As the tree, so the man. May it be given us to resemble it—to resemble that mighty but pacific oak, whose powerful absorption has concentrated every element, and made of it the grave, useful, enduring individual—the solid personality—of which all men confidently demand a support, a shelter; which stretches forth its helpful arms to the divers animal tribes, and shelters them with its foliage! With a thousand voices they gratefully enchant, by day and night, the still majesty of this aged witness of the years. The birds thank it from their hearts, and delight its paternal shades with song, love, and youth.
Indestructible vigour of the climates of the West? Why doth this oak live through a thousand years? Because it is ever young.
It is the oak which chronicles the commencement of spring. For us the emotion of the new life does not begin when all nature clothes itself in the uniform verdure of the meaner vegetation. It commences only when we see the oak, from the woody foliage of the past, which it still retains, gathering its fresh leaves; when the elm, permitting itself to be outstripped by inferior trees, tints with a light green the severe delicacy of its airy branches, clearly defined against the sky.
Then, then, Nature speaks to all—her potent voice troubles even the soul of sages. And why not? Is she not holy? And this surprising awakening, which has stirred life everywhere—from the hard dumb heart of the oaks, even to their lofty crest, where the bird pours out its gladness—is it not, as it were, a return of God?
I have lived in climates where the olive and the orange preserve an eternal bloom. Without ignoring the beauty of these favoured trees, and their special distinction, I could never accustom myself to the monotonous permanency of their unchangeable garb, whose verdure responded to the heaven's unchangeable sapphire. I was ever in a state of expectancy, waiting for a renewal which never came. The days passed by, but were always identical. Not a leaf the less on the ground, not a cloudlet in the sky. Mercy, I exclaimed, O everlasting Nature! To the changeful heart which thou hast given me, grant a little change. Rain, mire, storm, I accept them all; so that from sky or earth the idea of movement may return to me—the idea of renovation; that every year the spectacle of a new creation may refresh my heart, may restore to me the hope that my soul shall enjoy a similar resurrection, and, by the alternations of sleep, of death, or of winter, create for itself a new spring!
Man, bird, all nature, utter the same desire. We exist through change.
To these forcible alternations of heat, cold, fog, and sun, melancholyand joyaunce, we owe the tempered, the powerful personality of our West. Rain wearies us to-day; fine weather will come with the morrow. The splendours of the East, the marvels of the Tropics, taken together, are not worth the first violet of Easter, the first song of April, the blossom of the hawthorn, the glee of the young girl who resumes her robes of white.
In the morning a potent voice, of singular freshness and clearness, of keen metallictimbre, the voice of the mavis, rises aloft, and there is no heart so sick or so sour as to hear it without a smile.
One spring, on my way to Lyons, among the intertangled vines which the peasants laboured to raise up again, I heard a poor, old, miserable, and blind woman singing, with an accent of extraordinary gaiety, this ancient village lay:
"Nous quittons nos grands habits,Pour en prendre de plus petits."
"Nous quittons nos grands habits,Pour en prendre de plus petits."
THE BIRD AS THE LABOURER OF MAN.
THE BIRD AS THE LABOURER OF MAN.
THE BIRD AS THE LABOURER OF MAN.
The "miserlyagriculturist," is the accurate and forcible expression of Virgil. Miserly, and blind, in truth, for he proscribes the birds which destroy insects and protect his crops.
Not a grain will he spare to the bird which, during the winter rains, hunted up the future insect, sought out the nests of the larvæ, examined them, turned over every leaf, and daily destroyed myriads of future caterpillars; but sacks of corn to the adult insects, and whole fields to the grasshoppers which the bird would have combated!
With his eyes fixed on the furrow, on the present moment, without sight or foresight; deaf to the grand harmony which no one ever interrupts with impunity, he has everywhere solicited or approved the laws which suppressed the much-needed assistant of his labour, the insect-destroying bird. Andthe insects have avenged the bird. It has become necessary to recall in all haste the banished. In the island of Bourbon, for example, a price was set on each martin's head; they disappeared, and then the grasshoppers took possession of the island, devouring, extinguishing, burning up with harsh acridity all that they did not devour. The same thing has occurred in North America with the starling, the protector of the maize. The sparrow even, which attacks the grain, but also defends it—the thieving, pilfering sparrow, loaded with so many insults, and stricken with so many maledictions—it has been seen that without him Hungary would perish; that he alone could wage the mighty war against the cockchafers and the myriad winged foes which reign in the low-lying lands: his banishment has been revoked, and the courageous militia hastily recalled which, if not strictly disciplined, are not the less the salvation of the country.
