Primitive men—and those we style the Ancients were primitive so far as nature is concerned—regarded birds as supernaturally wise. This canniness is implied in many of the narratives and incidents set down in the succeeding pages; and in view of it birds came to be regarded by early man with great respect, yet also with apprehension, for they might utilize their knowledge to his harm. For example: The Canada jay is believed by the Indians along the northern shore of Hudson Bay to give warning whenever they approach an Eskimo camp—usually, of course, with hostile intent; and naturally those Indians kill that kind of jay whenever they can.
The ability in birds to speak implies knowledge, and Martha Young[[2]] gives us a view of this logic prevailing among the old-time southern darkies:
Sis’ Dove she know mo’n anybody or anything in de worl’. She know pintedly de time anybody gwine die. You’ll hear her moanin’ fer a passin’ soul ’fo’ you hear de bell tone. She know ’fo’ cotton-plantin’ time whe’r de craps dat gatherin’ ’ll be good er bad. ’Fo’ folks breaks up de new groun’ er bust out middles, Sis’ Dove know what de yield ’ll be. She know it an’ she’ll tell it, too. ’Caze ev’ybody know if Sis’ Dove coo on de right han’ of a man plowin’, dare ’ll be a good crap dat year; but ef she coo on de lef’ dar ’ll be a faillery crap dat year.
Sis’ Dove she know about all de craps dat grow out er de groun’ but she ’special know about corn, fer she plant de fi’st grain er corn dat ever was plant’ in de whole worl’. Whar she git it?... Umm—hum! You tell me dat!
From the belief in the intuitive wisdom of birds comes the world-wide confidence in their prophetic power. Hence their actions, often so mysterious, have been watched with intense interest, and everything unusual in their behavior was noticed in the hope that it might express a revelation from on high. Advantage was taken of this pathetic hope and assurance by the Roman augurs in their legalized ornithomancy, of which some description will be found in another chapter. Nine-tenths of it was priestly humbug to keep ordinary folks in mental subjection, as priestcraft has ever sought to do. The remaining tenth has become the basis of the present popular faith in birds’ ability to foretell coming weather. Let me cite a few aboriginal examples of this faith, more or less sincere, in the ability and willingness of birds to warn inquiring humanity.
The Omahas and other Siouan Indians used to say that when whippoorwills sing at night, saying “Hoia, hohin?” one replies “No.” If the birds stop at once, it is a sign that the answerer will soon die, but if the birds keep on calling he or she will live a long time. The Utes of Colorado, however, declare that this bird is the god of the night, and that it made the moon by magic, transforming a frog into it; while the Iroquois indulged in the pretty fancy that the moccasin-flowers (cypripediums) are whippoorwills’ shoes.
This is a little astray from my present theme, to which we may return by quoting from Waterton[[73]] that if one of the related goatsuckers of the Amazon Valley be heard close to an Indian’s or a negro’s hut, from that night evil fortune sits brooding over it. In Costa Rica bones of whippoorwills are dried and ground to a fine powder by the Indians when they want to concoct a charm against some enemy; mixed with tobacco it will form a cigarette believed to cause certain death to the person smoking it.
To the mountaineers of the southern Alleghanies the whippoorwill reveals how long it will be before marriage—as many years as its notes are repeated: as I have heard the bird reiterate its cry more than 800 times without taking breath, this must often be a discouraging report to an anxious maid or bachelor. One often hears it said lightly in New England that a whippoorwill calling very near a house portends death, but I can get no evidence that this “sign” is really attended to anywhere in the northern United States.
This, and the equally nocturnal screech-owl (against which the darkies have many “conjurings”) are not the only birds feared by rural folk in the Southern States, especially in the mountains. A child in a family of Georgia “crackers” fell ill, and his mother gave this account of it to a sympathetic friend:
Mikey is bound to die. I’ve know’d it all along. All las’ week the moanin’ doves was comin’ roun’ the house, and this mornin’ one come in at the window right by Mikey’s head, an’ cooed an’ moaned. I couldn’t scare it away, else a witch would ’a’ put a spell on me.