_Muscicapa armillata_, +Vieillot.+
_Myiadestes genibarbis_, +Swainson.+
_Ptilogonys armillatus_, +G. R. Gray.+—Gen. B. pl. 69.
[56] Length 8 inches; expanse 11¹⁄₂; flexure 3¹⁄₂; tail 3³⁄₄;
rictus ⁸⁄₁₀; breadth of beak at base ⁴⁄₁₀; tarsus 1; middle toe
¹⁵⁄₂₀.
Irides hazel, or dull orange; beak black; feet bright fulvous,
claws black. Upper parts blue-grey; wing-quills black with grey
edges, the bases of the interior primaries white, visible when
expanded; the greater primary coverts, and that part of the
primaries succeeding the white, deeper black, unedged with grey.
Tail black, uropygials grey; a short white line near the tip of
the inner web of the third true tail-feather from the middle,
increases on each outwardly, till the fifth is almost wholly white.
Cheeks black; a spot at base of lower mandible, and lower eyelid,
white; chin and throat rust-red. Breast ashy-grey, paler on belly;
vent and under tail-coverts rusty orange. Edge of shoulder white.
Intestine 7 inches: two cæca, so small as to be almost rudimentary.
Sexes alike.
Wandering among the woods on the summit of the mountain ridge that
rises behind Bluefields, I had often heard in the spring, proceeding
from the deep forests, a single clear note, lengthened and mellow as
the tone of a flute, sometimes alone, sometimes followed by another,
about two tones lower. The notes were singularly sweet, and their
sudden recurrence at rather long intervals, in the lone and sombre
silence of that lofty elevation, imparted to them a romantic character,
which made me very desirous to discover their author. As the summer
came on, however, I ceased to hear them: but in the beginning of
October, as I was wandering again in the same locality, I was again
startled by the interesting sounds. As I proceeded on the very lonely
road, through the humid woods, where the trees were loaded with
orchideæ and wild-pines, and the dank stones hidden by ferns and
mosses, the notes became more frequent and evidently nearer. It being
useless for a white man, with shoes, to attempt to follow retiring
birds among the matted woods, tangled and choked with climbers, and
strewn with loose stones, I sent in Sam with a gun, with orders to
follow the sound. He crept silently to a spot whence he heard it
proceed, and saw two birds of this species, which neither he nor I
had seen before, chasing each other among the boughs. He shot one
of them. As he was coming out into the road, he imitated the sound
by whistling, and was immediately answered by another bird, which
presently came flying to the place where he was, and alighted on a tree
at a little distance. He fired at this also, and it fell; but emitted
the remarkable note at the moment of falling.
But it is at early day,—when the dew lies so heavily on the
broad-leafed cocoes of the provision grounds, that from every leaf
you might collect a gill of sparkling water; while the mosses and
ground-ferns are moist as a saturated sponge; before the sun has
peeped over the distant mountain-peaks, and before the light has
struggled into the gloomy forest on either side;—it is at early day,
that if we traverse some narrow rocky bridle-path that winds around the
hill-sides, choked up with jointer and glass-eye berry, and overhung
by towering Santa Marias, cabbage-palms, and tree-ferns, we become
familiar with this interesting bird. The voices of many are then heard
saluting the opening day, some near at hand, some scarce audible in the
distance; and as all do not pipe in the same key, we sometimes hear
beautiful and startling chords produced. Although there is a richness
in the tones, which the human voice in whistling can by no means
attain, yet the birds will frequently respond to an imitation of their
call. Now and then we may obtain a sight of one, or a pair, as they
seem generally in pairs, sitting, with a melancholy absorbed air, on
some low tree a little way within the forest, manifesting little alarm
or curiosity.
