The Project Gutenberg eBook ofBird Life Glimpses

The Project Gutenberg eBook ofBird Life GlimpsesThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: Bird Life GlimpsesAuthor: Edmund SelousIllustrator: George Edward LodgeRelease date: April 11, 2016 [eBook #51733]Most recently updated: October 23, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: E-text prepared by Emmanuel Ackerman, Wayne Hammond, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries (https://archive.org/details/americana)*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BIRD LIFE GLIMPSES ***

This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.

Title: Bird Life GlimpsesAuthor: Edmund SelousIllustrator: George Edward LodgeRelease date: April 11, 2016 [eBook #51733]Most recently updated: October 23, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: E-text prepared by Emmanuel Ackerman, Wayne Hammond, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries (https://archive.org/details/americana)

Title: Bird Life Glimpses

Author: Edmund SelousIllustrator: George Edward Lodge

Author: Edmund Selous

Illustrator: George Edward Lodge

Release date: April 11, 2016 [eBook #51733]Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Credits: E-text prepared by Emmanuel Ackerman, Wayne Hammond, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries (https://archive.org/details/americana)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BIRD LIFE GLIMPSES ***

The Project Gutenberg eBook, Bird Life Glimpses, by Edmund Selous, Illustrated by G. E. Lodge

BIRD LIFEGLIMPSESBY EDMUND SELOUS

WITH 12 HEADINGS AND 6 FULL-PAGEILLUSTRATIONS BY G. E. LODGE

FLINT HOUSE, ICKLINGHAM

In the autumn of 1899 I came to live at Icklingham in Suffolk, and remained there, with occasional intervals of absence, for the next three years. During the greater part of that period I kept a day-to-day journal of field observation and reflection, and the following pages represent, for the most part, a portion of this. They are the work of one who professes nothing except to have used his eyes and ears to the best of his ability, and to give only, both in regard to fact and theory, the result of this method—combined, of course, in the latter case, with such illustrations and fortifications as his reading may have allowed him to make use of, and without taking into account some passing reference or allusion. That my notes relate almost entirely to birds, is not because I am less interested in other animals, but because, with the exception of rabbits, there are, practically, no wild quadrupeds in England. I am quite aware that a list can be made out, but let any one sit for a morning or afternoon in a wood, field,marsh, swamp, or pond, and he will then understand what I mean. In fact, to be a field naturalist in England, is to be a field ornithologist, and more often than not—I speak from experience—a waster of one’s time altogether. Unless you are prepared to be always unnaturally interested in the commonest matters, and not ashamed to pass as a genius by a never-ending barren allusion to them, be assured that you will often feel immensely dissatisfied with the way in which you have spent your day. Many a weary wandering, many an hour’s waiting and waiting to see, and seeing nothing, will be yours if you aim at more than this—and to read a book is fatal. But there is theper contra, and what that is I know very well. Of a few suchper contras—they were to me, and I can only hope that some may be so to the reader—these “Bird Life Glimpses” are made up.

EDMUND SELOUS.

Cheltenham,May 1905.

Pheasant Roosting

BIRD LIFE GLIMPSES

Icklingham, in and about which most of the observations contained in the following pages have been made, is a little village of West Suffolk, situated on the northern bank of the river Lark. It lies between Mildenhall and Bury St. Edmunds, amidst country which is very open, and so sandy and barren that in the last geological survey it is described as having more the character of an Arabian desert than an ordinary English landscape. There are, indeed, wide stretches where the sand has so encroached upon the scanty vegetation of moss and lichen that no one put suddenly downamongst them would think he were in England, if it happened to be a fine sunny day. These arid wastes form vast warrens for rabbits always, whilst over them, from April to October, roam bands of the great plover or stone-curlew, whose wailing, melancholy cries are in artistic unison with their drear desolation. The country is very flat: no hill can be seen anywhere around, but the ground rises somewhat, from the river on the northern side, and this and a few minor undulations of the sand look almost like hills, against the general dead level. I have seen the same effect on the great bank of the Chesil, and read of it, I think, in the desert of Sahara. These steppes on the one side of the river pass, on the other, into a fine sweep of moorland, the lonely road through which is bordered, on one side only, by a single row of gaunt Scotch firs. Westwards, towards Cambridgeshire, the sand-country, as it may be termed, passes, gradually, into the fenlands, which, in a modified, or, rather, transitional form, lie on either side the Lark, as far as Icklingham itself.

The Lark, which, for the greater part of its limited course, is a fenland stream, rises a little beyond Bury (the St. Edmunds is never added hereabouts), and enters the Ouse near Littleport. It is quite a small river; but though its volume, after the first twelve miles or so, does not increase to any very appreciable extent, the high artificial banks, through which, with a view to preventing flooding, it is made to flow, after entering the fenlands proper, give it a much more important appearance, and this is enhanced by the flatness of the country on either side: a flatness, however, which does not—nor doesit ever, in my opinion—prevent its being highly picturesque. Those, indeed, who cannot feel the charm of the fenlands should leave nature—as distinct from good hotels—alone. For myself, I sometimes wonder that all the artists in the world are not to be found there, sketching; but in spite of the skies and the windmills and Ely Cathedral in the near, far, or middle distance, I have never met even one. It is to the fens that the peewits, which, before, haunted the river and the country generally, retire towards the end of October, nor do they return till the following spring, so that Icklingham during this interval is almost—indeed, I believe quite—without a peewit. Bury is eight miles from Icklingham, and about half-way between them the country begins to assume the more familiar features of an English landscape, so that the difference which a few miles makes is quite remarkable.

Fifty years ago, I am told, there were no trees in this part of the world, except a willow here and there along the course of the stream, and a few huge ones of uncouth and fantastic appearance, which are sometimes called “she oaks” by the people. The size of these trees is often quite remarkable, and their wood being, fortunately, valueless, they are generally allowed to attain to the full of it. They grow sparingly, yet sometimes in scattered clusters, and the sand, with the wide waste of which their large, rude outlines and scanty foliage has a sort of harmony, seems a congenial soil for them. They are really, I believe, of the poplar tribe, which would make them “poppels” hereabouts, were this understood. These trees, withsome elders and gnarled old hawthorns, which the arid soil likewise supports, rather add to than diminish the desolate charm of the country, and, as I say, till fifty years ago there were no others. Then, however, it occurred to landowners, or to some local body or council, that sand ought to suit firs, and now, as a consequence, there are numerous plantations of the Scotch kind, with others of the larch and spruce, or of all three mingled together.

