Birdie

“ I grew very [Pg 95] fond of my pet, and that I might know it, if at some distant day it should leave me, I wound a bit of silver wire about its leg. Birdie grew stronger and saucier, and its peep fuller every day. At last one bright morning—you may imagine my surprise—on entering the little sewing-room, to find my pet gone; and as I thrust my head out of the window, a loud burst of glad song, from the top of the old apple-tree, told me that birdie was—
“Safe, safe, at home.” ”

“ Birdie had been accustomed to live in a cage on a high shelf in the kitchen, well cared for, no doubt, but, untamed and unnoticed, he led a lonely life, and was one of the wildest birds I ever met with. For many months his flutterings, when any one came near his cage, could not be calmed, but by always speaking to him when entering the room, and if possible giving him a few hemp seeds or any little dainty, he grew to endure one's presence ”

“ After a while, when the right time comes, the birdie will peck a tiny hole in the shell. This will keep growing larger and larger until it is large enough for the birdie to come through, then out it comes! ”

“ Then one night in Cincinnati I met Birdie, and she was up against it, too—and—"
After all he couldn't make a clean breast of it! Whatever he might say would reflect on Birdie, and he gave the explanation up in despair. But Nance came to his rescue.
"I know, Dan," she said. "Mrs. Smelts told me everything. I don't know another fellow in the world that would have stood by a girl like you did Birdie. She oughtn't have let you marry her without telling you."
"I think she meant to give me my freedom when the baby came," said Dan. ”

“ Then we birds have to hatch out the cowbird's eggs, and when her children come out they are so unpleasant that they shove our little birdies right out of the nest, and eat all the things we mamma birds bring home to our little ones. ”

“ This is the bird’s house. We sometimes see tiny eggs in the nest. The little eggs hatch, and then there are little birdies in the nest in place of the eggs. The mother bird hunts worms and bugs to feed the little ones. ”

“ After the Depôt Journey, at Hut Point, walking over that beastly, slippery, sloping ice-foot which I always imagined would leave me some day in the sea, Bill asked me whether I would go with him—and who else for a third? There can have been little doubt whom we both wanted, and that evening Bowers had been asked. Of course he was mad to come. And here we were. "This winter travel is a new and bold venture," wrote Scott in the hut that night, "but the right men have gone to attempt it."
I don't know. There never could have been any doubt about Bill and Birdie. ”

“ Meanwhile the red-headed woodpecker's eggs in the hollow maple had hatched, and the proud mother had great tales to tell of her baby birds,—of how beautiful and knowing they were, and of what good, noble birds they were going to be when they grew up. The yellow-bird, too, had four fuzzy little babies in her nest in the lilac-bush, and every now and then she came to sing to the little boy and Fido of her darlings. ”

“ The mother does so too, and then both birds, standing together side by side over the chick, pay it divided attentions, seeming as though they could not make enough either of their child or each other. It is a pretty picture, and here is another one. "A bird—we will think her the female, as she performs the most mother-like part—has just flown in with a fish—a sand-eel—in her bill. She makes her way with it to the partner, who rises and shifts the chick that he has been brooding over from himself to her. ”

“ They patiently flew back and forth, and brought worms, flies, and berries, till the greedy little bills gaped and chirped no more—then the good father-bird perched on a limb above the nest, began singing a sweet, tender song, while the kind mother-bird brooded over her darlings, as the dewy twilight was coming on. ”

“ Look again at the egg of the bird, dropped on its curious bed, the construction of which has cost the parent bird many labours and anxieties. It also is a seed, but it gives rise to a very different object. Fostered by the warmth imparted by the parent bird, the germ which it contains swells into life, and at length bursting its fragile enclosure, comes tottering into existence. To sustain the life and contribute to the development of this helpless being, the mother issues in quest of food, which she carefully places in its open throat. ”

