Part 9

They who have seen much of birds, and attended to their actions, will in general be certain of the creature that flits past, by the manner of its flight; or that utters its note unseen by the peculiarity of voice; but the tribe of titmice (parus), especially in the spring of the year, emit such a variety of sounds, that they will occasionally surprise and disappoint us. Hearing an unusual voice, and creeping with caution to observe the stranger from which it proceeds, we perceive only our old acquaintance, the large tom-tit (parus major), searching for food amid the lichens on the bough of an apple-tree. This bird, and that little dark species the “coal,” or “colemouse” (parus ater), in particular, will often acquire or compound a note, become delighted with it, and repeat it incessantly while sporting about the catkins of the alder, for an hour or so, then seem to forget or be weary of it, and we hear it no more.

Our tall hedge-rows and copses are frequented by a very amusing little bird, the long-tailed titmouse (parus caudatus). Our boys call it the long-tailed tom-tit, long tom, poke-pudding, and various other names. It seems the most restless of little creatures, and is all day long in a state of progression from tree to tree, from hedge to hedge, jerking through the air with its long tail like a ball of feathers, or threading the branches of a tree, several following each other in a little stream; the leading bird uttering a shrill cry of twĭt, twĭt, twĭt, and away they all scuttle to be first, stop for a second, and then are away again, observing the same order and precipitation the whole day long. The space travelled by these diminutive creatures in the course of their progresses from the first move till the evening roost must be considerable; yet, by their constant alacrity and animation, they appear fully equal to their daily task. We have no bird more remarkable for its family association than this parus. It is never seen alone, the young ones continuing to accompany each other from the period of their hatching until their pairing in spring. Its food is entirely insects, which it seeks among mosses and lichens, the very smallest being captured by the diminutive bill of this creature. Its nest is as singular in construction as the bird itself. Even in years long passed away, when, a nesting boy, I strung my plunder on the benty grass, it was my admiration; and I never see it now without secretly lauding the industry of these tiny architects. It is shaped like a bag, and externally fabricated of moss and different herbaceous lichens, collected chiefly from the sloe (lichen prunastri), and the maple (lichen farinaceus); but the inside contains such a profusion of feathers, that it seems rather filled than lined with them, a perfect feather-bed! I remember finding fourteen or sixteen pealike eggs within this downy covert, and many more were reported to have been found. The excessive labor of the parent birds in the construction and collection of this mass of materials is exceeded by none that I know of; and the exertions of two little creatures in providing for, and feeding, with all the incumbrances of feathers and tails, fourteen young ones, in such a situation, surpasses in diligence and ingenuity the efforts of any other birds, persevering as they are, that I am acquainted with.

We might naturally suppose that by the end of winter, all those little birds which are solely supported by insect food would find some difficulty in providing for their wants, having consumed by their numbers and exertions nearly all that store of provision which had been provided in the summer and deposited in safety; but I have found the stomachs of the tree-creeper, and this small titmouse, even in February, quite filled with parts of coleopterous creatures, which by their activity and perseverance they had been enabled to procure beneath the mosses on the branches, and from the chinks in the bark of trees, where they had retired in autumn. Such plenty being procurable after the supply of so many months, renders it apparent that there is no actual deficiency of food at any one period of the year. The small slugs, and some few insects, may perhaps be consumed by the severity of winter, but the larger portion of them are so constituted, as to derive no injury from the inclemency of that season, but afford during many months provender to other creatures, multitudes yet remaining to continue their races and animate the air, when the warm days of spring shall waken them to active life.

