Birds and all Nature, Vol. V, No. 2, February 1899

He was charming in that as in every other, and he was evidently a "good provider," for I often saw him after that day going about in great anxiety, looking here and there and everywhere, while a small green worm in the beak told plainly enough that he was seeking his wandering offspring.

During the remainder of the month I frequently saw, and more frequently heard, the little family as they followed their busy parents around on the neighboring trees.

One day I noted the singer flitting about the top of the spruce, singing most joyously, and almost as constantly as before the advent of the nestlings, while the mother was hurrying over the lower branches of the same tree, collecting food for one youngster. Suddenly the song ceased, and the tiny papa joined the family party below, and addressed himself with his usual energy to the business of filling that greedy mouth.

Over and under and around and through the branches he rushed, every few seconds returning to stuff a morsel into the always hungry mouth, till he actually reduced that infant to silence, and then he slipped away, returned to his tree top, and resumed his lovely "tee-tee-tweetum!"

Somewhat later I heard the baby black-throats at their practice, droll, quavering attempts to imitate the musical song of their father. They soon mastered the notes, but the spirit was as yet far beyond them.

This happy life went on before my window till, almost at the end of July, a heavy fog swept in one evening from the ocean, and when, the next day, a cool north wind blew it back whence it came, it seemed to take the whole tribe of warblers with it. August was now upon the threshold, and in the bird world at least

"Summer like a bird had flown."

FIVE LITTLE WOODMEN

E. F. MOSBY

OUT of the woods they come, visiting our homes wherever they see a standing invitation in the shape of a tree. But each one has his preferences. One likes the evergreens best, another the bare trunk where it is easy to break the bark, and still another likes a fresh tree like the magnolia, glossy and full of life even in winter. You have guessed these are birds? Yes; and the small downy woodpecker comes first, and in all weathers. The other day after a sun-rise of gold and a splendid rainbow arch, swiftly blotted out by a black storm with scudding rain and flying leaves, I caught sight of a tiny downy, in the very heart of all the uproar of the elements, busily pecking his way up a tree near my window. On another winter day, sunny and calm, he came flying overhead with a loud rattling note that spoke of good cheer in most neighborly fashion. It is a family, at the very least, that visits us. There are variations in size, if I mistake not, and one day a pair arrived together; the female with her glossy black velvet crown almost as handsome with her broad white satin stripe down the middle, and black and white markings, as her mate, who, indeed, only outshines her by the lovely band of red on the head or nape of his neck, as you choose to call it. I fancy she is the more anxious housekeeper. At least, it was her persistent call-note, rather sharp in tone, that drew me from my lounge to watch her quick movements on the bark, and it is she that more quickly takes flight. He seems never disturbed by his inquisitive human neighbors, nor even the impudent sparrows – though he can send these to the right about if he pleases – and his tap, tap, tap, like a small drummer on the tree-trunk, is always pleasant to hear. I am glad to know they both have a cozy little home, a hole on the southern side of a tree, where the sun shines on good days, and fancy them tucked into round balls of feathers, only to be distinguished by the red on top, and comfortably asleep, when neither pleasure nor necessity invites them abroad.

The yellow-bellied sapsucker is also a winter guest, but he is far more timid than the downy, and I have often seen him routed by the sparrows or scared off by a sudden sound. The male is very gay in plumage, with much mottled yellowish brown on back, conspicuous white stripes on wings, beautiful clear yellow and black in front, scarlet on his head and cardinal at his throat. The female has a white throat and cardinal or black cap. I have noticed one with a cardinal cap that had little black feathers sticking here and there like an emery bag. They are very full of fun, even riotous in play, and shout, in their summer home – the woods of the north – but they are very quiet when wintering with us, and often flit away without a sound.

Of the nuthatches, the pretty white-breasted one with his soft bluish-grey coat and shining black head, is our familiar resident and the red-breasted an occasional winter companion. They are charming little birds, not specially musical, though their call is vigorous and friendly, but very pretty and gentle, and awakening perpetual wonder and admiration at their feats as acrobats, running as lightly head downwards as in a natural position, and showing equal swiftness and grace in every movement, whether with aid of wings or without. They never seem in the least afraid of us, but raise their softly rounded heads and look at us with a most delightful confidence.

