Jan. i6, 1904.] 
FOREST AND STREAM 
46 
every ten rods. I remember a ledge of rocks back of the 
little settlement known as Wilson's Mills, which seemed 
a favorite breeding place for these birds, and in the space 
of every four or five rods a female was incubating her 
eggs. The male assists the female in incubating, as I 
have witnessed many times; when perching by her on a 
limb of a tree or a fence rail, he always sits along the 
limb or rail, instead of across it, a peculiarity which js 
also noticeable in the whip-poor-will. Some authors in 
alluding to this fact, explain it by noticing the compara- 
tively small size of the feet, and apparent weakness of the 
legs. I think this can hardly be a sufficient cause, for 
both species while on the ground can run with consider- 
able speed, and if captured cannot only perch across the 
finger or the branch or the back of a chair, as I have 
proved, but can rest on one foot, drawing the other up 
into the feathers of the belly like other birds. 
"About the last of August after the young have become 
able to provide for themselves, all the families in a given 
neighborhood assemble in a large scattered flock, after 
ihe manner of the swallows, and after having become 
completely recruited from the labors of incubation, they 
all leave for the South." 
The name "night hawk" is a misnomer, for it is abroad 
the greater portion of the day in search of its insect prey, 
which, like the swallow, it sometimes seeks high in the 
air, so high as to be almost invisible. 
It prefers pasture lands, barrens, and other rather deso- 
late places to heavily wooded localities; in the extensive 
had never imagined there were so many night hawks in 
cre-'tion. 
Of course the birds were in their autumnal migration, 
but how they managed to get together in such numbers, 
or why they shorild simultaneously be seized \yith the 
desire to thus come together at that particular time and 
by that special route, has always been inexplicable to mo. 
Whether they kept together until they arrived at their 
winter home or their numbers were scattered as they 
moved southward we shall never know, for I never heard 
of any other ornithologist making note of, this procession. 
Birds of such rapidity of flight as the night hawk could, 
no doubt, move in very long stages. 
My friend, Mr. C. J. Maynard, in writing me on the 
velocity of the flight of birds, says, according to his own 
and others' observations, gee.se, swans, and other large 
species move at upward of 100 miles an hour; thus they 
can readily accomplish a distance of 1,000 miles between 
meals. Ducks, especially the smaller species, like teal, 
scaup, etc., move more rapidly than this, the average be- 
ing probably as high as 150 miles per hour. Shore birds 
move even more rapidly, averaging 180 miles per hour. 
It is a well established fact that the golden plover some- 
times may take one uninterrupted flight from Newfound- 
land to the West Indies in a straight line, thus covering 
3,200 miles. Now, if these birds can cover such great 
distances, there is no reason why the night hawk cannot 
make such long flights also. 
There is no doubt that it flies across from the conti- 
siiiiii' 
IlilH 
■ii i 
ill 
liiiiii 
IIBIIMI 
1^ 
THE NTGHT HAWK. 
From Audubon's "Birds of America." 
tracts of barrens in Annapolis and Queens counties in 
Nova Scotia it is very abundant, scores of birds often 
being in sight in any given spot. 
It is one of the most widely distributed of all our 
native birds; it ranges from Texas and Florida on the 
south to high northern latitudes, and from the Atlantic 
Ocean westward to the great central plains. At Mata- 
nioras Mr. Dresser discovered it to be a rather abundant 
summer resident, and throughout the fur countries Dr. 
Richardson found it to be an abundant and well-known 
ipecies. 
The m.agnitude of its numbers can hardly be estimated. 
I once had a good opportunity to form an idea of how 
numerous the species is. I was tenting on Grand Lake 
Stream, the connecting link between two of the Schoodic 
lakes, Maine, in September, forty years ago. 
I was sitting with my companions one evening before 
cur camp-fire enjoying our go-to-bed smoke; the moon, 
which was nearly in its full, illuminated the scenery 
around us with almost the brightness of day. As we sat 
there swapping fish stories and recalling pleasant remi- 
niscences, our attention was attracted by the flutter- 
ing of wings around us, and looking up we discovered 
that there were hundreds, if not thousands, of long- 
winged birds darting about us, but all seemingly moving 
in one general direction, from north to south. To ascer- 
tain what they were I seized my gun and selecting one 
of the birds that Was winging its way within easy reach, 
I dropped it, and to our surprise we discovered' it was 
a night hawk. That such a prodigious number of these 
birds, which kept up a procession several hours in length, 
CQtild be of this species was simply astounding to us. We 
nent to Nova Scotia in the spring and autumn ; the dis- 
tance across Massachusetts Bay and the Bay of Fundy is 
no trifling matter, and this is undoubtedly covered by 
many thousands of smaller birds, warblers, sparrows, 
swallows, and other migratory species, and we know, 
also, that myriads of other migratory birds cross the 
]\]editerranean Sea every year. 
The night hawk is not the only species of our fer(2 
■naturce that is more or less often seen in Greater New 
York, as can be easily proved by those who will take the 
trouble to look around them. 
A year or more ago Forest and Stream printed a com- 
munication from me which noted the occurrence of a 
pair of weasels or ermines in Fordham ; in the same 
neighborhood I have seen the striped squirrel and the 
gray squirrel, and have whhin a year flushed a cornmon 
bittern or "stake driver" in the swamp through which a 
small. creek runs in the same locality. 
One afternoon last summer as I was enjoying a stroll 
through Riverside Park, I chanced to look upward and 
saw, high in the air, a great blue heron that was winging 
its way across the Hudson River, its destination probably 
being the extensive stretch of marshes a few miles the 
other side of the Palisades in New Jersey; whence it 
came of course we can only conjecture, but there are 
hundreds of localities along the Sound that would have 
attractions for the bird, and the heron could easily cover 
such a trifling distance as I have named. 