“ And now there lies my home nest swung in a bower of blossoms full of the old sweetie birds, the boy, the calf, puppy babies, pester chickens and—and I'm going to take a large, gray, prowling night-bird back and tuck him away for fear his cheeks will look hollow in the morning. I'm the mother bird, and while I know He watches with me all through the night, sometimes I sing in the dark because I and my nesties are close to Him and I'm not the least bit afraid. ”

“ You have heard so much about the mother-bird sitting on the nest, that I am sure you will be interested in seeing a father who broods the eggs and hatches out the little ones. I have five wives. They all lay their eggs in one and the same nest, which is a hollow pit scraped out by their feet, the earth heaped up around to form a sort of wall. They lay the eggs, I have said, sometimes thirty in a nest, and I—well, I do the rest.
We are dangerous fellows if disturbed when brooding; have been known to attack a man on horseback, trying to kick and leap on him. ”

“ Let me sit down here behind the screen of ferns and briers, and hear this wild hen of the woods call together her brood. At what an early age the partridge flies! Nature seems to concentrate her energies on the wing, making the safety of the bird a point to be looked after first; and while the body is covered with down, and no signs of feathers are visible there, the wing-quills sprout and unfold, and in an incredibly short time the young make fair headway in flying. ”

“ The energies of even this unattractive bird were so severely taxed that he spared us his comments on things in general, and our affairs in particular. In the wood, young high-holes thrust their heads out of the door and called; blackbird and martin babies flew over with their parents, talking eagerly all the way; barn swallow nestlings crowded up to the window-sill to look out and be fed by passing mothers; and cautious young kingbirds, in black caps, dressed their feathers on the edge of the nest. ”

“ Poor unfledged birds, fluttering your wings on the brim of the nest, and pooh-poohing the old bird behind you, that says, ‘Take care, my dears, or you will fall!’ She never flew out of the nest, did she?—she never preened her wings, and thought all the world lay before her, and she could fly as straight as any lark of them all, and catch as many flies as any swallow? ”

“ During the breeding season the bill of the male bird, and the large scales on the fore part of his legs, assume a beautiful deep rose-colour, looking just as if they were made of the finest pink coral; in some cases the skin of the head and neck also becomes red at that time. ”

“ All the young fathers and mothers, with their little families, could not, at first, see the reason why. They had built nests, and their birdlings were just putting on their first coat of feathers, and their proud parents wanted to show them off in their varied colors and bright neck-sheen. In fact, every mother bird was sure that her fledglings were very accomplished young ones, and would certainly surprise the world when they made their début. ”

“ When a bird first leaves the nest it goes about very gingerly, but this little fellow now began to feel his strength and the excitement of his freedom. He wiped his tongue on a branch, and then, to my astonishment, his wings began to whirl as if he were getting up steam, and presently they lifted him from his twig, and he went whirring off as softly as a hummingbird moth, among the oak sprays. ”

“ Whoever has not seen a setting hen has missed one of the most touching sights in this world: the devotion of the mother-bird to her eggs, her self-forgetfulness even to the point of sacrificing her own life. ”

“ When the eggs are near hatching, the female will not leave her eggs under any circumstances, and will suffer herself to be made a prisoner rather than abandon them. The mother assists the young birds to extricate themselves from the egg-shell, caresses and dries them with her bill, and aids them in their first efforts to totter out of the nest. ”

“ But an hot sunny season coming on before the brood was half fledged, the reflection of the wall became insupportable, and must inevitably have destroyed the tender young, had not affection suggested an expedient, and prompted the parent-birds to hover over the nest all the hotter hours, while with wings expanded, and mouths gaping for breath, they screened off the heat from their suffering offspring. ”

“ During incubation and after the young are hatched the parent birds display the most intense solicitude when the nest is approached, and flit from bough to bough close to the intruder’s head, incessantly repeating two strangely different notes—one low, clear, and sorrowful, the other a harsh, grinding sound. ”

“ Their feathers shall be coloured, like the leaves and fruits of summer. They shall nest in the land of everlasting summer-time and plenty.
"They who choose those eggs will follow these birds to the beautiful country of summer-time. The fruits will ripen daily and fall into the hands of the lucky earth children. Their food will come to them without labour and they shall know neither hunger nor cold." ”

