A little brother to the bear, and other animal studies

by William J. Long

My own acquaintance with Whitooweek began when I was a child, when I had no name to give the strange bird that I watched day after day, and when those whom I asked for information laughed at my description and said no such bird existed. It was just beyond the upland pasture where the famous Old Beech Partridge lived. On the northern slopes were some dark, wet maple woods, and beyond that the ground slanted away through scrub and alders to a little wild meadow where cowslips grew beside the brook. One April day, in stealing through the maple woods, I stopped suddenly at seeing something shining like a jewel almost at my feet. It was an eye, a bird's eye; but it was some moments before I could realize that it was really a bird sitting there on her nest between the broken ends of an old stub that had fallen years ago.

I backed away quietly and knelt down to watch the queer find. Her bill was enormously long and straight, and her eyes were 'way up at the back of her head—that was the first observation. Some wandering horse had put his hoof down and made a hollow in the dry rotten wood of the fallen stub. Into this hollow a few leaves and brown grass stems had been gathered,—a careless kind of nest, yet serving its purpose wonderfully, for it hid the brooding mother so well that one might step on her without ever knowing that bird or nest was near. This was the second wondering observation, as I made out the soft outlines of the bird sitting there, apparently without a thought of fear, within ten feet of my face.

I went away quietly that day and left her undisturbed; and I remember perfectly that I took with me something of the wonder, and something too of the fear, with which a child naturally meets the wild things for the first time. That she should be so still and fearless before me was a perfect argument to a child that she had some hidden means of defense—the long bill, perhaps, or a hidden sting—with which it was not well to trifle. All that seems very strange and far away to me now; but it was real enough then to a very small boy, alone in the dark woods, who met for the first time a large bird with an enormously long bill and eyes 'way up on the back of her head where they plainly did not belong, a bird moreover that had no fear and seemed perfectly well able to take care of herself. So I went away softly and wondered about it.

Next day I came back again. The strange bird was there on her nest as before, her long bill resting over the edge of the hollow and looking like a twig at the first glance. She showed no fear whatever, and encouraged at her quietness and assurance I crept nearer and nearer till I touched her bill with my finger and turned it gently aside. At this she wiggled it impatiently, and my first child's observation was one that has only recently been noticed by naturalists, namely, that the tip of the upper bill is flexible and can be moved about almost like the tip of a finger in order to find the food that lies deep in the mud, and seize it and drag it out of its hiding. At the same time she uttered a curious hissing sound that frightened me again and made me think of snakes and hidden stings; so I drew back and watched her from a safe distance. She sat for the most part perfectly motionless, the only movement being an occasional turning of the long bill; and once when she had been still a very long time, I turned her head aside again, and to my astonishment and delight she made no objection, but left her head as I had turned it, and presently she let me twist it back again. After her first warning she seemed to understand the situation perfectly, and had no concern for the wondering child that watched her and that had no intention whatever of harming her or her nest.

Others had laughed at my description of a brown bird with a long bill and eyes at the back of her head that let you touch her on her nest, so I said no more to them; but at the first opportunity I hunted up Natty Dingle and told him all about it. Natty was a gentle, harmless, improvident little man, who would never do any hard work for pay,—it gave him cricks in his back, he said,—but would cheerfully half kill himself to go fishing through the ice, or to oblige a neighbor. So far as he earned a living he did it by shooting and fishing and trapping and picking berries in their several seasons, and by gathering dandelions and cowslips (kew-slops he called them) in the spring and peddling them good-naturedly from door to door. Most of his time in pleasant weather he spent in roaming about the woods, or lying on his back by the pond shore where the woods were thickest, fishing lazily and catching fish where no one else could ever get them, or watching an otter's den on a stream where no one else had seen an otter for forty years. He knew all about the woods, knew every bird and beast and plant, and one boy at least, to my knowledge, would rather go with him for a day's fishing than see the president's train or go to a circus.

