lesson of con- ciliation from the example of the loving fellowship that exists in the bird community. I have often been shamed by this constant display of amity among many feathered folk, when I thought of the childish bickerings of men in church and state. But moralizing aside, I must describe the behavior of my little winter friends, the tree-sparrows. They are the hardiest birds that spend the winter in my neighborhood, disdaining to seek shelter in the thick woods during the most violent snow-storm. Even the snowbirds, whose very name is a synonym for toughness, are glad to seek a covert in some secluded forest nook; but the tree-sparrows choose the clearing at the border of the woodland, where the wind howls loudest and blows the snow in wild eddies. Here they revel in the storm, flitting from twig to twig, hopping on the snow-covered ground 4 50 IN BIRD LAND. as if it were a carpet of down, and picking seeds from grass-stems and weed-stalks. All the while they keep up a cheerful chirping, as if to express their appreciation of the pleasant winter weather. — Strangest of all is their wading about in the snow. It makes me shiver to see their little bare feet sink- ing into the icy crystals, and I feel disposed to offer them my warm rubber boots; only I know they would decline the proposal with scorn. “I am no tenderfoot !”’ one of them seems to say, with cunning literalness. ‘Their dainty tracks in the snow are suggestive, and give to the thoughtful observer more than one clew to bird cerebration. Let us follow one of these winding pathways. Here a bird alighted, his feet sinking deep into the cold down; then he hopped along to this tuft of grass, where he picked a few mouthfuls of seeds, standing up to his body in the snow; then an impulse seized him to seek another feeding-place; so he went plunging through the drifts, leaving, at regular intervals, the prints of his two tiny feet side by side, while his toes traced a slender connecting line on the white surface between the deeper indentations. But here is another path. What impulse seized this bird to turn back like a rabbit on his track? For it is evident that this is sometimes done. Then here are only two or three footprints, showing that the bird alighted suddenly, and as suddenly yielded to an impulse to fly up again. What thought struck him just at that moment that made him so quickly change his mind? Bes WINTER FROLICS. 51 At one point I traced a path which bore evidence of having been used a number of times for a long distance, as it wound here and there in an ex- tremely sinuous course among the bushes and briers. Probably it was a sparrow-trail, if not a thoroughfare, and had been used by many birds. In more than one place were small hollows in the snow, just large enough for a bird’s body to wallow in. Usually they were at the terminus of one of these thorough- fares. Might the birds have tarried there to take a snow-bath? I have seen birds taking pool-baths, shower-baths, dew-baths, and dust-baths. Who will say they never take a snow-bath? Next to the tree-sparrows, the juncos delight to hold carnival in the snow; but their behavior in this element is somewhat different: they are not so fond of hopping about in it, and do not plait such a net- work of tracks among the bushes. They will fly from a perch directly to the ground near a weed- stalk or other cluster of dainties, and stand quietly in the snow up to their little bodies while they take their luncheon. Sometimes their white breasts rest on the surface of the snow, or in a slight depression of it, when they look as if they were sitting in a nest of crystals. The eighth of January was a cold day; in a little opening in the midst of the woods was a covey of snowbirds, and, incredible as it may seem, several of them stood in the selfsame tracks in the snow, so long that my own feet actually got frost-bitten while I watched them, although I wore three pairs of 52 IN BIRD LAND. socks —this is an honest confession — and a pair of warm rubber boots. More than that, they thrust their beaks into the snow and ate of it quite greedily. What wonderful reserves of caloric must be wrapped up in their small bodies to enable them to keep themselves comfortable in winter with never a mouthful of warm victuals or drink! That the birds should thrive and be happy in the spring and summer is no matter of surprise ; but it remains for the lover of out-door life in the winter to prove that many of them are just as cheerful and content when the mercury has taken a jaunt to some point far below zero. | : The student of Nature cannot always be in the same mood. Indeed, Nature herself is, at.times, as whimsical, apparently, as the human heart. There are times when she seems quite stolid, keeping her precious secrets all to herself, as if her lips had been hermetically sealed. With all your coaxing and hoaxing and flattery, you cannot win from her a re- sponse. Emerson, in one of his poems, speaks about the forms of Nature dulling the edge of the mind with their monotony; and this sometimes seems to be the case. Yet I must protest at once that it is not generally true. There are days when Nature fairly bubbles over with good cheer, and grows talk- ative and even confidential, responding to every touch of the rambler as a well-strung harp responds to the touch of a skilful player. It is difficult to account for her changeable moods, but obviously they are not always to be traced only to the mind of the observer. | WINTER FROLICS. 53 ‘During the winter of 1891-1892 many a tramp was taken to the homes of the birds; and let me whisper that there were days when even they seemed to be dull and commonplace. That is a frank con- cession for a bird-lover to make, but it is the truth. Sometimes these feathered actors have behaved in the most ordinary way, failing to perform a single trick that I had not seen a score of times before, and I have actually gone home without making a single entry in my note-book. But it has not always been so. There, for example, was the twenty-second of January ; what an eventful day it was! The morn- ing of the twenty-first had been very cold, the mer- cury having sunk, probably in a fit of despair, to fourteen degrees below zero. During the day, how- ever, the weather grew considerably warmer; and when the twenty-second came, bright and clear, though still cold, one could take a jaunt with some comfort. _The sun shone from a cloudless sky, and having put on my warm rubber boots, I waded out through the deep snow to the woods. ‘The se- vere weather had not discouraged the jolly juncos and tree-sparrows, or driven them to a warmer climate. ‘They delight in cold weather; it seems to make them all the merrier. They were flitting about in the bushes and trees, chirping gayly, or, like my- self, were wading in the snow, although they had no woollen stockings for their little feet, much less warm rubber boots. What hardy creatures they are! For long distances I could trace their dainty tracks in the snow, winding in and out among the bushes and BA IN BIRD LAND. weeds, and making many a graceful curve, loop, angle, and labyrinth. By following these little paths, as has been said before, you may trace the thoughts of a bird, —that is, you may for the time become a bird mind-reader, interpreting every impulse that seized the throbbing little brain and breast. | While watching these birds in the woods, I ob- served a new freak of bird deportment. ‘The juncos would fly up into the dogwood-trees, pick off a berry, nibble it greedily a moment with their little white mandibles, and then fling it to the ground. My eye was especially fixed on one little epicure. Presently he found a berry that was juicy and quite to his taste, and what did he do but seize it in his beak and dash down into the snow, where he stood leg- deep in the icy crystals until he had eaten his blood- red tidbit! He was in no hurry, but slowly picked the berry to pieces, flinging it again and again into the snow, devouring the soft red pulp and throw- ing the rind and seed away. He must have stood for fully five minutes in the same tracks ; at all events, it seemed a long while to me, standing stock-still in the snow, watching him eat his cold luncheon, while my feet were becoming chilled. I should have pitied his little feet had he not seemed so utterly indifferent to the cold. Afterward I saw a number of juncos, as well as tree-sparrows, taking their dinner in a simi- lar way, — that is, on the snow, which seemed to serve them fora table-cloth. Having eaten the pulp of the berries, they left the pits and scarlet rinds lying on top of the snow. Crumbs they were, scattered WINTER FROLICS. 55 about by these precious children of the woods! In this respect the snowbirds and tree-sparrows differ from the crested titmice, which reject the pulp of the dogwood berries entirely, but bore out the ker- nel of the pit and eat it with a relish. And as to the gluttonous robins, bluebirds, woodpeckers, and waxwings, they swallow these berries whole. Every citizen of Birdville to his own taste, so I say. In the corn-field adjoining the woods I witnessed another little scene that filled me with delight. At some distance I perceived a snowbird eating seeds from the raceme of a tall weed, which bent over ina graceful arc beneath its dainty burden. Apparently he was enjoying his repast allto himself. I climbed the fence, and cautiously went nearer to get a better view of the little diner-out. What kind of discovery do you suppose I made? I could scarcely believe my eyes. ‘There, beneath the weed, hopping about on the snow, were a tree-sparrow and a junco, pick-- ing up the seeds that their little companion above was shaking down. It was such a pretty little comedy that I laughed aloud for pure delight. It seemed for all the world like a boy in an apple-tree shaking down the mellow fruit for his playmates, who were gathering it from the ground as it fell. It was a pity to disturb the birds at their festivities, and I felt like a bully for doing so; but in the inter- est of science, you see, I had to drive them away to see what kind of table they had spread. Beneath the weed the snow was etched with dainty. bird- tracks, and thickly strewn with black seeds from the raceme of the weed-stalk. 56 IN BIRD LAND. Farther on in the woods, another cunning little junco proved himself no lay figure. It seemed, in fact, to be a junco day. When I first espied him, he was standing in the snow beneath a slender weed- stem eating seeds from his white table-cloth. But the curious feature about his behavior was that, whenever his supply of seeds on the snow had been picked up, he would dart up to the weed-stem (which was too slender to afford hima comfortable perch), give it a vigorous shake, which would bring down a quantity of seeds, and then he would flit below and resume his meal. This he did several times. I should not have believed a junco gifted with so much sense had not my own eyes witnessed this cunning performance. Had some other observer told the story, I should have laughed at it a little slyly and more than half unbelievingly; but, of course, one cannot gainsay the evidence of one’s own eyesight. Nothing in all my winter rambles has surprised me more than the evident delight some species of _birds take in the snow. It is a sort of luxury to them, wading-ground and feasting-ground ail in one. How they keep their little bare feet from becoming chilblained is a mystery. The evening of the twen- tieth of January was bitterly cold, the wind blowing in fierce, howling gusts from the northwest. Yet when, at about five o’clock, I stalked out to the pond in the rear of my house, the tree-sparrows and song-sparrows were fairly revelling, not to say wal- lowing, in the snow among the weeds. The wind was so biting that I soon hurried back to the house, and left them to their midwinter carousal. WINTER FROLICS. 57 Quite a respectable colony of flickers found a home during the winter in my favorite woodland. Unlike the other birds mentioned, they do not wade about in the snow. No; to their minds, a bare tree-wall is the desideratum for a tramping-ground ; and if they need more exercise than promenading affords them, they can take to wing and go bounding from one part of the woods to another. Ai flicker is a staid bird when he doesn’t happen to be in a play- ful mood. You would have laughed at one in De- cember which was clinging to a branch high up ina tree with his head right in front of a woodpecker hole, over which he seemed to be standing guard. There he clung, as if that hollow contained the most precious treasure, and would not desert his post, although I leaped about on the ground, shouted loudly, and even flung my cap in the air like a wild man, to frighten him away. Howcomical he looked in his role of sentinel! He never smiled or even winked, but left such trifling to the human scatter- brain below, who was so ill-mannered as to laugh at a well-behaved woodpecker. Perhaps he had a winter store of food stowed away in that cavity, and thought he had to guard it well, now that a real brigand had come prowling about the premises. 1 a | oe) IN BIRD LAND. FV. FEBRUARY -OUTINGS. F I were not afraid of the ridicule of the cynic, I should begin this February chronicle with an exclamation of delight; but in these days, when so many of the so-called cultured class have taken for their motto, Wz/ admirari, one must try to repress one’s enthusiasm, or be scoffed at, or at least pat- ronized, as young and inexperienced. Yet it would be.out of the question for the genuine rambler to keep the valve constantly upon his buoyant feelings. If he did so, he would be wholly out of tune with the jubilant mood of bird and bloom and wave around him. Almost every day of February, 1891, was a gala- day for me, on account of the large number of birds in song at that time. ‘The weather was not always pleasant, but the month came in blandly, bringing on its gentle winds many birds from their southern winter-quarters ; and as they had come, they made up their minds to stay. My notes begin with the eleventh of the month, and my narrative will begin with that date. In the evening I strolled out to my favorite swamp. On my arrival all was quiet; but soon the song-sparrows, seeing that a human auditor FEBRUARY OUTINGS. 59 had come, broke into a jingling chorus. Early in the season as it was, they seemed to be almost in perfect voice, only a little of the hesitancy and twitter of their fall songs being distinguishable ; nor did they seem to care for the raw evening wind blowing across the meadows, or the gray clouds scurrying athwart the sky, but kept up their canticles until the dusk fell. Two days later, while sauntering through a wood- land, I had the greatest surprise of the winter. For several years I had been studying the tree-sparrows, hoping to hear them sing, but only two or three times had my anxious quest been rewarded with even a wisp of melody from their lyrical throats. On this day, however, I came upon a whole colony of them in full tune, giving a concert that would have thrilled the most prosaic soul with poetry and romance. It was the first time I had ever really seen these birds while singing; but now, so kind was fortune, I could watch the movement of their mandibles, the swelling of their throats, and the heaving of their bosoms while they trilled their roundelays. -My notes, taken on the spot, run as follows: ‘‘ The song is somewhat crude and labored in technique ; but the tones are very sweet indeed, not soft and low, as one author says, but quite loud | and clear, so that they might be heard at some dis- tance. ‘The minstrelsy is more like that of the fox- sparrow than of any other sparrow, though the tones are finer and not so full and resonant. Quite often the song opens with one or two long syllables, and 60 IM’ BIRD LAND. ends with a merry little trill having a delightfully human intonation. ‘There is, indeed, something innocent and even childlike about the voices of these sparrows. Had they the song-sparrow’s skill in execution, they would rival that triller’s vocal performances. How many of them are taking part in the concert! They seem to be holding a song carnival to-day, and there is real witchery in their music. Frequently their songs are superim- posed, as it were, upon the semi-musical chattering in which these birds so often indulge.” But, strange to say, although the conditions were apparently in every respect favorable, I did not hear the song of a single tree-sparrow after that epochal day for more than a year. Evidently these birds are: erratic songsters, at least in this latitude. On the same day the meadow-larks flung their flute-like songs athwart the fields, and the bold bugle of the Carolina wren echoed through the woods. February 14. ‘Inthe swamp the song-sparrows are holding an opera festival,”” my notes run. ‘“ One of them trills softly in a clump of wild-rose bushes, as if asking permission to sing ; and then, his request being gladly granted, he leaps up boldly to a twig of a sapling, and breaks into a torrent of melody. _Another, in precisely the same tune, answers him farther down the stream, the two executing a sort of fugue. A third leaps about on the dry grass that fringes a ditch, twitters merrily for a while, then flies to a small oak-tree near by, and — well, such a loud, rollicking, tempestuous song I have FEBRUARY OUTINGS. 61 never before heard from a song-sparrow’s throat. Some of his tones are full and exultant, while others in the same run are low and tender, like the strains of a love-lorn harp. ‘The tones produced by exha- lation can be distinguished from those produced by inhalation. Sometimes his voice sounds a little hoarse, as if he had strained one of the strings of his lyre, but I find, on focusing my ear upon them, that these are some of his most melodious notes. Presently, in a fit of ecstasy, he hurls forth such a torrent of song, in allegro furioso, that one almost fancies the naiads and water-witches of the marsh are crying out for admiration. “Here is something worthy of note — when the song-sparrow begins a trill, he usually sings it over a number of times, and then, as if wearied with one tune, turns to another; and yet with all his varia- tions — and I know not how many he is capable of singing — there is always something distinctive about his minstrelsy that differentiates it from that of all other birds.” | February 17. ‘Again in the swamp. It seems to me I have never before heard the song-sparrows sing so gleefully. Every concert goes ahead of its predecessor. Here is a sparrow hopping about on the green grass among the bushes like a brown mouse; now he chirps sharply as if to attract my attention, and then bursts into a melody that almost makes me turn a somersault for very joy; and now, having sung his intermittent trills for a few minutes, he begins to warble a sweet, continuous lay, with an andanite movement, as if he could not stop. 62 IN BIRD LAND. «A little farther on, another songster, with a voice of excellent “mdre, is descanting on a small oak sapling. Note, he runs over several trills, rising higher at every effort, until at last he strikes a note far up in the scale, holds it firmly a moment, and then drops to a lower note. ‘Then he repeats the process, the summit of his ambition being attained whenever he reaches that high note, which is bewitchingly sweet. How clear and true his voice rings ! «¢ Sometimes a silence falls upon the marsh; not a note is to be heard for a minute or two; and then, as if by a preconcerted signal, a dozen spar- rows throw the air into musical tumult, their com- bined rush of notes seeming almost like a salvo. Often, too, when I approach the marsh, no music is heard, but no sooner have I climbed the fence into the enclosure than the choral begins; so that I believe I am justified in saying that the “song-spar- row appreciates a human auditor. ‘This is not said by way of disparagement,—by no means; for almost all musicians, whether human or avian, sing to be heard.’’. | On the same day I saw a song-sparrow whose central tail-feather was pure white from quill to tip, and the bird remained in the marsh until the twenty- fourth of the month, his odd adornment visible from afar. I was also surprised to find two male che- winks in the bushes. A cardinal grossbeak was also seen, and a robin’s song and the loud call of a flicker were heard. | FEBRUARY OUTINGS. -° 63 My next outing occurred on the nineteenth, when the weather had turned colder, and snow was falling, mingled with sleet; yet several song- sparrows trilled softly in the marsh. On the twenty- third crow blackbirds were seen, and on the twenty- fourth a turtle-dove was cooing meditatively, and the song-sparrows were holding another opera festi- val. The last days of February became cold again, and March brought several severe storms ; but I think none of the hardy, adventurous birds named, retreated to a warmer clime, even if they did regret having left their winter quarters a little prematurely. 64 IN BIRD LAND. y: ARRIVAL OF THE BIRDS: AVE any of my readers kept a record of the arrival of the birds during the spring? The northward procession of the battalions in feathers is an interesting study. Why do some birds begin their pilgrimage from the south so much earlier than others? What is there in their physical and mental make-up that gives them the northward impulse even before fair weather has come? Do they become homesick for their summer haunts sooner than their fellows? ‘These are questions that are much more easily asked than answered. ‘The size of the bird furnishes no clew to the solution, for some small birds are better able to resist the cold than many larger ones. ‘There is the little black-capped tit- mouse —-a mere mite of a bird — which generally remains in my neighborhood all winter, cheerfully braving the stormiest weather; while the brown thrasher, fully five times as large, is carefully warm- ing his shins in the sunny south, and will not ven- ture north until the spring has come to stay. Here, too, is Bewick’s wren on the first day of April, — with no thought of making an April fool of any one, — while the Baltimore orioles, rose-breasted SK ARRIVAL OF THE BIRDS. 