CHAPTER V

THE GROSBEAKS

Have you ever heard of the sing-away bird, That sings where the run-away river Runs down with its rills from the bald-headed hills That stand in the sunshine and shiver? Oh, sing, sing away, sing away! How the pines and the birches are stirred By the trill of the sing-away bird!

And beneath the glad sun, every glad-hearted one Sets the world to the tune of its gladness; The swift rivers sing it, the wild breezes wing it. Till earth loses thought of her sadness. Oh, sing, sing away, sing away! Oh, sing, happy soul, to joy's giver-- Sing on, by Time's run-away river!

Lucy Larcom.

You would recognize it anywhere by its beak. And you may call this feature of the face a beak, or a nose, or a hand, or a pair of lips. In either case it is thick, heavy, prominent, the common characteristic of the grosbeaks. Individuals may differ in plumage, but always there is the thick, conical bill.

"Oh, oh, what a big nose you've got!" and "Oh, oh, what a red nose it is!" we exclaimed, when we first met the cardinal face to face in a thicket. In a moment we had forgotten the shape and tint of the beak in the song that poured out of it. It was like forgetting the look of the big rocks between which gushes the waterfall in a mountain gorge.

Not that the mouth of the grosbeak was built to accommodate its song, but, that being formed for other purposes, it nevertheless is a splendid flute.

Whichever he may be, the cardinal or the black headed, or the blue or the rose breasted, the grosbeak is a splendid singer.

On account of its gorgeous coloring, the cardinal is oftenest caged. But to those who love the wild birds best in their native freedom, the cardinal grosbeak imprisoned lacks the charm of manner which marks it in the tangle of wild grape-vines and blackberry thickets. Seldom still in the wild, unless it be singing, the red beauty flits and dodges between twigs, and dips into brush and careens through the thickest undergrowth of things that combine to hide it, now here, now there, and everywhere. One would think its bright coat a certain and quick token of its whereabouts, but so active is the lively fellow that it eludes even the sharpest eye, a stranger mistaking its gleam for a rift of sunlight through the treetops.

Legend tells us that the beak of this bird was once ashen gray and the face white. Once on a time, a whole flock of them were discovered in the currant rows of a mountaineer, who called on the gods of the woods to punish them, since he himself was unable to overtake the thieves. The gods, willing to appease the old man, yet loving the grosbeaks better, dyed their beaks crimson from that moment, and set black masks on their faces. Thus was a favor done to the cardinals, for ever after the juice of berries left no stain on their red lips, while the black masks set off their features to the best advantage, interrupting the tint of the beak and the head. He is no ecclesiastic, though he wear the red cap of the cardinal, which he lifts at pleasure, for he gets his living by foraging the woods and gardens for berries at berry-time.

The cardinal's companion is modest of tint, ashy brown with only traces of red below, deepening on wings, head, and tail. Bird of the bush is she, and she places her loosely made nest in the thicket, where she can easily obtain bark fiber and dry, soft leaves and grass. In it she sees that three or four chocolate-dotted eggs, like decorated marbles, are placed. And she repeats the family history two or three times a season, where the season is long. At first the lips of the baby birds are dark; but they soon blush into the family red. In plumage they resemble the mother for a time, but before cold weather the males put on a coat of red with the black mask.

In the respect of molting the cardinals differ from their young cousins, the rose-breasted, the latter requiring two or three years to complete the tints of adult life.

But born in the thickets are the rose-breasts, just like the cardinals, the nest being composed of the selfsame fibers and woodland grasses. Strange craft of Mother Nature is this, to bring the rose-breast and the cardinal from eggs of the very same size and markings. But so she does; so that a stranger coming upon either nest in the absence of the mother bird might mistake it for that of the other. You can't be certain until you see the old birds.

The rose-breasted grosbeaks are found east of the Rocky Mountains and north into Canada. It migrates south early, and returns to its summer habitat rather late in spring. The lips of the rose-breast are white, not red, while the feet are grayish blue, differing from the brown feet of the cardinal.

How did it come by its breast? Why, legend has it that the breast was white at the start. One day he forgot himself, not knowing it was night, he was so happy singing the funeral hymn of a robin-redbreast that had died of a chill in molting time, as birds do die when the process is belated. And the grosbeak sang on, until a night-owl spied him and thought to make a supper of a bird so plump. But the owl mistook his aim and flew away with only a beakful of the breast feathers, he not taking into account the nearness of the molt. The grosbeak escaped, but lacking a vest.

The robins gathered pink wild-rose leaves and laid them on the heart of the singer, not forgetting to line the wings, and so from that day to this the psalm singer is known as the rose-breasted grosbeak.

The head and neck of the male and most of the upper parts are black, the tail white and black combined, wings black variegated with white, and the middle breast and under wing-coverts the rich rose that deepens into a carmine. The beak is white.

The mother bird is streaked with blackish and olive brown above, below white tinged with dusky, under wing-coverts the tint of saffron. Her beak is brown.

