Love's Meinie Part 6

II.B.

ALLEGRETTA NYMPHaeA, STELLARIS. STARRY ALLEGRET.

97. Called 'Stellaris' by Temminck.--I do not find why, but it is by much the brightest in color of the three, and may be thought of as the star of them. Gould says it is the least, also, and calls it the 'Pigmy'; but we can't keep that name without confusing it with the 'Minuta.' 'Baillon's Crake' seems the most commonly accepted t.i.tle,--as the worst possible. Both this, and the more quietly toned Tiny, in Mr.

Gould's delightful plates of them, have softly brown backs, exquisitely ermined by black markings at the root of each feather, following into series of small waves, like little breakers on sand. They have lovely gray chemisettes, striped gray bodices, and green bills and feet; a little orange stain at the root of the green bill, and the bright red iris of the eye have wonderful effect in warming the color of the whole bird: and with beautiful fancy Mr. Gould has put the Stellaris among yellow water-lilies to set off its gray; and a yellow b.u.t.terfly with blue and red spots, and black-speckled wings (Papilio Machaon), to harmonize both. It is just as if the flower were gradually turning into the bird. Examples of the Starry Allegret _have_ been 'obtained'--in the British Islands. It is said to be numerous, un.o.btained, in India, China, j.a.pan, Persia, Greece, North Africa, Italy, and France. I have never heard of anybody's seeing it, however.

II.C.

ALLEGRETTA NYMPHaeA, MINUTA. TINY ALLEGRET.

98. 'Tiny Allegret,'--Yarrell's 'Little Crake,' (but see names in Appendix). It is a little more rosy than 'Stellaris' in the gray of its neck, pa.s.sing into brown; and Mr. Gould has put it with a pink water plant, which harmonizes with it to the bird's advantage; while the tiny creature stands on the bent leaf of a reed, and scarcely bends it more!

"It runs with rapidity over broken reeds, and moves gracefully, raising and displaying its tail at every step." It has so very small a tail to display, however, that I should hardly think the display was worth while. "It is very cunning, and especially noticeable for the subtlety with which it wearies the dog of the sportsman by executing a thousand evolutions with surprising celerity; whence comes the trivial name of 'kill-dog' bestowed upon it in some localities. Pursued to extremity, it casts itself into the water, swims with ease, and dives at the moment its enemy is about to seize it; or it conceals itself in a tuft of reeds or a bush, and by this means often escapes with impunity. It loves to breed among the reeds, and in long and thick gra.s.s, frequently in small companies of its own species, or of the Stellaris. The female lays her eggs on an inartificially constructed platform of decayed leaves or stalks of marsh plants, slightly elevated above the water."

How elevated, I cannot find proper account,--that is to say, whether it is hung to the stems of growing reeds, or built on hillocks of soil, but the bird is always liable to have its nest overflowed by floods.

The full-grown bird is dressed in an exquisite perfection of barred bodice, spotted chemisette, and waved feathers edged with gray on the back.

99. The reader will please recollect these three Allegrets as the second group of the dab- or dabble-chicks; and, while the water-ouzel is a mountain and torrent bird, these inhabit exclusively flat lands and calm water, belonging properly to temperate, inclining to warm, climates, and able to gladden for us--as their name now given implies--many scenes and places otherwise little enlivened; and to make the very gnats of them profitable to us, were we wise enough. Dainty and delightful creatures in all their ways,--voice only dubitable, but I hope not a shriek or a squeak;--and there seems to be no reason whatever why half our fen lands should not be turned into beds of white water lilies and golden ducks, with jetty ducklings, to the great comfort of English souls.[22]

[22] Compare Bishop Stanley's account of the larger tropical 'Jacana,' p. 311. "One species is often tamed, and from its being a resolute enemy to birds of prey, the inhabitants of the countries where it is found" (which be they?) "rear it as a protector for their fowls, as it not only feeds with them, but accompanies them into the fields, and brings them back in the evening!"

