Part 12

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 scarlet _grecque_, 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, to win 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).

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 is wanting 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 discovered in 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.

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 awakening of 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 live with 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 of hope. _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."

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 and _velvetiness_ of _timbre_, 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:--

"Je suis le compagnon Du pauvre bûcheron.

"Je le suis en automne, Au vent des premiers froids, Et c'est moi qui lui donne Le dernier chant des bois.

"Il est triste, et je chante Sous mon deuil mêlé d'or. Dans la brume pesante Je vois l'azur encor.

"Que ce chant te relève Et te garde l'espoir! Qu'il te berce d'un rêve, Et te ramène au soir!

"Mais quand vient la gelée, Je frappe à ton carreau. Il n'est plus de feuillée, Prends pitié de l'oiseau!

"C'est ton ami d'automne Qui revient près de toi. Le ciel, tout m'abandonne-- Bûcheron, ouvre-moi!

"Qu'en ce temps de disette, Le petit voyageur, Régalé d'une miette, S'endorme à ta chaleur!

"Je suis le compagnon Du pauvre bûcheron."

_Imitated_:--

I am the companion Of the poor woodcutter.

I follow him in autumn, When the first chill breezes plain; And I it is who warble The woodlands' last sweet strain.

He is sad, and then I sing Under my gilded shroud, And I see the gleam of azure Glint through the gathering cloud.

Oh, may the song inspiring Revive Hope's flame again, And at even guide thee homeward By the magic of its strain!

But when the streams are frozen, I tap at thy window-pane-- Oh, on the bird take pity, Not a leaf, not a herb remain!

It is thy autumn comrade Who makes appeal to thee; By heaven, by all forsaken, Woodman, oh, pity me!

Yes, in these days of famine The little pilgrim keep; On dainty crumbs regale him, By the fireside let him sleep!

For I am the companion Of the poor woodcutter!

THE NEST.

ARCHITECTURE OF BIRDS.

I am writing opposite a graceful collection of nests of French birds, made for me by a friend. I am able thus to appreciate, to verify the descriptions of authors, to improve them, perhaps, if the very limited resources of style can give any just idea of a wholly special art, less analogous to ours than one would be tempted to believe at the first glance. Nothing in this branch of study can supply the place of actual sight of the objects. You must see and touch; you will then perceive that all comparison is false and inaccurate. These things belong to a world apart. Shall we say _above_, or _below_ the works of man? Neither the one nor the other; but essentially different, and whose supposed similarities (or relations) are only external.

Let us recollect, at the outset, that this charming object, so much more delicate than words can describe, owes everything to art, to skill, to calculation. The materials are generally of the rudest, and not always those which the artist would have preferred. The instruments are very defective. The bird has neither the squirrel's hand nor the beaver's tooth. Having only his bill and his foot (which by no means serves the purpose of a hand), it seems that the nest should be to him an insoluble problem. The specimens now before my eyes are for the most part composed of a tissue or covering of mosses, small flexible branches, or long vegetable filaments; but it is less a _weaving_ than a _condensation_; a felting of materials, blended, beaten, and welded together with much exertion and perseverance; an act of great labour and energetic operation, for which the bill and the claw would be insufficient. The tool really used is the bird's own body--his breast--with which he presses and kneads the materials until he has rendered them completely pliable, has thoroughly mixed them, and subdued them to the general work.

And within, too, the implement which determines the circular form of the nest is no other than the bird's body. It is by constantly turning himself about, and ramming the wall on every side, that he succeeds in shaping the circle.

Thus, then, his house is his very person, his form, and his immediate effort--I would say, his suffering. The result is only obtained by a constantly repeated pressure of his breast. There is not one of these blades of grass but which, to take and retain the form of a curve, has been a thousand and a thousand times pressed against his bosom, his heart, certainly with much disturbance of the respiration, perhaps with much palpitation.

It is quite otherwise with the habitat of the quadruped. He comes into the world clothed; what need has he of a nest? Thus, then, those animals which build or burrow labour for themselves rather than for their young. A skilful miner is the mountain rat, in his oblique tunnel, which saves him from the winter gale. The squirrel, with hand adroit, raises the pretty turret which defends him from the rain. The great engineer of the lakes, the beaver, foreseeing the gathering of the waters, builds up several stages to which he may ascend at pleasure; but all this is done for the individual. The bird builds for her family. Carelessly did she live in her bright leafy bower, exposed to every enemy; but the moment she was no longer alone, the hoped for and anticipated maternity made her an artist. The nest is a creation of love.