I now proceed to speak of some of the birds of the locality. And again
it may be said, as in the case of the wild flowers, that, from the
variety of soils, there is a corresponding abundance in the species
frequenting the neighbourhood of Woodhall. Unfortunately another remark
made of the flowers also applies to the birds. “Ichabod” may be written
in large characters over the records of several. In the writer’s youth,
an old couple lived close to the Tower on the Moor, about a mile from the
Spa, in a cabin of their own construction, made chiefly of sods, then
locally called “bages.” {33} Old Dawson, or “Tabshag,” the soubriquet by
which he was more commonly known, lived with his wife the rather wild
existence of a squatter, on the waste, under sufferance from the owner.
He kept a pig, and was wont to boast that he possessed the highest pigsty
and the lowest barn in the country, because the sty was a structure of
his own erection, in the old brick tower, above the level of the
surrounding ground; while his straw was stored in an excavation (still
existing) several feet below. At that time between the Tower and Bracken
Wood there was a stretch of waste land, several acres in extent,
consisting of bog, interspersed with tussocks of coarse grass, and
straggling alders and birches, still known by the name of “The Bog’s
Nook,” or corner. {34a} On this ground the common green plover—Vanellus
cristatus—then commonly called the “Pyewipe,” {34b} bred in large
numbers; the eggs were, as they are still, regarded as a delicacy, and
old “Tabshag” used to make a considerable sum of money every year by
sending hampers of these eggs by coach up to London for sale. So
familiar he was said to be with the habits of the bird that he could tell
by its cry how many eggs were in the nest. {34c} This land is now under
cultivation, and the plaintive cry of the plover is heard no more, or
only seldom. The plover, indeed, is still with us, but in numbers
lessening every year. There are probably not now as many plovers’ nests
in the whole parish as there formerly were in a single ploughed field.
The writer, as a boy, was somewhat of an expert in finding these nests.
He has watched the birds making them, which they do by turning round and
round, with the breast or belly on the ground, thus forming a
saucer-shaped hollow, in which they sometimes place two or three fibres
of twitch as a lining. One bird makes three or four of such nests, and
finally selects the one which, presumably, she deems most unnoticeable.
Sixty years ago black game were found on the moorland called now “The
Ostler Plantations,” {34d} but though one still heard of them “in the
forties,” they were then either extinct or a rapidly vanishing quantity.
At the same time also the “boom” of the bittern might still be heard in
the marshy parts of the same ground, but they are also now among the has
been’s.
No more shall bittern boom,
No more shall blackcock crow:
For both have met their doom,
The sport of human foe.
From the character of the Ostler ground, formerly a very secluded tract
of mixed wood, moor, and morass, it has been frequented by a great
variety of birds. {35} The heron bred there within the last twenty
years, a solitary nest remaining in a clump of trees in the south-west
corner next to Tattershall, until it was blown down by a gale, and, the
particular tree being shortly afterwards felled, the bird never returned.
Drainage and the destruction of trees by the woodman’s axe, or by
accidental fires, have so dried the ground as to reduce greatly the
numbers of certain birds of aquatic or semi-aquatic habits. The coot
“clanking” in the sedgy pools is no more heard. The moor-hen with those
little, black, fluffy balls which formed her brood scuttling over the
water to hide in the reeds, is rarely seen. The wild duck has, indeed,
in one or two instances nested near a still-surviving pool within the
last ten years; a nest was once found by the writer among the branches of
a pollard willow, overhanging a pool, some five or six feet from the
ground. He has also shot teal on odd occasions lying in the open; but
both these birds are now rarely seen, and the same may be said of the
snipe, “jack” and “full.” The latter were once plentiful, so that it was
a common occurrence to put up a “whisp” of them, whereas now one seldom
sees more than three or four in a whole season. A delicate little bird,
very palatable on the table, was the waterrail, now almost extinct. The
writer used to have permission to shoot along the “ballast ponds” beside
the railway, and he has frequently shot them there. The woodcock is
still with us. The poet painter, Dante Rosetti, kept one as a favourite
pet; we of Woodhall are more prosaic, and like to see the bird rise out
of the bracken before us, and fall to our shot, eventually to appear
nicely cooked on a toast before us at table. But of late years drainage
has reduced their numbers. Although we could, of course, never at
Woodhall, compete with the shooter on the Irish bogs, where as many as
100 or 200 are sometimes shot in a day; yet I could at one time almost
always get a brace when I wanted them by trying certain spots which were
their regular resort, and among my notes I find this: “Nov. 16, 1872,
shot Bracken wood, got five woodcock, making 20 in three days.”
