Both the partridge and landrail run serious risk from scythe and plough while sitting on the nest. Landrails have before now been decapitated by the swing of the scythe, and a case is on record in which a sitting partridge, seeing that the plough was coming dangerously near her nest, actually removed the whole clutch of eggs, numbering over a score, to the shelter of a neighbouring hedge. This was accomplished, probably with the help of the male, during the short time it took the plough to get to the end of the field and back, and is a remarkable illustration of devotion and ingenuity. Not for nothing indeed is the partridge a game bird, for it has been seen to attack cats, and even foxes, in defence of the covey; and I have seen, in the MS. notes of the second Earl of Malmesbury, preserved in the library at Heron Court, mention of one that drove off a carrion crow that menaced the family. Both partridge and landrail sit very close, particularly when the time of hatching is near, and Charles St. John saw a partridge, which his dog, having taken off the nest, was forced to drop, none the worse for her adventure, go straight back to her duties; though, as he adds, if it had not been that she knew that the eggs were already chipping she would in all probability have deserted her post for good and all.
Whether or not France is to be regarded as the original home of the "red leg," the fact remains that in that country it is becoming scarcer every year, its numbers being maintained only in Brittany, Calvados, Orne, and Sarthe. Its distribution in Italy is equally capricious, for it is virtually restricted to the rocky slopes of the Apennines, the Volterrano Hills in Tuscany, and the coast ranges of Elba. It seems therefore that in Continental countries, as well as with us, the bird extends its range reluctantly. Game-preservers seem, however, to agree that partridges and pheasants are, beyond a certain point, incompatible as, with a limited supply of natural food, the smaller bird goes to the wall. Like most birds, partridges grow bold when pressed by cold and hunger, and I recollect hearing of a large covey being encountered ten or twelve years ago in an open space in the heart of the city of Frankfort.
OCTOBER
THE MOPING OWL
THE MOPING OWL
Music, vocal or otherwise, is always a matter of taste, and individual appreciation of birdsong varies like the rest. One man finds the cuckoo's cry intolerably wearisome. Another sees no romance in the gargling of doves, while comparatively few care for the piercing scream of the starling or the rasping note of the corncrake. Yet few birds perform to a more hostile audience than the owl. I say advisedly "the owl," since the vast majority of people make no distinction whatever between our three resident kinds of owl, not to mention at least half a dozen more visitors. Some excuse for such carelessness might perhaps be found in the similar flight and habits of different owls, but it might have been thought that greater measure of individual recognition on their own merits would have been conceded to birds that range in size from the dimensions of a sparrow to those of a duck. But no; an owl is just an owl. Why the soft and haunting cry of these birds should not merely displease, but actually alarm, so many people unaccustomed to such sounds of the gloaming and darkness it would be difficult to say; but the voice of owls may possibly owe some of its disturbing effect to contrast with their silent flight, which, thanks to their fluffy plumage, with its broad quills and long barbs, prevents their making much more noise than ghosts when hunting rats and mice in moonlit fields. Only one other English bird has so quiet a flight, and that is the nightjar, another creature of the darkness, which, though no cousin to these nocturnal birds of prey, is known in some parts of the country as the "fern-owl." Visitors unprepared for the eerie woodland music of these autumn nights shudder when they hear the cry of the owl, as if it suggested midnight crime. For myself I have more agreeable associations, since I never hear one of these birds without recalling a gallant fight I once had with a big Tweed salmon in the weak light of a young moon, while three owls hooted amid the ghostly ruins of Norham Castle. Yet, even apart from this wholly agreeable memory, I find nothing unpleasant in their music, and can readily conceive that the moping owl may sing to his mate as passionately as Philomel.
Not only is there the popular lack of distinction between one owl and another already referred to, but scientific ornithologists have displayed similar want of finality in classifying these birds. There are (as in seals) eared and earless owls, though the so-called "ears" in the birds are not actually ears at all, but tufts of feathers that give rather the impression of horns. There are bare-legged owls and owls with feather stockings. There are owls that fly by day and owls that fly by night, though this is a less satisfactory distinction than that between the diurnal butterflies and nocturnal moths. Any reliable classification of owls must, in short, rest on certain structural bony differences of interest only to the student of anatomy. Nearly all these birds are able to turn the outer toe completely round, and most of them, also, have very keen hearing, which must be an invaluable aid when hunting small animals in the dark.
Did the ancients actually regard the owl as a wise bird, or was the fashion of depicting it in the following of Minerva merely dictated by the presence of these birds on the Akropolis? It seems hardly conceivable that they could so have blundered as to call the owls that we know clever birds; and the alternative assumption that owlish intellect can have appreciably changed in the interval is even less acceptable. It is probable that too much significance need not be attached to such association between the Greek goddess of wisdom and her attendant owls, for Hindu symbolism represented Ganesa, god of wisdom, with the head of an elephant, yet that animal, which the natives of India know better than the men of any other race, has never figured in their folklore as a type noted for its cunning. About the owl as we know it to-day, with its spectacled face and blinking eyes, there is nothing strikingly intelligent, and schoolboy slang, in which the word does duty as synonymous with foolishness, discovers a more accurate appreciation of these birds.