Part 11
Let me not be mistaken. I do not say that butcher birds never keep larders, for they undoubtedly do; of this I am satisfied. Thus Mr. E. H. Aitken says of the shrike: “It sits upright on the top of a bush or low tree, commanding a good expanse of open, grassy land, and watches for anything which it may be able to surprise and murder—a large grasshopper, a small lizard, or a creeping field mouse. Sometimes it sees a possible chance in a flock of small birds absorbed in searching for grass seeds. Then it slips from its watch-tower and, gliding softly down, pops into the midst of them without warning, and forgetting all about the true nature of its deep plantar tendons, strikes its talons into the nearest. No other bird I know of makes its attack in this way except the birds of prey. The little bird shrieks and struggles, but the cruel shrike holds fast and hammers at the victim’s head with its strong beak until it is dead, then flies away with it to some thorn bush which is its larder. There it hangs it up on a thorn and leaves it to get tender. . . . This is no fable, I have seen the bird do it.” Again, the Rev. C. D. Cullen, with whom I have enjoyed many an ornithological ramble in England and on the continent of Europe, informs me that once in Surrey he came upon a shrike’s larder, and on that occasion the “shop” consisted of the legs of a young green finch.
The usual food, then, of the butcher bird appears to be small insects. When a suitable opportunity offers, the larger species will attack a lizard or a young or sickly bird, especially a bird in a cage. Of the rufous-backed shrike Mr. Benjamin Aitken writes: “It will come down at once to a cage of small birds exposed at a window, and I once had an amadavat killed and partly eaten through the wires by one of these shrikes, which I saw in the act with my own eyes. The next day I caught the shrike in a large basket which I set over the cage of amadavats.” But, of course, it is one thing to catch a bird in a cage and another to capture it in the open. Shrikes are savage enough for any murder, but most little birds are too sharp for them.
Fifteen species of shrike occur in India. The commonest are, perhaps, the Indian grey shrike (_Lanius lahtora_) and the bay-backed shrike (_Lanius vittatus_). The latter is the one that frequents our gardens. He is not a large bird, being about the size of a bulbul. The head and back of the neck are a pretty grey. The back is chestnut-maroon, shading off to whitish near the tail. There is a broad black streak running across the forehead and through the eye, giving the bird a grim, sinister aspect. The breast and lower parts are white; the wings and tail black, or rather appear black when the bird is at rest. During flight the pinions display a conspicuous white bar, and the white outer tail feathers also come into view. The stout beak is black, and the upper mandible projects downwards over the lower one. This further adds to the ferocity of the bird’s mien. It is impossible to mistake a butcher bird; look out for its grey head, broad, black eyebrow, and white breast.
The usual note of the shrike is a harsh cry, but during the breeding season, that is to say, from March to July, the cock is able to produce quite a musical song.
At all times the butcher bird is a great mimic. I am indebted to a correspondent for the following graphic account of his histrionic performances: “Of late one of these birds has daily perched himself on a _neem_ tree in my compound and treated me to much music. His hours of practice are early in the morning and at sunset. He begins with his natural harsh notes, and then launches out into mimicry. I gave him a patient hearing this morning, and he treated me to the following: the lap-wing, the sparrow-hawk, the partridge, the Brahminy minah, the kite, the honeysucker, the hornbill (of these parts), the scream of the green parrot, and the cry of a chicken when being carried off by a kite.”
The nests of the various species of shrike resemble one another very closely. Speaking generally, the nest is a neatly made, thick-walled, somewhat deep cup. All manner of material is pressed into service—grass, roots, wool, hair, leaves, feathers, pieces of rag, paper, fine twigs, and straw. The whole forms a compact structure firmly held together by cobweb, which is the cement ordinarily utilised by bird masons.
The nursery is usually situated in a small tree, a thorny one for preference, in the fork of a branch, or the angle that a branch makes with the main stem. Seen from below it looks likes a little mass of rubbish. As a rule one or two pieces of rag hang down from it and betray its presence to the egg-collector.