[N.B.—Bracken wood, as the visitor may not know, is within one field of
the Bath-house at Woodhall Spa.] Some years ago certain sportsmen (?) in
this neighbourhood used to go to the sea coast every year, in October, at
the time of the arrival of the first flight of woodcock (the second
flight is in November), and shot them in considerable numbers, when they
were resting, exhausted by their flight; hardly a creditable practice,
and unworthy of a true lover of nature. A wood in Kirkstead, named
“Bird-Hag Wood,” was formerly a favourite haunt of the woodcock, and I
have shot many in it; but it was cleared away in the seventies. {36a}
Woodcock occasionally breed on the moor, and a nest was found some years
ago within 80 yards of the road to Horncastle, opposite the Tower on the
Moor. Among my notes I find this: “Dec. 5, 1872, we saw about a dozen
woodcock in Bird-Hag Wood, but only three were shot.”
I have just mentioned Bird-Hag and its woodcock. Pleasant memories of
that wood have lingered with more than one sportsman. A former poetic
owner of Kirkstead has written of it thus {36b}:—
Remote Bird-Hag, that favourite preserve,
To crown some chosen day, the choice reserve
Where noble oaks their autumn tints display,
And fern gigantic checks the sportsman’s way
But well is toil and trouble there repaid,
By the wild tenants of that oaken shade,
While rabbits, hares, successive, cross your road,
And scarcely give the time to fire and load,—
While shots resound, and pheasants loudly crow,
Who heeds the bramble? Who fatigue can know?
Here from the brake, that bird of stealthy flight,
The mottled woodcock glads our eager sight,
Great is his triumph, whose lucky shot shall kill
The dark-eyed stranger of the lengthy bill
Unlike the pheasant, who himself betrays,
And dearly for his daring challenge pays.
Small notice gives the woodcock of his flight;
Not seen at once, at once he’s lost to sight.
Yet short his flight, and should you mark him down,
The chances are that woodcock is your own;
But quick the hand, and no less quick the eye,
Would stop him as he hurries by;
Few are the birds, whate’er may be their sort,
More try the skill, give more exciting sport.
A few words may be said on the pheasants and partridges; and first of the
former. The breed on the Ostler ground have a history. The late Sir
Henry Dymoke, of Scrivelsby Court, used to rear, in large numbers, a
white breed of pheasant, and as, with the exception of the Ostler ground,
he, with his brother, had almost the whole of the shooting, extending
from Scrivelsby to the Witham, they spread over that ground, and sought a
kind of asylum in the dense cover of the Ostler plantations. Further,
the writer’s father-in-law imported an Indian breed, called the “Kalege”
pheasant, a very handsome bird; and these two strains have affected the
breed on that ground, and, doubtless, have also had their effect on
pheasants in the neighbourhood generally. White broods of pheasants are
from time to time hatched on the ground; also piebald varieties are not
uncommon. In the year 1898, a cream-coloured specimen was shot. Some of
the cocks have at times a decided fringe of blue or purple in their
plumages from the Kalege mixture.
As to partridges: It is only in recent years that the French, or
red-legged breed (Cannabis rufa) have established themselves here. In
the sixties, though said to have been introduced into England by Charles
II., they were almost, if not entirely, unknown here. The writer shot
them in Cambridgeshire in the fifties; and from the south-eastern coast
and counties they have persistently spread, until now we have them
everywhere. In the first instance, probably, they were brought across
“the silver streak” by a gale, like the sand grouse, of which we have
read, on the coast of Yorkshire. But whereas the sand grouse were
immediately shot as curiosities, the red-leg, being a bird (as every
shooter knows) given to running, knew how to take care of himself, and,
like many another unwelcome intruder, he _came to stay_. The flesh is
decidedly inferior in flavour to that of the common English brown
partridge. I well remember a practical joke being played on a Woodhall
keeper. The “Frenchmen,” as they were called, had only just arrived. A
party of us were out shooting, and a red-leg was shot. The keeper,
seeing the new and handsome-looking bird, was very proud of it, and
though he had never yet tasted one, he loudly proclaimed, in his
ignorance, that it would be as good in the eating as fine in the plumage.
