Alfred Newton

“ Throughout the summer the duck continues her care unremittingly, until the young are full grown and feathered; but it is no part of the mallard’s duty to look after his offspring, and indeed he speedily becomes incapable of helping them, for towards the end of May he begins to undergo his extraordinary additional moult, loses the power of flight, and does not regain his full plumage till autumn. About harvest-time the young are well able to shift for themselves, and then resort to the corn-fields at evening, where they fatten on the scattered grain. ”

“ The cock bird is clothed in velvety-black generally glossed with rich purple, but having each feather of the abdomen broadly tipped with a chevron of green bronze, while the crown of the head is covered with scale-like feathers of glittering green, and on the throat gleams a triangular patch of brilliant bluish emerald, a colour that reappears on the whole upper surface of the middle pair of tail-quills. ”

“ In the spring and summer there is hardly a field, a copse or a garden that is not the resort of a pair or more of song-thrushes; and the brown-backed bird with its spotted breast, hopping over the grass for a few yards, then pausing to detect the movement of a worm, and vigorously seizing the same a moment after, is one of the most familiar sights. ”

“ Yet it is love of his mate or his young that prompts this bellicose behaviour, for it is only in the breeding season that he indulges in it; but then almost every large bird that approaches his nest, from an eagle downwards, is assaulted, and those alone that possess greater command of flight can escape from his repeated charges, which are accompanied by loud and shrill cries. ”

“ The waxwing is a bird that for many years excited vast interest. An irregular winter-visitant, sometimes in countless hordes, to the whole of the central and some parts of southern Europe, it was of old time looked upon as the harbinger of war, plague or death, and, while its harmonious coloration and the grace of its form were attractive, the curiosity with which its irregular appearances were regarded was enhanced by the mystery which enshrouded its birthplace, and until the summer of 1856 defied the searching of any explorer. ”

“ It is one of the latest migrants to arrive, and seldom reaches the British Islands till the latter part of May, when it may be seen, a small dust-coloured bird, sitting on the posts or railings of gardens and fields, ever and anon springing into the air, seizing with an audible snap of its bill some passing insect as it flies, and returning to the spot it has quitted, or taking up some similar station to keep watch as before. ”

“ Allied to the tree-creeper, but without its lengthened and stiff tail-feathers, is the genus Tichodroma, the single member of which is the wall-creeper (T. muraria) of the Alps and some other mountainous parts of Europe and Asia. It is occasionally seen in Switzerland, fluttering like a big butterfly against the face of a rock conspicuous from the scarlet-crimson of its wing-coverts and its white spotted primaries. Its bright hue is hardly visible when the bird is at rest, and it then presents a dingy appearance of grey and black. It is a species of wide range, extending from Spain to China ”

“ It is only when it spreads its wings that these are seen to be marked and spotted with white, rust-colour, and black, somewhat after the pattern of those of the sun-bittern. Like that bird, too, the kagu will, in moments of excitement, give up its ordinary placid behaviour and execute a variety of violent gesticulations, some of them even of a more extraordinary kind, for it will dance round, holding the tip of its tail or one of its wings in a way that no other bird is known to do. ”

“ The latter lay their eggs in one and the same nest, a shallow pit scraped out by their feet, with the earth heaped around to form a kind of wall against which the outermost circle of eggs rest. As soon as ten or a dozen eggs are laid, the cock begins to brood, always taking his place on them at nightfall surrounded by the hens, while by day they relieve one another, more it would seem to guard their common treasure from jackals and small beasts of prey than directly to forward the process of hatching, for that is often left wholly to the sun. ”

“ The house-crow of India (C. splendens) is not very nearly allied to its European namesakes, from which it can be readily distinguished by its smaller size and the lustrous tints of its darkest feathers, while its confidence in the human race has been so long encouraged by its intercourse with an unarmed and inoffensive population that it becomes a plague to the European abiding or travelling where it is abundant. Hardly a station or camp in British India is free from a crowd of feathered followers of this species, ready to dispute with the kites and the cooks the very meat at the fire. ”

“ The fieldfare’s call-note is harsh and loud, sounding like t’chatt’chat: its song is low, twittering and poor. It usually arrives in Britain about the middle or end of October, but sometimes earlier, and often remains till the middle of May before departing for its northern breeding-places. In hard weather it throngs to the berry-bearing bushes which then afford it sustenance, but in open winters the flocks spread over the fields in search of animal food—worms, slugs and the larvae of insects. ”