III.

TREPIDA STAGNARUM. LITTLE GREBE.

100. The two birds--Torrent-ouzel, and Lily-ouzel,--which we have been just describing, agree, you will observe, in delicate and singular use of their feet in the water; the torrent-ouzel holding itself mysteriously at the bottom; and the lily-ouzel, less mysteriously, but as skillfully, on the top (for I forgot to note, respecting this raft-walking, that the bird, however light, must be always careful not to tread on the edges of leaves, but in the middle, or, rather, as nearly as may be where they are set on the stalk; it would go in at once if it trod on the edges). But both the birds have the foot which is really characteristic of land, not water-birds; and especially of those land species that run well. Of the real action of the toes, either in running, or hopping, nothing is told us by the anatomists--(compare lecture on Robin, -- 26); but I hope before long to get at some of the facts respecting the greater flexibility of the gripping and climbing feet, and elasticity of running ones; and to draw up something like a properly graduated scale of the length of the toes in proportion to that of the body.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 12.]

And, for one question, relative to this--the balance of a bird _standing_, not gripping--is to be thought of. Taking a typical profile of bird-form in its abstract, with beak, belly, and foot, horizontal (Fig. 12), the security of the standing, (supposing atomic weight equal through the bird's body, and the _will_, in the ankle, of iron,) is the same as of an inverted cone, between the dotted lines from the extremities of the foot to those of the body; and, of course, with a little grip of the foot or hind claw, the bird can be safe in almost any position it likes. Nevertheless, when the feet are as small in proportion as the Torrent-ouzel's, I greatly doubt the possibility of such a balance as Bewick has given it (Fig. 13 _a_). Gould's of the black-bodiced Ouzel (Fig. 13 _b_) is, I imagine, right. Bewick was infallible in plume texture, and expression either of the features of animals, or of any action that had meaning in it; but he was singularly careless of indifferent points in geometry or perspective; and even loses character in his water-birds, by making them always swim on the top of the water.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 13_a_.]

101. But, whatever their balance of body, or use of foot, the two birds just examined are, as I said, essentially connected with the running land birds, or broadly, the Plovers; and with the Sand-runners, or (from their cry) Sandpipers, which Mr. Gould evidently a.s.sociates mentally with the Plovers, in his description of the plumage of the Dunlin; while he gives to them in his plates of that bird--the little Stint, and common Sandpiper--most subtle action with their fine feet,--thread-fine, almost, in the toes; requiring us, it seems to me, to consider them as entirely land-birds, however fond of the wave margins. But the next real water-ouzel we come to, belongs to a group with feet like little horse-chestnut leaves; each toe having its separate lobes of web. Why separated, I cannot yet make out, but the bird swims, or even dives, on occasion, with dexterity and force. These lobe-footed birds consist first of the Grebes, which are connected with fresh-water ducks; and, secondly, of the Phalaropes, which are a sort of sea-gulls. No bird which is not properly web-footed has any business to think itself either true duck or true gull; but as, both in size and habit of life, the larger grebes and phalaropes are entirely aquatic and marine, I shall take out of them into my cla.s.s of dabchicks, only those which are literally dabblers in habit, and chickens in size. And of the Grebes, therefore, only the one commonly known as the Dabchick, the 'Little Grebe,' 'Colymbus Minutus' (Minute Diver), of Linnaeus. A summary word or two, first, respecting the Grebe family, will be useful.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 13_b_.]