A day or two after we were out shooting again. Luncheon time came, and
we lay stretched on the sward under a spreading tree, on a hot day in
September, where the ladies joined us, bringing the refreshment. Cold
partridges were among the fare, and instructions had been given
beforehand that the “Frenchman” should be specially reserved, to hand to
the keeper. In due course the Captain passed on to the keeper—as being
specially favoured “above his fellows,” by the attention—half of a
partridge. Nothing was said, and we all busied ourselves with the viands
before us, but the keeper was under our careful observation. Presently
his features were seen to be considerably distorted by wry faces, as he
turned the leg or the wing about in his hands, while picking them, with
some difficulty, to the bone. Probably the bird was not only a
“Frenchman,” but a tough old cock into the bargain. At length he could
stand it no longer, and, looking round at us, he said, “Dal it! Captain,
but this bird’s a rum ’un.” “Don’t you like it?” was the reply; “why,
it’s the handsome Frenchman you admired so much, when it was shot the
other day.” “Well, then,” said the keeper, “I wish all such Frenchmen
were at the battle of Water-gruel. I’ll back the English.” {38}
There are some rather curious facts in connection with the brown English
partridge and the French variety. Though different in their habits, and,
it is said, even hostile to each other, they yet, in some instances,
consort. I once shot on the moor three brown and one red-leg, out of the
same covey, all young birds. They had evidently been reared together in
one brood, and the old birds were of the brown species. Mentioning this
to a friend of large experience, he told me that he had known several
instances where the eggs of the two kinds had been found laid in the same
nest. The eggs are, of course, easily distinguishable, those of the
common partridge being of a greenish drab colour, while those of the
red-leg are of a dull, cream colour, covered with small brown spots. I
have been informed by another authority that the eggs of the red-leg have
also been found in the nest of an outlying pheasant. {39} A curious
provision of nature, conducing to the preservation of the species, may be
here mentioned as interesting; the partridge, while sitting on her eggs,
has no scent. On one occasion a man was consulting me about a tombstone
at St. Andrew’s Church, Woodhall. We walked into the churchyard
together, and stood conversing opposite the grave in question. I was
aware that a partridge was sitting on her nest concealed in the grass
between that grave and the next, and therefore would not approach very
near. Suddenly I perceived that he had a terrier with him, which was
very busily hunting over the churchyard. I begged him to keep it in. He
was rather indignant, and replied that it could do no harm in the
churchyard. I remarked that he was not aware that within eight or ten
feet of us a partridge was on her nest, and I did not wish her to be
disturbed. He thereupon called in his dog, but that only brought his dog
nearer to the nest, hunting the while; and the dog actually passed over
the nest without scenting the bird. {40} The eggs were hatched the next
day, and that doubtless accounted for her sitting so closely. Whether or
not from an instinctive consciousness of this safeguard is not for me to
say, but the partridge is rather given to selecting her nesting place
near a highway or a footpath. I have known several instances of this,
and only last year I repeatedly saw both the parent birds sitting on
their nest together, on a bank close to a public footpath which was daily
traversed.
To show how closely a partridge will continue to sit, under very trying
circumstances, I give here an anecdote of what occurred in a parish
adjoining Woodhall Spa, as it was related to me by the chief witness, the
Squire himself.
In a meadow adjoining Roughton Hall, a partridge made her nest in a
slight depression of the surface. The meadow was, in due course, mown,
the mower passing his scythe over her without injuring her, and unaware
of her presence, the depression having still enough grass to conceal the
nest. The field was afterwards “tedded,” i.e., the grass was tossed
about by a machine, which again passed over the nest, still leaving her
unscathed and unmoved. In the process of “cocking,” the field was next
horse-raked, the rake passing over the nest, with the same result. One
of the haymakers, however, nearly trod on the nest; this drove the bird
off, behind him, so that he did not observe it. But a friend was near at
hand. The squire, seeing the bird fly away, went to the spot, found the
hidden nest, and counted in it the unusual number of 19 eggs (promise of
a good partridge season, weather permitting). He at once removed to a
distance all the hay lying near, to prevent her being disturbed again,
and watched the result. Within a quarter of an hour the partridge
quietly returned to her nest. Ten days later she successfully brought
off a brood of seventeen, two bad eggs remaining in the nest. Of course,
as the hatching time draws near, the mother, feeling the young lives
under her, sits more persistently than at an earlier period; but surely
this mother partridge exhibited a remarkable instance of fidelity to
maternal instinct, after passing through no less than four trying
ordeals.
