In the spring movements of the fishes up the stream, toward their
spawning-beds, the females are the pioneers, appearing some days in
advance of the males. With the birds the reverse is the case, the
males coming a week or ten days before the females. The female
fish is usually the larger and stronger, and perhaps better able to
take the lead; among most reptiles the same fact holds, and
throughout the insect world there is to my knowledge no exception
to the rule. Among the birds, the only exception I am aware of is
in the case of the birds of prey. Here the female is the larger
and stronger. If you see an exceptionally large and powerful
eagle, rest assured the sex is feminine. But higher in the scale
the male comes to the front and leads in size and strength.
But the first familiar spring birds are cocks; hence the songs and
tilts and rivalries. Hence also the fact that they are slightly in
excess of the other sex, to make up for this greater exposure;
apparently no courting is done in the South, and no matches are
prearranged. The males leave irregularly without any hint, I
suspect, to the females as to when and where they will meet them.
In the case of the passenger pigeon, however, the two sexes travel
together, as they do among the migrating water-fowls.
With the song-birds, love-making begins as soon as the hens are
here. So far as I have observed, the robin and the bluebird win
their mates by gentle and fond approaches; but certain of the
sparrows, notably the little social sparrow or "chippie," appear to
carry the case by storm. The same proceeding may be observed among
the English sparrows, now fairly established on our soil. Two or
three males beset a female, and a regular scuffle ensues. The poor
bird is pulled and jostled and cajoled amid what appears to be the
greatest mirth and hilarity of her audacious suitors. Her plumage
is plucked and ruffled; the rivals roll over each other and over
her; she extricates herself as best she can, and seems to say or
scream "no," "no," to every one of them with great emphasis. What
finally determines her choice would be hard to say. Our own
sparrows are far less noisy and obstreperous, but the same little
comedy in a milder form is often enacted among them. When two
males have a tilt, they rise several feet in the air, beak to beak,
and seek to deal each other blows as they mount. I have seen two
male chewinks facing each other and wrathfully impelled upward in
the same manner, while the female that was the bone of contention
between them regarded them unconcernedly from the near bushes.
The bobolink is also a precipitate and impetuous wooer. It is a
trial of speed, as if the female were to say, "Catch me and I am
yours," and she scurries away with all her might and main, often
with three or four dusky knights in hot pursuit. When she takes to
cover in the grass, there is generally a squabble "down among the
tickle-tops," or under the buttercups, and "Winterseeble" or
"Conquedle" is the winner.
In marked contrast to this violent love-making are the social and
festive reunions of the goldfinches about mating time. All the
birds of a neighborhood gather in a treetop, and the trial
apparently becomes one of voice and song. The contest is a most
friendly and happy one; all is harmony and gayety. The females
chirrup and twitter, and utter their confiding "PAISLEY"
"PAISLEY," while the more gayly dressed males squeak and warble in
the most delightful strain. The matches are apparently all made
and published during these gatherings; everybody is in a happy
frame of mind; there is no jealousy, and no rivalry but to see who
shall be gayest.
It often happens among the birds that the male has a rival after
the nuptials have been celebrated and the work of housekeeping
fairly begun. Every season a pair of phbe-birds have built their
nest on an elbow in the spouting beneath the eaves of my house.
The past spring a belated male made desperate efforts to supplant
the lawful mate and gain possession of the unfinished nest. There
was a battle fought about the premises every hour in the day for at
least a week. The antagonists would frequently grapple and fall to
the ground, and keep their hold like two dogs. On one such
occasion I came near covering them with my hat. I believe the
intruder was finally worsted and withdrew from the place. One
noticeable feature of the affair was the apparent utter
indifference of the female, who went on with her nest-building as
if all was peace and harmony. There can be little doubt that she
would have applauded and accepted the other bird had he finally
been the victor.
One of the most graceful of warriors is the robin. I know few
prettier sights than two males challenging and curveting about each
other upon the grass in early spring. Their attentions to each
other are so courteous and restrained. In alternate curves and
graceful sallies, they pursue and circumvent each other. First one
hops a few feet, then the other, each one standing erect in true
military style while his fellow passes him and describes the
segment of an ellipse about him, both uttering the while a fine
complacent warble in a high but suppressed key. Are they lovers or
enemies? the beholder wonders, until they make a spring and are
beak to beak in the twinkling of an eye, and perhaps mount a few
feet into the air, but rarely actually delivering blows upon each
other. Every thrust is parried, every movement met. They follow
each other with dignified composure about the fields or lawn, into
trees and upon the ground, with plumage slightly spread, breasts
glowing, their lisping, shrill war-song just audible. It forms on
the whole the most civil and high-bred tilt to be witnessed during
the season.
When the cock-robin makes love he is the same considerate,
deferential, but insinuating gallant. The warble he makes use of
on that occasion is the same, so far as my ear can tell, as the one
he pipes when facing his rival.