65 grossbeaks, and scarlet tanagers, all larger than he, are tarrying in Georgia and Alabama. ‘There is nothing in the size or color or form of the birds that makes this difference ; it is doubtless in the blood. I have kept a careful memorandum of the arrival of these feathered voyagers (this was during the spring of 1892), and know almost to a certainty the day, and sometimes the hour, when they cast anchor in this port. The winter had been unusually severe, and yet the migration began as early as the twenty-second of February, when the first meadow- larks put in appearance, and sent their wavering shafts of song across the frost-bound fields. They had left only on the last day of December, but had apparently remained away as long as they could. On the same day the killdeer plovers also arrived, making their presence known by their wailing cry. On the twenty-third I heard the Q-g-0-0-ka-l-e-e-e of the red-winged blackbirds, and on the morning of the twenty-fourth the first robins dropped from the sky after a “flying trip’”’ in the night from some more southern stopping-place; but the weather was too cold for them to sing. Yet the song-spar- rows and meadow-larks defied the cold with their cheerful melody. While the robin is a very gay and lavish songster, he wants favorable weather for his vocal rehearsals, and a “cold snap ”’ will easily discourage him. He is evidently somewhat of a fair- weather minstrel. It was on February twenty- eighth, a pleasant day, that I caught the first strain of robin melody. 5 66 IN BIRD LAND. The towhee buntings dropped anchor on the seventh of March, filling the woods with their fine, explosive trills. It was a pleasant day, a sort of oasis in the midst of the stormy weather, and it did not seem inapt to speculate a little as to the thoughts of these birds on their arrival at their old summer haunts, after an absence of four or five months. Was the old brush-heap, where they had built their nest the previous spring, still there? Had the winter storms spared the twig on the sapling where Cock Bunting had sung erstwhile his sweetest trills to his dusky mate? “What if the woodman has cleared away our pleasant corner of the woods?” whispers Mrs. Towhee to her lord as they approach the sequestered spot. How their hearts must bound with joy when they find sapling and brush-heap and winding woodway all as they had left them in the autumn! No wonder they are so tuneful! Even the snow-storms that moan and howl through the woods a few days later cannot wholly repress their exuberant feelings. On the same date a whole colony of young song- sparrows stopped at this station on their journey northward, although you must remember that quite a number of their elders remained here through the winter. What a twittering these year-old sparrows made in the bushes fringing the woods Lal actually laughed aloud at their crude, tuneless, quasi-musical efforts. They were not in good voice, and, besides, had not yet fully learned the tunes that are sung in sparrowdom, and could not control their vocal ARRIVAL OF THE BIRDS. 67 chords. ‘They made many sorry and amusing at- tempts to chant and trill, but their voices would break and catch in the most remarkable ways, now sliding up too high in the scale, now sliding down too low, and now veering too much to one side, so to speak. One tyro, I observed, sang the first part of a run very well, almost as well, in fact, as an adult musician could have sung it; but when he tried to finish, his voice seemed to fly all to flinders. He made the attempt again and again, but to no pur- pose. It was a day for which I have cut a notch in the tally-stick of memory. Leaving the company of young vocalists at their rehearsals at the border of the woods, I made my way to a swamp not far off, where a pleasant surprise lay in ambush. Here were no longer found young song-sparrows, but adults, and you should have heard them sing. What a contrast between the crude songs of the young birds and the loud, clear, splendidly intoned and executed trills of these trained musicians! But I must return to the subject of migration. The fifteenth of March was a raw, blustering day, as its predecessors had been; but in the woods sev- eral fox-sparrows were singing, not their best, of course, but fairly well for such weather. They must have come during the night. But why had they come when the weather was so cold? Most birds wait until there is a bland air-current from the south on which they can ride triumphantly. Had this small band of fox-sparrows followed the example of a well-known American humorist, and gone to 68 IN BIRD LAND. “roughing it’’? Strange to say, I saw no more fox- sparrows until the twenty-eighth, when the weather had grown warm. ‘That was also the day on which I saw the first winter wren scudding about in the brush-heaps and wood-piles and perking up his tail in the most approved bantam fashion. It may be a poor joke, but the thought came of its own accord, that if brevity is the soul of wit, this little wren must have a very witty tail; and it really is an amusing appendage, held up at an acute angle with the bird’s sloping back. | As I strolled along the edge of the woods on the same day, the fine rhythmic trill of the bush-spar- row reached my ear. He was celebrating his return to this sylvan resort, and his voice was in excellent trim ; the fact is, I never heard him acquit himself quite so well, not even in May. Miss Lucy Larcom, of tender and sacred memory, has happily charac- terized this triller’s song in melodious verse : — “One syllable, clear and soft As a raindrop’s silvery patter, Or a tinkling fairy-bell, heard aloft, In the midst of the merry chatter Of robin and linnet and wren and jay, — One syllable oft repeated ; He has but a word to say, And of that he will not be cheated.” a But why was not the grass-finch, his relative of the fields, in just as good voice when he arrived on the thirty-first? The last two springs this bird had to be on his singing-grounds several days before he ARRIVAL OF THE BiRDS. 69 recovered his full powers of voice. On the twenty- ninth the phcebe came with his burden of sweet song, and the first of April brought Bewick’s wren —sweet- voiced Arion of the suburbs—and the chipping sparrow, whose slender peal of song rang through my study window. Here my record stops for the present year; but by reference to my last year’s notes (1891) it appears that Bewick’s wren did not then arrive until April tenth, and chippy not until April twelfth. The difference in the seasons is doubtless the primary cause of this divergence in the time of arrival. April brings many other winged pilgrims, —the white-throated and white-crowned sparrows, the thrushes, the orioles, the tanagers, the cat-birds, the swallows and swifts, and some of the hardier warblers, while the great army of war- blers delay their coming till the first and second weeks in May. And all the while we are having bird concerts, cantatas, oratorios, and opera festivals, mingled with some tragedy and a great deal of comedy, and there are love songs and cradle songs, matins and vespers, and twitterings expressive of every shade and variety of feeling. I yield to the temptation to add a brief article entitled ‘“ Watching the Parade,” which was pub- lished in a New England journal in the summer of 1893, and contains a record of some observations made during the previous spring. By comparison with the preceding part of this chapter, it will indi- cate the versatile character of bird study in the 70 IN BIRD LAND. same season of different years. I shall give. it almost verbatim as first published, hoping the rather “free and easy” style will be generously overlooked by critical readers. , Every spring and autumn for many years I have been watching the parade; not a parade of soldiers, or of civic orders, or even of a menagerie ; but one of far more interest to the naturalist,—the pro- cession of the army in feathers. A wonderful cor- tége it is, this army in bright array; and every time you witness it, you add something new to your knowledge of bird life. The last spring has been no exception, although, when the pageant began, I wondered if I should see any new birds or hear any new songs, and even felt a little doubtful about it. But quite early a new bird was added to my list. It was the blue-winged warbler, which carries about a scientific name big enough to break its dainty back. Just think of calling a tiny bird Helmintho- phila pinus! But happily it does not know its own name, and, like some of my readers, would not be able to pronounce it if it did, and therefore no serious harm is done. ‘This bird may be known by the bright olive-green of its back, the pale blue of its wings, the pure yellow of its under parts, and the narrow black line running back through its eye. It seemed to be quite wary, yet I got near enough to see it catch insects on the wing like a wood-pewee, as well as pick them from the leaves of the trees. The bird student must sometimes let problems go ARKIVAL OF THE. BIRDS. pai unsolved. For nearly, perhaps quite a week, three or four large, heavy-beaked birds flitted about in several tall tree-tops of the woods, but were so far up that, try as I would, I could not identify them even with my opera-glass. In my small collection of mounted birds there is a female evening gross- beak ; and the tree-top flitters looked more like it than any other bird of my acquaintance. If they were evening grossbeaks, it was a rare find; for these birds are almost unknown in this part of the country, only a few having ever been discovered in this State. Their usual 4ocale is thought to be west of Lake Superior. I was sorely tempted to use a gun, but decided that it was just as well not to know some things as to massacre an innocent bird. However, other finds were more satisfactory. Strolling through the woods one day, I caught the notes of a bird song that did not sound familiar. Surely it was a vireo’s quaint, continuous lay; but which of the vireos could it be? It was different from any vireo minstrelsy I had ever heard. Peer- ing about in the bushes for the author of those elusive notes, I at length espied a little bird form, and the next moment my glass revealed the blue- headed or solitary vireo. It was the first time I had ever heard this little vocalist sing in the spring, although we have met—he and I—on familiar terms every season for many years. Here is a query: Why was blue-head silent other years, and so tuneful that spring? For he was often heard after that day. 72 IN BIRD LAND. The song was varied and lively, sometimes run- ning high in the scale, and had not that absent- minded air which marks the roundelay of the warbling vireo. It is much more intense and expressive, and some notes are quite like certain runs of the brown thrasher’s song. The bird did two other things that were a surprise: he chattered and scolded much like the ruby-crowned kinglet. Then he caught a miller, and, as it was too large to be swallowed whole, placed it under his claws pre- cisely like a chickadee or blue jay, and pulled it to pieces. This was a new trick to me, nor have I ever read, in any of the bird manuals, of his taking his dinner in this way. The red-eyed vireo also chanted a little roundel that spring, as he pursued his journey northward, his song being slower in movement and less expressive and varied than that of his cousin just referred to. Indeed, the procession seemed to be especially musical during that spring. One day, in the last week in April, a new style of music rang out at the border of the woods, and I fairly trembled lest the jolly soloist should scud away before I could iden- tify him; but he had no intention of making his escape, and giving the credit of his vocal efforts to somebody else in the bird world. At length I got my glass upon him. He proved to be the purple finch, — rosy little Mozart that he was! For years he has passed through these woods with the vernal procession, but this was the first time he had ever been obliging enough to sing in my hearing. And BRAY AL OF THE BIRDS, 73 what a rolling, rollicking little song it was, just as full of good cheer as bird song could be! He continued his vocal rehearsal for many minutes on that day, but afterward he and his fellows were as mute as the inmates of adeaf and dumb asylum. A purple finch once sang here in the fall; but the music was quite harsh and squeaking, very different from his springtime melody. One of the most beautiful birds that have a part in the vernal parade is the rose-breasted grossbeak, —a bird that you will recognize at once by his white-and-black coat and the rosy shield he so bravely bears on his bosom. In his summer home, farther north, I have often heard his vivacious music (this was in northern Indiana) ; but until the past spring he has always been silent as he passed through this neighborhood, save that he would sometimes utter his sharp, metallic Cz. However, on the fourteenth of May two of these grossbeaks sang a most vigorous duet in the grove near my house ; and I wish you could have heard it, for it would have made you almost leap for joy, it was so jolly and rollicksome. At first you may be disposed to think the grossbeak’s song much like the robin’s, but you will soon find that it is finer in several respects, the tones being clearer and fuller, the utterance more rapid and varied, and the whole song much more spirited; and that is saying a good deal, considering Cock Robin’s cheery carols. No one should fail to hear this rosy-breasted min- strel, whatever else he may miss. It will make him 74 IN BIRD LAND. feel that life is worth living ; that if God made this bird so happy, he must intend that his rational creatures, who are of more value than a bird, should also be cheerful. ? , Never were the birds so gentle and confiding as they were during that spring. A female redstart took up her residence in my yard for fully a week, flitting about in the trees and grape-arbor, seeking for nits and worms; and you are to remember that I live in town (though in the outskirts), with many houses and people about, and an electric car whirl- ing along the street every few minutes. A dainty bay-breasted warbler — little witch !— kept the red- start company, letting me stand beneath the trees on whose lower branches she tilted, and watch her agile movements ; yet one of my bird books declares that the bay-breasted warblers remain in the highest tree-tops of the woods! Both these birds occasion- ally uttered a trill. The goldfinches, too, were very familiar. ‘They came with the procession as far north as my neigh- borhood, but stopped here for the summer, instead of continuing their pilgrimage. Some of their brothers and sisters remained with me all winter. Within a few feet of my rear door stands a small apple-tree, in whose branches these feathered gold- flakes flashed about, and sang their childlike ditties, and one little madam fluttered in the leafy crotches of the twigs, fitting her body into them as if trying to see if they would make good nesting-sites; the while Sir Goldfinch sang and sang at the top of his ARRIVAL OF THE BIRDS: 2 voice. Several white-crowned sparrows also came to eat seeds thrown out into the back yard. These handsome sparrows were not shy, but perched on the fence or the trees, and trilled their sweet refrains. 76 IN BIRD LAND. VI, WINGED VOYAGERS. HE subject of bird migration is one of absorb- ing interest, presenting many a perplexing problem to the student who cares to go imto the philosophy of things. Why do the birds make these wonderful semi-annual pilgrimages, and whence came the original impulse, are questions often asked. With my limited opportunities for observation I cannot hope to shed much, if any, new light on the sub- ject ; yet it seems to me that some persons are dis- posed to invest it with more of an air of mystery than is really necessary. ‘There are several patent, if not wholly satisfactory, reasons that may be assigned for the migrating impulse. As this is not a scientific treatise, the writer will not be over-methodical in presenting these reasons, but will mention them in the order in which they occur to him. If we keep in mind the invariable succession of the seasons, and that this annual rota- tion has continued for ages, and if we also remem- ber that all animals are dowered by their Creator with as much intelligence as is necessary for their well-being, much of the difficulty attaching to this subject will at once disappear. Birds, like their WINGED VOYAGERS. a7 human kinsmen, learn by experience and tutelage, and are also gifted with a sure instinct that amounts in many cases almost to reason. ‘Take, for instance, this one fact. As the sun creeps northward in the spring, it pours a more and more intense heat upon the northern portions of the tropical and sub-tropical regions. ‘The heat would soon become intolerable to certain birds, which have doubtless tried the experiment of spending the summer in equatorial countries; or if individuals now living have not tried it, perhaps some of their more or less remote ancestors have. ‘That birds do make experiments is proved by the fact that several pets of mine will carefully “sample” a new kind of food offered miecue and if they do not find it to their taste, will let it severely alone; nor is it any the less evident that young birds receive instruction from their elders. Thus the necessity of leaving the torrid regions as summer approaches may have been impressed on the migrating species from time immemorial. 7 Again, as spring advances, insect and vegetable life is revived-in regions farther north, and this certainly must act as a magnet upon the birds, drawing them from point to point as the supply of food becomes scarce in the more southern localities. Then, let us suppose for a moment that all the birds did remain in the south through the summer; there would sooner or later be a bird famine in the land, for the supply of seeds and insects would soon be exhausted. Our feathered folk are simply obliged, 78 IN BIRD LAND. on account of the exigencies of food, to scatter themselves over a larger extent of country. They solve the problem of food supply and demand by these annual pilgrimages to the boreal lands of plenty. a To go a little more to the root of the matter, we may easily imagine how the migrating spirit got its first impulse and gradually became evolved into a habit of something like scientific precision. If the first birds lived in tropical climates, as was probably the case, some of them, as the food supply became exhausted, would be crowded northward, or would go of their own accord, and wherever they went they would find well-filled natural larders. Having once discovered that spring replenished the north with food, they would soon learn the desirability of making periodical journeys to that part of the globe. With this constant quest for food must also be coupled the instinctive desire of most birds for seclusion during the season of reproduction, — an instinct that would naturally drive them northward into the less thickly tenanted districts. But it may be objected that many species make long aerial voyages, passing over vast tracts of country to reach their chosen summer habitats in various parts of the north; and it is well known that the same individ- uals will return again and again, on the recurrence of spring, to the same locality. How are these facts to be accounted for? or ee If we accept the glacial theory — a hypothesis pretty well established now among scientific men — WINGED VOYAGERS. 