Birds and Nature Vol. 11 No. 5 [May 1902]

“And that is a good thing for you,” retorted Miss Dominie. “She is too old to be particular and she may tolerate you. For myself, I draw the line at ganders. Chickens are good enough for me.”

“You talk like a preacher,” suavely answered Jeremiah, “and I agree with you. They are good enough for me, too,” but Miss Dominie had darted around the big coop and was lost to view. At that moment Dollie came out of the house carrying a bucket of water and went from pan to trough, pouring the chickens a fresh drink. With cries of delight, Jeremiah fluttered in her rear, paddling and throwing the water, making it an undrinkable mixture for the chickens. Suddenly his eyes dilated, his neck straightened and stiffened, his wings slightly lifted and his large feet passed each other in rapid succession, fence-ward. Dollie’s father was coming from the barn, walking stiffly, his arm pressed against an aching back. His eye caught Jeremiah’s and the pursuit began. The man forgot his lame back and plunged forward, gathering small stones which he aimed at Jeremiah. Round and round the fence they went, the man throwing stones and execrations; the gander gabbling, ducking, dodging until he bethought himself of the haven of gooseberry bushes, scrambled under them and into the orchard, through the hedge into the open where, joy inexpressible, Mrs. Cochin and her ten fluffs were tumbling in the dog fennel.

“At last I have found you, my beloved,” gasped Jeremiah, and he rounded up the chicks and drove them into the orchard. Mrs. Cochin followed, protesting. She even flung herself at Jeremiah, with many a cluck and scratch; but Jeremiah had constituted himself head of her household and, serene in the consciousness of right, he took the family through the orchard, under the gooseberry bushes and back into the yard.

Jeremiah knew that a little of him went a long way with Mrs. Cochin, yet he never lost hope that his persistent devotion would win her favor. He had been a lone gander many years. There was not another feather of his kind in the poultry yard. It was sometimes marveled that he did not take to the ducks, his next of kin, fat and wabbly, with raucous voices. It was so much easier to love Mrs. Cochin, the perfection of grace and beauty. She was large and stately. She wore always a buff robe that flashed in the sun like burnished gold. Poor Jeremiah fell easily a prey to her unconscious wiles and consecrated himself, body and soul, to her personal attendance and protection.

Jeremiah’s first concern, again inside the yard, was to reconnoitre for his friend, the enemy. He was nowhere in sight and Jeremiah turned pleadingly to Mrs. Cochin. “Let us make up,” he urged. “Your coldness is killing me. I honestly think I have not long to live.”

“Diet yourself,” suggested Mrs. Cochin, her feminine intuitions connecting cause and effect. “And don’t be a goose.”

Mrs. Cochin went scratching in a flower bed. Ignored, he followed at a respectful distance, hissing at the pup who ambled near, striking a cat whose lithe body was poised for a spring at one of the chickens, and frightening away a brood of ducklings. All afternoon the faithful sentinel executed his self-imposed duty, and finally followed his charmer across the yard to the old workshop.

“Do not go in there,” he cried, sharply.

For answer Mrs. Cochin tripped over the threshold, clucking to her chicks. She flew upon the work bench, thence to a rafter and settled herself as if for the night.

“What do you think I am going to do with these chickens?” grumbled Jeremiah, trying to arouse her maternal solicitude. “Let the rats catch them, I don’t care. They are not my chickens.”

Mrs. Cochin looked down. She drooped a wing and shut an eye. Her attitude indicated that she would take proper care of her offspring as soon as their company had taken his welcome leave.

Again Jeremiah went through the scene at the fence. He gabbled his vain protestations. He groveled in the dust. He flung his unwieldly weight against the work bench and made many futile attempts to rise to Mrs. Cochin’s superior elevation.

“You distract, humiliate me,” he hissed. “Your heart is no larger than your head. You may stay there. I wash my feet of you,” and suiting the action of the word, he waddled into the water trough and fluttered there.

The black pullet drew near. She was really a comely creature, Jeremiah thought, and he stopped fluttering. If it were not for the fatal glitter of Mrs. Cochin’s blonde beauty, he might learn to care for demure Miss Dominie. He didn’t know but he could, anyway, and gracefully curving his kingly neck he approached her.

