Douglas Dewar

“ They are numbered among those who despise not small things: no insect is too tiny, no beetle too infinitesimal, no creeping thing too insignificant, to be eaten by these birds, so the little company of friends hops together along the ground from tree to tree, from shrub to shrub, searching every nook and cranny, turning over every fallen leaf in the most methodical way, seizing with alacrity everything it comes across in the shape of food. During the search for food the chattering never ceases. Now and again the birds will take to a tree and hop about its branches, talking louder than ever. ”

“ Song-birds are numerous in India. They do not make the same impression upon us as do our English birds because their song has not those associations which render dear to us the melody of birds in the homeland. Further, there is nothing in India which corresponds to the English spring, when the passion of the earth is at its highest, because there is in that country no sad and dismal winter-time, when life is sluggish and feeble. The excessive joy, the rapture, the ecstasy with which we greet the spring in the British Isles is, to a certain extent, a reaction. ”

“ Of all the methods of obtaining food to which birds resort, none makes greater demands on their physical powers than that which we human beings term scavenging—the seeking-out and devouring of the multifarious edible objects left, unclaimed by the owners, on the face of the land or the sea. No bird can eke out an existence by scavenging unless it be endowed with wonderful power of flight, the keenest eyesight, and limitless energy, to say nothing of the ability and the will to fight when necessity arises. ”

“ As they are larger than a man’s fist, and appear while the branches are yet bare, a cotton tree in flower is a very conspicuous and beautiful object. But it is of the feathered folk that visit this tree that I would write, not of the splendour of its blossom. Even before the March sun has risen and commenced to dispel the pleasant coolness of the night the cotton tree is the scene of riot and revelry. ”

“ When a hungry Butastur sees flitting all around him potential meals in the shape of small birds, his feelings must be akin to those of the impecunious man in the comic song who, as he contemplates the insurance policy on the life of his shrewish wife, cries out: “Stone broke with fifty quid staring me in the face!” The white-eyed buzzard has perforce to feed upon very humble quarry, upon the creeping and crawling things, upon beetles and insects, with an occasional rat or frog. ”

“ The bird while uttering it careers about madly among the foliage of a tree, hopping from bough to bough with great dexterity.
Mad babblers go about, like the seven sisters, in flocks of ten or twelve, and feed largely on the ground. [230] Their mode of progression when not on the wing is by a series of hops. Their movements are very like those of a thrush on an English lawn—a dash forward for about a yard, followed by an abrupt halt. They seem to subsist chiefly on insects, but grain does not come amiss to them. ”

“ A colony of nesting martins presents a very animated appearance. The main body dash through the air to and fro in front of the cliff, uttering their feeble twittering, but a few are always at the nest holes, either resting or working. These latter are constantly reinforced from those on the wing, and vice versa, so that there are two streams of birds, one flying to the cliff and the other leaving it. Suddenly the whole flock, including both the resting and the flying birds, will, as if affected simultaneously by a common influence, fly off en masse and disappear from sight. ”

“ If, on the other hand, they are not justified, why do not the orthodox biologists arise and refute my statements and arguments? It is my belief that the black livery of the coot is not only not the product of natural selection, but is positively harmful to its possessor; that the coot would be an even more successful species than it now is, if, while retaining all its habits and other characteristics, it had a coat of less conspicuous hue. I maintain that many organisms possess characters which are positively injurious to them, and yet manage to survive. ”

“ The minds and eyes of birds are almost invariably directed on small things. Now, a man bears to a small bird much the same relation as a horse three hundred hands high would bear to a man. As regards detail, the eyesight of birds is probably superior to that of men, for each sand-martin seems never to mistake its nest, although the entrance to it is merely one of several score of holes scattered irregularly over the face of the cliff. To the human eye these holes look all very much alike, but each must possess minute peculiarities which loom large in the eye of the sand-martin. ”

“ Nevertheless, the theory of protective mimicry is almost exclusively illustrated by examples taken from butterflies. In theory, these creatures are so relentlessly persecuted by insectivorous birds that in order to escape their foes many edible butterflies mimic the appearance of unpalatable species. Unfortunately for theory, few creatures in practice seem to attack butterflies when on the wing, which is just the time when the “mimicry” is most obvious.
The elegant little fly-catchers, then, are birds which mock Darwin, laugh at Wallace, and make merry at the expense of Muller and Bates! ”

“ Suddenly she throws herself, with a jump and a bound, into the air, to catch the circling gnat; and now should be seen the beating of wings, the darting hither and thither, the balancing and the shakes and the allegretto that her tail keeps time to. Nothing can surpass it in lightness. In fine, of all the little feathered people, none, except the swallow, is more graceful, fuller of movement, more adroit or insinuating, than the wagtail. ”

“ When we turn to consider the more outward characteristics of birds, the peacock, the monal pheasant, the “blue jay,” the oriole, the white-breasted kingfisher, the sunbird, the little green bee-eater, and a host of others rise up before us. Of these some, showily resplendent, compel attention and admiration; others of quieter hues possess a beauty which cannot be appreciated unless they be held in the hand and each [5] feather minutely examined. At the other extreme stands the superlative of hideousness, the ugliest bird in the world—Neophron ginginianus, the scavenger vulture. ”

“ It is therefore comparatively easy to study their habits. I can count no fewer than twenty different species which, during past nesting seasons, have elected to share with me the bungalow that I happened to occupy. Is it then surprising that an unbounded enthusiasm should pervade the writings of all Indian naturalists, that these should constantly bubble over with humour? The materials on which we work are superior to those vouchsafed to the ornithologists of other countries. Our writings must, therefore, other things being equal, excel theirs. ”

“ Argya malcomi are to that city what the Macphersons are to Inverness-shire. You cannot avoid them. The sound of their voices is never out of my ears during the hours of daylight. Some of them are shouting at me even now. Yet words to describe what I hear fail me. The only instrument made by man that can rival the call of the mad babbler is the “rattle” used at our English Universities, or at any rate at Cambridge, to encourage the oarsmen in the Lent or May races. It is the delight of two of these birds each to take up a position at the summit of a tree and for one to commence calling. ”