We then had some talk about sparrows, and I embody my ideas of them in the following sketch.
The British Sparrow: a study in ornithology.
The sparrow, although it undoubtedly belongs to the great natural family Fringillidae, which includes among its members the weavers and whydah birds, the linnet, the goldfinch, and bullfinch, to say nothing of the canary itself, can hardly be said to rank with the aristocracy of the bird world. Quite the reverse; in fact, the Passer domesticus is a bird of low life. He is by no means a humble bird, however. There is nothing at all of the Uriah Heep about my little friend; he has quite as good an opinion of himself as any feathered biped need to have. Yet if it be possible for some classes of birds to look with disdain on the behaviour and doings of others, sparrows are surely so treated by their betters. And no wonder, for they are neither elegant in shape nor appearance; they do not dress well either in winter or in summer; it is not their lot to be arrayed in scarlet or in gold, but in humble brown and russet grey. So much for the appearance of the bird.
In manners and in deportment sparrows are far beneath bon ton; their knowledge of music is exceedingly limited, their appreciation of sweet sounds conspicuous only by its absence—why, they think nothing of interrupting even the nightingale in his song—and if any bird can be said to talk Billingsgate, those birds are sparrows. Should any one doubt the truth of my last statement, let him go and listen for one minute to the wrangling linguamachy that goes on of an evening after sunset, as they are retiring to roost in a tree.
Yet, for all this, many of the tricks and manners of these plebeian birds are well worth watching, and often highly amusing.
It is not, however, merely to amuse the reader that I now write, but quite as much in behalf of the bird itself. For of late years the character of the British sparrow has been aspersed in this country, but more particularly abroad; and I think he ought to have a fair and impartial trial. I therefore stand forward, not, mind you, as the champion, but the counsel both for and against the prisoner at the bar—the said Passer domesticus, who, on this occasion, is not arraigned for the murder of cock-robin, but for a far more heinous offence, namely, that of constituting himself a common nuisance, and doing more harm than good in the world.
For some years back I have had many—nay, but constant—opportunities for studying the habits of sparrows and many other kinds of birds, and I am not unobservant. I live in one of the prettiest and leafiest nooks of tree-clad Berkshire. The village that adjoins me nestles among trees; the gardens all about the houses are masses of shrubbery and flowers; stone fences are utterly unknown; there are hedges everywhere. Our trees are wide-spreading oaks and planes, drooping acacias, leafy lindens, elm, ash, willow, poplar, and what not.
Up the lordly line of splendid poplar-trees that bound my cosy little paddock the green ivy grows, and here sparrows dwell in hundreds. I do not shoot my wild birds, nor do my children chase and frighten them. Linnets build every year in the laurels close by the dog-kennel: robins feed with the dogs, and some older sparrows know names that we have given them, and come to be fed. No need to hang up boxes for them to build in—we live in the bush; but in summer-time they have a bath on the back lawn, and it is a sight to see them in the early morning. Thrushes, blackbirds, finches, sparrows, starlings—they all agree as well as if they had learned Watts’ hymns, and laid them all to heart. More about my birds another day—perhaps. One starling, however, I must mention here; he comes down every sunny morning, with his wife; he sends her in to bathe and splash; he sits on the edge of the bath and receives the drops—that is all the bath he takes. She is a dutiful wife.
The plumage of the domestic sparrow is almost too well known to need description. In one of the very excellent publications of Messrs Cassell and Co.—viz, “Familiar Wild Birds”—the following remarks occur:—