Part 49

“This combination of musical ability, lovely plumage, and its seed-eating qualities long since has made the Indigo Bunting in danger of extermination, through the fact of its being universally, throughout the South, captured and sold as a cage-bird, both for home use and for export. In that section the bird is called the ‘blue pop,’ a corruption of ‘bleu pape,’ or ‘pope,’ of the French.

“The Cardinal, called ‘Grosbeak’ from the thickness and size of its bill, is of course a very conspicuous bird wherever seen, and therefore has always been a mark for the ‘arrow of death,’ as Mr. Allen, who knows this bird in its native haunts, and its every mood, puts it. Some day when you are older you will read his story of it as it lives in the deep recesses of the evergreen woods, called The Kentucky Cardinal. For though this bird is found nesting as far north as Central Park, New York, and it has once or twice come to my garden here, and gone into Massachusetts even, in the fall roving-time, we must always associate him with a long outdoor season and sunny skies, as we do the Mockingbird.

“If the Mocker suffered for his voice, the Cardinal was made a prisoner for his song and gorgeous colour combined, and though, as is bird law in such cases, the female is dull in colour, she has a very attractive song also, even in confinement. But I hope that these prison days are over. Whoever now confines the Cardinal is a law-breaker as well as a heart-breaker, and yet, but ten years ago, every bird-store window was aglow with the colour of the Cardinal’s mantle. I have here in the scrap-book a charming story that you will like to hear, of a Cardinal in Boston, made a temporary captive for its own preservation, and of its release when the right time came.”

THE CARDINAL AT THE HUB

His range being southern, Cardinal Grosbeak seldom travels through New England; and, to my knowledge, has never established a home and reared a family north of Connecticut until in the instance here recorded. Kentuckians claim him, and with some show of right, since James Lane Allen built his monument in imperishable prose. But, soon or late, all notables come to Boston, and among them may now be registered the “Kentucky Cardinal.”

Shy by nature, conspicuous in plumage, he shuns publicity; and avoiding the main lines of travel, he puts up at a quiet country house in a Boston suburb—Brookline.

Here, one October day in 1897, among the migrants stopping at this halfway house, appeared a distinguished guest, clad in red, with a black mask, a light red bill, and a striking crest; with him a bird so like him that they might have been called the two Dromios. After a few days the double passed on, and left our hero the only red-coat in the field. A White-throated Sparrow now arrived from the mountains, and a Damon-and-Pythias friendship sprang up between the birds. Having decided to winter at the North, they took lodgings in a spruce tree, and came regularly to the table d’hôte on the porch. My lord Cardinal, being the more distinguished guest, met with particular favour, and soon became welcome at the homes of the neighbourhood. With truly catholic taste, he refused creature-comforts from none, but showed preference for his first abode.

It was March 5, 1898, when we kept our first appointment with the Cardinal. A light snow had fallen during the night, and the air was keen, without premonition of spring. It was a day for home-keeping birds, the earth larder being closed. The most delicate tact was required in presenting strangers. A loud, clear summons—the Cardinal’s own whistle echoed by human lips—soon brought a response. Into the syringa bush near the porch flew, with a whir and a sharp tsip, a bird. How gorgeous he looked in the snow-laden shrub! For an instant the syringa blossoms loaded the air with fragrance as a dream of summer floated by. Then a call to the porch was met by several sallies and quick retreats, while the wary bird studied the newcomers. Reassuring tones from his gentle hostess, accompanied by the rattle of nuts and seeds, at last prevailed, and the Cardinal flew to the railing, and looked us over with keen, inquiring eye. Convinced that no hostilities were intended, he gave a long, trustful look into the face of his benefactress and flew to her feet.

A gray squirrel, frisking by, stopped at the lunch-counter and seized an “Educator” cracker.

The novel sensation of an uncaged bird within touch, where one might notice the lovely shading of his plumage as one notes a flower, was memorable; but a sweeter surprise was in store. As we left the house, having made obeisance to his eminence, the Cardinal, the bird flew into a spruce tree and saluted us with a melodious “Mizpah.” Then, as if reading the longing of our hearts, he opened his bright bill, and a song came forth such as never before enraptured the air of a New England March,—a song so copious, so free, so full of heavenly hope, that it seemed as if forever obliterated were the “tragic memories of his race.”

As March advanced, several changes in the Cardinal were noted by his ever-watchful friends. He made longer trips abroad, returning tired and hungry. The restlessness of the unsatisfied heart was plainly his. His long, sweet, interpolating whistle, variously rendering “Peace . . . peace . . . peace!” “Three cheers, three cheers,” etc., to these sympathetic northern ears became “Louise, Louise, Louise!” Thenceforth he was Louis, the Cardinal, calling for his mate.