No long time ago, near Rouen, and in the valley of Monville, the crows had for a considerable period been proscribed. The cockchafers, accordingly, profited to such an extent—their larvæ, multipledad infinitum, pushed so far their subterranean works—that an entire meadow was pointed out to me as completely withered on the surface; every root of grass or herb was eaten up; and all the turf, easily detached, could be rolled back on itself just as one raises a carpet.
All toil, all appeals of man to nature, supposes the intelligence of the natural order. Such is the order, and such the law:Life has around it and within it its enemy—most frequently as its guest—the parasite which undermines and cankers it.
Inert and defenceless life, especially vegetable, deprived of locomotion, would succumb to it but for the stronger support of the indefatigable enemy of the parasite, the merciless pursuer, the winged conqueror of the monsters.
The war rageswithoutunder the Tropics, where they surge up on all sides.Withinin our climates, where everything is hidden, more profound, and more mysterious.
In the exuberant fecundity of the Torrid Zone, the insects, thoseterrible destroyers of plant-life, carry off the superfluous. They are there a necessity. They ravage among the prodigious abundance of spontaneous plants, of lost seeds, of the fruits which Nature scatters over the wastes. Here, in the narrow field watered by the sweat of man, they garner in his place, devour his labour and its harvest; they attack even his life.
Do not say, "Winter is on my side; it will check the foe." Winter does but slay the enemies which would perish of themselves. It kills especially the ephemera, whose existence was already measured by that of the flower, or the leaf with which it was bound up. But, before dying, the prescient atom assures the safety of its posterity; it finds for it an asylum, conceals and carefully deposits its future, the germ of its reproduction. As eggs, as larvæ, or in their own shapes, living, mature, armed, these invisible creatures sleep in the bosom of the earth, awaiting their opportunity. Is she immovable, this earth? In the meadows I see her undulate—the black miner, the mole, continues her labours. At a higher elevation, in the dry grounds, stretch the subterranean granaries, where the philosophical rat, on a good pile of corn, passes the season in patience.
All this life breaks forth at spring-time. From high, from low, on the right, on the left, these predatory tribes,échelonnedby legions which succeed one another and relieve one another each in its month, in its day—the immense, the irresistible conscription of nature—will march to the conquest of man's works. The division of labour is perfect. Each has his post marked out, and will make no mistake. Each will go straight to his tree or his plant. And such will be their tremendous numbers, that not a leaf but will have its legion.
What wilt thou do, poor man? How wilt thou multiply thyself? Hast thou wings to pursue them? Hast thou even eyes to see them? Thou mayest kill them at thy pleasure; their security is complete: kill, annihilate millions; they live by thousands of millions! Where thou triumphest by sword and fire, burning up the plant itself, thou hearest all around the light whirring of the great army of atoms, which gives no heed to thy victory, and destroys unseen.
Listen. I will give thee two counsels. Weigh them, and adopt the wiser.
The first remedy for this, if you resolve upon fighting your foe, is to poison everything. Steep your seeds in sulphate of copper; put your barley under the protection of verdigris. This the foe is unprepared for; it disconcerts him. If he touches it, he dies or sickens. You, also, it is true, are scarcely flourishing; your adventurous stratagem may help the plagues which devastate our era. Happy age! The benevolent labourer poisons at the outset; this copper-coloured corn, handed over to the baker, ferments with the sulphate; a simple and agreeable means of "raising" the lightpâte, to which, perhaps, people would object.
No; adopt a better course than this. Take your side. Before so many enemies it is no shame to fall back. Let things go, and fold your arms. Rest, and look on. Be like that brave man who, on the eve of Waterloo, wounded and prostrate, contrived to lift himself up and scan the horizon; but he saw there Blucher, and the great cloud of the black army. Then he fell back, exclaiming, "They are too many!"
And how much more right have you to say so! You are alone against the universal conspiracy of life. You also may exclaim, "They are too many!"
You insist. See here these fields so full of inspiring hope; see the humid pastures where I might please myself with watching the cattle lost among the thick herbage. Let us lead thither the herds!
