Both these fables may, I think, have been built up on a
slender basis of fact—the only fact which the Greeks seem to
have known about the bird. Aristotle (Hist. Anim. v. 8. 4)
tells us that the ἀλκύων was very seldom seen. “It is the rarest
of all birds, for it is only seen at the setting of the Pleiades
(about Nov. 9) and at the winter solstice; and it appears at seaports
flying as much as round a ship, and then vanishing away.”
Whether the bird is still seen in Greece only in late autumn
and winter I cannot say; but Mr. Seebohm tells us (Brit.
Birds, ii. 345) that in Eastern Europe it is compelled by the
cold to migrate, some finding their way to Egypt, and therefore
necessarily crossing the Ægean, or passing over Greece or the
western coast of Asia Minor. I think it is a fair guess that
those known to Aristotle were on their way from Thrace and
Scythia to a warmer climate; and this hypothesis would explain
not only their short stay, but their connection with the sea and
harbours, and their mysterious character. Even supposing that
a few haunted the Greek rivers at other times of the year, they
would not be often seen there by a people not given either to
sporting or to exploring out-of-the-way places; the one fact
which would impress itself on the unscientific mind would be
the sudden apparition in winter, and especially in mid-winter,
of this little blue-green spirit about the harbours, and its as
rapid disappearance.
If this be so, I think we have not far to seek for the origin
of the two fables. Nothing being known of its nesting, it was
assumed that it nested at or about the time when it appeared;
and the not unfrequent calm and fine weather of mid-December
would confirm the fancy, and give it a new mythical colouring.
(The matter-of-fact philosopher does not of course allow that
these fine days always occurred in his own experience; they
are not always met, he says (v. 8. 3), in this country at the time
of the solstice, “but they always occur in the Sicilian Sea.”)
When this fable of the nesting-time had once established itself,
it would be not very difficult to find a nest among the curiosities
of the sea. So the little blue bird came to suffer “a sea-change,
into something rich and strange,” through the careless fancy of
the imaginative Greek.
On page 49 of the first edition of this book there was a
paragraph which described the shooting by Anderegg of a
Lesser Redpoll (Linota rufescens) on the Engstlen Alp. The
date was June 30 (1884), and I had little doubt that the bird
(which was a female) was one of a pair which had been breeding
there. And this idea was confirmed by the discovery of a
nest in the same place by Anderegg in May of the present
year (1886), which Mr. Scott Wilson, who was with him at the
time, considered to belong to the Lesser Redpoll.
The form, however, of the Redpoll which is usually found
in the Alps is that which is usually called ‘Mealy’ (Linota
linaria); this has been reported by Mr. Seebohm as pretty
frequent in the Engadine, and by Prof. Newton, on the authority
of Colonel Ward, as having been abundant in Canton Vaud in
the winter of 1874-5. All the Redpolls I saw last September
were, to judge from size and colouring, of this form: so also
were all that I have seen in Swiss museums marked as having
been shot in the Alps. Believing therefore, on these grounds,
and in deference to the arguments of the Rev. H. A. Macpherson,
that both Mr. Scott Wilson and myself had made a
mistake, I struck out the paragraph in question from my second
edition.
Since doing so, however, I have paid a visit to Cambridge,
where Prof. Newton pointed out to me a passage in Prof.
Giglioli’s recently published catalogue of Italian birds bearing
on the point. He writes without hesitation of Linota rufescens
as occasionally breeding in the Italian Alps. This induces me
to add this note to the present edition; for if it could be distinctly
proved that L. rufescens is found breeding in the Alpine
region, new light would be thrown, not only on the curious
geographical distribution of this form, but on the abnormal
character of the ornithology of the Alps. Prof. Giglioli may
be himself mistaken, and as Anderegg and I failed to skin our
bird, we cannot produce it as evidence; but my notes made
while examining it point decidedly to L. rufescens rather than
L. linaria, the length, for example, appearing as only four
inches.
[1]The name is sometimes said to be a corruption of
bud-finch.
But Prof. Skeat (
Etym. Dict., s. v.
