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[Illustration: THE TUG OF WAR--THE SHRIKE (PAGE 38)]
UPON THE TREE-TOPS
BY
OLIVE THORNE MILLER
_ILLUSTRATED BY J. CARTER BEARD_
[Illustration]
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
Copyright, 1897,
BY H. M. MILLER.
_All rights reserved._
_The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A._
Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton and Company.
_Do you ne'er think what wondrous beings these,
Whose household words are songs in many keys,
Whose habitations on the tree-tops even
Are half-way houses on the road to heaven?_
LONGFELLOW.
INTRODUCTORY.
In the beginning of my study of bird life, when I had a bird-room for
close observation, I was interested to see that our little neighbors in
feathers possess as much individuality of character as ourselves, and in
Chapters XII. and XIII. of this volume I offer two studies of that
period, illustrative of the point.
Thanks are due to Mr. Frederic A. Ober for the use of his notes on one
of the solitaires, embodied in Chapter XII., and to the Godey Company
for permission to reproduce two shrike pictures.
I wish also to give credit to my daughter, Mary Mann Miller, for the
minute and conscientious collection of the facts recorded in Chapters V.
and VI., which for convenience are related as if they were my own
observations.
OLIVE THORNE MILLER.
CONTENTS.
UPON THE TREE-TOPS.
I. TRAMPS WITH AN ENTHUSIAST 3
Hermit Thrush. _Turdus aonalaschkae pallasii._
American Crow. _Corvus Americanus._
Sandpiper.
Wilson's Thrush. _Turdus fuscescens._
Oven-bird. _Seiurus aurocapillus._
Wood Thrush. _Turdus mustelinus._
Olive-sided Flycatcher. _Contopus borealis._
Golden-winged Woodpecker. _Colaptes auratus._
Rose-breasted Grosbeak. _Habia ludoviciana._
Cow Bunting. _Molothrus ater._
White-throated Sparrow. _Zonotrichia albicollis._
Black-throated Green Warbler. _Dendroica
virens._
American Robin. _Merula migratoria._
Song Sparrow. _Melospiza fasciata._
House Wren. _Troglodytes aedon._
Bobolink. _Dolichonyx oryzivorus._
Meadow Lark. _Sturnella magna._
Eave Swallow. Petrochelidon lunifrons.
Ph[oe]be. _Sayornis ph[oe]be._
Shrike. _Lanius ludovicianus._
II. A MYSTERIOUS STRANGER 35
Red-headed Woodpecker. _Melanerpes erythrocephalus._
Shrike. _Lanius ludovicianus._
III. A THORN-TREE NEST 45
Shrike. _Lanius ludovicianus._
Golden-winged Woodpecker. Colaptes auratus.
Least Flycatcher. Empidonax minimus.
Yellow-billed Cuckoo. Coccyzus Americanus.
IV. THE WITCHING WREN 72
Winter Wren. _Troglodytes hiemalis._
Chipping Sparrow. _Spizella socialis._
V. WHIMSICAL WAYS IN BIRD-LAND 88
Yellow-breasted Chat. Icteria virens.
VI. THE "BIRD OF THE MUSICAL WING" 103
Ruby-throated Hummingbird. _Trochilus colubris._
VII. MY LADY IN GREEN 121
Ruby-throated Hummingbird. _Trochilus colubris._
VIII. YOUNG AMERICA IN FEATHERS 141
Maryland Yellow-throat. _Geothlypis trichus._
Thrasher. _Harporhynchus rufus._
Baltimore Oriole. _Icterus galbula._
Catbird. _Galeoscoptes Carolinensis._
Red-eyed Vireo. _Vireo olivaceus._
American Crow. _Corvus Americanus._
Wilson's Thrush. _Turdus fuscescens._
Towhee Bunting. _Pipilo erythrophthalmus._
IX. DOWN THE MEADOW 163
Golden-winged Woodpecker. _Colaptes auratus._
Red-winged Blackbird. _Agelaius ph[oe]nicens._
Bluebird. _Sialia sialis._
Vesper Sparrow. _Poocaetes gramineus._
Eave Swallow. _Petrochelidon lunifrons._
Tree Swallow. _Tachycineta bicolor._
X. IN A COLORADO NOOK 177
Summer Yellow-bird. _Dendroica aestiva._
Western Chewink. _Pipilo maculatus articus._
Arkansas Goldfinch. _Spinus psaltria._
Maryland Yellow-throat. _Geothlypis trichus._
House Wren. _Troglodytes aedon._
Red-shafted Flicker. _Colaptes cafer._
Western Meadow Lark. _Sturnella magna neglecta._
XI. THE IDYL OF AN EMPTY LOT 192
Night Hawk. _Chordeiles virginianus._
English Sparrow. _Passer domesticus._
Thrasher. _Harporhynchus rufus._
Junco. _Junco hyemalis._
White-throat Sparrow. _Zonotrichia albicollis._
Ruby-crowned Kinglet. _Regulus calendula._
Hermit Thrush. _Turdus aonalaschkae pallasii._
IN THE BIRD-ROOM.
XII. THE SOLITAIRE 205
Clarin. _Myadestes obscurus._
Blue Jay. _Cyanocitta cristata._
Brazilian Cardinal.
Mountain Whistler. _Siffleur montagne._
Trembleur.
