Part 18

The causes that influence this snipe to lead so solitary a life are particularly obscure, as well as those which stimulate some others to congregate, as we comprehend no individual benefit to arise from such habits. Wild fowl, the rook, and some other birds, derive security, perhaps, from feeding in society, as a sentinel appears to be placed by them at such times to give notice of danger; but our congregating small birds take no such precaution: security or mutual protection does not seem to be obtained by it, as the largeness of the flocks invites danger, and warmth in the winter season it does not afford. For the purposes of migration, such associations are in many respects serviceable and consistent; but in our resident species, considered in its various results, it becomes rather a subject of conjecture, than of explanation. Timid creatures associate commonly upon the apprehension of danger, and, without yielding any mutual support, become only the more obnoxious to evil; and this snipe, though its habits are the very reverse of connexion with its species, yet affords no clue to direct us to the causes of its unusual habits. These associations of some, and retirement of others, are not the capricious actions of an hour in a few individuals, but so regularly and annually observed in the several species, that they are manifestly appointed provisions of nature, though the object is unknown. This half-snipe, as our sportsmen call it, has rather generally been considered by our young shooters as the male of the larger species, or common snipe (scolopax gallinago); yet it is difficult to assign any reason for the prevalence of such an idea, with those who have had many opportunities of observing the dissimilarity in the mode of life, the manners, and plumage of the birds. I know not any bird that lays so large an egg, in proportion to its size, as the snipe.

A few pairs of the peewit (tringa vanellus) visit annually some of our larger plowed fields to breed; but they are so frequently disturbed by those necessary processes of husbandry, hoeing and weeding, that they seldom succeed in the object of their visit. On our adjoining heath they escape better, and bring off many of their young: but the larger portion of them keep their station on the banks and dikes of the great drains and sewers in the marsh lands; and the traveller, who happens, in the spring of the year, to pass along any of the roads bordering upon these haunts, where many pairs are settled, will long remember the wearying and incessant clamor of these birds, which, rising as he approaches, wheel about him in an awkward, tumbling flight, accompanied by the unremitting, querulous cry of “peewit, peewit,” continued by the perseverance of successive pairs, as long as he remains near their habitation; which generally being a flat, aguish, uninteresting country, where little is heard but the whispering of the wind in the reeds and sedges, the teasing monotony of this bird gives a very peculiarly dreary and melancholy character to parts of our lowland roads. In some counties these cold, wet districts go by the name of “peewit or pewety lands.” At this period of the year, the bird is bold and fearless, and menaces the intruder with all its vociferous powers, when he approaches its haunts; but the broods being fledged, the families unite, form large flocks, and retire to open meadows, uninclosed commons and downs, feeding on slugs and worms, and become wild and vigilant creatures. It is well known that the glareous liquor or white of the egg of this bird, upon being boiled, becomes gelatinous and translucent, not a thick opake substance like that of the hen; a circumstance that is likewise observable in the eggs of the rook, and of many of our small birds. The latter are not sufferers by it; but the eggs of the poor rook, though bearing little resemblance to those of this plover, are in some places not uncommonly taken and sold conjointly with them in the London market; and probably the habitual eater of them only can distinguish a sensible difference.