Bull) compares it
with
bull-dog, the prefix in each case suggesting the stout build
of the animal.
[2]See Mr. Seebohm’s
British Birds, vol. ii. p. 345.
[3]Mr. O. V. Aplin, of Banbury, tells me that he has heard it
stated that if you shoot a Kingfisher, and it falls on the snow,
you cannot see it.
[4]In 1885 Gray Wagtails were much less common in the
south than in 1884; at the present time (Oct. 1886) they are
again in their favourite places (
see Frontispiece).
[5]The scientific name is Motacilla sulphurea
(in Dresser’s List, M. melanope).
[6]At this same south-east corner, in May 1889, I have several
times found the trees above me alive with these bold little birds.
I have also seen an egg taken from a nest in the Botanic
Garden. We may now, I think, reckon these as residents both
in summer and winter.
[7]A Jack-snipe picked up under the telegraph wires at Banbury
in July, 1885, was (Mr. Aplin tells me) in an emaciated
condition; possibly an injured bird unable to migrate.
[8]In May, 1886, I saw one in a pollard willow at the northern
edge of the Parks, near the new boathouse.
[9]At Lulworth, in Dorset, when the berry-season begins, I
have noticed that the blackbirds will congregate on the hedgerows
in considerable numbers, and abandon for a time their
skulking habits. This makes it often difficult to distinguish
them at a distance from the Ring-ousels, which are there about
the same time.
[10]I.e. for the
Rasores, in
Love’s Meinie; where are some of
the most delightfully wilful thoughts about birds ever yet
published.
[11]What this sense is may be guessed from Milton,
Paradise
Lost, Bk. v. 195—
‘Fountains, and ye that warble as ye flow
Melodious murmurs, warbling tune his praise.’
The word seems to express a kind of singing which is soft,
continuous, and ‘legato.’
[12]Published by its author at 6 Tenterden Street, Hanover
Square.
[13]The three species were the Wood-warbler,
Phylloscopus
sibilatrix (Bechst.), Willow-warbler,
Ph. trochilus (Linn.), and
Chiff-chaff,
Ph. collybita (Viell.). Markwick declares that he
could not distinguish the first of these from the other two.
[14]The song ceases about mid-June, and is not renewed till
August: it is then usually so wanting in force as to be hardly
recognizable. See
Note B. at end of Volume.
[15]The spring of 1886 saw this hedge deserted by both
species; the result of an outbreak of lawn-tennis in the adjoining
field. They were lucky enough to find new quarters not
far off.
[16]The scientific name is appropriate, viz.
Sylvia rufa.
[17]Our Summer Migrants, p. 82.
[18]Mr. Courthope’s
Paradise of Birds. No one who loves birds or poetry should fail to read Mr. Ruskin’s commentary on the chorus from which these lines are taken, in
Love’s Meinie, p. 139 and foll.
[19]Unless it be in the westernmost branch, which runs at the
foot of the Berkshire hills. Near Godstow the nest is to be
found, as Mr. W. T. Arnold, of University Col., has kindly
informed me: for obvious reasons I will not describe the spot.
[20]In the summer of 1886 this interesting bird was quite
abundant in and round Oxford. If I am not mistaken a nest
was built in the reeds of the fountain at the south end of the
Botanic Garden, a perfectly secure spot. I heard the song
there as late as the end of July.
[21]This bird cannot really be wholly missing in summer, but
it is strange how seldom I have seen or heard it. It is wanting
also from a list sent me by Mr. A. H. Macpherson, of birds
noticed by him in Switzerland last summer (1886). But
Anderegg tells me that its song is often heard near his house
at Meiringen. The Missel-thrush is certainly more abundant.
[22]This name (Alpenlerche) seems to be applied by the
peasantry both to this species and to the Alpine Accentor.
Mr. Seebohm, in his
British Birds, calls the former, very
appropriately, the Alpine Pipit.
[23]E.g. on the rocks about the Devil’s Bridge near Andermatt,
or on these of the Gemmi-pass.