The construction and selected situations of the nests of birds are as remarkable, as the variety of materials employed in them; the same forms, places, and articles, being rarely, perhaps never, found united by the different species, which we should suppose similar necessities would direct to a uniform provision. Birds that build early in the spring seem to require warmth and shelter for their young, and the blackbird and the thrush line their nests with a plaster of loam, perfectly excluding, by these cottage-like walls, the keen icy gales of our opening year; yet should accident bereave the parents of their first hopes, they will construct another, even when summer is far advanced, upon the model of their first erection, and with the same precautions against severe weather, when all necessity for such provision has ceased, and the usual temperature of the season rather requiring coolness and a free circulation of air. The house-sparrow will commonly build four or five times in the year, and in a variety of situations, under the warm eaves of our houses and our sheds, the branch of the clustered fir, or the thick tall hedge that bounds our garden, &c.; in all which places, and without the least consideration of site or season, it will collect a great mass of straws and hay, and gather a profusion of feathers from the poultry-yard to line its nest. This cradle for its young, whether under our tiles in March or in July, when the parent bird is panting in the common heat of the atmosphere, has the same provision made to afford warmth to the brood; yet this is a bird that is little affected by any of the extremes of our climate. The wood-pigeon and the jay, though they erect their fabrics on the tall underwood in the open air, will construct them so slightly, and with such a scanty provision of materials, that they seem scarcely adequate to support their broods, and even their eggs may almost be seen through the loosely connected materials: but the goldfinch, that inimitable spinner, the Arachnè of the grove, forms its cradle of fine mosses and lichens, collected from the apple or the pear-tree, compact as a felt, lining it with the down of thistles besides, till it is as warm as any texture of the kind can be, and it becomes a model for beautiful construction. The golden- crested wren, a minute creature, perfectly unmindful of any severity in our winter, and which hatches its young in June, the warmer portion of our year, yet builds its most beautiful nest with the utmost attention to warmth; and, interweaving small branches of moss with the web of the spider, forms a closely compacted texture nearly an inch in thickness, lining it with such a profusion of feathers, that, sinking deep into this downy accumulation, it seems almost lost itself when sitting, and the young, when hatched, appear stifled with the warmth of their bedding and the heat of their apartment; while the whitethroat, the blackcap, and others, which will hatch their young nearly at the same period, or in July, will require nothing of the kind. A few loose bents and goose- grass, rudely entwined with perhaps the luxury of some scattered hairs, are perfectly sufficient for all the wants of these; yet they are birds that live only in genial temperatures, feel nothing of the icy gales that are natural to our pretty indigenous artists, but flit from sun to sun and we might suppose would require much warmth in our climate during the season of incubation; but it is not so. The green-finch places its nest in the hedge with little regard to concealment; its fabric is slovenly and rude, and the materials of the coarsest kinds: while the chaffinch, just above it in the elm, hides its nest with cautious care, and moulds it with the utmost attention to order, neatness, and form. One bird must have a hole in the ground; to another a crevice in a wall, or a chink in a tree, is indispensable. The bull-finch requires fine roots for its nest; the gray flycatcher will have cobwebs for the outworks of its shed. All the parus tribe, except the individual above- mentioned, select some hollow in a tree or cranny in a wall, and, sheltered as such places must be, yet will they collect abundance of feathers and warm materials for their infants’ beds. Endless examples might be found of the dissimilarity of requirements in these constructions among the several associates of our groves, our hedges, and our houses; and yet the supposition cannot be entertained for a moment that they are superfluous, or not essential for some purpose with which we are unacquainted. By how many of the ordinations of supreme intelligence is our ignorance made manifest! Even the fabrication of the nests of these little animals exceeds our comprehension—we know none of the causes or motives of that unbodied mind that willed them thus.

One notice more of the parus tribe (the parus cæruleus), and these little creatures may retire to their leafy shades and be forgotten. I was lately exceedingly pleased in witnessing the maternal care and intelligence of this bird; for the poor thing had its young ones in the hole of a wall, and the nest had been nearly all drawn out of the crevice by the paw of a cat, and part of its brood devoured. In revisiting its family, the bird discovered a portion of it remaining, though wrapped up and hidden in the tangled moss and feathers of their bed, and it then drew the whole of the nest back into the place from whence it had been taken, unrolled and resettled the remaining little ones, fed them with the usual attentions, and finally succeeded in rearing them. The parents of even this reduced family labored with great perseverance to supply its wants, one or the other of them bringing a grub, caterpillar, or some insect, at intervals of less than a minute through the day, and probably in the earlier part of the morning more frequently; but if we allow that they brought food to the hole every minute for fourteen hours, and provided for their own wants also, it will admit of perhaps a thousand grubs a day for the requirements of one, and that a diminished brood; and give us some comprehension of the infinite number requisite for the summer nutriment of our soft-billed birds, and the great distances gone over by such as have young ones, in their numerous trips from hedge to tree in the hours specified, when they have full broods to support. A climate of moisture and temperature like ours is peculiarly favorable for the production of insect food, which would in some seasons be particularly injurious, were we not visited by such numbers of active little friends to consume it.