Townsend's Fly-catching Thrush. _Myadestes
Townsendii._
XIII. INCOMPATIBILITY IN THE ORIOLE FAMILY 227
Orchard Oriole. _Icterus spurious._
Baltimore Oriole. _Icterus galbula._
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
THE SHRIKE.
_The tug of war_ (page 38) Frontispiece.
THE HERMIT THRUSH.
_Singing his way down to us_ 8
THE SHRIKE.
_Babies in gray_ 36
THE WINTER WREN.
_Cuddled up together on a log_ 86
THE YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT.
_Love-making_ 98
RUBY-THROATED HUMMINGBIRD.
_The nest with my lady upon it_ 110
THE BALTIMORE ORIOLE.
_Feeding the baby_ 150
THE GOLDEN-WINGED WOODPECKER.
_Taking breakfast_ 164
SOLITAIRE AND BLUE JAY.
_Studying the blue jay_ 216
THE ORCHARD ORIOLE.
_The enemy in the glass_ 230
UPON THE TREE-TOPS.
UPON THE TREE-TOPS.
I.
TRAMPS WITH AN ENTHUSIAST.
To a brain wearied by the din of the city, the clatter of wheels, the
jingle of street cars, the discord of bells, the cries of venders, the
ear-splitting whistles of factory and shop, how refreshing is the
heavenly stillness of the country! To the soul tortured by the sight of
ills it cannot cure, wrongs it cannot right, and sufferings it cannot
relieve, how blessed to be alone with nature, with trees living free,
unfettered lives, and flowers content each in its native spot, with
brooks singing of joy and good cheer, with mountains preaching divine
peace and rest!
Thus musing one evening, soon after my arrival at a lone farmhouse in
the heart of the Green Mountains, I seated myself at the window to make
acquaintance with my neighbors. Not the human; I wished for a time to
turn away from the world of people, to find rest and recreation in the
world outside the walls of houses.
My room was a wing lately added to the side of the cottage farthest
from the life that went on in it, from the kitchen and dairy, from the
sight of barns and henhouses. It was, consequently, as solitary as it
could be, and yet retain a slight hold upon humanity. It was connected
with the family and farm life by two doors, which I could shut at will,
and be alone with nature, and especially with the beloved birds.
From my window I looked upon a wide view over the road and the green
fields, and across the river to a lovely range of the Green Mountains,
with one of the highest peaks in the State as a crown. Close at hand was
a bank, the beginning of a mountain spur. It was covered from the road
up with clumps of fresh green ferns and a few young trees,--a maple or
two, half a dozen graceful young hemlocks, and others.
The top of the bank, about as high as my window, was thick with daisy
buds, which I had caught that day beginning to open their eyes,
sleepily, one lash at a time; and on looking closely I saw ranks of them
still asleep, each yellow eye carefully covered with its snow-white
fringes. When the blossoms were fully opened, a few days later, my point
of view--on a level--made even
"The daisy's frill a wondrous newness wear;"
for I saw only the edges of the flower faces turned to the sky, while
the stems were visible down to the ground, and formed a Lilliputian
forest in which it were easy to imagine tiny creatures spending days as
secluded and as happy as I enjoyed in my forest of beech and birch and
maple, which came down to the very back steps of the house.
[Sidenote: _FROM THE WINDOW._]
On the evening when my story begins, early in June, I was sitting, as I
said, at my window, listening to the good-night songs of the earlier
birds, enjoying the view of woods and mountains, and waiting till tea
should be over before taking my usual evening walk. I had fallen into a
reverie, when I was aroused by the sound of wheels, and in a moment a
horse appeared, trotting rapidly up the little hill. In his wake was a
face. There was of course a body also, and some sort of a vehicle, but
neither of them did I see; only a pair of eager, questioning eyes, and
an intelligent countenance framed in snow-white curls which streamed
back upon the wind,--a picture, a vision, I shall never forget.
I recognized at once my Enthusiast, a dear friend and fellow bird-lover,
who I knew was coming to spend some weeks in the village. I rushed to
the door to greet her.
"I'm delighted to see you!" she cried, as we clasped hands across the
wheels. "I arrived an hour or two ago, and now I want to go where I can
hear a hermit thrush. I've come all the way from Chicago to hear that
bird."
She dismounted, declined the invitation to tea given by my hostess, who
stood speechless with amazement at the erratic taste that would forego
tea for the sake of a bird song, and we started at once up the road,
where I had seen the bird perched in a partially dead hemlock-tree, and
heard
"his ravishing carol ring
From the topmost twig he made his throne."
Everything was perfectly still. Not a bird peeped. Even the tireless
vireo, who peopled the woods as the English sparrow the city streets,
was hushed. I began to be anxious; could it be too cool for song? or too
late? We walked steadily on, up the beautiful winding road: on one side
dense forest, on the other lovely changing views of the hills across the
intervale, blue now with approaching night. Crows called as they hurried
over; the little sandpiper's "ah weet! weet! weet!" came up from the
river bank, but in the woods all was silent.
Still we went on, climbing the steep hills, loitering through the
valleys, till suddenly a bird note broke the stillness, quite near us, a
low, yearning "wee-o!"
[Sidenote: _THE WONDERFUL SONG._]
"The veery!" I whispered.
"Is that the veery?" she exclaimed. (She had come from the home of the
wood thrush, where hermit and veery were unknown.)
"Yes," I said; "listen."
Again it came, more plaintive than before; once more, in an almost
agonized tone; and so it continued, ever growing higher in pitch and
more mournful, till we could hardly endure to listen to it. Then arose
the matchless song, the very breath of the woods, the solemn,
mysterious, wonderful song of the bird, and two listeners, at least,
lingered in ecstasy to hear, till it dropped to silence again.