They are expected. Without them what would become of those living clouds of insects which love nothing but blood? The blood of the ox is good; the blood of man is better. Enter; seat yourself in their midst; you will be well received, for you are their banquet. These darts, these horns, these pincers, will find an exquisite delicacy in your flesh; a sanguinary orgie will open on your body for the frantic dance of this famished host, which will not relax at least from want; you shall see more than one fall away, and die of the intoxicating fountain which he had opened with his dart. Wounded, bleeding, swollen with puffed-up sores, hope for no repose. Others will come, and again others, for ever, and without end. For if the climate is less severe than in the zones of the South, in revenge, the eternal rain—that ocean of soft warm water incessantly flooding our meadows—hatches in a hopeless fecundity those nascent and greedy lives, which are impatient to rise, to be born, and to finish their career by the destruction of superior existences.
I have seen, not in the marshes, but on the western heights, those pleasant verdurous hills, clothed with woods or meadows—I have seen the pluvial waters repose for lack of outlet; and then, when evaporated by the sun's rays, leave the earth covered with a rich and abundant animal production—slugs, snails, insects of a myriad species, all people of terrible appetite, born with sharp teeth, with formidable apparatus, and ingenious machines of destruction. Powerless against the irruption of an unexpected host which crawled, stirred, ascended, penetrated, had almost eaten up ourselves, we contended with them through the agency of some brave and voracious fowls, which never counted their enemies, and did not criticise, but swallowed them. These Breton and Vendean fowls, inspired with the genius of theircountry, made their campaign so much the more successfully, because each waged war in its own manner. Theblack, thegray, and theegg-layer(such were their military titles), marched together in close array, and recoiled not a step; thedreamerorphilosopherpreferred skirmishing by himself (chouanner), and accomplished much more work. A superb black cat, the companion of their solitude, studied daily the track of the field mouse and the lizard, hunted the wasp, devoured the Spanish fly, always at some distance in advance of the respectful hens.
One word more in reference to them, and one regret. Our business being finished, we prepared for our departure. But what would become ofthem? Given to a friend, they would assuredly be eaten. We deliberated long. Then, coming to a vigorous decision, according to the ancient creed of savage tribes, who believed that it was sweetest to die by the hands of those we love, and thought that by eating their heroes they themselves became heroic, we made of them, not without lamentation, a funereal banquet.
It is a truly grand spectacle to see descend—one might almost say from heaven—against this frightful swarming of the universal monster-birth which awakens in the spring, hissing, whirring, croaking, buzzing, in its huge hunger, the universal saviour, in a hundredforms and a hundred legions, differing in arms and character, but all endowed with wings, all sharing a seeming privilege of ubiquity.
To the universal presence of the insect, to its ubiquity of numbers, responds that of the bird, of his swiftness, of his wing. The great moment is that when the insect, developing itself through the heat, meets the bird face to face; the bird multiplied in numbers; the bird which, having no milk, must feed at this very moment a numerous family with her living prey. Every year the world would be endangered if the bird could suckle, if its aliment were the work of an individual, of a stomach. But see, the noisy, restless brood, by ten, twenty, or thirty little bills, cry out for their prey; and the exigency is so great, such the maternal ardour to respond to this demand, that the desperate tomtit, unable to satisfy its score of children with three hundred caterpillars a day, will even invade the nests of other birds and pick out the brains of their young.
From our windows, which opened on the Luxemburg, we observed every winter the commencement of this useful war of the bird against the insect. We saw it in December inaugurate the year's labour. The honest and respectable household of the thrush, which one might call the leaf-lifter (tourne-feuilles), did their work by couples; when the sunshine followed rain, they visited the pools, and lifted theleaves one by one, with skill and conscientiousness, allowing nothing to pass which had not been attentively examined.
Thus, in the gloomiest months, when the sleep of nature so closely resembles death, the bird continued for us the spectacle of life. Even among the snow, the thrush saluted us when we arose. During our grave winter walks we were always accompanied by the wren, with its golden crest, its short, quick song, its soft and flute-like recall. The more familiar sparrows appeared on our balconies; punctual to the hour, they knew that twice a-day their meal would be ready for them, without any peril to their freedom.
For the rest, the honest labourers, on the arrival of spring, scrupled to ask our aid. As soon as their young were able to fly, they joyously brought them to our windows, as if to thank and bless us.
LABOUR—THE WOODPECKER.
LABOUR—THE WOODPECKER.
LABOUR—THE WOODPECKER.