The raven (corvus corax) does not build with us. A pair indeed attempted to raise a brood in our wych elm; but they love retirement and quiet, and were soon scared away, and made no second trial. Ravens visit us, however, frequently, and always during the lambing season, watching for any weak and deserted creature, which, when perceived, is instantly deprived of its eyes; but they make no long stay in our pastures. They abide nowhere in fact, but move from place to place, where food may chance to be found. Should an animal die, or a limb of fresh carrion be on the hooks in the tree, the hoarse croak of the raven is sure immediately to be heard, calling his congeners to the banquet. We see it daily in its progress of inspection, or high in the air on a transit to other regions, hastening, we conjecture, to some distant prey. With the exception of the snipe, no bird seems more universally spread over the surface of our globe than the raven, inhabiting every zone, the hot, the temperate, the severe—feeding upon, and removing noxious substances from the earth, of which it obtains intimation by means of a faculty we have little conception of. Sight it cannot be; and we know not of any fetor escaping from an animal previous to putrescence, so subtile as to call these scavengers of nature from the extremity of one county to that of another; for it is manifest, from the height which they preserve in their flight, and the haste they are making, that their departure has been from some far distant station, having a remote and urgent object in contemplation.

In England the raven does not seem to abound; but it is most common on the shores of harbors, or near great rivers, where animal substances are more frequently to be met with than in inland places. In Greenland, and Iceland, where putrescent fishy substances abound, they appear to be almost domesticated. Horace calls the raven “annosa cornix;” and in a tame state it has attained a very long life. How long extended its existence may be, when roaming in an unrestricted state, we have no means of ascertaining. This liberty may be most favorable to longevity; yet, from the numerous contingencies attending the condition of these creatures, it is probable that few of them live out all their days, so as to become the “bird of ages.” However, the supposed longevity they have attained, their frequent mention and agency in holy writ, the obscure knowledge we possess of their powers and motives, with the gravity of their deportment, like an “all-knowing bird,” have acquired for them, from very remote periods, the veneration of mankind. The changes in our manners and ideas, in respect to many things, have certainly deprived them of much of this reverence; yet the almost supernatural information which they obtain of the decease, or approaching dissolution, of an animal, claims still some admiration for them. This supposed faculty of “smelling death” formerly rendered their presence, or even their voice, ominous to all, as

“The hateful messengers of heavy things, Of death and dolor telling;”

and the unusual sound of their harsh croak, still, when illness is in the house, with some timid and affectionate persons, brings old fancies to remembrance, savoring of terror and alarm. I am no friend to the superstition of converting natural transactions, or occasional events, into signs and indications of coming things; superstitions are wearing out, and shortly will waste away, and be no more heard of; but I fear, in their place, deism, infidelity, impiety, have started up, the offspring of intuitive wisdom: the first belief arises from weakness and ignorance; the latter disbelief is ingratitude, pride, wickedness.

Of the natural duration of animal life it is, from many circumstances, difficult to form an accurate statement, the wild creatures being in great measure removed from observation, and those in a condition of domestication being seldom permitted to live as long as their bodily strength would allow. It was formerly supposed that the length of animal life was in proportion to its duration in utero, or the space it remained in the parent from conception to birth, and the length of time it required to obtain maturity. This notion might have some support in reason and fact, occasionally, but in many cases was incorrect, and in regard to birds had no foundation. Herbivorous animals probably live longer than carnivorous ones, vegetable food being most easily obtainable in all seasons in a regular and requisite supply; whereas animals that subsist on flesh, or by the capture of prey, are necessitated at one period to pine without food, and at another are gorged with superfluity: and when the bodily powers of rapacious creatures become impaired, existence is difficult to support, and gradually ceases; but with herbivorous animals in the same condition, supply is not equally precarious, or wholly denied. Yet it is probable that few animals in a perfectly wild state live to a natural extinction of life. In a state of domestication, the small number of carnivorous creatures about us are sheltered and fed with care, seldom are in want of proper food, and at times are permitted to await a gradual decay, continuing as long as nature permits; and by such attentions many have attained to a great age; but this is rather an artificial than a natural existence. Our herbivorous animals, being kept mostly for profit, are seldom allowed to remain beyond approaching age; and when its advances trench upon our emoluments by diminishing the supply of utility, we remove them. The uses of the horse, though time may reduce them, are often protracted; and our gratitude for past services, or interest in what remains, prompts us to support his life by prepared food of easy digestion, or requiring little mastication, and he certainly by such means attains to a longevity probably beyond the contingencies of nature. I have still a favorite pony—for she has been a faithful and able performer of all the duties required of her in my service for upwards of two-and-twenty years—and, though now above five-and-twenty years of age, retains all her powers perfectly, without any diminution or symptom of decrepitude; the fineness of limb, brilliancy of eye, and ardor of spirit, are those of the colt and though treated with no remarkable care, she has never been disabled by the illness of a day, or sickened by the drench of the farrier. With birds it is probably the same as with other creatures, and the eagle, the raven, the parrot, &c., in a domestic state attain great longevity; and though we suppose them naturally tenacious of life, yet, in a really wild state, they would probably expire before the period which they attain when under our attention and care. And this is much the case with man who probably outlives most other creatures; for though excess may often shorten, and disease or misfortune terminate his days, yet naturally he is a long- lived animal. His “threescore years and ten” are often prolonged by constitutional strength, and by the cares, the loves, the charities, of human nature. As the decay of his powers awakens solicitude, duty and affection increase their attentions, and the spark of life only expires when the material is exhausted.