[24]In common with other Woodpeckers, as Mr. H. Wharton
has reminded me in the
Academy. It is indeed very doubtful
whether this striking bird was known either to Aristotle or
Pliny; it is now an uncommon bird in Italy, and is properly
an inhabitant of northern Europe. But when Italy was covered
with forest (cp. Theophrastus, Hist. Plant, v. 8. 2) it must have
been known to the country people.
[25]The closer acquaintance has been made, and I have learnt
the song of this bird, which is not unlike that of the Lesser
White-throat described in
Chapter II. Of all the warblers I
know, this is the most restless and difficult to observe when
once the leaves are fully out. It is the only bird, I think, which
has completely baffled me during a whole morning spent in
pursuing the song without once getting a fair look at the singer.
(June, 1889.)
[26]Mr. Seebohm’s
British Birds is a remarkable exception to
this tendency.
[27]This kindly patron of birds is E. D. Lockwood, Esq., late
of the Bengal Civil Service, and author of
Natural History,
Sport, and Travel in India.
[28]They came, but found the hole occupied by the ubiquitous
Starling. He again gave way to a pair of bold Blue-tits, who
brought up their young here, flitting about the garden like large
blue butterflies.
[29]For exactly four years I saw no other Black Redstart in
Oxfordshire. But on November 5, 1888, another caught my
eye within half a mile of the spot described in the text. This
time it was another new and ugly wall that he patronized, transferring
his attention now and then to the cabbages in a cottage
garden hard by.
[30]The discovery in Germany (see the
Ibis for April, 1889) of
a Cuckoo hatching its own egg should put all English observers
on the look-out. We have taken it too much for granted that
such a thing could not happen.
[31]Col. Barrow tells me that now (August, 1886) they have
come to prefer bread to nuts, and will leave the latter so long
as they can get the former.
[32]When does he leave us? On Aug. 23, 1886, I saw an
astonishing number of Flycatchers all on the same side of an
orchard, and felt sure, from their restlessness, that they had
assembled, as swallows do, in view of migration. On the 24th
I went to S. Wales, where, during a whole week, I only saw
one, though they were abundant up to that time. Letters from
ornithological friends led me to believe that the birds have
almost entirely disappeared from South and East England by
about Sept. 12; and Mr. Seebohm is probably right in giving
the first week of September as the usual date of their departure.
How much less we know of the departure than of the arrival of
birds, so quietly do they slip away!
[33]Mr. Seebohm (
Brit. Birds, i. 325) tells us of a quiet little
warble, so low as to be scarcely heard at a few yards’ distance;
but this I have never yet succeeded in catching.
[34]This year (1886) I took all the sparrows’ nests on my
house, and examined the young birds. Only one or two young
peas and grains had been given them: they had been fed largely
on insects.
[35]Mr. Aplin tells me, however, that the upper parts, in
summer at least, “have a decided wash or gloss of green”:
Mr. Seebohm calls it “dull olive-brown.”
[36]Stone-chats have been observed busy in this way near
Oxford.—A. H. M.
[37]The chat of the Whin-chat is a dissyllable, ‘u-tic’; that of
the Stone-chat a monosyllable, ‘chat.’ (O. V. A.)
[38]The Meadow Bunting (
Emberiza cia) seemed to me, when
I met with it in Switzerland this summer, to be more lively
and restless than other Buntings.
[40]Or like a delicate electric bell, heard at some distance,
while the door of your room is slowly opened and again
closed.
[41]Another cause is doubtless the
crescendo and
diminuendo
which the bird uses: see a valuable note in
The Birds of Cumberland,
by the Rev. H. A. Macpherson and W. Duckworth.
[42]In May this year (1886) I nearly trod upon a pair of these
birds, near the same wood: yet they showed no fear, allowed
me to approach them within six paces, and continued to reel
close at hand.
[43]As in Milton’s “most musical, most melancholy.” But as
Coleridge remarks in a note to his own poem of the Nightingale,
in
Sibylline Leaves, these words of Milton are spoken
in the character of the melancholy man, and have therefore
a dramatic rather than a descriptive propriety. Coleridge’s own
conception of the song is the true one and most happily expressed.