Then, slowly and leisurely, we went on. The dead hemlock, the throne of
the hermit, was vacant. On a bank not far off we sat down to wait,
talking in hushed tones of the veery, of the oven-bird whose rattling
call was now just beginning, of the mysterious "see-here" bird whose
plaintive call was sounding from the upper twig of another dead-topped
tree, of the hermit himself, when, to our amazement, a small bird soared
out of the woods, a few feet above our heads, flew around in a circle of
perhaps fifteen feet in the air, and plunged again into the trees,
singing all the time a rapturous, thrilling song, bewitching both in
manner and in tone.
"The oven-bird!" we exclaimed in a breath. That made our walk
noteworthy. We should not regret, even if the hermit refused to bless
us.
Silently on up the road we passed, till the deepening shadows reminded
us of the hour and the long drive before my friend, and we turned back.
By this time the sun had set, and the sky was filled with gorgeous rosy
clouds floating above the richest red-purple of the mountains. This
surely crowned our walk.
We were sauntering homeward, lingering, waiting, we hardly knew for
what, since we had given up the hermit, when a single bird note arrested
me. Then, as his first rich clause fell upon the air, I turned to my
companion, who was a few steps behind me. She stood motionless, both
hands raised, but dumb.
"Glorious!" she whispered when she recovered her voice. "Wonderful!" she
added, as he warmed into fuller song.
Quietly drawing as near as we dared, we dropped upon the bank and
listened in spellbound silence to our unseen melodist. Slow, rapturous,
entrancing was his song; and when it ended we came reluctantly back to
earth, stole in the growing darkness down to the farm, and my friend
resumed her place in the carriage and drove away, saying with her
good-by, "I am already paid for my long journey."
[Illustration: SINGING HIS WAY DOWN TO US--THE HERMIT THRUSH]
[Sidenote: _STUDY OF THE HERMIT'S SONG._]
Yet after the first surprise and wonder were over, she swung loyally
back to her first love, the wood thrush, of whose sublime voice she
says, "The first solemn opening note transports you instantly into a
holy cathedral."
For myself, I have never been able to choose permanently between these
two glorious singers, and at that time I had been under the spell of the
hermit song for days. Morning after morning I had spent in the woods,
listening to the marvelous voice, and trying to discover its charm.
The bird began to sing his way down to us about ten o'clock in the
morning. I heard him first afar off, then coming nearer and nearer, till
he reached some favorite perch in the woods behind, and very near the
farmhouse, before noon, where he usually sang at intervals till eight
o'clock in the evening. I studied his song carefully. It consisted of
but one clause, composed of a single emphasized note followed by two
triplets on a descending scale. But while retaining the relative
position of these few notes he varied the effect almost infinitely, by
changing both the key and the pitch constantly, with such skill that I
was astonished to discover the remarkable simplicity of the song. A
striking quality of it was an attempt which he frequently made to utter
his clause higher on the scale than he could reach, so that the triplets
became a sort of trill or tremolo, at the very extreme of his register.
Sometimes he gave the triplets alone, without the introductory note; but
never, in the weeks that I studied his song, did he sing other than this
one clause.
It was only with an effort that I could force myself to analyze the
performance. Far easier were it, and far more delightful, to sit
enchanted, to be overwhelmed and intoxicated by his thrilling music. For
me, the hermit voices the sublimity of the deep woods, while the veery
expresses its mystery, its unfathomable remoteness. A wood warbler, on
the contrary, always brings before me the rush and hurry of the world of
people, and the wood pewee its under-current of eternal sadness. Into
the mood induced by the melancholy pewee song breaks how completely and
how happily the cheery optimism of the chickadee! Brooding thoughts are
dissipated, all is not a hollow mockery, and life is still worth living.
[Sidenote: _A PERFECT NOOK._]
Often, when listening to the hermit song, I wondered that at the first
note of the king of singers all other birds were not mute. But evidently
the birds have not enthroned this thrush. Possibly, even, they do not
share human admiration for his song. The redstart goes on jerking out
his monotonous ditty; chippy irreverently mounts a perch and trills out
his inane apology for a song; the vireo in yonder tree spares us not
one of his never-ending platitudes. But the hermit thrush goes on with
sublime indifference to the voices of common folk down below. Sometimes
he is answered from afar by another of his kind, who arranges his notes
a little differently. The two seem to wait for each other, as if not to
mar their divine harmony by vulgar haste or confusion.
* * * * *
"We must find the 'see-here' bird," said my friend the next morning,
when she appeared at the door of the farmhouse, and I joined her for our
second tramp. This was a bird whose long, deliberate notes, sounding
like the above words, had tantalized me from the day of my arrival.
We resolved this time to go into the woods we had skirted the night
before. A set of bars admitted us to a most enticing bit of forest, a
paradise to city-weary eyes and nature-loving hearts. From the bars rose
sharply a rough wood road, while a few steps to the right and a scramble
up a rocky path changed the whole world in a moment. We were in a
perfect nook, which I had discovered a few days before, with a carpet of
dead leaves, a sky of waving branches, the fierce sun shut out by
curtains of living green, the air cooled by a clear mountain stream, and
the "priceless gift of delicious silence"--silence that had haunted my
dreams for months--broken only by the voices of birds, whispers of
leaves, and ripple of brook. In this spot,
"where Nature dwells alone,
Of man unknowing, and to man unknown,"
(as I tried to persuade myself) I had established my out-of-door study,
and here I had spent perfect days, watching the residents of the
vicinity, and saturating my whole being with the delights of sight and
sound and scent till it was thrilling happiness just to be alive. Would
that I could impart the freshness, the fragrance, the heavenly peace of
those days to this chronicle, to comfort and strengthen my readers not
so blessed as to share them!