“Good evening, Miss Dominie. You are looking very charming.”

Miss Dominie pretended not to hear. She was too young to be entirely unmoved by his apparent admiration and she felt vaguely sorry for him; but the sun was very low and the sand man had passed her twice. She was looking for a spring bed on one of the low limbs of the cottonwood tree. Jeremiah followed her, babbling the story of his wretched loneliness, until they unwittingly crossed the path of his enemy, the man. Jeremiah’s voice sank to a whisper and he hid behind a tree. Jeremiah is a goose about a good many things, but he knows when to lay dead.

The black pullet brushed against him and his heart warmed – but she was only enflight to the limb overhead. She leaned forward and spoke to him, drowsily: “I am sorry, Jeremiah. It is the old story and I can only advise you to get used to it. Don’t you give up. Remember, you can have anything in this world you want if you keep after it until you get it; that is one of the fixed laws of the universe. I think you will find Mrs. Cochin in the end coop now. I saw Dollie gathering the chickens into her apron and carrying Mrs. Cochin by the wing. It might be well to excite her jealousy. You may say to her that I have at last consented to be yours. Tell her that you have come to bid her a final farewell. Give her back that scar she made on your neck and assure her that I am a jealous god and object to your even passing the time of day with her.”

Jeremiah hastened to the end coop. Between the slats he recognized the profile of his beloved, hovering her fluffs. He tried to get his head inside, but the openings were too small and he could get in only as far as his eyes.

“I have come to say farewell,” he breathed, hoarsely. “I have found one younger and fairer than you.” His soul revolted when he said “fairer,” for Jeremiah hates a lie, and even if Miss Dominie be a diamond it cannot be denied she is of the charcoal variety. “I may see you sometimes,” he continued, “for I do not expect to leave the farm, and I wish you to know that the bright particular star of my life has blazed out and henceforth I am hers alone.”

Jeremiah gushed on, rapturing over his new attraction until he half convinced himself; gushed on, rapturing, until Mrs. Cochin lifted her head and struck him with her bill.

“You make me very tired,” she said. “If you have any respect for your lady love, keep your mouth shut about her. Don’t let everybody know you are a goose. Of course, you would be just as big a goose if you kept your mouth shut, but everybody wouldn’t know it. Even a gander owes that much to himself: not to let it get out how big a goose he is.”

Saying this, she tucked her head and sang a soft lullaby to her fluffs, and their faint, sweet “peep, peep,” lost in a low croon of content, sounded to forlorn Jeremiah like music behind the locked gates of paradise.

Sadly he clambered upon the back of an old wagon seat, half way between the end coop and the black pullet; and the friendly dark came down; and old Jeremiah lost the ache of self in the oblivion of sleep.

Emily Frances Smith.

THE ORIOLE

A flash of gold and black against the sky,A perch upon the orchard’s topmost bough,A strain of such unmingled ecstasy,The lingering echoes thrill the silence now.A hanging nest so beautifully shaped,So softly lined, close woven, firm and strong,A bright-eyed mate to brood above the eggs,And listen to that rhapsody of song.A deep serenity of blue above,A bubbling joy within beyond control.Of hopes fulfilled, of Summertime and love —Once more the golden story, Oriole!– Lulu Whedon Mitchell.

THE ORCHARD ORIOLE

The first of May finds the trees and shrubs well clothed in tender green, the air laden with the perfume of many blossoms, and bird life abounding. The number has been rapidly increasing since the coming of the meadow lark and robin that proclaim the approach of the moving host. Since their songs of joyous anticipation first were heard reverberating through field and orchard, almost every day has brought some new arrival, till now the air is alive with feathered creatures and hilarious song is rife. With ever varying motions they search for food and sport among the tree branches, or course through the vault of heaven. Nidification is now in progress in various stages of advancement, according to the species of bird.

But many of our summer visitors are still absent, yet just now is the season that one of the most interesting should make his appearance and join in the general jubilee. This is the Orchard Oriole, and he is among the gayest of the gay of all this merry throng.

Being a soft-billed bird, or insect eater, he defers his migration until insects have become plentiful. He is remarkably uniform in migration. Wintering south of the United States, he enters our borders about the last of March and with unusual regularity steadily makes his way onward till he reaches the northern limit of his range the latter part of May.