Of wild pigeons we have three kinds: the common woodpigeon or ringdove,
of which there are large flocks; the stockdoves, which go in pairs, and
(as their name implies) build their nest on a solitary stump or tree, or
occasionally in a rabbit hole. The turtledove, though common in the
south of England, is a migratory bird, and in these parts not a constant
visitor. A “wave” of them spread over the Midland counties in 1895, and
since that they have been seen in smaller numbers. The late Mr. J.
Cordeaux, F.R.G.S., M.B.O.U., one of our greatest authorities, says that
its note is lower and more of a querulous murmur than that of the
ringdove. In size it is not much larger than a missel thrush.
The first of these pigeons is the bird named the “Culver,” in old
writings, as Spencer sings in romantic ditty:—
Like as the culver, on the bared bough,
Sits mourning for the absence of her mate,
And in her song breathes many a wistful vow
For his return, who seems to linger late,
So I, alone, now left disconsolate.
Mourn to myself the absence of my love,
And sitting here, all desolate,
Seek with my plaints to match that mournful dove.
Of woodpeckers we have on the moor and in Bracken Wood at times, three
kinds: the common green species (picus viridis) which is generally
plentiful; the lesser spotted (picus minor), not seen every year, but
occasionally; and, still less frequently seen, the larger spotted (picus
major). Of the former of these spotted kinds, seeing three together, I
shot one a few years ago; and the keeper shot another for me more
recently, for our Naturalists’ Museum at Lincoln.
Of the “birds of prey,” so called, the greatest part are extinct, or
nearly so, too often from a mistaken belief in their destructiveness;
whereas they are really useful allies of the farmer, if not also of the
sportsman. In the cause of the latter, they, for the most part destroy
(if they destroy game at all) the weakly members, so conducing towards
keeping up a vigorous breed, and for the farmer they destroy smaller
vermin, the mice which, but for them, would multiply (as they have done
in several places) until they become a plague. In the year 1890, a very
large bird was reported as being seen about the woods near Woodhall, but
I could not get a sight of it myself, nor could I get anyone else to give
a description of it, except that it was very large. After a time it
disappeared from Woodhall, and was reported as being seen for a time
about Revesby, and on November 8th an eagle was shot by the son of a
farmer residing at Tupholme Hall, in a wood at Southrey belonging to Mr.
Vyner. It proved to be a male bird, in good condition, measuring 6ft.
7in. across the wings, and weighing 11lbs. I rode over to see it, but it
had been sent to the taxidermist to be stuffed. It was a sea eagle
(Haliactus albicilla). The kite (milvus ictinus) used to be common 40
years ago; its presence being notified by our hens cackling, and ducks
quacking, as they called together their broods, when they espied it
soaring at a considerable height above. If a reckless chick, or
duckling, neglected to take the warning, and seek shelter beneath the
mother’s wings, there was for a moment a rushing sound, a general
confusion in the poultry yard, a half-smothered scream, and the kite flew
away with a victim in its claws. {42} I have seen this more than once
myself. The kite is now quite extinct in this neighbourhood. The same
may be said of the buzzard (buteo vulgaris). Although their food was
chiefly mice and small birds; perhaps occasionally game, but not
generally; since, though a very fine bird in appearance, they were not
rapid enough on the wing to overtake the partridge in full flight; yet
the keepers waged war against them “to the knife.” Many is the buzzard I
have seen nailed up with the pole-cats and other vermin in the woods at
Woodhall. But they are now seen no more, and a handsome and
comparatively harmless ornament of our sylvan scenery is gone beyond
recall.
The Hen-Harrier (circus cyaneus), a more active bird than the buzzard, is
another of the “Ichabods.” Its last known nesting place was on the top
of “The Tower on the Moor,” near Woodhall. As a boy, the writer has
climbed that tower for the eggs, and he has now a very fine specimen of
the old bird stuffed, measuring about 40 inches across, from tip to tip
of the wings. These birds were wont to fly at higher game than the
buzzard, and doubtless did at times destroy partridges; but they also fed
largely on water-rats and frogs, and were not above gorging themselves on
carrion. The female is larger than the male.
