_NIGHT-JARS, SWIFTS, AND HUMMING-BIRDS._
NIGHT-JARS.
[Illustration: _Photo by A. S. Rudland & Sons._
COMMON NIGHT-JAR.
Known also as Fern-owl and Goat-sucker.]
It is probable that the NIGHT-JARS are the nearest allies of the Owls. As
pointed out in the last chapter, although the latter have acquired the
habits of the Hawk and Eagle Tribe, they are not really connected with that
group by descent.
Soberly clad, so as to be in complete harmony with its surroundings, with
large eyes, huge mouth, and peculiarly short beak, beset with long
bristles, the night-jar may be distinguished at once from all other British
birds. By day it hides, squatting close to the ground, or perched on the
thick branch of a tree; but when on the latter, it sits along and not
across the bough, like other birds, the complete harmony between its
plumage and the bark rendering it as invisible as when on the ground.
[Illustration: _Photo by A. S. Rudland & Sons._
PENNANT-WINGED NIGHT-JAR (FRONT VIEW).
The long and graceful plumes are much-lengthened quill-feathers, and by
their resemblance to the waving grass in which the bird nests afford
protection.]
Not until the spring has far advanced does this bird leave its winter
resort in Africa for Europe, making its presence known by its conspicuous
habit of hunting its food (which consists of moths and beetles) after
twilight has fallen. Later, its extraordinary churring note is heard--a
note which has been likened to the noise made by a spinning-wheel, and so
powerful as to be audible half a mile off. This note is made while on the
ground: on the wing, while toying with its mate, another equally peculiar
sound is made, which has been likened to the noise made by swinging a
whip-thong through the air.
No nest is made by this bird; but the eggs, two in number and beautifully
marked, are laid on the bare ground. The young are covered with down, and
remain in the nest for some time.
Another very remarkable feature is the fact that the claw of the middle toe
has its inner edge curiously serrated, forming a sort of comb, the function
of which is unknown. This comb-like claw occurs also in some few other
birds--bitterns, for instance.
A very remarkable kind is the PENNANT-WINGED NIGHT-JAR, in which one of the
quill-feathers in each wing is produced into a "pennant" of some 17 inches
in length. The shaft of the feather is bare for the greater part of its
length, and terminates in a feathery blade. It is an Abyssinian species
about which not much is known.
[Illustration: _Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S._] [_Milford-on-Sea._
MORE-PORKS.
So called from the note they utter.]
Some of the night-jars, as the New World NIGHT-HAWK and the Old World EARED
NIGHT-JARS, are particularly owl-like, a resemblance imparted by long
"ear-like" tufts of feathers which rise from the back of the head. Others,
as the MORE-PORK of the Tasmanian colonist, or the FROG-MOUTH, as it is
called in Australia, are remarkable for the huge size of the mouth,
bounded, as it appears to be, by huge lips, represented by the short,
round-edged beak.
Very nearly related to the night-jars is the OIL-BIRD of South America,
which lives in caves in Trinidad, Ecuador, and Peru, where it builds a nest
which has been likened in appearance to a huge cheese, and in which are
laid from two to four white eggs. Like the night-jars, these birds feed by
night, emerging from their gloomy retreats at twilight with much noise and
in great numbers. Their food, however, is entirely of a vegetable nature,
consisting of oily nuts or fruits.
The young, soon after they are hatched, become perfect masses of fat, and
on this account are much in demand by the Indians, who make a special
business of killing them and extracting the oil.
SWIFTS.
In general appearance SWIFTS bear a strong superficial resemblance to
Swallows; in reality they are related, not to those harbingers of spring,
but to the Night-jars on the one hand and the Humming-birds on the other.
The COMMON SWIFT arrives in England during the early part of May, and stays
till the end of August, or sometimes till September has half run its
course. Black in colour, relieved only by a white throat, it has little in
the sense of beauty to recommend it; nevertheless, there are probably few
who do not cherish tender feelings towards this bird. The swift has great
buoyancy of spirits, as is manifested by the wild, exuberant bursts of
screaming to which it gives voice as it rushes in small parties down the
lanes or along the less-frequented thoroughfares of towns as morning breaks
or evening falls, and occasionally throughout the day. The greater part of
its life is spent upon the wing (indeed, it appears to rest only when
incubating or sleeping), and of all the smaller birds it is the most
graceful in flight, turning and twisting in fairy mazes high in the heavens
for hours at a time.