The dwellers in this delectable spot, where I persuaded my friend to
rest a moment, I had not found altogether what I should have chosen;
for, unfortunately, the place most desirable for the student is not
always the best for birds. They are quite apt to desert the cool, breezy
heights charming to wood-lovers, to build in some impenetrable tangle,
where the ground is wet and full of treacherous quagmires, where
mosquitoes abound, and flies do greatly flourish, where close-growing
branches and leaves keep out every breath of air, and there is no solid
rest for the legs of a camp-stool. Such a difference does it make, as
to a desirable situation, from which side you look at it.
[Sidenote: _A SPORTSMAN IN FUR._]
The principal inhabitant presented himself before we were fairly seated,
a chipmunk, who came out of his snug door under the roots of a
maple-tree and sat up on his doorstep--one of the roots--to make his
morning toilet, dress his sleek fur, scent the sweet fresh air, and
enjoy himself generally. In due time he ran down to the little brook
before the door, and then started out, evidently after something to eat;
and he went nosing about on the ground with a thoroughness to make a
bird-lover shudder, for what ground bird's nest could escape him!
I recognize the fact that, from his point of view, chipmunks must live,
and why should they not have eggs for breakfast? Doubtless, in squirrel
philosophy, it is a self-evident truth that birds were created to supply
the tables of their betters in fur, and the pursuit of eggs and
nestlings adds the true sportsman's zest to the enjoyment of them. So
long, therefore, as the law that "might makes right" prevails in higher
quarters, we are forced to acknowledge, however grudgingly, his "right"
to his game; but for all that I should like exceedingly to protect it
from him.
I could not long keep a bird-lover studying a chipmunk. In a few minutes
we started again on our way up the mountain. Each side of our primitive
wood road was bordered with ferns in their first tender green, many of
them still wearing their droll little hoods. Forward marched the
Enthusiast; breathlessly I followed. Up one little hill, down another,
over a third we hastened.
"See!" I said, hoping to arrest the tireless steps; "on that tree I saw
yesterday a scarlet tanager."
"Oh, did you?" she said carelessly, pausing not an instant in her steady
tramp.
Then rose the note we were listening for, far to the left of the road.
"He's over there!" she cried eagerly, leaving the path, and pushing in
the direction of the sound. "But I'm afraid I shall tire you," she
added. "You sit down here, and I'll just go on a little."
"No, indeed!" I answered hastily, for I knew well what "just go on a
little" meant,--I had tried it before: it meant pass out of sight in two
minutes, and out of hearing in one more, so absorbed in following an
elusive bird note that everything else would be forgotten. "No, indeed!"
I repeated. "I shall not be left in these woods; where you go I follow."
"But I won't go out of sight," she urged, her conscience contending with
her eager desire to proceed, for well she knew that I did not take my
woods by storm in this way.
[Sidenote: _AN ECCENTRIC FOX._]
I said nothing in reply, but I had no intention of being left, for I did
not know what dwellers the forest might contain, and I had a vivid
remembrance of being greatly startled, only a day or two before, by
unearthly cries in these very woods; of seeing a herd of young cattle
rushing frantically away, turning apprehensive glances toward the
sounds, and huddling in a frightened heap down by the bars, while the
strange cries came nearer and nearer, till I should not have been
surprised to see any sort of a horror emerge; of calling out to the
farmer whom I met at the door, "Oh, there's something dreadful up in the
woods!" and his crushing reply, "Yes, I heard it. It's a fox barking; we
hear one now and then."
I cast no doubts on the veracity of that farmer, though I could not but
remember the license men sometimes allow themselves when trying to quiet
fears they consider foolish; nor did his solution seem to account
satisfactorily for the evident terror of the cattle, which had lived in
those woods all their lives, and had no reason to fear the "bark" of a
fox. I preferred, therefore, not to encounter any such eccentric "fox"
alone; hence I refused to listen to my friend's entreaties, but simply
followed on, over fallen tree-trunks, under drooping branches, and
through unyielding brush; now sinking ankle-deep in a pile of dead
leaves, now catching my hair in a broken branch, and now nearly falling
over a concealed root; wading through swamps, sliding down banks,
cutting and tearing our shoes, and leaving bits of our garments
everywhere. On we went recklessly, intent upon one thing only,--seeing
the bird who, enthroned on his tree-top, calmly and serenely uttered his
musical "see-e he-e-re!" while we struggled and scrambled and fought our
way down below.
We reached a steep bank, and paused a moment, breathless, disheveled,
_my_ interest in the beguiler long ago cooled.
"There's a brook down there," I said hastily; "we can't cross it."
Could we not? But we did, at the expense of a little further rending,
and the addition of wet feet to our other discomforts. But at last! at
last! we came in sight of our bird, a mere black speck against the sky.
"It's a flycatcher!" exclaimed my companion eagerly. "See his attitude!
