cropped out everywhere, filling my memory with pictures to take home
with me. But to-day I could not stay. I entered one of the paths, passed
into the grand, silent woods, found a comfortable seat on a bed of pine
needles, with the trunk of a tall maple tree for a back, and prepared
to wait. I would test Thoreau's assertion that if one will sit long
enough in some attractive spot in the woods, sooner or later every
inhabitant of it will pass before him. I had confidence in Thoreau's
woodcraft, for has not Emerson said:--
"What others did at distance hear,
And guessed within the thicket's gloom,
Was shown to this philosopher,
And at his bidding seemed to come"?
and I resolved to sit there till I should see my bird. I was confident I
should know him: a wild, fearless eye, I was sure, a noble bearing, a
dweller on the tree-tops.
Alas! I forgot one phrase in Thoreau's statement: "sooner or _later_."
No doubt the Concord hermit was a true prophet; but how many of the
inhabitants are "later"--too late, indeed, for a mortal who, unlike our
New England philosopher, has such weak human needs as food and rest, and
whose back will be tired in spite of her enthusiasm, if she sits a few
hours on a rock, with a tree for a back.
Many of the sweet and shy residents of that lovely bit of wildness
showed themselves while I waited. A flicker, whose open door was in
sight, and who was plainly engaged in setting her house in order,
entertained me for a long time. Silently she stole in, I did not see
how. Her first appearance to me was on the trunk, the opposite side
from her nest, whence she slid, or so it looked, in a series of jerks to
her door, paused a few minutes on the step to look sharply at me, and
then disappeared, head first, within. Quick as a jack-in-the-box, her
head popped out again to see if the spy had moved while she had been out
of sight, and finding all serene, she threw herself with true feminine
energy into her work. The beak-loads she brought to the door and flung
out seemed so insufficient that I longed to lend her a broom; but I
found she had a better helper than that, a partner.
When she tired, or thought she had earned a rest, she came out, and
flying to the limb above the nest, began softly calling. Never was the
ventriloquial quality more plainly exhibited. I heard that low "ka! ka!
ka! ka! ka!" long repeated, and I looked with interest in every
direction to see the bird appear. For a long time I did not suspect the
sly dame so quietly resting on the branch, and when I did it was only by
the closest inspection that I discovered the slight jerk of the tail,
the almost imperceptible movement of the beak, that betrayed her.
Another as well as I heard that call, and he responded. He was exactly
like her, with the addition of a pair of black "mustachios," and it may
be she told him that the strange object under the maple had not moved
for half an hour, and was undoubtedly some new device of man's, made of
wood perhaps, for he did not hesitate on the door-step, but plunged in
at once, and devoted himself to the business in hand, clearing out,
while she vanished.
But though I watched this domestic scene with pleasure, and saw and
noted every feather that appeared about me, the tree-tops had my closest
attention, for there I was certain I should find my rare singer. Hours
passed, the shadows grew long, and sadly and slowly I took my way
homewards, wishing I had a charm against fatigue, mosquitoes, and other
terrors of the night, and could stay out till he came.
All through the month of June I haunted that wood, seeking the unknown.
Every evening I heard him, but no sight came to gladden my eyes. I grew
almost to believe it merely "a wandering voice," and I went home with my
longing unsatisfied.
When next the month of roses came around, I betook myself to a spur of
the Hoosac Mountains to see my birds. The evening of my arrival, as the
twilight gathered, rose the call of my witching voice.
"What bird is that?" I demanded, with the usual result; no one knew. (A
chapter might be written on the ignorance of country people of their
own birds and plants. A chapter, did I say? A book, a dozen books, the
country is full of material.)
"I shall find that bird," I said, "if I stay a year." In the morning I
set out. The song had come from the belt of trees that hang lovingly
over a little stream on its merry way down the mountain, and thither I
turned my steps. Now, my hostess had a drove of twenty cows, wild,
head-tossing creatures,--"Holsteins" they were,--and having half a dozen
pastures, they were changed about from day to day. Driving them every
morning was almost as exciting as the stampede of a drove of horses, and
it seemed as if they could never reconcile themselves to the
idiosyncrasies of the American woman. The pasture where they were shut
for the day was as sacred from my foot as if it were filled with mad
dogs. My mere appearance near the fence was a signal for a headlong race
to the spot to see what on earth I was doing now.
