The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-12-08
IALL RIGHTS ~ERV
Fairy Tales of Science
v.
BIRD ZION
BY HERBERT MAXWELL, Bart, NJ. p.

] ~ he CdTS u the great Wneel AT Earl 8
Court discovered that a certain tramp had
taken up lodging for the night in one of
the highest of them. He perceived at once
that this was no ordinary tramp; the dress
of the wanderer was evidence of it; it was
beautifully fitted, of the tint known to
deer-stalkers as "Lovat mixture''-a deli
cate ashen green. His boots were brown
and carefully vanished, but the most re-
markable part of his attire was the cap.
which was brilliant fame-color, turned up
with black velvet. Altogether an excep-
tionally dandy tramp.
Further inquiry revealed other differ
ences between this and the ordinary tramp.
All British tramps nave their rounds; gen.
orally limited to the United Kingdom, or a
certain portion thereof. You don't meet
tramps on the channel steamers nor on the
Atlantic liners; country lanes, high roads
or the t~horoughfares of great towns are
the best places to look for them by day;
and by night-weli, you had better not look
for them at all, unless in the admirably
managed Rowton houses. This tramp, like
others, had his special round. but it COW
cred several thousands of miles over land
and sea, which he was in the habit of
traversing twice a year, to and fro.
II FAIRY TRAMP"
His name was Regulus, the kinglet-Reg-
illus cristatus in full. L have forgot TO
mention one remarkable popularity, that Of
his stature. He measured less than four
inches in height. This, taken in c~onjunc-
ton with his attire of green and gold. con-
WINGED the attendant that here at last was
a veritable fairy-nay, named Regulus, was
he not king of the fairies?
If we drop romance and come to sober
science have we not in this incident some
thing more marvellous than any fairy tale?
Night draws her curtain over the vast city;
the crowd disperses from the pleasure
grounds at Earl's Court; the great wheel
makes its last revolution and is still. Lon
don is asleep or as near asleep as it can get.
At all events its feathered population are
fast asleep, the sparrows on the housetops,
the pigeons on the clock tower, the thrushes
i'm the park. Yet far overhead, under the
STOPPING clouds, there flowers a stream of
life, fowls of the air, great and small. If
you point your glass at the moon on a
clear October night you may chance to see
myriads of tiny specks moving southwark.
The great autumn migration is going on.
The little gold crest wren-tiniest OF all
British birds-had been an atom in this
mighty movement. Lured down from it's
lofty course by the light left burning in
one of the cars, it lost it's citizenship in
the great host of which it had been a unit.
Had it held on with the others, it might
have dashed out its diminutive life against
the lantern of some lighthouse; for so
tens of thousands of it's kindred and of
other and greater birds sacrifice them
IT,. 49,
than do moths at a candle. Or it might
have escaped all the perils of travel-the
hostile hordes of gulls which hover off the
coast, bouncing on the w~ing-weary, hun
CRY travellers as they land-the diligent
bird catchers who know so we'll to spread
their snares upon immemorial resting
places like our Sussex downs or Heligoland
through all these the little fairy king
might have winged a way and spent a
happy Christmas among the chestnut
woods of the Valtelline or oleanders of
Granada, to return to the domestic duties
in England when the primroses began to
blow. 1t was fated otherwise. This minute
morsel of flesh and feathers lost its way in
the busiest of human hives, to remind us
that with all our devices of science and in
dustry some of the humblest creatures
and the smallest possess faculties which
we are unable TO realize or define.
The seasonal migration of birds has re-
ceived much careful attention of late years.
Certain well-defned arrivals and depar-
lures have been landmark in the year
from the earliest recorded times; the stork
in the heaven knoweth her appointed times,
and the turtle and the crane and the swal-
low observe the time of their coming but
the general character of the movement of
nearly all species of British birds was not
suspected until systematic observations,
conducted over a number of seasons at the
lighthouses on the British and Irish coasts,
revealed the fact that even some of our
most constant feathered fellow-citizens dis
patched innumerable contingents to the
south on the approach of winter. The
lighthouse keepers are kept supplied with
forms by a committee of the British Asso-
citation. the men are diligent in filing them
UP, noting the focks revealed TO them at
night by the flare of the light, registering
the dates of movement, and recording the
mortality among birds flying against the
lantern. That the species of these last may
be verified the wings Of victims are for
warded with the reports. From the mass
of information thus accumulated year by
year IL may De pronounced that game DlTOS
are almost absolutely stationary, although
partridge has been recorded from Heligo-
land; so probably may the house sparrow,
demoralized by long acquaintance with the
vices of town life; but rocks, jays, black
birds. thrushes. chaffinches. even the con-
iding robin and the contented little brown
wren pass in literally countless numbers
from one region TO another. moved by a
latent but irresistible impulse.
THE TRAVELS OF THE KNOT.
An extreme instance of this annual mi
grafton may be found in the knot CTringa
%canutus). a two-penny half-penny little
wader about the size of a common snipe.
Breeding so far to the north that no col
lection in the world contains a specimen Of
its egg. the knots leave the Arctic circle in
the autumn, and move in vast multitudes
through Europe, Asia and America. not
shunning the British isles. and continue
their leisurely journey TO such prodigious
limits that the advanced guard, before it
has turned north again, has occupied