February on our hills may be anything—from September round to May.
Sometimes it is mild and sunny and sweet with the scent of newly-turned
earth; or it may be bitingly cold, and very bleak in the exposed parts,
with a shivery-ness even in the valleys. You just take your chance,
sure, at least, of fresh air, peace—and the birds.
That is one of the perennial joys of the place; summer or winter
you know there will be a host of little fluttering things all ready
to welcome you as a friend, if you will but show the least bit of
friendliness towards them.
Not that their greeting is entirely cordial when you arrive. The
starlings are probably the first to see you; they are arrant
busybodies, and seem to spend most of their time retailing gossip from
the ridge of the red-tiled roof. No wonder their nests are the lazy
make-shifts they are!
A perfect scandal to the bird world, Mrs. Missel-Thrush has told me;
it’s a wonder the sanitary authorities don’t insist on their being
pulled down and rebuilt! Anything, stuffed in anywhere; a handful of
straw in the chimney; dried grass and oddments of rubbish collected
in a corner under the tiles; you wouldn’t think any self-respecting
egg would consent to be hatched out in such a nest!—certainly no
young thrush would put up with so disreputable a nursery. But then,
as we all know, the thrushes come of very good family; whereas the
starlings!—well—not that one would say a word against one’s neighbours,
but since everyone can see and hear it for themselves, the starlings
are simply “impossible.”
But the starlings don’t seem to be the least bit worried by the cold
shoulder of the more exclusive residents; they gabble and bawl the
whole day long, from the top of the roof, while the one who has managed
to secure the apex of the weathercock is positively insulting. And the
moment we turn into the little white gate, they begin.
“See who’s down there? I say, everybody, look! There’s that wretched
white dog again! Remember what a perfect nuisance he was last August,
when we’d just got the youngsters out of the nest? We were afraid every
moment lest he would start to climb the trees like their old cat used
to. Hi! there, you on the barn-roof! Have you heard the news?” Shriek,
shriek! chatter, chatter, chatter! So they go on for hours at a time.
Then policeman-robin arrives. “What’s all this noise about?” he
demands, from the post of the gate leading into the upper orchard. “Oh,
good gracious! it’s that horrid white dog again! Nearly shoved his nose
right into our nest in the woodruff bank last year! Chit! chit! chit!
But don’t you worry, my dear” (this to the lady he has just married);
“I’ll drive him away; you can trust to me,” and he flicks his conceited
little tail, and flies to the top of a tree stump near by, still
calling out his “Chit! chit! chit!” in severe reprimand.
Next the blackbird, hunting for a little fresh meat among the grey,
mossed-over stones that edge the garden beds, raises his head and
cranes his neck above the overhanging heart’s-ease trails, and the
foliage of the pinks, to see what the commotion is all about.
“I say, Martha!” (to the demure body in brown, who has been meekly
tracking along behind him), “there’s that terror of a dog again!
Recollect when he was here last year? Never a chance to enjoy a snail
in peace; before you’d given the shell more than one tap on the stone,
down he’d rush. Here he comes now! Slip along quick to the laurels. I
say, that was a near shave! Chut! chut! chut! Go away! What business
have you to come here disturbing respectable old inhabitants like us?”
And so the hubbub continues, while the small white dog with the brown
ears trots in a business-like manner all over the place, making sure
that every corner-stone, and bush, and gate-post is just where he
left it last time. And having ascertained that the universe is still
intact, he sets off to a particular spot in the lower orchard, sniffs
about till he finds the identical tuft of grass he is searching for;
whereupon he eats, and eats, at the long green blades, much in the
same way as we fall on the young lettuces, or the black currants, or
whatever else may be in season when we come down. Though why this
particular tuft of grass should be the only one he selects out of the
acres and acres at his disposal, is always a mystery to us. Yet he
never forgets it; straight for that small patch in the middle of the
big orchard he makes, once he has done his tour of inspection round the
estate.