79 we may readily conceive that, as the sun melted the ice at a greater distance in both directions from the equator, the habitable area of the earth’s surface would gradually become enlarged. For the sake of vividness let us fancy ourselves living at that period of the world’s history. Let us select a point north of the equator where a given pair of birds can live in summer. ‘They find plenty of food there, and are comparatively undisturbed by other birds, and they therefore become attached to the place, most feathered folk having a strong “homing instinct.” When winter comes, they and their progeny are forced to retire to the south; but they do not for- get their pleasant summer haunt, their Mecca in the north, and therefore, at the approach of the following spring, they obey the home impulse and hie by easy stages to the beloved spot. Some of their number doubtless find it possible from time to time to push farther northward, and thus other breeding-haunts are selected. As the glacial ac- cumulations melt away, the whole temperate region and a large part of the frigid zone become habitable. All this takes place by a very gradual process, re- quiring thousands of years, thus giving ample time for heredity to infuse the migratory habit into the nature of the birds. Every new generation would learn the route and other needful details from their predecessors, and thus the process would: go on in an unending circuit year by year. After the foregoing was written, my attention was called to the following quotation from Dr. J. A. SO IN BIRD LAND. Allen’s valuable paper on the “ Origin of the In- stinct of Migration in Birds.” ‘The extract is taken from an article by Frank M. Chapman, published in “The Auk” for January, 1894 : “ Nothing is doubtless more thoroughly established than that a warm tem- perate or sub-tropical climate prevailed down to the close of the Tertiary epoch, nearly to the Northern Pole, and that climate was previously everywhere so far equable that the necessity for migration can hardly be supposed to have existed. With the later refrigeration of the northern regions, bird life must have been crowded thence toward the tropics, and the struggle for life thereby greatly intensified. The less yielding forms may have become extinct; those less sensitive to climatic change would seek to extend the boundaries of their range by a slight removal northward during the milder intervals of summer, only, however, to be forced back again by the recur- rence of winter. Such migration must have been at first ‘incipient and gradual,’ extending and strength- ening as the cold wave receded, and opened up a wider area within which existence in summer became possible. What was at first a forced migration would become habitual, and through the heredity of habit give rise to that wonderful faculty which we term the instinct of migration.” The reader’s attention is also directed to Mr. Chapman’s own article in the number of “ The Auk’”’ indicated. It may be asked why some species remain in torrid and temperate climates, while others wing their way to the far north, even beyond the boun- WINGED VOYAGERS. St dary of the Arctic Circle. My answer is, There is some Power that has wisely arranged all these mat- ters, either by gradual development or by an original creative fiat. Every species is made to fit with nice precision into its peculiar niche in the creation. Perhaps Bryant suggests the true explanation in his poem entitled “To a Waterfowl” : — “ There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast, The desert and illimitable air, Lone wandering, but not lost.” This may seem like begging the question ; yet, to my mind, it is impossible to develop a philosophy of the universe without assuming an original crea- tive Intelligence. True, the laws of evolution will account for many of the details, and birds, like men, are empowered in a large measure to work out their own destiny ; but somewhere there must be a Power that has infused into Nature all these wonderful po- tentialities of development. Involution must pre- cede evolution. But this is speculation. Account for them as we may, the facts are evident. Within the circle of my own observation there is abundant proof of this varied but wise adaptation in Nature. There, for example, is the tiny golden-crested kinglet, which remains here all winter, no matter how severe the weather, and seems to be the embodiment of good cheer ; whereas the brown thrasher, a bird many times as large, would be likely to perish in the first snow-squall. Then, when spring arrives, Master Kinglet hies to 6 82 _ IN BIRD LAND. the north for the breeding-season, while Monsieur Thrasher comes up from the south and becomes my all-summer intimate. : ; Another matter of intense interest concerning bird migration is that the migrants which winter farthest north are, as a rule, the first to arrive in the spring at their summer homes or vernal feeding-grounds. For instance, in the latter part of March or the beginning of April, while the thrashers, cat-birds, and others which winter in our Southern States, are arriving in New England, New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, the warbler army, which spends the winter in the West Indies, Yucatan, and Central America, is just crossing over from those countries to the southern borders of the United States. _ ‘When autumn comes, experience has taught the migrants that their only safety lies in making their way to the south before cold weather sets in; for many of them certainly do start on this voyage long before winter drives them from their northern haunts. In my opinion, they are gifted with suf- ficient reason — call it instinct, if you like—to do this, and I do not think they are moved by an uncontrollable impulse which acts upon them as if they were mere automata. Portions of the migrating army often overlap. For example, the juncos and tree-sparrows are winter residents in my neighborhood, but very frequently they remain here a month or more after the earliest arrivals from the south. Presently, however, they grow nervous, flit about uneasily, WINGED VOYAGERS. 83 trill little snatches of song, inure themselves to flight by longer or shorter excursions about the country, and then join the northward procession en route for their breeding-haunts in British Amer- ica. With regret I bid them adieu, but find com- pensation in the knowledge that their places will be supplied by a brilliant company of summer residents. One of the strangest features of migration is the fact that a bird will sometimes make the voyage from north to south, and we versa —or a part of the voyage — alone, at least as far as companionship with individuals of its own kind is_ concerned. Whether this is done advertently or inadvertently I am unable to say, but the fact cannot be disputed. In the spring of 1892, as noted in another chapter, a hooded warbler was flitting about a gravel bank in a wooded hollow, and although I scoured the coun- try for miles around day after day, I never met another bird of this species. ‘The little Apollo in feathers was so gentle and familiar that surely his mates would not have escaped my notice had there been any in the neighborhood. Why he preferred to travel alone, or in company with other species rather than his own kin, might be an interesting problem in avian psychology. A little farther down the glen a single mourning warbler was also seen at almost the same date. His companions had prob- ably wished him 402 voyage, and left him to strike out in an independent course through the trackless ocean of air. 84 IN BIRD LAND. That the army of migrants travel mostly by night is a well-known fact that can be verified by any one who will stand out-of-doors and listen to their chirp- ing overhead. ‘They seem to move in loose flocks, for there are intervals of complete silence, followed by a promiscuous chirping from many throats. Nor are these nocturnal calls all uttered by a single species, but usually a number of species seem to be travelling in company. One might say, therefore, that the feathered army moves in squads. As they travel in the dark, very little can be said about their flight ; but every student has found species of birds in an early morning ramble which he could not find anywhere on the previous day, proving that they must have arrived in the night. Here is a single excerpt — many might be given — from my note-book: “ On the third of March, 1894, I took a long stroll into the country, remaining in the fields until dusk; not a single meadow-lark was to be seen or heard. At daybreak next morning, however, the shrill whistle of I know not how many larks rose like musical incense from the fields and commons in the rear of my house. Depend upon it, had these lavish min- strels been in the neighborhood during the previous afternoon, they would not have escaped my atten- tion, for they could not have kept their music in their larynxes, not they! There is a cog in Nature’s machinery lost if the wana larks are sHent for a half day in the spring.” In 1885 Mr. William Brewster, the oe known ornithologist, made some intensely interesting dis- WINGED VOYAGERS. ' 85 coveries on the nocturnal flight of migrants, at Point Lepreaux Lighthouse, New Brunswick. ‘The prin- cipal lantern, which was in the top of the tower, cast a light that could be seen fifteen miles away in clear weather. Even on dark and foggy nights this lantern would throw out a strong light to such a dis- tance that a bird coming into the lighted area could readily be seen. On stormy nights the lighthouse seemed to possess a fatal attraction for the lost and rain-beaten birds, which would fly toward it and often dash against the glass, the roof, and other portions of the tower with such force that they mi dead or disabled. -Mr. Brewster could. see them approaching in the prism of light, some dash- ing themselves with fatal effect against the tower, but more, fortunately, turning aside or gliding upward over the roof, and then pressing on toward the west with incessant chirping. During rainy weather a larger proportion would strike the brilliant obstruction. | It is interesting to notice that different species composed the companies that passed the lighthouse. For instance, on the night of September first, seven different species of warblers and one red-eyed vireo were killed or disabled, and one Traill’s flycatcher entered the mouth of the ventilator, and came down through it into the lantern. A few evenings later, about forty per cent of the specimens identified were Maryland yellow-throats, forty per cent more red- eyed vireos, and the remaining twenty per cent were made up of two kinds of thrushes and six kinds 86 IN BIRD LAND. of warblers. ‘These figures are given to show the heterogeneous composition of the migrant army. Mr. Brewster also found that no birds came about the lantern except on densely cloudy or foggy nights, and that they came in the greatest numbers when the first hour or two of the evening had been clear and was succeeded by fog orstorm. These data would seem to prove that the birds began their noc- turnal journey with the expectation of having pleas- ant weather, and when the fog or storm rose later in the evening, they flew lower and got bewildered by the glare of the lighthouse. : Many theories of bird migration have been pro- posed and argued at length, but, on the whole, I incline to Mr. Brewster’s theory that the old birds, having learned the advantage of these semi-annual expeditions, and having also determined the route by means of certain landmarks, act as aerial pilots to the army of young birds to whom the way is still unknown. Mountain ranges, river valleys, coast lines, and sheets of landlocked water doubtless serve the purpose of guide-posts to these airy travellers. Much as has been written on the subject, however, there still remains a large field for original research. PLUMAGE OF YOUNG BIRDS. 87 VIL PLUMAGE OF YOUNG BIRDS. T is surprising what odd and variegated costumes are sometimes worn by the juvenile members of the bird community. Frequently their attire is so different from that of their elders that even the expert ornithologist may be sorely puzzled to deter- mine the category to which they belong; yet there are usually some characteristic markings, however obscure, by which their places in the avian system may be fixed. As a rule, the plumage of young birds is more striped and mottled than that of mature specimens, Nature playing some odd pranks of color- mixing in tiding a bird over from callow infancy to full-fledged life. Fashion plates in the world of bantlings would be of little account, as no fixed patterns are followed. Some parts of the growing bird’s plumage change to the normal color sooner than others. I remem- ber a young male indigo bird that I saw in October, whose garb, just after fledging, must have been a warm brown almost like that of the adult female ; but now he had cast off a part of his infantile robes, and put on in their stead the cerulean of his male parent; his tail, rump, and the base of his wings 88 IN BIRD LAND. were blue, while the rest of his plumage was brown. He made a unique and pretty picture as he sat atilt on a blackberry stem, asking me with loud Tsip~s to admire his quaint toilet. Early in the spring I have seen indigo birds in whose plumage the tints were quite differently blended and arranged. What a party-colored suit the young bluebird wears! His breast, instead of being plain brick-red as in the case of the adult bird, is profusely striped with dark brown on a background of soiled white ; and his upper parts, in lieu of the warm azure of riper years, are a lustrous brown curiously mottled with tear-shaped blocks of white; while his wings and tail have already assumed the normal blue of this species. In the days of his youth the chipping- sparrow also dons a striped vest, so that, if it were not for his smaller size, it would be difficult to dis- tinguish him from his relative, the grass-finch. My admiration was especially stirred, one mid- summer day, by the dainty appearance of a small coterie of bush-sparrows flitting about on a railroad which I was pursuing on foot; a large patch on their wings was of a dark, glossy brown tint, extremely pretty, and looking precisely as if it had been painted by the deft hand of an artist. Their under parts were variously streaked with white and dusk. At first I scarcely recognized my familiar. little sylvan friends; but their intimacy with several adult specimens, as well as several well-known diag- nostic markings, settled the question of their identity beyond a doubt. | PLUMAGE OF YOUNG BIRDS. 89 Not every person is aware that the common red- headed woodpecker is no red-head at all during the first summer of his buoyant young life, but a black- head instead, or, rather, his head and neck are very dark gray. However, one day in September I was delighted and amused to find an adolescent wood- pecker whose head and neck were beginning to turn quite reddish, flecked everywhere with white, giving him a decidedly picturesque appearance as he scuddled up an oblique fence-stake. Of course the red-head is always suz generis, but in this case he seemed to be more so than usual. Nearly all the woodpeckers —the downy, the hairy, and the golden-winged — are devoid of the red spots on their heads, while young, to prevent them, I suppose, from becoming vain. Sometimes an entirely foreign tint is introduced into the plumage of the young bird during his tran- sition state. One day I was surprised to observe a decidedly bluish cast on the striped breast of a young towhee bunting, which was all the more curious because there is no blue whatever in the plumage of either the adult male or female. But the most curious freak of Nature’s dyeing I have ever seen in the bird world was in the case of a young scarlet tanager, whose body, including the wings, was completely girded with a band of white, the border of which was quite irregular. As every observer knows, the only colors visible in the adult male’s plumage are black and scarlet; still, when the scarlet feathers are pushed aside, they show gO IN BIRD LAND. white underneath, and that may account for the albino quality of this specimen. When he is first fledged, the pattern of the young cardinal grossbeak’s plumage very much resembles that of his mother; but soon the bright red of his full dress begins to peep here and there through the grayish-olive of his kilts and trousers, so to speak, making him look as if he had been meddling with a keg of red paint and had splashed himself liberally ; with it. By and by there is a very odd blending of tints in his suit. -Scarcely less curious is the garb of the young white-crowned sparrow; his whole head is black or blackish-brown, except a tiny speck of white in the centre of the crown, gleaming like a diamond in its dark setting. In the adult bird the whole crown is a glistening white, bordered on each side by a black band, which circles about on the forehead and separates the crown-piece from the white superciliary line. Some of the warblers are scarcely recognizable in their juvenile attire. For example, the young black- poll, bay-breasted, and chestnut-sided warblers bear little, if any,-resemblance to their parents, whose diversified nuptial robes make our woodlands radiant in the spring. ‘The young are quite tame in their soiled olive plumes, and look so much alike that the ornithologist is often at his wits’ end to tell them apart. Were it not for the yellow rumps of the magnolia and myrtle warblers when young, one would scarcely know them from a dozen other species as they pursue their journey southward in mi PLUMAGE OF YOUNG BIRDS. OI the autumn. The Maryland yellow-throat does not deign to wear his black mask until he is about eight months old, and the boy redstart contents himself with his mamma’s style of dress until he returns in the spring from his sojourn in the south, and does not seem to be ashamed to be tied to her apron- string. And there is that natty little dandy, the ruby-crowned kinglet — it is said, on good authority, that he must be two years old before he is entitled to wear the ruby gem in his forehead; which must be a sore deprivation for this little aristocrat in feathers. Perhaps in kingletdom a bird does not become of age until he is two years old. Thus it will be seen that the study of ornithology is made more difficult, and at the same time more interesting, by this change of toilet among the birds, — more difficult, because the observer must learn to identify the birds in their youthful as well as in their adult plumage; and more interesting, because of the greater variety thus given to this branch of scientific inquiry. 92 IN BIRD LAND. VIII. NEST-HUNTING. OTHING in Nature is more pregnant with suggestion than the nest of a bird. The story of one of these deftly woven dwellings in the woods, if fully written, might prove almost as weird and romantic as the history of a castle on the Rhine. What madrigals, what pzans, have been sung, and what victories celebrated, from the time the first fibres were braided until the chirping nestlings were able to shift for themselves! And, alas, how many fond hopes have perished as well! No doubt the ruses and subterfuges employed to elude cunning foes or ward off their murderous attacks, would fill a volume of valuable information on military tactics. One might write comedies or tragedies about the nest-life of the birds that would be no less inter- esting than realistic. More than that, the study of these wonderful fabrics would virtually be a study of the psychology of the feathered artisans, each nest being an index of a special type of mind and a measure of the bird’s mental resources. As William Hamilton Gibson has well said: “'To know the nidification and nest-life of a bird is to get-the NEST-HUNTING. 93 cream of its history ;”’ than which nothing could be truer or more aptly expressed. No wonder the poets have so often been thrown into lyrical moods over the homesteads of the birds ! Mrs. Margaret E. Sangster’s poem on “ The Build- ing of the Nest” is perhaps not unfamiliar to most readers ; but one stanza is so graceful and rhythmi- cal that it begs for quotation at this point : — “ They ’Il come again to the apple-tree — Robin and all the rest — When the orchard branches are fair to see In the snow of blossoms dressed, And the prettiest thing in the world will be The building of the nest.” In one of my rambles I found an abandoned towhee bunting’s nest containing three eggs, and could not help speculating as to the cause of its desertion. Might there have been a quarrel between husband and wife, making a separation necessary? JI am loath to believe it, although, if certain acute observers are correct, divorce is not wholly unknown in the bird community. But in this case I am inclined to think that some enemy had destroyed the female, for a male flitted about in the bushes, calling a good deal and singing at intervals, and there seemed to be a plaintive note in his song, as if he might be chanting an elegy. At all events, the pair that built the nest had had their tragedy. Every bird-student must admit that his quest for nests often ends in disappointment, because many 94 IN. BIRD LAND. birds are adepts at concealment, while others build in places where you would not think of looking. However, I have had but little difficulty in finding the nests of the brown thrasher, which erects an inartistic platform of sticks, bound together by a few grass fibres, and thus is easily descried in the bushes, where it is usually placed. Early in the spring I found the nest of a pair of these birds in a thick clump of bushes near the edge of a woodland, and resolved to keep watch over it until the young family had left their home. The parent birds in this case were very solicitous for the safety of their young. Every time I called they set up a pitiful to-do, which invariably made me hurry away, after a timid peep into the cradle. There is as much difference in the temperaments of birds of the same species as there is among persons belonging to the same family. While the thrashers in question seemed to be terrified at my presence, others driven from their nests displayed little or no fear, but sat quietly on a perch near by and allowed me to examine their domicile without so much as a chirp. 7 : The brown thrasher has surprised me by the variety of places he selects for building his log house. Wilson Flagg in his book, “A Year with the Birds,” says that this bird usually builds on the ground; and Mr. Eldridge E. Fish, who writes pleasantly about the birds of western New York, bears similar testimony. Perhaps thrasher-fashion in New England and New York differs . from NEST-HUNTING. 