I went into the field, looking cautiously about, and satisfying myself
that the too curious foreigners were not within sight, found a
comfortable seat on a bank overlooking the whole beautiful view of the
brook and its waving green borders, and commanding the approach to my
side of the field.
This time again my mysterious singer proved to be among the "later"
ones, and after spending an hour or two there, I rose to go back, when
in passing a thick-growing evergreen tree, I saw that I had created a
panic. There was a flutter of wings, there were cries, and on the tree,
in plain sight, the towhee bunting and his brown-clad spouse. Of course
there must be some reason for this reckless display; I sought the cause,
and found a nest, a mere depression in the ground, and one sorry-looking
youngster, the sole survivor of the perils of the situation. Over that
one nestling they were as concerned as the proverbial hen with one
chicken, and they flitted about in distress while I looked at their
half-fledged bantling, and hoped it was a singer to ring the delightful
silver-toned tremolo that had charmed me that morning.
That evening, listening on the piazza to the usual twilight chorus, the
wood-thrush far-off, the towhee from the pasture, the robins all around,
I heard suddenly the "quee-o" of a bird I knew, so near that I started,
and my eyes fell directly upon him, standing on the lowest limb of a
dead tree, not ten feet from me.
He was so near I did not need my glass, nor indeed did I dare move a
finger, lest he take flight. Several times he uttered his soft call, and
then, while my eyes were fastened upon him, he began quivering with
excitement, his wings lifted a little, and in a clear though low tone
he uttered the long-sought song. I held my breath, and he repeated it,
each time lower than before. Even at that distance it sounded far off,
and doubtless many times in the woods, when I looked for it afar, it may
have been over my head.
A long time--how long I cannot guess--that beautiful bird sat and sang
his witching evening hymn, while I listened spellbound.
It was the tawny thrush,--the veery.
X.
THE VEERY MOTHER.
My next interview with the veery family took place the following June,
at the foot of Mount Greylock, in Massachusetts. I had just returned
from a walk down the meadow, put on wrapper and slippers, and
established myself by the window to write some letters. Pen, ink, paper,
and all the accessories were spread out before me. I dipped my pen in
the ink and wrote "My Dear," when a sound fell upon my ears: it was the
cry of a young bird! it was new to me! it had a veery ring!
Away went my good resolutions, and my pen with them; papers flew to
right and left; hither and thither scattered the letters I had meant to
answer. I snatched my glass, seized my hat as I passed, and was
outdoors. In the open air the call sounded louder, and plainly came from
the borders of the brook that with its fringe of trees divides the yard
from the pasture beyond. It was a two-syllabled utterance like "quee
wee," but it had the intermitted or tremolo sound that distinguishes the
song of the tawny thrush from others. I could locate the bird almost to
a twig, but nobody cared if I could. It was on the other side of the
brook and the deep gully through which it ran, and they who had that
youngster in charge could laugh at me.
But I knew the way up the brookside. I went down the road to the bars,
crossed the water on stepping-stones, and in a few minutes entered a
cow-path that wandered up beside the stream. All was quiet; the young
thrush no doubt had been hushed. They were waiting for me to pass by, as
I often did, for that was a common walk of mine. On this log I sat one
day to watch a woodchuck; a little further on was the rock from which I
had peeped into a robin's nest, where one egg had been alone a week, and
I never saw a robin near it.
At length I reached the path that ran up the bank where I usually turned
and went to the pasture, for beyond this the cow-path descended, and
looked damp and wild, as if it might once have been the way of the cows,
but now was abandoned. Still all was quiet, and I thought of my letters
unanswered, of my slippers, and--and I turned to go back.
Just at that moment that unlucky young thrush opened his mouth for a
cry; the birds had been too sure. I forgot my letters again, and looked
at the path beyond. I thought I could see a dry way, so I took a step
or two forward. This was too much! this I had never before done, and I
believe those birds were well used to my habits, for the moment I passed
my usual bounds a cry rang out, loud, and a bird flew past my head. She
alighted near me. It was a tawny thrush; and when one of those shy
birds, who fly if I turn my head behind the blinds, gets bold, there's a
good reason for it. I thanked madam for giving me my cue; I knew now it
was her baby, and I walked slowly on.
