A WELL-EARNED REST—HANGING THE WINNING BIRD UP IN THE SUNSHINE AFTER THE CONTEST.
From a Photograph.
As the clock of the village church laboriously chimed out its seventh stroke the manager of the competition, in a loud voice, issued the order for the contest to begin. At this there was a general stir. Each man took up a more or less business-like attitude in front of the cage of one of his opponents, every competitor acting as judge for someone else’s bird. Having produced his curious-looking marker—a thing resembling a four-sided yard-stick, painted black, with a handle either in the form of a knob or a ring at the top end—the men at once proceeded to chalk certain cabalistic signs thereupon, which a close observation showed me stood for the number of trills made by each bird—“Chuie, chuie, chuie, chuie, chuiep” being a perfect trill. It is the fifth and last part of the warble upon which success really depends. If the final “chuiep” is not heard the feat is incomplete, and the little warbler is not credited with a chalk mark.
The silence was scarcely broken save for the shrill piping of the birds, and the seriousness exhibited by competitors and spectators alike would have done credit to the mourners at a funeral. It was curious to note the manner in which some of the less gravely-disposed owners spent the interval of waiting for their charges to distinguish themselves. Some were lightening the serious business of marking by occasional draughts of beer from huge tumblers, which they had, with wise forethought, placed close at hand. Others, with that calmness that comes from long practice, were puffing contentedly at short clay pipes, while the greater number—among whom were some very youthful competitors, evidently on their first trial—wore anxious expressions, never letting their eyes rest upon any other object than the cage and the scoring-stick entrusted to their care.
COLLECTING THE TALLY STICKS.
From a Photograph.
All this time the subdued talking among the group of interested spectators scarcely rose above the continued chirping of the birds, which seemed to become more and more shrill and vigorous as the moments passed, until, after the lapse of half an hour or so, each of the little songsters seemed ready to burst its little throat in its determination to make itself heard above its neighbours.
PLACING THE NET AND DECOY-BIRDS TO CAPTURE FINCHES.
From a Photograph.
At the commencement of the competition I had been under the pleasant impression that the little creatures, although selfishly deprived of the blessing of sight in order to administer to a somewhat barbaric form of human enjoyment, sang their early morning songs out of pure gladness of heart and “the wild joy of living,” but my fond delusion was soon nipped in the bud, for unmistakable notes of anger were by this time distinct, and it needed not the assurance of one of the spectators to convince me that, in its wild state, this particular species of the winged creation, at all events, is far from preserving that unity and perfect agreement in the home circle ascribed to it by one of our poets and pointed out for man’s emulation. It is in order to stimulate an artificially-produced anger, considered necessary for the success of the “concours,” that these matches are held in the early morning hours, while the birds of the trees and hedges are singing most lustily. The chirping of the imprisoned songsters proceeds from a wild frenzy of desire to do battle-royal with those of their brethren still enjoying freedom, and by degrees the longing grows for an encounter with their competing neighbours.