Among the calumnies of which birds have been made the victims, none is more absurd than to say, as it has been said, that the woodpecker, when burrowing among the trees, selects the robust and healthy trunks, those that offer the greatest difficulties, and must increase his toil. Common sense plainly shows that the poor animal, living upon worms and insects, will seek the infirm, the rotten trees, those offering the least resistance, and promising, moreover, the most abundant prey. The persistent hostility which he wages against the destructive tribes that would corrupt the vigorous trunk, is a signal service rendered to man. The State owes him, if not the appointment, at least the honorary title, of Conservator of the Forests. But what is the fact? That for all his reward, ignorant officials have often set a price upon his head!
But the woodpecker would be no true type of the workman if he were not calumniated and persecuted. His modest guild, spread over the two worlds, serves, teaches, and edifies man. His garb varies; but the common sign by which he may be recognized is the scarlet hood with which the good artisan generally covers his head, his firm and solid skull. His special tool, which is at once pickaxe and auger, chisel and plane, is his square-fashioned bill. His nervous limbs, armed with strong black nails of a sure and firm grasp, seat him securely on his branch, where he remains for whole days, in an awkward attitude, striking always from below upwards. Except in the morning, when he bestirs himself, and stretches his limbs in every direction, like all superior workmen, who allow a few moments' preparation in order not to interrupt themselves afterwards, he digs and digs throughout a long day with singular perseverance. You may hear him still later, for he prolongs his work into the night, and thus gains some additional hours.
His constitution is well adapted for so laborious a life. His muscles, always stretched, render his flesh hard and leathery. The vesicle of the gall, in him very large, seems to indicate a bilious disposition, eager and violent in work, but otherwise by no means choleric.
Necessarily the opinions which men have pronounced on this singular being are widely different. They have judged this great worker well or ill, according as they have esteemed or despised work, according as they themselves have been more or less laborious, and have regarded a sedentary and industrious life as cursed or blessed by Heaven.
It has often been questioned whether the woodpecker was gay or melancholy, and various answers have been given—perhaps all equally good—according to species and climate. I can easily believe that Wilson and Audubon, who chiefly refer to the golden-winged woodpecker of the Carolinas, on the threshold of the Tropics, have found him very lively and restless; this woodpecker gains his livelihood without toil in a genial country, rich in insects; his curved elegant beak, less rugged than the beak of our species, seems to indicate that heworks in less rebellious woods. But the woodpecker of France and Germany, compelled to pierce the bark of our ancient European oaks, possesses quite a different instrument—a hard, strong, and heavy bill. It is probable that he devotes more hours to his toil than his American congener. He is, as a labourer, bound by hard conditions, working more and earning less. In dry seasons especially, his lot is wretched; his prey flies from him, and retires to an extreme distance, in search of moisture. Therefore he invokes the rain, with constant cry: "Plieu! Plieu!" It is thus that the common people interpret his note; in Burgundy he is calledThe Miller's Procurer; woodpecker and miller, if the rain should not descend, would stand still and run the risk of starving.
One eminent ornithologist, Toussenel, an excellent and ingenious observer, seems to me mistaken in his judgment of the woodpecker's character, when he pronounces him a lively bird. For on what grounds? On the amusing curvets in which he indulges to gain the heart of his love. But who among us, or among more serious beings, in such a case, does not do the same? He calls him also a tumbler and a clown, because at his appearance he wheeled round rapidly. For a bird whose powers of flight are very limited, it wasperhaps the wisest course to adopt, especially in the presence of such an admirable shot. And this proved his good sense. A vulgar sportsman, the woodpecker, which knows the coarseness of his flesh, would have suffered to approach him. But in the presence of such a connoisseur and so keen a friend of birds, he had great cause for fear, lest he should be impaled to adorn his collection.
I beg this illustrious writer to consider also the moral habitudes and disposition which would be acquired from such continuous toil. Thepapillonnecounts for nothing here, and the length of such working-days far exceeds the convenient limit of what Fourier calls agreeable labour. The woodpecker toils alone and on his own account; undoubtedly he makes no complaint; he feels that it is for his interest to work hard and to work long. Firm on his robust legs, though in a painful attitude, he remains at his post all day, and even far into the night. Is he happy? I believe so. Gay? I doubt it. Melancholy? By no means. The passionate toil which renders us so grave, compensates by driving away sorrow.
