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The Crane's Back. 
A few weeks ago I was sitting in my lodge talking 
with White Calf, a venerable chief of the Piegan Black- 
feet, It was the time of the medicine lodge, and I was 
asking \ him some questions about the religious cere- 
monies that I had' just witnessed. That morning the 
sacred bonnets had been transferred from the medicine 
lodge women of last year to those of this year, and 
among the ornaments of one or more of these bonnets 
were the stuffed skins of several rail (Porsana Carolina). 
"Why is it, my friend," said I, "that this little bird 
is sacred among the Piegans? Why do they put it on 
these sacred bonnets, and why do they have it in their 
medicine bundles, as I have sometimes seen it and its 
feathers on the stems of the medicine pipes through 
which we pray?" 
"My son, I cannot tell you," he said, "but we all know 
that this little bird has great power. We call it ho-6-tin, 
heel. We do not often see it. Oni" once in a while a per- 
son may see one walking among the grass at the edge 
of some little lake, and then if he stops to look closely 
at it suddenly it disappears and is seen no more. Some- 
times too we hear it. It has a loud voice. It calls out 
strongly. Perhaps this is so that 'its enemies may be 
frightened and run away." 
"Yes." said Big Plume, a middle-aged man, "the heel 
bird has' strong power. I think maybe we consider it 
sacred because it is so scarce a bird on the prairie, and 
because it can hide itself well. Perhaps it is for this rea- 
son that the people use it in the. medicine lodge and use 
its feathers to ornament the stems of the medicine 
pipes." 
"Pi nut u ye is tsim o lean," said White Calf to me. 
"I do not think you know how it is that these little birds 
go to the warm country when -winter draws near." 
"How do they go, father?" said I. 
"I will tell you," he replied.. "The cranes carry them 
on their backs from the north to the warm country. 
They,ride on the cranes. This is how we know it: Once 
a good while ago, in the fall of the year, two cranes 
were going south and alighted on the prairie. Near 
where the cranes were two men were sitting down, and 
they watched them. When the cranes rose to fly on 
their journey southward, the}'' passed over these two 
men, who shot at them and hit one of them; and as it fell 
the men both saw one of these little birds roll off its 
back. This is how we learned first that the cranes carry 
the heel bird to the warm country." 
As he talked there flashed across my memory the 
account of the "crane's back." published many years ago 
in Forest and Stream by Dr. J. C. Merrill, and the 
widespread belief, among the primitive peoples- both in 
the old world and the new, that many small birds per- 
form, their migrations or travel here and there on the 
backs of the larger birds. Of positive scientific evidence 
that this is done there is perhaps but little; yet as will 
be seen from quotations given below some eminent 
ornithologists believe that this takes place, it is gener- 
ally credited among certain tribes of Indians of western 
ftorth America, and is a belief common to the people 
of southern Europe and of northern Africa. 
In order to bring to the reader's mind the chief facts 
which have been printed on this subject we quote from 
Forest and Stream Dr. Merrill's original letter on the 
crane's back, published in March, 1881, and a subsequent 
article printed in Forest and Stream in April, 1888, 
from the pen of the. well-known naturalist Dr. J. E. 
Harting, long the natural history editor of the Loudon 
Field: 
I notice that in the Forest and Stream of Dec. 23 you 
reprint a letter published in the Evening Post on the 
subject of wagtails crossing the Mediterranean Sea on 
the backs of cranes and storks. This has the indorse- 
ment of the eminent ornithologist Von Heuglin, and 
induces me to report a general belief among the Crow 
Indians of Montana that the sandhill crane performs 
the same office for a bird they call napite-shu-utte or "the 
crane's back." This bird I have not yet seen, but from 
the description it is probably a small grebe. It is "big 
medicine," and when obtained is rudely stuffed and care- 
fully preserved. I hope to have one brought to me soon 
for identification. 
The Indian's account of the bird is as follows, and I 
give it for what it may be worth, adding that I have been 
assured by a very intelligent and observing hunter, who 
has lived in Montana for eighteen years, that he has 
noticed the same habit: 
"The 'crane's back' arrives and departs with the sand- 
hill crane, and except when nesting is rarely seen far 
from- that bird. About ten or fifteen per cent, of cranes 
are accompanied by the 'crane's back,' which, as ilie 
crane rises from the ground, flutters up and settles on the 
back between the wings, remaining there until the crane 
alights." 