* * * * *
Before I have been in the house half-an-hour, I start making overtures
to the birds, and they immediately respond. I proceed by way of the
bird-board.
This may need explanation.
Outside one of the living-room windows I have established a board
that projects about a foot beyond the wide window-ledge. At first I
had it resting on the window-ledge, but I found that the birds were
down out of sight, when they came up to feed, hidden by the sash and
window-frame. Therefore I had it raised to bring it exactly on a level
with the glass. It is fixed securely on supports, so that it won’t blow
away, neither would a flock of jays and wood-pigeons overbalance it. A
couple of stout bits of tree branches have been fixed upright at the
sides; these are very popular, as they make the board look less bare,
more tree-like and familiar to the birds. They love to alight on a
branch, before going down to feed, and they often return to the branch
when they have eaten their fill, saucing their relations and daring
them to touch a morsel of the food, which each bird seems to consider
its own exclusive property! Strips of narrow lath have been nailed to
the outside edges of the board, projecting about an inch above the
level of the board. This wooden rim saves the food from rolling off, or
blowing away too easily; it also gives the birds a little perch that
they love to stand on while they run their eyes over the menu.
On this board—in times of plenty—go crumbs, seed, rolled oats, maize,
peas, little bits of fat or suet, anything in fact that birds will
eat; and if the weather be cold, a lump of suet will be lashed to each
branch, for the tits to peck at, with occasional bunches of bacon rind,
hanging like tassels.
In war-time the birds just have to take what they can get.
Within twenty-four hours of our arrival, the birds have re-discovered
their food board, and over they come, from garden and adjoining
orchards and woods, with such a whirring of wings, directly they hear
the window being opened. In the apple tree, in the laburnum tree, in
the damson tree they wait, and the moment I move away from the window,
down they pounce, and such a squabbling and chatter and succession
of arguments takes place. In a few days’ time, as they get more used
to me, they flutter down before I have even spread out their meal,
perching on the edge of the board and eyeing me with the most audacious
nerve. The robin is positively impudent in his demand that I should
hurry up!
And it is not longer than a week before they come hopping right into
the room, hunting all over the breakfast table if the window be left
open, and I have not been down sufficiently early to meet their
requirements. If the days are cold, and outside food scarce, they tap
the window sharply with their beaks, to call attention to their needs,
while plaintive, appealing little faces look anxiously at me.
* * * * *
And oh, they are such a pretty little crowd. One has no idea what
clear, beautifully bright colour our British birds can show, unless
one has seen them right away from the taint of smoke and grime. Town
environments, be they ever so rural, are always reminiscent of the
chimneys in the distance, or the railways that cut them up. But on
these hills, where cottage chimneys are very few and far between, and
what smoke there is, is usually wood smoke, some of the birds are
exceedingly lovely.
There is the great-tit, brilliantly yellow as a daffodil, with an
admixture of black velvet and pure white; he and his wife quite take
your breath away as they splash down, out of space, and flitter about
among the sober thrushes and darker blackbirds. And when, in the
summer, they bring their babies along with them, I don’t think there is
a prettier sight in creation than the little bluey-grey balls of fluff,
that peck daintily at the bits of suet, and then hiss vigorously and
scold at the big wasps that come and steal it from under their very
beaks! So tame and innocent of fear they are, that they come into the
room whenever the window is left open; and mother and father follow
them, quite as trustfully.
Then again, we all think we know the blue-tit; but when you see him in
the wilds he is a very different-looking morsel from the dirty-blue
apology you meet nearer town. On the bird-board, he is almost metallic
in the brightness of his blue-green feathers, and the lovely tint of
yellow. He raises his crest feathers, with pleasure, when he sees the
suet on the branch; and over the little acrobat goes, hanging head
downwards or clinging with one tiny claw to a piece of twig; it is all
one to him, he swings about like a bright enamel pendant.