The unintelligent artisan, or the poor over-wrought slave, whose only idea of happiness lies in immobility, would not fail to see in a life of such assiduity the malediction of Fate. The artisans of the German towns assert that he is a baker, who, in the indolent ease of his counting-house, starved the poor, deceived them, sold them false weight. And now, as a punishment, he works, they say, and must work until the day of judgment, living on insects only.
A poor and unmeaning explanation! I prefer the old Italian fable: Picus, son of Time or Saturn, was an austere hero, who scorned the deceitful love and illusions of Circe. To avoid her, he took to himself wings, and flew into the forest. If he bears no longer a human figure, he has—what is better—a foreseeing and prophetic genius; he knows that which is to come, he sees that which is to be.
A very grave opinion upon the woodpecker is pronounced by the Indians of North America. These heroes discern very clearly that the woodpecker himself was a hero. They are partial to wearing the headof one which they name "the wiry-billed woodpecker," and believe that his ardour and courage will pass into them. A well-founded belief, as experience has shown. The puniest heart must feel strengthened which sees ever present before it this eloquent symbol, saying: "I shall be like it in strength and constancy."
Only it should be noted that, if the woodpecker be a hero, he is the peaceful hero of labour. He asks nothing more. His beak, which might be very formidable, and his powerful spurs, are nevertheless prepared for everything else but combat. His toil so completely absorbs him, that no competition could stimulate him to fight. It engulfs him, requires of him all the exertion of his faculties.
Varied and complex is his work. At first the skilful forester, full of tact and experience, tests his tree with his hammer—I mean hisbeak. He listens, as the tree resounds, to what it has to say, to what there is within it. The process of auscultation, but recently adopted in medicine, has been the woodpecker's leading act for some thousands of years. He interrogates, sounds, detects by his ear the cavernous voids which the substance of the tree presents. Such an one, sound and vigorous in appearance, which, on account of its gigantic size, has been marked out for the shipwright's axe, the woodpecker, by his peculiar skill, condemns as worm-eaten, rotten, sure to fail in the most fatal manner possible, to bend in construction, or to spring a leak and so produce a wreck.
The tree thoroughly tested, the woodpecker selects it for himself, and establishes himself upon it; there he will exercise his art. The trunk is hollow, therefore rotten, therefore populous; a tribe of insects inhabits it. You must strike at the gate of the city. The citizens in wild tumult attempt to escape, either through the walls of the city, or below, through the drains. Sentinels should be posted; but in their default the solitary besieger watches, and from moment to moment looks behind to snap up the passing fugitives, making use, for this purpose, of an extremely long tongue, which he darts to and fro like a miniature serpent. The uncertainty of the sport, and the hearty appetite which it stimulates, fill him with passion; his glance pierces through bark and wood; he is present amidst the terrors and the counsels of his enemies. Sometimes he descends very suddenly, in alarm lest a secret issue should save the besieged.
A tree externally sound, but rotten and corrupt within, is a terrible image for the patriot who dreams over the destinies of cities. Rome, at the epoch when the republic begun to totter, feeling itself like to such a tree, trembled one day as a woodpecker alighted on the tribunal in open forum, under the very hand of the prætor. The people were profoundly moved, and revolved the gloomiest thoughts. But the augurs, who had been summoned, arrived: if the bird escaped with impunity, the republic would perish; if he remained, he threatened only him who held the bird in his hand—the prætor. This magistrate, who was Ælius Tubero, killed the bird immediately,died soon afterwards, and the republic endured six centuries longer.
This is grand, not ridiculous. It endured through this noble appeal to the citizen's devotion. It endured through this silent response given to it by a great heart. Such actions are fertile; they make men and heroes; they prolong the life of states.
To return to our bird: this workman, this solitary, this sublime prophet does not escape the universal law. Twice a-year he grows demented, throws off his austerity, and, shall it be said, becomes ridiculous. Happy he among men who plays the fool but twice a-year!
Ridiculous! He is not so because he loves, but because he loves comically. Gorgeously arrayed, and in his finest plumage, relieving his somewhat sombre garb by his beautiful scarletgrecque, he whirls round his lady-love; and his rivals do the same.
But these innocent workers, designed for the most serious labours—strangers to the arts of the fashionable world, to the graces of the humming-birds—know not in what way to manifest their duty, and present their very humble homage but by the most uncouth curvettings. Uncouth at least in our opinion; they are scarcely so in the eyes of the object of these attentions. They please her, and this is all that is needed. The queen's choice declared, no battle can take place. Admirable are the manners of these good and worthy workmen. The others retire aggrieved, but with delicacy cherish religiously the right of liberty.