95 thrasher-fashion in Ohio (in which locality the birds display the best taste I will not say); for during the spring of 1890 I found but two nests on the ground, and was surprised to find even them, while at least fifteen were discovered in other places. Most of them were on low thorn-bushes, but not all. One was built in a brush-heap, one on a pile of “ cord-wood,”’ another on a small stump screened by some bushes, and two on arail fence. Of the last two, one was partly supported by poison-ivy vines and partly by a rail; the other was built entirely on a rail in a projecting corner of the fence. The thrasher, as has been said, builds an artless platform of sticks that in some cases barely holds together long enough to answer the purpose for which it was intended. In this respect its habits differ from those of the wood-thrush, a bird that is very abundant and musical in my neighborhood. I have found many of the wood-thrush’s nests, which are built in the crotches of small saplings in the thickest part of the woods, and are made almost as substantial as the adobe dwellings of the robin. The thrush does not use as much mortar as his red- breasted relative ; otherwise there is a close resem- blance between the nests of the two birds. It was amusing to find pieces of newspaper bedizening the houses of the wood-thrushes so frequently, though it cannot be said that they showed the highest literary taste in their selec- tions; for one or two of the fragments contained 96 IN BIRD LAND. accounts of political caucuses. However, it would be too much to assume that the birds had read them, as many of us “ humans”’ find such literature too deep for our comprehension. I shall neither eulogize nor stigmatize this favorite minstrel by calling him a politician, although if one were to regard his nesting-habits alone, he deserves that sobriquet quite as well as the white-eyed vireo. That parasite among American birds, the female cow-bunting, audaciously spirits her eggs into the wood-thrush’s nest, to be hatched with those that properly belong there, while she and her mate sit in the trees near by and whistle their taunting airs, and watch to see whether their dupe attends faithfully to the additional household cares imposed upon her. When the birds are hatched, the victim of this piece of imposture innocently feeds her foster children with the best tidbits she can find, spite of the fact that they may soon crowd her own offspring out of the nest-home. ‘The wonder is that she does not discover the trick at once; for her eggs are deep blue, while the cow-bird’s are white, speckled with ashy brown. Can the wood-thrush be color-blind ? About two miles from town, along the banks of a small creek, was the nest of that interesting little bird, the summer warbler, —a dainty structure, com- posed of downy material, and deftly lodged among the twigs of a sapling at the foot of a cliff. A cold spring gurgled from the rocks near by; the willows and buttonwood trees bent to the balmy breezes, and the tinkling of the brook mingled with the songs NEST-HUNTING, 97 of many birds. A place for day-dreams truly, and the summer warblers were the dryads and nymphs flitting through the realms of fancy. If all birds were as astute as the summer warbler, the race of cow- buntings would soon become extinct, or would soon have to change their methods of propagation, and go to rearing their own families. Our little strategist, when she comes home and finds a cowbird’s egg dropped into her nest, begins forthwith to add another story, and thus leaves the interloper in the cellar, with a floor between it and her warm breast. It is a genuine case of “being left out in the cold.” I have found several of these exquisite towers that were three stories high, on the top of which the little bird sat perched like a goddess on the summit of Olympus. (My simile may seem a trifle far- fetched, but I shall let it stand.) But why, you dear little sprite, do you not merely pitch the offen- sive egg out of the nest, instead of going to all the trouble of building a loft? No answer, save an untranslatable trill, comes from the throat of the dainty minstrel.? Some years ago I witnessed a curious bit of bird- behavior that I have never seen described in any of the numerous books on ornithology which I have 1 Mr. Eldridge E. Fish, to whom reference has already been made, after reading this article, which first appeared in a weekly paper, suggested in a letter that the little warbler could not well remove the intruded egg without breaking it, which would spoil her nest altogether. Hence she simply adds another story to her dwelling. This is doubtless the true explanation. | 7 4if7 4/istiw Savi ttt itt consulted. I make reference to it here for the first time. I was strolling along the banks of a broad river in northern Indiana on the first of June, when a warm, steady rain set in. How the birds contrive to keep their eggs and nestlings dry during a shower had long been an enigma to me, and now was my time to find out. Knowing where a summer warbler had built her nest in some bushes, I cautiously ap- proached, and then stood looking down on the bird before me, which showed no disposition to leave her progeny to the mercy of the elements. It was a picture indeed! The darling little mother — how can one help using an endearing term !—sat with her wings and tail spread out gracefully over the rim of the nest all the way round, thus making a perfect umbrella of her lithe, dainty body. Nothing could differ more from the airy out-door nest of the summer warbler than the dark subter- ranean caverns of the swallows in the bank of the creek. One day, while sauntering along a stream, I noticed a hole in the opposite bank. I passed on, but on second thought turned to look at the excava- tion a little more closely, when a swallow darted like an arrow into it, and in a few moments made as quick an exit. Wading across the creek, I thrust my walking-stick, which was almost four feet long, into the orifice over its entire length without reach- ing the end! Why a bird, so neat in attire and so agile on the wing, should build her nest in a dark Erebus like that, is a Sphinx’s riddle that must be left to wiser heads to solve. | NEST-HUNTING. 99 What a contrast is the open-air hammock of the Baltimore oriole, swinging from the flexible branches of a buttonwood tree a little farther up the stream ! How softly the chirping brood within is rocked by the breezes that sweep down from the slopes, laden with the odor of clover blossoms! Somewhere near there must be a warbling vireo’s nest, for one of these birds is singing in the trees; but my eyes are not sharp enough to descry its pensile domicile. On my way home, on the top of a hill, I step casually up to a small thorn-bush, whose branches and leaves are thickly matted together, and, as I push the foliage aside, there is a flutter of wings, followed by a rapid chirping, and a little bird flits away, pretending to be seriously wounded. It is a bush-sparrow. Cosily placed beneath the leafy roof among the thick boughs is the procreant cradle. What could be more dainty! A little nest, woven of fine grass-fibres, deftly lined with hair, and con- taining four speckled eggs, real gems. How “beau- tiful for situation” is this tiny cottage on the hill ! Here the feathered poets may sit on their leafy verandas, look down into the green valleys, and compose verses on the pastoral attractions of Nature. One is almost tempted to spin a romance about the happy couple. On returning, one day, from an ornithological jaunt, I met my friend, the young farmer, who knows something about my furor for the birds. There was a knowing smile on his sunburned face, ‘‘T know where there’s a killdeer’s nest,’ he said ; I0O LIV BIKLY LANL. “would you like to see it?” Tired out as I was with my long walk, I exclaimed: “Yes, sir! Ill follow you to the end of the world to see a plover’s nest.” The sentence was added merely by way of mild (not wild) hyperbole. A shallow pit in the open corn-field, lined with a few chips and pebbles, constituted the nest of the plover, not having so much as a spear of grass to protect it from rain and storm. It contained one egg and acallow youngster, the egg being quite large at one end and pointed at the other, which gave it a very uncouth shape. My young friend informed me that there had been five eggs when he found the nest, al] lying with their acute ends toward the centre; the next time he went to look there were only four, then three, and finally only two. Evidently the parent birds were having a serious time guarding their homestead from marauders. On going to the place some days later, I found both the egg and the baby plover gone, and I could only hope that no mischance had befallen them. Strange as it may seem, the winter is a favorable season for nest-hunting. ‘True, the birds are not then at home, to speak with a good deal of license, or engaged in rearing families; but the deserted structures may be more readily found after the leaves have fallen from the trees and bushes. As I stroll through the woods or the marsh on a winter day, scores of nests that escaped my eye during the summer are to be seen. Especially is this the case after a snowfall, for the nests catch the descending NEST-HUNTING. 10! fiakes which are piled up in them in downy mounds, and thus attract the attention of the observer. I have often felt inclined to heap upon myself the most caustic epithets for having passed again and again, during the breeding-season, so near the nest of an interesting bird without knowing of its exist- ence until winter’s frosts had stripped the coppice of its leaves, and have resolved as often that the next season shall not find me napping. In the marsh which is one of my favorite trudging- grounds, I made a quaint discovery some winters ago, which has raised more than one query in my mind. One day, after a snowfall, I found many deserted nests in the thickets. Brushing the snow out of them revealed, in the bottom of each basket, a small pile of the seeds and broken shells of wild- rose and thorn berries. Why had the birds put them there—if it was the birds? Perhaps the winter birds, when they arrived in the autumn, found these old nests good storehouses in which to lay by their winter supplies. I have never seen the birds feeding on them, but, as spring approached, the berry seeds had nearly all disappeared. Come with me, for I know a pleasant, half-clois- tered field of clover which is the habitat of a number of charming little birds. Just where it is shall remain one of my semi-sylvan secrets, for one must not betray all the confidences of one’s feathered intimates. The field cutsa right angle in a wood- land, by which it is, therefore, bounded on the east and north, while toward the west and south the 102 IN BIRD LAND. undulating country stretches away like a billowy sea of green. ‘The woods themselves, on the sides adjacent to the field, are hemmed and fringed with a thick growth of saplings, bushes, and brambles, where the feathered husbands sit and hymn their. joy by the hour to their little mates hugging their nests in the clover and the copse. It is a quiet spot, — one of Nature’s nunneries. Human dwellings may be seen in the distance; but it is seldom that any one, save a mooning rambler like myself, goes there to disturb the peace of the feathered tenants. Here, one summer a few years ago, a pair of those wary birds the yellow-breasted chats built a nest, which they placed snugly in the blackberry bushes that bordered and partly hid the rail-fence. I kept close reconnoissance on this little home- stead until the nascent inmates were about half- fledged, when, to my dismay, every one of them was kidnapped by some despicable nest-robber. My own sorrow was equalled only by the inexpres- sible anguish of the bereaved parents. To add to my troubles, a nestful of young indigo-birds came to grief in the same way. ‘There must be, it seems, a system of brigandage in every realm, be it human _or faunal. 7 A pair of bush-sparrows, however, were-more for- tunate in their brood-rearing. One day, while standing near the fence, I noticed a bush-sparrow, bearing an insect in her bill, dart down into the clover, a short distance over in the field. I walked to the spot, when she flew up with an uneasy chirp, NEST-HUNTING. 103 proclaiming a secret. that she could not keep. There on the grass, sure enough, was her nestful of little ones. Some accident must have befallen the fibrous cot, for the weeds and clover were broken down and trampled flat all around it, so that it sat loosely on the ground, without even a blade of grass to shelter it. Fearing that buccaneers in the shape of jays or hawks might rob the nest, I broke off a number of weeds and made a sort of thatched roof over it; that would also protect the panting infants from the sun, which was beating down like a furnace. Then I took my stand a few rods away, to see what the old birds would do. Erelong both the papa and mamma came with billsome morsels in their mouths, and, after fluttering about uneasily for a few minutes, darted down to the nest and fed their young, Of course, they first had to peep, and peer, and cant their dainty heads this way and that, to examine the roof I had improvised for the nest, wondering, no doubt, what kind of a bungling archi- tect had been at work there; but finally they seemed to think all was well. Perhaps in their hearts they thanked me for my thoughtful care. A day or two later I called again, even at the risk of coming de ¢frop. The weeds arched over the bird crib at my former visit having withered, I made them another green roof, sheltering them as cosily as I could and leaving a small opening at the side for an entrance. After an absence of a few minutes I crept surreptitiously back to the enchanted spot, — for it drew me like a loadstone, —and there sat the 104 IN BIRD LAND. trim little mother on her cradle, covering her chil- dren to keep them warm, her reddish-brown tail daintily reaching out through the doorway. She did not fly up as I bent lovingly over her, and presently I stole away, desirous not to disturb her. | The bush-sparrow is a captivating little bird, graceful of form and sweet of voice, singing his cheerful trills from early spring until far past mid- summer. The song makes me think of a silver thread running through a woof of golden sunshine, carried forward by a swinging shuttle of pearl. I think the figure is not far-fetched. He is quite partial to a dense little thorn-bush for a nesting- place, often concealing his grassy cottage so cun- ningly that you must look sharply for it among the leaves and twigs, or it will escape your eye. ‘One of the neatest and prettiest denizens of my clover-field was the goldfinch. Wings of black and coat of bright yellow, he went bounding through the ether, rising and falling in graceful festoons of flight, in such a lightsome way he seemed to be rocking himself on the breeze. How jauntily he wore his tiny black cap, little exquisite of the field that he is, to whom I always go hat in hand! He deserves a monograph all to himself, but at this time I can spare him only a few paragraphs. As a rule, the goldfinches prefer to build their nests in small trees, often selecting the maples along the suburban streets of the city. I was greatly surprised, therefore, to find a nest in my clover- field, where there were no trees at all. Noticing a NEST-HUNTING. 105 bird fly into a clump of blackberry bushes one day, I took it for a female indigo-bird. A nest was soon found woven very neatly and compactly, and having not only grass-fibres wrought into its structure, but also wool and thistle-down. A queer indigo-bird’s nest, I mused. The wool in the cup was ruffled and loose, and taking it for a deserted homestead, I carelessly thrust my hand intoit. ‘The next moment I was sorry for the thoughtless act, for the material looked so fresh that I decided it must be an unfin- ished bird-cradle. I resolved to discover the own- ers, if possible. ‘Two days later it was in the same condition. Had I driven away the little builders by laying defiling hands on the nest? I felt like a culprit, and waited a week before again venturing to visit the place, when, as I approached, a female gold- finch flew from the nest, uncovering five dainty white eggs, set like pearls in the bottom of the cup. A goldfinch’s nest in a blackberry bush! ‘That was a climax of surprises, in very truth. On the same day, not far distant, another bush- sparrow’s nest was found in some bushes, placed about three feet from the ground. In a few weeks there were babies five in the goldfinch’s nest, and four in that of the bush-sparrow. Pray keep both nests in mind, remembering that the youngsters of both families were hatched on the same day. One evening at twilight I again stepped out to the clover- field. ‘The mother goldfinch was sitting close on her fies, and did not. stir as) |: came ‘near. Then J touched her lightly with my cane. Still she remained 106 IN BIRD LAND. on her nest as if glued fast, only glaring at me with her wild, beady eyes. At length I softly laid my finger on her back, when she uttered a queer, half- scolding cry, and leaped up to the nest’s rim, but did not fly. There she stood, turning her head and eying me keenly until I stole away, unwilling to for- feit her confidence and good-will. But when, on my way home, I paused a moment to look at the bush-sparrow’s nest, the mother flitted away with a frightened chirp before I came within reach. She was not as confiding as her little neighbor, the goldfinch. | : Now mark! On the fifteenth of August the young bush-sparrows had become so large and well devel- oped that when, meaning no harm, I touched them gently with my finger, they flipped out of the nest like flashes of lightning. The infant goldfinches were not yet more than half fledged, and merely snuggled close to the bottom of the nest when I caressed them. ‘The idea of flying was still remote from their little pates. These observations prove that young bush-sparrows develop much more rap- idly than young goldfinches; yet, strange as it may seem, the goldfinch, when grown, flies much higher, if not more swiftly, than his little neighbor, and continues longer on the wing. On the same day I sat down in the clover, a few rods from the goldfinch’s nest, and kept close watch on both the old birds and their offspring for an hour and a half. The sun attacked me savagely with his red-hot arrows, and the sweat broke from every NEST-HUNTING. 107 pore, but I felt amply repaid for my vigil. During the first half-hour the parent birds ventured slyly to feed their bantlings twice. Then I crept closer, and waited an hour; but the parent birds were too shy to bring their hungry nestlings a single mouth- ful of food, choosing, it would seem, to let them suf- fer hunger rather than take risk themselves. The little things were almost famished, and behaved very quaintly. Every rustle of the leaves in the wind caused them to start up, crane out their necks, pry open their mouths as wide as they could, waddle awkwardly from side to side, and chirp for some- thing to eat. How famished they were! They even seized one another’s heads and tried to gulp one another down. The spectacle was just a little uncanny. But, dear me! they were not as ignorant of the ways of the world as you might suppose. When I lightly tapped the stems of the bushes with my cane, instead of leaping up and opening their mouths as they were expected to do, they shrank down into the bottom of the nest, discerning at once the dif- ference between those strokes on the bush and their parents’ quiet approach or loving call. Something must have put them on their guard, and instilled feelings of fear into their palpitating bosoms. Per- haps it was that shy personage, the mother herself ; for she would call admonishingly at intervals from the woods, Ba-bie!/ ba-bie/ putting a _ pathetic accent on the second syllable. It was droll to see 108 IN BIRD LAND. the youngsters try to preen their feathers, they went about the performance so awkwardly. On the seventeenth of the month one of the nest- lings was missing, and no amount of looking for it in the thicket revealed any clew to its whereabouts. None of the remaining birds were ready to fly. Two days later they were still in the nest, although they had grown considerably since my last visit, so that one of them was almost crowded out of the circular trundle-bed. -I could not resist the temp- tation to lift it in my hand, just to see how pretty it was and how it would act. It uttered a sharp cry of alarm, and sprang from my hand; but its wings were still so weak that it merely fluttered in an oblique direction to the ground. ‘The.third time I caught it, it sat contentedly on my palm, and allowed me to stroke its back, looking up at its captor with mingled wonder and trustfulness. On the heads of all the nestlings a fine down pro- truded up through and above the feathers. The birds looked very knowingly out of their small coal- black eyes, but the cunning little things obstinately refused to open their mouths for me, entice them as I would; however, when I moved away some distance, and their mamma came with a tempting morsel, they sprang up instantly and gulped it down. Not so very unsophisticated, after all, for mere bant- lings! On the morning of the twenty-sixth all the young finches had left the nest, and were perched in the bushes near by. I contrived to catch one of them NEST-HUNTING. 