Wings

“ How entrancing are the impetuous rush of the tiny body, the tiny fluttering spread of the buoyant wings! Yet no sooner do we whip out a pencil than the bird is gone beyond recall.
Think of the wonderful non-resisting shape of the body that slips through the air as a fish glides through water, the rudder-like shape of the transparent tail, and the tremendous span of the spread wings! How often do we draw wings that would be of no real use to our birds! The length of the wing outspread is prodigious in comparison with the size of the body. ”

“ The men alone have arms; the women have only wings. Resplendent wings are they, wherein they can shroud themselves from head to foot in a panoply of glistering glory. By these wings alone, it may frequently be judged in what seasons, and under what aspects, they were born. From those that came in winter, go great white wings, white as snow; the edge of every feather shining like the sheen of silver, so that they flash and glitter like frost in the sun. ”

“ So infantile, so helpless and awkward upon the earth, so graceful and masterful on the wing, the child and darling of the summer air, reaping its invisible harvest in the fields of space as if it dined on the sunbeams, touching no earthly food, drinking and bathing and mating on the wing, swiftly, tirelessly coursing the long day through, a thought on wings, a lyric in the shape of a bird! ”

“ It is as though wings, as though myriad wings no eye can see, transparent wings of great supernatural birds that have their homes on invisible mountains swept by eternal snow, have come to refresh my eyes and my brow with their overwhelming fragrance! ”

“ He goes on—his new made wings carry him through a region of delight, and he believes himself to possess the powers of the eagle—still lighter he ascends, and the solid earth on which he formerly trod in safety, recedes immeasurably from his giddy eye—at length his wings prove wax, they melt before the sun, and the victim of his own folly tumbles into the abyss of destruction. ”

“ Out of the young grass and silence you arise, frail bird, spinning upwards to the sky. Faster beat the wings, and shriller is the voice, and soon you are lost in the high blue, so that scarcely can I hear your voice or see the maddened flutterings of your wings. ”

“ It has grown for itself a pair of wings—not a mere parachute like that of the flying squirrels or the flying fish, but a real pair of wings which enable it to laugh to scorn all the flying machines and balloons ever invented by man. How clumsy all these inventions are in comparison with a bat's wing. Four of its fingers are drawn out like the ribs of an umbrella, and then covered over with its own skin like the web of a duck's foot; and thus furnished with the necessary means of competing with the birds, it sails out like the swallow in pursuit of its prey. ”

“ And equally fascinating to watch, perhaps, is the adroit and wonderful balancing a bird displays in hovering with motionless wings outstretched, and the way it uses every current of air to sustain or propel its perfectly-adjusted weight. One could almost imagine that there ran through every feather down to the very tips some exquisite system of nerves more delicate even than those of human beings. They seem to feel the wind, to be forewarned of every slightest change, to sense the advance and retreat of every little current. ”

“ It is entertaining to watch the courtship of these birds, "as the male struts with drooping wings and wide spread tail around his mate in the most captivating manner, often at such times rising spiral-like with quickly beating wings high in the air, dropping back in a wavy, graceful circle, uttering at the same time his jarring, cackling love note, which, with the vibration of the wings upon the air, makes a rather pleasing sound." ”

“ The rustling sound of these thousands upon thousands of wings beating the air with slow steady stroke can hardly be compared to anything else in its weird oppressiveness, so to say: it is a little like falling water, but may be best likened, perhaps, to a vast invisible broom sweeping the sky. ”

“ There they may generally be seen at all times of the day, soaring on motionless wings at a prodigious elevation, wheeling round in large circles with a peculiarly easy and graceful flight, as they reconnoitre the distant earth below. ”

“ But the usual meaning of the bird as a symbol [103] looks to a different analogy—to that which appears in such familiar expressions as “the wings of the wind,” “the flying clouds.” Like the wind, the bird sweeps through the aerial spaces, sings in the forests, and rustles on its course; like the cloud, it floats in mid-air and casts its shadow on the earth; like the lightning, it darts from heaven to earth to strike its unsuspecting prey. ”

“ The day after my arrival, Miss Meta and I were returning home, after we had driven several miles over the country in a sleigh. Our nearest conception of the ecstasy of those who shall hereafter have wings, with which they can fly over earth and sea, on a bright morning, racing with the larks, or some ambitious hawk, or, on some most fortunate hour, even with the eagle, is attained when we glide thus over the snow. ”

“ When flying in flocks in clear sunny weather, the blue of their wings glistens like polished steel, so as to give them the most lively appearance; and while they are wheeling over the places in which they intend to alight, their wings being alternately thrown in the shade and exposed to the bright light, the glowing and varied lustre thus produced, at whatever distance they may be, draws your eyes involuntarily towards them. ”

“ All this noise and fury and scurry of wings of innumerable white forms, mixed up with boats and busy shouting men, comes to be regarded by the people concerned as a necessary part of the whole business, and the bigger the bird crowd and the louder the uproar the better they appear to like it. ”

“ Gradually, as in increasing excitement he executes the convulsive vibrations of his wings, his song changes to single deeper notes—following quickly after each other—at last to die out while the bird at the same time drops to the earth on stiff wings strongly bent upward. ”

“ No wonder that poets give the angels wings, and that the symbolism of wings is found in the most vital thoughts of all religions. The wings of the soul, the wings of the imagination, these are more than mere empty phrases!
The choice of the air to illustrate some imagined spiritual region, of course, is obvious enough, for air will most certainly be the last department of Nature men will conquer; and, apart from unwieldy mechanical contrivances, men will never really fly⁠—as birds do. To pass through and across the air is quite another thing to flying as the birds know flying. ”

“ Sometimes, indeed, the wings do bend just a little—for, after all, they have a joint—but the straight-set attitude is more germane to them, and soon they assume it again, shooting forward so briskly, yet softly, that one seems to hear a soft little musical click. ”

