Part 11 (1/2)
The thrushes are the birds of real melody, and will afford one more delight perhaps than any other cla.s.s. The robin is the most familiar example. Their manners, flight, and form are the same in each species.
See the robin hop along upon the ground, strike an att.i.tude, scratch for a worm, fix his eye upon something before him or upon the beholder, flip his wings suspiciously, fly straight to his perch, or sit at sundown on some high branch caroling his sweet and honest strain, and you have seen what is characteristic of all the thrushes.
Their carriage is preeminently marked by grace, and their songs by melody.
Beside the robin, which is in no sense a wood-bird, we have, in New York, the wood-thrush, the hermit-thrush, the veery, or Wilson's thrush, the olive-backed thrush, and, transiently, one or two other species not so clearly defined.
The wood-thrush and the hermit stand at the head as songsters, no two persons, perhaps, agreeing as to which is the superior.
Under the general head of finches, Audubon describes over sixty different birds, ranging from the sparrows to the grossbeaks, and including the buntings, the linnets, the snow-birds, the cross-bills, and the red-birds.
We have nearly or quite a dozen varieties of the sparrow in the Atlantic States, but perhaps no more than half that number would be discriminated by the unprofessional observer. The song-sparrow, which every child knows, comes first; at least, his voice is first heard.
And can there be anything more fresh and pleasing than this first simple strain heard from the garden fence or a near hedge, on some bright, still March morning?
The field or vesper-sparrow, called also gra.s.s-finch, and bay-winged sparrow, a bird slightly larger than the song-sparrow and of a lighter gray color, is abundant in all our upland fields and pastures, and is a very sweet songster. It builds upon the ground, without the slightest cover or protection, and also roosts there. Walking through the fields at dusk I frequently start them up almost beneath my feet.
When disturbed by day they fly with a quick, sharp movement, showing two white quills in the tail. The traveler along the country roads disturbs them earthing their wings in the soft dry earth, or sees them skulking and flitting along the fences in front of him. They run in the furrow in advance of the team, or perch upon the stones a few roads off. They sing much after sundown, hence the aptness of the name vesper-sparrow, which a recent writer, Wilson Flagg, has bestowed upon them.
In the meadows and low wet lands the Savannah sparrow is met with, and may be known by its fine, insect-like song. In the swamp, the swamp-sparrow.
The fox-sparrow, the largest and handsomest species of this family, comes to us in the fall, from the North, where it breeds. Likewise the tree or Canada sparrow, and the white-crowned and white-throated sparrows.
The social-sparrow, _alias_ ”hair-bird,” _alias_ ”red-headed chipping-bird,” is the smallest of the sparrows, and, I believe, the only one that builds in trees.
The finches, as a cla.s.s, all have short conical bills, with tails more or less forked. The purple finch heads the list in varied musical ability.
Beside the groups of our more familiar birds which I have thus hastily outlined, there are numerous other groups, more limited in specimens but comprising some of our best known songsters. The bobolink, for instance, has properly no congener. The famous mocking-bird of the Southern States belongs to a genus which has but two other representatives in the Atlantic States, namely, the cat-bird and the long-tailed or ferruginous thrush.
The wrens are a large and interesting family, and as songsters are noted for vivacity and volubility. The more common species are the house-wren, the wood-wren, the marsh-wren, the great Carolina wren, and the winter-wren, the latter perhaps deriving its name from the fact that it breeds in the North. It is an exquisite songster, and pours forth its notes so rapidly and with such sylvan sweetness and cadence, that it seems to _go off_ like a musical alarm.
Wilson called the kinglets wrens, but they have little to justify the name, except their song, which is of the same continuous, gus.h.i.+ng, lyrical character as that referred to above. Dr. Brewer was entranced with the song of one of these tiny minstrels in the woods of New Brunswick, and thought he had found the author of the strain in the black-poll warbler. He seems loath to believe that a bird so small as either of the kinglets could possess such vocal powers. It may indeed have been the winter-wren, but from my own observation I believe the golden-crowned kinglet quite capable of such a performance.
But I must leave this part of the subject and hasten on. As to works on ornithology. Audubon's, though its expense puts it beyond the reach of the ma.s.s of readers, is, by far, the most full and accurate. His drawings surpa.s.s all others in accuracy and spirit, while his enthusiasm and devotion to the work he had undertaken, have but few parallels in the history of science. His chapter on the wild goose is as good as a poem. One readily overlooks his style, which is often verbose and affected, in consideration of enthusiasm so genuine and purpose so single.