Do the fortunate suitor and his fair one, think you, air their idle loves wandering through the forests? Not at all. They instantly begin to work. "Show me thy talents," says she, "and let me see that I have not deceived myself." What an opportunity for an artist! She inspires his genius. From a carpenter he becomes a joiner, a cabinet-maker; from a cabinet-maker, a geometer! The regularity of forms, that divine rhythm, appears to him in love.
It is exactly the renowned history of the famous blacksmith of Anvers, Quintin Matsys, who loved a painter's daughter, and who, towin her love, became the greatest painter of Flanders in the sixteenth century.
"Of Vulcan swart, love an Apelles made."(D'un noir Vulcain, l'amour fit un Appelle).
"Of Vulcan swart, love an Apelles made."
(D'un noir Vulcain, l'amour fit un Appelle).
Thus, one morning the woodpecker develops into the sculptor. With severe precision, the perfect roundness which the compass might give, he hollows out the graceful vault of a superb hemisphere. The whole receives the polish of marble and ivory. All kinds of hygienic and strategic precautions are not wanting. A narrow winding entry, whose slope inclines outwards that the water may not penetrate, favours the defence; it suffices for one head and one courageous bill to close it.
What heart could resist all these toils? Who would not accept this artist, this laborious purveyor for domestic wants, this intrepid defender? Who would not believe herself able to accomplish in safety, behind the generous rampart of this devoted champion, the delicate mystery of maternity?
So she resists no longer, and behold the pair installed! There iswanting now but a nuptial chant (Hymen! O Hymeneæ!) It is not the woodpecker's fault if Nature has denied to his genius the muse of melody. At least, in his harsh voice one cannot mistake the impassioned accents of the heart.
May they be happy! May a young and amiable generation spring into life, and mature under their eyes! Birds of prey shall not easily penetrate here. Only grant that the serpent, the frightful black serpent, may never visit this nest! Oh, that the child's rough hand may not cruelly crush its sweet hope! And, above all, may the ornithologist, the friend of birds, keep afar from this spot!
If persevering toil, ardent love of family, heroic defence of liberty, could impose respect and arrest the cruel hand of man, no sportsman would touch this noble bird. A young naturalist, who smothered one in order to impale it, has told me that he sickened of the brutal struggle, and suffered a keen remorse; it seemed to him as if he had committed an assassination.
Wilson appears to have felt an analogous impression. "The first time," says he, "that I observed this bird, in North Carolina, I wounded him slightly in the wing, and when I caught him he gave a cry exactly like an infant's, but so loud and lamentable that my frightened horse nearly threw me off. I carried him to Wilmington: in passing through the streets, the bird's prolonged cries drew to the doors and windows a crowd of people, especially of women, filled with alarm. I continued my route, and, on entering the court of the hotel, met the master of the house and a crowd of people, alarmed at what they heard. Judge how this alarm increased when I asked for what was needed both by my child and myself. The master remained pale and stupid, and the others were dumb with astonishment. After having amused myself at their expense for a minute or two, I revealed my woodpecker, and a burst of universal laughter echoed around. I ascended with it to my chamber, where I left it while I paid attention to my horse's wants. I returned at the end of an hour, and, on opening the door, heard anew the same terrible cry, which this time appeared to originate in grief at being discoveredin his attempts to escape. He had climbed along the window almost to the ceiling, immediately above which he had begun to excavate. The bed was covered with large pieces of plaster, the laths of the ceiling were exposed for an area of nearly fifteen square inches, and a hole through which you could pass your thumb was already formed in the skylight; so that, in the space of another hour, he would certainly have succeeded in effecting an opening. I fastened round his neck a cord, which I attached to the table, and left him—I wanted to preserve him alive—while I went in search of food. On returning, I could hear that he had resumed his labours, and on my entrance saw that he had nearly destroyed the table to which he had been fastened, and against which he had directed all his wrath. When I wished to take a sketch, he cut me several times with his beak, and displayed so noble and so indomitable a courage that I was tempted to restore him to his native forests. He lived with me nearly three days, refusing all food, and I was present at his death with sincere regret."
THE SONG.
THE SONG.
THE SONG.
There is no one who will not have remarked that birds kept in a cage in a drawing-room never fail, if visitors arrive and the conversation grows animated, to take a part in it, after their fashion, by chattering or singing.