The brown creeper is like a bit of the trunk in his brown tints, mottled as if in mimicry of the play of light and shadow on the bark. He is as truly a tree-creature as ever Greek fable devised, and can so flatten himself, when alarmed, against a tree that no inch of his light breast is visible, and it is difficult, indeed, to recognize him as a separate being. He is the one species found in America of quite a large Old World family, and has some odd characteristics. First, his long tail, used to aid him in climbing, is rather curved and stiff and generally worn by constant use. His bill is also curved, so that the profile of his figure is like a relaxed bow as he works his plodding way up the side of the tree, diligently seeking insects, eggs, and larvæ, in the minute crevices of the bark. He sticks his little nest, made, of course, of bits of dead wood, bark, and twigs, between the tree and a strip of loose bark, very like a part of the tree itself, and the eggs are spotted and dotted with wood colors, brown in different shades, and lavender. Altogether his life is a tree-study; the tree is to him home, model, hunting-ground, hiding-place, and refuge. He never descends by creeping, but when he wants to search a lower part of the trunk, he flies to the base, and begins it all over again. In the summer fir-wood, farther northward, it is said he sings, but in winter-time we hear only a faint squeak, a little like one bough scraping against another.

The black-and-white creeping warbler is very like our sober brown creeper in habit, but he, like most of his gay brethren, is only a summer guest. In his place we have Carolina chickadees and golden-crowned kinglets – and even, by good luck, an occasional ruby-crowned. All these tiny creatures have the most charming and airy ways of flitting from bough to bough, swinging lightly from the utmost end of a bough, daintily dropping to unexpected resting-places, and rarely pausing for a second's breathing-time anywhere. The Carolina chickadee is said to have a longer note and more varied repertoire than his northern cousin, yet whenever I have heard him in winter weather, there is the same silvery and joyous tinkle of showering Chick-a-dee-dee-dees from the pretty gray and black-capped flock that I have heard in Massachusetts. Perhaps the variations are more evident in his summer singing.

I have left the kinglet for the last, but it is hard to do justice to this lovely little bird that, if the food-supply be all right, will often elect to stay with us in winter rather than migrate to Mexico. His colors are exquisite, olive-green bordered by darker tints that throw the green above and the yellow-tinted white below into fine relief; a brilliant crown of reddish-gold, bordered by black and yellow, and every feather preened to satiny smoothness. He gleans his food merrily, singing or calling softly to himself as he works. His nest is built in the far northern forests, sometimes swinging as high as sixty feet, and woven of pale green mosses, lined with strips of the silky inside back and down for the many nestlings.

THE COCOA-NUT

THE fruit of the cocoa-nut palm, (Cocos nucifera), which is the most useful tree of all its tribe to the natives of the regions in which it grows, is one of the most valuable and important of commercial products. On the Malabar and Corvomandel coasts of India the trees grow in vast numbers; and in Ceylon, which is peculiarly well situated for their cultivation, it is estimated that twenty millions of the trees flourish. The wealth of a native in Ceylon is estimated by his property in cocoa-nut trees, and Sir Emerson Tennent notes a law case in a district court in which the subject in dispute was a claim of the twenty-fifth twentieth part of an acre of palms. The tree is very beautiful and lofty, growing to a height of from sixty to one hundred feet, with a cylindrical stem which attains a thickness of two feet. It terminates in a crown of graceful leaves. The leaf sometimes attains a length of twenty feet, consists of a strong mid-rib, whence numerous long, acute leaflets spring, giving the whole, as one traveler described it, the appearance of a gigantic feather. The fruit consists of a thick external husk or rind of a fibrous structure, within which is the ordinary cocoa-nut of commerce. The nut has a very hard, woody shell, inclosing the kernel, within which again is a milky substance of a rather agreeable taste.

The cocoa-nut palm is so widely disseminated throughout tropical countries that it is impossible to distinguish its original habitat. It flourishes with equal vigor on the coast of the East Indies, throughout the tropical islands of the Pacific, and in the West Indies and tropical America. It is most at home, however, in the numerous small islands of the Pacific Ocean. Its wide dissemination is accounted for by the shape of the fruit, which, dropping into the sea from trees growing along the shores, would be carried by the tides and currents to be cast up and to vegetate on distant coasts.

