Syringa

“ But I’m not much used to refined society, I bet you. More at home in a stable than in a drawing-room; the riverside and moor or the forest is more in old Cracker’s way than fountain, lawn, and shrubbery. But, la! Shireen, whatever is that lying along that branch? It isn’t a big snail and it ain’t a large slug, sometimes grey and sometimes green. Well, of all the ugly—”
“It’s a friend of ours,” said Shireen, interrupting Cracker, “and, I assure you, Chammy won’t hurt anything or anybody except the flies and mealworms.” ”

“ Begging her to listen, Pan followed; and Syrinx, more and more frightened by the patter of his hoofs, never heeded him, but went as fast as light till she came to the brink of the river. Only then she paused, praying her friends, the water-nymphs, for some way of escape. The gentle, bewildered creatures, looking up through the water, could think of but one device.
Just as the god overtook Syrinx and stretched out his arms to her, she vanished like a mist, and he found himself grasping a cluster of tall reeds. Poor Pan! ”

“ In zoology the siren (Siren lacertina) , or “mud-eel” of the Americans, one of the perennibranchiate tailed batrachians, is the type of the family Sirenidae, chiefly distinguished from the Proteidae by the structure of the jaws, which, instead of being beset with small teeth, are covered by a horny sheath like a beak; there are, however, rasp-like teeth on the palate, and a few on the inner side of the lower jaw, inserted on the splenial bone. The body is eel-like, black or blackish, and only the fore-limbs are present, but are feeble and furnished with four fingers. ”

“ But to Syrinx, who knew no fear, Fear came at last. She was returning one evening from the shadowy hills, untired by the chase that had lasted for many an hour, when, face to face, she met with one whom hitherto she had only seen from afar. Of him the other nymphs spoke often. Who was so great as Pan?—Pan, who ruled the woods. None could stand against Pan. Those who defied him must ever come under his power in the end. ”

“ Richardson thinks that Syria had its name from Suri, a beautiful and delicate species of rose, for which that country has always been famous;—hence, Suristan, the Land of Roses.
[168] "The number of lizards I saw one day in the great court of the Temple of the Sun at Balbec amounted to many thousands; the ground, the walls, and stones of the ruined buildings, were covered with them."—Bruce.
[169] "The Syrinx or Pan's pipes is still a pastoral instrument in Syria."—Russel.
[170] "Wild bees, frequent in Palestine, in hollow trunks or branches of trees, and the clefts of rocks. ”

“ I say poor Danger, because it really was the fault of that wicked butcher-boy. Dogs are only what men make them.
Shireen is not so young as she was once upon a time, but she feels very youthful now. And very happy too. She stops for a few minutes to dry herself in a patch of sunshine, then goes galloping off across Ben’s lawn, making pretences that the withered leaves are mice, and whacking them about in all directions.
Next moment she has jumped into Ben’s hammock.
“Why, old girl,” cries Ben, “you’re as playful as a kitten. ”

“ The winelike air of the early summer morning seemed to bring a light and unlooked-for warmth into his blood. He was going to walk in the fields with Sybil, for Terence, the gardener, had reported that already the warm June rains had brought out an early crop of puffballs, down in the old sheep pasture. And Sybil was waiting for him, singing in the garden below. He wondered, before the old-fashioned cheval mirror of the Shotwell guest chamber, how he had ever fallen into the habit of wearing nothing but solemn black. ”

“ De Sterny sat down by the chimney to warm his feet. "Deuced cold!--hand me the chartreuse, so--Yes, a refined siren if you like," he continued. "The siren has soft human arms with which she draws us into destructive pleasures, the chimera has claws with which she tears our heart. The siren entices us into the mire, the chimera lures us toward heaven,--only we don't reach the heaven, and we often find ourselves very well off in the mire,--deucedly well off! But saperment! you don't understand that yet." And he pulled Gesa's ear. ”

“ It is moreover a tricky little animal; by whisking and wagging its tail it assumes the appearance of fawning and wheedling, but as soon as anyone touches it, he gets a good bite on his finger. When hunted out and followed by dogs, it throws itself down on its back, kicks its legs about, and grins and gnashes with its teeth. To keep clear of being bitten the best way is to pounce upon it by its tail and to let it hang dangling in the air.
One morning there arrived at the Seriba from the far distant boundaries of the Bongo several wild-looking men, armed with bows and arrows. ”

