Barbet

“ The present species appears to rank very near the doubtful barbet of Latham, from which however it is clearly distinct. It is but little above seven inches in length, the female rather less. The bill is of a blackish horn-colour, about nine eighths of an inch from the gape to the tip, and about three quarters of an inch in thickness at the base. It has two notches in the edge of the upper mandible, and a sort of indentation in the lower mandible, as if to receive the foremost notch ”

“ As a group, these birds are noted for the habit of attracting the attention of human beings and leading them to bee trees, presumably so that they will break down the bee tree for the honey, and the birds can feed on the scraps left over. Bates found that the West African species is parasitic on other birds in its nesting habits and its young have been found in the nesting hole of a little barbet. This barbet was a much smaller bird than the honey-guide and the entrance to the nest hole was so small that Bates doubted that the honey-guide would have been able to get in to - 34 - lay its egg. ”

“ They perch high; and their long tails would probably be an inconvenience if they frequented the short, thick lower bush. Two Barbets are found; the pied (Pogonorhynchus leucomelas) is quite common. These birds fly singly in the bush and are easily approached. The beautiful Le Valliant's Barbet (Trachyphonus caffer) is much scarcer. Once among the thick twigs of a high tree I could just distinguish two birds either fighting or courting, and on firing I secured a specimen of this handsome species ”

“ They live in the hot regions of South America and feed upon Reptiles and Insects. The two principal species of this genus are the Razor-bill of Jamaica, and the Savannah Blackbird of America.
The Barbets owe their name to a number of straight hairs which they have upon their beak. They are massive in form, and their flight is heavy. They inhabit the warm countries of both continents, and feed upon fruits, berries and Insects. The best known of this genus is the Collared Barbet, with a distinct collar of white feathers about the throat. ”

“ Not found in Punjab, Sind, Rajputana, Lower Bengal, or the East Coast of the Madras presidency.
114. Xantholæma hæmatocephala: The Crimson-breasted Barbet, or Coppersmith. (F. 1019) , (J. 197) , (+I.)
An olive-green bird with very gaudy colouring on the head. I quote the following description from Bombay Ducks: The bird “always puts me in mind of a woman who ‘makes up’ very carelessly, who is not only exceedingly lavish of the paint, but does not understand how to shade it off gradually. ”

“ Barbette did these things with the slowness of a person absorbed in one overpowering feeling. She listened to every sound. Deceived by the whistling of the wind she went often to the door of the hut, returning sadly. She cleaned two beakers, filled them with cider, and placed them on the long table. Now and again she looked at her boy, who watched the baking of the buckwheat cakes, but did not speak to him. The lad’s eyes happened to rest on the nails which usually held his father’s duck-gun, and Barbette trembled as she noticed that the gun was gone. ”

“ The flight is powerful and undulating, but Barbets are inactive birds, and often sit motionless for hours, their plaintive whistle, or noisy ringing note of two or three syllables being heard at intervals {449}throughout the day or on moonlight nights. ”

“ The barbel is extremely capricious, abnormally so of late years in the Thames, and there are plenty of blanks to one fortunate day. There is, however, a fascination in barbel-fishing that is not a little surprising, and men have been known to boast aggressively that it is the only form of angling that appeals to them. It must be confessed that if the barbel is of poor esteem as food, he is the very gamest of the coarse fishes and a fighter to the last. ”

“ But the Barbel, though he be of a fine shape, and looks big, yet he is not
accounted the best fish to eat, neither for his wholesomeness nor his
taste; but the male is reputed much better than the female, whose spawn
is very hurtful, as I will presently declare to you.
They flock together like sheep, and are at the worst in April, about
which time they spawn; but quickly grow to be in season. He is able to
live in the strongest swifts of the water: and, in summer, they love the
shallowest and sharpest streams: and love to lurk under weeds, and to
feed on gravel, against a rising ground ”

“ What's the word, Barbee?"
Packard, having held back thus long, remained motionless, glimpsing unexpectedly something of Barbee's soul; watching a little human drama, become spectator to the battle royal of the two contending factions which made up a man's self.
It seemed to him that young Barbee was pale and grew paler; that a shiver ran through him; that he was, for the moment, like one drugged. And, side by side, two emotions, both primal and unmistakable, peered out of his eyes: a savage hatred of Blenham, a leaping greed of gold. ”