Thus, in the more immediate proximity of Icklingham we have the warrens or sandy steppes, the moorlands passing here and there into green seas of bracken, the river, with a smaller stream that runs into it, and these fir plantations, which are diversified, sometimes, with oaks, beeches, and chestnuts, and amidst which an undergrowth of bush and shrub has long since sprung up. Beyond, on the one hand, there are the fenlands, and, on the other, ordinary English country. In all these bits there is something for a bird-lover to see, though, I confess, I wish there was a great deal more. The plantations perhaps give the greatest variety. Dark and sombre spots these make upon the great steppes or moors, looking black as night against the dusky red of the wintry sky, after the sun has sunk. In them one may sit silent, as the shadows fall, and see the pheasants steal or the wood-pigeons sweep to their roosting-trees, listening to the “mik, mik, mik” of the blackbird, before he retires, the harsh strident note of the mistle-thrush, or the still harsher and more outrageous scolding of the fieldfare. Blackbirds utter a variety of notes whilst waiting, as one may say, to roost. The last, or theone that continues longest, is the “mik, mik” that I have spoken of, and this is repeated continuously for a considerable time. Another is a loud and fussy sort of “chuck, chuck, chuck,” which often ends in almost an exaggeration of that well-known note which is generally considered to be the one of alarm, but which, in my experience, has, with most other cries to which some special meaning is attributed, a far wider and more generalised significance. As the bird utters it, it flies, full of excitement, to the tree or bush in which it means to pass the night, and here, whilst the darkness deepens, it “mik, mik, mik, mik, miks,” till, as I suppose, with the last “mik” of all, the head is laid beneath the wing, and it goes peacefully to sleep. It is now that the pheasants come stealing, often running, to bed. You may hear their quick, elastic little steps upon the pine-needles, as they pass you, sometimes, quite close. I have had one run almost upon me, as I sat, stone still, in the gloom, seen it pause, look, hesitate, retreat, return again, to be again torn with doubt, and, finally, hurry by fearfully, and only a pace or two off, to fly into a tree just behind me. This shows, I think, that pheasants have their accustomed trees, where they roost night after night. In my experience this is the habit of most birds, but, after a time, the favourite tree or spot will be changed for another, and thus it will vary in a longer period, though not in a very short one. This, at least, is my idea; assurance in such a matter is difficult. The aviary may help us here. Two little Australian parrakeets, that expatiate in my greenhouse, chose, soon after they were introduced,a certain projecting stump or knob of a vine, as a roosting-place. For a week or two they were constant to this, but, after that, I found them roosting somewhere else, and they have now made use, for a time, of some half-dozen places, coming back to their first choice in due course, and leaving it again for one of their subsequent ones. Part of this process I have noticed with some long-tailed tits, which, for a night or two, slept all together, not only in the same bush but on the same spray of it. Then, just like the parrakeets, they left it, but I was not able to follow them beyond this. It would seem, therefore, that birds, though they do not sleep anywhere, but have a bedroom, like us, yet like variety, in respect of one, within reasonable limits, and go “from the blue bed to the brown.”

Pheasants are sometimes very noisy and sometimes quite silent in roosting, and this is just one of those differences which might be thought to depend on the weather. For some time it seemed to me as if a sudden sharp frost, or a fall of snow, made the birds clamorous, but hardly had I got this fixed, as a rule, in my mind, when there came a flagrant contradiction of it, and such contradictions were soon as numerous as the supporting illustrations. I noticed, too, that on the most vociferous nights some birds would be silent, whilst even on the most silent ones, one or two were sure to be noisy, so that I soon came to think that if their conduct in this respect did not depend, purely, on personal caprice, it at least depended on something beyond one’s power of finding out. The cries of all sorts of birds are supposed to have something to do with theweather, but I believe that any one who set himself seriously to test this theory would soon feel like substituting “nothing” for “something” in the statement of the proposition. It is much as with Sir Robert Redgauntlet’s jackanape, I suspect—“ran about the haill castle chattering, and yowling, and pinching, and biting folk, specially before ill weather or disturbances in the state.” Every one knows the loud trumpety note, as I call it, with which a pheasant flies up on to its perch, for the night. It is a tremendous clamour, and continues, sometimes, for a long time after the bird is settled. But sometimes, after each loud flourish, there comes an answer from another bird, which is quite in an undertone; in fact a different class of sound altogether, brief, and without the harsh resonance of the other, so that you would not take it to be the cry of a pheasant at all were it not always in immediate response to the loud one. It proceeds, too, from the same spot or thereabouts. What, precisely, is the meaning of this soft answering note? What is the state of mind of the bird uttering it, and by which of the sexes is it uttered? It is the cock that makes the loud trumpeting, and were another cock to answer this, one would expect him to do so in a similar manner. It is in April that my attention has been more particularly drawn to this after-sound, so that, though early in the month, one may suppose the male pheasant to have mated with at least a part of his harem. One would hardly expect, however, to find a polygamous bird on terms of affectionate connubiality with one or other of his wives, and yet this little duet reminds me, strongly, of what onemay often hear, sitting in the woods, when wood-pigeons are cooing in the spring. Almost always they are invisible, and it is by the ear, alone, that one must judge of what is going on. Everywhere comes the familiar “Roo, coo, oo, oo-oo,” and this, if you are not very close, is all you hear, and it suggests that one bird is sitting alone—at least alone in its tree, though answered perhaps from another. Sometimes, however, one happens to be at the foot of the tree oneself, and then, if one listens attentively, one will generally hear a single note, much lower, and even softer than the other which precedes it, a long-drawn, hoarse—but sweetly, tenderly hoarse—“oo.” The instant this has been uttered, comes the note we know, the two tones being different, and suggesting—which, I believe, is the case—that the first utterance is the tender avowal of the one bird, the next the instant and impassioned response of the other.

There is, perhaps, as much monotonous sameness—certainly as much of expressive tenderness—in the coo of the wood-pigeon as in any sound in nature, and yet, if one listens a little, one will find a good deal of variety in it. Every individual bird has its own intonation, and whilst, in the greatest number, this “speaks of all loves” as it should do, in some few a coo seems almost turned into a scream. Sometimes, too, I have remarked a peculiar vibration in the cooing of one of these birds, due, I think, to there being hardly any pause between the several notes, which are, usually, well separated. Such a difference does this make in the character of the sound, that, at first, one might hardly recognise it as belonging to the same species. Even in thetypical note, as uttered by any individual bird, there is not so much sameness as one might think. It is repeated, but not exactly repeated. Three similar, or almost similar, phrases, as one may call them, are made to vary considerably by the different emphasis and expression with which they are spoken. In the first of these the bird says, “Roo, coo, oo-oo, oo-oo,” with but moderate insistence, as though stating an undeniable fact. Then quickly, but still with a sufficiently well-marked pause, comes the second, “Rōō, cōō, oo-ōō, oo-ōō,” with very much increased energy, as though warmly maintaining a proposition that had been casually laid down. In the third, “roo, coo,” &c., there is a return to the former placidity, but now comes the last word on the subject: “ook?” which differs in intonation from anything that has gone before, there being a little rise in it, an upturning which makes it a distinct and unmistakable interrogative, an “Is it not so?” to all that has gone before.