102. Grebe, properly, I suppose, Grebe, from the French, is not in Johnson, nor do any of my books tell me what it means. I retain it, however, as being short, not ugly, and well established in two languages. We may think of it as formed from gre, and meaning 'a nice bird.' The specialities of the whole cla.s.s, easily remembered, are, first, that they have chestnut-leaf feet; secondly, that their legs are serrated behind with a double row of notches--(why?); thirdly, that they have no tails; fourthly, that they have, most of them, very fine and very comic crests, tufts, tippets, and other variously applied appendages to their heads and chins, so that some are called 'crested,'

some 'eared,' some 'tippeted,' and so on; but the least of them, our proper Dabchick, displays no absurdity of this sort, and I have the less scruple in distinguishing it from others. I find, further, in Stanley's cla.s.ses, the Grebes placed among the short-winged birds, and made to include all the divers; but he does not say how short their wings are; and his grouping them with guillemots and puffins is entirely absurd, all their ways and looks, and abodes, being those of ducks. We can say no more of them as a family, accordingly, until we know what a duck is;--and I go on to the little pet of them, whose ways are more entirely its own.

103. Strangely, the most interesting fact (if _fact_ it be) that it builds a floating nest, gains scarcely more than chance notice from its historians. Here is Mr. Gould's account of it: "The materials composing this raft or nest are weeds and aquatic plants carefully heaped together in a rounded form; it is very large at the base, and is so constantly added to, that a considerable portion of it becomes submerged; at the same time it is sufficiently buoyant to admit of its saucer-like hollow top being always above the surface. In this wet depression five or six eggs are laid. The bird, always most alert, is still more so now, and scarcely ever admits of a near examination of the nest-making, or of a view of the eggs. In favorable situations, however, and with the aid of a telescope, the process may be watched; and it is not a little interesting to notice with what remarkable quickness the dabchick scratches the weeds over her eggs with her feet, when she perceives herself observed, so as not to lead even to the suspicion that any were deposited on the ill-shapen floating ma.s.s. This work of an instant displays as much skill in deception as can well be imagined."

104. It is still left to question, first, what is meant by a wet depression?--does the bird actually sit in the water, and are the eggs under it? and, if not, how is the water kept out? Secondly, is the floating nest anch.o.r.ed, and how? Looking to other ornithologists for solution of these particulars, I find n.o.body else say anything about a floating nest at all. Bewick describes it as being of a large size, and composed of a very great quant.i.ty of gra.s.s and water plants, at least a foot in thickness, and so placed in the water that the female hatches her eggs amidst the continual wet in which they were first laid.

Yarrell says only that it is a large flat nest made of aquatic plants; while Morris finally complicates the whole business by telling us that the nest is placed often as much as twenty or thirty yards from the water, that it is composed of short pieces of roots, reeds, rushes, and flags, and that when dry the whole naturally becomes very brittle.[23]

[23] I hear, from a friend in whose statements I have absolute confidence, that he has found the eggs of the water-hen laid on a dead sycamore leaf by the side of a shallow stream, one of the many brooks near Uxbridge.

105. While, out of my fifteen volumes of ornithology, I can obtain only this very vague account of the prettiest bird, next to the kingfisher, that haunts our English rivers, I have no doubt the most precise and accurate accounts are obtainable of the shapes of her bones and the sinuosities of her larynx; but about these I am low-minded enough not to feel the slightest curiosity. I return to Mr. Gould, therefore, to gather some pleasanter particulars; first, namely, that she has a winter and summer dress,--in winter olive gray and white, but in summer, (changing at marriage time) deep olive black, with dark chestnut chemisette. Infant dabchicks have "delicate rose-colored bills, harlequin-like markings, and rosy-white ap.r.o.ns." The harlequin-like markings I should call, rather, agate-like, especially on the head, where they are black and white, like an onyx. The bodies look more like a little walnut-sh.e.l.l, or nutmeg with wings to it, or things that are to be wings, some day.