“ The relationship between the Syrnium cinereum and the S. lapponicum is exactly parallel to that between the Otus vulgaris, var. wilsonianus, and var. vulgaris, Surnia ulula, var. hudsonia, and the var. ulula, and Nyctale tengmalmi, var. richardsoni, and the var. tengmalmi. In conformity to the general rule among the species which belong to the two continents, the American race of the present bird is very decidedly darker than the European one, which has the whitish mottling much more prevalent, giving the plumage a lighter and more grayish aspect. ”

“ That is to say, Nature still flashes her semaphoric danger signal, although for centuries and centuries not a car wheel of emergency has moved along that track, so to speak!”
“Isn't that interesting?' said Sybil, her utterance a little thick with a half-eaten strawberry. “And, after all, there isn't the slightest danger, is there?”
Stoutly and decisively the young professor assured her that there was not, and Sybil suddenly flung away a strawberry that proved to be bitter and overripe. Then she rose to her feet. ”

“ Some thirty years ago, while pottering about among his fancy fruit-trees, Cap'n Steiner had made an experiment. On a bough of one of his vigorous young Strawberry Reds he had grafted the sprig of a Brandywine pear. Then he had carefully bound up the wound with grafting-wax and a piece of Miss Arabella's old flannel petticoat—Arabella, in those days, the older men held, was rarely comely and rosy-cheeked—and waited somewhat doubtfully for the outcome.
The strange marriage of aliens was an unlooked-for success. ”

“ She was a high-bred cat, it is true, and a cat of ancient lineage, as we know, but she was not at all aristocratic in the choice of her friends.
Shireen left the blacksmith at last, and went to see the sick child. It is strange, but true as well as strange, that cats never fail to sympathise with human beings in grief or suffering.
But little Tom Richards was better to-night, and sitting up in his chair by the fireside. He was delighted when Shireen came in, and made his mother place a saucer of milk down for her, and puss drank a little just to please the boy. ”

“ Two leagues to the south of the new Seriba was the site of the one which had been burnt. But few vestiges remained, for nature here soon effaces what fire may have spared. The only surviving evidence of its ever having been the resort of men was a thriving grove of plantains (Musa sapientum) . The shoots had been introduced from the Niam-niam lands. In the meagre households of the Nubians, fruits and vegetables are hardly considered necessaries; indolence and distaste for work cause the gardens to be much neglected. ”

“ It is this, Shireen. Those beautiful English books tell me that in England a man has someone to love and care for him, someone whose lot in life is the same as his; that someone is his life. But here in Persia—oh! Shireen, Shireen—if one is as I am, the daughter of a noble, and if she is beautiful and clever, her lot is indeed a hard one. She is sold—yes, sold is the right name, to the Shah.
“My father is cold-hearted and cruel. I seldom see him. He is ever, ever at Court, and when in the hunting season he brings a party to this lovely castle I am hidden away. And why, think you, Shireen? ”

“ Shireen (loquitur) : “Oh, you’re the new dog, aren’t you? What’s your name, and what’s your breed? I’m simply delighted to see a new face!”
Fresh Arrival (looking astonished) : “My name is Cracker. My breed is the Airedale terrier. I come from Yorkshire. I have fought and slain an otter single-handed. I’m a terrible fellow when I’m put out. My duty is to kill rats, and—listen—sometimes even cats!”
Shireen (purring louder than ever) : “Oh, I daresay and, indeed, Cracker, some cats deserve to be killed. But I’m Shireen. Nobody ever kills me. What a nice good-natured face you have! ”

“ The Seriba, like its environs, was unique of its kind. The formidable appearance of the confused pile-work would have spoilt the night’s rest of any one who had a very sensitive imagination. Something like a picture I remember of the Antiquary’s dream, only without the sea, did the complication of huts stand out against the tall blocks of granite from which the fan-palms started like proud columns. The huts themselves, on their platform of clay, were like paper cones on a flat table. In front was the great farmyard, with its hundreds of cattle under the charge of Dinka servants. ”

