Birds and Nature, Vol. 10 No. 3 [October 1901]

RUBY-CROWNED KINGLET

(Regulus calendula.)

“What wondrous power from heaven upon thee wrought?
What prisoned Ariel within thee broods?”

    – Celia Thaxter.
“Thou singest as if the God of Wine
Had helped thee to a valentine;
A song in mockery and despite
Of shades and dews and silent night,
And steady bliss and all the loves
Now sleeping in these peaceful groves.”

    – Wordsworth.
Like a bee with its honey, when the Ruby-crown has unloaded his vocal sweetness, there is comparatively little left of him, and, ebullient with an energy that would otherwise rend him, his incredible vocal achievement is the safety valve that has so far preserved his atoms in their Avian semblance.

Dr. Coues says that his lower larynx, the sound-producing organ, is not much bigger than a good-sized pin’s head, and the muscles that move it are almost microscopic shreds of flesh. “If the strength of the human voice were in the same proportion to the size of the larynx, we could converse with ease at a distance of a mile or more.”

“The Kinglet’s exquisite vocalization,” he continues, “defies description; we can only speak in general terms of the power, purity and volume of the notes, their faultless modulation and long continuance. Many doubtless, have listened to this music without suspecting that the author was the diminutive Ruby-crown, with whose commonplace utterance, the slender, wiry ‘tsip,’ they were already familiar. This delightful role, of musician, is chiefly executed during the mating season, and the brief period of exaltation which precedes it. It is consequently seldom heard in regions where the bird does not rear its young, except when the little performer breaks forth in song on nearing its summer resorts.”

When Rev. J. H. Langille heard his first Regulus calendula, he said, “The song came from out of a thick clump of thorns, and was so loud and spirited that I was led to expect a bird at least as large as a thrush. Chee-oo, chee-oo, chee-oo, choo, choo, tseet, tseet, te-tseet, te-tseet, te-tseet, etc., may represent this wonderful melody, the first notes being strongly palatal and somewhat aspirated, the latter slender and sibilant and more rapidly uttered; the first part being also so full and animated as to make one think of the water-thrush, or the winter wren; while the last part sounded like a succeedant song from a slender-voiced warbler. Could all this come from the throat of this tiny, four-inch Sylvia? I was obliged to believe my own eyes, for I saw the bird many times in the act of singing. The melody was such as to mark the day on which I heard it.”

H. D. Minot says, “In autumn and winter their only note is a feeble lisp. In spring, besides occasionally uttering an indescribable querulous sound, and a harsh, ‘grating’ note, which belongs exclusively to that season, the Ruby-crowned wrens sing extremely well and louder than such small birds seem capable of singing. Their song begins with a few clear whistles, followed by a short, very sweet, and complicated warble, and ending with notes like the syllables tu-we-we, tu-we-we, tu-we-we. These latter are often repeated separately, as if the birds had no time for a prelude, or are sometimes prefaced by merely a few rather shrill notes with a rising inflection.”

Messrs. Baird, Brewer and Ridgway say that “The song of this bird is by far the most remarkable of its specific peculiarities,” and Mr. Chapman declares, “Taking the small size of the bird into consideration, the Ruby-crown’s song is one of the most marvellous vocal performances among birds; being not only surpassingly sweet, varied and sustained, but possessed of sufficient volume to be heard at a distance of two hundred yards. Fortunately he sings both on the spring and fall migrations.”

Mrs. Wright describes the call-note as “Thin and metallic, like a vibrating wire,” and quotes Mr. Nehrling, who speaks of the “Power, purity and volume of the notes, their faultless modulation and long continuance.”

Mr. Robert Ridgway wrote that this little king of song was one of our very smallest birds he also “ranks among the sweetest singers of the country. It is wonderfully powerful for one so small, but it is remarkable for its softness and sweet expression more than for other qualities. It consists of an inexpressibly delicate and musical warble, astonishingly protracted at times, and most beautifully varied by softly rising and falling cadences, and the most tender whistlings imaginable.”

Mr. Ridgway quotes from Dr. Brewer: “The notes are clear, resonant and high, and constitute a prolonged series, varying from the lowest tones to the highest, and terminating with the latter. It may be heard at quite a distance, and in some respects bears more resemblance to the song of the English skylark than to that of the canary, to which Mr. Audubon compares it.” Mr. Ridgway continues: “We have never heard the skylark sing, but there is certainly no resemblance between the notes of the Ruby-crowned Kinglet and those of the canary, the latter being as inferior in tenderness and softness as they excel in loudness.”

Mr. Audubon had stated: “When I tell you that its song is fully as sonorous as that of the canary-bird, and much richer, I do not come up to the truth, for it is not only as powerful and clear, but much more varied and pleasing to the ear.”

While the frequent sacrifice of the adult regulus and regina through their reckless absorption in their own affairs and obliviousness to the presence of enemies, lends color to the statement that “The spirits of the martyrs will be lodged in the crops of green birds,” yet by virtue of a talent other than vocal, they compel few of the human family to echo the remorseful lament of John Halifax, Gentleman,

“I took the wren’s nest,
Bird, forgive me!”

For but few of the most ardent seekers have succeeded in locating the habitation of the fairy kinglet, and the unsuccessful majority perforce exclaim with Wordsworth,

“Oh, blessed bird! The earth we pace
Again appears to be
An unsubstantial, fairy place,
That is fit home for thee!”

    Juliette A. Owen.

THE CORN SONG

Heap high the farmer’s wintry hoard!
Heap high the golden corn!
No richer gift has autumn poured
From out her lavish horn!

Let other lands, exulting, glean
The apple from the pine,
The orange from its glossy green,
The cluster from the vine;

We better love the hardy gift
Our ragged vales bestow,
To cheer us when the storm shall drift
Our harvest-fields with snow.

Through vales of grass and meads of flowers,
Our ploughs their furrows made,
While on the hills the sun and showers
Of changeful April played.

We dropped the seed o’er hill and plain,
Beneath the sun of May,
And frightened from our sprouting grain
The robber crows away.

All through the long, bright days of June,
Its leaves grew green and fair,
And waved in hot midsummer’s noon
Its soft and yellow hair.

And now, with Autumn’s moonlit eves,
Its harvest time has come,
We pluck away the frosted leaves,
And bear the treasure home.

Then, richer than the fabled gift
Apollo showered of old,
Fair hands the broken grain shall sift,
And knead its meal of gold.

Let vapid idlers loll in silk,
Around their costly board;
Give us the bowl of samp and milk,
By homespun beauty poured!

Where’er the wide old kitchen hearth
Sends up its smoky curls,
Who will not thank the kindly earth,