That rare bird the crossbill (loxia curvirostra) occasionally visits the orchards in our neighborhood, coming in little parties to feed upon the seeds of the apple; and, seldom as it appears, is always noticed by the mischief it does to the fruit, by cutting it asunder with its well- constructed mandibles, in order to obtain the kernels. A native of those extensive pine forests in the neighborhood of the Rhine, it makes excursions into various parts of Europe in search of change of food; and, though several instances are recorded of its visits to our island, I know but one mention of its having bred in England. A pair was brought to me very early in August, and the breast of the female being nearly bare of feathers, as is observable in sitting birds, it is very probable that she had a nest in the neighborhood.

Gesner has called the common rook (corvus frugilegus) a corn-eating bird. Linnæus has somewhat lightened this epithet by considering it only as a gatherer of corn; to neither of which names do I believe it entitled, as it appears to live solely upon grubs, various insects, and worms. It has at times great difficulty to support its life, for in a dry spring or summer most of these are hidden in the earth beyond its reach, except at those uncertain periods when the grub of the chaffer is to be found; and in a hot day we see the poor birds perambulating the fields, and wandering by the sides of the highways, seeking for, and feeding upon grasshoppers, or any casual nourishment that may be found. At those times, was it not for its breakfast of dew-worms, which it catches in the gray of the morning, as it is appointed the earliest of risers, it would commonly be famished. In the hot summer of 1825, many of the young brood of the season perished from want; the mornings were without dew, and consequently few or no worms were to be obtained; and we found them dead under the trees, having expired on their roostings. It was particularly distressing, for no relief could be given, to hear the constant clamor and importunity of the young for food. The old birds seemed to suffer without complaint; but the wants of their offspring were expressed by the unceasing cry of hunger, and pursuit of the parents for supply, and our fields were scenes of daily restlessness and lament. Yet, amid all this distress, it was pleasing to observe the perseverance of the old birds in the endeavor to relieve their famishing families, as many of them remained out searching for food quite in the dusk, and returned to their roosts long after the usual period for retiring. In this extremity it becomes a plunderer, to which by inclination it is not much addicted, and resorts to our newly-set potato-fields, digging out the cuttings. Ranks are seen sadly defective, the result of its labors, I fear; and the request of my neighbors now and then for a bird from my rookery, to hang up in terrorem in their fields, is confirmatory of its bad name. In autumn a ripe pear, or a walnut, becomes an irresistible temptation, and it will occasionally obtain a good share of these fruits. In hard frost, it is pinched again, visits for food the banks of streams, and in conjunction with its congener the “villain crow,” becomes a wayfaring bird, and seeks a dole from every passing steed. Its life, however, is not always dark and sombre: it has its periods of festivity also. When the waters retire from meadows and low lands, where they have remained any time, a luxurious banquet is provided for this corvus, in the multitude of worms which it finds drowned on them. But its jubilee is the season of the cockchaffer (melolantha vulgaris), when every little copse, every oak, becomes animated with it and all its noisy, joyful family feeding and scrambling for the insect food. The power or faculty, be it by the scent, or by other means, that rooks possess of discovering their food, is very remarkable. I have often observed them alight on a pasture of uniform verdure, and exhibiting no sensible appearance of withering or decay, and immediately commence stocking up the ground. Upon investigating the object of their operations, I have found many heads of plantains, the little autumnal dandelions, and other plants, drawn out of the ground and scattered about, their roots having been eaten off by a grub, leaving only a crown of leaves upon the surface. This grub beneath, in the earth, the rooks had detected in their flight, and descended to feed on it, first pulling up the plant which concealed it, and then drawing the larvæ from their holes. By what intimation this bird had discovered its hidden food we are at a loss to conjecture; but the rook has always been supposed to scent matters with great discrimination.