[44]A Woodpecker on a railway bridge is a curiosity. But a
Lesser Spotted bird was once seen on the stonework of the
bridge which spans the Chipping Norton branch line, by the
Rev. S. D. Lockwood, Rector of my parish, who knows the
bird well.
[45]Vol. ii. pp. 461-463.
Hickwall seems to be the recognized
orthography; but I spell the word as it was pronounced.
[46]They will often build their nests in holes in the timber of
the houses. Anderegg tells me that this was the case in his
own house two years ago. Nor is this the only instance of the
habits of birds being affected by the nature of the house-architecture
in these parts; for the House-martins, being unable
(I suppose) to make their nests adhere securely against timber,
or disliking the large projecting eaves, build in the Haslithal
under ledges of rock, and are known there as the Rock-martin,
as distinct from the Rock-swallow (Felsenschwalbe), which is
the name there given to the Crag-martin. It is well-known that
there are places even in England where this bird prefers rocks
to houses.
[47]I afterwards saw three of the same species about some
stunted thistles on the Furka-pass, at a height of 8000 feet, and
on a bitter cold day. See
Note D. at end of Volume.
[48]It is worth noting that Knox observed that the progress of
the Pied Wagtail is chiefly observable between daybreak and
10 a.m. All the movements I noticed in the Alps were
observed during the earlier morning hours.
[49]Ancient Lives of Virgil (Prof. Nettleship), p. 33.
[50]I Virgil then, of sweet Parthenope
The nursling, woo’d the flowery walks of peace
Inglorious, &c.
[51]“Habuit domum Romae Esquiliis juxta hortos Maecenatianos,
quamquam secessu Campaniae Siciliaeque plurimum
uteretur.” (
Life by Suetonius, ch. 13.)
[52]Plin.,
N. H. x. 60. Aristotle refutes the fable, which is
alluded to by Aristophanes in the
Birds (1137). See Arist.,
H. N. viii. 14. 5.
[53]And all the while, with hollow voice, thine own
Loved wood-pigeon shall soothe thee, nor alone,
For from the lofty elm the dove shall ever moan.
[55]Columella viii. 8. Cato de Re Rustica, 90.
[56]Philemon Holland so translates
palumbes in his version of
Pliny.
[57]Nissen,
Italische Landeskunde, p. 374.
[58]But no whit the more
For all expedients tried and travail borne
By man and beast in turning oft the soil,
Do greedy goose and Strymon-haunting cranes
And succory’s bitter fibres not molest
Or shade not injure—
[59]Time it is to set
Snares for the crane, and meshes for the stag,
And hunt the long-eared hares.
[60]The Dardanians on the walls raise a shout to the sky.
Hope comes to kindle wrath; they hurl their missiles strongly;
even as under black clouds cranes from the Strymon utter
their signal notes and sail clamouring across the sky, and
noisily stream down the gale.
—Aen. x. 262 foll.
[61]Never at unawares did showers annoy:
Or, as it rises, the high-soaring cranes
Flee to the hills before it, or, with face
Upturned to heaven, the heifer snuffs the gale
Through gaping nostrils, or about the meres
Shrill-twittering flits the swallow.
—Georgic i. 373.
[62]In blushing spring
Comes the white bird long-bodied snakes abhor.
—Georg. ii. 320.
[64]See Petronius,
Satyr. 55. Cp. also
Juv. Sat. 1, line 116, and Mayor’s note. In the London Zoological Gardens, in March 1889, a pair of Storks were illustrating Petronius’ lines admirably—except in that they were captives.
[65]Gibbon, vol. iv. p. 240, ed. Milman.
[66]Georg. i. 120, 139, 156, 271.
[69]Then the crow
With full voice, good-for-nought, inviting rain,
Stalks on the dry sand mateless and alone.
—Georg. i. 388.
[70]Soft then the voice of rooks from indrawn throat
Thrice, four times, o’er repeated, and full oft
On their high cradles, by some hidden joy
Gladdened beyond their wont, in bustling throngs
Among the leaves they riot; so sweet it is
When showers are spent, their own loved nests again
And tender brood to visit.