The male chaffinch is another very gay little fellow, with his warm
red and pretty blue and yellow. He calls “Spink, spink,” in clear
penetrating notes, as he lands on the board; and up comes his wife—one
of the most shapely and elegant of all the small birds, with the
dearest little face!
Mr. and Mrs. Bullfinch invariably come together, unless she is detained
at home with the family. They perch on the edge of the drinking saucer,
side by side, like a pair of solemn paroquets; he, very beautiful in
crimson and black velvet; she, decidedly more homely and nondescript.
But I can’t go through the whole list, there is such a crowd—including
a little flock of eight goldfinches that for two winters have always
been about the garden together.
Jays, with their handsome wing feathers and ugly, very ugly, mouths,
swoop down continually, scaring the small birds to vanishing point,
and gobbling up the food by the shovelful! Magpies in plenty perch on
the garden rails, but only once has one come to the board when I have
been there, and then he got his tail so mixed up with the decorative
branches, that he had the fright of his life, and never repeated the
adventure.
Wood pigeons are regular in their attendance, when other food is
scarce. Oh, certainly, I know all that is to be said on the subject of
encouraging wood pigeons! But—have you ever studied the peacock and
wine-colour gleam on their necks, when unsmirched by smoke or grime?
If so, you will understand my admiration for them. And, in any case,
ours isn’t a farming area; there is no corn here for them to squander,
and although they sigh all summer long, in the fir trees, “Take _two_
pears, Tommy! Take _two_ pears, Tommy!—_do!_” there are very few pears
available that Tommy would even look at; most that grow in the orchards
around are the harsh, bitter variety, used for making the drink known
as “perry” (the pear equivalent of apple cider).
The wood pigeons have helped me back to health and strength many a
time, with their soft crooning in the larches, and their quiet talk
of things above the petty strife and noisy clamour of the struggling
market place. Therefore, I don’t say them nay, in times of plenty, if I
have a little to spare, and they chance to need it.
* * * * *
Of all the bird family, however, I think the coal-tits are our
favourites—and there are _such_ a quantity of them. Coal-tits always
abound in the neighbourhood of larch woods and birches, which accounts
for the numbers that dart about my garden; there are birch woods lower
down the hill below the cottage, as well as the larch woods up above;
and both birch and larch cluster thick down one side of the house to
shield it from the cold winds.
Though the coal-tit is not brightly-coloured, like its relations, there
is something very delightful about his soft grey garb, and his black
head with its light grey or nearly white streak down the back. Like the
robin, he always looks well-tailored, not a feather out of place, not
a draggled filament anywhere. And he is so extraordinarily alert; he
doesn’t seem to give himself time to fly, he darts and dives and flits
all over the place, and seems to have an appetite proportionately equal
to that of the proverbial alderman.
Down he dives the minute the food appears. He stands very erect on his
slim little legs (no squatting down on his breast bone, as the sparrows
and even the chaffinches often do); he cocks his head from side to
side, promptly decides on the largest lump of fat he can find; seizes
it, and flies up into a big fir tree, where, apparently, he bolts the
whole lump instantaneously! At any rate, before you have time to see
where he alighted, down he dives, seizes another big piece, and off
he goes again. He seems to eat twice his own size in suet in a few
minutes! But I conclude he must drop some of it, though I’ve never been
able to prove it. And the theory of a nestful of hungry beaks doesn’t
always explain his voraciousness; for he disposes of just as much in
the winter as in nesting time.
Yet, in spite of his appetite, we love him, for he is so tiny and so
wonderfully alert; one marvels how so much energy can be boxed up in
such a small body.
* * * * *
Visitors who have never had much to do with birds at close quarters—and
the birds may be said to be part of the family at this cottage, for
they live with us and meal with us—are usually surprised at the
differences and the distinctiveness of their various personalities.
The robin not only adopts you at once, but he proceeds to supervise
your every action, and instals himself as your personal attendant.