In the southern states arid southern portion of the middle states east of the Rocky mountains this Oriole is one of the most abundant and familiar songsters that frequent the orchards and gardens.

He is a very conspicuous bird in both plumage and song. Although not quite so brilliantly attired as his cousin Baltimore, his coat of chestnut and black is very noticeable. His song is loud and gushing and resembles that of the rose-breasted grosbeak enough for the superficial observer to confound the two, but to the trained ear there is a decided difference. The notes, though uttered with force and rapidity, are varied, clear and sweet. His sojourn with us is short, but while here his rapturous refrain is heard almost incessantly. This sprightly bird is seldom, if ever, inactive, but with ever-moving pinion he flits from branch to branch, from tree to tree, and even when giving forth his gushing melody he quivers and sways.

Orchard Orioles are masters in the art of nest-building. The nest, a beautiful basket-like structure about three inches across and the same in length, is attached to half-upright or horizontal branches. Usually it is half pensile, though some are wholly pendent. It is always made of blades of long, slender grasses woven together in a most wonderful manner and lined with plant fiber and feathers. As the grass is invariably used while fresh and green, the nest is of a more or less green hue at all times, and consequently difficult to detect among the thick foliage. The four or five bluish-white eggs are spotted with a purplish color. At first the nestlings are fed on tiny insects and later on beetles and grasshoppers. The number of noxious insects a pair of these birds will destroy in a season is almost incredible.

Addie L. Booker.

THE PRAIRIE WARBLER

(Dendroica discolor.)

This beautiful little Warbler cannot fail to awaken an interest in bird life in the mind of any person whose privilege it is to observe it in its chosen haunts. These are the shrubby pasture lands and the open woods of the eastern United States. It is more common in barren, sandy places of the Atlantic coast, where it seems to find an insect food suited to its taste. It not infrequently visits orchards, when in bloom, especially those in retired localities. Wilson, who wrote enthusiastically of the Prairie Warbler, says: “They seem to prefer open plains and thinly-wooded tracts, and have this singularity in their manners, that they are not easily alarmed, and search among the leaves the most leisurely of any of the tribe I have yet met with, seeming to examine every blade of grass and every leaf, uttering at short intervals a feeble chirr.”

Dr. Coues was also an ardent admirer of this little bird and during his college days frequently hunted and studied its habits. He found the “inflection of the Prairie Warbler’s notes a much more agreeable theme than that of a Greek verb,” and possibly quite as profitable. He says: “There was a little glade just by the college, a sloping sandy field run waste with scattered cedars, where we could be sure of finding the Warblers any day, from the twentieth of April, for two or three weeks. Ten to one we would not see the little creatures at first. But presently, from the nearest juniper, would come the well known sounds. A curious song, if song it can be called – as much like a mouse complaining of the toothache as anything else I can liken it to – it is simply indescribable. Then perhaps the quaint performer would dart out into the air, turn a somersault after a passing midge, get right side up and into the shrubbery again in an instant.”

The flight of the Prairie Warbler is neither strong nor protracted. Yet it is one of the most expert fly catchers among the Warblers. It is not a social bird and it is very seldom that more than two or three are seen together. A peculiar characteristic of this Warbler is that it does not try to lead an intruder away from the vicinity of its nest. Mr. Nuttall speaks of removing two eggs from a nest and replacing them in a short time. Each time he removed the eggs the female bird returned to the nest.

The Prairie Warbler is prettily colored. The back is marked with reddish-brown spots on an olive-green ground. Beneath the eye of the male there is a streak of black which is absent in the female. The throat and under parts are a rich yellow color, with small spots of black on the sides of the neck. The female is duller in color.

The nest is nearly always placed in the fork of a branch of either a tree or shrub and never far from the ground. A wild rose bush is sometimes selected. Mr. Welch describes one that he found in such a place. It was mainly constructed of “the soft inner bark of small shrubs mingled with dry rose leaves, bits of wood, woody fibers, decayed stems of plants, spiders’ webs, etc.” These were elaborately woven together and bound by “cotton-like fibers of a vegetable origin.” The nest had a lining of fine fibers and horse hair. He also calls attention to the upper rim of the nest, it “being a strongly interlaced weaving of vegetable roots and strips of bark.”