—Georg. i. 410.
[71]Sundevall (
Thierarten des Aristoteles, p. 123) pronounces
κόραξ to have been our Raven.
[72]See Newton’s
Yarrell, ii. 290.
[73]Whose weedy water feeds the snow-white swan.
—Georg. ii. 199.
[74]With that a great noise rises aloft in diverse contention, even as when flocks of birds haply settle on a lofty grove, and swans utter their hoarse cry among the vocal pools in the fish-filled river of Padusa.
—Aen. xi. 456; cp. vii. 700.
[75]When cool eve
Allays the air, and dewy moonbeams slake
The forest glades, with halcyon’s voice the shore
And every thicket with the goldfinch rings.
—Georg. iii. 338.
[76]Not to the Sun’s warmth there upon the shore
Do halcyons dear to Thetis ope their wings.
—Georg. i. 398.
[77]This exception is singular, as Pliny seems to depend on
Aristotle for everything else which he tells about the bird. I
am inclined to think that in this case Pliny must have supplemented
his master’s account from his own observation. He
had a villa on the bay of Naples, which bay was probably the
‘littus’ referred to by Virgil; and both may here have seen the
bird on the shore.
[78]I have
seen a photograph of this coin, and satisfied myself
that the bird was meant for a Tern. But I have so far been
unable to discover any connection between Eretria and the
ἀλκυὼν.
Sundevall is confident that Aristotle’s bird is the
Kingfisher.
[79]E.g. Aristotle gives, and Pliny copies from him, an extraordinary
account of the nest and eggs.
N. H. ix. 14. See
Note C, at end of volume.
[80]For the connection between
ἄκανθα and
ἀκαλανθίς
see Conington’s note on
Georg. iii. 338.
[81]Theophrastus,
for example, applies it to the Egyptian
mimosa, the thorns of which lately proved so damaging to
our troops in the Soudan. (Lenz,
Botanik der Griechen, p. 735.)
[82]There
is another reading, ‘et acanthida.’
[83]Κακόβιοι καὶ κακόχροοι, φωνὴν μέντοι λιγυρὰν ἔχουσιν.—
Hist. Anim. ix. 17.
[84]A sibilant trill is probably what is meant in a passage of
the Greek Anthology (i. 175),
λιγυρὸν βομβεῦσιν ἀκανθίδες;
suggesting the Grasshopper Warbler (see
p. 154), or the Sedge-warbler.
[85]Georg. i. 356 foll. I quote this time Mr. R. D. Blackmore’s admirable rhyming version.
Ere yet the lowering storm breaks o’er the land
A sullen groundswell heaves along the strand,
On mountain heights dry snapping sounds are heard,
The booming shores bedrizzled are and blurred,
And soughs of wind sigh through the forest stirred.
The wave already scarce foregoes the hull
When homeward from the offing flies the gull,
With screams borne inland by the blast; and when
Sea-coots play round the margin of the fen;
The heron quits the marsh where she was bred
And soars upon a cloud far overhead.
[86]Following Keightley’s Commentary, which is the best we
possess on
Georg. i. 351-423.
[87]Aen. xii. 473. Mr. Mackail translates: “As when a black swallow flits through some rich lord’s spacious house, and circles in flight in the lofty halls, gathering her tiny food for sustenance to her twittering nestlings, and now swoops down the spacious colonnades, now round the wet ponds,” &c.
[88]Aen. ix. 564; xi. 721, 751; xii. 247.
[89]As in the poplar-shade a nightingale
Mourns her lost young, which some relentless swain,
Spying, from the nest has torn unfledged, but she
Wails the long night, and perched upon a spray
With sad insistence pipes her dolorous strain,
Till all the region with her wrongs o’erflows.
—Georg. iv. 511.
[90]Aen. vi. 309. “Multitudinous as leaves fall dropping in the forests at autumn’s earliest frost, or birds swarm landward from the deep gulf, when the chill of the year routs them over seas and drives them to sunny lands.”