Probably this is all the more emphasized by the fact that he will not
allow any rival to encroach on his particular territory. Most birds
seem to peg out a claim at the beginning of the season, and to resent,
more or less, the intrusion of any other of its own kind. Swallows
and sparrows and rooks, and a few others, build in colonies, but the
majority of birds seem to prefer a little domain each to himself, wife
and family, and you will find one pair of blackbirds driving another
from the laurel bush they have chosen, or chasing strangers from the
particular garden path they call their own.
Though starlings feed—and chatter—in flocks, one particular pair of
starlings make it their business to oust any other starling that they
find on the bird board.
But the robin can be a perfect terror in the way he seeks to domineer
over the whole earth. It is a very large area that he marks off for
his individual own, and woe betide any other robin who tries to defy
him—unless he be the stronger of the two. One of our robins killed his
own wife (we conclude, as she disappeared, after a series of thrashings
he gave her daily!), and then he injured the wing of one of his own
youngsters, because we had petted them, and given them food inside the
living room.
The father used to hide behind a stone down on the garden bed, and
watch as his family—the mother and two babies—nervously and timidly
approached the bird-board, looking round anxiously lest father
should see! Then, when they started to feed, he would hiss out the
dreadfullest of wicked words at them, and fling himself on them,
bashing them with his beak—a positive little fury.
So one day I put some food on the table inside the room, and the
down-trodden ones hopped in. I shut the window before the irate father
could follow them. He seemed demented with rage, when he saw them
feeding and couldn’t get at them; he literally stamped his foot, and
viciously tossed off all the pieces of food that were on the board,
flinging them to the ground in a most highly-glazed specimen of temper!
I let the family out by a side window, instead of the bird-board
window, and they evaded their loving and affectionate relative for
a little while. But he found them at last; and went for his wife,
while the children cheeped forlornly among the pansies in the border.
We never saw her again, poor, plucky little soul; and one of the
youngsters dragged a broken wing along the path next day, explaining to
me, pitifully, that he couldn’t possibly get up to the bird-board now,
neither could he find mother anywhere.
I took him in, and tried to save his life—but it was no use. With all
our knowledge and skill and discoveries and training, what clumsy,
inadequate creatures we are in comparison with a little mother bird!
* * * * *
Less harrowing was the incident of a robin who, on one occasion, came
inside, in order to get more than his share of provender if possible,
when he was suddenly startled by the dog running into the room. Instead
of flying through the window that was open, he made for a closed one,
banging his head with such force against the glass that the blow
stunned him, and he fell senseless to the ground.
I picked him up, and tried all the restoratives I could think of,
a drop of water on his beak, a cold splash on his head, but to no
purpose; he lay, just a tiny handful of beautiful feathers, in my hand;
so light, so helpless, so altogether pathetic—it hurt me badly to gaze
at the small mite that only the minute before had been talking to me,
and cheeking me, and liking me (yes, I am sure he did), and I unable
now to do a thing to bring back the gaiety and life and sparkle to the
poor still body.
I felt sure he was dead, yet to give him every chance, I placed him
in a nest of soft flannel out on the window-ledge; the day was warm,
but there was a breeze that might perhaps revive him. And as a last
offering—one does so try to do all one can!—I put a tempting piece of
suet near his inanimate beak. And how unnatural it seemed to see that
suet remain untouched in his vicinity!
I took my work and sat where I could see if he so much as stirred a
claw. But for a quarter of an hour there wasn’t the slightest sign of
movement, except when the wind gently ruffled his feathers—and how
exquisite they were, the blue so unlike the ordinary blue, the red much
more red than the London robins, and the bronze-brown so glinting.
At last I decided it was useless to watch any longer, for his eyelids
had never so much as flickered.
I was folding up my work, when a big yellow tit flew on to the window
ledge, hopped over inquiringly to the suet, and started to sample it.
In an instant up jumped the corpse, and with an angry “Chit! chit!”
hurled himself at the interloper; and the last I saw of him was chasing
the yellow tit all across the garden.