It is but simple justice to these often censured birds, to mention the service that they at times perform for us in our pasture lands. There is no plant that I endeavor to root out with more persistency in these places than the turfy hair-grass (aira cæspitosa). It abounds in all the colder parts of our grass lands, increasing greatly when undisturbed, and, worthless itself, overpowers its more valuable neighbors. The larger turfs we pretty well get rid of; but multitudes of small roots are so interwoven with the pasture herbage, that we cannot separate them without injury; and these our persevering rooks stock up for us in such quantities, that in some seasons the fields are strewed with the eradicated plants. The whole so torn up does not exclusively prove to be the hair-grass, but infinitely the larger portion consists of this injurious plant. The object of the bird in performing this service for us is to obtain the larvæ of several species of insects, underground feeders, that prey on the roots, as Linnæus long ago observed upon the subject of the little nard grass (nardus stricta). This benefit is partly a joint operation: the grub eats the root, but not often so effectually as to destroy the plant, which easily roots itself anew; but the rook finishes the affair by pulling it up to get at the larvæ, and thus prevents all vegetation; nor do I believe that the bird ever removes a specimen that has not already been eaten, or commenced upon, by the caterpillar.

The rook entices its young from the breeding trees, as soon as they can flutter to any other. These young, for a few evenings after their flight, will return with their parents, and roost where they were bred; but they soon quit their abode, and remain absent the whole of the summer months. As soon however as the heat of summer is subdued, and the air of autumn felt, they return and visit their forsaken habitations, and some few of them even commence the repair of their shattered nests; but this meeting is very differently conducted from that in the spring; their voices have now a mellowness approaching to musical, with little admixture of that harsh and noisy contention, so distracting at the former season, and seems more like a grave consultation upon future procedure; and as winter approaches they depart for some other place. The object of this meeting is unknown; nor are we aware that any other bird revisits the nest it has once forsaken. Domestic fowls, indeed, make use again of their old nests; but this is never, or only occasionally, done by birds in a wild state. The daw and rock-pigeon will build in society with their separate kindred: and the former even revisits in autumn the places it had nestled in. But such situations as these birds require, the ruined castle, abbey, or church tower, ledge in the rock, &c., are not universally found, and are apparently occupied from necessity. The rooks appear to associate from preference to society, as trees are common everywhere; but what motive they can have in view in lingering thus for a few autumnal mornings and counselling with each other around their abandoned and now useless nests, which before the return of spring are generally beaten from the trees, is by no means manifest to us.

The sense of smelling seems often to supply in animals the want of faculties they are not gifted with; and it is this power which directs them to their food with greater certainty, than the discernment of man could do. That we have every faculty given us necessary for the condition in which we are placed, is manifest; yet the mechanical talents and intuition of the insect, the powers that birds and beasts possess, and the superior acuteness of some of their senses, of which, perhaps, we have little conception, makes it evident that all created things were equally the objects of their Maker’s benevolence and care; the worm that creepeth, and the beast that perisheth, deserve our consideration, and claim from human reason mercy and compassion.

The tall tangled hedge-row, the fir grove, or the old, well-wooded inclosure, constitutes the delight of the magpie (corvus pica), as there alone its large and dark nest has any chance of escaping observation. We here annually deprive it of these asylums, and it leaves us; but it does not seem to be a bird that increases much anywhere. As it generally lays eight or ten eggs, and is a very wary and cunning creature, avoiding all appearance of danger, it might be supposed that it would yearly become more numerous. Upon particular occasions we see a few of them collect; but the general spread is diminished, and as population advances, the few that escape will retire from the haunts and persecutions of man. These birds will occasionally plunder the nests of some few others; and we find in early spring the eggs of our out-laying domestic fowls frequently dropped about, robbed of their contents. That the pie is a party concerned in these thefts, we cannot deny, but to the superior audacity of the crow we attribute our principal injury. However the magpie may feed on the eggs of others, it is particularly careful to guard its own nest from similar injuries by covering it with an impenetrable canopy of thorns, and is our only bird that uses such a precaution, securing it from all common depredation, though not from the hand of the bird-nesting boy. When a hatch is effected, the number of young demand a larger quantity of food than is easily obtained, and whole broods of our ducklings, whenever they stray from the yard, are conveyed to the nest. But still the “magot” is not an unuseful bird, as it frees our pastures of incredible numbers of grubs and slugs, which lodge themselves under the crusts formed by the dung of cattle. These the birds with their strong beaks turn over, and catch the lurking animals beneath, and then break them to search for more; by which means, during the winter they will spread the entire droppings in the fields; and by spring I have had, especially under the hedges, all this labor saved to me by these assiduous animals.