106. Even when full-grown, the birds never fly much,--never more, says Morris, "than six or ten feet above the water, and for the most part trailing their legs in it; but either on the water or under it, every movement is characterized by the most consummate dexterity, and facile agility. The most expert waterman that sculls his skiff on the Thames or Isis, is but an humble and unskillful imitator of the dabchick. In moving straightforward (under water?), the wings are used to aid its progress, as if in the air, and in turning it has an easy gliding motion, feet and wings being used, as occasion requires, sometimes on one side and sometimes on the other. It walks but indifferently, as may readily be imagined from the position of the legs, so very far back. It is pleasant to watch the parent bird feeding her young: down she dives with a quick turn, and presently rises again with, five times out of six, a minnow, or other little fish, glittering like silver in her bill. The young rush towards the spot where the mother has come up, but she does not drop the fish into the water for them to receive until she has well shaken it about and killed it, so that it may not escape, when for the last time in its own element. I have seen a young one which had just seized, out of its turn I have no doubt, the captured prey, chased away by her, and pursued in apparent anger, as if for punishment, the following one being willingly given the next fish without any demur."

107. Mr. Gould seems to think that the dabchick likes insects and fish sp.a.w.n better than fish, or at least more prudently dines upon them.

"That fish are taken we have positive evidence from examples having been repeatedly picked up dead by the fishermen of the Thames, with a bull-head or miller's thumb in their throats, and by which they had evidently been choked in the act of swallowing them. That it is especially fond of insects is shown by the great activity it displays, when in captivity, in capturing house-flies and other diptera. Those who have visited Paris will probably have seen the grebes in the window of the restaurateur in the Rue de Rivoli. For years have a pair of these birds been living, apparently in the greatest enjoyment, within the gla.s.s window, attracting the admiration of all the pa.s.sers-by. The extreme agility with which they sailed round their little prison, or scrambled over the half-submerged piece of rock for a fly, was very remarkable. That no bird can be more easily kept in a state of confinement is certain."

108. This question about its food is closely connected with that of its diving. So far as I understand Mr. Morris, it dives only when disturbed, and to escape,--remaining under water, however, if need be, an almost incredible time, and swimming underneath it to great distances. Here we have, if we would only think of it, the same question as that about the water-ouzel, how it _keeps down_; and we must now note a few general points about diving birds altogether.

It is easy to understand how the properly so-called divers can plunge with impetus to great depths, or keep themselves at the bottom by continued strokes of the webbed feet; but neither how the ouzel walks at the bottom, if it be specifically lighter than the water, nor how a bird can swim horizontally under the surface; at least it is not enough explained that the action must be always that of oblique diving, the bird regulating the stroke according to the upward pressure of the water at different depths.

109. But there are many other points needing elucidation. It is said (and beautifully insisted on, by Michelet,) that great s.p.a.ces in the bones of birds that pa.s.s most of their lives in flight are filled with air: presumably the bones of the divers are made comparatively solid, or it is even conceivable--if conceptions or suppositions were of any use,--that the deep divers may take in water, to help themselves to sink. The enormous depths at which they have been caught, according to report, cannot be reached by any mere effort of strength, if the body remained as buoyant as it evidently is on the surface. The strength of the wing must, however, be enormous, for the great northern diver is described as swimming under water "as it were with the velocity of an arrow in the air" (Yarrell, vol. iii., page 431); or to keep to more measured fact, Sir William Jardine says, "I have pursued this bird in a Newhaven fishing-boat with four st.u.r.dy rowers, and notwithstanding it was kept almost constantly under water by firing as soon as it appeared, the boat could not succeed in making one yard upon it"

(_ibid._, p. 432).

110. But this is followed by the amazing statement of Mr. Robert Dunn, p. 433, that in the act of diving it does not appear to make the least exertion, but sinks gradually under the surface, without throwing itself forward, the head being the last part that disappears. I am not fond of the word 'impossible,' but I think I am safe in saying that according to the laws of nature no buoyant body can sink merely by an act of volition; and that it must pull itself down by some hitherto unconceived action of the feet, which in this bird are immensely broad and strong, and so flat that it cannot walk with them, any more than we could with two flat boards a yard square tied to our feet; but, when it is caught on land, shoves its body along upon the ground, like a seal, by jerks. All these diving motions are executed in a more delicate but quite as wonderful way by the dabchick,--more wonderful indeed it may be said, because it has only the divided or chestnut-leaf-like foot, to strike with. We shall understand it perhaps a little better after tracing, in a future talk, the history of its relations among the smaller sea-gulls; meantime, in quitting the little dainty creature, I must plead for a daintier Latin name than it has now--'Podiceps.' No one seems to have the least idea what that means; and 'Colymbus,'

diver, must be kept for the great Northern Diver and his deep-sea relatives, far removed from our little living ripple-line of the pools.