There has never been a keener eye than Audubon's, though there have been more discriminative ears. Nuttall, for instance, is far more happy in his descriptions of the songs and notes of birds, and more to be relied upon. Audubon thinks the song of the Louisiana water-thrush equal to that of the European nightingale, and, as he had heard both birds, one would think was prepared to judge. Yet he has, no doubt, overrated the one and underrated the other. The song of the water-thrush is very brief, compared with the philomel's, and its quality is brightness and vivacity, while that of the latter bird, if the books are to be credited, is melody and harmony. Again, he says the song of the blue grossbeak resembles the bobolink's, which it does about as much as the color of the two birds resembles each other; one is black and white and the other is blue. The song of the wood-wagtail, he says, consists of a ”short succession of simple notes beginning with emphasis and gradually falling.” The truth is they run up the scale instead of down; beginning low and ending in a shriek.
Yet considering the extent of Audubon's work, the wonder is the errors are so few. I can, at this moment, recall but one observation of his, the contrary of which I have proved to be true. In his account of the bobolink he makes a point of the fact that in returning South in the fall they do not travel by night as they do when moving North in the spring. In Was.h.i.+ngton I have heard their calls as they flew over at night for four successive autumns. As he devoted the whole of a long life to the subject, and figured and described over four hundred species, one feels a real triumph on finding in our common woods a bird not described in his work. I have seen but two. Walking in the woods one day in early fall, in the vicinity of West Point, I started up a thrush that was sitting on the ground. It alighted on a branch a few yards off, and looked new to me. I thought I had never before seen so long-legged a thrush. I shot it, and saw that it was a new acquaintance. Its peculiarities were its broad, square tail; the length of its legs, which were three and three quarters inches from the end of the middle toe to the hip-joint; and the deep uniform olive-brown of the upper parts, and the gray of the lower. It proved to be the gray-cheeked thrush (_t.u.r.dus aliciae_), named and first described by Professor Baird. But little seems to be known concerning it, except that it breeds in the far North, even on the sh.o.r.es of the Arctic Ocean. I would go a good way to hear its song.
The present season I met with a pair of them near Was.h.i.+ngton, as mentioned above. In size this bird approaches the wood-thrush, being larger than either the hermit or the veery; unlike all other species, no part of its plumage has a tawny or yellowish tinge. The other specimen was the Northern or small water-thrush, cousin-german to the oven-bird and half-brother to the Louisiana water-thrush or wagtail. I found it at the head of a remote mountain lake among the sources of the Delaware, where it evidently had a nest. It usually breeds much farther North. It has a strong, clear warble, which at once suggests the song of its congener. I have not been able to find any account of this particular species in the books, though it seems to be well known.
More recent writers and explorers have added to Audubon's list over three hundred new species, the greater number of which belong to the Northern and Western parts of the Continent. Audubon's observations were confined mainly to the Atlantic and Gulf States and the adjacent islands; hence the Western or Pacific birds were but little known to him, and are only briefly mentioned in his works.
It is, by the way, a little remarkable how many of the Western birds seem merely duplicates of the Eastern. Thus, the varied-thrush of the West is our robin, a little differently marked; and the red-shafted woodp.e.c.k.e.r is our golden-wing, or high-hole, colored red instead of yellow. There is also a Western chickadee, a Western chewink, a Western blue jay, a Western meadow-lark, a Western snow-bird, a Western bluebird, a Western song-sparrow, Western grouse, quail, hen-hawk, etc., etc.
One of the most remarkable birds of the West seems to be a species of skylark, met with on the plains of Dakota, which mounts to the height of three or four hundred feet, and showers down its ecstatic notes. It is evidently akin to several of our Eastern species.
A correspondent, writing to me from the country one September, says, ”I have observed recently a new species of bird here. They alight upon the buildings and fences as well as upon the ground. They are _walkers_.” In a few days he obtained one, and sent me the skin. It proved to be what I had antic.i.p.ated, namely, the American pipit, or t.i.tlark, a slender brown bird, about the size of the sparrow, which pa.s.ses through the States in the fall and spring, to and from its breeding haunts in the far North. They generally appear by twos and threes, or in small loose flocks, searching for food on banks and plowed ground. As they fly up, they show two or three white quills in the tail like the vesper-sparrow. Flying over, they utter a single chirp or cry every few rods. They breed in the bleak, moss-covered rocks of Labrador. Their eggs have also been found in Vermont, and I feel quite certain that I saw this bird in the Adirondac Mountains in the month of August. The male launches into the air, and gives forth a brief but melodious song, after the manner of all larks. They are _walkers_. This is a characteristic of but few of our land-birds. By far the greater number are _hoppers_. Note the track of the common snow-bird; the feet are not placed one in front of the other, as in the track of the crow or partridge, but side and side. The sparrows, thrushes, warblers, woodp.e.c.k.e.rs, buntings, etc., are all hoppers. On the other hand, all aquatic or semi-aquatic birds are walkers. The plovers and sandpipers and snipes run rapidly. Among the land-birds, the grouse, pigeons, quails, larks, and various blackbirds, walk. The swallows walk, also, whenever they use their feet at all, but very awkwardly. The larks walk with ease and grace. Note the meadow-lark strutting about all day in the meadows.