I must get around the other side!" and on we went again. A fence loomed
before us, a fence of brush, impossible to get through, and almost as
impossible to get over. But what were any of man's devices to an eager
bird-hunter! Over that fence she went--like a bird, I was going to say,
but like a boy would perhaps be better. More leisurely and with
difficulty I followed, for once on the other side I should be content. I
knew the road could not be far off, and through the tangled way we had
come I was resolved I would not pass again.
[Sidenote: _UPON THE TREE-TOP._]
Well, we ran him down. He was obliging enough to stay in one spot,
indifferent to our noisy presence on the earth below, while we studied
him on all sides, and decided him to be the olive-sided flycatcher
(_Contopus borealis_). We entered his name and his manners in our
notebooks, and we were happy, or at least relieved.
The habit of this bird, as I learned by observation of him afterward,
was to sit on the highest twig of a tree dead at the top, where he could
command a view of the whole neighborhood, and sing or call by the hour,
in a loud, drawling, and rather plaintive tone, somewhat resembling the
wood pewee's, though more animated in delivery. I found that the two
notes which syllabled themselves to my ear as "see-e he-e-re!" were
prefaced by a low, staccato utterance like "quick!" and all were on the
same note of the musical scale. Occasionally, but not often, he made a
dash into the air, flycatcher fashion, and once I saw him attempt to
drive away a golden-winged woodpecker who took the liberty of alighting
on a neighboring dead tree-trunk. Down upon him like a small tornado
came the flycatcher instantly, expecting, apparently, to annihilate him.
But the big, clumsy woodpecker merely slid one side a little, to avoid
the onslaught, and calmly went on dressing his feathers as if no small
flycatcher existed. This indifference did not please the olive-sided,
but he alighted on a branch below and bided his time; it came soon, when
the goldenwing took flight, and he came down upon him like a kingbird on
a crow. I heard the snap of the woodpecker's beak as he passed into the
thick woods, but nobody was hurt, and the flycatcher returned to his
perch.
When we had rested a little after our mad rush through the woods, we
found that the hours were slipping away, and we must go. Passing down
the road at the edge of the woods, we were about to cross a tiny brook,
when our eyes fell upon a distinguished personage at his bath. He was a
rose-breasted grosbeak, and we instantly stopped to see him. He did not
linger, but gave himself a thorough splashing, and flew at once to a
tree, where he began dressing his plumage in frantic haste, as if he
knew he was a "shining mark" for man and beast. He stayed half a minute
on one branch, jerked a few feathers through his beak, then flew to
another place and hurriedly dressed a few more; and so he kept on,
evidently excited and nervous at being temporarily disabled by wet
feathers, though I do not think he knew he had human observers, for we
were at some distance and perfectly motionless. He was a beauty, even
for his lovely family, and the rose color of his wing-linings was the
most gorgeous I ever saw.
[Sidenote: _DRESSING IN A HURRY._]
Moreover, I knew this bird, later, to be as useful as he was beautiful.
He it was who took upon himself the care of the potato-patch in the
garden below, spending hours every day in clearing off the destructive
potato-beetle, singing as he went to and from his labors, and, when the
toils of the day were over, treating us to a delicious evening song from
the top of a tree close by.
In that way the grosbeak's time was spent till babies appeared in the
hidden nest, when everything was changed, and he set to work like any
hod-carrier; appearing silently, near the house, on the lowest board of
the fence, looking earnestly for some special luxury for baby beaks. No
more singing on the tree-tops, no more hunting of the beetle in stripes;
food more delicate was needed now, and he found it among the brakes that
grew in clumps all about under my window. It was curious to see him
searching, hopping upon a stalk which bent very much with his weight,
peering eagerly inside; then on another, picking off something; then
creeping between the stems, going into the bunch out of sight, and
reappearing with his mouth full; then flying off to his home. This bird
was peculiarly marked, so that I knew him. The red of his breast was
continued in a narrow streak down through the white, as if the color had
been put on wet, and had dripped at the point.
* * * * *
The third tramp with my Enthusiast was after a warbler. To my fellow
bird-students that tells a story. Who among them has not been bewitched
by one of those woodland sprites, led a wild dance through bush and
brier, satisfied and happy if he could catch an occasional glimpse of
the flitting enchanter!
This morning we drove a mile or two out of the village, hitched our
horse,--a piece of perfection, who feared nothing, never saw anything on
the road, and would stand forever if desired,--and started into the
pasture. The gate passed, we had first to pick our way through a bog
which had been cut by cows' hoofs into innumerable holes and pitfalls,
and then so overgrown by weeds and moss that we could not always tell
where it was safe to put a foot. We consoled ourselves for the
inconvenience by reflecting that a bog on the side of a mountain must
probably be a provision of Mother Nature's, an irrigating scheme for the
benefit of the hillside vegetation. If all the water ran off at once, we
argued, very little could grow there. So we who love to see our hills
covered with trees should not complain, but patiently seek the
stepping-stones sometimes to be found, or meekly resign ourselves to
going in over boot-tops without a word.
[Sidenote: _THE HERMIT'S NEST._]
Our first destination was the nest of a hermit thrush, discovered by my
friend the day before; and we stumbled and slipped and picked our way a
long distance over the dismal swamp, floundering on till we reached a
clump of young hemlocks, on ground somewhat more solid, where we could
sit down to rest. There was the nest right before us, a nicely made,
compact bird home, exquisitely placed in one of the little trees, a foot
from the ground.