109 and hold him in my hand a few moments, to admire his dainty toilet and pretty dark eyes. Thus my brief study in comparative ornithology proved that the young goldfinches left the nest seven days after the young bush-sparrows, hatched at the same time, had taken wing. IIo IN BIRD LAND. IX. . MIDSUMMER MELODIES. EVERAL times has the statement been made in print that it is scarcely worth one’s while to attempt to study the birds during the midsummer months, the reason alleged being that at that time they are silent and inactive, and their behavior devoid of special interest. Now, nothing ministers so gratefully to the pride of the original investigator as to prove untrue the theories that have been advanced in books and that are current among ‘scientific men. During the summer of 1891 I re- solved to discover for myself what the birds were doing, and so, spite of drought, heat, and mosqui- toes, I visited the haunts of my winged companions at least every other day. ‘The result was a surprise to myself, proving that the unwisest thing a_natu- alist can do is to lay down absolute canons of conduct for feathered folk. It is just possible that physical stupor, induced by the extreme heat of summer, has caused some ornithologists to observe carelessly and _listlessly, and for that reason they have supposed that the birds were as languid as themselves; but the wide- awake student, who can brave heat and cold alike, will never find the feathered creation failing to MIDSUMMER MELODIES. Tit repay the closest attention. Some birds are almost as active when the mercury is wrestling with the nineties as on the fairest day of May, and those are the ones to be studied in midsummer. My special investigations began about the middle of July. It is true that at that time what are usually regarded as the songsters of the first class — the brown thrashers, wood-thrushes, cat-birds, and bobo- links —had gone into a conspiracy of silence, not a musical note coming from their throats, although some of them always remain in this latitude until far into September. But when the first-class min- strels are mute, one appreciates the minor vocalists allthe more. Yet I must not omit to say that on the thirtieth of July I caught a fragment of a wood- thrush’s song, the last I heard for the season. Let me recall one day in particular. It was the tenth of August, and the weather was broiling, — hot enough to drive the thermometer into hysterics, just the day to see how the heat would affect the feathered tenants of the groves ; and so, overcoming my physical inertia as best I could, I stalked to the woods in the afternoon in quest of bird lore. With the perspiration running from every pore, I trudged about for some time without seeing or hear- ing a single bird. Were the books correct, after all? Was I to be deprived of the pleasure of proving taem- im error? It began to appear as if such might be the case. Presently, however, as I pushed out into a gap at one side of the woods, an uneasy chirping in the clumps of bushes and brambles near I12 IN BIRD LAND. by sent a thrill of gladness through my veins. I felt intuitively that there were birds in abundance in the neighborhood, and my presentiment proved correct ; for before my brief search was completed, I was permitted to record the songs of the indigo-bird, the cardinal grossbeak, the towhee bunting, the wood-pewee, the Baltimore oriole, and the black- capped chickadee ; while, no sooner had I stepped out of the woods into the adjoining swamp, than the song-sparrow chimed merrily, “Oh, certainly, certainly, you must n’t forget me-me-me! No-sirree, no-sirree !”’ | One of the most blithesome trillers of midsurnmer was the grass-finch, which sang his canticles until about the twelfth of August, when he suddenly took leave for parts unknown. It seemed to me he sang ‘more vigorously in July than in May, for several times he prolonged his trill with such splendid musical effect as to make me rush out to the adjoin- ing field to find a lark-sparrow. The black-throated bunting remained here almost as long, rasping his harsh notes until he also took his flight. I was somewhat disappointed in the meadow-larks, having heard but one note from their tuneful throats during August ; but when September came, they resumed their shrill choruses, which lasted until November, increasing in vigor as the autumn advanced. The robins were chary of their music, only two songs having been heard during August, one of them on the fourteenth. But the little bush-sparrow made ample compensation, chanting his pensive MIDSUMMER MELODIES. EY voluntaries almost every. day at the border of the woods until about the twentieth of August. Still more lavish of his melody was the indigo-bird, which on several occasions was the only songster, besides the wood-pewee, heard during a long stroll through the woods. An irrepressible minstrel, he is the most cheery member of the midsummer chorus. My notes say that the Maryland yellow-throat was sing- ing in splendid voice on the first of August, but I am positive I heard him later in the month, as he is one of our most rollicksome midsummer choralists. The goldfinch sang cheerily on the first, eighteenth, and nineteenth of August, and I cannot say how often in July and August I heard the loud refrain of the Carolina wren. On the tenth, twelfth, fourteenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth of August, the Baltimore oriole piped cheerily, though he had partly doffed his splendid vernal robes, and was beginning to don his modest autumnal garb. ‘The cardinal bird fluted frequently during July and August, and, besides, regaled me with a vocal performance on the third of September. The last record I have of the towhee bunting’s trill is the tenth of August; but before that date he was quite lavish of his music. On many of my tramps to the woods the sad minor whistle of the black-capped chickadee pierced the solitudes, making one dream of one’s boyhood days, — “ When birds and flowers and I were happy peers,” as Lowell would phrase it. 8 114 IN BIRD LAND. One of my surprises was a warbler’s trill on the twelfth of August. The little tantalizer kept itself so far up in the trees as to baffle all attempts at identification, but I am disposed to think it was a cerulean warbler. On the nineteenth of August two warbler trills, one of them, I feel almost sure, from the throat of the chestnut-sided warbler, were heard, which is all the more novel because these birds are not residents, but only migrants in this latitude. I should have felt amply repaid for all my efforts, had I proved nothing more than that warblers will some- times regale one with an aftermath of song in the dog days. | | | The most persistent minstrel of the midsummer orchestra was the wood-pewee, — the only bird whose song I heard on every excursion to the woods during July and August ; and even when September came, there seemed to be little abatement in his musical industry. All the year round, the song- sparrow is the most prolific lyrist of my acquain- tance, but in midsummer he is distanced by his sylvan neighbor, the wood-pewee. During my walks on the twenty-ninth and thirty-first of August the pewee’s was the only song heard. Then, he does not confine himself wholly to his ordinary song, Phe-e-w-e-e or LPhe-e-e-0-r-e-e-e, for one day in July he twittered a quaint med- ley in a low, caressing tone, as if singing a lullaby to his nestlings. At first I could not tell what bird was the author of the new style of melody, but presently the song glided sweetly into the well-known MIDSUMMER MELODIES. I15 Pe-e-w-e-e. On another occasion I was charmed by the vocal rehearsals of a young pewee. His youth was evident from the fact that he twinkled his wings and coaxed for food from the mother bird, who re- warded his vocal efforts by feeding him. ‘The song was extremely beautiful, spite of the crudeness of its execution ; a clear continuous strain, repeated quite loudly, with here and there a partially successful at- tempt to emit the ordinary pewee notes. Occasion- ally the parent bird would respond, as if setting the ambitious novice a musical copy, and then he would make a heroic effort to pipe the notes he had just heard, and several times he succeeded admirably. He had a voice of excellent quality, but did not have it under perfect control; still, the immature song was so innocent, so zaive and striking, that it was a temptation to wish he would never learn to sing otherwise. Permit me to add, in conclusion, that, while the birds are not equally musical or plentiful all the year round, yet there is never a time when their behavior is not worth careful attention. Moreover, midsum- mer is the most favorable time for the study of the quaint behavior and varied plumage of young birds, —a theme connected with our avian fauna that merits more consideration than it has yet received. 116 IN BIRD LAND. X. WHERE BIRDS KOGse NE winter evening found me tramping through a swamp not far from my home, listening to the dulcet trills of the song-sparrows, which had recently returned from a brief visit to a more south- ern latitude. There was no snow on the ground, and the day had been pleasant; but, as evening approached, the west wind blew raw across the fields. _ For some reason which I cannot now re- call, an impulse seized me to clamber over the fence into the adjacent meadow, where I stalked about somewhat aimlessly for a minute or two, little thinking that I was on the eve of a discovery, — one that was destined to lead me into a delightful field of investigation. The ground was rather soggy, but a pair of tall rubber boots make one indifferent to mire and mud. The dusk was now gathering rapidly, and it was time for most birds to go to bed. I soon found, too, that they were going to bed, and, more- over, were taking lodgings in the most unexpected quarters. Imagine my surprise when, as I trudged about, the little tree-sparrows, which are. winter WHERE BIRDS ROOST. rL7 residents in my neighborhood, flew up here and there out of the deep grass. They seemed to be hidden somewhere until I came near, and then they would suddenly dart up as if they had emerged from a hole in the ground. This unexpected behavior led me to investigate ; and I soon found that in many places there were cosey apartments hollowed out under the long, thick tufts of marsh grass, with neat entrances at one side like the door of an Eskimo hut. These hollows gave ample evidence of having been occupied by the birds, so that there could be no doubt about their being bird bedrooms. Very frequently they were burrowed in the sides of the mounds of sod raised by the winter frosts, and were thus lifted above the intervening hollows, which contained ice- cold water. In every case the overhanging grass made a thatched roof to carry off the rain. I do not mean to say that these little dugouts were made by the birds themselves. Perhaps they were, but it is more probable that they had been scooped out the previous summer by field-mice, and had only been appropriated for sleeping-apartments by the sparrows. However that may be, they were exceedingly cunning and cosey ; and soft must have been the slumbers of the feathered occupants while the wintry blasts howled unharming above them. Prior to that discovery I had supposed, with most people, that all birds roost in trees and bushes. Later researches have proved how wide of the truth one’s unverified hypotheses may be. A week or so 118 IN BIRD LAND. afterward, while strolling one evening at dusk through a favorite timber-belt, I noticed the snow- birds, or juncos, darting up from the leaves and bushes and small brush-heaps, beneath which they had found dainty little coverts from the storm. In many places crooked twigs and branches, covered with leaves, lay on the ground, leaving underneath small spaces overarched and sheltered, and into these cosey nooks the juncos had crept for the night. No enemies, at least in winter, would find them there, and their hiding-places were snug and warm. Long after dark I lingered in the woods, and everywhere startled the snow-birds from their leafy couches. At one place a whole colony of them had taken lodgings. When my passing fright- éned them away, they flew through the darkness into the neighboring trees. After waiting at some distance for several minutes, I returned to the spot, and found that some of the birds had gone back to their bedrooms on the ground. | . In my nocturnal prowlings through the fields and lowlands, I have frequently frightened the meadow- larks from the grass, and that long before nest-build- ing or incubation had begun. Of course, they were recognized by their nervous alarm-calls, as well as by the peculiar sound of their fluttering wings. What surprises me beyond measure is that they so often select low, boggy places for their roosts, instead of the dry pleasant upland slopes. But there is no accounting for tastes in the bird world. ‘The grass- finches and lark-sparrows, like their relatives just WHERE BIRDS ROOST. 119 mentioned, seek little hollows in the ground for bed-chambers, usually sheltered by grass tufts. Long before day, one April morning, J made my way to the marsh so frequently mentioned in this volume. The moon was shining brightly in the southern sky. Early as it was—for as yet there was no sign of daybreak —the silvery trills of the song-sparrows rose from the bushes like a votive offering to the Queen of Night. From one part of the swamp a sweet song would ring out on the moonlit air, and would at once be taken up by an- other songster not far away. Then another would chime in, and another, until the whole enclosure was filled with the antiphonal melody. A silence would then fall upon the marsh like a dream-spirit, to be broken soon by another outburst of min- strelsy ; and thus the nocturne continued until day broke, and it merged into the glad matin service. But my object is to tell about bird roosts rather than about bird music. When I reached the farther end of the marsh, several sparrow songs came up from the ground. I walked with a ten- tative purpose toward a spot whence a song came, when the little triller sprang up affrighted. The same experiment with a number of other songsters brought a like result in each case, proving beyond doubt, I think, that at least some of the song- sparrows roost on the ground, and begin their matins before they rise from their couches, so anxious are they to put in a full day of song. On the same morning — it was still before day- 120 IN BIRD LAND. break —-a bevy of red-winged blackbirds, which had been roosting in the long grass, flew up with vociferous cries and protests at the rude awakening I had given them, just when they were enjoying their morning nap. Blame them who will for making loud ado, for there are many people who would do the same under similar provocation. Thus it will be seen that many birds sleep on the ground. My investigations lead me to this con- clusion: As a rule, those birds which nest on or near the ground, and spend a considerable portion of their time in the grass, like the meadow-larks and song-sparrows, roost on the ground, while others find bushes and trees more to their taste. Still, there are exceptions to this rule ; for on several occasions, while bent on my nocturnal prowlings, I have driven the turtle-dove from the ground, although this bird usually roosts in the thorn-trees and willows.’ The robins choose thick trees and even wild rose- bushes for roosts. In the apple-trees and pines of a neighbor’s yard across the fields these birds find sleeping-apartments early in the spring, before nest-building is begun, for a perfect deluge of robin music often pours from that locality, both morning and evening. | The white-throats, wood-sparrows, and brown thrashers make use of the thick thorn-trees of the marsh for lodgings. They flutter about in sore 1 This is, after all, no exception, for I have since founda number of turtle-doves’ nests on the ground. WHERE BIRDS ROOST. iP | dismay as I approach, until I start back, lest they should impale themselves on the sharp thorns. Sometimes the thrasher ensconces himself for the night in the brush-heaps which the wood-choppers have made on the slopes, making his presence known by his peculiar way of scolding at my offi- clous intrusion. One cannot help admiring the wise forethought displayed by many birds in creeping into the thick thorn-bushes at night, where they may sleep without fear of attack from their nocturnal foe, the owl. Full well they seem to know he cannot force his | bulky form through the thick network of branch and thorn. How he must gnash his teeth with rage —if owls ever do that—when he espies his coveted prey sleeping peacefully just beyond the reach of his talons! Still, it sometimes happens that even a small bird ventures into too close quarters in these terrible prickly bushes ; for I once found a-dead sparrow completely wedged in among the’ fierce thorns, where it had ‘evidently been caught in such a way as to prevent its escape. Something over a year after the preceding facts were published, I was seized with a whim to re- sume my investigations on bird roosts. One of my nocturnal rambles seems to be deserving of some- what minute description. .It was a delightful evening of early spring, with a warm westerly breeze stirring the bursting leaves. The sun had set, and the dusk was falling over fields and woods. The bright moon, a little more than half full, 122 IN BIRD LAND. lengthened out the gloaming and added many precious minutes to the singing hours of the birds. Such a woodland chorus as I was permitted to listen to that evening! It was a rare privilege. How the wood-thrushes vied’ with the towhee buntings! Which would sing the latest? That seemed to be the question. At length there were several moments of silence, and I supposed all the birds had gone to sleep, when a white-throated sparrow and a wood-pewee struck in with their sweet strains; and so the chorus continued until it was really night. The wood-thrushes, I think, got in the last note of the twilight serenade. Before it had become quite dark, I espied a wood-thrush sitting in the fork of a dogwood-tree, looking at me in a startled way; but she did not fly. JI walked off some distance, remained awhile, and then returned, to find her still in her place. Then I strolled about until night had fully come ; the moon shone brightly, so that it was not dark. When I went back to the dogwood-tree, the speckled breast of the thrush was still visible in the fork which she had chosen for her bed-chamber, and I wished her pleasant dreams. While stalking about, I startled another wood- thrush, which had selected a loose brush-heap on the ground instead of a sapling or tree for a roost. The indigo-birds and bush-sparrows flew up from the blackberry bushes as I pushed my way through them. Several times the towhee buntings leaped scolding out of bed, having selected brush-heaps, WHERE BIRDS ROOST. | 123 or dead branches lying on the ground, for roost- ing-places. A discovery was also made in regard to the sleeping-apartments of the red-headed woodpecker. As the dusk was gathering, a red-head dashed in front of me into the border of the woods, alighting on a sapling stem, and then began to shuffle upward toward a hole plainly visible from where I sat; but just as he reached the hole, another red-head appeared with a challenging air on the inside of the cavity, and red-head number one darted away with a cry of alarm. Now was my time to discover, if possible, where red-head number two would roost. So I kept a close watch on the cavity, waiting about, as previously said, until nightfall, and then, keeping my eye on the hole, so that the bird could not fly out without being seen, I made my way to the sap- ling. Intently watching the hole with my glass, I tapped the stem of the tree with my heel, when, in the moonlight, a red head and long, black beak were protruded from the opening above. The wood- pecker was within, that much was proved ; and when I had beaten against the tree, he had sprung up to the orifice to see who was thus impolitely disturbing his evening slumbers. He turned his head sidewise, and looked down at me with his keen beady eyes; but although I tapped against the tree again and again, he would not leave the cavity. There can be no doubt that it was his bedroom, — that cosey apart- ment in the sapling, — for it was still too early in the season for the bird to begin nesting, as he had 124 IN BIRD LAND. arrived only two or three days before from his winter residence in the south. Very likely most wood- peckers roost in the cavities which they hew in trees, for I do not see why the one into whose private affairs I pried that evening should have been an exception. He most probably was only following the customs of his tribe from time immemorial.} A number of experiments made with young birds purloined from the nest —I must beg the feathered parents’ forgiveness — have added several interesting facts to the subject in hand. One spring I became guardian, purveyor, and man-of-all-work to a pair of young flickers, taken from a cavity in an old apple- tree. They were kept in a large cage, in which I placed sapling boughs of considerable size. They had not become my protégés many days before they insisted on converting these upright branches into sleeping-couches, clinging to the vertical boles with their stout claws, and pillowing their heads in the feathers of their backs. In this position they slept as comfortably as the thrushes and orioles confined in other cages slept on their horizontal perches, or, for that matter, as I slept in my own bed. ‘They 1 The reader will see, from the facts given in the remainder of the chapter, that I reckoned without my host in supposing that woodpeckers usually sleep in cavities of trees. That they sometimes select such places for roosts cannot be doubted; but that such is always or even generally their habit the ex- periments described farther on conclusively disprove. It is only fair to say that the rest of the chapter was added long after the foregoing had been written, and proves how unsafe it is for the naturalist to make generalizations. WHERE BIRDS ROOST. 125 even slept on the under- side of an oblique branch. One of them passed one night on a horizontal perch, although apparently his slumbers were not quite so sound and refreshing as they would have been had he roosted in the wonted upright position. Queerest of all, these woodpeckers sometimes selected the side of the cage itself for a roosting-place, thrusting their claws into the crevice between the door and its frame. Wherever they roosted, their tails were made to do duty as braces, by being pressed tightly against the wall to which they clung. A pair of young red-headed woodpeckers behaved in much the same way, always preferring to sleep on an upright perch. During the spring of 1893 I placed in a cage the foliowing birds, all taken while in a half-callow state, from the nest: Two cat-birds, one red-winged black- bird, one cow-bunting, and two meadow-larks. In a few days all of them proclaimed their species, as well as the inexorable law of heredity, by selecting such roosts as were best adapted to them, and that without any instruction whatever from adult birds. The meadow-larks almost invariably squatted on the grass with which the floor of the cage was lined, usually scratching and waddling from side to side until they had made cosey hollows to fit their bodies ; while the remaining inmates flew up to iis petenes when bed-time came. It was quite interesting to look in upon my group of sleeping pets of an evening, part of them roosting in the lower story of the cage and the rest in the 126 IN BIRD LAND. upper story. Several times, however, one of the larks slept on a perch, and the red-wing, after the cat-birds and bunting had been removed from the cage, occa- sionally seemed to think the upstairs a little lonely, and so he cuddled down on the grass below, edging up close to the larks. The strangely assorted bed- fellows slept together in this way like happy children. THE WOOD-PEWEE. 