NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



399 



soundfi aud voices adapted to express their vari- 

 ous pasbious, ■wants, and feelings — such as an- 

 ger, fear, love, hatred, hunger, aud the like. All 

 species are not equally eloquent ; some are co- 

 pious and fluent, as it were, in their utterance, 

 while others are confined to a few important 

 Founds ; no bird, like the fish kind, is quite mute, 

 though some arc rather silent. The language of 

 birds is very ancient, and, like other ancient 

 modes of speech, very elliptical ; little is said, 

 but much is meant aud understood. 



The notes of the eagle kind are .shrill and 

 piercing, aud. about the season of uidification, 

 much diversified, as I have been often assured 

 bj' a curious observer of Nature, who long re- 

 aided at Gibraltar, where eagles abound. The 

 notes of our hawks much resemble those- of the 

 king of bird.s. Owls have very expressive 

 notes; tliey hoot in a fine vocal sound, much re- 

 sembling the vox humana, aud reducible by a 

 pitchpipo to a mu.sical key. This uote seems 

 to express complacencj' and rivalry among the 

 males: they use also a quick call and a hoirible 

 scream, and can snore and hiss when they mean 

 to menace. Ravens, besides their loud croak, 

 can exert a deep aud solemn note that makes 

 the woods to echo ; the amorous .sound of a crow 

 is .strange and ridiculous; rooks, in the breed- 

 ing season, attempt sometimes, in the gayety of 

 their hearts, to sing, but with no great succe.ss; 

 the parrot kin! liavo many modulationy-of voice, 

 as appears by their aptitude to leani human 

 sounds ; doves coo in an amorous and mournful 

 manner, and are emblems of despairing lovers; 

 \ tlie woodpecker sets up a sort of louil and hearty 

 i laugh ; the fernowl, or goat-sucker, from the 

 I dusk till daybreak, .serenades his mate with the 

 ' clattering of castanets. All the tuneful /^a.'ssercs 

 ' express their complacenc}- by sweet modula- 

 tions and a variety of melody. The swallow, 

 as has been observed in a former letter, by a 

 shrill alarm, Viespcaks the attention of the other 

 hirundincs, and bids them be aware that the 

 ha^vk isnthand. Aquatic and ffrcgarious birds, 

 especially the nocturnal, that shift their quarters 

 in the dark, are very nois^' and locjuacious — as 

 cranes, wild-geese, wild-ducks, and the like ; 

 their perpetual clamor prevents them from dis- 

 persing and losing their companions. 



In so extensive a subject, sketches and out- 

 lines are as much as can be expected; for it 

 would be endless to instance in all the infinite 

 variety of the feathered nation. \Ve shall there- 

 fore confine the remainder of this letter to the 

 few domestic fowls of our yards, wiiich are 

 most known, and, therefore, best understooil. — 

 And first, the peacock, with his gorgeous train, 

 demands our attention; but, like mo.st of the 

 gaudy birds, his notes are grating and shocking 

 to the ear : the yelling of cats, and the braying 

 of an ass, are not more disgustful. The voice of 

 the goose is trumpet-like and clanking, and once 

 saved the Cai)itol at Kf>me. as grave historians 

 assert; the hiss, also, of the gander is formida- 

 ble and full of menace, and " protective of his 

 young."' Among ducks the sexual distinction 

 of voice is remarkable ; for, while the quack of 

 the female is loud and sonorous, the voice of the 

 drake is inward, and harsh, and feeble, and 

 scarce discernible. The cork turkey struts and 

 gobbles to his mistress in a most uncouth man- 

 ner ; he hath also a pert and petulant note when 

 he attacks his adversary. When a hen turkey 

 -leads fortli her young brood, she keeps a watch- 

 ful eye; and if a bird of prey appear, though 

 ever 80 high in tlie air, tlie careful mother an- 

 (811) 



nounces the enemy with a little inward moan, 

 and watches him with a steady and attentive 

 look ; but, if he approach, her note becomes 

 canie.st and alarming, and her outcries are re- 

 doubled. 



No inhabitants of a yard seem possessed of 

 such a variety of expression, and so copious a 

 language, as common poultry. Take a cliicken 

 of four or five days old. and hold it up to a win- 

 dow where there are flies, and it will immediate- 

 ly seize its prey with little twitterings of com- 

 placency ; but, if you tender it a wasp or a bee, 

 at once its note becomes harsh and expressive 

 of disapprobation and a sense of danger. When 

 a pullet is ready to lay, she intimates the event 

 by a Joyous and easy, sr.ofi note. Of all the oc- 

 currences of their life, that of laying seems to 

 be the most important ; for, no .sooner has a hen 

 disburdened herself, than she rushes forth with 

 a clamorous kind of joy, which the cock and the 

 rest of his mistresses immediately adopt. The 

 tumult is not confined to the family concerned, 

 but catches from yard to yard, and spreads to 

 every homestead within hearing, till at last the 

 whole village is in an uproar. As soon as a hen 

 becomes a mother, her new relation demands a 

 new language ; she then runs clucking and 

 screaming about, and seems agitated as if pos- 

 sessed. The father of the flock has also a con- 

 siderable vocabulary ; if he finds food, he calls a 

 favorite concubine to partake ; and, if a bird of 

 prey passes over, with a warning voice he bids 

 his family beware. The gallant chanticleer has 

 at command his amorous phrases and his terms 

 of defiance. But the sound by which he is best 

 known is his crowing; by this he has been dis- 

 tinguished in all ages as the countryman's clock 

 or larum — as the watchman that proclaims the 

 divisions of the night. Thus Uie poet elegantly 

 styles him 



" The crested cock, whose clarion sounds 

 The silent hours." 



A neighboring gentleman one summer had 

 lost most of his chickens by a sparrow-hawk, 

 that came gliding down between a faggot pile 

 and the end of his house to the place where the 

 coops stood. The owner, inwardly vexed to 

 see his flock thus diminishing, hung a setting 

 net adroitly between the pile and the house, in- 

 to which the caitiff dashed and was entangled. 

 Resentment suggested the law of retaliation ; 

 he therefore clipped the hawk's win?.a, cut off" 

 his talons, and, fixing a cork on his bill, threw 

 him down among the brood-hens. Imagination 

 cannot paint the scene that ensued ; the expre.s- 

 sions that frar, rage and revenge ins])ired were 

 new, or at least .such as had been unnoticed be- 

 fore. The exa.spcrated matrons upbraided — 

 they execrated, they insulted, they triumphed. 

 In a word, they never desisted from buffeting 

 their adversary till they had torn him in a hun- 

 dred pieces. 



Thn.s, instead of a line of introduction merely, 

 as we had intended, to a long but most impress- 

 ive essay from an English periodical, we have 

 been led on to add chapter upon chapter. 



What a beautiful parlor-table hook, by-the- 

 bye. might be made on the Natural History of 

 Lonq Island ! with colored drawings of speci- 

 mens and of individuals of all the departments 

 to be found there, where still exists such a 

 wonderful proportion. of all the knowu birds of 

 North America. 