Natural affection, the love of offspring, is particularly manifested in birds; for in general they are timid and weak creatures, flying from apprehended dangers, and endowed with little or no power of defending themselves; but they will menace when injury is threatened to their brood, and incur dangers in order to obtain food for their young, that they will encounter in no other period of their lives.

The common jay (corvus glandarius) affords a good example of this temporary departure from general character. This bird is always extremely timid and cautious, when its own interest or safety is solely concerned; but no sooner does its hungry brood clamor for supply, than it loses all this wary character, and becomes a bold and impudent thief. At this period it will visit our gardens which it rarely approaches at other times, plunder them of every raspberry, cherry, or bean, that it can obtain; and will not cease from rapine as long as any of the brood or the crop remains. We see all the nestlings approach, and, settling near some meditated scene of plunder, quietly await a summons to commence. A parent bird from some tree surveys the ground, then descends upon the cherry, or into the rows, immediately announces a discovery by a low but particular call, and all the family flock in to the banquet, which having finished by repeated visits, the old birds return to the woods, with all their chattering children, and become the same wild, cautious creatures they were before. Some of our birds separate from their broods, as soon as they are able to provide for themselves; but the jay and its family associate during all the autumn and winter months, taking great delight in each other’s company, and only separate to become founders of new establishments. We see them in winter under the shelter of tall hedges, or on the sunny sides of woods and copses, seeking amid the dry leaves for acorns, or the crab, to pick out the seeds, or for the worms and grubs hidden under cowdung; feeding in perfect silence, yet so timid and watchful, that they seldom permit the sportsman to approach them. When disturbed, they take shelter in the depth of the thicket, calling to each other with a harsh and loud voice, that resounds through the covert. The Welsh call this creature “screch y coed,” the screamer of the wood. The jay is a very heavy, inelegant bird. Its general plumage is sober and plain, though its fine browns harmoniously blend with each other: but the beautiful blue-barred feathers, that form the greater coverts of the wings, distinguish it from every other bird, and, in the days when featherwork was in favor with our fair countrywomen, were in such request, that every gamekeeper, and schoolboy brother with his Christmas gun, persecuted the poor jay through all his retirements, to obtain his wings.

The great shrike, or butcher-bird (lanius excubitor), is not uncommon with us, and breeds annually near my dwelling. It is one of our late birds of passage, but its arrival is soon made known to us by its croaking, unmusical voice from the summit of some tree. Its nest is large and ill-concealed; and during the season of incubation the male bird is particularly vigilant and uneasy at any approach towards his sitting mate, though often by his clamorous anxiety he betrays it and her to every bird-nesting boy. The female, when the eggs are hatched, unites her vociferations with those of the male, and facilitates the detection of the brood. Both parents are very assiduous in their attentions to their offspring, feeding them long after they have left the nest; for the young appear to be heavy, inactive birds, and little able to capture the winged insects, that constitute their principal food. I could never observe that this bird destroyed others smaller than itself, or even fed upon flesh. I have hung up dead young birds, and even parts of them, near their nests; but never found that they were touched by the shrike. Yet it appears that it must be a butcher too; and that the name “lanius,” bestowed on it by Gesner two hundred and fifty years ago, was not lightly given. My neighbor’s gamekeeper kills it as a bird of prey; and tells me he has known it draw the weak young pheasants through the bars of the breeding coops; and others have assured me that they have killed them when banqueting on the carcass of some little bird they had captured. All small birds have an antipathy to the shrike, betray anger, and utter the moan of danger, when it approaches their nest. I have often heard this signal of distress, and, cautiously approaching to learn the cause, have frequently found that this butcher- bird occasioned it. They will mob, attack, and drive it away, as they do the owl, as if fully acquainted with its plundering propensities. Linnæus attached to it the trivial epithet “excubitor,” a sentinel; a very apposite appellation, as this bird seldom conceals itself in a bush, but sits perched upon some upper spray, or in an open situation, heedful of danger, or watching for its prey. This shrike must be most mischievously inclined, if not a predatory bird.—May 23d:—A pair of robins have young ones in a bank near my dwelling: the anxiety and vociferation of the poor things have three times this day called my attention to the cause of their distress, and each time have I seen this bird watching near the place, or stealing away upon my approach; and then the tumult of the parents subsided; but had they not experienced injury, or been aware that it was meditated, all this terror and outcry would not have been excited.

