Edward at last gave his consent; and in the Zoologist for 1850,[40] Mr. Smith inserted a notice of the Sanderlings which had been shot by Edward on the sands of Boyndie. In the following year Mr. Smith inserted, in the same magazine, a notice of the spinous shark which Edward had seen under Gamrie Head.[41] “In order,” says Mr. Smith, “to determine whether it was the spinous shark or not, I sent Mr. Edward the 39th volume of the ‘Naturalist’s Library,’ which contains an account, by Dr. Hamilton of Edinburgh, of the Squalida, or family of sharks, and in which there is a coloured engraving of this particular shark. In reply, Mr. Edward observes—‘I have now no doubt whatever that the animal discovered and examined by me was the Spinous Shark.’”
EDWARD DESCRIBED BY MR. SMITH.
In another article, Mr. Smith described Edward in the following terms:—“I have oftener than once made mention in the Zoologist of Mr. Thomas Edward, shoemaker in Banff, who is a zealous admirer of Nature and an excellent preserver of animals. Occasionally he tears himself, as it were, from the employment to which necessity compels him, and slakes his thirst for the contemplation of zoological scenes and objects by a solitary ramble amid the mountains and hills which so greatly abound in the upper portion of the shires of Aberdeen and Banff. Of some of his adventures during a ramble of this description, he has sent me an account. This I consider so interesting, that I have rewritten it, and now submit it for insertion in the Zoologist. The facts, the ideas, and the reflections, are all his own, and in many parts I have retained his own impressions. Upon the accuracy and the minuteness of his observations, and upon his veracity of character, the utmost reliance may at all times be placed.”
THE BEAUTIFUL HERON.
The paper that follows consists of the description of a ramble, extending over several days, in the hill districts near Noth and Kirknie. It is not necessary to transcribe the whole paper; but we may select the following passages as showing the keen observation as well as the character of the man. Edward had entered a narrow glen, at the bottom of which runs the burn called Ness Bogie. He was listening to the voice of the cuckoo, and the clap-clap of the ring pigeons, which rose in great numbers, when an abrupt turn of the road brought him, suddenly and unexpectedly, within a few yards of a beautiful heron:—
CRIES OF THE BIRDS.
“I immediately stood still,” he says; “the upright and motionless attitude of the bird indicated plainly that he had been taken by surprise; and for the moment he seemed, as it were, stunned, and incapable of flight. There he remained, as if fastened to the spot, his bright yellow eye staring me full in the face, and with an expression that seemed to inquire what right I had to intrude into solitudes where the human form is so rarely seen. As we were thus gazing at each other, in mutual surprise at having met in such a place, I observed his long slender neck quietly and gradually doubling down upon his breast. His dark and lengthened plumes were at the same time slightly shaken. I knew by this that he was about to rise; another moment, and he was up. Stretching his long legs behind him, he uttered a scream so dismal, wild, and loud, that the very glen and hills re-echoed the sound, and the whole scene was instantly filled with clamour. The sandpiper screamed its kittie-needie; the pigeon cooed; the pipit, with lively emotion, came flying round me, uttering all the while its peeping note; the moor-cock sprang with whirring wing from his heathy lair, and gave forth his well-known and indignant birr birr-bick; the curlew came sailing down the glen with steady flight, and added to the noise with his shrill and peculiar notes of poo-elie poo-elie coorlie coorlie wha-up; and, from the loftier parts of the hills, the plovers ceased not their mournful wail, which accorded so well with the scene of which I alone appeared to be a silent spectator. But I moved not a foot until the alarmed inmates of the glen and the mountain had disappeared, and solemn stillness had again resumed its sway.”
On the following day, while crossing the Clashmauch, on his way to Huntly, Edward observed a curlew rise from a marshy part of the hill, to which he bent his steps in hopes of finding her nest. In this, however, he was disappointed; but, in searching about, and within a few feet of the remains of a wreath of snow, he came upon a wild duck lying beside a tuft of rushes. It may be mentioned that there had been a heavy snowstorm which had forced the plovers and wild ducks to abandon their nests, though then full of eggs, and greatly interrupted the breeding season in the northern counties. Edward proceeds:—
THE MOTHERLY WILD DUCK.
“As I imagined she was skulking with a view to avoid observation, I touched her with my stick, in order that she might rise; but she rose not. I was surprised, and, on a nearer inspection, I found that she was dead. She lay raised a little on one side, her neck stretched out, her mouth open and full of snow, her wings somewhat extended, and with one of her legs appearing a little behind her. Near to it there were two eggs. On my discovering this I lifted up the bird, and underneath her was a nest containing eleven eggs; these, with the other two, made thirteen in all; a few of them were broken. I examined the whole of them, and found them, without exception, to contain young birds. This was an undoubted proof that the poor mother had sat upon them from two to three weeks. With her dead body in my hand I sat down to investigate the matter, and to ascertain, if I could, the cause of her death. I examined her minutely all over, and could find neither wound nor any mark whatever of violence. She had every appearance of having died of suffocation. Although I had only circumstantial evidence, I had no hesitation in arriving at the conclusion that she had come by her death in a desperate but faithful struggle to protect her eggs from the fatal effects of the recent snowstorm.