It was soon after I became acquainted with this bird that I received
the following note from Mr. Hill: in reference to an intention which I
then had of ascending that magnificent ridge called the Blue Mountains,
whose summits are 8000 feet high.—“There are two living attractions
in these mountains, a crested snake, and a sweetly mysterious singing
bird called the Solitaire. This bird is a Thrush, and it is worth a
journey to hear his wonderful song. I find among some detached notes
of mine, the following memorandum respecting a similar bird in the
smaller West Indian islands. ‘The precipitous sides of the Souffriere
mountain in St. Vincent,’ says a writer describing the volcano which
so disastrously broke out there in 1812, ‘were fringed with various
evergreens, and aromatic shrubs, flowers, and many Alpine plants. On
the north and south sides of the base of the cone were two pieces of
water, one perfectly pure and tasteless, the other strongly impregnated
with sulphur and alum. This lonely and beautiful spot was rendered
more enchanting by the singularly melodious notes of a bird, an
inhabitant of those upper solitudes, and altogether unknown to the
other parts of the island; hence supposed to be invisible, though it
certainly has been seen, and is a species of merle.’ I extract my notes
on the Haytian bird: though I have seen Jamaica specimens, I never
visited their mountain haunts. ‘As soon as the first indications of
day-light are perceived, even while the mists hang over the forests,
these minstrels are heard pouring forth their wild notes in a concert
of many voices, sweet and lengthened like those of the harmonica
or musical glasses. It is the sweetest, the most solemn, and most
unearthly of all the woodland singing I have ever heard. The lofty
locality, the cloud-capt heights, to which alone the eagle soars in
other countries,—so different from ordinary singing-birds in gardens
and cultivated fields,—combine with the solemnity of the music to
excite something like devotional associations. The notes are uttered
slowly and distinctly, with a strangely-measured exactness. Though
it is seldom that the bird is seen, it can scarcely be said to be
solitary, since it rarely sings alone, but in harmony or concert
with some half-dozen others chanting in the same glen. Occasionally
it strikes out into such an adventitious combination of notes, as to
form a perfect tune. The time of enunciating a single note, is that of
the semi-breve. The quaver is executed with the most perfect trill.
It regards the major and minor cadences, and observes the harmony of
counter-point, with all the preciseness of a perfect musician. Its
melodies, from the length and distinctness of each note, are more hymns
than songs. Though the concert of singers will keep to the same melody
for an hour, each little coterie of birds chants a different song, and
the traveller by no accident ever hears the same tune.’” In another
letter he says, “Buffon notices the Solitaire under the title of the
Organist. He thus speaks of it,—‘In St. Domingo the name of _Organist_
has been given to this little bird, because, in ascending from grave
to sharp, it sounds all the tones of the octave. It is not only very
singular but very agreeable. Chevalier Fabre Deshayes writes, that,
in the southern parts of St. Domingo in the high mountains, there is
a very rare but very celebrated bird, called the _Musician_, whose
song can be set down by notes. The Musician of M. Deshayes, it is to
be presumed, is the same with our Organist.[57] In M. Page Dupretz’s
History of Louisiana, there is a description of a small bird which they
call the Bishop, and which we believe to be the same with our Organist.
Its plumage being blue passing into violet, it has hence obtained the
name of Bishop. It is so sweet-throated, so flexible in its tones, and
so soft in its warblings, that those who once hear it become somewhat
measured in their praises of the Nightingale. The notes of its song are
lengthened out like those of a _miserere_. Whilst it sings it does not
seem to draw breath; but it rests a double time before it recommences,
and this alternation of singing and resting will be continued for two
hours.’”
[57] There is some confusion here. Our Solitaire has no resemblance
to “L’Organiste de St. Domingue,” Pl. Enl. 809, (_Pipra musica_ of
Gmel. and Lath.) nor to “L’Euphone Organiste” of Vieillot (Gal.
Ois.) which is an Euphonia, allied to our Blue Quit, (see p. 238,)
but with brighter colours. I incline to think that Deshayes is
writing of our bird; but certainly not the others, unless they
attribute the notes erroneously.
When I received these notes from my friend, and had identified my
bird with his description, I had never heard more than two notes in
succession. Curiosity impelled me to visit their lofty solitudes often
through the winter, and at length on the 3rd of February, when they
were abundant, I heard three successive notes of different tones,
proceed from the same bird; exactly like so many notes of a psalm,
played in slow time. And about three weeks later, I find this note
in my journal; I have at length heard the _song_ of the Solitaire;
the long clear notes, followed by many others of varying length, and
different tones, but separated by pauses rather too long to make a
piece of music, causing the whole to seem disjointed; but with much
sweetness. If I may conjecture, these true melodies are peculiar to
the nuptial season, and indicate that the period of incubation is
either begun or near; a time that generally exerts much influence on
the singing of birds.
