Part 34

They are friendly among themselves, and they like to alight on a roof and chatter away a long time. In one place where I was staying, they liked to gather on a piazza roof right under my window. They often woke me in the morning with their sweet little voices.

One morning the sound was so near, it seemed as if they must be in the room, and I opened my eyes to see. There on the sill close to the screen was one of the pretty fellows. He was looking in at the open window, and evidently keeping watch of me. When I moved a little, he gave the alarm, and the whole party flew away.

The chatter of barn swallows always seems to me like talk, and men who study bird ways agree that birds have some sort of language. The swallows have many different notes. One is a general warning of danger, but there is another note for a man, another for a cat, and a still different one when they find something good to eat, which they call the others to share.

"The variety of bird speech," says a man who has studied birds a long time, "is very great." And of all bird voices, swallows' are the most like human speech. If you lie on the hay in the barn very quiet, and listen to them when they come in and fly about, you will see that this is true. It seems sometimes as if you could almost make out words.

Swallows more than any other birds like to make use of our buildings for their own homes. Barn swallows take the beams inside the barns, EAVE SWALLOWS settle under the eaves outside, and PURPLE MARTINS, the largest of the family, choose bird-houses which we put up for them.

It is said that purple martins will not stay anywhere that men have not made houses for them. But I have seen them living in a place not put up for them, though perhaps they thought it was. It was under a terra-cotta covering to a cornice on a business block in the middle of a busy city. The terra-cotta was shaped like a large pipe cut in half, the long way. This half cylinder was laid on top of the brick cornice, and that made a little roof, you see. The whole length of that cornice was thus made into one long room, with a brick floor and terra-cotta roof, and an entrance at the end. That room must have had a dozen martin nests, for a flock was all the time sailing about in the air, above the roofs of the houses.

As these birds eat only flying insects, they cannot stay with us when it is too cool for insects to fly abroad. So they leave us very early. When the little ones are out of the nest and can fly well, swallows from all the country around collect in great flocks, and go to some swamp, or lonely place where people do not go much. There the young ones are taught and exercised every day in flying. And some day we shall go out and find them all gone, not a swallow to be seen. They have started for their winter home, which is far south, in tropical countries, where insects never fail; but it is a comfort to think that next summer we shall have them back with us again.

The swallows I have mentioned, barn swallow, eave swallow, and purple martin, are found all over our country.

Let me tell you a story that shows the purple martin has a good deal of sense. One of these birds built in a box under a window, fixed so that the owner could open it and take out eggs. He took out several, one at a time, and at last he took out one of the birds.

The mate of the stolen bird went off and in a few days came back with another mate. The box was too good to give up, so both the birds went to work to make it safe against the nest robber. They built up a wall of mud before the too handy back door. The egg thief could not get in without breaking down the wall, and he was ashamed to do that. So the birds kept their pleasant home, and reared their family there.

FOOTNOTE:

See Appendix, 12.

THE TANAGER FAMILY

(Tanagridæ)

THIS is a large family of between three and four hundred species, all dressed in gay colors. But we have only three of them in our country. Their home is in the warmer parts of the world. We have the scarlet tanager in the East, the Louisiana tanager in the West, and the summer tanager in the South. Tanagers are a little larger than sparrows, and live in the trees. They feed on insects and fruit; sometimes, it is said, on flowers.

The SCARLET TANAGER is the brilliant red bird with black wings and tail, common all over the Eastern and Middle States. His mate is dressed in modest olive green, and the nestlings are like her the first year.

The tanager himself wears his gay dress only during the nesting season, that is, spring and summer. Towards fall he turns from scarlet to green like his mate, and he is a droll-looking object while he does it. He seems to break out into green patches or streaks. One that I watched began by showing a little green feather among the red on each side of his breast. I have seen one with a green ring around the neck, and all the rest of the plumage scarlet; and another with a green stripe down the back. Some show no regularity about it, but are covered with green patches all over, and look like bunches of colored rags.

It is no wonder that a bird hides in the woods, as many do, when changing his coat, if he looks such an object. In spring he gets back his brilliant coat, and comes to our Northern woods again, to nest.

The nest of this bird is not very high in a tree. It is a rather shabby affair, that looks as if it would fall to pieces, and the birds are madly shy about being looked at.

I once saw in the woods a tanager building her nest. I hoped to watch her through nesting, and see how she brought up her little folk. Both of the pair were there, but were too shy to come to the nest while my friend and I were there. We kept very still, and even hid in some bushes, hoping she would not see us. We were so quiet that she was gradually getting over her fright, and coming nearer the nest, when suddenly the big dog we had with us gave a loud sneeze. In an instant both birds were off, as if shot out of a gun. And I think they never came back, for the nest was not finished.

The song of the tanager is much like the robin song, but having once learned it, a sharp ear can easily tell them apart, for it is of a different tone. It is rather hoarse, not so smooth as a robin's voice. The common call is a hoarse and very distinct "chip, chur," given by both of the pair.

Several years ago I saw a scarlet tanager in a bird store. It was winter, and I brought him home to keep till it was safe to set him free in the spring. He was very timid, and did not like to have any one look at him, especially when he went to eat.

If I happened to look at him when he was at his food-dish, he would instantly fly to his top perch, and look as if he would never eat again. So I partitioned off one corner of his cage for a private dining-room, by a strip of stiff paper woven between the wires. After that it was very droll to see him retire behind the screen and eat, now and then sticking up his head to glance over the top, and see if I were looking.

I found it hard to please him with food. He liked living insects, but he wanted to catch them for himself. So I got some sticky fly-paper, and hung it up outside the kitchen door. When I had caught half a dozen flies, I took it up to him. He was not in a cage, and the minute he saw the flies he flew across the room and hovered before me like a big hummingbird, while he daintily picked off every fly. He forgot that he didn't like to have me see him eat. After that I was fly-catcher every day till he learned to like mockingbird food.

In the spring he began to sing--a sweet, low song, different from the common tanager song. Then I took him out to the country, away from the English sparrows, and set him free.

The SUMMER TANAGER nests in the Southern States from New Jersey to Florida. He is all red, but otherwise looks like the scarlet tanager, and his habits are about the same.

The LOUISIANA TANAGER nests in the Western States from the Plains to the Pacific. He is brighter, with a variety of colors. He is mostly bright yellow, with brilliant red head, and black wings and tail, and his mate--like other female tanagers--is in olive green. He is a shy bird, and lives in the woods, and his habits have been very little studied.

I once saw a pair of these birds in Utah, getting their breakfast. At least, the gay singer himself was at that business, though his sharp-eyed mate was too busy watching me to see that I did not mean any harm, to care for food.