While waiting for the owners to appear, I was struck with the beauty of
the young hemlocks, so different from most evergreen trees. From the
time a hemlock has two twigs above ground it is always picturesque in
its method of growth. Its twigs, especially the topmost one, bend over
gracefully like a plume. There is no rigid uniformity among the smaller
branches, no two appear to be of the same length, but there is an
artistic variety that makes of the little tree a thing of beauty. When
it puts out new leaves in the early summer, and every twig is tipped
with light green, it is particularly lovely, as if in bloom.
How different the mathematical precision of the spruce, which might
indeed have been laid out upon geometrical lines! When a baby spruce has
but three twigs, one will stand stiffly upright, as if it bore the
responsibility of upholding the spruce traditions of the ages, while the
other twigs will duly spread themselves at nearly right angles, leaving
their brother to represent the aspirations of the family, and thus even
in infancy reproduce in miniature the full-grown, formal tree.
When, after waiting some time in vain for the birds to appear, we
examined the nest before us, we found that it held two thrush eggs and
one of the cowbird. The impertinence of this disreputable bird in
thrusting her plebeian offspring upon the divine songster, to rear at
the expense of her own lovely brood, was not to be tolerated. The dirty
speckled egg looked strangely out of place among the gems that belonged
to the nest, and I removed it, careful not to touch nest or eggs. So
pertinacious is this parasite upon bird society that my friend says that
in Illinois, where the wood thrush represents the charming family,
almost every wood thrush nest, in the early summer, contains a cowbird's
egg; and not until they have reared one of the intruders can the birds
hope to have a brood of their own. Fortunately they nest twice in the
season, and the cowbird does not disturb the second family.
[Sidenote: _A DISTURBER OF NESTS._]
While we sat watching the hermit's nest, we were attracted by another
resident of that cozy group of hemlocks and maples. He appeared upon a
low shrub within twenty feet of us, and began to sing. First came a
long, deliberate note of the clearest and sweetest tone, then two
similar notes, a third higher, followed by three triplets on the same
note. Though dressed in sparrow garb, his colors were bright, and he was
distinguished and made really beautiful by two broad lines of
buff-tinted white over his crown, and a snowy white throat. He was the
white-throated sparrow, one of the largest and most interesting of his
family. The charm of his song is its clearness of tone and
deliberateness of utterance. It is calm as the morning, finished,
complete, and almost the only bird song that can be perfectly imitated
by a human whistle. I never shared the enthusiasm of some of my fellow
bird-lovers for the sparrows till I knew the white-throat and learned to
love the dear little song sparrow. It is unfortunate that the song of
the former has been translated into a word so unworthy as "peabody," and
that the name "peabody bird" has become fastened on him in New England.
Far more appropriate the words applied by Elizabeth Akers Allen to an
unknown singer,--possibly this very bird,--embodied in her beautiful
poem "The Sunset Thrush." For whatever bird it was intended, the
syllables and arrangement correspond to the white-throat's utterance,
and the words are, "Sweet! sweet! sweet! Sorrowful! sorrowful!
sorrowful!"
A white-throat who haunted the neighborhood of my farmhouse did not
confine himself to the family song; which, by the way, varies less with
this species than with any other I know. At first, for some time, he
entirely omitted the triplets, making his song consist of four long
notes, the fourth being in place of the triplets. Then, later, he
dropped the last note a half tone below the others, still omitting the
triplets, which, in fact, in three or four weeks of listening and
watching, I never once heard him utter. In July of that year, in passing
over the Canadian Pacific Railway on my way West, I heard innumerable
songs by this bird. Every time the train stopped, white-throat voices
rang out on all sides, and with considerable variety. Many dropped half
a tone at the end, and some uttered the triplets on that note, while
others began the song on a higher note, and gave the rest a third below,
instead of above, as usual.
[Sidenote: _FINDING BIRDS'-NESTS._]
But to return to the singer before us on that memorable day. After
singing a long time, he suddenly began to utter the first two notes
alone, and then apparently to listen. We also listened, and soon heard a
reply of the same two notes on a different pitch. These responsive calls
were kept up for some time, and seemed to be signals between the bird
and his mate; for neither she nor her nest could be found, though the
pair had been startled out of that very bush on the preceding day. We
searched the clumps of shrubs carefully, but without success.
I long ago came to the conclusion that the ability to find nests easily
is as truly a natural gift as the ability to become a musician, or the
power to see a statue in a block of marble. That gift is not mine. I
have an almost invincible repugnance to poking into bushes and thrusting
aside branches to discover who has hidden there. Moreover, if a bird
seems anxious or alarmed, I never can bear to disturb her. Nor indeed do
I care to find many nests. A long list of nests found in a season gives
me no pleasure; how many birds belong to a certain district does not
concern me in the least. But if I have really studied one or two nests,
and made acquaintance with the tricks and manners of the small dwellers
therein, I am satisfied and happy.
While we lingered in the little hemlock grove, enraptured with the
white-throat, and feeling that
"Here were the place to lie alone all day
On shadowed grass, beneath the blessed trees,"
a distant note reached our ever-listening ears. It was the voice of a
warbler, and a most alluring song. Such indeed we found it, for on the
instant the Enthusiast sprang to her feet, alert to her finger-tips,
crying, "That's the bird we're after!" adding as usual, as she started
across the field, "You sit still! I won't go far," while as usual, also,
I snatched my things and followed.