The beautiful little Merlin (Falco Æsalon) was also seen, though not
common, twenty-five or thirty years ago. It was a very plucky little
bird, and I have seen one strike down a partridge larger in bulk than
itself. This is gone, never to return.
The Sparrow-Hawk (Accipiter fringillarius) survives, although in
diminished numbers; and this indeed is the only one of the hawks against
which “my voice should be for open war.” It is very destructive and very
daring in the pursuit of its quarry. A connection of my own was sitting
in a room facing the garden at the Victoria Hotel, Woodhall, when a
sparrow-hawk dashed after its prey, broke the glass of the window, and
fell stunned on the floor of the room. The female in this kind also is
larger than the mate. This bird will kill young ducks and chickens, and
partridges, and even pheasants.
The Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) also still survives, and we do not grudge
it a prolonged lease of life. It feeds chiefly upon mice and small
birds, cockchafers, and other insects; is a graceful object as it hangs
lightly hovering at a considerable height in the air; with its keen
vision detects its small prey half hidden in the grass or stubble, and
then with lightning rapidity, drops like a stone upon it, and bears it
away. I have kept kestrels and sparrow-hawks and tamed them; and the
former will become tractable and almost affectionate, but the latter is a
winged Ishmaelite, and very treacherous, and if allowed a little liberty,
it generally ends in his making his escape. {44a}
Owls are still, I am glad to say, plentiful. They are amongst the
farmers’ greatest feathered friends, killing enormous quantities of mice,
which otherwise would damage his crops. {44b} We have three kinds on the
moor or in the woods: 1st—the barn owl, or screech owl (stryx flammea);
2nd—the wood or brown owl (synnium aluco); 3rd—the horned-owl (asio
otus). The two last are very much alike in both size and colour, but the
last has two tufts of feathers rising on each aide of the head, from
which it gets its name of horned-owl. I have a note among my shooting
records: “Dec. 5th, 1872, shot Bird Hag Wood, in Kirkstead, put up about
a dozen owls.” These would be the “horned” kind. Five were shot on that
occasion, but as a rule they have been carefully spared, one only
occasionally being killed as a specimen for stuffing. Within the
nineties, being out with my gun, on the moor, when the ground was covered
with snow, I passed by a solitary thick Scotch fir, when an owl flew out.
I wanted a specimen for a friend who was staying with me, and I shot it.
The report created quite a commotion within the tree, and some twenty
owls were immediately flying about me. Not being likely to settle in the
snow, and apparently dazed by the glare of the sun reflected from the
snow, I left them as quickly as I could, to recover their composure, and
return to the sheltered quarters in which they had congregated. Hunting,
as they do, almost entirely by night, they have little opportunity of
interfering with the game, nor is it their propensity to do so. {45}
There are three very ancient hollow oak trees in “The Arbours” Wood in
Kirkstead. These are a favourite resort of the barn owl.
The carrion crow still nests on the moor, although the eggs are taken
every season. But the old birds are very wary, and manage to keep out of
shot. The common rook, however, of late years, has got a bad name, as
having taken up the marauding habits of the genuine crow. Owing to the
improved cultivation of land, there is not now the supply of grubs on
which the rook used to feed, and they have taken to hunting for the eggs
of partridge and pheasant, and may be seen “quartering” the ground as
methodically as a pointer or setter. They are strongly suspected of
killing the young as well as rifling the nests of eggs, and the Scotch
keepers complain of their depredations on the moors, among the young
grouse.
A writer in the “Yorkshire Poet” (of August 22, 1898) says that black
game are decreasing in the Border counties, as the rooks destroy the
eggs.
This completes the list of the larger birds frequenting the
neighbourhood. As I write this chapter, a letter from an old friend says
that he well remembers the number of night-jars which were to be heard
“churring” about Woodhall on a summer’s evening. This bird (caprimulgus
Europœus), locally called fern-owl, comes to us about May. I have a
note: “May 23rd, 1873, the first night-jar heard.” During the daytime,
the visitor, walking quietly through the woodland paths near the Victoria
Hotel, may, if he has a keen eye, see the night-jar lying flat upon the
branch of an oak, hardly indeed perceptible, owing to its colour being so
near that of the brown bark. Then, towards evening, it may be seen
taking its short and wonderfully rapid flights, and you may hear its
bills snap together as it catches the moths and cockchafers on which it
feeds. It breeds on the moor, the nest generally being laid on the
ground among the bracken; whence its name of fern-owl. The old idea of
its sucking the goat or cow, from the former of which it gets its
classical name caprimulgus (as well as the English equivalent), is, of
course, long since exploded. {46a} The churring note is seldom heard
except when it is at rest on a branch of a tree.