Don’t ask me to explain; I am only telling you what happened under my
own eyes.
* * * * *
Yes, robin _père_ can be a villain; he also can be the extreme reverse.
Like the majority of the rest of us, he shows to the most amiable
advantage when there is no rival to distract public admiration. So long
as he is the centre, as well as the beginning and the end, of the bird
universe, he is sweetness itself.
No other bird is so keenly alive to all my comings and goings. It
doesn’t matter how fully occupied he may be with the settlement of
every other bird’s affairs, I have but to go up the garden with fork or
spade or broom, and before I have turned half-a-dozen clods, or pulled
out a handful of weeds, I am conscious of a soft streak through the
air, though I hardly see it; there he sits on a low branch of a currant
bush close to my hand, or stands motionless on an edging stone at my
very feet. If I take no notice of him, in all probability he starts a
Whisper Song to call attention to himself.
Have you ever heard this? It suggests nothing so much as elf-land
music; I know no song exactly like it. You seem to hear a bird warbling
most delightfully, but it is far, far away. You raise your eyes, and
scan the trees around, but no singing bird can you discover; you decide
it must be farther off—but what a haunting charm there is about it.
Then it ceases. Mr. Robin is hoping that you have understood what he
has been saying. But no, the obtuse human just goes on weeding the path
as before; so the Whisper Song starts again. This time you think it
resembles a very mellow musical box shut up in some distant room.
Suddenly you see him, singing straight at you, so close to your hand
that it gives you quite an uncanny feeling for the moment; and you
wonder: Who is he—what is he—that he should be saying all this to me,
obviously to me, and to no one else but me?
Robin doesn’t encourage you in daydreams, however, he means business;
and once he sees that he has secured your undivided attention, he
discards the Whisper Song and comes to the point. Down on to the path
he drops, seizes an unwary worm that your energy has brought to light;
then tosses it over scornfully and flirts a contemptuous tail, which
says as plainly as any tale that was ever told, “Is _that_ the best
worm you can offer a gentleman? Pouf!”
He eats it nevertheless.
And so he follows me round the place; I never garden alone. If at first
I cannot see him, I whistle a quiet call; invariably I hear the Whisper
Song in response, and there he is—waiting, watching, missing nothing,
with his tiny throat feathers vibrating and quivering as he strives to
let me into bird-land secrets, and tells me lots and lots of wonderful
things that as yet I am too dull-witted to understand.
* * * * *
Then there are the blackbirds—for individuality they are hard to beat;
though I admit they are always reproving someone or something, with
their “Chutter, chut, chut!”
I never knew a bird with as many grudges and grievances as Augustus
seems to have. He “chut-chuts” at me if I’m late with his breakfast,
at Abigail when she ventures to gather a few raspberries, at the dog
whenever he sees him, at the little colt for scampering down the
meadow, at the cuckoo when his voice breaks—I’ve heard him get up
after all the family had gone to bed, and roundly abuse a poor July
cuckoo who had developed a bad stutter—and every night about sundown he
admonishes the world in general, from his pulpit in a pine, despite the
fact that Martha has put the children to bed and is trying to get them
to sleep, and that every other masculine blackbird for acres round is
discoursing on the same subject.
But the poor thing has had his troubles. The first time we really
distinguished Augustus and Martha (who monopolise my bedroom window
ledge, and the pinks and pansy border) from Claude and Juliet (who
patronise the biggest mountain ash, and consider the white and red
currants and the snails in the snapdragon bed their particular
perquisites) was when the former (that means Augustus and Martha, you
know) built in the old plum tree that hangs partly over the green and
gold grotto. Though it has plenty of snowy-white flowers on its dark
stems in the spring, it has been too neglected to produce much fruit;
but it makes up in flowering ivy and heavenly-scented honeysuckle for
any other deficiencies. And it was in this tangled mass of loveliness
that Augustus and Martha first set up housekeeping. (Augustus being
always recognizable by reason of one grey feather.)
