BIRDS IN GENERAL. 3* 



CHAPTER II. 



OF TKE GENERATION, NESTLING, AND INCUBATION OP BIRDS. 



THE return of spring is the beginning of pleasure. Those vitas 

 spirits, which seemed locked up during the winter, then begin to ex- 

 pand ; vegetables and insects supply abundance of food ; and the bird, 

 having more than a sufficiency for its own subsistence, is impelled to 

 transfuse life, as well as to maintain it. Those warblings which had 

 been hushed during the colder seasons, now begin to animate the 

 fields ; every grove and bush resounds with the challenge of anger, or 

 the call of allurement. This delightful concert of the grove, which is 

 so much admired by man, is no way studied for his amusement : it is 

 usually the call of the male to the female ; his efforts to sooth her 

 during the times of incubation ; or it is a challenge between two males, 

 for the affections of some common favourite. 



It is by this call that birds begin to pair at the approach of spring, 

 and provide for the support of a future progeny. The loudest notes 

 are usually from the male, while the hen seldom expresses her consent, 

 but in a short, interrupted twittering. This compact, at least for the 

 season, holds with unbroken faith : many birds live with inviolable 

 fidelity together for a constancy ; and when one dies, the other is al- 

 ways seen to share the same fate s.oon after. We must not take our 

 idea of the conjugal fidelity of birds, from observing the poultry in our 

 yards, whose freedom is abridged, and whose manners are totally cor- 

 rupted by slavery. We must look for it in our fields and our forests, 

 where -nature continues in unadulterated simplicity ; where the num- 

 ber of males is generally equal to that of females ; and where every 

 little animal seems prouder of his progeny, than pleased with his 

 mate. Were it possible to compare sensations, the male of all wild 

 birds seems as happy in the young brood as the female ; and all his 

 former caresses, all his soothing melodies, seem only aimed at that im- 

 portant occasion when they are both to become parents, and to educate 

 a progeny of their own producing. The pleasures of love appear dull 

 in their effects, when compared to the interval immediately after the 

 exclusion of their young. They both seem at that season transported 

 with pleasure ; every action testifies their pride, their importance, and 

 their tender solicitude. 



When the business of fecundation is performed, the female then be- 

 gins to lay. Such eggs as have been impregnated by the cock are 

 prolific ; and such as have not, for she lays often without any congress 

 whatsoever, continue barren, and are only addled by incubation. Pre- 

 vious, however, to laying, the work of nestling becomes the common 

 care ; and this is performed with no small degree of assiduity and appa 

 rent design. It has been asserted, that birds of one kind always make 

 their nests in the same manner, and of the same materials : but the 



