Our Night Hawk 



By Edward B. Clark 



Our bird friend the nif,'ht hawk is handicapped with a name .su^K*-*stive of 

 chicken thievery and nii(hiij,'ht marauding. In both ICngland and America the 

 word in its plural form has been used for years as one of reproach for vandals 

 who unhinge gates, hang the worthy doctor's sign over the door of the under- 

 taker and rcpkicc the mortar of the apothecary with the spade of the grave-digger. 



The night hawk in some unenlightened country districts still is held to 

 be an enemy of the j)0ultry yard and is classed in the infamy calendar with the 

 sharp-shinned and the cooper's hawks. It would seem that everybody ought to 

 know, but everybody doesn't, that the night hawk is not a hawk at all, but on the 

 contrary, is a beneficial bird, making its chief prey the poisonous mosquito and 

 the pestiferous gnat. 



Year by year the wild-bird colony of Chicago increases in numbers. The 

 night hawks squeak over the city's roofs and rear their young on the hard 

 gravel thereof. The birds are attracting the attention of the populace. Hundreds 

 of people watch them nightly in summer as they pass in rapid and easy flight 

 above the shore line of the lake on the North Side. Just how much the birds 

 do to keep down the plague of insects it is hard even to conjecture, but they 

 have cavernous mouths and capacious stomachs, and their pest-destroying work 

 ceases not from sunset until late night. 



One summer the janitor of a Xorth Side apartment building who had climbed 

 to the roof to look for a leak was something more than startled by a large bird 

 which took to flight with a protesting cry from almost beneath his feet. The 

 janitor barely escaped stepping on two darkly marked eggs which closely resem- 

 bled the larger of the pebbles among which they were placed. There was not 

 a sign of a nest. The night hawk, the roof dweller, lacks either the art or 

 the inclination to provide a soft couch for its young. Theirs is a stony bed, 

 whether made in city or country. 



The janitor told the story of his discovery to a tenant, who for once had 

 the temerity to give orders to the king of the flats. Xo one not properly accred- 

 ited as a bird lover was to have access to the roof. The janitor was of the 

 right sort. "No need to tell me that," he said ; "I wasn't going to tell anybody 

 but you. The man who robs that nest will lose his lea.^e, or I'm no janitor." 



The night hawk hatched its young. The fledglings took their first flight 

 into a darkened world, but they saw their way well enough, for the night hawk 

 holds in contempt the creatures who need anything brighter than starlight to 

 make clear the path. 



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