They chose it with much circumspection—Martha with an eye to the easy
building facilities offered by strands of tough woodbine, and sturdy
ivy cables, combined with stout plum branches; Augustus with his main
eye focussed on the bird-board, and the other on the accessibility of
the bird-bath (originally a sheep-trough hollowed out of a block of
rough stone, over which moss and small ivy are now trailing).
Altogether it was a most desirable site for a young couple. They were
in full view of the side window in the living room, and we watched them
flying in and out, to and fro, with beaks laden with grass and straw
and similar materials for household decorations.
Later on, when two youngsters were hatched, there were the same endless
journeyings, the same loaded beaks. But here Augustus’s perspicacity
stood him in good stead; it was a very short flight from the plum tree
down to the bird-board, and the pair must have nearly worn the air out,
judging by the number of times they made the trip!
The tragedy happened when the youngsters were nearly ready to leave the
nest. And the sad part of it was that we saw it all enacted before our
eyes, and yet were powerless to prevent it.
We had just sat down to our mid-day meal; the day seemed all blue sky
and bright flowers and gladdening sunshine—the very last day one ought
to have met trouble.
Augustus had gone off to give Claude a piece of his mind that must
have been owing for some time, judging by the heat and length of his
harangue; Martha was gathering up the biggest mouthful she could manage
(and it is astonishing how they will collect several pieces of bread,
a piece of fat and a flake of oatmeal, packing it up securely in their
beak, in order to carry it safely).
I saw a big bird swoop down on to the branch beside the nest; but big
birds are so plentiful with us, it conveyed nothing out of the ordinary
to me. It looked like a shrike, but I couldn’t be certain. Everything
happened so quickly. It seized one of the little ones, killed it
outright with one vicious toss, while the other baby called out in wild
terror.
In far less time than it takes me to write this, the whole air seemed
teeming with screaming blackbirds, dozens of them. They went for the
murderer, trying to attack him with their beaks; but he flew off into
the woods, followed by a crowd of threatening and bewailing birds; one
could hear them in the distance when they were no longer in sight.
Of course we had all rushed out into the garden; but we could do
nothing; the nest was too high up to be reached without a ladder.
Then an unusual silence fell over the garden; the majority of the birds
having joined the crowd of pursuers. It is strange how we all bury our
hatchets in face of a common danger!
It seemed almost death-like for the moment, till, from the top of a
larch, a chaffinch bubbled forth. At least there was one happy bird
left. Then I bethought me about baby-blackbird No. 2. The villain had
only carried off one. We got a ladder, but no bird was in the nest!
We decided it must have fallen out in the scrimmage, and searched
carefully. After a while we found it, helpless and terrified, among the
ferns, just where it had fallen, in the grotto.
As it didn’t seem able to walk or fly, we left it there, and sat down
to watch events. Back came poor Martha presently. She looked in the
nest, then flew distractedly about. But I suppose the baby was too
dazed with fright to do a thing, at any rate it never uttered a sound
or call; and the distressed mother flew off again to the woods on her
hopeless quest.
We remained on watch the whole afternoon and evening; but neither
parent returned. Then I began to get anxious. I put a little food near
the frightened crouching thing, but it took no notice. Only once it
gave a piteous cry; how I wished it would keep it up! That at least
would surely reach the mother in time. But it didn’t repeat the call.
At last we had to go in, because it was getting dark, and every
bird but our poor little baby was safely in bed. We tried to console
ourselves by saying that it would probably be all right, and it was
wonderful how birds survived all sorts of dangers. But, all the same,
we none of us believed we should ever see him again; and we shook our
heads silently next morning, when we found an empty space under the
ferns, where we had left him overnight.
During the day, my suspicions were aroused by the fact that Augustus
returned again and again to the bird-board and stuffed his beak full of
provender, which he carried off in the good old way. But the moment I
tried to follow him, he merely went into a near-by tree, and tried to
say “Chut! chut!” with his mouth full!