[Illustration: _Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S._] [_Milford-on-Sea._
MORE-PORK.
This is one of the most owl-like of the Night-jars.]
[Illustration: _Photo by J. T. Newman_] [_Berkhamsted._
SWIFT.
A common British bird during the summer months.]
The swift chooses for its nesting-place the eaves of houses and holes in
church towers, and occasionally a crevice in the face of a quarry. The nest
is formed of bits of straw, dry grass, and a few feathers, glued together
by a secretion of the salivary glands into a compact crust; in this the
bird deposits from two to four white eggs. The young, which are hatched
naked and blind, never develop down-feathers, but soon become more or less
imperfectly clothed in a mass of tiny spines, representing the budding
feathers; these give the bird somewhat the appearance of a young hedgehog.
In adaptation to its remarkable powers of flight, the wing has undergone
considerable modification in form, so that it differs from that of all
other birds. On the other hand, the legs, being so little required, have
diminished considerably, and are remarkable for their smallness--a fact
which hampers the bird considerably, should it happen to alight on level
ground, for, owing to the great length of the wings, it can arise only with
considerable difficulty.
Nearly allied to the common swift is SALVIN'S SWIFT, remarkable on account
of its nest, which has been described by Dr. Sharpe as the most wonderful
in the world. About 2 feet long and 6 inches in diameter, it looks rather
like the sleeve of an old coat than a nest. It is made entirely of the
downy seeds of plants, which, floating through the air after the fashion of
such seeds, are caught by the birds when on the wing, and, partly felted
and partly glued by the salivary secretion, are woven slowly into the
characteristic woolly domicile. The site and manner of fixation of the nest
are scarcely less wonderful, for it is suspended from the flat surface of
some projecting piece of rock on the face of a cliff, and is thus almost
inaccessible; yet, as if to make assurance doubly sure, two entrances are
made, one at the bottom, which is really blind, and one at the top, near
its foundation, if we may call it so, which leads into the nursery.
[Illustration: _Photo by A. S. Rudland & Sons._
EDIBLE SWIFT.
The nests of this bird are used for soup; five are seen in this
photograph.]
Still more swallow-like in general appearance are the diminutive EDIBLE
SWIFTS, so called, not on account of the palatability of the birds
themselves, but of their nests, which are in great demand by the wealthy
Chinese for conversion into birds'-nest soup. It has already been remarked
that the salivary glands are unusually active in the swifts, their
secretion bearing a very important part in the construction of the nest,
and serving as a kind of cement. It is, therefore, not surprising that in
some members of the group we find this secretion playing a still more
prominent part, forming, at least in one species, the entire material of
the nest. "With these nests," writes Dr. Sharpe, "a large trade is done
with China from many of the Malayan Islands, over 3,500,000 nests having
been known to be exported in a single year from Borneo to the latter
country.... In Borneo and other places the caves in which the swiftlets
build are leased to the collectors for a considerable sum; but it is only
the white nests, made of the pure secretion, which are of any real value.
The nests of those species which mix into their nests grass or feathers are
not appreciated as an article of commerce."
Colonel Legge gives some extremely interesting particulars concerning the
nesting habits of these birds in Ceylon. "It is noteworthy," he writes,
"that the partially fledged young--which were procured on this occasion for
me, and which I kept for the night--scrambled out on to the exterior of the
nest, and slept in an upright position, with the bill pointing straight up.
This is evidently the normal mode of roosting resorted to by this species.