127 XI. THE WOOD-PEWEE. A MONOGRAPH. LMOST every person living in the country or the suburbs of a town is familiar with the house-pewee, or phoebe-bird. It is usually looked upon as the sure harbinger of spring. In my boy- hood days my parents and grandparents were wont to say, “Spring is here; the phoebe is singing.” And if blithesomeness of tone and good cheer have anything to do with the advent of the season of song and bursting blossoms, the pewit, as he is often called, must be a true herald and prophet. He seems to carry the “subtle essence of spring ”’ in his tuneful larynx, and in the graceful sweep of his flight as he pounces upon an insect. It is quite easy to make the transition from his familiar song of FPhe-e-by to the exclamation, Spring ’s here! by a little stretch of the fancy. But the phoebe has a woodland relative, a first cousin, with which most persons are not so well acquainted, because he is more retiring in his habits, and seeks out-of-the-way places for his habitat. I refer to the wood-pewee. If your eyes and ears are not so sharp as they should be, you may get these 128 IN BIRD LAND. two birds confounded; yet there is no need of making such a blunder. The woodland bird is smaller, slenderer, and of a darker cast than his relative ; and, besides, there is a marked difference in the musical performances of these birds. The song of the phcebe is sprightly and cheerful, and the syllables are uttered rather quickly, while the whistle of the wood-pewee is softer and more plain- tive, and is repeated with less emphasis and more deliberation. ‘There is, indeed, something inex- pressibly sad and dreamy about the strain of the wood-pewee, especially if heard at a distance in the “emerald twilight” of the “ woodland privacies.” Mr. Lowell seldom erred in his attempts to charac- terize the songs and habits of the birds, but in his exquisite poem entitled “ Phcebe”’ he certainly must have referred to the wood-pewee and not to the phcebe-bird, as his description applies to the former but not ,to the latter. He calls this. age “the loneliest of its kind,’ while the pewit is a familiar species about many a country home. ‘Tak- ing it for granted that he meant the wood-pewee, how happy is his description ! “Tt is a wee sad-colored thing, As shy and secret as a maid, That ere in choir the robins ring, _ Pipes its own name like one afraid. “Tt seems pain-prompted to repeat The story of some ancient ill, But Phebe! Phebe! sadly sweet, Is all it says, and then is still. THE WOOD-PEWEE. 129 “ Phebe! it calls and calls again ; And Ovid, could he but have heard, Had hung a legendary pain About the memory of the bird. “ Phebe! is all it has to say In plaintive cadence o’er and o’er, Like children who have lost their way, And know their names, but nothing more.” This poetical tribute is certainly very graceful, and would be true to life if the phonetic represen- tation were a little more accurate. Instead of Phebe, imagine the song to be Pe-e-w-e-e-e or Phe- é-w-e-e-e, and you will gain a clear idea of the min- strelsy of this songster of the wildwood. However, he frequently varies his tune,—to prevent its becoming monotonous, I opine. He sometimes closes his refrain with the falling inflection or cir- cumflex, and sometimes with the rising, as the mood prompts him. In the former case the first syllable receives the greater emphasis and is the more pro- longed, and in the latter this order is precisely reversed. When the last syllable is uttered with the rising circumflex, it is usually, if not always, cut off somewhat abruptly. Moreover, this minstrel often runs the two syllables of hissong together, — a pecu- liarity that I have represented in my notes, taken while listening to the song, in this way: V/he-e-e-o- o-w-e-e-e ! There is a characteristic swing about the melody that refuses to be caught in the mesh of letters and syllables. In some of the pewee’s vocal efforts he does not 9 130 IN BIRD LAND. get farther than the end of the first syllable. The song seems to be cut off short, as if the notes had stuck fast in the singer’s throat, or as if something had occurred to divert his mind from the song. Perhaps this hiatus is caused by the sudden appear- ance of an insect glancing by, which attracts the musician’s attention. ‘This bird usually chooses a dead twig or limb in the woods as a perch, on which he sits and sings, turning his head from side to side, so that no flitting moth may escape him. And what a persistent singer he is! He sings not only in the spring when other vocalists are in full tune, but also all summer long, never growing disheartened, even when the mercury rises far up into the nineties. What a pleasant companion he has been in my midsummer strolls as I have wearily patrolled the woods! On the sultriest August days, when all other birds were glad to keep mute, sitting on their shady perches with open mandibles and drooping wings, the dreamful, far-away strain of the wood-pewee has drifted, a welcome sound, to my ears through the dim aisles. He seems to be a friend in need. How often, when the heat has almost overcome me, as I pursued my daily beat, that song has put new vigor into my veins! When Mr. Lowell wrote that ““The phoebe scarce whistles Once an hour to his fellow,” he must have been listening to a far lazier specimen — than those with which I am acquainted. THE WOOD-PEWEE. 131 Most birds fall occasionally into a kind of ecstasy of song, and the wood-pewee is no exception. One evening, after it had grown almost dark, a pewee flew out into the air directly above my head from a tree by the wayside, and began to sing in a per- fect transport as he wheeled about; then he swung back into the tree, keeping up his song in a con- tinuous strain, and in sweet, half-caressing tones, until finally it died away, as if the bird had fallen into a doze during his vocal recital. I lingered about for some time, but he did not sing again. Why should he repeat his good-night song? I have frequently heard young pewees in mid- summer singing in a continuous way, instead of whistling the intermittent song of their elders. It sounds very droll, giving you the impression that the little neophyte has begun to turn the crank of his music-box and can’t stop. His voice is quite sweet, but his execution is very crude. Wait, however, until he is eight or nine months older, and he will show you what a winged Orpheus can do. My notes say that on the thirtieth of July, 1891, I heard a “ pewee’s quaint, prolonged whistle, interlarded with his ordinary notes.” Thus it will be seen that he is a somewhat versatile songster, proving the poet’s lines half true and half untrue : — “The birds but repeat without ending The same old traditional notes, Which some, by more happily blending, Seem to make over new in their throats.” 132 IN BIRD LAND. Younger readers may, perhaps, need to be in- formed that the wood-pewee belongs to the family of flycatchers, as do also the king-bird or bee- martin, the phcebe-bird, the great-crested fly- catcher, and a number of other interesting species, all of which have a peculiar way of taking their prey. The pewee will sit almost motionless on a twig, lisping his plaintive tune at intervals, until a luckless insect comes buzzing near, all unconscious of its peril, when the bird will make a quick dash at it, seize it dexterously between his mandibles, and then circle around gracefully to the same or another perch, having made a splendid “catch on the fly.” If the quarry he has taken is small, it slips at once down his throat; but should it be too large to be disposed of in that summary way, he will beat it into an edible form upon a limb before gulping it down. Agile as he is, he some- times misses his aim, being compelled to make a second, and occasionally even a third attempt to secure his prize. I have witnessed more than one comedy which turned out to be a tragedy for the ill-starred insect. Sometimes the insect will resort to the ruse of dropping toward the ground when it sees the bird darting toward it, and then a scuffle ensues that is really laughable, the pursuer whirl- ing, tumbling, almost turning somersault in his desperate efforts to capture his prize. Once an insect flew between me and a pewee perched on a twig, when the bird darted down toward me with a directness of aim that made me think for a | THE WOOD-PEWEE. 133 moment he would fly right into my face; but he made a dexterous turn in time, caught his quarry, and swung to a bough near by. If one were dis- posed to be speculative, one might well raise sidney Lanier’s pregnant inquiry at this point, the reference being to the southern mocking-bird, and not to our pewee, — “Flow may the death of that dull insect be The life of yon trim Shakspeare, on the tree?” It has been my good fortune to find one, but only one, nest of this bird. It was placed on a horizontal branch about fifteen feet above the ground, and was a neat, compact structure, deco- rated on the outside with grayish lichens and moss, giving it the appearance of an excrescence on the limb.1 It is said by those who have closely exam- ined the nests, that they are handsomely built and ornamented, and are equalled only by the dainty houses of the humming-bird and the blue-gray gnat-catcher. The eggs, usually four in number, are of a creamy white hue, beautifully embellished with a wreath of lavender and _ purplish-brown around the larger end or near the centre. Though our bird prefers solitary places for his home, he is far from shy, if you call on him in his haunt in the wildwood. MHe will sit fearless on his perch, even if you come quite near, looking at 1 Since this was written, I have found several more nests, and have even watched the skilful architects at their house- building. 134 IN BIRD LAND. you in his staid, philosophical way, as if you were scarcely worth noticing. Nor will he hush his song at your approach, although he does not seem to care whether you listen to him or not. It is seldom that he can be betrayed into doing an undignified act; and even if he does almost turn a somersault in pursuing a refractory miller, he re- covers his poise the next moment, and settles upon his perch with as much sang frotd as if nothing unusual had occurred. Altogether, the wood-pewee is what Bradford Torrey would call a “character in feathers.”’ ; A PAIR OF NIGHT-HAWKS. 135 XII. A PAIR OF NIGHT-HAWKS. HE night-hawk and the whippoorwill are often confounded by persons of inaccurate habits of observation. It is true, both birds are members of the goatsucker family; but they belong to entirely different genera, and are therefore of much more distant kin than many people suppose. ‘The whip- poorwill is a forest bird, while the night-hawk pre- fers the open country. Besides, the whippoorwill is decidedly nocturnal in his habits, making the woods ring at night, as every one knows, with his weird, flutelike melody; whereas the night-hawk is a bird of the day and evening. ‘Then, a peculiar mark of the night-hawk is the round white spot on his wings, visible on the under surface as he per- forms his wonderful feats overhead,—a mark that does not distinguish his woodland relative. As a tule, the gloaming is the favorite time for the night-hawk’s wing-exercises; then he may be seen whirling, curveting, mounting, and plunging, often at a dizzy height, gathering his supper of insects as he flies ; but his petulant call is often heard at other hours of the day, perhaps at noon when the sun is shining with fierce warmth. Even during a shower 136 IN BIRD-LAND. he seems to be fond of haunting the cloudy canopy, toying with the wind. om His call, as he tilts overhead, is difficult to repre- sent phonetically, both the vowels and consonants being provokingly elusive and hard to catch. To me he seems usually to say Sfe-ah. Sometimes the S appears to be omitted, or is enunciated very slightly, while at other times his call seems to have a de- cidedly sibilant beginning. On several occasions he seemed to pronounce the syllable Scape. I had often watched the marvellous flight of these birds, as they passed like living silhouettes across the sky; but they had always seemed so shy and unapproachable that, prior to the summer of 1891, I had despaired of ever finding a night-hawk’s nest. However, one evening in June, while stalking about in the marsh, I suddenly became aware of a large bird fluttering uneasily about me in the gathering darkness. Presently it was joined by its mate, and then the two birds circled and hovered about, often coming into uncomfortable proximity with my head, and muttering under their breath, Chuckle / chuckle! Several times one of them alighted for a few moments on the rail-fence near by, and then resumed its circular flight. Even in the darkness I recognized that my uncanny companions were night- hawks, and felt convinced that there must be a nest in the neighborhood, or they would not display so much anxiety. It was too late to discover their secret that evening, and, besides, I really felt a slight chill creeping up my back, with those dark, ghostly A PAIR OF NIGHT-HAWKS. 137 forms wheeling about_ my head, and so I went reluctantly home. Two days later I found time to visit the marsh. On reaching the spot where the two birds had been seen, presto! a dark feathered form started up before me from the ground. It was the female night-hawk ; and there on the damp earth, without the least trace of a nest or a covering of any kind, lay two eggs. At last I had found a night-hawk’s nest! The ground-color of the eggs, which were quite large, was of a dirty bluish-gray cast, mottled and clouded with darker gray and brown. The behavior of the mother bird was curious. She had fluttered away a few rods, pretending to be hurt, and then dropped into the grass. On my driving her from her hiding-place, she rose in the air and began to hover about above my head, and then, to my utter surprise, she swooped down toward me savagely, as if she really had a mind to attack me. As I walked away, she seemed to grow angrier and bolder, making a swift dash at me every few minutes, and actually coming so near my head as to cause me involuntarily to raise my cane in self-defence. A quaver of uneasiness went through me. I really believe she would have struck me had IJ given her sufficient provocation. There was a brisk shower falling at the time, and so, fearing the eggs might become addled, I hurried to the remote end of the marsh. Suddenly my feathered pursuer disappeared. Wondering if she had resumed her place on the nest, I sauntered back to settle the doubt, but pres- 138 IN BIRD LAND. ently espied her sitting lengthwise on a top rail of the fence, while her eggs lay unprotected in the rain. Her dark, mottled form and sleepy, half-closed eyes made a quaint picture. I slowly withdrew, and as long as I could see her with my glass, she kept her perch on the rail without moving a pinion. On the twenty-third of June another call was made on the night-hawk family, when I found two odd- looking bairns in the nest, if nest it could be called. They were covered with soft down, the black and white of which presented a wavy appearance. ‘Their short, thick bills were covered with a speckled fuzz, except the tips. I stooped down and smoothed their downy backs with my hand, but there was no expression of fear in their sluggish eyes.- Both parents were present on the twenty-sixth of June. Fora while the male bird pursued his mate savagely through the air, as if venting on her his anger at my intrusion, and then, mounting far up toward the sky and poising a moment, he plunged toward the earth with a velocity that made my head dizzy, checking himself, as is his wont, with a loud resounding Bo-o-m-m. The female again pursued her unwelcome visitor, swooping so near my head two or three times that I could have reached her with my cane. The cock bird, curiously enough, never displayed so much courage, but kept at a safe distance. On the twenty-ninth the young birds had been moved about a half rod from the original site of the nest, and hopped off awkwardly into the grass when A PAIR OF NIGHT-HAWKS. 139 I tried to clasp them with my hand. ‘The benedict was absent this time, and was never seen on any of my subsequent visits while the young birds were fledging. By the first of July the bantlings hopped about in a lively manner at my approach to their domicile, and wheezed in a frightened way, spread- ing out their mottled pinions. On the seventh of July neither of the parents was to be seen, and the youngsters .sat so cosily side by side on the ground that I had not the heart to disturb their slumbers. Approaching cautiously on the tenth, I almost stepped on the mother bird before she flew up. At the same moment both young birds started from the ground, and fluttered away in different directions on their untried wings, their flight being awkward and labored. ; The first fine careless rapture.” A BIRDS’ GALA-DAY. IST New strains were continually introduced. So loud and full were some of his notes that “the blue air trembled with his song,’ and the woods fairly woke into echoes. It is really doubtful if the disparaging term “ hurly-burly ” should be applied to such peer- less vocalization. It was bird opera music of the highest style, improvised for the occasion, and formed a fitting conclusion to this rare birds’ gala-day. 152 IN BIRD LAND. XIV. RIEE WITH, BIRDS. A JAUNT TO A NEW FIELD. FOUR days’ outing along the Ohio River one A spring brought me some “finds” that may be of interest to bird lovers. Everywhere there were the twinkle of wings, the twitter of voices, and the charm of song; indeed, so plentiful were the feathered folk that the title of this article is far less poetical than realistic and descriptive. It was the latter part of May, the time in that latitude when the birds were in full song, at least those which were not too busy with their family cares. Sixty-four species were seen during a stay of four _ days in the neighborhood. - Mine host-was a farmer whose premises afforded a habitat for numerous birds, there being many trees and bushes in the yard and a large orchard near by. In one of the silver maples a pair of war- bling vireos had built a tiny pendent cradle, as is their wont, set in a bower of shining twigs and green leaves. ‘There it swayed in the zephyrs, rock- ing the birdlings to sleep and filling their dreams with rhythm; and the lullabies that the happy RIFE WITH BIRDS. 153 parents sang were cheerful and engaging, in spite of the fact that some critic has pronounced the min- strelsy of the warbling vireo tiresome. ‘Tiresome, forsooth! ‘Truth to tell, the more closely you listen to it the sweeter it grows. All day long, from peep of dawn to evening twilight, those quaint, continuous lays could be heard, now subdued and desultory, now almost as vigorous as a robin’s carol. It sometimes seemed as if the vireos and orchard orioles were rival vocalists. If so, a prize should be awarded to both, —to the vireos for persistency, for never letting up; to the orioles for richness and melody of tone. Many a rollicking two-part con- cert they gave. But there were other voices frequently heard in the chorus, though not so continuously as those of the birds just mentioned. A song-sparrow, which had built a dainty cot in a bush not two rods from the veranda, sometimes trilled an interlude of en- trancing sweetness, taking the bays for real tunefui- ness from every rival. Then, to my surprise, a Maryland yellow-throat, shy little fellow in other places, would frequently sing his heart out in the small trees and silver maples of the front yard. He did not fly off or discontinue his song when an auditor stood right beneath his perch, but would throw back his masked head, distend his golden throat, and deliver his trill to his own and every- body else’s satisfaction. Very often, too, the indigo- bird, just returned from a bath in the cerulean depths, would enrich the harmony with the most 154 IN BIRD LAND. rollicksome, if not the most tuneful lay of the chorus. Asa sort of accompaniment, the chipping- sparrow often trilled his silvery monotone; and once a robin added his Cheerily, here, here / So much for the birds about the house, though there were many others that have not been men- tioned ; in fact, there were some twenty species in all. There were also birds a-plenty in other places. A half day was spent in some fields bordering the broad river. Ona green slope was a bush-sparrow’s nest, daintily bowered in the grass by the side of a blackberry bush, and in a thicket hard by two yellow-breasted chats had placed their grassy cradles, proclaiming their secret to all the world by their loud cries of warning to keep away. It is odd that these birds, shy and nervous as they are, should go so far out of their way to tell you that they have a nest somewhere in the copse that you mustn’t touch, mustn’t even look for. While you are yet a quarter of a mile away, they will utter their loud cries of warning ; and if you go to the thicket where they are, you will be almost sure to find their nest, so poorly have they learned the lesson of discretion. In a little hollow of the copse a dying crow lay prone upon the ground. At intervals he would struggle and gasp in a spasmodic way. When I gently moved him with my cane, he grasped it with his claws and held it quite firmly. I put the stick to his large black beak. He took hold of it feebly, ready to defend himself even with his last gasp, for that it proved to be; he lay over and died the next RIFE WITH BIRDS. 