I can't think of any one pretty enough; but for the present 'Trepida'

may serve; and perhaps be applied, not improperly, to all the Grebes, with reference to their subtle and instant escape from any sudden danger. (See Stanley, p. 419.) "It requires all the address of a keen sportsman to get within shot," and when he does, the bird may still be too shrewd for him. "I fired at the distance of thirty yards; my gun went quick as lightning, but the grebe went quicker, and scrambling over, out of sight, came up again in a few seconds perfectly unhurt."

I think, therefore, that unless I receive some better suggestion, 'Trepida Stagnarum' may be the sufficiently intelligible Latin renaming of our easily startled favorite.

IV.

t.i.tANIA ARCTICA. ARCTIC FAIRY.

111. I must first get quit of the confusion of names for this bird.

Linnaeus, in the Fauna Suecica, p. 64, calls it 'Tringa Lobata,' but afterwards 'Northern Tringa'; and his editor, Gmelin, 'Dark Tringa.'

Other people agree to call it a 'phalarope,' but some of them 'northern' phalarope, some, the 'dark' phalarope; some, the 'ashy'

phalarope, some, the 'disposed to be ashy' phalarope; some, the 'red-necked' phalarope; and some, 'Mr. Williams's' phalarope; finally, Cuvier calls it a 'Lobipes,' and Mr. Gould, in English, 'red-necked phalarope.' Few people are likely to know what 'Phalarope' means,[24]

and I believe n.o.body knows what 'Tringa' means; and as, also, n.o.body ever sees it, the little bird being obliged to live in Orkney, Greenland, Norway, and Lapland, out of human creatures' way, I shall myself call it the Arctic Fairy. It would come south if we would let it, but of course Mr. Bond says, "The first specimen I ever had was shot by a friend of mine in September, 1842, near Southend, Ess.e.x, where he saw the phalarope swimming on the water, like a little duck, about a mile from land; not knowing what it was, he shot it, and kindly brought it to me." Another was shot while running between the metals of the Great Eastern Railway, near the Stratford station, early in June, 1852; and on the Norfolk coast, four others have been killed during the last fifteen years; and the birds' visits, thus, satisfactorily, put a stop to. I can therefore study it only in Mr. Gould's drawing, on consulting which, I find the bird to be simply a sea dabchick,--brown stripes on the back, and all; but the webs of the feet a little finer, and in its habits it is more like the Lily-ouzel, according to the following report of Mr. St. John: "The red-necked phalarope is certainly the most beautiful little wader of my acquaintance. There were a pair of them, male and female, feeding near the loch, in a little pool which was covered with weeds of different kinds. Nothing could be more graceful than the movements of these two little birds, as they swam about in search of insects, etc. Sometimes _they ran lightly on the broad leaves of the water-lily which served them for a raft_, and entirely kept them out of the water. Though not exactly web-footed, the phalarope swims with the greatest ease. The attachment of these two birds to each other seemed very great: whenever in their search for food they wandered so far apart as to be hidden by the intervening weeds, the male bird stopped feeding suddenly, and, looking round, uttered a low and musical call of inquiry, which was immediately answered by the female in a different note, but perfectly expressive of her answer, which one might suppose to be to the purport that she was at hand and quite safe; on hearing her, the male immediately recommenced feeding, but at the same time making his way towards her; she also flew to meet him; they then joined company for a moment or two, and, after a few little notes of endearment, turned off again in different directions. This scene was repeated a dozen times while I was watching them. They seemed to have not the slightest fear of me, for frequently they came to within a yard of where I was sitting, and after looking up they continued catching the small water-insects, etc., on the weeds, without minding my presence in the least." What reward the birds got for this gentle behavior, we learn from the sentence following after the next two lines, containing the extremely valuable contribution to their natural history, that "on dissecting the female we found two eggs in her."

