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IV THE BROWN THRASHER
THE brown thrasher — called also the brown thrush — is a bird considerably longer than a robin, with a noticeably long tail and a long, curved bill. His upper parts are reddish brown or cinnamon color, and his lower parts white or whitish, boldly streaked with black. You will find him in hedgerows, in scrub-lands, and about the edges of woods, where he keeps mostly on or near the ground. His general manner is that of a creature who wishes nothing else so much as to escape notice. “Only let me alone,” he seems to say. If he sees you coming, as he pretty certainly will, he dodges into the nearest thicket or barberry-bush, and waits for you to pass. Farmers know him as
the “planting-bird.” In New England he makes his appearance with commendable
punctuality between the twentieth of April and the first of May; and while the
farmer is planting his garden, the thrasher encourages him with song. One man,
who was planting beans, imagined that the bird said, “Drop it, drop it!
Cover it up, cover it up!” Perhaps he did. It was good advice, anyhow. In his own way the
thrasher is one of the great singers of the world. He is own cousin to the
famous mockingbird, and at the South, where he and the mocker may be heard
singing side by side, — and so much alike that it is hard to tell one from the
other, — he is known as the “brown mocking-bird.” He would deserve the title
but for one thing — he does not mock. In that respect he falls far short of his
gray cousin, who not only has all the thrasher’s gift of original song, but a
most amazing faculty of imitation, as every one knows who has heard even a
caged mocking bird running over the medley of notes he has picked up here and
there and carefully rehearsed and remembered. The thrasher’s song is a medley,
but not a medley of imitations. I have said that
the thrasher keeps near the ground. Such is his habit; but there is one
exception. When he sings he takes the very top of a tree, although usually it
is not a tall one. There he stands by the half-hour together, head up and tail
down, pouring out a flood of music; sounds of all sorts, high notes and low
notes, smooth notes and rough notes, all jumbled together in the craziest
fashion, as if the musician were really beside himself. It is a performance
worth buying a ticket for and going miles to hear; but it is to be heard
without price on the outskirts of almost any village in the United States east
of the Rocky Mountains and south of Maine. You must go out at the right time,
however, for the bird sings but a few weeks in the year, although he remains in
New England almost six months, or till the middle of October. He is one of the
birds that every one should know, since it is perfectly easy to identify him;
and once known, he is never to be forgotten, or to be confounded with anything
else. The thrasher’s nest
is a rude, careless-looking structure, made of twigs, roots, and dry leaves,
and is to be looked for on the ground, or in a bush not far above it. Often it
has so much the appearance of a last year’s affair that one is tempted to pass
it as unworthy of notice. I have been fooled in that way more than once. The bird sits
close, as the saying is, and as she stares at you with her yellow eyes, full at
once of courage and fear, you will need a hard heart to disturb her. Sometimes
she will really show fight, and she has been known to drive a small boy off the
field. Her whistle after she has been frightened from her eggs or nestlings is
one of the most pathetic sounds in nature. I should feel sorry for the boy who
could hear it without pity. Besides this
mournful whistle, the thrasher has a note almost exactly like a smacking kiss,
— very realistic, — and sometimes, especially at dusk, an uncanny, ghostly
whisper, that seems meant expressly to suggest the presence of some thing
unearthly and awful. So far as I am aware, there is no other bird-note like it.
I have no doubt that many a superstitious person has taken to his heels on
hearing it from the bushes along a lonesome roadside after nightfall. Except in the
spring, indeed, there is little about the thrasher’s appearance or behavior to
suggest pleasant thoughts. To me, at any rate, he seems a creature of chronic
low spirits. The world has used him badly, and he cannot get over it. He is
almost the only bird I ever see without a little inspiration of cheerfulness.
Per haps I misjudge him. Let my young
readers make his acquaintance on their own account, if they have not already
done so, and find him a livelier creature than I have described him, if they
can. |
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