Various - The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 05, No. 32, June, 1860

A large, brave heart has our bold sailor of the upper deep. Old Pindar never saw our little pet, this darling of the New World; yet he says,—

"Were it the will of Heaven, an osier-bough Were vessel safe enough the seas to plough."

Here he is, safe enough, not one tiny feather ruffled,—all the intense life of the tropics condensed into this one live jewel,—the glance of the sun on emeralds and rubies. Is it soft downy feathers that take this rich metallic glow, changing their hue with every rapid turn?

Other birds fly: he darts quick as the glance of the eye,—sudden as thought, he is here, he is there. No floating, balancing motion, like the lazy butterfly, who fans the air with her broad sails. To the point, always to the point, he turns in straight lines. How stumbling and heavy is the flight of the "burly, dozing bumblebee," beside this quick intelligence! Our knight of the ruby throat, with lance in rest, makes wild and rapid sallies on this "little mundane bird,"—this bumblebee,—this rolling sailor, never off his sea-legs, always spinning his long homespun yarns. This rich bed of golden and crimson flowers is a handsome field of tournament. What invisible circle sits round to adjudge the prize?

What secret does he bring me under those misty wings,—that busy birring sound, like Neighbor Clark's spinning-wheel? Is he busy as well, this bit of pure light and heat? Yes! he, too, has got a little home down in the swamp over there,—that bit of a knot on the young oak-sapling. Last year we found a nest (and brought it home) lined with the floss of willow-catkin, stuck all over with lichens, deep enough to secure the two pure round pearls from being thrown out, strongly fastened to the forked branch,—a home so snug, so warm, so soft!—a home "contrived for fairy needs."

Who but the fairies, or Mr. Fine-Ear himself, ever heard the tiny tap of the young bird, when he breaks the imprisoning shell?

The mother-bird knows well the fine sound. Hours? days? no, weeks, she has sat to hear at last that least wave of sound.

What! this tiny bit of restless motion sit there still? Minutes must be long hours to her quick panting heart.

I will just whisper it in your ear, that the meek-looking mother-bird only comes out between daylight and dark,—just like other busy mothers I have known, who take a little run out after tea.

Can it be, that Mr. Ruby-Throat, my preux chevalier , keeps all the sunshiny hours for himself, that he may enjoy to the full his own gay flight?

Ah! you know nothing, hear nothing of woman's rights up there, in that well-ordered household. Were it not well, if we, too, could give up our royal right of choice,—if we could fall back on our strong earth-born instincts, to be, to know, to do, one thing?

See how closely our darling curls up his slender black feet and legs, that we may not see this one bit of mortality about him! No, my little immortal does not touch the earth; he hangs suspended by that long bill, which just tethers him to its flowers. Now and then he will let down the little black tendrils of legs and feet on some bare twig, and there be rests and preens those already smooth plumules with the long slender bodkin you lent him. Now, just now, he darts into my room, coquets with my basket of flowers, "a kiss, a touch, and then away." I heard the whirr of those gauzy wings; it was not to the flowers alone he told his story. You did well to trust this most passionate pilgrim with your secret; the room is radiant with it. Slow-flying doves may well draw the car of Venus; but this arrow tipped with flame darts before, to tell of its coming. What need of word, of song, with that iridescent glow? Some day I will hear the whole story; just now let the Humming-Bird keep it under his misty wings.

I have heard of a lady who reared these little birds from the nest; they would suck honey from her lips, and fly in and out of her chamber. Only think of seeing these callow fledglings! It is as if the winged thought could be domesticated, could learn to make its nest with us and rear its young.

Bountiful Nature has spared to our cold North this one compact bit from the Tropics.

I believe we allow that birds are very highly organized creatures,—next to man, they say. We, with our weary feet plodding always on the earth, our heavy arms pinioned close to our sides!—look at this live creature, with thinnest wing cutting the fine air! We, slow in word, slow in thought!—look at this quivering flame, kindled by some more passionate glance of Nature! Next to man? Yes, we might say next above. Had it not been for that fire we stole one day, that Promethean spark, hidden in the ashes, kept a-light ever since, it had gone hard with us; Nature might have kept her pet, her darling, high, high above us,—almost out of roach of our dull senses.

What is our boasted speech, with its harsh, rude sounds, to their gushing melody? We learn music, certainly, with much pains and care. The bird cannot tell if it be A sharp or B flat, but he sings.

Our old friend, the friend of our childhood, Mr. White of Selborne, (who had attended much to the life and conversation of birds,) says, "Their language is very elliptical; little is said, and much is meant and understood." Something like a lady's letter, is it not?

How wise we might grow, if we could only "the bird-language rightly spell"! In the olden times, we are told, the Caliphs and Viziers always listened to what the birds said about it, before they undertook any new enterprise. I have often thought I heard wise old folk discoursing, when a company of hens were busy on the side-hill, scratching and clucking together. Perchance some day we shall pick up a leaf of that herb which shall open our ears to these now inarticulate sounds.

Why may we not (just for this summer) believe in Transmigrations, and find some elder civilization embodied in this community of birds,—all those lost arts taken wings, not to fly away, but to come flitting and building in our trees, picking crumbs from our door-steps?

Do they say birds are limited? Who are we that set bounds to this direct knowledge, this instinct? Mathematical, constructive, they certainly are. What bold architect has builded so snug, so airy a house,—well concealed, and yet with a good outlook? We make our dwellings conspicuous; they hide their pretty art.

We wiseacres, who stay at home, instead of following the seasons round the globe, should learn the art of making happy homes; yet what housekeeper will not hang her head in shame and despair, to see this nice adaptation of use to wants, shown each year in multitudes of nests? Now, only look at it! always just room enough,—none to spare. First, the four or five eggs lie comfortably in the small round at the bottom of the nest, with room enough for the mother robin to give them the whole warmth of her broad red breast,—her sloping back and wings making a rain-proof roof over her jewels. Then the callow younglings rise a little higher into the wider circle. Next the fledglings brim the cup; at last it runs over; four large clumsy robins flutter to the ground, with much noise, much anxious calling from papa and mamma,—much good advice, no doubt. They are fairly turned out to shift for themselves; with the same wise, unfathomable eyes which have mirrored the round world for so many years, which know all things, say nothing, older than time, lively and quick as to-day; with the same touching melody in their long monotonous call; soon with the same power of wing; next year to build a nest with the same wise economy, each young robin carrying in his own swelling, bulging breast the model of the hollow circle, the cradle of other young robins. So you see it is a nest within a nest,—a whole nest of nests; like Vishnu Sarma's fables, or Scheherazade's stories, you can never find where one leaves off and another begins, they shut so one into the other. No wonder the children and philosophers are they who ask, whether the egg comes from the bird, or the bird from the egg. Yes, it is a Heimskringla , a world-circle, a home-circle, this nest.