Many birds are arranged in our British ornithology not known as permanent inhabitants, but which have occasionally visited our shores during inclement seasons, or been driven from their general stations by tempestuous weather. An event like this, the violent gale of All-hallows eve, in 1824, brought to us the stormy petrel (procellaria pelagica); a bird that resides far in the depths of the ocean, does not approach our shores, it is believed, except for the purposes of incubation, and we know only one place, the Isle of Sky, that it haunts even for this short period. It is a creature

——“that roams on her sea-wing, Unfatigued, and ever sleeps, Calm, upon the toiling deeps.”

It is a pretty good manifestation of the strength and extent of that hurricane, which could catch up a bird with a wing so powerful as to enable it to riot in the whirlwind and enjoy the storm, and bear it away irresistibly, perhaps, from the Atlantic waves, over such a space of land and ocean, and then dash it down on a rather elevated common in this parish, whence it was brought to me in a very perfect state. This little creature, scarcely as big again as a swallow, and the smallest of all our web-footed birds, has, like all the others of its genus, that extraordinary tube on its upper mandible, through which it spirts out an oily matter when irritated; but the real object of this singular provision seems unknown. Our seamen amuse themselves during the monotony of a voyage with the vagaries of “mother Carey’s chickens,” as they have from very early times called this bird. The petrels seem to repose in a common breeze, but upon the approach, or during the continuation, of a gale, they surround a ship, and catch up the small animals which the agitated ocean brings near the surface, or any food that may be dropped from the vessel. Whisking with the celerity of an arrow through the deep valleys of the abyss, and darting away over the foaming crest of some mountain wave, they attend the laboring bark in all her perilous course. When the storm subsides they retire to rest, and are no more seen. The presence of this petrel was thought in times past to predict a storm, and it was consequently looked upon as an unwelcome visitant.

The wryneck (jynx torquilla) visits us annually, but in very uncertain numbers, and, from some unknown cause, or local changes, in yearly diminishing quantities. In one short season after its arrival we hear its singular monotonous note at intervals through half the day. This ceases, and we think no more about it, as it continues perfectly mute; not a twit or a chirp escapes to remind us of its presence during all the remainder of its sojourn with us, except the maternal note or hush of danger, which is a faint, low, protracted hissing, as the female sits clinging by the side or on the stump of a tree. Shy and unusually timid, as if all its life were spent in the deepest retirement away from man, it remains through the day on some ditch-bank, or basks with seeming enjoyment, in any sunny hour, on the ant-hills nearest to its retreat; and these it depopulates for food, by means of its long glutinous tongue, which with the insects collects much of the soil of the heaps, as we find a much larger portion of grit in its stomach than is usually met with in that of other birds. When disturbed it escapes by a flight precipitate and awkward, hides itself from our sight, and, were not its haunts and habits known, we should never conjecture that this bustling fugitive was our long-forgotten spring visitant the wryneck. The winter or spring of 1818 was, from some unknown cause, singularly unfavorable for this bird. It generally arrives before the middle of April; and its vernal note, so unlike that of any of its companions, announces its presence throughout all the mild mornings of this month, and part of the following; but during the spring of that year it was perfectly silent, or absent from us. The season, it is true, was unusually cheerless and ungenial.