I had to go slowly, for the placing of each foot required study. It is
surprising what a quantity of water will stand on the steep sides of a
mountain. Some parts of this one were like a marsh, or a saturated
sponge, and everywhere a cow had stepped was a small pool. As I
proceeded the thrush grew more and more uneasy. She came so near me that
I saw she had a gauzy-winged fly in her mouth, another proof that she
had young ones near. She called, without opening her beak, her usual low
"quee."
Finding a dry spot, and the baby-cry having ceased, I sat down to
consider and to wait. Then the bird seemed suddenly to remember how
compromising her mouthful was, and she planted herself on a branch
before my eyes, deliberately ate that fly and wiped her beak, as who
should say, "You thought I was carrying that morsel to somebody, but
you see I have eaten it myself; there's nothing up that path." But much
as I respected the dear mother, I did not believe her eloquent
demonstration. I selected another point where I could stop a minute, and
picked my way to it. Then all my poor little bird's philosophy deserted
her; she came close to me, she uttered the greatest variety of cries;
she almost begged me to believe that she was the only living creature up
that gully. And so much did she move me, so intolerably brutal did she
make me feel, that for the second time I was very near to turning back.
But the cry began again. How could I miss so good a chance to see that
tawny youngster, when I knew I should not lay finger on it? I hardened
my heart, and struggled a few feet further.
Then some of the neighbors came to see what was the trouble, and if they
could do anything about it. A black-and-white creeper rose from a low
bush with a surprised "chit-it-it-it," alighted on a tree and ran glibly
up the upright branch as though it were a ladder. But a glance at the
"cause of all this woe" was more than his courage could endure; one cry
escaped him, and then a streak of black and white passed over the road
out of sight.
Next came a redstart, himself the head of a family, for he too had his
beak full of provisions. He was not in the least dismayed; he perched on
a twig and looked over at me with interest, as if trying to see what the
veery found so terrifying, and then continued on his way home. A
snow-bird was the last visitor, and he came nearer and nearer, not at
all frightened, merely curious, but madam evidently distrusted him, for
she flew at him, intimating in a way that he plainly understood that
"his room was better than his company."
Still I floundered on, and now the disturbed mother added a new cry,
like the bleating of a lamb. I never should have suspected a bird of
making that sound; it was a perfect "ba-ha-ha." Yet on listening
closely, I saw that it was the very tremolo that gives the song of the
male its peculiar thrill. Her "ba-ha-ha," pitched to his tone, and with
his intervals, would be a perfect reproduction of it. No doubt she could
sing, and perhaps she does,--who knows?
Now the mother threw in occasionally a louder sort of call-note like
"pee-ro," which was quickly followed by the appearance of another
thrush, her mate, I presume. He called, too, the usual "quee-o," but he
kept himself well out of sight; no reckless mother-love made him lose
his reason. Still, steadily though slowly, and with many pauses to
study out the next step, I progressed. The cry, often suppressed for
minutes at a time, was perceptibly nearer. The bank was rougher than
ever, but with one scramble I was sure I could reach my prize. I started
carefully, when a cry rang out sudden and sharp and close at hand. At
that instant the stone I had put faith in failed me basely and rolled:
one foot _went in_, a dead twig caught my hair, part of my dress
remained with the sharp end of a broken branch, I came to one knee (but
not in a devotional spirit); I struck the ground with one hand and a
brier-bush with the other, but I did not drop my glass, and I reached my
goal in a fashion.
I paused to recover my breath and give that youngster, who I was
persuaded was laughing at me all the time, a chance to lift up his voice
again. But he had subsided, while the mother was earnest as ever.
Perhaps I was too near, or had scared him out of his wits by my
sensational entry. While I was patiently studying every twig on the tree
from which the last cry had come, the slight flutter of a leaf caught my
eye, and there stood the long-sought infant himself.