“ The U-shaped furcula is sometimes entirely absent; a completely ossified orbital ring occurs in the Cacatuinae, Stringopinae, and many Psittacinae; the tongue is short and fleshy, being fringed in the Nestorinae, or having a brush of hairs towards the tip in the Loriinae and Nanodes; the uniquely modified syrinx has three pairs of tracheal and tracheo-bronchial muscles; and a crop is present. The aftershaft is large, the down of the adults and young is uniform, the latter being naked when hatched. ”

“ In the Diacromyodi these muscles are inserted into both ends of the semi-rings. They may be limited always to one pair as in Clamatores, to two as in Oligomyodi and some Tracheophonæ or there may be as many as seven pairs as in the Oscines. But the structure of the syrinx itself, as apart from its musculature, has been, and still is, a feature of importance in the classification of the Passeres—as witness the Tracheophonæ. Briefly three types of syrinx are recognized—the Tracheo-bronchial, the Tracheal and the Bronchial, the last two being derivatives of the first. ”

“ The genus Syrrhaptes, though in general appearance resembling Pterocles, has a conformation of foot quite unique among birds, the three anterior toes being encased in a common “podotheca,” which is clothed to the claws with hairy feathers, so as to look much like a fingerless glove. The hind toe is wanting. The two species of Syrrhaptes are S. tibetanus—the largest sand-grouse known—inhabiting the country whence its trivial name is derived, and S. paradoxus, ranging from N. China across Central Asia to the confines of Europe, which it occasionally invades. ”

“ But my eyes, Shireen, how beautiful you’re looking! And to think I’ve got you back again. Won’t we have some jolly larks, and won’t we catch some flying fish. A few, eh? But mind you, Shireen, no going to sleep on the bulwarks and tumbling into the sea, this cruise.”
“Oh, it makes me shudder to think of that wild adventure, Tom,” I said.
“Yes, those sharks pretty nearly had us, hadn’t they, Shireen? If they hadn’t set to quarrelling among themselves as to which would have the white cat and which the black, they’d have eaten us both.” ”

“ While chiefly confined to marshy places or still waters of the South, occasional specimens of the siren families have been found as far north as Illinois, [68] and no doubt could live in any locality in the United States, if protected from their enemies. For their own part they are helpless, and fall a prey to whatever attacks them. Their teeth are far down in the throat so they cannot bite; their tails are weak so they cannot strike; they have even no nails on their toes wherewith to scratch. ”

“ Warlock and Tabby had just come back from a long ramble in the woods, and thrown themselves down beside Shireen and her foster son, Vee-Vee, the Pomeranian, Cockie, and Dick, the starling, were bandying words together on the gowany lawn. (The gowan is the mountain daisy.)
It would have been very difficult indeed for a stranger to have told whether they were quarrelling or not. ”

“ Occasions there were when nightly orgies were all the rage, and the idle pretext under which these were maintained was that the plague of flies permitted no rest. The Nubians, when they had made themselves tipsy with their detestable merissa, had the habit of finding an outlet for their hilarity in banging on the kettle-drums which hung at the entrance of the Seriba. ”

“ In the second place, it has been proved by actual dissection that the shrike, which possesses no song gift worthy of the name, has a well-developed syrinx, while the mockingbird, our feathered minstrel par excellence, has a syrinx that is absolutely insignificant. On the other hand, the shrike's larynx, including the glottis, is a clumsy affair, whereas the mocker's larynx is indeed wonderfully made.
It must not be supposed, however, that the syrinx does not perform an important function in the production of avian melody. It acts as a regulator or meter of the air impelled from the lungs. ”

“ The syrinx consisted of a varying number of reeds, having their open ends or embouchures in a horizontal line and their stopped ends, formed by the knots in the reed, gradually decreasing in length from left to right. Each pipe gave out one note, but by overblowing, i.e. increased pressure of breath and tension of lips, harmonies could be obtained. ”

“ Beyond the river we passed through cultivated lands, leaving Agahd’s chief Seriba on our left; we then crossed a low range of hills stretching towards the north-east, and brought our day’s march to an end in the hamlet of a Dyoor chief named Dimmoh, where we encamped for the night. I had purposely avoided entering the Seriba Wow, although it was quite within reach, my reason being that I had recently been aggrieved by the behaviour of the acting Vokeel, one of the few men of Turkish origin who had settled in the land. ”