Although the "homing" propensity of the pigeon is not systematically cultivated and the bird is not regularly employed as a messenger, there are many stories to show that this characteristic trait is recognised. Nor are they always sentimental love tales. A Bengal legend tells the pitiful fate of a Hindu Raja, the last of his race, attacked by Muhammadan invaders. He went bravely out to meet them, carrying with him a pigeon whose return to the palace was to be regarded by his family as an intimation of his defeat, and a signal to put themselves to death and to burn their home. He gained the victory, but while he stooped to drink in the river after the fatigues of the battle, the bird escaped and flew home. The Raja hurried after, but was only in time to throw himself on the still burning pyre.
A common object on the low sky-line of Indian towns of the plain is a light bamboo lattice about six feet square on the top of a tall bamboo pole. This is a pigeon perch, and in the early mornings unkempt pigeon-flyers are seen on the house roofs waving a lure made of rag tied to a stick and whistling through a mouth-call (like that of the English Punch and Judy men) to attract to their roosts the flock of pigeons circling overhead. The evolutions of pigeons in the air, their wheeling and turning on the wing, and the pretty manner of their settling from flight are all so beautiful that it seems stupid to associate a taint of human blackguardism with them.
The Koel.—We English call the cuckoo a blithe newcomer and a vernal harbinger, but we do not, because of the bird's association with the sweet o' the year, consider his song the perfection of all music. A Western ear finds no more in the tune of that cuculine bird, the Koel (Eudynamys honorata) than a tiresome iteration of one or two clear, high, and resonant notes. Yet Oriental poetry, algebraic in its persistent use of a limited number of symbols, has officially adopted the Koel as the figure for exquisite sound; so the voice of your beloved, the performances of a musical artiste, and all best worth hearing in life are posted under this heading. A Delhi shoemaker or a Lucknow embroiderer can tell you of other bird music, but they have not read much classic poetry and hear with their ears. The Englishman in India has a grudge against the Koel; listening with modified rapture to notes that warn him to put up his punkah, overhaul his thermantidote, and prepare for the long St. Laurence penance of an Indian summer. And he thinks longingly of an English spring.
"Ah! Koel, little Koel, singing on the siris bough,
In my ears the knell of exile your ceaseless bell-like speech is,
Can you tell me aught of England or of spring in England now?"
Natives say crows hate the Koel because it selects their nests for its foundling eggs, which is very probable. I have seen crows mobbing a Koel, but then crows are like London street boys, and will mob anybody of unfamiliar aspect.
The Coppersmith.—The Coppersmith bird is another noisy herald of spring. This is the handsome crimson-breasted barbet (Xantholæma hæmacephala), and its cry of tock, tock, fills the air as completely as the sound of a hammer on a brazen vessel. It has the same cadence, and with each loud beat the bird's head is swung to right and left alternately. Sir Edwin Arnold in his Light of Asia gives an Indian Spring picture in a few words:—
"... In the mango-sprays
The sun-birds flashed; alone at his green forge
Toiled the loud Coppersmith...."
But when you are down with fever and headache you heartily wish the noisy bird would take a holiday or go on strike.
The Sparrow.—To the native of India the sparrow seems to stand as the type of a thing of naught, an intrusive feathered fly to be brushed aside—but on no account to be starved or harmed. Our bird is a size smaller than his Western brother, and is tolerated both by Hindu and Muhammadan. In mosque courts one sometimes sees pretty troughs made of brick with divisions for water and food; and in trees near shrines, or over the places where devotees sit, earthen saucers are slung with food and water, all for the sparrow. A Hindu proverb quoted in Fallon's Dictionary says: "God's birds in God's field! eat, birds, eat your bellies full." This pious and kindly word is easily reconciled in practice with a just appreciation of the essential triviality and impertinence of the bird. A large toll is daily taken all over the country from field and garden, and the equally accessible grain-dealer's basket. The most devout Hindu alive waves them off from his stores, for he also must live.