Prognostications and signs, a great amusement, and the ground-work of belief to our forefathers, have, in general, pretty much declined with us; the repeated falsity of most of them having destroyed their reputation. We know so little, if any thing, of the actuating causes of seasons and their change, or the combinations effecting results, that no safe conclusion can be formed of any present events influencing the future. Whatever our almanacs may do, few persons of credit will venture now to predict, from what we call natural causes, a hot summer, or a severe winter; yet that very ancient idea, amongst country people, that “years of store of haws and heps do commonly portend cold winters,” still lingers with us. However warmly we assent to the fundamental truth, the merciful consideration of Providence, in providing food for the necessities of the little fowls of the air, which, perhaps, piously gave rise to the observation, almost every year proves, that any conclusions drawn from these “stores of haws and heps” are perfectly fallacious. The birds that feed chiefly upon the fruit of the white thorn, and the wild rose, are the fieldfare (turdus pilaris), and the redwing (turdus iliacus); and that they do so, every sportsman has had the most manifest conviction: yet it has been said recently, that these creatures do not eat these fruits; and said too by an eminent and amiable man, with whom I have frequently had the honor of conversing, and always with profit.[55] Were he living, his love of science would encourage my observations, though not in unison with his opinion: my breath shall not agitate his ashes, nor will his spirit, I am certain, frown in anger at my lines. It must be premised, that these birds, generally speaking, give the preference to insect food and worms; and when flights of them have taken their station near the banks of large rivers, margined by lowlands, we shall find, that the bulk of them will remain there, and feed in those places; and, in the uplands, we shall observe small restless parties only. But in the midland and some other counties, the flocks that are resident have not always these meadows to resort to, and they then feed on the haws as long as they remain. In this county, the extensive lowlands of the river Severn in open weather are visited by prodigious flocks of these birds; but as soon as snow falls, or hard weather comes on, they leave these marshy lands, because their insect food is covered or become scarce, visit the uplands, to feed on the produce of the hedges, and we see them all day long passing over our heads in large flights on some distant progress, in the same manner as our larks, at the commencement of a snowy season, repair to the turnip fields of Somerset and Wiltshire. They remain absent during the continuance of those causes which incited their migration; but, as the frost breaks up, and even before the thaw has actually commenced, we see a large portion of these passengers returning to their worm and insect food in the meadows, attended probably by many that did not take flight with them—though a great number remain in the upland pastures, feeding promiscuously as they can. In my younger days, a keen, unwearied sportsman, it was always observable, that in hard weather these birds increased prodigiously in number in the counties far distant from the meadow lands, though we knew not the reason; and we usually against this time provided tempting bushes of haws, preserved in a barn, to place in frequented hedges, near our secret standings. When the fieldfare first arrives, its flesh is dark, thin, and scurfy; but, having fed a little time in the hedges, its rump and side veins are covered with fat. This is, in part, attributable to suppression of perspiration by the cold, and partly to a nutritive farinaceous food; its flesh at the time becoming bluish and clean. The upland birds are in this state, from perhaps the end of November till the end of January, according as the hedge fruit has held out; and at this period they are comparatively tame: afterward, though the flights may be large, they become wild; and the flesh, assuming its darkness, manifests that their food has not been farinaceous. The distant foreign migrations, which have been stated to take place from the meadows of the Severn, I believe to be only these inland trips; and that the supposed migrators returned to those stations fat and in good condition, owing to their having fed during their absence on the nutricious berry of the white thorn. I have several times seen the fruit on our hedges refused by these birds, and this too in no very temperate season; but in all these cases, the summer had been ungenial—the berries had not ripened well, they were nipped by the frosts of October, and hung on the sprays dark in color, small, and juiceless in substance. The summer of 1825 produced the finest and largest haws I ever remember. They were in general of a bright red hue, and filled with farinaceous pulp; and in consequence, though the season was uncommonly mild and open, long before Christmas, little wandering parties of these birds consumed the whole of them.

Perfectly gregarious as the fieldfare is, yet we observe every year, in some tall hedge-row, or little, quiet pasture, two or three of them that have withdrawn from the main flocks, and there associate with the blackbird and the thrush. They do not appear to be wounded birds, which from necessity have sought concealment and quiet, but to have retired from inclination; and I have reason to apprehend that these retreats are occasionally made for the purpose of forming nests, though they are afterwards abandoned without incubation; as I have now before me the egg of a bird, which I believe to be that of a fieldfare, taken from a nest somewhat like that formed by the song-thrush, in 1824. Its color is uniform—a rather pale blue; it is larger than that of the thrush, obtuse at both ends, and unlike any egg produced by our known British birds. These retiring birds linger with us late in the season, after all the main flights are departed, as if reluctant to leave us; but towards the middle or end of April these stragglers unite, form a small company, and take their flight.