Mr. Nuttall describes the nest as not unlike that of a summer yellow-bird. He speaks of one that he examined as “being fixed in a trifid branch and formed of strips of inner red cedar bark and asclepias (milkweed) fibers, also with some caterpillar silk, and thickly lined with cud-weed down and slender tops of the bent grass (Agrostis.)”

It is difficult to understand why this bird should be called the Prairie Warbler, unless it is in order to distinguish it from those species that frequent less open places. A much more appropriate name is the Chestnut-backed Yellow Warbler. Though it is found in open places, this little bird would easily elude observation were it not for its peculiar notes, which Mr. Chapman describes as “a series of six or seven quickly repeated zees, the next to the last one the highest.”

APRIL BIRDS AND FLOWERS OF THE MISSISSIPPI GULF COAST

Fickle April, with its sullen showers and teasing, wayward moods, its alternate days of warm sunshine and chilling rain, still leaves us who live north of the fortieth parallel in doubt whether summer really intends to come or not. Not so on the gulf coast; langorous breezes incline one to take life easy, the sun high overhead has the true June fervor, and, if further evidence is needed to convince us, ripening strawberries and blooming roses tell us that summer is here. Gardens filled with huge, flaming amaryllis, fragrant calycanthus and a thousand and one shrubs strange to the northern eye, greet us in every yard. In front of the houses and along the streets, their purple fragrance welcoming every newcomer, stand the China trees, the haunt of busy bees and their indefatigable pursuer the kingbird, or bee martin.

In the lowlands a short distance back from the beach, the azaleas (Azalea nudiflora) are just dropping the last of their pink bloom, a bouquet thrown at the feet of all-conquering summer. Here and there in these jungles of yupon, bay, buttonwood, etc., appears a shrub clad in a filmy white mist. If this be the season for weddings, it must be that this is the bride that greets our eyes. A delicately beautiful bride she is, with arms that toss in the slightest breeze and now and then coyly shove aside the cloudy veil to take a farewell glimpse at the world she leaves.

The natives do not take this view of this shrub (Chionanthus virginicus). They have dubbed it “grand-daddy-gray-beard.” Usually popular names have much to justify them, but in the instance just mentioned, and that of the brilliant red flower which gazes at us from the underbrush, they are suggestive of African superstition rather than Saxon sentiment. The melancholy local fancy sees in these flaming orbs only the power of evil, hence the name “Devil’s eye.” If I could be assured that the devil’s eye is really as beautiful and kind in its expression as its floral representative I would be willing, like Emerson, to call its possessor “the dear old devil.”

Let us go back to the beach and stroll along the shell road, which parallels the shore all the way from Gulfport to Biloxi. Perhaps the glare of the white road is not pleasant to the eyes, but the deep green of live oak and long leafed pine is restful, the mingled fragrance of the salt breeze of the gulf, the resiny odor of the pine and the blossoming wisteria charm the senses and lull us into rapturous content. Only a few of the trees and shrubs which border the highway are of the kinds familiar to observers in Ohio and Illinois. Now and then a water oak or a sweet gum appears; but otherwise in the cypress, pine or live oak of the larger growth, or in the palmetto, Spanish dagger and rattan vine of the undergrowth, the eye looks in vain for old acquaintances.

The live oak certainly has individuality. Shorter and more spreading in its habit of growth than most of its kind, its limbs are gnarled and knotty, strong and muscular with its wrestling with the hurricanes that sweep the bosom of the gulf. It loves the white sand just a few feet above high tide, where it stands as a protector for the weaker growth between the tossing waters and the great pine forest. As is the case with human beings, this vigorous conflict with its surroundings does it good; for no place in the South that I have been have I found the live oaks as plentiful or as vigorous as on this strip of barren sand.

The birds know a good thing when they see it; hence they are well represented here at this season of the year. Our old acquaintance of the Maumee Valley, the Maryland yellow throat, with his cunning black mask and his cheerful if not wholly musical “Wichety, wichety, wichety,” greets us from a perch on a rattan vine, but on our nearer approach dives down into the palmettos, where only the noise made by his tiny feet indicates his whereabouts. Two other warblers, the hooded and the redstart, a little belated, perhaps, have stopped here on their way north to the old nesting grounds on the Kankakee and the Hudson. The most numerous as well as the most conspicuous element of the bird population is the summer tanager, whose intensely scarlet coat adds a touch of vivid color very grateful to the eye. Nearly every oak contains one of these redcoats, whistling a solo for our benefit or discussing the details of housekeeping with his more sober coated little wife.