From that time they filled the woods with their solemn music, until
April; when they began to become scarce, and by the middle of May not
one was to be heard or seen. I concluded that they were migratory, and
had now departed from the island for the summer; but on mentioning the
fact to Mr. Hill, he informed me about the beginning of June, that a
friend of his who had travelled through the Coona-coonas a day or two
before, (a district of the Blue Mountains, in which Mr. Purdie heard
them in his botanical tour, and at the same season,) had heard them
singing by scores. And he adds, “My Haytian notes relate to two visits
to the mountains they inhabit in that neighbour island; the first was
in August, the second in June; and they were there in the lofty pine
forests in hundreds.” The curious fact of the total disappearance of
the species from the Bluefields Peaks during the summer, while yet
present in the island, leads me to conjecture, that they may be subject
to the same instinct as influences migratory birds, but leading them
to seek a colder climate, not in a northern latitude, but in a loftier
elevation. The Peaks of Bluefields, though the highest land in the
western part of the island, are not more than 2600 feet high, and
therefore far less elevated than the ridges of the eastern end.
As far as I know, the food of the Solitaire is exclusively berries:
I have never found an insect in the stomachs of many that I have
dissected. Mr. Hill found in one, the berries of a mountain Rubus,
like the blackberry. In the Autumn, I have detected those of the
misseltoe, but more commonly those called glass-eye berries, from their
constituting the chief food of the Merle of that name. In February, the
pimento groves, which cover the mountain-brow are loaded with fruit,
not soft and sweet and black, as when ripe, but hard and green, and
in the very state in which it is picked to be dried for commerce. The
temptation of these berries draws the Solitaires from their seclusion,
and we not only hear their clear notes trilled from every part of the
groves, but see them familiarly eating, at the edges of the pastures,
and by the roadsides. It is worthy of remark that their companions
in retirement, the Glass-eyes, accompany them also in these feeding
excursions, and partake of the feast. I found the stomachs of both
species at this season, loaded with the green pimento.
The two specimens which first came into my hands, early in October,
manifested signs of a seasonal change of plumage. One had the head
prettily covered with pale rusty spots, each feather being thus tipped:
several of the body feathers were similarly tipped. This was moulting,
and I perceived that it was the old feathers which were tipped, the
new ones being uniformly grey, whence I infer the spotted character to
be that of the summer dress, perhaps extending to all the clothing
feathers. The other specimen exhibited the same peculiarity, but in a
less degree.
[Music]
I have much pleasure in adding the following note contained in a letter
from my friend, received since my arrival in England. Mr. Hill, having
made some inquiries of a gentleman residing among the Blue Mountains,
Andrew G. Johnston, Esq., received the following reply:—“I have no copy
of my musical score of the Solitaire’s song. The bird _now_ [July 27th]
uses only its long breve notes [Music] and its octave, often out of
tune, more often so than perfect. In the spring they are very numerous
in the deep forests, and warble very prettily, somewhat like this:—
[Music]
sometimes thus— [Music]
The pointed crotchets are very sweet sounds, and seem to sound
[symbol]E—vil [symbol]evil. I tried in vain to get one this spring,
but I find the negroes know nothing about them. Hearing them one day
singing, I asked two maroon-men who also listened, what birds they
were. One said _a grey speckled bird, mottled like a guinea-fowl_: the
other that it was black, and red about the rump and under the wings.”
My conjectures on both points, are thus confirmed. I may add that the
most common notes that I have heard are these.
[Music: _tr_ _tr_]
Vieillot, who first described the species by the name of _Muscicapa
armillata_, says that “it inhabits the Antilles, but is very rare in
the greater islands.” His figure, pl. 42, is poor, both as regards form
and colour. Mr. Swainson’s figure of _Myiadestes genibarbis_, (Nat.
Lib. Flycatchers, pl. 13,) _if meant_ for this species, is better as
to colouring, but neither its form nor attitude is correct. Moreover,
as he says, its body is not much larger than that of the robin, and
mentions white lines on the black ear-coverts, it is with me a matter
of doubt; especially as he speaks of the intimate resemblance which
it bears to our common robin, “not merely in the red colour of the
throat,” but in form; a resemblance certainly not discoverable in the
living bird.
The figure in Mr. Gray’s Genera of Birds was drawn from one of the
specimens procured by me in Jamaica, and is in winter plumage.
+Fam.+—CORVIDÆ.—(_The Crows._)