THE SHRIKE, OR BUTCHER BIRD.
My little readers have, none of them perhaps, ever seen this bird: it is not very common in England, though found in most parts of the globe. This one we see in the picture is feeding its young with an insect, or beetle; but the Shrike is a very voracious and cruel bird. It not only eats insects, reptiles, little mice and such things, but attacks the young unfledged nestlings of smaller birds than itself, and devours them. This is why it is called by the ugly name of Butcher Bird. Fancy the horrid thing devouring the tender, weak, and helpless young of its own species! Poor little baby-birds settled comfortably in their nests, waiting for the return of papa or mamma with food, are pounced upon by these cruel creatures, carried off, torn limb from limb, and used to feed a nestful of little butcher birds!
I never saw a Shrike but once, and that was many years ago. I was driving with a relation of mine, the wife of a country clergyman, to visit a sick child, the daughter of one of the parishioners. As we drove up to the farmhouse, we met the child’s father, who was a small farmer, coming out at the door with a gun in his hand. After inquiring about the child, we naturally asked what he was going to shoot, for it was not the shooting season. He told us in reply that he had just seen a grey shrike up in an apple tree in the orchard, and he was going to have a shot at it.
“For it be a rare bird, that it be,” added he; “this be the furst as I’ve seen since I wor a boy, and loike enough I mayn’t never see another, so I be a’going to shoot un.”
Although the bird is so cruel itself, I did not feel inclined to see it killed, so I wished the farmer good morning. But he did “shoot un,” I afterwards learnt; in fact, he butchered the butcher bird, and had it stuffed too, and put into a glass case. In this condition I saw it. It was a handsome bird; the general colour of it was grey, but it had a white breast, and some strong black marks upon the head, wings, and tail. Its size was about that of a pigeon.
There is another kind of Shrike, which is found in South America, and is called the Bush Shrike. This bird is rather larger, and more powerful than the European Shrike, and has a handsome tuft of feathers on its head. It is found in forests and thick brushwood, where it passes its time in a constant search for insects, reptiles, and the young of other birds, which it devours like the European Shrike. It possesses a strong and rather hooked beak, and is a formidable enemy to any creature it may attack.
But the country in which the Shrike lives on the best terms with man is New South Wales. There it is very common, and in appearance resembles the Shrike of Europe. It is called by the colonists the Piping Crow, on account of the rich and varied strain of song it pours forth in early morning and towards evening. In this gift of song it seems to differ from the European bird, or at least, if the latter possesses such a merit, it has not been observed. In New South Wales the Shrike prefers the open localities to the wooded districts, and in particular shows a preference for those parts which have been cleared by the settlers. In fact, in that country, the Piping Crow is looked upon as being a particularly trustful bird,—trustful, I mean, of man. It will build its nest in the plantations or gardens of the colonists, who, particularly in the back settlements, do all they can to encourage it for the sake of its pleasant morning and evening song.
A FABLE.
