Birds and all Nature, Vol. IV, No. 4, October 1898

Оглавление

Various. Birds and all Nature, Vol. IV, No. 4, October 1898

EARS

THE KINGBIRD OF PARADISE

THE PECCARY

AUTUMN

THE BOTTLE-NOSE DOLPHIN

NEW CHAMPION FOR THE SPARROW

THE VOICE OF NATURE

IN THE ANIMAL WORLD

THE TUFTED PUFFIN

"THE TALK OF ANIMALS."

THE BUTTERFLY

THE ARMADILLO

NATURE'S GROTESQUE

THE RED-HEAD DUCK

BIRDS IN GARDEN AND ORCHARD

GOLDENROD

OCTOBER

FROM "CONSTANTINOPLE."

ANIMALS AND MUSIC

Отрывок из книги

Wouldn't you little folks like to see a number of us brilliant, gem-like Birds of Paradise flitting among the trees as do your Robins and Woodpeckers and Jays? To see us spreading our wings in the sun, and preening our ruby and emerald and topaz and amethyst tinted plumes, ribbons, and streamers?

Ah, that would be an astonishing sight, but you will have to journey to an island in the South Pacific Ocean to see that; an island whose shores are bathed by a warm sea, and where the land is covered with the most luxuriant tropical vegetation.

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THE sublime is no nearer the ridiculous in literature than in the things of nature. An instance of this is the close relation of the common Crow to the most glorious bird of them all. Not only are they very much alike in general form, including shape of feet, bill, bones, and ordinary feathering, but also in habit. They seem to delight in the same sorts of food and secure it in much the same manner. When they are happiest and attempt to pour forth their songs of joy the voice of the Crow is fully as melodious and satisfactory to the human ear as is that of the Bird of Paradise.

The old fable in regard to their having no feet and living only on the dews of heaven and the delicacies which they were supposed to be able to collect from the atmosphere as they floated perpetually free from the earth and its contaminations was so grateful to Europeans that when Antony Pigafetta, who accompanied Magellan around the world and secured a great deal of information at first hand, described them as birds with very ordinary, in fact, almost ugly, feet and legs, he was not believed, and Aldrovandus publicly brought accusations against him for audacious falsehood.

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