The normal clutch of eggs is four. The ground colour of these is cream, pale greenish, or grey, and there is towards the large end a zone of brown or purplish blotches.
The shrike is not a shy bird. I have sat within eight feet of a nest and watched the parents feeding their young. No notice was taken of me, but a large lizard that appeared on the branch on which the nest was placed was savagely attacked. The young seem to be fed chiefly on large green caterpillars.
Newly fledged butcher birds differ considerably from the adults, and while in the transition stage are sometimes rather puzzling to the ornithologist.
DUCKS
“The duck,” says a writer in the _Spectator_, “is a person who seldom gets his deserts.” As regards myself I cannot but admit the truth of this assertion. I mean, not that I am a duck, but that I have returned that bird evil for good. He has given me much pleasure, and I have either eaten or shot him as a _quid pro quo_.
One of the greatest delights of my early youth was to feed the ducks that lived on the Serpentine. How vividly do I remember the joy that the operation gave me! In the first place, I was allowed to enter the kitchen—that Forbidden Land of childhood’s days, presided over by a fearsome tyrant, yclept the cook—and witness dry bread being cut up into pieces of a size supposed to be suited to the mastication of ducks. The bread thus cut up would be placed in a paper bag and borne off by me in triumph to the upper regions. Then my sister and I, accompanied by the governess, would toddle up Sloane Street, through Lowndes Square, past the great French Embassy, into Hyde Park, along Rotten Row, and thus up to that corner of the Serpentine where the ducks were wont to congregate. There, amid a chorus of quacks, the bread would be thrown, piece by piece, to the ever-hungry ducks. The writer in the _Spectator_ states that “the domestic duck, unlike his wild brother, is a materialist, and where dinner is concerned is decidedly greedy.” The avidity with which the ducks used to make for those pieces of dry bread certainly bears out this statement. Every time a crust was thrown on to the water there would be a wild scramble for it. One individual, more fortunate than the others, would secure it, and, sprinting away from his comrades, would endeavour to swallow it whole. I have said that the pieces of bread were cut up into portions of a size supposed to be convenient for the mastication of a duck; but, if the truth must be told, the cook invariably overestimated the size of the bird’s gullet; hence the frantic muscular efforts to induce them to descend “red lane.” It is a miracle that not one of those ducks shared the sad fate of Earl Godwin.
Some of them must certainly have lost the epithelial lining of the œsophagus in their desperate efforts to dispose of those pieces of dry bread. An exceptionally unmanageable morsel would be dropped again into the water, and there would be a second scramble for it. By this time, however, it would have become so much softened as to be comparatively easy to swallow. How we used to enjoy watching the efforts of those ducks to negotiate the pieces of bread! We were, of course, blissfully ignorant of the unnaturalness of the process. Our governess used to read, in preference to natural history, fiction of the class in which the fortunate scullery-maid always marries a Duke. Thus it was that my sister and I knew nothing of the wonderful structure of the duck’s beak. We were not aware that the mandibles were lamellated or toothed to form a most efficient sieve. We were not acquainted with the fact that the natural food of the duck is composed of small, soft substances, that as the bird puts its head under water it catches up its breath to suck in the soft substances that may be floating by, that these become broken up as they pass through the duck’s patent filter, only those that are approved being retained and swallowed. But the want of this knowledge did not diminish by one jot or tittle our enjoyment. When all the bread was disposed of, we would inflate and “pop” the paper bag—a performance which gave us nearly as much pleasure as feeding the ducks.
As I grew older I came to regard the feeding of ducks as a childish amusement, and in no way suited to one who had attained the dignity of stand-up collars. So, for some years, I took but little interest in the birds, except on the occasions when one confronted me at table.
