"I cannot love the man who doth not love,
As men love light, the song of happy birds."
It is indeed fitting that the great poets have ever been the
best interpreters of the songs of birds. In many of the plays of
Shakespeare, especially where the scene is laid in the primeval
forest, his most delicious bits of fancy are inspired by the flitting
throng. Wordsworth and Tennyson, and many of the minor English poets,
are pervaded with bird notes, and Shelley's masterpiece, The Skylark,
will long survive his greater and more ambitious poems. Our own poet,
Cranch, has left one immortal stanza, and Bryant, and Longfellow, and
Lowell, and Whittier, and Emerson have written enough of poetic
melody, the direct inspiration of the feathered inhabitants of the
woods, to fill a good-sized volume. In prose, no one has said finer
things than Thoreau, who probed nature with a deeper ken than any of
his contemporaries. He is to be read, and read, and read.
But just what meaning should be attached to a bird's notes--some of
which are "the least disagreeable of noises"--will probably never be
discovered. They do seem to express almost every feeling of which the
human heart is capable. We wonder if the Mocking Bird understands what
all these notes mean. He is so fine an imitator that it is hard to
believe he is not doing more than mimicking the notes of other birds,
but rather that he really does mock them with a sort of defiant
sarcasm. He banters them less, perhaps, than the Cat Bird, but one
would naturally expect all other birds to fly at him with vengeful
purpose. But perhaps the birds are not so sensitive as their human
brothers, who do not always look upon imitation as the highest
flattery.
A gentleman who kept a note-book, describes one of the matinee
performances of the Mocker, which he attended by creeping under a tent
curtain. He sat at the foot of a tree on the top of which the bird was
perched unconscious of his presence. The Mocker gave one of the notes
of the Guinea-hen, a fine imitation of the Cardinal, or Red Bird,
an exact reproduction of the note of the Phoebe, and some of the
difficult notes of the Yellow-breasted Chat. "Now I hear a young
chicken peeping. Now the Carolina Wren sings, '_cheerily, cheerily,
cheerily_.' Now a small bird is shrilling with a fine insect tone. A
Flicker, a Wood-pewee, and a Phoebe follow in quick succession. Then a
Tufted Titmouse squeals. To display his versatility, he gives a dull
performance which couples the '_go-back_' of the Guinea fowl with the
plaint of the Wood-pewee, two widely diverse vocal sounds. With all
the performance there is such perfect self-reliance and consciousness
of superior ability that one feels that the singer has but to choose
what bird he will imitate next."
Nor does the plaintive, melancholy note of the Robin, that "pious"
bird, altogether express his character. He has so many lovely traits,
according to his biographers, that we accept him unhesitatingly as a
truly good bird. Didn't he once upon a time tenderly cover with leaves
certain poor little wanderers? Isn't he called "The Bird of the
Morning?" And evening as well, for you can hear his sad voice long
after the sun has himself retired.
The poet Coleridge claims the credit of first using the Owl's cry
in poetry, and his musical note _Tu-whit, tu-who!_ has made him a
favorite with the poets. Tennyson has fancifully played upon it in
his little "Songs to the Owl," the last stanza of which runs:
"I would mock thy chant anew;
But I cannot mimic it,
Not a whit of thy tuhoo,
Thee to woo to thy tuwhit,
Thee to woo to thy tuwhit.
With a lengthen'd loud halloo,
Tuwhoo, tuwhit, tuwhit, tuhoo-o-o."
But Coleridge was not correct in his claim to precedence in the use of
the Owl's cry, for Shakespeare preceded him, and Tennyson's "First
Song to the Owl" is modeled after that at the end of "Love's Labor
Lost:"
"When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring Owl,
Tu-who;
Tu-whit, tu-who, a merry note."
In references to birds, Tennyson is the most felicitous of all poets
and the exquisite swallow-song in "The Princess" is especially
recommended to the reader's perusal.
Birds undoubtedly sing for the same reasons that inspire to utterance
all the animated creatures in the universe. Insects sing and bees,
crickets, locusts, and mosquitos. Frogs sing, and mice, monkeys,
and woodchucks. We have recently heard even an English Sparrow do
something better than chipper; some very pretty notes escaped him,
perchance, because his heart was overflowing with love-thoughts, and
he was very merry, knowing that his affection was reciprocated. The
elevated railway stations, about whose eaves the ugly, hastily built
nests protrude everywhere, furnish ample explanation of his reasons
for singing.
Birds are more musical at certain times of the day as well as at
certain seasons of the year. During the hour between dawn and sunrise
occurs the grand concert of the feathered folk. There are no concerts
during the day--only individual songs. After sunset there seems to be
an effort to renew the chorus, but it cannot be compared to the
morning concert when they are practically undisturbed by man.
Birds sing because they are happy. Bradford Torrey has given with much
felicity his opinion on the subject, as follows:
"I recall a Cardinal Grosbeak, whom I heard several years ago, on the
bank of the Potomac river. An old soldier had taken me to visit the
Great Falls, and as we were clambering over the rocks this Grosbeak
began to sing; and soon, without any hint from me, and without knowing
who the invisible musician was, my companion remarked upon the
uncommon beauty of the song. The Cardinal is always a great singer,
having a voice which, as European writers say, is almost equal to the
Nightingale's; but in this case the more stirring, martial quality of
the strain had given place to an exquisite mellowness, as if it were,
what I have no doubt it was,
A Song of Love."
--C. C. Marble.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
[Illustration: From col. F. M. Woodruff. YELLOW-THROATED VIREO.]