When the faintest flush of morning
Overtints the distant hill,
_If you waken, if you listen_,
You may hear the Whip-poor-will.
Like an echo from the darkness,
Strangely wild across the glen,
Sound the notes of his finale,
And the woods are still again.
Soon upon the dreamy silence
There will come a gentle trill,
Like the whisper of an organ,
Or the murmur of a rill,
And then a burst of music,
Swelling forth upon the air,
Till the melody of morning
Seems to come from everywhere.
A Thrush, as if awakened by
The parting voice of night,
Gives forth a joyous welcome to
The coming of the light.
In early evening twilight
Again the Wood Thrush sings,
Like a voice of inspiration
With the melody of strings;
A song of joy ecstatic,
And a vesper hymn of praise,
For the glory of the summer
And the promise of the days.
* * * * * *
And when his song is ended,
And all the world grows still,
As if but just awakened,
Calls again the Whip-poor-will.
—Garrett Newkirk, in _Bird-Lore_.
“_The Nighthawk_, when perching, bears a general resemblance to the
Whip-poor-will. The white band on its throat is wider, the tail is _not_
round, and it has white band near the end. There is a white bar across
the quills of the wings that in flight looks like a round white spot or
a hole.
“These four white patches, throat, wings, and tail tell you his name
plainly, so when he is on the wing the Nighthawk should never be
mistaken for a Whip-poor-will. Then, too, their habits are unlike. The
Nighthawk does not belong to the night, neither is he a Hawk, which is a
Bird of Prey with talons and a hooked beak. Early morning and late
afternoon are his favourite times for hunting the sky for insects, for
he also is one of our most valuable sky sweepers.
“Having no song, the cry of Skirk-skirk! given when on the wing, has a
wild and eerie sound which is often followed by a booming noise of the
quality that can be imitated by placing tissue-paper over a long, coarse
comb and then blowing rapidly across it from one end to the other. This
noise is made by the rush of the wind through the wing quills as the
bird drops through the air after its winged food.
“The Nighthawk builds no nest, but lays its eggs on a bare rock in a
field, amid the stones of rocky ground, on roofs even of city houses.
Again does colour protection aid a bird, for the arrangements of its
markings blend the Nighthawk with granite as perfectly as those of the
Whip-poor-will conceal it in the woods.
“The Nighthawk, whose erratic flight makes it a target that piques the
skill of a certain class of sportsmen, has frequently been shot at for
prowess, the excuse being that it ‘wasn’t any good, anyway.’ Aside from
the list of insects harmful to agriculture and domestic animals that it
destroys, let us remember its crowning virtue, and cry ‘Hands off!’ It
kills mosquitoes, and has thus earned the local name of Mosquito-hawk.
“It is hard to believe that any one should insist that the Nighthawk and
the Whip-poor-will are one and the same bird, but such has been the
case, and among intelligent people also, though the mistake has been
definitely settled by one of the Wise Men.