Such is the Indian account, and many of their hunters 
and chiefs have assured me that they have frequently 
seen the birds carried off in this way. At these times the 
bird is said to keep up a constant chattering whistle, 
which is the origin of the Crow custom of warriors 
going into battle, each with a small bone whistle in his 
mouth; this is continually blown, imitating the note of 
the "crane's back," and as they believe preserves their 
ponies and themselves from wounds, so that in case of 
de'fcslt they may be safely carried away, as is the iiapite- 
shu-utle. The Cree Indians are said to observe the same 
habit in the white crane. J. C. Merrill. 
Fort CnsTER, Montana, February, 1SSI. 
About seven years ago Dr. J. C. Merrill published in 
these cjhimns a most interesting- note on the "crane's' 
back." This, according to the- Crows, from- whom Dr. 
Merrill derived his information, is a small water bird, 
probably a grebe, which is said to perform its migrations 
on the back of the sandhill crane. 
Shortly after the publication of this note, we alluded 
10 Dr. Pae's observations in the far North, which cred- 
ited the Crees with a similar story of a small finch-like 
bird which migrates on the backs of the wild geese. 
Bearing on the same point is a note by our lamented 
friend, J. C. Hughes, who found a young sandhill crane 
unable to fly, under circumstances which pointed strongly 
to its transportation on its. mother's back. 
In a recent number of the London Field, the well- 
known naturalist, Dr. J. E. Harting, calls renewed atten- 
tion to this widespread belief among people, civilized as 
well as savage, and brings together a great deal of inter- 
esting matter bearing on the point in question. He 
says: 
"At a recent meeting of the Linnasan Society, Dr. John 
Rae, the well-known Arctic traveler, read a paper relat- 
ing to the birds and mammals of the Hudson Bay Ter- 
ritories, and in the course of his remarks referred to the 
assertion of the Cree Indians, both at Moose and York 
Factory, that a small passerine bird, which was pointed 
out to him, but the name of which he has forgotten, 
habitually avails itself of the Canada goose when migrat- 
ing to get a lift in the same direction, they having fre- 
quently seen it fly off from a goose when shot or shot at 
on the wing. All the coast Indians of Hudson Bay, says 
Dr. Rae, devote a month or more every spring to shoot- 
ing wildfowl (chiefly geese), the birds killed forming their 
entire food for the time. As soon as the geese begin to 
arrive the Indian constructs a concealment of willows 
and grass, usually near a pool of open water, at the edge 
of which he sets up decoys. When geese are seen ap- 
proaching, usually flying at a great height, the Indian 
imitates their call, and the geese, on seeing the decoys, 
circle round, gradually coming lower down until within 
shot, when they are fired at. It is from high-flying 
geese that the small birds are seen to come. If the geese 
are flying low it is a pretty sure indication that they have 
already rested on the ground somewhere near after their 
long flight, when of course their tiny passengers would 
have alighted. The Indians on the shores of Athabasca 
and Great Slave lakes — both great resorts of wild geese 
— and those living on the Mackenzie River, more than 
1,000 miles to the northwest of Moose Factory, tell the 
same story, and from the positive statements which were 
made to him on the subject Dr. Rae saw no reason to 
doubt the assertion. So far as he could ascertain, the 
Canada goose is the only species in North America which 
thus acts the part of a locomotive, and conveys small 
passengers from pTace to place ; but in Europe and Africa 
the common crane and the stork have on very respecta- 
ble authority been credited with performing a similar 
friendly office. 
"Dr. Lennep, in his 'Bible Customs in Bible Lands,' 
refers to the many small birds which find their way from 
Palestine into Arabia and Egypt on the backs of cranes, 
over lofty mountains and sea, which without such aid it 
would be difficult to cross. In the autumn flocks of 
cranes are seen coming from the north with the first cold 
blast from that quarter, flying low, and uttering peculiar 
cries as they circle over the cultivated plains. Little 
birds of different species may then be seen flying up to 
them, while the twittering of those already comfortably 
settled upon their backs may be distinctly heard. On 
their return in spring they fly high, perhaps considering 
that their little passengers can easily find their way down 
to the earth. 
"Ill some instances, however, the small birds have been 
seen to come off the backs of the larger ones just as the 
latter were about to alight. An American visitor to the 
Island of Crete in the autumn of 1878, as related by Prof. 
Claypole, of Antioch College, Yellow Springs, O. 