The brilliant little Kingfisher (Alcedo ispida), the most gay in colour
of all our birds, may still sometimes be seen, darting about the only
rivulet which we can boast of at Woodhall, and which rejoices in the
unattractive name of “The Sewer,” {46b} although its water, welling up at
its source near Well Syke Wood, is beautifully clear and pure. The
occurrence, however, of the bird here is rare. An old inhabitant of
Kirkby assures me that it is not uncommon on the river Bain, in that
parish; and of late years, partly through the writer’s influence, it may
be seen on the rivers Bain or Waring, in the heart of Horncastle,
unmolested, and even fed, by the people.
The Grey Fly Catcher (Muscicapa Grisola) is fairly common on our lawns,
where it will sit quietly on a garden seat, or roller, and thence take
its short jerky flight after the flies. I have known it to nest year
after year, at the Vicarage, in a hole in the wall, where an iron
ventilator was broken.
The Wryneck (Yunx Torquilla) is a somewhat uncommon bird at Woodhall,
though a pretty one. For several years it also frequented the Vicarage
garden, sometimes four or five of them, during the summer months. One
year there were so many that I shot one and had it stuffed, and I found
that at the same time a noble Marquis was having two stuffed, as being
rather rare. It is called in some parts of the country the “weet” bird,
from its peculiar note; other authorities say that the note is
represented by the words, “Peel, peel,” or “Peep-peep.” I should myself
say “Snipe, snipe” was nearer to the sound, and a writer compares it to
the sound of Punch, in the old show of “Punch and Judy,” which I think
comes nearer to my own interpretation. The body of this bird is in
colour a mixture of grey and brown, but its tail and wings are most
beautifully marked with dark zig-zag bars, which make it very handsome.
In size it is between the blackbird and the lark. Like the woodpecker,
it has a very long tongue, which is covered with a glutinous matter, and
which it inserts into the grass roots or tree bark, in search of its
food. {47}
I give here a list of birds which I have stuffed, all of which were
killed in this neighbourhood:—Night-jar (Caprimulgus Europœus), wry neck
(Yunx Torquilla), buff blackbird (Turdus merula), razorbill (Alca Torda),
little auk (Mergulus Alia), ruff (Machetes Pugnax), green sand piper
(Totanus Octaopus), snipe (Scolopax gallinago), water rail (Rallus
Aquaticus), golden plover (Charadrius Pluvialis), woodcock (Scolopax
Rusticola), large spotted wood pecker (Dendrocopus Major), hawfinch
(Coccothraustes Vulgaris), cuckoo (Cuculus Canorus), jay (Garrulus
Glandarius), French partridge (Cannabis Rufa), turtledove (Turtur
Auritus), horned owl (Asio Otus), hen harrier (Circus Cyaneus), kestrel
(Falco Tinnunculus), peregrine falcon (Falco Peregrinus), piebald
pheasant (phasianus colchicus), buff pheasant, cormorant (phylacrocorax
carbo), jay (corvus glandarius), heron (ardea cinerea), horned owl (asio
otus).
In times gone by, never to return, the numbers and variety of wild fowls
frequenting the Witham, with its “sykes and meres,” was something
extraordinary. Charles Kingsley doubtless wrote, if not of his own
knowledge, yet, at furthest, at second hand, when he gave the following
description: “Grand it was, while dark green alders and pale green reeds
stretched for miles . . . where the coot clanked, and the bittern boomed,
and the sedgebird, not content with its own sweet song, mocked the notes
of all the birds around . . . far off upon the silver mere would rise a
puff of smoke from a punt, invisible from its flatness. Then down the
wind came the boom of the great stanchion-gun; and after that another
sound, louder as it neared; a cry as of all the bells of Cambridge, and
all the hounds of Cottesmore; and overhead rushed and whirled the skeins
of terrified wildfowl, screaming, piping, clacking, croaking, filling the
air with the hoarse rattle of their wings; while, clear above all,
sounded the wild whistle of the curlew, and the trumpet note of the wild
swan.” “Prose Idylls,” The Fens.
The living clouds on clouds arose,
Infinite wing! Till all the plume-dart air
And rude resounding shore was one wild cry.