It is their universal instinct, even in a condition of freedom. They are the echoes both of God and of man. They associate themselves with all sounds and voices, add their own poesy, their wild and simple rhythms. By analogy, by contrast, they augment and complete the grand effects of nature. To the hoarse beating of the waves the sea-bird opposes his shrill strident notes; with the monotonous murmuring of the agitated trees the turtle-dove and a hundred birds blend a soft sad cadence; to the awakeningof the fields, the gaiety of the country, the lark responds with his song, and bears aloft to heaven the joys of earth.
Thus, then, everywhere, above the vast instrumental concert of nature, above her deep sighs, above the sonorous waves which escape from the divine organ, a vocal music springs and detaches itself—that of the bird, almost always in vivid notes, which strike sharply on this solemn base with the ardent strokes of a bow.
Winged voices, voices of fire, angel voices, emanations of an intense life superior to ours, of a fugitive and mobile existence, which inspires the traveller doomed to a well-beaten track with the serenest thoughts and the dream of liberty.
Just as vegetable life renews itself in spring by the return of the leaves, is animal life renewed, rejuvenified by the return of the birds, by their loves, and by their strains. There is nothing like it in the southern hemisphere, a youthful world in an inferior condition, which, still in travail, aspires to find a voice. That supreme flower of life and the soul, Song, is not yet given to it.
The beautiful, the sublime phenomenon of this higher aspect of the world occurs at the moment that Nature commences her voiceless concert of leaves and blossoms, her melodies of March and April, her symphony of May, and we all vibrate to the glorious harmony; men and birds take up the strain. At that moment the smallest become poets, often sublime songsters. They sing for their companions whose love they wish to gain. They sing for those who hearken to them, and more than one accomplishes incredible efforts of emulation. Man also responds to the bird. The song of the one inspires the other with song. Harmony unknown in tropic climes! The dazzling colours which there replace this concord of sweet sounds do not create such a mutual bond. In a robe of sparkling gems, the bird is not less alone.
Far different from this favoured, dazzling, glittering being are the birds of our colder countries, humble in attire, rich in heart, but almost paupers. Few, very few of them, seek the handsome gardens, the aristocratic avenues, the shade of great parks. They all livewith the peasant. God has distributed them everywhere. Woods and thickets, clearings, fields, vineyards, humid meadows, reedy pools, mountain forests, even the peaks snow-crowned—he has allotted each winged tribe to its particular region—has deprived no country, no locality, of this harmony, so that man can wander nowhere, can neither ascend so high, nor descend so low, but that he will be greeted with a chorus of joy and consolation.
Day scarcely begins, scarcely does the stable-bell ring out for the herds, but the wagtail appears to conduct, and frisk and hover around them. She mingles with the cattle, and familiarly accompanies the hind. She knows that she is loved both by man and the beasts, which she defends against insects. She boldly plants herself on the head of the cow, on the back of the sheep. By day she never quits them; she leads them homeward faithfully at evening.
The water-wagtail, equally punctual, is at her post; she flutters round the washerwomen; she hops on her long legs into the water, and asks for crumbs; by a strange instinct of mimicry she raises and dips her tail, as if to imitate the motion of beating the linen, to do her work also and earn her pay.
The bird of the fields before all others, the labourer's bird, is the lark, his constant companion, which he encounters everywhere in his painful furrow, ready to encourage, to sustain him, to sing to him ofhope.Espoir, hope, is the old device of us Gauls; and for this reason we have adopted as our national bird that humble minstrel, so poorly clad, but so rich in heart and song.
Nature seems to have treated the lark with harshness. Owing to the arrangement of her claws, she cannot perch on the trees. She rests on the ground, close to the poor hare, and with no other shelter than the furrow. How precarious, how riskful a life, at the time of incubation! What cares must be hers, what inquietudes! Scarcely a tuft of grass conceals the mother's fond treasure from the dog, the hawk, or the falcon. She hatches her eggs in haste; with haste she trains the trembling brood. Who would not believe that the ill-fated bird must share the melancholy of her sad neighbour, the hare?
This animal is sad, and fear consumes her."Cet animal est triste et la crainte le ronge."
This animal is sad, and fear consumes her.
"Cet animal est triste et la crainte le ronge."
La Fontaine.