“AT THE QUIET EVENFALL”Wood-Pigeons coming in to Roost

Considerable numbers of wood-pigeons roost, during winter, in the various fir plantations which now make a feature of the country round Icklingham. They retire somewhat early, so that it is still the afternoon, rather than the evening, when one hears the first great rushing sound overhead, and a first detachment come sweeping over the tops of the tall, slender firs, and shoot, like arrows, into them. Then come other bands, closely following one another. The birds fly in grandly. Sailing on outspread wings, they give them but an occasional flap, and descend upon the dark tree-tops from a considerable height. The grand rushing sound of their wings,so fraught with the sense of mystery, so full of hurry and impatience, has a fine inspiriting effect; it sweeps the soul, one may say, filling it with wild elemental emotions. What is this? Is it not a yearning back to something that one once was, a backward-rushing tide down the long, long line of advance? I believe that most of those vague, undefined, yet strongly pleasurable emotions that are apt to puzzle us—such, for instance, as Wordsworth looks upon as “intimations of immortality”—have their origin in the ordinary laws of inheritance. What evidence of such immortality as is here imagined do these supposed intimations of it offer? Do they not bear a considerable resemblance to the feelings which music calls up in us, and which Darwin has rationally explained?1“All these facts,” says Darwin, “with respect to music and impassioned speech, become intelligible to a certain extent, if we may assume that musical tones and rhythm were used by our half-human ancestors during the season of courtship, when animals of all kinds are excited, not only by love, but by the strong feelings of jealousy, rivalry, and triumph. From the deeply-laid principle of inherited associations, musical tones, in this case, would be likely to call up, vaguely and indefinitely, the strong emotions of a long-past age. Thus, in the Chinese annals it is said, ‘Music’ (and this is Chinese music, by the way) ‘has the power of making heaven descendupon earth’; and, again, as Herbert Spencer remarks, ‘Music arouses dormant sentiments of which we had not conceived the possibility, and do not know the meaning’; or, as Richter says, ‘tells us of things we have not seen and shall not see.’” I have little doubt myself that the feelings to which we owe our famous ode, and those which were aroused by music in the breast of Jean Paul and the Chinese annalist, were all much of the same kind, and due to the same fundamental cause. We may, indeed, say with Wordsworth that the soul “cometh from afar,” but what world is more afar than that of long past time, which we may, yet, dimly carry about with us in our own ancestral memories?

There is, I believe, no falser view than that which looks upon the poet as a teacher, if we mean by this that he leads along the path of growing knowledge; that he, for instance, and not Newton, gets first at the law of gravitation, and so forth. If he ever does, it is by a chance combination, merely, and not as a poet that he achieves this; but, as a rule, poets only catch up the ideas of the age and present them grandly and attractively.

“A monstrous eft was, of old, the Lord and Master of Earth,” &c.

Yet this very ode of Wordsworth “on intimations of immortality,” has been quoted by Sir Oliver Lodge in his Presidential Address to the Society for Psychical Research,2as though it were evidential. I cannot understand this. Surely a feeling that a thing is, is not, in itself, evidence that it is—and, if not, how does the beauty and strength of the languagewhich states the conviction, make it such? In this famous poem there is no jot of argument, so that the case, after reading it, stands exactly the same as it did before. No more has been said now, either for or against, than if any plain body had expressed the same ideas in his or her own way. For these mysterious sensations are not confined to poets or great people. They are a common heritage, but attract outside attention only when they find exalted utterance.Suum cuiquetherefore. The poet’s aptitude is to feel and express; not, as a rule, to discover.

Besides the grand sweeping rush of the wood-pigeons over the plantation, which makes the air full of sound, there is some fluttering of wings, as the birds get into the trees; but this is less than one might expect. It is afterwards, when they fly—first one and then another—from the tree they have at first settled in to some other one, that they think will suit them better, that the real noise begins. Then all silence and solitude vanishes out of the lonely plantation, and it becomes full of bustle, liveliness, and commotion. The speed and impetus of the first downward flight has carried the birds smoothly on to the branches, but now, flying under them, amongst the tree trunks, they move heavily, make a great clattering of wings in getting up to the selected bough, and often give a loud final clap with them, as they perch upon it.

Wood-pigeons are in greater numbers in this part of Suffolk than one might suppose would be the case, in a country for the most part so open. However, even a small plantation will accommodate a great many. I remember one cold afternoon inDecember going into one of young oaks and beeches, skirting a grove of gloomy pines, where the rooks come nightly to roost. My entry disturbed a multitude of the birds in question, but after sitting, for some time, silently, under a tree of the dividing row, they returned “in numbers numberless,” almost rivalling the rooks themselves. Some trees seemed favourites, and, from these, clouds of them would, sometimes, fly suddenly off, as if they had become overcrowded. There was a constantly recurring clatter and swish of wings, and then all at once the great bulk of the birds, as it seemed to me, rose with such a clapping as Garrick or Mrs. Siddons might have dreamed of, and departed—quantities of them, at least—in impetuous, arrowy flight. I should have said, now, that the greater number were gone, though the plantation still seemed fairly peopled. Towards four, however, it became so cold that I had to move, andallthe pigeons flew out of all the trees—a revelation as to their real numbers, quite a wonderful thing to see. Some of the trees, as the birds left them, just in the moment when they were going, but still there, were neither oaks nor beeches—nor ashes, elms, poplars, firs, sycamores, or any other known kind for the matter of that—butpigeon-trees, that and nothing else.

For wrens, tits, and golden-crested wrens these fir plantations are as paradises all the year round. The first-named little bird may often be seen creeping about amongst the small holes and tunnels at the roots of trees—especially overturned trees—going down into one and coming out at another,as though it were a mouse. It is very pretty to see it peep and creep and disappear, and then demurely appear again. Often it will be underground for quite a little while—long enough to make one wonder, sometimes, if anything has happened to it—but nothing ever has. As soon as it has explored one labyrinth, it utters its little chirruppy, chirpy, chattery note, and flits, a brown little shadow, to another, into the first dark root-cavern of which it, once more, disappears. House-hunting, it looks like—for the coming spring quarter, to take from Lady Day, it being February now—but it is too early for the bird to be really thinking of a nest, and no doubt the finding of insects is its sole object. The golden-crested wrens are more aerial in their search for food. They pass from fir-top to fir-top, flitting swiftly about amongst the tufts of needles, owing to which, and their small size, it is difficult to follow their movements accurately. The pine-needles seem very attractive to them. I have often searched these for insects, but never with much success, and I think, myself, that they feed principally upon the tiny buds which begin to appear upon them, very early in the year. In winter they may often be seen about the trunks of the trees, and I remember, once, jotting down a query as to what they could get there on a cold frosty morning in December, when a spider, falling on the note-book, answered it in a quite satisfactory manner.