“ So instinct teaches the bird to leave its winter home, in some far southern country, and fly hundreds of miles across land and ocean, to reach a spot suitable for the purpose of breeding and rearing its young; to collect the materials and to build its nest, and after the eggs are laid, to sit patiently on them the appointed time ”

“ Is it not produced by the dimness and density of the atmosphere through which she has to shine? Give me the love of the bird that broods over her own nest, rather than of one who lays her eggs in the nest of another, albeit she warble about parental affection as loudly as Rousseau or Lord Byron. ”

“ As soon as the young are hatched they will run to hide, while the mother bird is feigning [Pg 314] all kinds of decrepitude to attract your attention from the cute little brownish fluffs of feather scampering here and there for cover. I once knew a farmer boy who found a nest, took the eggs home, and put them under a hen. In due time they hatched out. How pretty, cute, and interesting were the little birds, and how the foster-mother strutted about, undoubtedly proud of her chicks! ”

“ The eggs are never more than two in number, pure white, and of a broadly elliptical form. During incubation the male bird feeds the mate and afterwards assists in supplying the young birds, and both birds are conspicuous in their demonstrations of affection, both to each other and to their offspring. The young brood, usually both sexes in one nest, leave their parents as soon as they are able to shift for themselves. ”

“ Then bent again to the yoke,
With peace in their dreaming eyes.
And a small brown bird on her nest
Hid her speckled eggs with care,
Lest one should chill while her mate
Sang high in the golden air. ”

“ The young birds are fed from the parent’s crop, as young pigeons and young hummingbirds are. The old bird thrusts its bill down the throat of the nestling and gives it a meal of partially digested food by what scientific people call a process of regurgitation. ”

“ It is comical to see a nest full of little birds when the father or mother comes with food. All stretch up and open their big mouths as wide as they can, and if they are old enough, they cry as if they were starving.
Some birds bring food enough for all in the nest, every time they come. A cedar-bird, feeding wild cherries, brought five of them every time, one for each of the five nestlings. ”

“ From the first I had looked for a nest, and had suffered two or three disappointments. One pair flaunted their intentions by appearing on a tree before my window, "tsipping" with all their might; she with her beak full of hay from the lawn below; he, eager and devoted, assisting by his presence. The important and consequential manner of a bird with building material in mouth is amusing. ”

“ It seemed a singular place for a bird to begin its life, this little pinch of down, and lie still on the exact spot where the egg lay, a flat exposed shelf on the side of a bare hill, with nothing but the whole heavens, the broad universe above, to brood it when its mother was away. ”

“ They build a nest, and when it is all nicely finished, the mother bird lays her eggs. Then the papa and mamma bird take turns and sit on the eggs to keep them warm, and after a time the egg breaks and a little bird is born into the world. They feed the little baby birds until their feathers grow, and when they are old enough they fly away from their home and begin life by themselves. ”

“ The old birds line them with moss, with wool, or with feathers, to make them warm and soft.
Boy. Where do they get all these things?
Mother. They fly a great way to fetch them; and sometimes they pluck their own breasts to supply down for their young to lie upon.
Boy. How kind they are!
Mother. So kind are good parents to their children.
Boy. Pray why do the birds sing?
Mother. One old bird sings whilst one sits on the eggs. ”

“ Opening their wide mouths till one could see right down their throats, they would just sit there in the nest all day long eating what their parents brought them,—chopped egg and cracker, and baby bird seed, which the big birds first cracked for them in their own bills. ”

“ By an elaborate intertwining of these long fibres they form the principal part, sometimes the whole, of their nests. These structures are at once simple, beautiful, ingenious, and skilfully wrought. When first made, they are somewhat rude and unfinished, but as their family are gathered, the eggs deposited, incubated, and hatched, a change has been going on. Little by little has the male bird busied himself, when not procuring food for his mate, in improving, strengthening, and enlarging the nest. ”