Of the swans, we may observe that not only did this bird, in its wild
state, frequent the Witham and the Fen waters, but the swannery was a
valuable possession. The Abbots of Bardney and Kirkstead owned
swanneries on the Witham. (“Archæol.” vol. xvi., p. 153). The swans of
various owners were distinguished by marks on the upper mandible, and
there were no less than 97 different swan marks on the Witham. A rhyming
list of the birds of the Witham is given in Drayton’s Polyolbion (song
25), too long to quote here; suffice it to say that one parish alone,
near Boston, some 60 years ago, sent 30,000 wild fowl in a year to
London—(Thompson’s History, Boston). The bird’s captured by net were
dunlins, knots, ruffs, reeves, red-shanks, lapwings, golden plovers,
curlews, godwits, etc. One fowler stated that he had so taken 24 dozen
lapwings in one day, and four dozen and nine at one time.—Stevenson’s
“Birds of Norfolk,” vol. i., p. 57. Other birds shot by the fowlers were
mallard, teal, widgeon, whimbrells, grebes of several kinds, and the
“yelping” avocet. A relative of the present writer owned a decoy, where
some 20,000 wild ducks were taken, within his own recollection, in one
season. {49}
We now come to the last bird which I shall name in this somewhat lengthy
list; a goddess among birds, as someone has almost literally called her,
“œmula divini suavissima carminis ales”; and the old Scotch poet, William
Drummond, of Hawthornden, says:—
Sweet artless songster! thou my mind dost raise
To airs of spheres—yes, and to angels’ lays.
while quaint old Isaac Walton says: “She breathes such sweet music from
her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think that
miracles are not yet ceased.” The nightingale was first heard in my own
garden, at the vicarage, Woodhall Spa, in the spring of 1876. Having
heard it at Cambridge, in the South of England, and also in Italy, I
immediately recognised the note, and at first was delighted at the
arrival of this new visitor to Woodhall Spa, who did not come needing the
water, and complaining of aches and pains, but to delight everyone with
its rich flood of song. And having thus found its way here, it has
further found the attractions of Woodhall so great that, although
favouring no other place in the neighbourhood, it has continued its
annual visits ever since, and has brought its kindred in increasing
numbers. But, although charmed at first with its melody, the novelty
wore off; and when, night after night, there were three or four of these
birds waking the echoes beneath my bedroom window, trying in jealous
rivalry each to outdo the other in compassing the whole gamut, “in the
rich mazes of sound,” my admiration considerably abated, and I became
rather disposed to vote the performance a veritable surfeit of song, to
the utter banishment of much-needed slumber. Before, however, I had
arrived at this prosaic way of viewing the “Queen of Song,” I composed in
its honour the following lines, with which I shall close this chapter on
the Birds of Woodhall:—
TO THE NIGHTINGALE.
2 a.m., April 27.
How from that tiny throat,
Songster of night!
Flows such a wealth of note,
Full of delight;
Trembling with resonance,
Rapid and racy,
Sinking in soft cadence,
Gushing with ecstasy,
Dying away,
All in their turns;
Plaintive and gay,
Thrilling with tones aglow,
Melting in murmurs low,
Till one’s heart burns?
Once in the wilderness,
By desert well,
Hagar in loneliness,
With Ishmael,
Sighed to the silent air,
Tears on her glistening;
Yet to her, even there,
Angels were listening,
Noting her prayer.
Even so singest thou,
_Not to thyself_,
Mayn’t there be list’ning now
Some fairy elf,
Silently sitting near
Thy dark retreat,
Drinking with grateful ear
Thy music sweet,
Ringing so clear?
No! not alone art thou;
One there’s above, e’en now,
“Whose mercy’s over all,”
“Who sees the sparrow fall;”
“To Him the night is day,”
He hears thy matin lay,
High o’er us all.
Through the hushed, slumb’ring air,
Thy accents raise,
For all his loving care
Incense of praise;
Thrilling with happiness,
Full with content,
Still asking His goodness,
Prayer with praise blent.
Little thou mayest be,
Yet art His care;
He, too, has given thee
Gifts rich and rare.
Still, then, thy voice upraise,
Still chant thy Maker’s praise
While we are rapt in sleep,
Still thou thy vigil keep;
Still let some earthly cry
Go to our God on high;
Humbly, yet fervently, piercingly call,
Call for His watchfulness over us all.