These beautiful birds may be seen in the haunts of autumn berries, early spring buds that are yet incased in winter wrappings, and orchards in the remote tops of whose trees have been left stray apples. By the time these are frost-bitten they are "ready cooked" for the belated rose-breasts, whose strong beaks seem made on purpose to bite into frozen apples. But frozen apples have a charm of taste for any one who takes the trouble of climbing to the outer limbs for a tempting recluse. Better were more of them left in the late harvest for boys and girls and the rose-breasted grosbeaks.

An invisible thread fastened to a solitary apple on a high twig, and connected inside of the attic window of a cottage, suggests winter fun of a harmless sort. The grosbeaks fish for the apple, which all of a sudden is given a jerk from a watchful urchin inside the window; and the bird realizes the historical "slip 'twixt the cup and the lip." The string being, to start with, almost invisible, is from necessity very weak as well, and breaks at about the third jerk. The fun for the participants inside the window at the other end of the string is over for a time, and before it is readjusted the apple has several bites in it. And besides, there are other apples.

On the Pacific coast we have the black-headed grosbeak, cousin of the others and equally gifted in song.

The sides of the head, back, wings, and tail of this male are black, though the back and wings are dotted with white and cinnamon-brown. The neck and under parts are rich orange-brown, changing to bright, pure yellow on the belly and under wing-coverts. The bill and feet are dark grayish blue. The female and her young differ in the under parts, being a rich sulphur-yellow. Upper parts are olive shaded, varied with whitish or brownish stripes. The habits of the black-headed grosbeak are like those of the others described.

From our custom of making the grounds as attractive to all wild birds as possible, never relenting our vigilance in regard to the feline race, we have had splendid opportunities of studying this bird. They have nested with us for three years, beginning in wary fashion and ending in perfect confidence.

The first of the season we saw only the male, and he kept high in the blue-gum trees, fifty or sixty feet or more above ground, singing as soon as everybody was out of sight, but disappearing if a door opened. We thought him a belated robin, so do the songs of the two birds impress a stranger. For weeks we could catch not so much as a glimpse of the singer, though we hid in the shrubbery. Shrubbery was no barrier to the sight of the keen little eye and ear above. Then we took to the attic, and from a little roof corner-pane beheld the musician.

But his song was short and ended unfinished, so suspicious was the bird. Gradually he came to understand that no shot-gun disturbed the garden stillness, even though he sat on an outer bough, and no cat lurked in the roses. He also appeared to notice that nobody played ball on the greensward, nor threw stones at stray chickens. Altogether circumstances seemed favorable to Sir Grosbeak, and he brought Madam along down from the mountain cañons.

By midsummer of the second season the two were seen at sunrise as low as the tallest of the orange-trees, but they flew higher or disappeared if the door were opened. It was the year that we first planted the row of Logan berries, a new cross between the blackberry and raspberry. It was between the orange and lemon trees, in a quiet corner of the orchard, and the grosbeaks espied them, reddening a month before they ripened. By getting up at dawn we made sure that nesting operations had begun within twenty feet of the Logan berries. But which way? It was not until the eggs were laid that we found the site on a low limb of a fig-tree adjoining the berry row. The nest was made solely of dry dark-leaf spines, and so transparently laid that we could distinguish the three eggs from below. There was no lining, plenty of ventilation in this and other of these grosbeaks' nests observed in the foothills being the rule. Perhaps the climate induces the birds to this sanitary measure. Certain it is that this nest could be no harbor for those insect foes that too often make life miserable for the birdlings.

The summer passed, and we gave up the row of berries to the grosbeaks. There were but few anyway, and we wanted the birds. And there was other fruit they were welcome to.

This season the grosbeaks have brought off three broods within fifty feet of the house. The male sings in the low bushes and trees, and does not think of punctuating his notes with stops and pauses, even though we stand within a few feet of him. In fact, the birds are now as tame as robins. Young striped fledglings grope about in the clover, or flutter in the bushes as fearless as sparrows. If we pick them up they will support themselves by a grip on the hand and swing by their strong great beaks, screaming at the top of their shrill voices to "let go!" when it is themselves that are holding on with might and main. If they scream long enough, and their beaks do not weaken in their clutch, the mocker comes to the rescue and scolds us, while we explain the situation, extending our hands with the grosbeak clinging to the palm.

So far as we have known, all the nests in our grounds have been built in the crotch of a fig-tree. The fig has sparse foliage and affords little shelter. But then there are figs that ripen most of the summer--and figs are good for baby grosbeaks. Once we discovered a nest by accident. The bees at swarming-time settled in the top of a fig-tree, a place not at all suitable, in our opinion. We were busily engaged in tossing dust into the tree to frighten the bees out, when a grosbeak appeared, scolding so hard in her familiar, motherly tone that we knew we were "sanding" her nest as well as the bees. And we found it all right! She went on with her work after we had attended to the bees.

On account of the fondness of the birds for fruit and buds, the grosbeaks might easily become resident in any home grounds. Low shrubbery they love when once they have become familiar; unlike the thrushes, not caring particularly for damp places. Dry, baked-in-the-sun nooks, crisp undergrowth, and especially untrimmed berry rows fascinate them. During mating-season the male sings all the time when he is not eating, singing as he flies from perch to perch, and like others of the family, has been accused of night serenades. We are unable to know certainly if it is our grosbeak or the mocker that wakes us at midnight. It is probably the mocker, who has stolen notes from all the birds.