It has again become a pleasure to feed ducks, but I fear that, in spite of this, I shoot them more often than I feed them. I must confess that, when I see a great company of the quacking community, the sportsman in me gets the upper hand of the naturalist, the lust of killing prevails over the love of observation. I know of few greater pleasures than to spend a morning at a well-stocked _jhil_ on a superb winter’s day in Northern India, accompanied, of course, by a number of fellow-sportsmen; for duck shooting is poor sport for a single gun. With but one man after them it is the ducks rather than the human being who enjoy the sport. But, given three or four companions, what better sport is there than that afforded by a day on a well-stocked _jhil_? At a preconcerted signal the various shooters, each in his boat, put off from different parts of the bank of the lake and make for the middle, which is black with a great company of quack-quacks, composed chiefly of white-eyed pochards, gadwalls, and spotted-bills. Suddenly a number of duck take alarm and get up; then the fun begins. For half an hour or more one enjoys a succession of good sporting shots; the firing is so constant that one’s gun grows almost too hot to hold. Soon, however, all the duck that are not shot down betake themselves to some other _jhil_, and only the coots remain.
Excellent sport though duck shooting be, I am thankful to say that in these latter days my acquaintance with the duck tribe is not confined to shooting and eating members of it. I occasionally have the opportunity of coming into more friendly relations with it.
The duck is a bird worth knowing. He is a fowl of character, a creature that commands not only our respect, but our affection. He makes an excellent pet, as any one may find out by purchasing some bazaar ducks.
Some years ago the cook of the Superintendent of Police of a certain district in the United Provinces purchased a couple of these birds. When bought they were in an emaciated condition, and it was the intention of the cook to fatten them up and then set them before his master. But before the fattening process was completed the small sons of the policeman took a great fancy to the birds, and the birds reciprocated the fancy. The result was that their lives were spared, and they became friends of the family. They went everywhere with the children, and used even to accompany them when on tour with their father. They were allowed to enter the tents as though they were dogs, and in return used to permit the children to do anything they pleased with them. They even submitted to being carried about like dolls. Most amusing was it to see the good-natured boredom on a duck’s face as a small boy staggered along with it tightly clasped in his arms. Its expression would say more plainly than words, “I don’t altogether relish this, but I know the child means well.”
Nor was this behaviour in any way exceptional. A better-disposed creature than the duck does not exist. “I have kept and closely watched hundreds of ducks,” writes Mr. S. M. Hawkes, “but I never saw them fight with each other, nor ever knew a duck the aggressor in a dispute with some other kind of fowl.” Yet the duck is no coward. The drake is a warrior every inch of him, constant in affection, and violent in love and wrath. If the adult duck is so lovable, how much more so is the duckling! What a source of delight are those golden fluff balls to a child. On seeing them for the first time nine out of ten children will cry—
But I want one to play with—Oh I want A little yellow duck to take to bed with me!
A DETHRONED MONARCH
The eagle is a bird that deserves much sympathy, for he has seen better times. Until a few years ago the pride of place among the fowls of the air was always given to the eagle. “Which eagle?” you ask. I reply, “_The_ eagle.” The poets, who have ever been the bird’s trumpeters, know but one eagle upon which they lavish such epithets as “the imperial bird,” “the royal eagle,” “the monarch bird,” “lord of land and sea,” “the wide-ruling eagle,” “the prince of all the feathered kind,” “the king of birds,” “the bird of heaven,” “the Olympic eagle,” “the bold imperial bird of Jove,” and so on, _ad nauseam_.
The eagle of the poets was truly regal. But somebody discovered, one day, that this bird is, like the phœnix, a mythical creature. Eagles do exist—many species of them—but they are very ordinary creatures, in no way answering to the description of the poet’s pet fowl. This, of course, is not the fault of the eagles. They are not to blame because the bards have, with one accord, combined to idealise them. Nevertheless, men, now that they have found out the truth, seem to bear a grudge against the eagle. They are not content with dethroning him, they must needs throw mud at him. It is the present custom to vilify the eagle, to speak of him as though he were an opponent at an election, to dub him a cowardly carrion feeder, little if anything better than a common vulture. Let us, therefore, give the poor out-at-elbows bird an innings to-day and see what we can do for him.