Many spiders hibernate under the rough outer bark of the Scotch fir, often in a sort of webby cocoon, which they spin for themselves; numbers of smallpupæ, too, choose—or have chosen in their pre-existences—the same situations, especially that of the cinnabar moth, which is extremely common about here. Its luridly-coloured caterpillar—banded with deep black and orange—swarms upon the common flea-bane, which grows something like a scanty crop over much of the sandy soil; and when about to pupate, as I have noticed with interest, it ascends the trunk of the Scotch fir, and undergoes the change in one of the numerous chinks in its flaky bark. I have seen numbers of these caterpillars thus ascending and concealing themselves, but I do not know from how great a distance they come to the trees. Probably it is only from quite near, for the majority, to get to them, would have to travel farther than can be supposed possible, and, moreover, fir-trees in these parts date, as I said, only from some fifty years back. Doubtless it is mere accident, but when one sees such numbers crawling towards the trees, and ascending as soon as they reach them, it looks as though they were acting under some special impulse, such as that which urges birds to migrate, or sends the lemmings to perish in the sea. These caterpillars, however, as I now bethink me, are nauseous to birds. I have thrown them to fowls who appeared not to see them, so that they offer, I suppose, an example of warning coloration. If, however, the caterpillar is unpalatable, the chrysalis probably is also, so that it would not be for these that the golden wren, or the coal-tit, its frequent companion, searches the bark in the winter.

Coal-tits, too, feed much—ne m’en parlez point—on the delicate little buds at the ends of the clustersof spruce-needles, but they, likewise, pull at and examine the needles themselves, so may, perhaps, find some minute insects at their bases. They eat the buds of the larch, too, and, as said before, whatever they can get by prying and probing about, on the trunks of all these firs—especially that of the Scotch one, which they search, sometimes, very industriously. Whilst thus engaged they say at intervals, “Woo-tee, woo-tee, woo-tee” (or “Wee-tee,” a sound between the two), and sometimes “Tooey, tooey, tooey-too; tooey, tooey, tooey-too.” They flit quickly from place to place, and, both in this and their way of feeding generally, a good deal resemble the little golden wrens. The latter, however, are brisker, more fairy-like, and still more difficult to watch. Yet, do not let me wrong the coal-tit—he moves most daintily. Every little hop is a little flutter with the wings, a little flirt with the tail. His little legs you hardly see. He has a little game—not hop, skip, and jump, but hop, flirt, and flutter. His motion combines all three—in what proportions, how or when varying, that no man knoweth. How, exactly, he gets to any place that he would, you do not see, you cannot tell—he is there, that you see, but the rest is doubtful. He does not know, himself, I believe. “Aber frag’ mich nür nicht wie,” he might say, with Heine, if you asked him about it.

But if there is such a mystery in the movements of the coal-tit, what is to be said about those of the long-tailed one? Most unfair would it be to omit him, now that the other has been mentioned. Nor will I. Dear little birdikins! The naturalist mustbeblasé, indeed, who could ever be tired of noting your ways, though he might well be weary of following you about amongst the delicate larches, which are most your fairy home and in which you look most fairy-like. Such a dance as you lead him! For always you are passing on, making a hasting, running examination of the twigs of the trees you flit through, searching systematically, from one to another, in a sort of aerial forced-march, which makes you—oh, birdikins!—most difficult to watch. Like other tits, you—Oh, but hang the apostrophe; I can’t sustain it, so must drop, again—and I think for ever—into the sober third person. Like other tits, then, these little long-tailed ones are fond of hanging, head downwards, on the under side of a bough or twig: but I am not sure if I have seen other tits come down on a bough or twig in this way—at any rate not to the same extent. Say that a blue or a great tit, and a long-tailed one, are both on the same bough, together. The two former will fly, or flutter—fly, to another, alight upon its upper side, and get round to its under one, by a process that can be seen. The long-tailed tit will jump and arrive on the under side, hanging there head downwards. That, at least, is what it looks like, as if he had turned himself on his back, in the air, before seizing hold of his twig. Really there is a little swing down, after seizing it—like an acrobat on a trapeze—but this is so quick that it eludes the eye. It is by his legerdemain and illusion, and by his jumping, rather than flying, from bough to bough, that the long-tailed tit is distinguished. He often makes a good long jump—areal jump—without appearing to aid himself with his wings at all. The note of these tits is a “Zee, zee—zee, zee, zee, zee,” but it is not of such a sharp quality as the “zee” or “tzee” of the blue tit. It is more pleasing—indeed, there is something very pleasing about it. What is there, in fact, that is not pleasing about this little bird?

But I have something more to say upon the subject of the coal-tit’s diet; for he eats, I believe, the seeds of the fir-cones, and manages not only to pick them out of these, but to pick the cone itself to pieces in so doing—a wonderful feat, surely, when one thinks how large and hard the cone is, and how small the bird. It is not on the tree that I have seen these tits feeding in this manner, but on the ground, and the question, for me, is whether the cones that lay everywhere about had been detached and then reduced, sometimes, almost to shreds, by them or by squirrels. At first I unhesitatingly put it down to the latter, but I soon noticed that in these particular firs—not part of a plantation but skirting the road, as is common here—a squirrel was never to be seen. Neither were coal-tits numerous, but still a pair or two seemed to live here, and were often engaged with the cones. Half-a-dozen of these I took home to examine at leisure. Two, I found, had been only just commenced on, and the punctures upon them were certainly such as might have been made by the beak of a small bird, suggesting that the tit had here begun the process of picking the cone to pieces, before any squirrel had touched it. One of the outer four-sided scales had been removed, and as no cut or excoriation wasvisible upon the surface thus exposed, this, again, looked more as if the scale aforesaid had been seized with a pincers—the bird’s beak—and torn off, than as though it had been cut away with a chisel—the squirrel’s teeth—for, in this latter case, the plate beneath would, in all probability, have been cut into, too, at some point, and not left in its natural smooth state. Another two of these cones consisted of the bases only, and from their appearance and the debris around them, seemed to have been pecked and torn, rather than gnawed to pieces. In five out of the six, the extreme base—that part from the centre of which the stalk springs—had been left untouched. In the sixth, however, this had been attacked, and presented a rough, hacked, punctured appearance, the stalk itself—represented by just a point—having apparently been pecked through, suggesting strongly that the tits had commenced work while the cone hung on the tree, and had severed it in this way. All round the basal circle the scales had been stripped off, and the exposed surface was smooth and unexcoriated—as in the other instance—except where a portion of it seemed to have been torn, not cut, away. Two seed-cavities were exposed and empty. It certainly looked as though these cones had been hacked and pulled to pieces by the tits, and not gnawed by squirrels, so as this agreed with the absence of the latter, and what I had actually seen the bird doing, I came to the conclusion that they had been. Perhaps there is nothing very wonderful in it after all, but, looking at a fir-cone, I should have thought it clean beyond the strength of a coal-tit to tear it to pieces. But what, now, isthe origin of the name “coal-tit,” which seems to have no particular meaning? Is it a corruption of “cone-tit,” which, if the bird really feeds on the seeds of the fir, and procures them in this manner, would have one? GermanKohlmeise, however, is rather against this hypothesis.