To be sure, not every one has the leisure and inclina- 
tion to spend much time in gazing skyward, but tho.se 
who are thus lilessed will often see birds winging their 
way in variowa, directions whose presence would hardly 
be looked for in the neighborhood of one of the greatest 
cities on earth, ■ ■ 
It has been my practice for years to thus scan the 
heavens, and almost always I have seen something' inter- 
esting in the ornithological line. 
Once while resting on a seat in Central Park I saw 
soaring high up in the air a bald eagle, and a very lafge 
one at that. There was no mistaking the identity of 
the bird, for I have seen in past years a number of them 
in flight. On other occasions I have seen wedge-shaped 
flocks of geese and ducks winging their course across 
the sky, and flocks of plover and other shore birds are 
common. 
In fact, if one had a favorable situation from which to 
make his observations, I have no doubt that he would, 
almost any day in summer or autumn, be amply repaid 
for the time consumed. 
I have, once or twice when sitting by my window at 
night, heard the unmistakable note of the qua bird, or 
night heron, high up in the air, and on two different occa- 
sions have at night heard the shrill, quavering cry of the 
loon as he was winging his way over the metropolis. 
The presence of large birds in the neighborhood of a 
great city, however, is not confined to New York, for 
scoters, coots, and other sea ducks and black ducks often 
pass the winter in the Back Bay Fens and the Charles 
River in Boston, where they seem to know intuitively that 
gunners will not molest them; and the same aquatic fowl 
are often seen on the Delaware River near Philadelphia, 
while steamers and tugboats ply around them. 
Lions for Two Presidents. 
Correspondence New York Eveninf; Post. 
Consul-General Skinner, now cn his return from the 
Abyssinian capital, "has been charged to deliver to the 
President two lions" as a present from King Menelik; 
and, as they could not well be shipped by express from 
Abyssinia, presumably the Consul-General has them in 
his personal custody. It is to be hoped he enjoys the 
mission thus imposed upon him better than a certain 
earlier consular officer did a like trust. 
In 1839, while Thomas N. Carr was Consul at Tangier, 
a rumor came to him from Fez that the Emperor of 
^lorocco intended making him the recipient of some bar- 
baric present or other expressive of his regard for the 
Government of the United States. Consul Carr took im- 
mediate alarm, and sought the bashaw, who was the chief 
official at Tangier, to remonstrate. From the bashaw he 
got no satisfaction, and set about communicating with 
the Emperor; but, before he could do so, there came to 
his door a glittering official, attended by a file of soldiers, 
and bringing a full-grown lion and lioness— the finest 
ones, said Mr. Carr, that he had ever seen. The Morpccan 
official said he had come to give the Consul the lions as a 
present. The Consul said he could not take presents; the 
laws did not permit it. "But you are expected to forward 
these to your President," said the official. The Consul 
said that the laws of Congress did not permit the Presi- 
dent, either, to accept presents from a foreign Power. 
"Then you may send them tq your Congress," replied the 
official. "But," remonstrated tthe distressed Consul, "Con- 
gress will not accept presents; it has resolved to that 
efi^ect." "Well," next inquired the Moroccan, "who is 
back of your Congress — who is the highest authority in 
your country?" "The people," responded the American. 
"Then send the lions to the American people," was the 
conclusive and triumphant answer of the official. Then 
thfe Consul refused point-blank to receive the lions for 
anybody or on any terms. "But," answered the Moroc- 
can, "that is impossible. T have been sent to give you 
these lions, and give them to you T must and shall ; it is 
the Emperor's orders, and in Morocco to disobey an ord<:r 
means to lose one's head; if you don't take the lions, I 
shall turn them loose in your street and put a guard 
across' the head of it to keep them there." 
Mr. Carr wrote to the State Department . that the 
street in which he lived was a short cul-de-sac, in which 
were only half a dozen houses besides his own; thai 'to 
turn lions loose in it would have made it uninhabifSble, 
and, at the end of all his resources of resistance, he could 
see nothing to do but clear a room in his house and 
turn the lions into it. This he did, and his letter relating 
to the State Department the story of his adventure and 
his helplessness against the overpowering generosity of 
his Moroccan admirers is a most pathetic and moving 
paper. It is printed in full in House document No. 221, 
Twenty-sixth Congress, first session. 
Communication sixty-four years ago was tedious to an 
extent which it is hard for those of our day to realize, and 
his letter, dated September 3, 1839, did not reach the 
State Department till November 5 of the same year. On 
November 12 a reply was forwarded in which Mr. Carr 
was told that as it appeared^ he had done all that lay in 
his power to repel the invasion of the lions, he might send 
them to the United States by the first available ship, and 
the charges for transportation and for the subsistence cf 
the animals while they remained members of his family 
would be allowed in the settlement of his accounts. At 
this point Document No. 221 drops the story. If the chap- 
ter — probably of equal or greater interest— relating the 
shipment of the lions, their arrival in this country, and 
their reception by the President, is in the public docu- 
ments, I have not yet run across it. Giving the State De- 
partment's letter two months to reach Tangier, and mak- 
ing reasonable allowance for delay in securing a ship 
(^only accidental sailing ships being available), the un- 
fortunate Consul must have had the lions in his house- 
hold for the better part of six months. 
The story of the progress of Consul-General Skinner's 
menagerie will, of course, be told more minutely, and 'f 
King Menelik's lions reach President Roosevelt he will 
have an easy outlet from the dilemma by way of the 
National Zoological Park in Washington, which, of 
course, did not exist in President Van Buren's time;" 
F. A. Crandall. 
All communications for Forest and Stream must he 
directed lo Forest and Stream Pub. Co., New, York, to 
receive attention,. We have no other office. 