He was a few feet below me. I could have laid my hands upon him, but he
did not appear to see me, and stood like a statue while I studied his
points. Mamma, too, was suddenly quiet; either she saw at last that my
intentions were friendly, or she thought the supreme moment had come,
and was paralyzed. I had no leisure to look after her; I wanted to make
acquaintance with her bairn, and I did. He was the exact image of his
parents; I should have known him anywhere, the same soft, tawny back,
and light under-parts, but no tail to be seen, and only a dumpy pair of
wings, which would not bear him very far. The feathers of his side
looked rough, and not fully out, but his head was lovely and his eye was
the wild free eye of a veery. I saw the youngster utter his cry. I saw
him fly four or five feet, and then I climbed the bank, hopeless of
returning the way I had come, pushed my way between detaining spruces,
and emerged once more on dry ground. I had been two hours on the trail.
I slipped into the house the back way, and hastened to my room, where I
counted the cost: slippers ruined, dress torn, hand scratched, toilet a
general wreck. But I had seen the tawny-thrush baby, and I was happy.
And it's no common thing to do, either. Does not Emerson count it among
Thoreau's remarkable feats that
"All her shows did Nature yield
To please and win this pilgrim wise;
He found the tawny thrush's brood,
And the shy hawk did wait for him"?
XI.
THE TAWNY THRUSH'S BROOD.
"He found the tawny thrush's brood," says Emerson, in enumerating the
special gifts of the nature-lover whose praise he celebrates. Whether
the reference were to Thoreau or to another "forest-seer," it was
certainly to a fortunate and happy man, whom I have always envied till I
learned to find the shy brood myself.
I shall never forget the exciting and blissful moment when I discovered
my first tawny-thrush nest. It was the crowning event of a long search.
It was not until the fourth year that I had looked for him, that I came
really to know the bird, to see his family, and last of all his nest. My
summer abiding-place in the Black River country was very near a bit of
woods where veeries were plentiful, and I saw them at all hours, and
under nearly all conditions.
My favorite seat was at the foot of a low-growing tree in the edge of
the woods, where the branches hung over and almost hid me. From under
my green screen I could look out into a field golden with buttercups,
with scattering elms and maples, while behind me was the forest, the
chosen haunt of this bird. Here, unseen, I listened to his song,--
"O matchless melody! O perfect art!
O lovely, lofty voice unfaltering!"
till my soul was filled with rapture, and a longing to know him in his
home relations took such possession of me that the world seemed to hold
but one object of desire, a veery's nest.
Yet though the woods were full of them, so wary and so wise were the
little builders that not a nest could I find. I studied the descriptions
in the books; I examined the nests in a collection at hand. The books
declared, and the specimens confirmed the statement, that the cradle of
the tawny thrush would be found amid certain surroundings. Many such
places existed in the woods, and I never passed one without seeking a
nest; but always unsuccessfully, till, as June days were rapidly
passing, I came to have a feeling something akin to despair when I heard
the veery notes.
One day,--it was Sunday afternoon,--I was still grieving over the lost,
or rather the unfound nest, and my friend was sitting composedly on the
veranda writing letters, when restlessness seized me, and I resolved to
take a quiet walk. I sauntered slowly down the road, towards the woods,
of course; all roads in that charming place led to the woods.
I had nearly reached the "Sunset Corner," where I had a half-formed
intention of resting and then turning back, when my eyes fell upon--but
hold! I will not describe it, lest I enlighten one more collector, and
aid in the robbery, perhaps the death, of one more bird-mother. Suffice
it to say what I saw resembled, though not perfectly, the surroundings
of a veery's nest as described in the books.
Of course there could be no nest there, I thought, yet the ruling
passion asserted itself at once. It would at least do no harm to look. I
left the path, walked carelessly up to the spot, and looked at it. It
seemed empty of life; but as I gazed, there gradually took form a head,
a pair of anxious eyes fixed upon mine, a beak pointed upward, and there
was my nest! almost at my feet.
Joy and surprise contended within me. I thought not of the mother's
anxiety; I stood and stared, absolutely paralyzed with delight.