155 instant. I could not give the pathology of the case, as no wounds could be found on his body. One of the most interesting finds of the day was the nest of a green heron, often called “ fly-up-the- creek.’”’ ‘The nest, only a loosely constructed plat- form of sticks, was placed on the branches of a leaning clump of small trees, and was about twenty feet from the ground. ‘The startled bird flew back and forth in the row of trees, and even went back _ to the nest while I watched her at a distance, but was too shy to remain there when I went near. In spite of the offensive nicknames foisted upon this heron, it is a handsome bird. As this one flew back and forth she made quite an elegant picture, with her long, glossy-brown neck and tail, white throat- line, ash-blue back, dappled under parts, and the long, slender feathers draping her hind-neck. But why was she called the green heron? Look as sharply as I would, I could descry no green in her plumage. A few days later, however, I examined a mounted specimen, and then the puzzle was solved ; for an iridescent green patch on the wing was so marked a feature of its coloration as to ac- count for the bird’s common name. Memory will always linger fondly about a certain afternoon and evening spent on the steep hills mounting up toward the sky a quarter of a mile or more back from the river. To a pedestrian like myself, used to rambling over a comparatively level scope of country, these high hills afforded a wonder- ful prospect, and almost made my head dizzy, as I 156 IN BIRD LAND. clambered far up their steep sides. Perhaps the mountain-climber would think them tame. — It made my head swim that evening to see a towhee bunting dart from a copse near by and hurl himself with reck- less abandon down the declivity, as if there were not the slightest danger of breaking his neck or dashing himself to pieces. He stopped just in time to plunge into another thicket for which he had taken aim. As the sun sank, I seated myself on the grass far up the steep, and looked down on the beautiful valley belowme. ‘There was the broad Ohio, wend- ing its way between the sentinel hills, the green clover fields and meadows smiling good-night to the sinking sun, and the brown ploughed fields with their green corn-rows. A wood-thrush mounted to a dead twig at the very top of a tall oak some distance below me, and poured forth his sad vesper hymn, so bewitchingly sweet and far-away ; the while Ken- tucky warblers and cardinal grossbeaks piped their lullabies or madrigals, as they chose, from the dark- ling woods; and, altogether, it was a never-to-be- forgotten evening. | An early morning hour found me climbing the ac- clivity and mounting to the top of the hill. In a clover-field the gossamer 7Zse-e-e of the grasshopper sparrow, a birdlet among birds, pierced my ear. Presently a pair of these sparrows were seen on the fence-stakes, and, yes, one of them had a worm in its bill, indicating that there were little ones in the neighborhood. If I could find a grasshopper spar- RIFE WITH BIRDS. 157 row’s nest! Often had I sought for one, but with- out success. For a long while my eyes followed the bird with the worm in her bill. Every now and then she would dart over into the grass as if to feed her bantlings, and I would mark the spot where she alighted ; but when I went to it no nest or bird- lings were to be found. Again and again I fairly trembled, thinking myself on the verge of a dis- covery, only to be balked completely in the end. But one victory was won; I got close enough to the bird to see distinctly with my glass the yellow mark- ings on the edge of the wings, —a characteristic I had never before been able to make out. Curiously enough, one wing of this bird was quite profusely tinged with yellow, while the yellow of the other could just be distinguished. Why should not a bird-student frankly chronicle his failures as well as his successes? During the day I encountered three birds that I was unable to identify, try as I would. One was singing lustily in some tall trees, and when at length I got my glass upon him he looked like a Carolina wren; but that bird has been a familiar acquaintance for many years, — comparatively speaking, — and I have so often heard his varied roundels that they certainly are all known to me. Moreover, the quality of this mys- terious singer’s voice and the manner of his execu- tion were wholly different from those of the Carolina or any Other wren of my acquaintance. ‘The fol- lowing is a transcription of the song as near as it could be represented by letters: Che-ha-p-e-e-r-r-r | 158 IN BIRD LAND. che-ha-p-e-e-r-r-r | repeated at brief intervals loudly and vigorously, but without variation. ‘The bird had a white superciliary line, brownish-barred wings, and whitish under parts. A consultation of all the man- uals in my possession fails to solve the problem. ; In a deep gorge, cut through the country by a small creek—small now, at least —on its way to the river, two curious bird calls were heard ; but one bird kept himself hidden in a dense thicket, and the other bolted into the dark woods that covered a steep acclivity. The first bird sang rather than called, and the words he said sounded quite dis- tinct : Che-o-wade'll-wade U-chip /—a sentiment that he repeated again and again. aes In spite of these disappointments my jaunt through this ravine was exceedingly pleasant,— so delightfully quiet and solitary; not a human sound to disturb the sacredness of the place; nothing but the songs and calls of wild birds. | “*T was one of those charmed days When the genius of God doth flow; The wind may alter twenty ways, A tempest cannot blow: It may blow north, it still is warm ; Or south, it still is clear; Or east, it smells like a clover-farm ; Or west, no thunder fear.” In one of the loneliest parts of the ravine there appeared on the scene my first Louisiana water- thrush, often called the large-billed wagtail. There it stood “ teetering’? on a spray or a rock, or skim- ming through the shallow water, its speckled breast RIFE WITH BIRDS. 159 and olive back harmonizing—I had almost said rhyming — with the gray of the creek’s bed, the crystal of the water, and the green of the thicket- fringed banks. It was part and parcel of the scene, —a lone bird in a lone place. But, hold! not lone, after all. Presently a young wagtail, the image of its mamma, emerged from somewhere or nowhere, and ran toward the old bird with open mouth, twinkling wings, and a pretty, coaxing call. She thrust something into its mouth; but still the bantling coaxed for more, when she dashed away a few feet, picked up another tidbit from the water, ran back to her little charge, and fed it again. But now, when it still pursued her, she seemed to lose her patience, for she rushed threateningly toward it, causing it to scamper away, and then she flew off. Yet after that she fed either the same or another youngster a number of times. Once a water-thrush went swinging down the gorge, the very poetry of graceful poise and movement, looking more like a naiad than a real flesh-and-blood birdlet. On a horizontal branch extending out over the rippling stream, a wood-thrush sat on her mud cottage ; but whether she appreciated the romantic character of the situation or not, she did not say. There were many other interesting feathered folk in the gorge and on its wooded steeps, each “a brother of the dancing leaves;’’ but to describe them all would take too long, and merely to name them would be too much like reciting a dry catalogue. 160 IN BIRD LAND. XV. VARIOUS PHASES OF BIRD Tite i BIRD COURTSHIP. O one who has studied the birds can deny that there is genuine sexual love among them. Many species act on the principle that “a pure life for two”’ is the only kind of life to live, and there- fore a match once made is a match that lasts until death does them part. There may be fickleness, divorce, and downright unfaithfulness among birds sometimes, and there certainly is polygamy among some species; but such examples of irregularity are rather the exception than the rule. ‘Monogamy largely prevails, and I have no doubt that any departure from the regular connubial relation creates a scandal in bird circles. As in the human world, so in the bird world a period of courtship precedes the celebration of the nuptials. But the mode differs in different kingdoms of creation. Many lovers in feathers conduct their 1 This series of papers, as well as some others in this vol- ume, was written at the suggestion of Mr. Amos R. Wells, of “The Golden Rule,” Boston, and was first published in that journal. PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 161 wooing in a somewhat rudely persistent and obtru- sive fashion. Society would soon ostracize the human suitor having such manners, and might even consider him amenable to the civil courts, and put him in jail as a character unfit to be abroad. How- ever, if hot pursuit, brazen manners, and _ half-coer- cive measures are considered “good form” in bird land, we of the human genus are the last who have a right to find fault, for are we not the most conventional beings on the face of the earth? You might almost as well be in limbo or inferno as out of style. Was there not a time when even the flaming sunflower was regarded as the _ highest emblem of the beautiful, merely because it was the “fad,” and not because anybody really felt that it possessed special esthetic qualities? ‘ People who live in glass houses ought not to throw stones,” is the saucy challenge of the merry chickadee to his human critic, as he dashes, like an animated “ nigger- chaser,”’ after the little Dulcinea whom he has marked for his bride. Then he stops, and, balancing on a spray, whistles his sweetest minor tune, /-e- w-e-€, pe-e-e-w-e-e ; which, being interpreted, prob- ably means, — “Does not all the blood within me Leap to meet thee, leap to meet thee, As the spring to meet the sunshine? ”’ No doubt many a feathered swain is smitten, and smitten very deeply too, with Cupid’s arrow, flung by some charming capturer of hearts. A little boy’s love-letter to a lassie who had taken his throb- II 162 IN BIRD LAND. bing heart by storm, ran thus: “I love you very dearly. You are so nice that I don’t blame any- body for falling in love with you. I don’t see why everybody doesn’t fall in love with you.” If one may judge from the impetuosity with which most feathered lovers press their suits, there must be many instances of such captivation in bird land. _ Have you ever been witness of the wooing of that half-knightly, half-boorish bird, the yellow-hammer ? In the grove near my house several pairs of these birds had a great time one spring settling their hymeneal affairs. For hours a lover would pursue the object of his affections around and around, never giving her a moment’s respite. No sooner had she gone bounding to another tree than he would dash after, often flinging himself recklessly right upon the spot where she had alighted, compelling her to hitch away, to avoid being struck by her impetuous lover. His policy seemed to be to take her heart by storm, to wear her out, to give her no time to think matters over, to compel her, zolens volens, to consent to his proposed marital alliance. No doubt she finally said yes, merely to get rid of him, and then failed of her purpose. After the courtship has passed its first stage, and the wooed one has grown less shy, the bowings and scrapings of the yellow-hammers are truly ludicrous. The female will flit away only a short distance, and will sometimes turn toward her mottled suitor, when they will wag their heads at each other, now to this side, now to that, in the most serio-comical manner imaginable. It is the PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 163 way these lords and ladies of woodpeckerdom make their royal obeisances. On a pleasant day in February two downy wood- peckers were “scraping acquaintance.’’ The male pursued his sweetheart about in the trees after the manner of his kind; but occasionally she would stand at bay and apparently challenge him to come nearer if he dared. Then both of them would lift their striped forms to an almost perpendicular posi- tion, their heads and beaks pointing straight toward the sky, and their bodies swaying grotesquely from side to side. This little comedy over, the finical miss bolted to another tree, with her cavalier in hot pursuit. Coy as the feathered ladies usually seem, many of them apparently are genuine flirts, and would feel greatly disappointed should their lovers give over the chase. They evidently want to be won, but not too easily. (Perhaps it might be said, ez passan?é, there are belles in other than the bird community who resort to similar zaive and winsome ruses.) In a shady nook of the woods I once saw a gallant towhee bunting employing all the arts at his command to win a damsel who seemed very demure. He was an extremely handsomely formed and finely clad bird, — a real édition de luxe. He flew down to the ground, picked up a brown leaf in his bill, and flourished it at her, as much as to say, “ It is time for nest-build- ing, dear.” Then he spread his wings and hand: some tail, and strutted almost like a peacock about on the leafy ground. But, no, she would not, and 164 IN BIRD LAND. she would not, and there was no use in talking ; she flitted, half contemptuously, to a more distant bush. That proud cockney need not think she cared for him! She wasn’t going to lose her heart to every lovelorn swain who came along. But, mark you, when I tried to separate them, by driving one to one side of the path and the other to the opposite side, the little hypocrite contrived every time, with admirable finesse, to flit over toward her knightly suitor. Three times the experiment brought the same result. Her maidenly reserve had a good deal of calculation in it, after all, innocent as she appeared. Perhaps she had conned Longfellow’s wise quatrain : “ How can I tell the signals and the signs By which one heart another heart divines ? How can I tell the many thousand ways By which it keeps the secret it betrays?” That the course of true love does not always run smooth in the bird world as elsewhere, goes without saying. There are feuds and jealousies. Sometimes two beaux admire the same belle, and then there may be war to the death. I have seen two rival song-sparrows clutch in the air, peck and claw at each other viciously, and come down to the ground with a thud that must have knocked the breath out of them for a few moments. Incredible as it may seem, an acute observer of bird life declares that the females are most likely to quarrel and fight over their lovers. At such times the male stands by, looks on approvingly, and lets them fight it out, no PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 165 doubt pluming himself on the fact that he is of suffi- cient importance to be the cause of a duel or a sparring-match among the ladies. Even those birds that seem to be the impersona- tion of kindiiness often engage in vigorous wrangles before they are able to settle the troubles that arise from match-making. The bluebird, of the siren voice and cerulean hue, is a case in point. Mr. Bur- roughs describes, in his inimitable way, the vigorous campaign of two pairs of bluebirds, which could not decide the subject of matrimony among themselves without resort to arms. Both the males and females engaged in more than one set-to. Once the hot- headed lovers closed with each other in the air, fell to the ploughed ground, and remained there, tugging and pecking and tweaking for nearly two minutes. Yet, when they separated, neither seemed to be any the worse for the mée. The tiny hummers are extremely belligerent birds. A writer describes the contests of certain humming- birds in the island of Jamaica when moved by jealousy. When two males have become rivals, they will level their long, pointed bills at each other, and then dash together with the swiftness of an arrow; they meet, separate, meet again, with shrill chirping, dart upward, then downward, and circle around and around, until the eye grows weary of watching them, and can no longer follow their rapid transits. At length one falls, exhausted, to the ground, while the other rests, panting and trembling, on a leafy spray, or perhaps tumbles, mortally wounded, to the earth. 166 IN BIRD LAND. There are some diminutive hummers, called Mexi- can stars, which become perfect furies when their jealousy isaroused. Their throats swell ; their crests, wings, and tails expand; and they clinch and spear each other in the air like the veriest disciples of Bellona. Thus a giant passion may dwell in a pygmy form. It will be pleasant to turn to more gentle ways of pressing a love-suit. The manners of some males are very courtly while trying to win a spouse. ‘They strut about most gracefully, and display their plumes to the best advantage, as if they would charm the coy damsel of their choice. The dainty kinglets erect and expand their crest feathers so that the golden or ruby spot spreads over the entire crown, making them look handsome indeed. It has never been my good fortune to witness the wooing of the ruffed grouse, miscalled the partridge in New England and the pheasant in the Middle States; but Mr. Langille has seen the performance, and with good reason goes into raptures over it. He describes it in this way: ‘Behold the male strutting before the female in time of courtship! The first time I saw him in this act I was utterly at a loss to identify him. The ruff about the neck is perfectly erect, so that the head is almost dis- guised ; the wings are partially opened and drooped gracefully ; the feathers are generally elevated ; the tail, with its rich, black band, is spread to the ut- most and thrown forward. Thus he stands, nearly motionless, a genuine object of beauty.” | PHASES OF BIKD LIFE. E67 One of the most brilliant exhibitions of this kind must be that of the great emerald birds of Paradise, as they disport themselves before the object of their affection. ‘They gather in flocks of from twelve to twenty on certain trees. Mr. A. R. Wallace, in his ‘‘ Malay Archipelago,” gives an interesting descrip- tion of these ‘‘ dancing-parties,” as they are called by the natives. The wings of the male birds, he says, ‘‘ are raised vertically over the back; the head is bent down and stretched out; and the long plumes ’’— those that spring like spray from the sides or shoulders — “ are raised and expanded till they form two magnificent golden fans, striped with deep red at the base, and fading off into the pale brown tint of the finely divided and softly waving points; the whole bird is then overshadowed by them, the crouching body, yellow head, and emerald- green throat forming but a foundation and setting to the golden glory which waves above them.” No wonder the maiden’s reserve all melts away, and she soon yields willing consent to her lover’s importunings! ‘There is only one flaw in this beau- tiful picture, and that is made by man himself, — man, the meddler in avian happiness. While the birds are absorbed in their courtship, the natives, for love of pelf, steal near and shoot them with blunt arrows. Sometimes all the males are thus murdered, ruthlessly, heartlessly, before the danger is discovered. Of course the mercenary butchers sell the plumes for decorative purposes. Gold is the only thing that glitters in the eyes of a sordid world. some people spell “ God” with an 1.” 