But how are we to recognise him when we see him? This is indeed a problem. There is a feature by which the true eagles may be distinguished from all other birds of prey, namely, the feathered tarsus. The true eagles alone among the _raptores_ decline to go about with bare legs; their “understandings” are feathered right down to the toe. Thus may they be recognised.
This method of identification is on a par with that of catching a bird by placing a small quantity of salt upon its tail. Eagles show no readiness to come and have their legs inspected. There is, I fear, no feature whereby the tyro can distinguish an eagle as it soars overhead high in the heavens. Nothing save years of patient observation can enable the naturalist to identify any particular bird of prey at sight. Colour is, alas! no guide. The _raptores_ are continually changing their plumage. It were as easy to identify a woman by the colour of her frock as a bird of prey by the hues of its plumage. We read of one eagle that it is tawny rufous, of another that it is rufous tawny, of a third that it is tawny buff. The surest method of distinguishing the various birds of prey is by their flight; but is it possible to describe the peculiar flap of the wings of one eagle, and the particular angle at which another carries its pinions as it sails along? The length of the tail is a guide, but by no means an infallible one. The shikra, the sparrow-hawk, the kestrel, and the kite are long-tailed birds, the caudal appendage accounting for half their total length. In the eagles the tail is considerably shorter in proportion to the size of the bird. Thus the female of the golden eagle (_Aquila chrysætus_)—which, _en passant_, is not gold in colour, but dirty whitish brown—is 40 inches long, while the tail is but 14 inches. The vultures have yet shorter tails in proportion to their size. If, therefore, you see soaring overhead a big bird of prey, looking like a large kite, with a moderate tail and curved rather than straight wings, that bird is probably an eagle. So much, then, for the appearance of our dethroned monarch; it now behoves us to consider his character and habits. There are many species of eagle, each of which has its own peculiar ways, hence it is impossible for the naturalist to generalise concerning them. In this respect he is not so fortunate as the poet. Let us briefly consider two species, one belonging to the finer type of eagle and the other to the baser sort.
Bonelli’s eagle (_Hieraëtus fasciatus_), or the crestless hawk eagle as Jerdon calls him, is perhaps the nearest approach of any to the poet’s eagle. This fine bird is common on the Nilgiris, but rare in Madras. It is said to disdain carrion; it preys on small mammals and birds of all sizes. It takes game birds by preference, but when hungry does not draw the line at the crow. If it has hunted all day without obtaining the wherewithal to fill its belly, it repairs to the grove of trees in which all the crows of the neighbourhood roost. As the sun sinks in the heavens the crows arrive in straggling flocks. Suddenly the eagle dashes into the midst of them and, before the crows have realised what has happened, one of them is being carried away in the eagle’s talons. Then the _corvi_ fill the welkin with their cries of distress. It is very naughty of the eagle to prey upon crows in this way, because by so doing it mocks the theory of protective colouration. No one can maintain that our friend _Corvus splendens_ is protectively coloured, that is to say, so coloured as to be inconspicuous. No one but a blind man can fail to see a crow as he steadily flaps his way through the air. No one can deny that the bird flourishes, in spite of the fact that eagles eat him, and that his plumage is as conspicuous as the blazer of the Lady Margaret Boat Club at Cambridge. If, as the theory teaches, it is of paramount importance to a bird to be inconspicuous, why was not the whole clan of _corvi_ swept off the face of the earth long ago?
We have, in conclusion, to consider an eagle of the baser sort. The Indian tawny eagle (_Aquila vindhiana_), which is the commonest eagle in India, will serve as an example. This bird eats anything in the way of flesh that it can obtain. If the opportunity offers, it will pounce upon a squirrel, a small bird, a lizard, or a frog; but it is a comparatively sluggish creature, and so robs other _raptores_ in preference to catching its own quarry. Most birds of prey are robbers. This the falconer knows, and profits by his knowledge. He first captures some small bird of prey, such as a white-eyed buzzard. Having tied up two or three of its wing feathers so that it cannot fly far, he attaches to its feet a bundle of feathers, from which hang a number of fine hair nooses. He then flies this lure bird. Every bird of prey in the neighbourhood espies it and, seeing the bundle of feathers and remarking the laboured flight, jumps to the conclusion that it is carrying booty, and promptly gives chase with the object of relieving it of its burden. The first robber to arrive is caught in one of the nooses.