“ Among the Picariæ are many conspicuous groups; as, woodpeckers (Picidæ) ; barbets (Megalæmidæ) ; trogons (Trogonidæ) ; kingfishers (Alcedinidæ) ; and hornbills (Bucerotidæ) ; five families which are perhaps the most conspicuous in the whole fauna. Lastly come the pigeons (Columbidæ) , and the pheasants (Phasianidæ) , which are fairly represented by such fine genera as Treron, Ptilopus, Euplocamus, and Argusianus. A few forms whose affinities are Australian rather than Oriental, help to give a character to the ornithology, though none of them are numerous. ”

“ Those arriving under such distinction, are to be considered the true MOUNTAIN BARB, the pedigree of whose blood has been recorded with as much tenacity and care as the genealogy of our most ancient nobility. Barbs (as they are called) are to be found in the possession of many people of fashion and fortune in England, but they are in general of inferior degree, and thought to be only the common horses of the country from whence they came: such there are at all times to be obtained through the intervening medium of Provence and Languedoc in France ”

“ Maybe, though, I can climb up somehow.”
“Perhaps,” offered Polly, “Ned will bring some one back with him to help.”
“Let’s hope so,” said Laurie. “If he doesn’t, the next best thing is a rope long enough to reach to the bottom. My idea was this, Bob.” He paused long enough to shift one foot gingerly and relieve his jumping nerves. “I thought I could tie the end of the rope under my shoulders and work along this ledge that I’m standing on until I got where I could jump or drop or something.” ”

“ Now and then a shot sounded far away, but clear and sharp, from where the guests of my lord of Barfield were killing time in the warren.
A labouring man, smock-frocked, billy-cocked, gaitered, and hob-nailed, was clamping down the frozen lane, the earth ringing like iron under iron as he walked. By his side was a fair-haired lad of nine or ten years of age, a boy of frank and engaging countenance, carefully and even daintily dressed, and holding up his head as if he were a lord of the soil and knew it. ”

“ Barbe, as a literary man and critic, always professed a desire to live in a quiet neighbourhood. Therefore, as I approached his house, on the almost inaccessible slopes of Campden Hill, I was amazed to see a large and increasing crowd assembled in the vicinity. Pushing my way through, I saw that St. Barbe's windows were broken, glass was in a weak minority in the panes, and, what was more singular, the breakage seemed to be done from within! Objects were flying out into the garden, and those objects were books. I had the curiosity and agility to catch a few as they fell, and to pick others up. ”

“ In the barge, at either end, go as many as twenty or even thirty men, some sitting rowing, others facing them and standing to row, and others punting with their poles of immense length that taper away at the top to the slight girth of a fishing rod. The shirts of the men, mauve, pink, white, red, or purple, their light blue or black coats, red sashes, trousers of velvet or velvet corduroy of many shades, from bright yellow to dark brown, the long shining yellow punt poles, and the white pyramids of salt on the sea of sapphire, combine to form a strange and beautiful sight. ”

“ I was walking homeward one afternoon about this time, when I met Barbel, a man I had known well in my early literary career. He was now about fifty years of age, but looked older. His hair and beard were quite gray, and his clothes, which were of the same general hue, gave me the idea that they, like his hair, had originally been black. Age is very hard on a man's external appointments. Barbel had an air of having been to let for a long time, and quite out of repair. ”

“ Like the sheat-fishes, the Barbels are fond of grubbing in the mud, for the purpose of getting at the worms, grubs, and larvæ of aquatic insects that are always to be found in such places. The Barbels are rather long in proportion to their depth, a peculiarity which, owing to the length of the head, is rather exaggerated in this species.
The Long-headed Barbel is extremely common in Palestine, and may be taken with the very simplest kind of net. Indeed, in some places, the fish are so numerous that a common sack answers nearly as well as a net. ”