The interior of this cave, with its numbers of active tenants, presented a
singular appearance. The bottom was filled with a vast deposit of liquid
guano, reaching, I was informed, to a depth of 30 feet, and composed of
droppings, old nests, and dead young fallen from above, the whole mingled
into a loathsome mass, with water lodged in the crevices, and causing an
awful stench, which would have been intolerable for a moment even, had not
the hundreds of frightened little birds, as they screamed and whirred in
and out of the gloomy cave with a hum like a storm in a ship's rigging,
powerfully excited my interest, and produced a long examination of the
colony. This guano-deposit is a source of considerable profit to the
estate, the hospitable manager of which informed us that he had manured 100
acres of coffee with it during that season."
HUMMING-BIRDS.
It is generally admitted that HUMMING-BIRDS are nearly related to Swifts,
with which, however, they stand in the strongest possible contrast in the
matter of plumage--the latter being always inconspicuously coloured, whilst
the former are for the most part clad in vestments so gorgeous as to render
it extremely difficult to describe them in sober language. Moreover, so
great is the wealth of species--some hundreds in number--and so varied are
the form and coloration, and so closely do the various types pass one into
the other, that their classification is a matter of extreme difficulty.
Confined to the American Continent and certain islands adjacent thereto,
humming-birds range from Canada to Tierra del Fuego in a horizontal
direction, and rise vertically in the mountain-range of Chimborazo to a
height of 16,000 feet above the sea-level--"dwelling," as Professor Newton
describes it, "in a world of almost constant hail, sleet, and rain, and
feeding on the insects which resort to the indigenous flowering plants."
[Illustration: _Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S._] [_Milford-on-Sea._
RUBY-THROATED HUMMING-BIRDS.
About 500 distinct species of humming-birds are known.]
Humming-birds surpass all others in the wondrous beauty of their plumage,
which depends not so much on colour as metallic lustre reflecting all the
hues of the most precious stones--amethyst, ruby, sapphire, emerald, and
topaz gleaming and sparkling from their bodies with a fire and intensity
truly marvellous. "In some cases," as Professor Newton aptly describes it,
"this radiance beams from the brow, in some it glows from the throat, in
others it shines from the tail-coverts, in others it sparkles from the tips
of elongated feathers that crest the head or surround the neck as with a
frill, while again in others it may appear as a luminous streak across the
cheek.... The feathers that cover the upper parts of the body very
frequently have a metallic lustre of golden green, which in other birds
would be thought sufficiently beautiful, but in the [humming-birds] its
sheen is overspread by the almost dazzling splendour that radiates from the
spots where Nature's lapidary has set her jewels."
Besides this brilliancy of colour and variety in form--variety due to the
development of these crests and frills, or to the forking and elongation of
the tail-feathers--still further changes are brought about by the
modification of the bill, which may be produced into a long straight style,
longer than the body of the bird, or turned up like that of the avocet or
down like that of the curlew. These changes are adaptations to the bird's
methods of feeding, some seeking their food from the long tubular corollas
of flowers, and requiring, therefore, very elongated beaks, others from
more open and easily accessible flowers, whilst others hunt among leaves,
especially the under-surfaces, the quarry consisting mainly of insects
attracted by the honey secreted by the flowers, or those living on the
leaves. Not only the beak but the tongue also has undergone great
modification in this group, its outer sheath curling up on each side into a
thin scroll, so as to form a pair of tubes, the exact use of which is
unknown. The wings, like those of the swift, have undergone a certain
amount of change in the relative proportion of the several regions, and in
the form and number of the quill-feathers, whilst the legs have become
considerably reduced in size. In some species each leg is surrounded by a
little tuft of down, which may be black, brown, or snow-white in colour. In
size these birds vary from 8 inches to scarcely more than 3 inches.
"The beautiful nests of humming-birds," writes Professor Newton, "than
which the fairies could not have conceived more delicate ... will be found
on examination to be very solidly and tenaciously built, though the
materials are generally of the slightest--cotton-wool, or some vegetable
down, and spiders' webs. They vary greatly in form and ornamentation--for
it would seem that the portions of lichen which frequently bestud them are
affixed to their exterior with that object, though probably concealment was
the original intention. They are mostly cup-shaped; and the singular fact
is on record, that in one instance, as the young grew, the walls were
heightened by the parents, until at last the nest was more than twice as
big as when the eggs were laid and hatched."
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