Young Nightjars

One bird there is to whom these scattered fir plantations, with their surrounding, sandy territory, dotted here and there with a gaunt elder-bush or gnarled old hawthorn, are extremely dear, and that bird is the nightjar. Nightjars are very common here. If spruces and larches alternate with the prevailing Scotch fir, they love to sit on the extreme tip-top of one of these, and there, sometimes, they will “churr” without intermission for an extraordinary length of time. Sometimes it seems as if the bird would never either move, or leave off, but all at once, with a suddenness which surprises one, it rises into the air, and goes off with several loud claps of the wings above the back, and uttering another note—“quaw-ee, quaw-ee”—which is never heard, save during flight. After a few circles it may bejoined by a companion—probably its mate—upon which, as in an excess of glad excitement, it will clap its wings, again, a dozen or score of times in succession. The two then pursue one another, wheeling in swiftest circles and making, often, the most astonishing turns and twists, as they strive either to escape or overtake. Often they will be joined by a third or fourth bird, and more fast, more furious, then, becomes the airy play. No words can give an idea of the extreme beauty of the flight of these birds. In their soft moods they seem to swoon on the air, and, again, they flout, coquette, and play all manner of tricks with it. Grace and jerkiness are qualities quite opposite to each other. The nightjar, when “i’ the vein,” combines them with easy mastery, and to see this is almost to have a new sensation. It is as though Shakespeare’s Ariel were to dance in a pantomime,3yet still be Shakespeare’s Ariel. As one watches such beings in the deepening gloom, they seem not to be real, but parts of the night’s pageant only—dusky imaginings, shadows in the shapes of birds. What glorious powers of motion! One cannot see them without wishing to be one of them.

I have spoken of the nightjar clapping its wings a dozen or score of times in succession. This is not exaggerated. I have counted up to twenty-five claps myself, and this was less than the real number, as the first tumultuous burst of them was well-nigh over before I began to count. It is not easy, indeed, to keep up with the bird, and when it stops, one is,generally, a little behind. The claps are wonderfully loud and distinct—musical they always sound to me—and I believe, myself, that they are almost as sexual in their character as is the bleating of the snipe. The habit has, indeed, become now so thoroughly ingrained that any sudden emotion, as, say, surprise or fear, is apt to call it forth, of which principle, in nature, many illustrations might be given; but it is when two or more birds are sporting together—or when one, after a long bout of “churring,” springs from the tree, and, especially, in a swift, downward flight to the ground, where its mate is probably reclining—that one hears it in its perfection. Why so little has been said about this very marked and noticeable peculiarity, why a work of high authority should only tell us that “in general its flight is silent, but at times, when disturbed from its repose, its wings may be heard to smite together,” I really do not know. The expression used suggests that the sound made by the smiting of the wings is but slight, whereas one would have to be fairly deaf not to hear it. And why only “when disturbed”? Under such circumstances the performance will always be a poor one, but it is not by startling the bird, but by waiting, unseen and silent, that one is likely to hear it in its perfection, and then not alarm or disquietude, but joy will have produced it—it is a glad ebullition.

The domestic habits of the nightjar are very pretty and interesting. No bird can be more exemplary in its conjugal relations, and in its care and charge of the young. Both husband and wifetake part in the incubation of the eggs, and there is, perhaps, no prettier sight than to see the one relieve the other upon them. It is the female bird, as I believe, that sits during the day—which, to her, is as the night—and, shortly after the first churring round about begins to be heard, her partner may be seen flying up from some neighbouring clump of trees, and, as he comes, uttering, at intervals, that curious note of “quaw-ee, quaw-ee,” which seems to be the chief aerial vehicle of the domestic emotions. As it comes nearer, it is evidently recognised by the sitting bird, who churrs in response, but so softly that human ears can only just catch the sound. The male now settles beside her, churrs softly himself, and then pressing and, as it were, snoozling against her, seems to insist that it is now his turn. For a few seconds the pair sit thus, churring together, and, whilst doing so, both wag their tails—and not only their tails, but their whole bodies also—from side to side, like a dog in a transport of pleasure. Then all at once, without any fondling or touching with the beak—which, indeed, I have never seen in them—the female darts away, leaving the male upon the eggs. She goes off instantaneously, launching, light as a feather, direct from her sitting attitude, without rising, or even moving, first. In other cases the cock bird settles himself a little farther away, and the hen at once flies off. There are infinite variations in the pretty scene, but the prettiest, because the most affectionate, is that which I have described, where the male, softly and imperceptibly, seems to squeeze himself on to the eggs, and his partner off them.I have seen tame doves of mine act in just the same way, and here, too, both would coo together upon the nest.

In regard to the two sexes churring, thus, in unison, I can assert, in the most uncompromising manner, that they do so, having been several times a witness of it, at but a few steps’ distance, and in broad daylight, I may almost say, taking the time of the year into consideration. The eyes, indeed, are as important as the ears in coming to a conclusion on the matter, for not only is the tail wagged in these little duets, but with the first breath of the sound, the feathers of the bird’s throat begin to twitch and vibrate, in a very noticeable manner. Various authorities, it is true, either state or imply that the male nightjar alone churrs, or burrs, or plays the castanets, however one may try to describe that wonderful sound, which seems to become the air itself, on summer evenings, anywhere where nightjars are numerous. But these authorities are all mistaken, and as soon as they take to watching a pair of the birds hatching their eggs, they will find that they were, but not before, for there is no other way of making certain. It is true that the churr thus uttered, though as distinct as an air played on the piano, is now extraordinarily subdued, of so soft and low a quality that, remembering what it more commonly is, one feels inclined to marvel at such a power of modulation. But it is just the same sound “in little”—how, indeed, can such a sound be mistaken?—and, after all, since a drum can be beaten lightly, there is no reason why an instrument, which is part of the performer itself,should be less under control. What is really interesting and curious is to hear such a note expressing, even to one’s human ears, the soft language of affection—for it does do so in the most unmistakable manner.