168 IN BIRD LAND. No doubt vocal display also plays a large part in the courtship of birds. Nothing else in the early spring can wholly account for the wonderful musical tournaments that one hears lilting so lavishly on the air. Many a damsel, doubtless, listens to the numer- ous vocalists of her neighborhood, and then chooses the suitor whose voice possesses the finest qualities, or whose madrigals have the truest ring. How many things may combine to determine the choice of the parties, it would be difficult to say. Perhaps some birds are handsomer than others in the eyes of those that are looking for mates; perhaps some have more courtly and agreeable manners ; perhaps some put more fervor into their wooing or more passion into their songs; perhaps some are better tempered ; others may be more industrious or frugal or tidy, and thus will make better husbands or house- wives. Many a lass doubtless is sorely puzzled as to whom she shall choose for a mate. One may even fancy her crooning Addison’s quaint, paradox- ical lines to a whimsical lover concerning whose eligibility she harbors some doubt, — “Tn all thy humors, whether grave or mellow, Thou ’rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow, Hast so much wit and mirth and spleen about thee, That there’s no living with thee or without thee.” One question — not a profound one, I confess -— must bring this chapter to a close: Do the plumed ladies ever propose? One might imagine a love- lorn female bird throwing aside her maidenly reserve PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 169 ina fit of desperation, and singing the lines of Mrs. Browning, — “ But I love you, sir; And when a woman says she loves a man, The man must hear her, though he love her not.” II. BIRD NURSERIES. A BIRD’s nest is a bedroom, dining-room, sitting- room, parlor, and nursery all in one; for there the young birds sleep, eat, rest, entertain their guests (if they ever have any), and receive their earliest training. Yet there is no doubt that in treating the nest as a nursery we make use of the aptest simile that could be chosen. Those who have not given the matter special attention would scarcely suspect how many and varied are the in- terests that cluster around these dwellings of our little , brothers and sisters of field and woodland. The growth of the bantling family, their mental develop- ment, their deportment in the nest, their chirpings and chatterings, their way of beguiling the time, the length of their stay in their childhood home, — all these, and many other problems of equally absorbing interest, can be solved only by the closest surveil- lance. But it is no light task to watch a nest at close enough range to study the natural, unrestrained ways of the young birds. The fact is, in many, perhaps most, cases it cannot be done. 170 IN BIRD LAND. But before describing the inmates of the nursery it would be well to give some attention to the nursery itself, its site and structure. By going to the books I might tell you of many quaint nests, of the nests of the. tailor-bird, the water-ouzel, the parula warbler, the burrowing owl, and many others ; but — begging pardon for my conceit—I prefer not to get my material second-hand. One would rather describe one’s own observations, even though one may not be able to present so rare a list of curios. The nest of the common wood-thrush, right here in my own neighborhood, is of far more personal interest than the remarkable nest of the fairy martin of Australia, which I have small hope of ever seeing. Having mentioned the nest of the wood-thrush, I might as well begin with it. It is not a remarkable structure from an architectural point of view. It might be called a semi-adobe dwelling, thatched with vari- ous kinds of grasses and leaves, and lined with vege- table fibres. It is much like the nest of the robin, only Madam Thrush does not go quite so extensively into the plastering business. It has been interesting to study the ingenuity of these sylvan architects in choosing sites for their nests. They seem to know just where a nest may be built with the least labor in order to make it sit firmly in its place. In the woods that I most frequently haunt there is a sort of bushy sapling whose branches, at a certain point on the main stem, often grow out almost horizontally for a few inches, and then form an elbow by shooting up almost vertically, thus making an arbor, as it were, PHASES: OF BIRD) LIE. U7t which says plainly to the thrush, ‘This is just the site for a nest.’”’ In these crotches the wood-thrush rears her dwelling, its walls being firmly supported all around by the perpendicular branches. Do these saplings grow for the special benefit of the wood- thrush, or does the feathered artificer accommodate herself to the circumstances, or is there mutual adaptation between bird and bush? That is a problem for the evolutionist. But the thrush often selects other sites for her nursery. One day I found a nest deftly placed on the point of intersection of two almost horizontal limbs. From the lower one several small branches grew up in an oblique direction, to give the walls of the mud cottage firm support. ‘The intersecting boughs belonged to two different saplings. Another nest that did not have very strong external support was set down upon the short stub of a limb, which ran up into the mud floor and held the structure firmly in place. | One day I stumbled upon a very tall thrush nest, looking almost like a tower in its crotch. As the nestlings had left, I lifted it from its place and tore it apart, thinking the thrush might have fallen upon the summer warbler’s ruse to outwit the cow-bunting by adding another story to her hut, thus leaving the bunting’s intruded egg in the cellar. But such was not the case; she had simply done the unorthodox thing of using an old nest, still in good condition, for a foundation upon which to rear the new structure. Will the theologians of thrushdom bring charges of TS rye IN BIRD LAND. heresy against her? Was it really a case of “ higher criticism’’? It may have been, especially when you remember that these thrushes often weave into their nests fragments of newspapers, some of which may contain theological discussions. | One peculiarity in the nest-building of most of the birds of my neighborhood may as well be mentioned now as later; they seldom build in the densest and most secluded parts of the woods, but usually choose some bush or sapling near the border, or close to a woodland path or winding road, where people some- times pass. Perhaps they do this because the natural enemies of birds, such as squirrels, minks, and hawks, fight shy of these pathways traversed by human feet. Perhaps, too, the birds do not like the gloom and loneliness of the more sequestered por- tions of the woods. ‘They like to be semi-sociable, at least, and are not disposed to make monks and nuns of themselves. | | A far more artless nest is that of the turtle-dove. This bird should attend an industrial college for a term or two, to learn the art of building; but it would do no good: the meek little thing would cling obstinately to her inherited ideas, and never become a connoisseur in nest construction. Sometimes, when you stand beneath her cottage, you can see her white eggs gleaming through the interstices of the loosely matted floor. Asa rule, she builds on a branch ; but something possessed one little mother, in the spring of 1891, to build her nursery on a large stump about six feet high, standing right in the PHASES OF (BIRDLIFE: 173 midst of the woods. I fear she was not a well-trained bird ; but I watched her closely, and must concede that, whether her conduct was in ‘good form” or not, she reared her brood in the most approved manner. I could come within two feet of her, and almost touch her with my cane, before she would fly from the nest. How her little round eyes stared at me without so much asa blink! But she was greatly agitated, for her bosom palpitated with the violent throbbing of her heart. “T’ve found a turtle-dove’s nest on the ground,” said my friend, the young farmer across the fields, one spring day. (No matter about the year of grace, for every year is a year of grace in bird study.) My head was shaken skeptically, and I smiled in a patronizing way, for a turtle-dove’s nest on the ground was an unknown quantity in all my study of birds ; but my friend declared, “ Honest Injun!” and I left him to his obstinate opinions. But, hold! who, after all, proved to be the donkey? A few days later I myself stumbled upon a turtle-dove’s nest in a clover-field, flat on the ground. Bird students, be careful how you dispute the word of these sharp-eyed tillers of the soil! But for birds that invariably choose old mother earth for the foundation of their houses, commend me to the American meadow-larks. In this respect they are certainly groundlings, though not in a bad sense. All their nests are constructed on the same general plan, it is true; but the details are quite diverse, proving that architectural designs in the lark 174 IN BIRD LAND. guild of builders are almost as numerous as the builders themselves. My young farmer friend found a nest early in the spring, with not a blade of grass near it for protection, while the structure itself was arched over only a very little in the rear. Another nest was situated in a pasture, and was almost as devoid of roofing as was the first nest. But rather late in the spring a nest was found, hidden most deftly in the clover and plantain leaves, which were woven together in the most intricate manner so as to form a canopy over the cosey cot. At one side there was a tunnel, some two feet long, forming the only entrance to the apartment. ‘The nest proper was arched over from the rear for fully one half its width. Not ten feet away was another lark’s nest that was almost wholly exposed to the light and air. In the lark world there is evidently a good deal of room for originality. ‘There seem to be many larks of many minds. | My quest for cuckoos’ nests during the summer of 1892 was well rewarded, but I shall stop to describe only one of these finds. The young birds having left, I lifted the nest from the swaying branch on which it hung, and examined it. The founda- tion was composed of twigs and sticks intertwined and plaited together with some degree of skill, but it was the lining that stirred my interest. First, it consisted of a number of dead forest leaves from which the cellular texture had been completely stripped, leaving only the petiole, midrib, and veins ; underneath this was a more compact carpet of the PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 195 same kind of leaves, of which the blade, instead of being stripped off, was perforated with innumerable small holes, making them look like extremely fine sieves. In some cases the blades seemed to be split, leaving the veins and veinlets exposed, so that one could trace their intricate net-work. Another cuckoo nest had both the stripped and perforated leaves, but fewer of each kind. Whether the birds themselves did the artistic work on these leaves or not, —that is a question. The stripping of the upper layer of their blades would allow the dust and scaly substance shed by the young birds, to sift through to the second layer, where it would not come in direct contact with the nurslings. The two carpets were laid, no doubt, in the interests of health and cleanliness. But it is time to turn our attention to the children of the nursery. ‘The life of young birds in the nest, — what a field for study! One thing they learn very early, probably almost as soon as they emerge fem tie shell; that is, to open their mouths for food. No tutor or professor needed for that! Most young birds soon become quite clamorous for their rations. Lowell must have looked into more than one bird nursery, or he scarcely would have thought of writing the lines, —- “ Blind nestlings, unafraid, Stretch up, wide-mouthed, to every shade By which their downy dream is stirred, Taking it for the mother-bird.” A nestful of half-callow younglings, standing on 176 IN BIRD LAND. tiptoe, craning up their necks, wabbling from side to side, opening their mouths to the widest extent of their “gapes,” knocking heads and beaks to- gether, and chirping at the top of their voices, — I] confess it makes a picture more grotesque than attractive. By and by, as the pin-feathers begin to grow, the infant brood seem to feel an itching sen- sation, which causes them to pick the various parts of their bodies to remove the scaly substance that gathers on the skin and at the bases of the sprout- ing feathers. But how awkwardly they go about this exercise! Their heads seem to be too heavy for their long, slender necks, and go waggling and rolling from side to side, often missing the mark aimed at. However, the muscles of the nurslings are developing all the while. Soon they lift them- selves to their full height, stretch themselves, jerk their tails higher than their heads in a most amusing way (you smile, but they don’t), and then squat down upon the floor of the nest again. A day or so later the most advanced youngster feels the flying impulse stirring in his veins, and so, after stretching himself as previously described, he extends his wings to their utmost reach, and flaps them in a joyous way over his cuddling companions, sometimes rap- ping them smartly on the head. Soon there comes a day when he hops to the edge of the nest, looks out upon the wide, beckoning world like a young satrap, and flaps his wings with a semi-conscious feeling of strength. Ere long, encouraged by his parents, he spreads his wings, and takes a header PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. br | for the nearest twig. Why, his wings will bear him up on the buoyant air! He has graduated from the nursery and the grammar grade into the high school. Every year has its eccentricities, so to speak; that is, the character of the weather and other modifying causes afford the faunal life an occasion for a development that is peculiar. ‘Thus the observations made by the naturalist one year are not necessarily mere repetitions of those made other years. Nature is not often guilty of tautology. I yield therefore to the temptation to add a few chronicles made during the spring of 1893, which, I hope, will not destroy the unity of this article on bird nurseries. One day in June, while strolling through the woods, I heard the song of a red-eyed vireo. It was a kind of talking song, or recitative, as if the bird were discoursing on some favorite theme, and improvising his music as he went. His voice was so loud and clear that I could hear it far away, drifting through the green, embowered aisles of the woods. ‘This vigorous chanson was a surprise, for I have never before known this vireo to remain in my neighborhood during the summer. He mostly hies farther north. But a still greater surprise lay in ambush for me a few days later, in one of my rambles through the woods. Suddenly there was a light flutter of wings near my head, and there hung a tiny nest on the low, swaying branches of a sapling. That it was a vireo’s nest was evident, for it was T2 178 IN BIRD LAND. fastened to the twigs by the rim, without any support below, swinging there like a dainty basket. Pres- ently I got my glass on the bird herself, and found her to be ared-eyed vireo. That was my first nest of this species, and proud enough I was of the discovery. The outside of the little cot was prettily ornamented with tufts of spider-webs. As usual with this bird, a piece of white paper was wrought into the lower part of the nest. ‘Three vireo’s eggs and one cow- bunting’s lay in the bottom of the cup. Every few days I called on the bird, going close enough only to see her plainly, without driving her off the nest. She made a pretty picture sitting there, one fit for an artist’s brush, with her head and tail pointing almost straight up, her body grace- fully curved to fit the deep little basket, and her eyes growing large and wild at her visitor’s approach. At length, one day, I felt sure there must be little ones in the nest, and so I went very close to her; yet she did not fly. Then I moved my hand toward her, and finally touched her back before she flitted away. A featherless cow-bunting lay in the ham- mock, but the vireo’s eggs were not yet hatched. A few days later the nest was robbed. Some heart- less villain, probably a blue jay, had destroyed all the children. I could have wept, so keen was my sense of bereavement. The cow-buntings imposed a great deal on other kind-hearted bird parents that spring. Almost every nest contained one or two of this interloper’s eggs, and, as if Nature abetted the designs of the parasite, PHASES OF BIRD LIFE. 179 these eges were almost always hatched first. One wood-thrush’s nest contained two bunting and three thrush eggs. As soon as the bantlings had broken from the shell, the buntings could be readily dis- tinguished from the thrushes, for the former feath- ered much more rapidly than the latter. When the youngsters were about half grown, they crowded one another considerably in their adobe apartment, but, to all intents and purposes, they lived together in beautiful domestic harmony. At all events, no un- seemly family wrangles came under my eye. By and by, on one of my visits, I found that the bunt- ings had left the maternal roof (to speak with a good deal of poetic license), while the thrush trio still sat contentedly on the nest, and did not display any fear when I caressingly stroked their brown backs, but looked up at me in a zaive, confiding way that was very gratifying. Quite different was the conduct of the inmates of a bush-sparrow’s nest, hidden in the grass at the woodland’s border. ‘The baby sparrows rushed pell-mell from their pretty homestead when I came near, leaving a bunting, which had been hatched and reared with them, alone’ inthe nest. He was not nearly so far developed as his brothers and sisters, and had no intention of being driven from home. But here is an instance more like that of the bunting-wood-thrush episode just described. A pretty basket, woven of fine fibrous material, swung from the lower branches of an apple-tree in the orchard of one of my farmer friends, and contained three 180 IN BIRD LAND. young orchard orioles and one cow-bunting. One day I procured a step-ladder and climbed up to the nest, when the bunting sprang out with a wild cry and toppled to the ground, while the young orioles, not yet half-fledged, merely pried open their mouths for food. Yet these birds, when grown, are fully as dexterous on the wing as their foster relatives, the buntings. During the same aoe some observations on youthful blackbirds were made. ‘They may be of sufficient interest to register in this place. Did you know that a part of the heads of infant blackbirds remains bare a week or two after the other por- tions of their bodies are well feathered? . This is true of the three species of my acquaintance, — the purple grackles, the red-winged blackbirds, and the cow-buntings. The bald portion includes the forehead, part of the crown, the chin, and throat, and extends behind and below the ears, which are covered with a tiny tuft of fuzz. Had this unfeathered portion been red instead of black, the youngsters would have looked quite like diminutive turkey- buzzards. One may be pardoned for being some- what puzzled over the childish conundrum, Why young blackbirds, of all the birds in the circle of one’s acquaintance, must go bareheaded during the first few weeks of their life. By and by, however, the feathers grow out on this space as se as on the remainder of their bodies. Strange that I have found so few black-capped titmice’s nests, familiar and abundant as they are PHASES: OF “BIRD: LIFE. 181 in my neighborhood, both summer and winter; but my quest was rewarded in two instances during the spring of 1893,—the first nest being in the top of a truncated sassafras-tree. The snag was perhaps twenty feet high. On one of my visits the birds were hollowing out their little apartment. They would dart into the narrow opening, and presently emerge, carrying small fragments of partly decayed wood in their beaks and dropping them to the ground. Some weeks later, I climbed the tree (with much fear and trembling, be it said), but the birds had made the cavity so deep that I could not see the bottom, and break open their sylvan nursery I would not. The second titmouse nest was in a very slender branch of a sassafras-tree, —so slender, indeed, that it was a wonder the birds were able to make a hollow in it. At first it looked precisely like a black patch burned on the bough’s surface. When ore of the feathered atoms stood in the tiny doorway and looked out, she made a pretty picture, —one that would have put a throb of joy into an artist’s bosom. | Yet there is another picture that I should prefer — to have painted, not on account of its attractiveness, but on account of its quaintness; it was the nest, eggs, and young of a pair of green herons in an orchard. The nest was built high in an apple-tree, and was only a loose platform of sticks. Although anything but an expert climber, I contrived to scale that tree three times to satisfy my curiosity. The first time there were four eggs of a greenish-blue 182 IN BIRD LAND. cast — not jewels by any means — in the nest. On my second visit four of the oddest birdlings I ever looked upon greeted me with wide-open eyes and mouths. ‘They were covered with light yellowish down, and the space about the eyes was of a greenish hue, —one of the characteristic markings of the adult birds. When they opened their mouths, expecting to be fed, their throats puffed out some- what like the throats of croaking frogs, making a good-sized pocket inside to receive chunks of food. The thought struck me that perhaps the pocket was designed as a sort of temporary storage place for victuals until the nestling was ready to swallow them. The birds made a low, quaint noise that cannot be represented phonetically. Indeed, the picture they made was slightly uncanny, so I did not linger about it overlong. A week later my third and last call on the heron household was made. What an odd spectacle it presented! ‘The young birds had grown wonder- fully, though still covered with down, with very little sign of feathers. As my head appeared above the rim of the nest, they slowly craned up their India- rubber necks, then rose on their stilt-like legs, and looked at me with wondering, wide-open eyes that gleamed almost like gold. The spectacle made me think of ghouls, incongruous as the simile may seem. When I touched one of the birds, it huddled, half-alarmed, down to the bottom of the nest. An- other slyly stalked off to the edge of the platform, upon a thick clump of twigs and leaves, eying me PHASES. OF “BIRD, LIFE. 183 keenly as he moved away. I hurriedly clinibed down, lest he should topple to the ground and dash himself to death ; and thus, while I was on the brink of causing a tragedy, yet, as a sort of emollient to my conscience, I consoled myself with the thought that I had really prevented one. Another interesting discovery of the same spring was a killdeer plover’s nest, which my farmer friend across-lots found in a clover-field. There had been a heavy rainfall, making the ploughed ground as soft as mush; but my tall rubber boots were mud-proof, and so I went to pay the plovers my respects. This was after six o’clock in the evening. I found one little bird in the shallow, pebble-lined nest, and three eggs, one of them slightly broken at the larger end. ‘The plover nestling was an odd baby, with its large head, fluffy, square-shouldered body, and slender beak sticking straight out.