232 LESSONS TAUGHT BY THEM. contrasting them with the bird, which knows the will of its Maker, and hesitates not to do it:-'The turtle, and the crane, and the swallow, observe the time of their coming, but my people know not the judgement of the Lord.' We recall to mind that Anacreon and Ælian, and Aristotle and Pliny, and other heathen poets and sages, have sung and written of this little bird none the less sweetly and pleasantly for the mistakes as to some of its habits which their limited knowledge of its natural history caused them to fall into. As we glance through the poetic literature of all countries, allusions to the Swallow constantly attract our attention, and most usually these are of a joyous or devotional character: for a few only, in addition to those already quoted, can we find space, and these shall be from those of our own age and country. But first one from our American favourite, Longfellow, who in his prose poem 'Hyperion' says of one of the characters: 'The heyday of life is over with him; but his old age is sunny and chirping, and a merry heart still nestles in his tottering frame, like a Swallow that builds in a tumbledown chimney.' And again, before we come nearer home, let us read a lesson of mutual dependence from a French author, who has written much true poetry in a prose form- M. de Lamennais, from whose 'Book of the People' we now quote: All nature tells us of the indispensable need which all have each of the other. The divine precept of mutual aid, of selfdevotion, and of love, is every moment recalled to us by what we behold around us. When the time is come for the Swallows to seek in another country the food which their heavenly Father has prepared for them, they assemble, and, without again dispersing, the aerial voyagers fly towards the shores where they will repose in peace and abundance. Alone, what would become of each one of them? Not one would escape the perils of the journey. But united they resist the winds; the tired or feeble wing rests on a wing less frail. Poor little gentle creatures which the last spring saw hatched, the youngest sheltered by the old ones, reach, under their protection, the term of their voyage, and, on the distant shore to which Providence has conducted them beyond the seas, dream of their native nests, and those first joys, mysterious and unspeakable, which God has planted for all tribes of being at the gate of life. The great French lyrist, Béranger, has, we remember, also written a poem, Les Hirondelles- the Swallowsin which 'a captive on the Moorish strand' asks the birds migrating southward from his father's land for news from home, and calls up pictures of what may be passing there, which do but add to his present misery. By some of our own poets the Swallow is made the emblem of summer friends, who fly when wintry clouds and storms are gathering in the horizon: thus Sheridan Knowles makes Hero, in the play of' Woman's Wit,' say— Do you take me for A season friend, no stauncher than the bird The sun doth tell his time to come and go, And's with us when 't is summer? Oh, you wrong me! The land he makes his gay sojourning in, My friend, because 't is leaf and blossom time? An older dramatist Beaumont or Fletcher, we know not which — has the same idea in Wit without Money.' Valentine says You imagine now That I am at the last, as also that my friends Thus it is, too, that an old English divine, Bishop Hall, moralises on A SWALLOW IN THE CHIMNEY. Here is music, such as it is; but how long will it hold? When a cold morning comes, my guest is gone, without either warning or thanks. This pleasant season hath the least need of cheerful notes; the dead of winter shall want and wish them 231 FAREWELL TO THE SWALLOWS. in vain. Thus doth an ungrateful parasite. No man is more ready to applaud and enjoy our prosperity; but when with the times our condition begins to alter, he is a stranger at least. Give me that bird which will sing in winter, and come to my window in the hardest frost. There is no trial of friendship but adversity. He that is not ashamed of my bonds, not daunted with my checks, not alienated with my disgrace, is a friend for me. One dram of that man's love is worth a world of false and inconstant formality. But we love not to think of this gentle and much-loved bird as an unfaithful friend; rather would we dwell on the lessons of cheerful activity in an appointed round of duties, of love and obedience and dependence on divine support, which it teaches. Like Bernard Barton we would say Aerial voyager, thou spread'st thy wing O'er trackless waves to seek a summer clime; Rather would we, on this bright October morn, as we watch the late voyagers Proving their strength in many an airy ring, as Jago has it, and gathering all their energies for the coming conflict with the elements, wish them 'God speed,' in the words of Carrington — Without you spring Would lose the charm; for you have ever been In silence through the emerald meads. Then plume WOODPECKERS: CHAPTER XI. THE GREAT BLACK, PIED, STRIATED, AND With shrill and oft-repeated cry Her angular course, alternate rise and fall, Start from each chink that bores the mouldering stem: And brighter scarlet sparkles on her crest. GISBORNE'S Walks in a Forest. HE British Woodpeckers, of whose movements in search Tof Those in search of prey so graphic a picture is given in the above lines, belong to an extensive family group, distinguished by the generic term Picus. Members of this family are found in nearly all parts of the world, and abound most in the warmer climates. They are all scansorial or climbing 202 WHY CALLED WRYNECK. seen the Green Woodpecker takes its food in the same manner.' เ Knapp, in his Journal of a Naturalist,' describes this bird as, Shy, and unusually timid, as if all its life was spent in the deepest retirement, away from man. It remains through the day on some ditch bank, or basks with seeming enjoyment on the ant-hills nearest to its retreat; and these it depopulates for food, by means of its long glutinous tongue, which, with the insects, collects much of the soil of the heaps, as we find a much larger portion of grit in its stomach than is usually met with in that of other birds. When disturbed, it escapes by a flight precipitate and awkward, hides itself from our sight, and were not its haunts and habits known, we should never conjecture that this bustling fugitive was our long-forgotten spring visitant, the Wryneck.' The note of this bird is a shrill cry, which has been compared to the scream of the Kestrel; when disturbed in its nest, or in any way alarmed, it makes a hissing sound, like that of a snake, or it barks, erects the feathers of its neck; hence the names Snake Bird, and Turkey Bird, given to it. The name Wryneck, which was probably originally Writhe-neck, corresponding to the Latin name Torquilus or Torticollis, is derived from the curious habit of moving the neck and head in various directions with a slow undulatory motion, which it performs almost constantly when in a state of captivity; ruffling out the feathers of its head, spreading its broad fan-like tail, advancing and retiring, and striking the bottom of its cage with its bill, if anyone approaches it. The nest of the Wryneck is merely the rounded bottom of a cavity, or hole in a tree, which the bird adapts to its purpose by means of its bill, the small pieces chipped off in the process serving instead of straw or feathers for a lining. The eggs, which are generally seven or eight in |