The song was in the tone of one of the most bewitching as well as the
most elusive of warblers, the black-throated green; a bird not so big as
one's thumb, with a provoking fondness for the tops of the tallest
trees, where foliage is thickest, and for keeping in constant motion,
flitting from twig to twig, and from tree to tree, throwing out as he
goes
"The sweetest sound that ever stirred
A warbler's throat."
This one was tireless, as are all of his tribe, and led us a weary dance
over big, steep-sided rocks, through more and more bogs, over a fence,
and out of our open fields into deep woods.
[Sidenote: "_YOU SIT STILL._"]
Now, my companion in these tramps has a rooted opinion that she is
easily fatigued, and must rest frequently; and I have no doubt it is
true, when she has no strong interest to urge her on. So she used to
burden herself with a clumsy waterproof, to throw on the ground to sit
upon; and in compliance with this notion (which was most amusing to
those whom she tired out in her tramps), whenever she thought of
it--that is, when the bird voice was still for a moment--she would seek
a sloping bank, or a place beside a tree where she could lean, and then
throw herself down, determined to rest. But always in one minute or
less, the warbler would be sure to begin again, when away went good
resolutions and fatigue, and she sprang up like a Jack-in-the-box,
saying, of course, "You sit still; I'll just go on a little," and off we
went over brake and brier.
While pursuing this vocal _ignis fatuus_ I made a charming discovery. In
one of the temporary pauses in our wild career, I was startled by the
flight of a bird from the ground very near us, and, searching about, I
soon found a veery's nest with one egg. It was daintily placed in a
clump of brakes or big ferns, resting on a fallen stick, over and around
which the brakes had grown.
The bird was not so pleased with my discovery as I was. She perched on a
tree over our heads, and uttered the mournful veery cry; and though I
did not so much as lay a finger on that nest, I believe she deserted it
at that moment, for several days afterward it was found exactly as on
that day, with its one egg cold and abandoned.
If I had not, through two summers' close study, made myself very
familiar with the various calls and cries of the veery, I think I should
be driven wild by them; for no bird that I know can impart such distance
to his notes, and few can get around so silently and unobserved as he. A
great charm in his song is that it rarely bursts upon your notice; it
appears to steal into your consciousness, and in a moment the air seems
full of his breezy, woodsy music, his "quivering, silvery song," as
Cheney calls it.
Not long were we allowed to meditate upon the charms of the veery, for
again the luring song began, the other side of the belt of woods, and
off we started anew. This time we secured the bird, or his name, which
was all we desired. The sweet beguiler turned out to be the warbler
mentioned above, the black-throated green, but with a more than usually
exquisite arrangement of his notes. Indeed, my friend, who was what I
call warbler-mad,--a state of infatuation I have with care and
difficulty guarded myself against,--heard in the woods of the
neighborhood, during that summer's visit, no less than four different
songs from the same species of warbler.
[Sidenote: _THE LAST TRAMP._]
While slowly and weariedly dragging myself back to where our patient
horse stood waiting, I fell into meditation on this way of making the
study of nature hard work instead of rest and refreshment, and the
comparative merits of chasing up one's birds and waiting for them to
come about one. Without doubt the choice of method is due largely to
temperament, but I think it will be found that most of our nature-seers
have followed the latter course.
* * * * *
June was now drawing to an end, and the day of my friend's departure had
nearly arrived. One more tramp remained to us. It was a walk up a long,
lonely road to a solitary thorn-tree, where I was studying a shrike's
nest.
Just as we left the village a robin burst into song, and this bird,
because of certain associations, was the Enthusiast's favorite singer.
We paused to listen. When bird music begins to wane, when thrushes have
taken their broods afar, and orioles and catbirds are heard no more, one
appreciates the hearty philosophy, the cheerful and pleasing song, of
the robin. It is truly delightful then to hear his noisy challenge, his
gleeful "laugh," his jolly song. We may indeed rhapsodize over our rare,
fine singers, but after all we could better spare one and all of them
than our two most common songsters, our faithful stand-bys, upon whom we
can always count to preach to us the gospel of contentment,
cheerfulness, and patience,--the dear common robin and the blessed
little song sparrow. No weather is so hot that they will not pour out
their evangel to us; no rain so wet, no wind so strong, that these two
will not let their sweet voices be heard. Blessed, I say, be the common
birds, living beside our dwellings, bringing up their young under our
very eyes, accepting our advances in a spirit of friendliness, coming
earliest, staying latest, and keeping up their song even through the
season of feeding, when many become silent. These two are indispensable
to us; these two should be dearest to us; these, above all others,
should our children be taught to respect and love.
The robin ceased, and we passed on. One more voice saluted us from the
last house of the village: a wren, whose nest was placed in a bracket
under the roof, sang his gushing little ditty, and then in a moment we
were in a different bird world. From one side came the bobolink's
voice,
"Preaching boldly to the sad the folly of despair,
And telling whom it may concern that all the world is fair;"
from the other, the plaintive notes of the meadow lark.
[Sidenote: _THE LARK'S "SPUTTER."_]
Lovely indeed the lark looked among the buttercups in the pasture,
stretching himself up from the ground, tall and slim, and almost as
yellow as they; and very droll his sputtering cry, as he flew over the
road to the deep grass of the meadow, to attend to the wants of his
family, for the meadow was full of mysterious sounds under the grass,
and seemed to give both bobolink and lark much concern.