(Nature, Feb. 24, 1881), satisfied himself that wagtails 
and other small birds cross over from Europe on their 
southward migration on the backs of cranes; and al- 
though on first hearing the statements made he was 
extremely incredulous, he afterward, on one occasion, 
had ocular demonstration of the fact. A fisherman in 
his presence discharging his flint-lock at a flock of pas- 
sing cranes, he saw three small birds rise up from among 
them and disappear. 
"A German author, Adolf Ebeling, writing in the 
Gartenlaube, asserts that he found it currently believed 
at Cairo that wagtails and other small birds cross from 
Europe to Nubia and Abyssinia on the backs of storks 
and cranes, and details the result of conversations which 
he had with several independent witnesses, all testifying 
to the same thing. He then proceeds: At supper in- the 
Hotel du Nill I related the curious story to all present, 
but naturally enough found only unbelieving ears. The 
only one who did not laugh-was the Privy-Councillor Von 
Heuglin, the famous African traveler, and excepting 
Brehm the most celebrated authority of our time on the 
birds of Africa.' On asking his opinion, he remarked, 
'Let others laugh; they know nothing about it. I do not 
laugh, for the thing is well known to me. I should have 
made mention of it in my work if I had had any personal 
proof to justify it. I consider the case probable, though 
I cannot give any warrant for it.' 'My discovery, if 1 
may so call it,' continues Herr Ebeling, T would have 
kept to myself, even after Heuglin had thus expressed 
himself, had I not since discovered a new authority for it. 
In the second edition of Dr. Petermann's great book of 
travels I find the following: 'Prof. Roth, of Munich, 
related to me, in Jerusalem, that the. well-known Swedish 
traveler, Hedenborg, made an interesting observation on 
the island of Rhodes, where he was staying. In the 
autumn, when the storks came in flocks over the sea to 
Rhodes, he often heard the notes of small birds, without 
being able to see them; but on one occasion he observed 
a party of storks just as they alighted, and saw several 
small birds come off their backs, having been 1 thus 
evidently transported by them across the sea.' 
"In the face of such testimony then as that above 
mentioned, and the admission of his belief in the story by 
so experienced an ornithologist as Heuglin, the conclu- 
sion seems inevitable that there must be some truth in it, 
and it has received some confirmation from a singular 
observation since made in England. Mr. T. H. Nelson, 
of Redcar, writing to the Zoologist for February, 1882 
(p. 73), reports an occurrence related to him by an eye 
witness, Mr. Wilson, the foreman on the South Gare 
Breakwater, at the mouth of the Tees, which bears direct- 
ly on the question at issue. 
"On the morning of Oct. 16, fine and cold, wind north- 
erly, Wilson was at the end of the Gare when he saw a 
'woodcock owl' (short-eared owl) 'come flopping across 
the sea.' As it came nearer he saw something between 
its shoulders, and wondered what it could be. The owl 
[Sept. tf, 
came and lit on the gearing within 10yds. of where he 
was standing, and directly it came down a little bird 
dropped off its back and flew along the Gare. He sig- 
nalled for a gun, but the owl saw him move, and flew off. 
He followed the small bird, however" and secured it, and 
on taking it to the local bird-stuff er for preservation 
learned that it was a golden-crested wren. To see its 
irregular and apparently weak flight in passing through 
the air on a stormy day it would never be supposed that 
so tiny a creature as the golden-crested wren would 
attempt to cross the sea, or would succeed in doing so if 
it tried. But that it travels to and from the Continent in 
spring and autumn is a fact which has been well ascer- 
tained by many competent obervers. On the coasts of 
Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, says Mr. Cordeaux, the 
autumnal migration of the gold-crest is as well known as 
that of the woodcock, and from its usually arriving just 
before that species it is known as the 'woodcock pilot.' 
The North Sea fishermen assert that these little birds 
often alight on their boats, and in foggy weather perish 
by hundreds. The same thing has been observed by Mr. 
E. T. Booth off the coast of Norfolk. There is then noth- 
ing so improbable as might at first sight appear in a gold- 
crest crossing the North Sea and alighting tired on the 
broad platform afforded by the expansive back and wings 
of a short-eared owl traveling at slower speed beneath 
it. At any rate, the fact remains that the gold-crest 
was seen to descend from the owl's back when the latter 
alighted, and its identity was placed beyond doubt by its 
subsequent capture. There is, verily, in heaven and earth 
much that is stilfundreamed of in our philosophy." 