The uses to which the various parts of the cocoa-nut tree are applied in the regions of their growth are almost endless. The nuts supply a considerable proportion of the food of the people, and the liquor enclosed within them forms a pleasant and refreshing drink. The liquid may also be boiled down to sugar. When distilled it yields a spirit which is known as "arrack." The trunk yields a timber which is known in commerce as porcupine wood, and is used for building, furniture, and firewood; the leaves are plaited into fans and baskets, and for thatching roofs of houses; the shell of the nut is employed as a water vessel, and the outer husk or rind yields the fiber which is used for the manufacture of ropes, brushes, cordage and the like. Cocoa-nut-oil is an important article of commerce. It is obtained by pressing or boiling the kernels, which are first broken up into small pieces and dried in the sun. It is estimated that one thousand full-sized nuts will produce upwards of twenty-five gallons of oil. The oil is a white, solid substance at ordinary temperature, with a peculiar rather disagreeable odor. Under pressure it spreads into a liquid and a solid, the latter being extensively used in the manufacture of candles.

Within late years the oil has also been manufactured into cocoa-nut butter, retaining, however, in a greater or less degree a distinct flavor of the nut.

The monkeys and orang-outangs are very expert in destroying the tough outer covering of the cocoa-nut, though quite two inches thick. They insert their teeth into the tapering end of the nut, where the shell is very uneven, hold it firmly with the right foot, and with the left tear the covering to pieces. Then thrusting a finger into one of the natural apertures they pierce a hole, drink the milk, break the shell on some hard object and eat the kernel.

THE BLACK WALNUT AND BUTTERNUT

THE black walnut (Juglans nigra) is found in the rich, deep soils, from western Massachusetts, west to southern Minnesota and southward to central Texas and northern Florida. It is not found along the gulf or Atlantic coasts to any extent, but abounds west of the Allegheny mountains, especially in the Mississippi Valley. The tree grows rapidly and to a great size, one specimen on Long Island having attained a circumference of twenty-five feet.

The wood is dark-colored, becoming almost black when properly seasoned, and was formerly extensively used for cabinet work, inside finish, gun stocks, and many ornamental purposes; it is not in so much demand at present, as other cheaper woods may be had which seem to answer the purposes quite as well, but it is still numbered among our valuable forest productions.

The nut has a thick, hard shell, which is deeply and unevenly corrugated with rough, sharp points and ridges, and is almost too well known to admit of description. The kernel is large and sweet, but has usually a rather strong, rank taste, less oily than the butternut. An oil is expressed from its kernel which is known as nut-oil, and is much used by painters as a drying oil. A kind of dye is also manufactured from the husk, or outside cover, of the nut.

The butternut, as its name Juglans cinerea implies, is somewhat related to the black walnut, in fact, rare instances are recorded in which the two species have become mixed, forming a tree which resembled both species. It is found in about the same regions frequented by the black walnut, but extends further east and north into New Brunswick, Maine, Quebec, and Ontario, and does not extend quite so far west. It is most abundant in the Ohio River Valley. It is not so plentiful in the forest as the black walnut, and where it is so found does not fruit well. Its favorite resort is an open grove or along a fence row. Attempts to cultivate it generally yield only disappointment, but under right conditions the trees are very fruitful, one tree having been known to produce forty bushels in a single season, and trees bearing twenty bushels are frequently reported.

The fruit is longer than that of the black walnut and tapers to a point at both ends, with the ridges somewhat more pronounced, but aside from the difference in shape they present a similar appearance.

THE EDIBLE PINE

THE edible pine, or piñon (Pinus edulis), is only one of many varieties of pine nuts which grows on the Pacific Slope of the United States and in Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Mexico.

The pine nut has a rich, marrowy kernel in a shell that varies in thickness from that of a chestnut to that of a hazel-nut. The form and size of the nuts also vary greatly according to the species. They are but little known to the people of the eastern states, but in some of the cities of California they are marketed in large quantities. The larger ones are valued for dessert and confectionery purposes and will doubtless become popular in the East.

They are well known to the Indians and have formed a staple article of their diet for centuries. Their method of harvesting them is very simple. They collect the cones after they have fallen from the trees, then heat them until they open, then rattle them out upon their blankets.

Of the twenty-four species of pine which grow along the Pacific Slope one-half furnish seeds that are esteemed by the Indians as food. When a Mexican Indian starts out on a long trip across the country and does not wish to burden himself with food he fills a small pouch with piñon nuts and can subsist on a small number of them for a remarkably long time.