Rural sounds, the voices, the language of the wild creatures, as heard by the naturalist, belong to, and are in concord with the country only. Our sight, our smell, may perhaps be deceived for an interval by conservatories, horticultural arts, and bowers of sweets; but our hearing can in no way be beguiled by any semblance of what is heard in the grove or the field. The hum, the murmur, the medley of the mead, is peculiarly its own, admits of no imitation, and the voices of our birds convey particular intimation, and distinctly notify the various periods of the year, with an accuracy as certain as they are detailed in our calendars. The season of spring is always announced as approaching by the notes of the rookery, by the jangle or wooing accents of the dark frequenters of its trees; and that time having passed away, these contentions and cadences are no longer heard. The cuckoo then comes, and informs us that spring has arrived; that he has journeyed to us, borne by gentle gales in sunny days; that fragrant flowers are in the copse and the mead, and all things telling of gratulation and of joy: the children mark this well-known sound, spring out, and cuckoo! cuckoo! as they gambol down the lane: the very plow-boy bids him welcome in the early morn. It is hardly spring without the cuckoo’s song; and having told his tale, he has voice for no more—is silent or away. Then comes the dark, swift-winged marten, glancing through the air, that seems afraid to visit our uncertain clime: he comes, though late, and hurries through his business here, eager again to depart, all day long in agitation and precipitate flight. The bland zephyrs of the spring have no charms with them; but basking and careering in the sultry gleams of June and July, they associate in throngs, and, screaming, dash round the steeple or the ruined tower, to serenade their nesting mates; and glare and heat are in their train. When the fervor of summer ceases, this bird of the sun will depart. The evening robin from the summit of some leafless bough, or projecting point, tells us that autumn is come, and brings matured fruits, chilly airs, and sober hours, and he, the lonely minstrel now that sings, is understood by all. These four birds thus indicate a separate season, have no interference with the intelligence of the other, nor could they be transposed without the loss of all the meaning they convey, which no contrivance of art could, supply; and, by long association, they have become identified with the period, and in peculiar accordance with the time.

We note birds in general more from their voices than their plumage; for the carols of spring may be heard involuntarily, but to observe the form and decoration of these creatures, requires an attention not always given. Yet we have some native birds beautifully and conspicuously feathered; the goldfinch, the chaffinch, the wagtails, are all eminently adorned, and the fine gradations of sober browns in several others are very pleasing. Those sweet sounds, called the song of birds, proceed only from the male; and, with a few exceptions, only during the season of incubation. Hence the comparative quietness of our summer months, when this care is over, except from accidental causes, where a second nest is formed; few of our birds bringing up more than one brood in the season. The redbreast, blackbird, and thrush, in mild winters will continually be heard, and form exceptions to the general procedure of our British birds; and we have one little bird, the woodlark (alunda arborea), that in the early parts of the autumnal months delights us with its harmony, and its carols may be heard in the air commonly during the calm sunny mornings of this season. They have a softness and quietness perfectly in unison with the sober, almost melancholy, stillness of the hour. The sky-lark[56] also sings now, and its song is very sweet, full of harmony, cheerful as the blue sky and gladdening beam in which it circles and sports, and known and admired by all; but the voice of the woodlark is local, not so generally heard, from its softness must almost be listened for, to be distinguished, and has not any pretensions to the hilarity of the former. This little bird sings likewise in the spring; but, at that season, the contending songsters of the grove, and the variety of sound proceeding from every thing that has utterance, confuse and almost render inaudible the placid voice of the woodlark. It delights to fix its residence near little groves and copses, or quiet pastures, and is a very unobtrusive bird, not uniting in companies, but associating in its own little family parties only, feeding in the woodlands on seeds and insects. Upon the approach of man it crouches close to the ground, then suddenly darts away, as if for a distant flight, but settles again almost immediately. This lark will often continue its song, circle in the air, a scarcely visible speck, by the hour together; and the vast distance from which its voice reaches us in a calm day is almost incredible. In the scale of comparison, it stands immediately below the nightingale in melody and plaintiveness; but compass of voice is given to the linnet, a bird of very inferior powers. The strength of the larynx and of the muscles of the throat in birds is infinitely greater than in the human race. The loudest shout of the peasant is but a feeble cry, compared with that of the golden-eyed duck, the wild goose, or even this lark. The sweet song of this poor little bird, with a fate like that of the nightingale, renders it an object of capture and confinement, which few of them comparatively survive. I have known our country bird-catchers take them by a very simple but effectual method. Watching them to the ground, the wings of a hawk, or of the brown owl, stretched out, are drawn against the current of air by a string as a paper kite, and made to flutter and librate like a kestrel over the place where the woodlark has lodged; which so intimidates the bird that it remains crouching and motionless as a stone on the ground; a hand-net is brought over it, and it is caught.