“ In birds Australia is by no means so isolated from the rest of the world, as it contains great numbers of warblers, thrushes, flycatchers, shrikes, crows, and other familiar types of the Eastern Hemisphere; yet a considerable number of the most characteristic Oriental families are absent. Thus there are no vultures, woodpeckers, pheasants, bulbuls, or barbets in the Australian region; and the absence of these is almost as marked a feature as that of cats, deer, or monkeys, among mammalia. The most conspicuous and characteristic birds of the Australian region are, the piping crows ”

“ THE PEQUOT QUEEN The first pull on the rope resulted only in sawing through the turf and earth at the edge of the cliff until the rock was reached. The next tug brought a few inches more at the cost of terrific effort, for the rope must pass at almost right angles over the raw edge of the rock. Laurie, his hands clasping the rope above his head to lessen the strain across his chest, was showered with earth. Another heave, and Ned and Bob went back a scant foot, Polly, her weight on the rope, tightening the slack around the tree. ”

“ Quand l’état d’ivresse est complet, la barbe est simple; elle est indigne quand le sujet tombe sous la table, cas extrêmement rare. Il est certains “poivreaux” qui commettent la grave imprudence de “promener leur barbe” à l’atelier; presque tous deviennent alors “pallasseurs,” surtout ceux qui sont taciturnes à l’état sec.—Boutmy.
“Prendre une barbe” is “to quad out” in the slang of English printers. Prendre la mesure du cul avec le pied (obsolete) , to bring one’s foot in violent contact with another’s posteriors. ”

“ Mr. Betterlee, watching from the bank, recalled forgotten lore of water-sprites and nereids. The boy circled at the end of the pool and came back, straight into the reflected orb, and for the moment a confusion of senses made it seem to the watcher that the slim, gleaming body was suspended in air, afloat in moonlit heavens. Then the illusion was dispelled, for the swimmer bobbed a dripping head from the ripples, and laughed softly in the stillness.
"Say, why don't you come in, Mister? Honest, the water's great!"
Beneath Mr. Betterlee's immaculate shirt-front a pagan impulse stirred. ”

“ BARBARA appears, pale and beautiful;—richly dressed in white, with flowing locks. She is wan and exhausted.—The dance-mania, as it seizes her, makes her circle slowly and dazedly with a certain pitiful silliness. The nuns and monks accompanying her point in horror. But they, too, dance off with each other, willy-nilly,—like leaves in a tempest. BARBARA is left alone, still circling slowly. The piping sounds softer. She staggers against a tree, and keeps on waving her hands and turning her head, vaguely, in time.
MICHAEL looks forth from the well; then climbs out and approaches her. ”

“ When one was strong one wasn’t fidgety, and a union with a species of calm goddess would of course be a source of repose. Lady Barb was a calm, was an even calmer goddess still, and he had a much more intimate view of her divinity than on the day he had led her to the altar; but I’m not sure he felt either as firm or as easy.
“How do you know what people are?” he said in a moment. “You’ve seen so few; you’re perpetually denying yourself. If you should leave New York to-morrow you’d know wonderfully little about it.” ”

“ Indeed, many a time [165] he had paddled about in one of the Grace and Ella’s dories, and despite Mr. Barker’s enmity, the lad had received more than one invitation from Captain Jordan to make a trip in the schooner to the fishing-grounds, though he had declined to do so, at the desire of his father.
“You say the tug ain’t coming straight out o’ Greenport?” the skipper asked.
“No telling when she will be here,” replied Jack. “I don’t think she can be long, though.”
“Well, I’ll have to drop my anchor soon as the tide turns again,” replied the fisherman, “unless you like to give us a tow. ”

“ It sounds— You know how it sounds, Barbee."
"I don't know how he does it," growled Barbee. "I don't know how a man could run off a string of cows like that in them mountains an' not leave no tracks. Why, there ain't half-a-dozen places where they could be drove out'n the valley an' through the cliffs, an' I been watchin' every one of them places myself all night an' keepin' the other boys ridin' until they're saddle-weary. An'—an' six head more gone——"
"You're either a clever little actor, Mr. Barbee," muttered Steve sharply, "or you are straight, and I'm hanged if I know which. ”