“ Though goldfinches may occasionally be observed in the coldest weather, incomparably the largest number leave Britain in autumn, returning in spring, and resorting to gardens and orchards to breed, when the lively song of the cock, and the bright yellow wings of both sexes, quickly attract notice. The nest is a beautifully neat structure, often placed at no great height from the ground, but generally so well hidden by the leafy bough on which it is built as not to be easily found, until, the young being hatched, the constant visits of the parents reveal its site. ”

“ Indeed, the crane’s aerial journeys are of a very extended kind; and on its way from beyond the borders of the Tropic of Cancer to within the Arctic Circle, or on the return voyage, its flocks may be descried passing overhead at a marvellous height, or halting for rest and refreshment on the wide meadows that border some great river, while the seeming order with which its ranks are marshalled during flight has long attracted attention. The crane takes up its winter quarters under the burning sun of Central Africa and India, but early in spring returns northward. ”

“ Those who only know the Snipe as it shows itself in the shooting-season, when without warning it rises from the boggy ground uttering a sharp note that sounds like scape, scape, and, after a few rapid twists, darts away, if it be not brought down by the gun, to disappear in the distance after a desultory flight, have no conception of the bird's behaviour at breeding-time. ”

“ That the gare-fowl was not plentiful in either group of islands is sufficiently obvious, as also is the impossibility of its continuing to breed “up to the year 1830.”
But mistakes like these are not confined to British authors. As on the death of an ancient hero myths gathered round his memory as quickly as clouds round the setting sun, so have stories, probable as well as impossible, accumulated over the true history of this species, and it behoves the conscientious naturalist to exercise more than common caution in sifting the truth from the large mass of error. ”

“ The birds of the genus Muscisaxicola have the habits and almost the appearance of wheat-ears; the genus Alectorurus calls to mind a water-wagtail; Euscarthmus may suggest a titmouse, Elainea perhaps a willow-wren; but the greatest number of forms have no analogous bird of the Old World with which they can be compared; and, while the combination of delicate beauty and peculiar external form possibly attains its utmost in the long-tailed Milvulus, the glory of the family may be said to culminate in the king of king-birds, Muscivora regia. ”

“ Conspicuous as the strongly contrasted colours of its plumage and its very peculiar flight make it, it is remarkable that it maintains its ground when so many of its allies have been almost exterminated, for the lapwing is the object perhaps of greater persecution than any other European bird that is not a plunderer. Its eggs are the well-known “plovers’ eggs” of commerce, [2] and the bird, wary and wild at other times of the year, in the breeding-season becomes easily approachable, and is shot to be sold in the markets for “golden plover.” ”

“ In a general way buzzards are smaller than eagles, though there are several exceptions to this statement, and have their plumage more mottled. Furthermore, most if not all of the buzzards, about which anything of the kind is with certainty known, assume their adult dress at the first moult, while the eagles take a longer time to reach maturity. The buzzards are fine-looking birds, but are slow and heavy of flight, so that in the old days of falconry they were regarded with infinite scorn, and hence in common English to call a man “a buzzard” is to denounce him as stupid. ”

“ This beautiful bird, Ruticilla phoenicurus, returns to England about the middle or towards the end of April, and at once takes up its abode in gardens, orchards and about old buildings, when its curious habit of flirting at nearly every change of position its brightly-coloured tail, together with the pure white forehead, the black throat, and the bright bay breast of the cock, renders him conspicuous, even if attention be not drawn by his lively though intermittent song. The hen is much more plainly attired ”

“ The nest is a slight hollow in the ground, wonderfully inconspicuous even when deepened, as is usually the case, by incubation, and the black-spotted olive eggs (four in number) are almost invisible to the careless or untrained eye. The young when first hatched are clothed with mottled down, so as closely to resemble a stone, and to be overlooked as they squat motionless on the approach of danger. At a distance the plumage of the adult appears to be white and black in about equal proportions, the latter predominating above ”

“ We start with the Anas boschas of Linnaeus, the common wild duck, which from every point of view is by far the most important species, as it is the most plentiful, the most widely distributed, and the best known—being indeed the origin of all the British domestic breeds. It inhabits the greater part of the northern hemisphere, reaching in winter so far as the Isthmus of Panama in the New World, and in the Old being abundant at the same season in Egypt and north-western India, while in summer it ranges throughout the Fur-Countries, Greenland, Iceland, Lapland and Siberia. ”

“ Subsequent voyagers, Cook and others, found that the range of the species extended over the greater part of Australia, in many districts of which it was abundant. It has since rapidly decreased in numbers, but is not likely soon to cease to exist as a wild bird, while its singular and ornamental appearance will probably preserve it as a modified captive in most civilized countries. The species scarcely needs description: the sooty black of its general plumage is relieved by the snowy white of its flight-feathers and its coral-like bill banded with ivory. ”