It took me all the afternoon, and used up all the stealth and
cautiousness I possess, to track him. He would not fly any more than
he could help; he kept right down on the ground, running along with
his head slightly lowered, keeping close to the shadow of the wall,
slipping under hedges and low growths, always looking about from side
to side, standing stock still when he scented danger—in this way he
got up the hill, and right across a field, to where a big Wellingtonia
stands like a pyramid, against a stone wall, its outspreading branches
drooping protectingly, and hiding all sorts of secrets in its dark
green depths.
Behold, there was Martha, anxiously waiting on the doorstep, so to
speak, for Augustus to return. She was as cautious in her movements as
he was, but she couldn’t help uttering a low “Chut! chut!” of pleasure
when she saw his beak so crammed with good things. Both slipped in
under the lowest branch.
I bided my time. I didn’t want to add one single extra anxiety to the
little mother heart that was already so burdened with care. But when
at length I saw both birds slink off in search of food, I parted the
branches and looked in. For some time I could see nothing, it was so
dark and mysterious under the heavily plumed boughs, but the little
one had learnt to use its voice by now; “Cheep” came vigorously from
within; and then I saw our baby comfortably ensconced on a drift of
pine needles against the wall.
I slipped away quietly, wondering and wondering how in the world those
little birds had managed to get that fat youngster up that hill and
into the tree that was fully three minutes’ walk, even for me, from the
old nest!
The baby flourished apace, and before we returned to town, it was
brought along to the pansy border, and told to stay there quite still
for a moment, while mother got it something to eat. But it didn’t do
anything of the sort; directly her back was turned, it hopped into
the bird’s bath, and splashed joyously till its expostulating parents
returned, alarmed out of their senses lest it should be drowned!
* * * * *
After thinking it over, I fancy that for all-round serviceability you
cannot do better than the blackbird. He starts singing in January, as
a rule, and keeps at it till August, always a beautiful song, but not
always the same song.
It is a clear-blue message of hope, as it rings out on a cold winter’s
day.
As the spring progresses, it becomes a cascade that overflows with
bubbling sound and ends with a challenge: “Let any blackbird dare to
say he can sing that cadenza as brilliantly as I can, and I’ll know the
reason why!”
Later on, when the nestlings keep up a constant demand for “more,” he
only manages to get in an occasional stanza; and that, I am inclined to
think, is when he has a difference of opinion with another of his kind;
though sometimes he sings a rippling, pulsating song to the setting sun.
But best of all I love him when the summer has run well on into July.
He is getting tired then; two families—possibly with four in the nest
at a time—are something of a handful to cater for. He has become
draggled and weary in appearance. His yellow-ringed eyes do not seem as
sparkling as they were. But he still tries to do his best, and towards
sundown you may hear him singing; one of those in my garden seems to
have a preference for an underbough on a tall pine, where he stands
almost hidden from sight, and whistles gently and softly—though not to
me personally, as the robin does; apparently he is talking to himself.
Gone is the buoyancy of his early spring song; gone the
self-assertiveness, the boastfulness and dominating clamour of his
early married life. Now, his song is much subdued, gentler, and
strangely suggestive of a quiet, almost saddened reminiscence.
Is it that his family have failed to come up to his expectations? Is
his song tinged with regret for the lost happiness of those first glad
days of spring? Or is it the reflection of the tranquillity that comes
to those who bravely shouldered life’s responsibility when the time
came for leaving behind the things of youth?
Who knows what that subdued but exquisite little song means, as it
falls, like a rain of soft, gentle sounds from the branches above?
I cannot tell, but it stirs something strangely responsive in my own
heart; I sense far-back things that I cannot take hold of, or put into
tangible shape, and for the moment I feel mysteriously akin to the
unseen singer in the blue-green depths of the old and rugged pine.