[24] The terminal 'pe' is short for pus, (pous!) and 'phalero,'

from phalera, fringes--"Fringe-foot" (Morris).

112. All other accounts concur in expressing (with as much admiration as is possible to naturalists) the kindly and frank disposition of this bird; which for the rest is almost a central type of all bird power with elf gifts added: it flies like a lark, trips on water-lily leaves like a fairy, swims like a duck, and roves like a sea-gull, having been seen sixty miles from land: and, finally, though living chiefly in Lapland and Iceland, and other such northern countries, it has been seen serenely swimming and catching flies in the hot water of the geysers, in which a man could not bear his hand.

And no less harmoniously than in report of the extreme tameness, grace, and affectionateness of this bird do sportsmen agree also in the treatment and appreciation of these qualities. Thus says Mr. Salmon: "Although we shot two pairs, those that were swimming about did not take the least notice of the report of the gun, and they seemed to be much attached to each other; for when one of them flew to a short distance, the other directly followed; and while I held a wounded female in my hand, its mate came and fluttered before my face."

(Compare the scene between Irene and Hector, at page 393 of the May number of _Aunt Judy's Magazine_.) And, again, says Mr. Wolley: "The bird is extremely tame, swimming about my india-rubber boat so near that I could almost catch it in my hand; I have seen it even, when far from its nest, struck at many times with an oar before it flew away."

In its domestic habits also the creature seems as exemplary as, in its social habits, it is frank; for on the approach of danger to her nestlings, the hen uses all the careful subtleties of the most cunning land birds, "spreading her wings, and counterfeiting lameness, for the purpose of deluding the intruder; and after leading the enemy from her young, she takes wing and flies to a great height, at the same time displaying a peculiar action of the wings; then descending with great velocity, and making simultaneously a noise with her wings. On her return to her young, she uses a particular cry for the purpose of gathering them together. As soon as she has collected them, she covers them with her wings, like the domestic hen."

113. I cannot quite make out the limits of the fairy's migrations; but it is said by Morris to 'occur' in France, Holland, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. I find that one was what sportsmen call 'procured' near York, in full summer dress; and another killed at Rottingdean, swimming in a pond in the middle of the village, in the company of some ducks.

At Scarborough, Louth, and Sh.o.r.eham, it has also been captured or shot, and has been 'found' building nests in Sutherland: and, on the whole, it seems that here is a sort of petrel-partridge, and duckling-dove, and diving-lark, with every possible grace and faculty that bird can have, in body and soul; ready, at least in summer, to swim on our village ponds, or, wait at our railway stations, and make the wild north-eastern coasts of Scotland gay with its dancing flocks upon the foam; were it not that the idle c.o.c.kneys, and pot-headed squires fresh out of Parliament, stand as it were on guard all round the island, spluttering small-shot at it, striking at it with oars, cutting it open to find how many eggs there are inside, and, in fine, sending it for refuge into the hot water of Hecla, and any manner of stormy solitude that it can still find for itself and its amber nestlings. I have never seen one, nor I suppose ever shall see, but hear of some of my friends sunning themselves at midnight about the North Cape, of whom, if any one will bring me a couple of Arctic fairies in a basket, I think I can pledge our own Squire's and Squire's lady's faith, for the pair's getting some peace, if they choose to take it, and as many water-lily leaves as they can trip upon, on the tarns of Monk-Coniston.

IV.B.

t.i.tANIA INCONSTANS. CHANGEFUL FAIRY.

_Phalaropus Fulicarius._ (_Coot-like Phalarope--Gould._)