Some of our birds are annually diminishing in numbers; others have been entirely destroyed, or no longer visit the shores of Britain. The increase of our population, inclosure, and clearage of rude and open places, and the drainage of marshy lands, added to the noise of our fire-arms, have driven them away, or rendered their former breeding and feeding stations no longer eligible to many, especially to the waders and aquatic birds. The great Swan Pool, near the city of Lincoln, on which I have seen at one time forty of these majestic creatures sailing in all their dignity, is, I am told, no longer a pool; the extensive marshes of Glastonbury, which have afforded me the finest snipe shooting, are now luxuriant corn farms; and multitudes of other cases of such subversions of harbor for birds are within memory. An ornithological list made no longer ago than the days of Elizabeth would present the names of multitudes now aliens to our shores. The nightingale was common with us here a few years past; the rival songs of many were heard every evening during the season, and in most of our shady lanes we were saluted by the harsh warning note of the parent to its young; but from the assiduity of bird-catchers, or some local change that we are not sensible of, a solitary vocalist or so now only delights our evening walk. The egg of this bird is rather singularly colored, and not commonly to be obtained. Our migrating small birds incur from natural causes great loss in their transits; birds of prey, adverse winds, and fatigue, probably reduce their numbers nearly as much as want, and the severity of the winter season, does those that remain; and in some summers the paucity of such birds is strikingly manifest. Even the hardy rook is probably not found in such numbers as formerly, its haunts having been destroyed or disturbed by the felling of trees, in consequence of the increased value of timber, and the changes in our manners and ideas. Rooks love to build near the habitation of man: but their delight, the long avenue, to caw as it were in perspective from end to end, is no longer the fashion; and the poor birds have been dispersed to settle on single distant trees, or in the copse, and are captured and persecuted.

“Old-fashioned halls, dull aunts, and croaking rooks,”

a modern Zephalinda would scarcely find now to anticipate with dread. In many counties very few rookeries remain, where once they were considered as a necessary appendage, and regularly pointed out the abbey, the hall, the court-house, and the grange.

The starling (sturnus vulgaris) breeds with us, as in most villages in England. Towards autumn the broods unite, and form large flocks; but those prodigious flights, with which, in some particular years, we are visited, especially in parts of those districts formerly called the “fen counties,” are probably an accumulation from foreign countries. We have seldom more than a pair, or two, which nestle under the tiling of an old house, in the tower of the church, the deserted hole of the woodpecker, or some such inaccessible place. The flights probably migrate to this country alone, as few birds could travel long, and continue such a rapid motion as the starling. The Royston crow, the only migrating bird with which it forms an intimate association, is infinitely too heavy of wing to have journeyed with the stare. The delight of these birds in society is a predominant character; and to feed they will associate with the rook, the pigeon, or the daw; and sometimes, but not cordially, with the fieldfare: but they chiefly roost with their own families, preferring some reedy, marshy situation. These social birds are rarely seen alone, and should any accident separate an individual from the companions of its flight, it will sit disconsolate on an eminence, piping and plaining, till some one of its congeners join it. Even in small parties they keep continually calling and inviting associates to them, with a fine clear note, that, in particular states of the air, may be heard at a considerable distance. This love of society seems to be innate; for I remember one poor bird, that had escaped from domestication, in which it had entirely lost, or probably never knew, the language or manners of its race, and acquired only the name of its mistress; disliked and avoided by its congeners, it would sit by the hour together, sunning on some tall elm, calling in a most plaintive strain, Nānny, Nānny, but no Nanny came; and our poor solitary either pined itself to death, or was killed, as its note ceased. They vastly delight, in a bright autumnal morning, to sit basking and preening themselves on the summit of a tree, chattering all together in a low song-like note. There is something singularly curious and mysterious in the conduct of these birds previous to their nightly retirement, by the variety and intricacy of the evolutions they execute at that time. They will form themselves perhaps into a triangle, then shoot into a long, pearshaped figure, expand like a sheet, wheel into a ball, as Pliny observes, each individual striving to get into the centre, &c., with a promptitude more like parade movements, than the actions of birds. As the breeding season advances, these prodigious flights divide, and finally separate into pairs, and form their summer settlements; but probably the vast body of them leaves the kingdom. Travellers tell us, that starlings abound in Persia and the regions of Caucasus.

No birds, except sparrows, congregate more densely than stares. They seem continually to be running into clusters, if ever so little scattered; and the stopping of one, to peck at a worm, immediately sets all its companions hastening to partake. This habit in the winter season brings on them death, and protracted sufferings, as every village popper notices these flocks, and fires at the poor starlings. Their flesh is bitter and rank, and thus useless when obtained; but the thickness of the flights, the possibility of killing numbers, and manifesting his skill, encourages the trial. The flight of these birds, whether from feeding to roost, or on their return to feed, is so rapid, that none with any impediment can keep company; and in consequence we see many, which have received slight wing or body wounds, lingering about the pastures long into spring, and pining after companions they cannot associate with.