Unlike the others, Natty did not laugh at my description, but listened patiently and told me I had found a woodcock's nest,—a rare thing, he said, for though he had roamed the woods so much, and shot hundreds of the birds in season, he had never yet chanced upon a nest. Next day he went with me, to see the eggs, he said; but, as I think of it now, it was probably with a view of locating the brood accurately for the August shooting. As we rounded the end of the fallen stub the woodcock's confidence deserted her at sight of the stranger, and she slipped away noiselessly into the leafy shadows. Then we saw her four eggs, very big at one end, very little at the other, and beautifully colored and spotted.

Natty, who was wise in his way, merely glanced at the nest and then drew me aside into hiding, and before we knew it, or had even seen her approach, Mother Woodcock was brooding her eggs again. Then Natty, who had doubted one part of my story, whispered to me to go out; and the bird never stirred as I crept near on hands and knees and touched her as before.

A few minutes later we crept away softly, and Natty took me to the swamp to show me the borings, telling me on the way of the woodcock's habits as he had seen them in the fall hunting. The borings we found in plenty wherever the earth was soft,—numerous holes, as if made with a pencil, where the woodcock had probed the earth with her long bill. She was hunting for earthworms, Natty told me,—a queer mistake of his, and of all the bird books as well, for in the primitive alder woods and swamps where the borings are so often seen, there are no earthworms, but only slugs and soft beetles and delicate white grubs. Woodcock hunt by scent and feeling, and also by listening for the slight sounds made by the worms underground, he told me, and that is why the eyes are far back on the head, to be out of the way, and also to watch for danger above and behind while the bird's bill is deep in the mud. And that also explains why the tip of the bill is flexible, so that when the bird bores in the earth and has failed to locate the game accurately by hearing, the sensitive tip of the bill feels around, like a finger, until it finds and seizes the morsel. All this and many things more he told me as we searched through the swamp for the signs of Mother Woodcock's hunting and made our way home together in the twilight. Some things were true, some erroneous; and some were a curious blending of accurate traditions and imaginative folk-lore from some unknown source, such as is still held as knowledge of birds and beasts in all country places; and these were the most interesting of all to a child. And the boy listened, as a devotee listens to a great sacred concert, and remembered all these things and afterwards sifted them and found out for himself what things were true.

When I went back to the spot, a few days later, the nest was deserted. A few bits of shell scattered about told me the story, and that I must now hunt for the little woodcocks, which are almost impossible to find unless the mother herself show you where they are. A week later, as I prowled along the edge of the swamp, a sudden little brown whirlwind seemed to roll up the leaves at my feet. In the midst of it I made out the woodcock fluttering away, clucking, and trailing now a wing and now a leg, as if desperately hurt. Of course I followed her to see what was the matter, forgetting the partridge that had once played me the same pretty trick to decoy me away from her chicks. When she had led me to a safe distance all her injuries vanished as at the touch of magic. She sprang up on strong wings, whirled across the swamp and circled swiftly back to where I had first started her. But I did not find one of the little woodcocks, though I hunted for them half an hour, and there were four of them, probably, hiding among the leaves and grass stems under my very eyes.

The wonderful knowledge gleaned from Natty Dingle's store and from the borings in the swamp brought me into trouble and conflict a few weeks later. Not far from me lived a neighbor's boy, a budding naturalist, who had a big yellow cat named Blink at his house. A queer old cat was Blink, and the greatest hunter I ever saw. He knew, for instance, where a mole could be found in his long tunnel,—and that is something that still puzzles me,—and caught scores of them; but, like most cats, he could never be induced to taste one. When he caught a mole and was hungry, he would hide it and go off to catch a mouse or a bird; and these he would eat, leaving the mole to be brought home as game. He would hunt by himself for hours at a time, and come meowing home, bringing everything he caught,—rats, squirrels, rabbits, quail, grouse, and even grasshoppers when no bigger game was afoot. At a distance we would hear his call, a peculiar yeow-yow that he gave only when he had caught something, and the boy would run out to meet him and take his game, while Blink purred and rubbed against his legs to show his pride and satisfaction. When no one met him he would go meowing round the house once or twice and then put his game under the door-step, where our noses must speedily call it to our attention, for Blink would never touch it again.