The call I name the "sputter," because it sounds like nothing else on
earth, is a sort of "retching" note followed by several sputtering
utterances, hard to describe, but not unpleasant to hear, perhaps
because it suggests the meadow under the warm sun of June, with
bobolinks soaring and singing, and a populous colony beneath the long
grass. Now night was coming on, and the larks were passing from the
pasture, where they seemed to spend most of the day, some with song and
some with sputter, over the road, to drop into the grass and be seen no
more;
"While through the blue of the sky the swallows, flitting and flinging,
Sent their slender twitterings down from a thousand throats."
Sometimes, on that lonely road, which I passed over several times a day,
I was treated to a fairy-like sight. It was when a recent shower had
left little puddles in the clay road, and the eave swallows from a house
across the meadow came down to procure material for their adobe
structures. Most daintily they alighted on their tiny feet around the
edge, holding up their tails like wrens, lest they should soil a feather
of their plumage, and raising both wings over their backs like
butterflies, fluttering them all the time, as if to keep their balance
and partly hold them up from the ground,--a lovely sight which I enjoyed
several times.
Under the eaves of the distant house, where the nests of these birds
were placed, and which I visited later, were evidences of tragedies. The
whole length of the cornice on the back side of the house showed marks
of many nests, and there were left at that time but four, two close
together at each end of the line. I cannot say positively that the nests
had fallen while in use, but in another place, a mile away, I know of a
long row having fallen, with young in, every one of whom was killed.
Where was the "instinct" of the birds whose hopes thus perished? And was
the trouble with their material or with their situation? I noticed this:
that the nests had absolutely nothing to rest on, not even a projecting
board. They were plastered against a perfectly plain painted board.
[Sidenote: _THE PH[OE]BE'S TALK._]
Another bird whom I caught in a new role, apparently giving a lesson in
food-hunting to a youngster, was a ph[oe]be. Hearing a new and strange
cry, mingled with tones of a voice familiar to me, I looked up, and
discovered a young and an old ph[oe]be. The elder kept up a running
series of remarks in the tone peculiar to the species, while the infant
answered, at every pause, by a querulous single note in a higher key.
Every moment or two the instructor would fly out and capture something,
talking all the while, as if to say, "See how easy it is!" but careful
not to give the food to the begging and complaining pupil. No sooner did
the parent alight than the youngster was after him, following him
everywhere he went. After a while the old bird flew away, when that
deceiving little rogue took upon himself the business of fly-catching.
He flew out, snapped his beak, and, returning to his perch, wiped it
carefully. Yet when the elder returned he at once resumed his begging
and crying, as if starved and unable to help himself.
A friend and bird-student, whose home is in these mountains, assures me
that the ph[oe]bes in this vicinity do not confine themselves to the
traditional family cry, but have a really pleasing song, which she has
heard several times. That, then, is another of the supposed songless
birds added to the list of singers. I know both the kingbird and the
wood pewee sing, not, to be sure, in a way to be compared to the
thrushes, though far excelling the utterances of the warblers. But why
are they so shy of exhibiting their talent? Why do they make such a
secret of it? Can it be that they are just developing their musical
abilities?
When we reached the thorn-tree, on that last evening, we seated
ourselves on the bank beside the road, to enjoy the music of the meadow,
and to see the shrike family. At the nest all was still, probably
settled for the night, but the "lord and master" of that snug homestead
stood on a tall maple-tree close by, in dignified silence, watching our
movements, no doubt. We waited some time, but he refused either to go or
to relax his vigilance in the least, till the hour grew late, and we
were obliged to turn back.
The sun had set, and the sky was filled, as on that first evening, with
soft, rosy sunset clouds, and the distant mountains, with Jay Peak for a
crown, were clothed in gorgeous purple again. With all this beauty
before us, we slowly walked back to the village, and I felt it a fitting
close to my delightful if exhausting tramps with an Enthusiast.
II.
A MYSTERIOUS STRANGER.
My first sight of the little stranger was one morning when returning
from a long stroll in search of a nest of the red-headed woodpecker. It
was not through the woods I had been, as might be expected. I did not
search the dead limbs or lifeless trees; on the contrary, I followed the
dusty road and examined the telegraph poles, for the woodpecker of these
latter days has departed from the ways of his fathers, deserted the cool
and fragrant woods, and taken up his abode in degenerate places, a
fitting change of residence to follow his change of habit from digging
his prey out of the tree-trunks to catching it on the wing.
On this special morning I found holes enough, and birds enough, but no
hole that seemed to belong to any particular bird; and as I walked along
home by the railroad, I came upon my little stranger. He was seated
comfortably, as it appeared, on a telegraph wire, so comfortably,
indeed, that he did not care to disturb himself for any stray mortal who
might chance to pass.
I stopped to look, and hurriedly note his points, fearing every moment
that he would take wing; but not a feather stirred. A king on his throne
could not be more absolutely indifferent to a passer-by than this little
beauty. He was self-possessed as a thrush, and serene as a dove, but he
was not conveniently placed for study, being above my head in strong
sunlight, against a glaring sky. I could see only that his under parts
were beautiful fluffy white dusted with blue-gray, and that he had black
on the wings. He was somewhat smaller than a robin, and held his tail
with the grace of a catbird.
On several subsequent days I passed that way frequently, sometimes
seeing the bird alone, again with a comrade, but always noting the same
reserved and composed manners, and always so placed that I could not see
his markings. It was not until a week or ten days later that I had a
more satisfactory view.
[Illustration: BABIES IN GRAY--THE SHRIKE]
[Sidenote: _BABIES IN GRAY._]