Though, as we have seen, both the male and female nightjar help in the hatching of the eggs, the female takes the greater part of it upon herself, and is also much moreau faitin the business—I believe so, at least. The sexes are, indeed, hard to distinguish, and, as the light fades, it becomes, of course, impossible to do so. Still, one cannot watch a sitting pair, evening after evening, for an hour or more at a time, without forming an opinion on such a point; and this is mine. We may assume, perhaps, that it is the female bird who sits all day, without once being relieved. If so, it is the male who flies up in the evening, and from this point one can judge by reckoning up the changes, and timing each bird on the eggs. This I did, and it appeared to me, not only that the hen was, from the first, the most assiduous of the two, but, also, that the cock became less and less inclined to attend to the eggs, as the time of their hatching drew near. So, too, he seemed to me to sit upon them with less ease and to have a tendency to get them separated from each other, which, in one case, led to a scene which, to me, seemed very interesting, as bearing on the bird’s intelligence, and which I will therefore describe. I must say that, previously to this, when both birds were away, I had left my shelter in order to pluck an intervening nettle or two, and thus get a still clearer view, and I hadthen noticed that the two eggs lay rather wide apart. Shortly afterwards one of the birds, which I judged to be the male, returned, and in getting on to the eggs—which it did by pushing itself along the ground—it must, I think, have moved them still farther from one another. At any rate it became necessary, in the bird’s opinion, to alter their relative position, and in order to do this it went into a very peculiar attitude. It, as it were, stood upon its breast, with its tail raised, almost perpendicularly, into the air, so that it looked something like a peg-top set, peg upwards, on the broad end, the legs being, at no time, visible. Thus poised, it pressed with the under part of its broad beak—or, as one may say, with its chin—first one egg and then the other against its breast, and, so holding it, moved backwards and forwards over the ground, presenting a strange and most unbirdlike appearance. The ground, however, was not even, and despite the bird’s efforts to get the two eggs together, one of them—as I plainly saw—rolled down a little declivity. At the bottom some large pieces of fir-bark lay partially buried in the sand, and under one of these the egg became wedged. The bird was unable to get it out, so as to bring it up the hill again to where the other egg lay, for the bark, by presenting an edge, prevented it from getting its chin against the farther side of the one that was fast, so as to press it against its breast as before—though making the most desperate efforts to do so. Wedging its head between the bark and the ground, it now stood still more perpendicularly upright on its breast, and, in thisposition, shoved and shouldered away, most desperately. After each effort it would lie a little, as if exhausted, then waddle to the other egg, and settle itself upon it; then, in a minute or two, return to the one it had left, and repeat its efforts to extricate it. At last, however, after nearly half-an-hour’s labour, an idea seemed to occur to it. It went again to the properly-placed egg, but instead of settling down upon it, as before, began to move it to the other one, in the way that I have described. “If the mountain will not go to Mahomet, Mahomet must go to the mountain”—that was clearly the process of reasoning, and seeing how set the bird’s mind had been on one course of action—how it had toiled and struggled and returned to its efforts, again and again—its subsequent, sudden adoption of another plan showed, I think, both intelligence and versatility. It, in fact, acted just as a sensible man would have done. It tried to do the best thing, till convinced it was impossible, and then did the second best. Having thus got the two eggs together again, it tried hard to push away the piece of bark—which was half buried in the sand—backwards, with its wings, feet, and tail, after the manner in which the young cuckoo—in spite of the anti-vaccinationists4—ejects its foster brothers and sisters from the nest. Finally, as it grew dark, it flew away. I then went out to look, and found that the bird had been successful in its efforts, to a certain extent. The two eggs now lay together,and though not quite on the same level, and though the piece of bark was still in the way of one of them, both might yet have been covered, though not with ease, and so, possibly, hatched out. However, had I left them as they were, I have no doubt that, assisted, perhaps, by its partner, the bird would have continued to work away till matters were quite satisfactory. But having seen so much, and since it would soon have been too dark to see anything more, I thought I would interfere, for once, and so removed the bark, and smoothing down the declivity, laid the eggs side by side, on a flat surface. I must add that whilst this nightjar was thus struggling to extricate its eggs, it uttered from time to time a low querulous note.

When the eggs are hatched, both parents assist in feeding the chicks, and the first thing that one notices—and to me, at least, it was an interesting discovery—is that they feed them, not by bringing them moths or cockchafers—on which insects the nightjar is supposed principally to feed—in their bill, but by a process of regurgitation, after the manner of pigeons. There is one difference, however, viz., that whereas the bill of the young pigeon is placed within that of the parent, the young nightjar seizes the parent’s bill in its own. Those peculiar jerking and straining motions, which are employed to bring up the food—from the crop, as I suppose—into the mouth, are the same, or, at least, closely similar, in either case. I have watched the thing taking place so often, and from so near, that I cannot, I think, have been mistaken. There was, usually, a good light, when the first ministrationsbegan, and even after it had grown dark I could almost always see the outline of the bird’s head and beak, defined against the sky, as it sat perched upon the bare, thin point of an elder-stump, from which it generally flew to feed the chicks. Never was this outline broken by any projection, as it must have been had an insect of any size been held in the bill. A more conclusive argument is, I think, that the chicks were generally fed, in the way I have described, several times in succession. They would always come out from under their mother, as the evening approached, and, jumping up at her bill, try to insist on her feeding them. Whether she ever fed them, then, before leaving the nest, I cannot, for certain, say. I do not think she did, nor can I see how she could have had anything in her crop after sitting, fasting, all day. As a rule, at any rate, she first flew off, and fed them only on her return. When she flew, I used to watch her for as long as I could, and would sometimes see her, as well as the other one, circling and twisting about in the air, in pursuit of insects, as it appeared to me. I never saw any insects, however, as I should have done had they been of any size, nor did I ever see anything, on the part of the birds, that looked like a snatch in the air with open bill. But if insects were being caught at all, the bill must, of course, have been opened to some extent, and this shows, I think—for what else could the birds have been doing?—that it is very difficult in the dusk of evening to see it opened, even when it is. For my own part, I have found it difficult—not to say impossible—to see swallowsopen their beaks, even in broad daylight, when they were obviously hawking for insects. The point is an important one, I think, in considering what kinds of insects the nightjar more habitually feeds on, and how, in general, it procures them—questions which, having been settled, as it seems to me, merely by assertion, are entirely reopened by the fact that the young are fed in the way I have described. For if moths and cockchafers are the bird’s principal food, why should it not bring these to the young, in the ordinary way? But if it swallows huge quantities of insects, so small that it cannot seize them in the bill, but must engulf them, merely, as it flies, as a whale does infusoria, we can then see a reason for its not doing so. How else, but by disgorging it in the form of a pulp, could such food as this be given to the chick? and if to do so became the bird’s habitual practice, it would not be likely to vary it in any instance. Now the green woodpecker feeds largely on ants, and, further on, I will give my reasons for believing that it feeds its young by regurgitation. The little woodpecker, however, I have watched coming, time and time again, to its hole in the tree-trunk, with its bill full of insects of various kinds, and of a respectable size, so that there is no doubt that it gives these to its brood, as does a thrush or a blackbird. What can make a difference, in this respect, between two such closely-allied species, if it be not that the one has taken to eating ants, minute creatures which it has to swallow wholesale, and could not well carry in the bill? When, therefore, we find the parent nightjar regurgitating food into thechick’s mouth, we may suspect that it also swallows large quantities of insects of an equally small, or smaller size. The beak need neither be widely nor continuously opened, for many such to be engulfed as the bird sailed through a strata of them; but even if it were both, we need not wonder at its not often being remarked, in a species which flies and feeds, mostly, by night, when it is both dark, and people are in bed. Still, I find in Seebohm’s “History of British Birds” the following: “The bird has been said to hunt for its food, with its large mouth wide open, but this is certainly an error.” The first part of the sentence impresses me more than the last. Whyhasthe bird its tremendous, bristle-fringed gape? Does it not suggest a whale’s mouth, with the baleen? Other birds catch individual insects as cleverly, without it.