Dr. Merrill, who has kindly loaned me his clippings 
on this subject, writes that his reason for believing the 
bird described by the Crows to be a grebe was that they 
said it sometimes (or usually) alighted in the water. "In 
other respects a rail agrees perfectly with their account." 
But of course we must remember that in being inter- 
preted from one language to another matters are likely 
to be more or less misunderstood, and that the Crows 
may have said alighted near by or close to the water, 
which the interpreter may have translated as "in." The 
"chattering whistle" which gives the bird a part of its im- 
portance among the Crows certainly applies well to the 
rail. Among the Blackfeet the bird was identified as 
stated by specimens. Geo. Bird Grtnnell. 
New York. 
Snakes in Captivity. 
Some years ago, when the writer was returning from 
a ramble through the Pennsylvania woods, his attention 
was attracted to a rustling in the grass, and there he saw 
a tiriy toad struggling feebly to escape from the jaws oi 
a slender snake, whose delicately striped body resembled 
a dainty bit of ribbon. While watching the little toad dis- 
appear down the reptile's rapidly moving jaws, a new 
arrival appeared upon the scene; from among some loosu 
stubble glided a spotted snake of much larger propor- 
tions than the first, and quickly grasping the smaller by 
the head swallowed feaster and toad until only an inch 
or so of wriggling tail protruded from its mouth, when, 
observing the human intruder, it turned quickly and dis- 
appeared whence it came. 
This curious little tragedy, so quickly enacted and 
among such queer creatures, excited the writer's interest 
in the serpent race and prompted him to collect and 
study the habits of these creatures. 
In a number of large glass-fronted cages are the 
snakes of his collection; some lying coiled and motion- 
less; some gliding slowly up and down branches pro- 
vided them, while others, from the desert regions, Ho 
buried in the sand at the bottom of their cages, with 
only the head and neck protruding from the surface. 
It is feeding time and the snakes are about to be pro- 
vided with their weekly meal— the diet is variable, con- 
sisting of frogs, mice and fishes. A mouse is placed in 
the cage with the deadly desert viper — the horned cerastes 
from Egypt — the little creature runs timidly about, not 
observing the scaly gray body with sinister heart-shaped 
head that has been so slowly issuing from the sand. The. 
serpent's neck is drawn back into the shape of a letter 
S, and its glassy eyes have dilated as it prepares to 
spring. Suddenly there is a flash of its pink jaws, a 
feeble squeak, and the little gray mouse lies quivering 
before it, struck by the deadly fangs. Carefully the 
reptile examines the body of its victim, and after satis- 
fying itself that the prey is quite dead it slowly engulfs 
its meal, swallowing it entire, and without mastication, 
when it once more crawls into the sand, disappearing for 
a moment, only to again thrust forth the head and neck 
to await, motionless and silent, the approach of further 
prey. . '' , " 
Far differently does the agile milk snake of our New 
England States attack the mouse introduced into its 
cage. This reptile is harmless, and must kill its prey 
by force. Quickly it rushes upon the terrified rodent 
and grasps it by the nose, while coil after coil of the 
spotted body are thrown around the struggling creature, 
which is quickly squeezed to death. But here is still an- 
other snake eagerly waiting its meal; this species, our 
common garter snake, has no power to squeeze its prey 
to death, so swallows it alive, a fish rapidly disappearing 
down the elastic jaws of the reptile, when it darts for- 
ward ready for more. 
Thus snakes take their prey in three different ways: 
The venomous reptiles killing it by a stroke from the 
fangs, the harmless constrictors squeezing it to death, 
and lastly the little garter snake which gobbles down it v 
food without further ado. 
Snakes in captivity become remarkably gentle and 
tame, and' seem to enjoy being handled. They are per- 
fectly devoid of slime, their shiny appearance being 
caused by the delicate, highly polished scales. A slender 
blacksnake, which has been in captivity for a number 
of years, is often allowed the. liberty of the writer's 
room, and seems to take great delight in roaming abom, 
satisfying its curiosity. In winter it will frequently be 
found coiled in the wicker work of a chair near the 
fire, enjoying the warmth, while in summer it seeks 
more elevated quarters, and may be seen stretched, along 
the top of a curtain rod, peerine over the side and water- 
ing every movement of a visitor. 
In a perfectly round coil, its vivid markings of green 