But the contrary has taken place by an unexpected marvel of gaiety and easy forgetfulness, of lightsome indifference and truly French carelessness; the national bird is scarcely out of peril before she recovers all her serenity, her song, her indomitable glee. Another wonder: her perils, her precarious existence, her cruel trials, do not harden her heart; she remains good as well as gay, sociable and trustful, presenting a model (rare enough among birds) of paternal love; the lark, like the swallow, will, in case of need, nourish her sisters.
Two things sustain and animate her: love and light. She makes love for half the year. Twice, nay, thrice, she assumes the dangerous happiness of maternity, the incessant travail of a hazardous education. And when love fails, light remains and re-inspires her. The smallest gleam suffices to restore her song.
She is the daughter of day. As soon as it dawns, when the horizon reddens and the sun breaks forth, she springs from her furrow like an arrow, and bears to heaven's gate her hymn of joy. Hallowed poetry, fresh as the dawn, pure and gleeful as a childish heart! That powerful and sonorous voice is the reapers' signal. "We must start," says the father; "do you not hear the lark?" She follows them, and bids them have courage; in the hot sunny hours invites them to slumber, and drives away the insects. Upon the bent head of the young girl half awakened she pours her floods of harmony.
"No throat," says Toussenel, "can contend with that of the lark in richness and variety of song, compass andvelvetinessoftimbre, duration and range of sound, suppleness and indefatigability of the vocal chords. The lark sings for a whole hour without half a second's pause, rising vertically in the air to the height of a thousand yards, and stretching from side to side in the realm of clouds to gain a yet loftier elevation, without losing one of its notes in this immense flight.
"What nightingale could do as much?"
This hymn of light is a benefit bestowed on the world, and you will meet with it in every country which the sun illuminates. There are as many different species of larks as there are different countries: wood-larks, field-larks, larks of the thickets, of the marshes, the larks of the Crau de Provence, larks of the chalky soil of Champagne, larks of the northern lands in both hemispheres; you will find them, moreover, in the salt steppes, in the plains of Tartary withered by the north wind. Preserving reclamation of kindly nature; tender consolations of the love of God!
But autumn has arrived. While the lark gathers behind the plough the harvest of insects, the guests of the northern countries come to visit us: the thrush, punctual to our vintage-time; and, haughty under his crown, the wren, the imperceptible "King of the North." From Norway, at the season of fogs, he comes, and, under a gigantic fir-tree, the little magician sings his mysterious song, until the extreme cold constrains him to descend, to mingle, and make himself popular among the little troglodytes which dwell with us, and charm our cottages by their limpid notes.
The season grows rough; all the birds draw nearer man. The honest bullfinches, fond and faithful couples, come, with a short melancholy chirp, to solicit help. The winter-warbler also quits his bushes; timid as he is, he grows sufficiently bold towards evening to raise outside our doors his trembling voice with its monotonous, plaintive accents.
"When, in the first mists of October, shortly before winter, the poor proletarian seeks in the forest his pitiful provision of dead wood, a small bird approaches him, attracted by the noise of his axe; he hovers around him, and taxes his wits to amuse him by singing in a very low voice his softest lays. It is the robin redbreast, which a charitable fairy has despatched to tell the solitary labourer that there is still some one in nature interested in him.
"When the woodcutter has collected the brands of the preceding day, reduced to cinders; when the chips and the dry branches crackle in the flames, the robin hastens singing to enjoy his share of the warmth, and to participate in the woodcutter's happiness.
"When Nature retires to slumber, and folds herself in her mantle of snow; when one hears no other voices than those of the birds of the North, which define in the air their rapid triangles, or that of the north wind, which roars and engulfs itself in the thatched roof of the cottages, a tiny flute-like song, modulated in softest notes, protests still, in the name of creative work, against the universal weakness, lamentation, and lethargy."
Open your windows, for pity's sake, and give him a few crumbs,a handful of grain. If he sees friendly faces, he will enter the room; he is not insensible to warmth; cheered by this brief breath of summer, the poor little one returns much stronger into the winter.
Toussenel is justly indignant that no poet has sung of the robin.[25]But the bird himself is his own bard; and if one could transcribe his little song, it would express completely the humble poesy of his life. The one which I have by my side, and which flies about my study, for lack of listeners of his own species, perches before the glass, and, without disturbing me, in a whispering voice utters his thoughts to the ideal robin which he fancies he sees before him. And here is their meaning, so far as a woman's hand has succeeded in preserving it:—