On March 26, a kind friend took pity on the lonely bachelor, and a caged bird, “Louise,” was introduced to him. In the lovely dove-coloured bird, with faint washings of red, and the family mask and crest, the Cardinal at once recognized his kind. His joy was unbounded, and the acquaintance progressed rapidly, a mutual understanding being plainly reached during the seventeen days of cage courtship. Louis brought food to Louise, and they had all things in common, except liberty.

April 12, in the early morning, the cage was taken out-of-doors, and Louise was set free. She was quick to embrace her chance, and flew into the neighbouring shrubbery. For six days she revelled in her new-found freedom, Louis, meanwhile, coming and going as of old, and often carrying away seeds from the house to share with his mate.

April 16, he lured her into the house, and after that they came often for food, flying fearlessly in at the window, and delighting their friends with their songs and charming ways. Louis invariably gave the choicest morsels to his mate, and the course of true love seemed to cross the adage; but, alas! Death was already adjusting an arrow for that shining mark.

April 25, Louise stayed in the house all day, going out at nightfall. Again the following day she remained indoors, Louis feeding her; but her excellent appetite disarmed suspicion, and it was thought that she had taken refuge from the cold and rain, especially as she spent the night within. The third morning, April 27, she died. An examination of her body showed three dreadful wounds.

Louis came twittering to the window, but was not let in until a day or two later, when a new bird, “Louisa,” had been put in the cage. When he saw the familiar form, he evidently thought his lost love restored, for he burst into glorious song; but, soon discovering his mistake, he stopped short in his hallelujahs, and walked around the cage inspecting the occupant.

Louisa’s admiration for the Cardinal was marked; but for some days he took little notice of her, and his friends began to fear that their second attempt at match-making would prove a failure. April 30, however, some responsive interest was shown, and the next day Louis brought to the cage a brown bug, half an inch long, and gave Louisa his first meat-offering.

The second wooing progressed rapidly, and May 7, when Louisa was set free, the pair flew away together with unrestrained delight. After three days of liberty, Louisa flew back to the house with her mate, and thenceforth was a frequent visitor.

May 21, Louisa was seen carrying straws, and on June 6 her nest was discovered low down in a dense evergreen thorn. Four speckled eggs lay in the nest. These were hatched June 9, the parent birds, meantime and afterward, going regularly to market, and keeping up social relations with their friends.

In nine days after their exit from the shell, the little Cardinals left the nest and faced life’s sterner realities. A black cat was their worst foe, and more than once, during their youth, Louis flew to his devoted commissary and made known his anxiety. Each time, on following him to the nest, she found the black prowler, or one of his kind, watching for prey. On June 28, the black cat outwitted the allied forces, Señor Cardinal and his friends, and a little one was slain. The other three grew up, and enjoyed all the privileges of their parents, flying in at the window, and frequenting the bountiful porch.

July 25, Louisa disappeared from the scene, presumably on a southern trip, leaving the Cardinal sole protector, provider, and peacemaker for their lively and quarrelsome triplet. A fight is apparently as needful for the development of a young Cardinal as of an English schoolboy, possibly due in both cases to a meat diet.

Overfeeding was but temporary with our birds. On the 8th of August the migratory instinct prevailed over ease, indulgence, friendship, and the Cardinal with his brood left the house, where he had been so well entertained, to return no more. No more? Who shall say of any novel that it can have no sequel? Massachusetts may yet become the permanent home of the Kentucky Cardinal, the descendant to the third and fourth generation of Louis and his mate.

—Ella Gilbert Ives, in Bird-Lore.

* * * * *

As Gray Lady read the story of the Cardinal, the children, between listening to it and being intent on their work, forgot the Mockingbird in the window, upon whom the rays of the sun, that had gradually managed to pierce the clouds, were resting.

As her mother finished and paused, Goldilocks, with a very slight gesture, directed their glance toward the window, where the Mockingbird, having completed his toilet and meal, perched, wings slightly raised and quivering, with half-closed eyes, murmuring a few broken snatches of song, half to himself and half as if in a dream, his head thrown back and, oh, such a human expression of longing in his attitude, that Gray Lady, without speaking, turned the leaves of her scrap-book slowly until she came to a place where the long line of prose shortened to verse, and then in a low but distinct voice she read:—

IN CAPTIVITY

You ask me why I long to fly Out from your palace to the dreamy woods, And the summer solitude, Why I pine In this cage of mine; Why I fret, Why I set All manner of querulous echoes fluttering forth From the cold North And wandering southward with beseeching pain In every strain. Ask me not, Task me not With such vain questions, but fling wide the door And hinder me no more; Give back my wings to me, And the wild current of my liberty.