There is another consideration which makes me think that nightjars feed much in this way. They hardly begin to fly about, before 8.30 in the evening, and between 3 and 4, next morning, they have retired for the day. Now I have watched them closely, on many successive evenings in June and July, and, for the life of me, I could never make out what food they were getting, or, indeed, that they were getting any, up to at least 10 o’clock. For much of the time they would be sitting on a bough, or perched on a fir-top, and churring, and, when they flew, it was often straight to the ground, and then back, again, to the same tree. They certainly did not seem to be catching insects when they did this, and their longer flights were not, as a rule, round trees, andoften resolved themselves into chasing and sporting with one another. That they occasionally caught moths or cockchafers seems, in itself, likely, but I never had reason to suppose that these were their particular quarry. It seems strange that I should have so rarely seen them catch any large insect—I cannot, indeed, remember an instance; but, on the other hand, they might well have engulfed crowds of small ones, as they flew, without my being able to detect it, and without any special effort to do so. That the air is often full of these—gnats, little flies, &c.—may be conjectured by watching swallows, and also bats. Indeed, one may both see and feel them oneself—in cycling, for instance, when I have often had a small beetle, constructed on the general plan of a devil’s coach-horse, sticking all over me. For all the above reasons, my view is that it is the smaller things of the air which form the staple of the nightjar’s food, and that its huge gape, and, possibly, the bristles on either side of the upper jaw, stand in relation to the enormous numbers of these which it engulfs. The bird, in fact—and this would apply equally to the other members of the family—plays, in my idea, the part of an aerial whale.

I have watched a pair of nightjars through the whole process of hatching out their eggs and bringing up their young, as long as the latter were to be found; for they got away from the nest—if the bare ground may be called one—long before they could fly. It was on the last day of June that the chicks first burst upon me. I had been watching the sitting bird for some time, and had noticed that thefeathers just under her chin were quivering, while her beak was held slightly—as slightly as possible—open. I thought she must be churring, but no sound reached my ear, so I concluded she was asleep merely, and dreaming that she was. She sat so still and close that I never imagined she could have ceased incubating. I had seen her eggs, too, as I thought, yesterday; but in this I may have been mistaken. All at once, however, a strange little, flat, fluffy thing ran out from under her breast, and, stretching up, touched its mother’s beak with its own. She did not respond, however, on which the chick ran back, disappointed. As soon as that queer little figure had disappeared, I was all eagerness to see it again, but hour after hour went by, the old bird drowsed and dreamed, and still there was no re-emergence. It seemed as though I had had an hallucination of the senses, all looked so still and unchangeable; but, at last, as the evening began to fall, and churring to be heard round about, out, suddenly, came the little apparition again, accompanied, this time, with an exact duplicate of itself. The two appeared from opposite sides, and, with a simultaneous jump, seized and struggled for the beak of the mother, who again resisted, and then, suddenly, darted off, just as, with “quaw-ee, quaw-ee,” the partner bird flew up. He settled himself beside the chicks, and when they sprang up at him, as they had just before done at the mother, he fed one thoroughly, but not the other, flying off immediately afterwards. The hen soon returned, and fed both the chicks several times, always, as I say, by the regurgitatory process. Between theintervals of feeding them, she kept uttering a little croodling note, expressive of quiet content and affection, whilst the chicks, more rarely, gave vent to a slender pipe. One of them I now5saw to be a little larger than the other, and of a lighter colour, and this bird seemed always to be the more greedy. The difference, in all three respects, increased from day to day, till at last, in regard to size, it became quite remarkable. The two parent birds were much alike in this respect, and as the two chicks had been born within a day of each other, it seems odd that there should have been this disparity between them. But so it was.

It appeared to me that, as the big chick was certainly the greedier of the two, so both the parents tried to avoid the undue favouring of it at the expense of the other. If so, however, their efforts were not very effective. It was difficult, indeed, to avoid the eagerness of whichever one first jumped up at them. As they got older, the chicks were left more and more alone in the nest, or, rather, on the spot where they were born. At first, they used to lie there in a wonderfully quiescent way, not moving, sometimes, for hours at a time, but gradually they became more active, and would make little excursions, from which they did not always trouble to return. Thus, by degrees, the old nesting-site became lost, for the parents, though for some time they continued to show an affection for it, settled more and more by the chicks, or, if they did not see them, somewhere near about, and then called them up to them. This they did with the littlecroodling note which I have spoken of, and which the chicks, on hearing, would answer with a “quirr, quirr,” and run towards it, then stop to listen, and run again, getting, all the while, more and more excited. If the old bird was at any distance, which, as the chicks got older, was more and more frequently the case, there would sometimes be long intervals between these summoning notes—if we assume them to be such—and, during these, the chicks lay still and, generally, close together, as if they were in the nest. When I walked to them, on these occasions, both the parent birds would start up from somewhere in the neighbourhood, and whilst one of them flew excitedly about, the other—which I took to be the hen—used always to spin, in the most extraordinary manner, over the ground, looking more like an insect than a bird, or, at any rate, suggesting, by her movements, those of a bluebottle that has got its wings scorched in the gas, and fallen down on the table. Whilst she was doing this, the chicks would, sometimes, run away, but, quite as often, one or both of them would remain where they were—apparently quite unconcerned—and allow me to take them up. When, at last, the mother followed the example of her mate, and flew off, she showed the same superior degree of anxiety in the air, as she had, before, upon the ground. She would come quite near me, hover about, dart away and then back again, sit on a thistle-tuft, leave it, as though in despair, and, at last, re-alight on the ground, where she kept up a loud, distressed kind of clucking, which, at times, became shriller, rising, as it were, to an agony. Themale was a little less moved. Still, he would fly quite near, and often clap his wings above his back. I cannot, now, quite remember whether the male ever began by spinning over the ground, in the same way as the hen, but, if he did, it did not last long, and he soon took to flight.