“ High up in the heavens, two or three men-of-war birds, with wide-spread pointed wings, and their swallow tails cut as sharp as knife-blades, were heading seaward, and every little while falling in a rapid sidelong plunge, as if in a vacuum, and then again giving an almost imperceptible dash with their pinions as they recovered the lost space and continued on in their silent flight. ”

“ Glasses again in request, amid many exclamations, reveal to us that this is a dense cloud of birds; a flock so vast that towards the water it seems black; can it be the dead body of a whale that has collected this world of wings from all the Northern seas? ”

“ They afford an opportunity only of admiring at a distance the extraordinary agility and the stateliness likewise of their motions, the richness of their plumage, and the great propriety there was of ascribing to them ‘an expanded, quivering wing.’ Nothing certainly can be more beautiful and entertaining than such a sight! the wings, by their repeated though unwearied vibrations, equally serving them for sails and oars; while their feet, no less assisting in conveying them out of sight, are no less insensible of fatigue. ”

“ In older birds the wings become too rigid and the bodies too heavy for flight. Who that has watched a sea-mew struggling bravely with the storm, could doubt for an instant that the wings and feathers of the wings are under control? ”

“ They are all good fliers, and some, from the extreme expanse of their wings, have extraordinary powers of flight. They spend a great deal of time upon the wing, some soaring far out over the ocean, or mounting to a most sublime elevation, others beating over a limited space, till the appearance of a fish beneath them arrests their attention, when they plunge down upon it, and instantly rise again into the air. ”

“ That’s what you mean? Our thoughts are our wings?”
“Yes; and our minds can fly with these wings higher and farther than any bird can go. If I read to you about a volcano in Italy, off you go on the wings of thought and look down into the fiery crater. If I tell you of the frozen North, you are there in an instant, gazing upon icy seas and the wonders of a desolate region. The wings of an eagle are not half so swift and strong as the wings of your thought. The very king of birds would perish in regions where they can take you in safety.”
[Pg 274]
SQUANKO.
WHAT a name for a dog, auntie!” ”

“ They have fingers, and some birds' wings have claws; only you cannot see them, because they are all wrapped up in the skin and covered over with the feathers. Some day—not to-day, because you have had a long lesson already—I will show you a bird's wing with only its bones. ”

“ Like most short-winged, heavy-bodied birds, they fly straight to their point, rushing violently through the air with rapidly-beating wings. It is amusing to watch a bird flying in from the sea, and attempting to alight on a ledge of rock already crowded ”

“ The whole bird is an embodiment of animation and power. The intelligent active eye, the easy, graceful, oscillation of the head and neck, the folding or partial folding of one or both wings, nay more, the slight tremor or quiver of the individual feathers of parts of the wings so rapid, that only an experienced eye can detect it, all confirm the belief that the living wing has not only the power of directing, controlling, and utilizing natural currents, but of creating and utilizing artificial ones. ”

“ They rise with a loud rattling noise, and utter a peculiar cry, like ‘chuck, chuck, chuck,’ rapidly and shrilly repeated. On first rising the wings are moved with great rapidity, but after getting some distance off they sail along, the wings being almost quiescent. ”

“ How this solid and weighty-looking bird can, with wings that are small out of all proportion to its bulk, narrow to a degree, and by no means long, get through the air at the rate it does, how it can even stay in it at all and not come plump down like the wooden bird that it looks, is to me a mystery. ”

“ There cannot, however, be a doubt that the bird has the power of controlling its wings both during the down and up strokes; for how otherwise could it steer and direct its course with such precision in obtaining its food? how fix its wings on a level with or above its body for skimming purposes? how fly in a curve? how fly with, against, or across a breeze? how project itself from a rock directly into space, or how elevate itself from a level surface by the laboured action of its wings? ”

“ The wings are long and narrow and carry their owner through the air in a bewildering series of swoops, curves, and zigzag turns remarkable even in a group of animals so notable for their powers of flight. ”

“ Then I shall have great pleasure in talking to you, my dear. It is quite refreshing nowadays to see anything without wings. They must all have wings, forsooth, now, every new upstart sort of bird, and fly. What can they want with flying, and raising themselves above their proper station in life? In the days of my ancestors no birds ever thought of having wings, and did very well without; and now they all laugh at me because I keep to the good old fashion. Why, the very marrocks and dovekies have got wings, the vulgar creatures, and poor little ones enough they are ”

“ The bird that has been searched for and found puts itself into a very beautiful attitude, with wings half-spread and set at right angles to the body, ruff erected circularly, and head drawn back upon the shoulders, so that nothing is visible but the brilliant rosette of the spread ruff in the centre of the screen of wings, each wing showing a broad bar of brilliant white on its dusk-grey surface. ”

“ The wings of the bird, if flying, are only visible as a thin grey film, bounded above and below by fine black threads, in form of a St Andrew’s cross,—the effect on the observer’s retina of the instantaneous reversal of the motion of the wing at each beat—the strokes being so rapid as to leave no more distinct image. ”

“ Flexion of the Wing necessary to the Flight of Birds.—Considerable diversity of opinion exists as to whether birds do or do not flex their wings in flight. The discrepancy is owing to the great difficulty experienced in analysing animal movements, particularly when, as in the case of the wings, they are consecutive and rapid. My own opinion is, that the wings are flexed in flight, but that all wings are not flexed to the same extent, and that what holds true of one wing does not necessarily hold true of another. ”

“ THE FLIGHT OF BIRDS.—Volumes have been written concerning observations on the flight of birds. The marvel has been why do soaring birds maintain themselves in space without flapping their wings. In fact, it is a much more remarkable thing to contemplate why birds which depend on flapping wings can fly. ”