Chapter 25

A FEATHERED FISHERMAN

THE OSPREY

Before the day was over the children were so in love with Olaf--with the beach where crabs were living, with the sea over which water birds were soaring--and wished to know so many things, that the Doctor told them the only way to satisfy them would be to camp on the shore in August, when the water would be warm enough for bathing; for to answer all the questions they asked would take a month.

"And then you can tell us another bookful about water and fish, and crabs and sky," said Dodo. "So we shall have a bird book, and a butterfly book, and Olive's flower book!"

"Yes, and a beast book, too!" said Nat, "about coons and bears, and squirrels and foxes, you know! Rap has seen foxes right on our Farm!"

"I wish I knew something about the stars--and the rocks too," said Rap very earnestly. "Was this earth ever young, Doctor?"

"Yes, my boy, everything that Heart of Nature guides had a beginning and was once young."

"What is that? An Eagle?" cried Dodo suddenly, pointing up to a very large bird, with a white breast and brown-barred tail, who flew over the bay and dived into the water.

"It's the Fisherman Bird," said Olaf. "Some call it the Fish Hawk and others the Osprey. They say it lives all over North America, but it goes far south in winter, and when it conies back in spring we know the fish are running again; for it lives on the fish it catches, and won't come until they are plenty."

"How does it catch fish?" asked Dodo.

"It hovers overhead until it sees, with its sharp eye, a fish ripple the water; then it pounces down like a flash, and grabs the fish with, its long claws, that are made like grappling-irons. If the fish is small the Osprey carries it home easily; but if it is a big one there may be a fight. Sometimes, if the Osprey's claws get caught in a fish too large to fly away with, the Fisherman Bird is dragged under water and drowned."

"Do they still nest on Round Island?" asked the Doctor. "There were a dozen pairs of them there when I was a boy."

"Yes, sir! But there is only one pair now. It's a great rack of sticks, half as big as a haystack; for they mend it every season, and so it keeps growing until now it is almost ready to fall out of the old tree that holds it. And, do you know, sir, that Purple Grackles have stuck their own nests into the sides of it, until it is as full of birds as a great summer hotel is of people."

"Oh, we must see it!" said Olive, who had finished putting her seaweeds to press; "for as yet I have only read about such a nest."

"What does the Osprey look like near to?" asked Rap.

"Like a large Hawk," answered the Doctor. "You would know him to be a Hawk by his hooked beak and claws. He walks in the procession of bird families along with the cannibal birds among whom he belongs, and who come after the Birds that only Croak and Call. But he is not a real cannibal, because he lives on fish, and never eats birds. So I will give you a description of him now."

The Osprey

Length about two feet.

Upper parts dark brown with some white on the head and neck.

Under parts white with some dark spots.

Feet very large and scaly, with long sharp claws, to hold the slippery fishes he catches.

A Citizen of North America.

A very industrious fisherman who minds his own business and does nobody any harm.