The tawny eagle is not above feeding upon carrion. It has not the pluck of Bonelli’s eagle, but is apparently not the contemptible coward it is made out to be by some writers. A few weeks ago I noticed, high up in a _farash_ tree, the platform of sticks and branches that does duty for the nest of this species. I sent my climber to find out what was in the nest. While he was handling the two eggs it contained, the mother eagle swooped down upon him, scratched his head severely, and flew off with his turban. As she sped away, her prize attracted the notice of some kites, who at once attacked her. In the _mêlée_ which ensued, the _puggaree_ dropped to the ground, to the joy of its lawful owner and the disgust of the combatants. I must add that I was not an eye-witness of the encounter; I however saw the marks of the bird’s claws on my climber’s scalp.
BIRDS IN THE RAIN
There are occasions when one is tempted to wish that one were a bird, for the fowls of the air are spared many of the troubles which we poor terrestrial creatures have to endure.
Most of us in India have received a telegram ordering us off to some far-away station; then, when distracted by the worry and bustle of packing; when the hideous noises of the Indian railway station “get on the nerves”; as we sit in the dusty, jolting train, we begin to envy the birds who are able to annihilate distance, who have no boxes to pack up, no baggage to go astray, no bills to pay, no _chits_ to write, no cards to leave, no time-table to worry through, no trains to lose, no connections to miss, but have simply to take to their wings and away.
Most of us, again, have been caught in the rain. As the watery contents of the clouds slowly but surely percolated through our clothes, as our boots grew heavier and heavier until the water oozed out at every step, we must have envied the birds. They know naught of rheumatism or ague. Their clothes do not spoil in the rain. They wear no boots to become waterlogged. Their wings rarely become heavy or sodden. For them the rain is a huge joke. They enjoy the falling rain-drops as keenly as a man enjoys his morning shower-bath. There is no bath like the rain bath, and if the drops do fall very heavily there is always shelter to be taken.
It is of course possible for birds to have too much rain; but this does not often happen in India, except occasionally in the monsoon.
As I write this it is pouring “cats and dogs,” and sitting in a tree not five yards away from the window are a couple of crows thoroughly enjoying the blessings which Jupiter Pluvius is showering down upon them. I am high up, seventy or eighty feet above the level of the ground, and can therefore look down upon the crows. They are perched on the ends of the highest branches, determined not to miss a drop of the rain. One of them is not quite satisfied with his position; he espies another bough which seems more exposed, so to this branch he flies, although it is so slender that it can scarce support him. Nevertheless he hangs on to his swaying perch and opens out his wings and flaps his tail—does, in fact, everything in his power to make the most of the passing tropical shower. The other crow has caught sight of me, and thinks he will stare me out, so sits motionless with his eye fixed on mine, while the rain pours upon him and falls off his tail in a little waterfall. Occasionally he gives his friend an answering “squawk,” and then shakes his feathers, and is altogether enjoying himself; he is as jolly as the proverbial sandboy. In other trees near by sit more crows, and, so far as one can judge, each seems to have taken up a position in which he is likely to secure the maximum of rain. All round there is ample shelter; there are numerous ledges, outhouses, and verandahs, in any of which the crows could obtain shelter if they desired it. Shelter? Not a bit of it, they revel in the rain.
Two pied wagtails fly by, chasing one another gleefully in the pouring rain; they too are regular “wet bobs.”
On the telegraph wires hard by the king-crows sit with their tails projecting horizontally so as to catch as much of the downpour as possible. The dragon-flies are seeking their prey regardless of the rain; this is somewhat surprising, when we consider that to them a drop of rain must bear about the same relation as a glass of water does to a human being. As they are hunting, it is obvious that the minute creatures on which they feed must also be out in the rain, although every drop contains quite sufficient water in which to drown them.