But not for long. I remembered my friend who had not found the tawny
thrush's nest, and with whom I must instantly share my happiness, and
carefully marking the locality, not to lose what I had so accidentally
found, and might so easily lose, I moved quietly away till I reached
the road. Then I hurried to an opening in the trees from which the house
could be seen. Here I stopped; the letter-writer looked up. I waved my
green bough in triumph above my head, and with the other hand I
beckoned.
"A veery's nest!" she thought at once. Away went paper and pen, and in a
moment she joined me. Together we stood beside the beautiful sitting
thrush, so brave, though no doubt suffering from deadly terror. Then we
slowly walked away, rejoicing. It was so near the house! so easy to
watch! the bird not at all afraid! All the way home we congratulated
ourselves.
The next morning our first thought was of the veery's nest, and on
starting out for the day we turned in that direction. Alas! the old
story! The nest was overturned and thrown out of place, the leaves were
trampled; there had evidently been a struggle of some kind. No birds, no
eggs, not a bit of broken shell--nothing was left, except one dark brown
spotted feather from a large bird, whether hawk or owl I shall never
know, for neglecting to take it at the moment, it was gone when I
thought of it as a witness.
Again the old longing for a nest assailed me; but I was not without
hope, for I had my hint. I had found out what sort of places the
veeries in this neighborhood liked. After that I never went into the
woods, on whatever errand bent, but I kept my eyes open for the chosen
situation. I examined dozens of promising spots, and I found nests that
had been used, which proved that I was on the right track, and kept up
my courage.
It was several days before another tawny-thrush cradle in use gladdened
our eyes, and this was in a wild part of the woods where we seldom went.
We were drawn there by the song of a tiny warbler, whose nest my friend
desired to find, since it was rare; and in passing a thicket of maple
saplings three feet high, she discovered a nest. She quickly parted the
leaves and looked in; three young birds opened their mouths for food.
"Veeries!" she exclaimed, in surprise. "What a strange place!"
This little home rested on a bare dead stick that had fallen and lodged
in a living branch, and the dead leaves used by veeries in their
building made it conspicuous, when the eyes happened to fall upon it;
but it was so well concealed by living branches that one might pass
fifty times and not see it. I describe this location, for it was very
unusual.
We looked at the birdlings; we walked on till we came to the place where
we turned from the path to see the warbler's little domicile. My friend
passed along. I lingered a moment, for it was a lovely spot, attractive
to birds as to bird-lovers, and high up in the air on the upturned roots
of a fallen tree
"an elder or two
Foamed over with blossoms white as spray."
While I stood there admiring the brave little bush that kept on living
and blooming, though lifted into an unnatural position by the tree at
whose feet it had grown, some mysterious drawing made me look closely at
a spot beside the road which we had passed many times without special
notice. There I found our third veery nest, the mother bird sitting.
Henceforth, every morning we went up the veery road, and before each
little nursery we sat us down to watch and study. It was necessary to be
very quiet, the birds in the saplings were so nervous; but keeping still
in the woods in summer is not the easy performance it is elsewhere,
though great are the inducements. From one side comes the chirp of the
winter wren, from the other, low, excited calls of veeries, and nothing
but absolute quiet seems necessary to capture some of the charming
secrets of their lives. Meanwhile a dancing and singing host collects
around one's head. I call up my philosophy; I resolve not to care,
though I shall be devoured. My philosophy stands the strain; I do not
_care_; but my nerves basely fail me, and after a few moments, and a
dozen stings here and there, I spring involuntarily to my feet, wildly
flourish my wisp of leaves, and of course put to instant flight the
actors in the drama before me.
The pair of veeries in the maple bushes were never reconciled to our
visits. They called and cried in all the varied inflections of their
sweet voices, and they moved uneasily about on the low branches with
mouths full of food. But though we were as motionless as circumstances
would permit, they never learned to trust us.
One--the mother, doubtless--did sometimes pay a flying visit to her
three darlings under the leaves; but she undoubtedly felt that she took
her life in her hands (so to speak), and it did not give her courage.
She returned to her post and cried no less than before. We were not
heartless; we could not bear to torture the timid creatures, and
therefore we never stayed very long.