BIRDS WITH A HANDICAP 



own, we are going to call things whatever we like, so 

 we shall speak of this order as the "handicapped" birds, 

 because their weak hands seem so unfitted for the 

 world's work. Were it not for their strong wings, the 

 handicap would be too much for them. 



For convenience sake only, I shall speak of the swifts 

 in the chapter with the swallows, and go on now to these 

 most singular of our birds, the Whippoorwill and the 

 Nighthawk. The ancients called birds of this order 

 "goatsuckers," from the absurd superstition that they 

 sucked the milk from goats with their large mouths, as 

 vampire bats have been said to do. Slander is hard to 

 down, and the bad name has stuck to them ever since. 



"Are the Whippoorwill and Nighthawk the same 

 birds .^" This is a question which people ask me over 

 and over again. Well, I should say not! They re- 

 semble each other in form and size, and are closely 

 related species, belonging to the same family group, 

 but their habits are very different. The difference is 

 about like that between the Song and Chipping Spar- 

 row^s, the Wood Thrush and the Veery among thrushes, 

 or the Oven-bird and the Redstart among warblers. 

 The Whippoorwill is probably partly to blame for this 

 confusion, for it will seldom give people a good look at 

 it, coming out of its retreat in the woods only after dusk. 

 It looks like the Nighthawk in form, as it flies, so peo- 

 ple imagine that the familiar "whip-poor-will" is the 

 Nighthawk's evening song and use both names as for 

 the same bird. 



102 