It will be seen from the above that the chicks are very well able to get about. They run, indeed, as easily, if not quite so fast, as a young duckling, and this power is retained by the grown bird, in spite of its aerial habits, for I have seen my two pursuing one another over the ground with perfect ease and some speed, seeming, thus, to run without legs, for these were at no time visible. The ground-breeding habits of the nightjar probably point to a time when it was, much more, a ground-dwelling bird, and as these habits have continued, we can understand a fair power of locomotion having been retained also. My own idea is that the nuptial rite is, sometimes at least, performed on the ground, but of this I have had no more than an indication.6

The nightjar utters many notes, besides that very extraordinary one by which it is so well known, and which has procured for it many of its names. I have made out at least nineteen others; but I do not believe that any very special significance belongs to the greater number of them, and I hold the same view in regard to many other notes uttered by various birds, which are supposed, always, to have some well-defined, limited meaning. Each, no doubt, has a meaning, at the time it is uttered,but I think it is, generally, one of many possible ones which may all be expressed by the same note, such note being the outcome, not of a definite idea, but of a certain state of feeling. Surprise, for instance, may be either a glad surprise or a fearful surprise, and very varied acts spring from either joy or fear. With ourselves definite ideas have become greatly developed; but animals may live, rather, in a world of emotions, which would then be much more a cause of their actions, and, consequently, of the cries which accompanied them, than the various ideas appertaining to each. Because, for instance, a rabbit stamps with its hind feet when alarmed, and other rabbits profit by its doing so, why need this be done as a signal, which would involve a conscious design? Is it not more likely that the stamp is merely the reaction to some sudden, strong emotion, which need not always be that of fear? If rabbits stamp, sometimes, in sport and frolic—as I think they do—this cannot be a signal, and therefore we ought not to assume that it is, when it has the appearance, or produces the effect, of one. All we can say, as it seems to me, is that excitement produces a certain muscular movement, which, according to the class of excitement to which it belongs, may mean or express either one thing or another. Such a movement, or such a cry, is like the bang of a gun, which may have been fired either as a salute or with deadly intent. However, if the nightjar’s nineteen notes really express nineteen definite ideas in the bird’s mind, I can only confess that I have not discovered what these are. Some of the sounds,indeed, are very good illustrations of the view here brought forward—for instance, the croodling one just mentioned, which, when it calls the chicks from a distance, seems as though it could have no other meaning than this, but which may also be heard when parent and young are sitting together, and, again, between the intervals in the process of feeding the latter. Is it not, therefore, a sound belonging to the soft, parental emotions, from which sometimes one class of actions, and sometimes another, may spring—the note being the same in all? From the number of sounds which the nightjar has at command, I deduce that it is a bird of considerable range and variety of feeling, which would be likely to make it an intelligent bird also; and this, in my experience, it is. Two of the most interesting notes, or rather series of notes, which it utters, are modifications, or extensions, of the only one which has received much attention—the churr, namely. One of these is a sort of jubilee of gurgling sounds, impossible to describe, at the end of it; and the other—much rarer—a beatification, so to speak, of the churr itself, also towards the end, the sound becoming more vocal and expressive, and losing the hard, woodeny, insect-like character which it usually has. To these I will not add a mere list of sounds, as to the import of which—not wishing to say more than I know—I have nothing very particular to say.

These are days in which the theory of protective coloration has been run—especially, in my opinion, in the case of the higher animals—almost to death. It may not be amiss, therefore, that I shouldmention the extraordinary resemblance which the nightjar bears to a piece of fir-bark, when it happens to be sitting amidst pieces of fir-bark, and not amidst other things, which, when it is, it no doubt resembles as strongly. If, at a short distance, and for a considerable time, one steadily mistakes one thing for another thing, with the appearance of which one is well acquainted, this, I suppose, is fair proof of a likeness, provided one’s sight is good. Such a mistake I have made several times, and especially upon one occasion. It was midday in June, and a sunny day as well. I had left the bird in question, for a little while, to watch another, and when I returned, it was sitting in the same place, which I knew like my study table. My eye rested full upon it, as it sat, but not catching the outline of the tip of the wings and tail, across a certain dry stalk, as I was accustomed to do, I thought I was looking at a piece of fir-bark—one of those amongst which it sat. I, in fact, looked for the eggsuponthe bird, for I knew the exact spot where they should be; but, as I should have seen them, at once, owing to their light colour, I felt sure they must be covered, and after gazing steadily, for some time, all at once—by an optical delusion, as it seemed, rather than by the passing away of one—the piece of fir-bark became the nightjar. It was like a conjuring trick. The broad, flat head, from which the short beak projects hardly noticeably, presented no special outline for the eye to seize on, but was all in one line with the body. It looked just like the blunt, rounded end, either of a stump, or of any of the pieces of fir-bark that were lying about, whilst the darkbrown lines and mottlings of the plumage, besides that they blended with, and faded into, the surroundings, had, both in pattern and colouring, a great resemblance to the latter object; the lighter feathers exactly mimicking those patches which are made by the flaking off of some of the numerous layers of which the bark of the Scotch fir is composed. This would only be of any special advantage to the bird when, as in the present instance, it had laid its eggs amongst pieces of such bark, fallen from the neighbouring Scotch fir-trees, and did it invariably do so, a special protective resemblance might, perhaps, be admitted. This, however, is not the case. It lays them, also, under beeches or elsewhere, where neither firs nor fir-bark are to be seen.

Unless, therefore, it can be shown that a large majority of nightjars lay, and have for a long time laid, their eggs in the neighbourhood of the Scotch fir, the theory of a special resemblance in relation to such a habit, due to the action of natural selection, must be given up; as I believe it ought to be in some other apparent instances of it, which have received more attention. Of course, there might be a difference of opinion, especially if the bird were laid on a table, as to the amount, or even the existence, of the resemblance which I here insist upon. But I return to the essential fact. At the distance of two paces I looked full at a nightjar sitting amongst flakes of fir-bark, strewed about the sand, and, for some time, it appeared to me that it was one of these. This is interesting, if we suppose, as I do, that mere chance has brought about the resemblance, for here is a point fromwhich natural selection might easily go on towards perfection. As I did make out the bird, at last, there is clearly more to be done. It is, perhaps, just possible that we already see in the nightjar some steps towards a special resemblance. The bird is especially numerous in Norway, as I was told when I was there; and Norway is one great, pine forest. However, not knowing enough in regard to its habitat, and the relative numbers of individuals that resort to different portions of it, to form an opinion on this point, I will suppose, in the meantime, that its colouring has been made generally protective, in relation to its incubatory habits; for the eggs are laid on the ground, and commonly at the foot of a tree, stump, or bush—in the neighbourhood of such objects, in fact, as have a more or less brownish hue.

It is during incubation that the bird would stand most in need of protection, since it is then exposed, more or less completely, for a great length of time. One bird, as far as I have been able to see, sits on the eggs all day long, without ever once leaving them. Day, however, is night to the nightjar, who not only sits on its eggs, but sleeps, or, at least, dozes, on them as well. Drowsiness may, in this case, have meant security both to bird and eggs; for the most sleepy individuals would, by keeping still, have best safeguarded their young, at all stages, as well as themselves, against the attacks of small predatory animals. Flies used often to crawl over the face of the bird I watched daily. They would get on its eyes; and once a large bluebottle flewright at one of them. But beyond causing it just to open or shut the eye, as the case might be, they produced no effect upon the sleepy creature. The nightjar is a remarkably close sitter, and both this special habit and its general drowsiness upon the nest may have been fostered, at the same time, by natural selection. The more usual view of the nightjar’s colouring is, I suppose, that it is dusky, in harmony with night. But from what does a bird of its great powers of flight require protection, either as against the attacks of enemies or the escape of prey; and again, what colour, short of white, would be a disadvantage to it, in the case of either, whennox atra colorem abstulit rebus?

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