Almost as numerous as the tanagers, and even more interesting, are the orchard orioles. Their song has more of the fire and ring of true music, a compensation probably for the comparative dullness of their garb. In nest building the orchard oriole is an artist. I remember one day finding in a small water oak a nest so carefully woven out of excelsior as to make me think the bird could knit if he would only turn his talent in that direction. Where twine and excelsior are not easily obtained, no doubt they utilize the long streamers of Spanish moss which hang from half the trees in the gulf country.

Flying about in the gardens, as tame as robins on northern lawns, or sharing the live oaks with the tanagers and orioles, are a multitude of mocking birds. There must be something in Maurice Thompson’s suggestion in “By Ways and Bird Notes” that along this coast the mocking birds find those berries and seeds best adapted to develop a high degree of musical ability and artistic expression, for these birds certainly surpass their brethren found a few hundred miles to the north.

Besides these land birds there are a multitude of sea birds more conspicuous on account of noise and numbers than bright coloring or attractive ways. The herring gull is very plentiful on this coast, wherever sand flats and shallow water offer attractive feeding grounds. It is a pleasant sight to see a dozen of these pearl gray creatures turning and wheeling, as free and easy as the wind. Just in shore from where the gulls are flying are some fish crows, a thoughtless, noisy set, contented to feast on the crabs and stray minnows which have eluded the watchful gulls. At the edge of the water, just where the wavelets of the receding tide curl and swish before turning back to join their fellows, a couple of sandpipers are running a race, now and then stopping to pick up some tidbit left by the water. A shadow flits along the sand. We look up. A great fish hawk or osprey soars seaward. He sails past the noisy crows, past the graceful gulls and steers for Ship Island, that line of darker haze where sky and ocean meet. Truly, April is the season to visit this coast.

James Stephen Compton.

BIRTH STONES

From the earliest times and among all peoples there seem to have been sentiments and superstitions connected with gems. The ancient use of gems is proved by their being found in the oldest tombs of Egypt and by their mention in the earliest books of the Bible, and no less ancient seem to be the mystic properties and powers ascribed to them.

Not only was the power of driving away evil spirits and producing all sorts of “luck” long attributed to them, but as late as the beginning of the eighteenth century reputable physicians were accustomed to mix fragments of them in their medicines and to use them as charms. The study of the uses of gems in this way forms a subject of much interest, but we may confine ourselves here simply to the custom which made a particular gem appropriate to a corresponding month of the year.

The first arrangement of gems into a group of twelve of which we have any record is that in the Book of Exodus. Here in the twenty-eighth chapter, verses 17-19, are prescribed in order, twelve precious stones, which shall be set in the breastplate of the High Priest. The list is repeated in the thirty-ninth chapter of the same book, verses 10-12. In the context it is prescribed that the stones shall be set in four rows and that upon them shall be engraved the names of the Children of Israel, one for each stone. As to the particular stones as they are known to the modern world, which are indicated by the Hebrew words, authorities differ, but in the authorized version of the Bible they are given as follows:

Sardius, topaz, carbuncle,Emerald, sapphire, diamond,Ligure, agate, amethyst,Beryl, onyx, jasper.

It is not probable, however, that these names indicate in each case the corresponding stones of modern usage. Thus it is quite unlikely that the Hebrews could have engraved a name upon the diamond even if they could have obtained one of sufficient size. Again, the words emerald and carbuncle are undoubtedly interchanged in the above list and the ancient topaz is known to have been the modern chrysolite. In the revised version the word jacinth is substituted for ligure and amber is given as a marginal rendering for the same. There are also given marginal renderings for others of the gems, as follows: ruby for sardius, emerald for carbuncle, carbuncle for emerald, sardonyx for diamond, chalcedony for beryl, and beryl for onyx. The modern equivalents of the terms recognized by secret orders which use them in symbolism are: