PROGRAMS FOR BIRD DAY

A Bird Day exercise, in order to have much value educationally, should be largely the result of the pupils’ previous work, and should not be the mere repetition of a prepared program taken verbatim from some paper or leaflet. It is, of course, better to have the pupils recite this leaflet or list of statements than it would be to have it ground out of a phonograph. The program should be prepared by the pupils under direction of the teacher.

The following general suggestions are offered:

1. For the first observance of this day by a school it would be well to have some pupil read Senator Hoar’s petition of the birds to the Legislature of Massachusetts.

PETITION OF THE BIRDS

Written by Senator Hoar to the Massachusetts Legislature

The petition which was instrumental in getting the Massachusetts law passed, prohibiting the wearing of song and insectivorous birds on womens hats, was written by Senator Hoar. The petition read as follows:

To the Great and General Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts: We, the song birds of Massachusetts and their playfellows, make this our humble petition. We know more about you than you think we do. We know how good you are. We have hopped about the roofs and looked in at your windows of the houses you have built for poor and sick and hungry people, and little lame and deaf and blind children. We have built our nests in the trees and sung many a song as we flew about the gardens and parks you have made so beautiful for your children, especially your poor children to play in. Every year we fly a great way over the country, keeping all the time where the sun is bright and warm. And we know that whenever you do anything the other people all over this great land between the seas and the Great Lakes find it out, and pretty soon will try to do the same. We know. We know.

We are Americans just the same as you are. Some of us, like you, came across the great sea. But most of the birds like us have lived here a long while; and the birds like us welcomed your fathers when they came here many, many years ago. Our fathers and mothers have always done their best to please your fathers and mothers.

Now we have a sad story to tell you. Thoughtless or bad people are trying to destroy us. They kill us because our feathers are beautiful. Even pretty and sweet girls, who we should think would be our best friends, kill our brothers and children so that they may wear our plumage on their hats. Sometimes people kill us for mere wantonness. Cruel boys destroy our nests and steal our eggs and our young ones. People with guns and snares lie in wait to kill us; as if the place for a bird were not in the sky, alive, but in a shop window or in a glass case. If this goes on much longer all our song birds will be gone. Already we are told in some other countries that used to be full of birds, they are now almost gone. Even the nightingales are being killed in Italy.

Now we humbly pray that you will stop all this and will save us from this sad fate. You have already made a law that no one shall kill a harmless song bird or destroy our nests or our eggs. Will you please make another one that no one shall wear our feathers, so that no one shall kill us to get them? We want them all ourselves. Your pretty girls are pretty enough without them. We are told that it is as easy for you to do it as for a blackbird to whistle.

If you will, we know how to pay you a hundred times over. We will teach your children to keep themselves clean and neat. We will show them how to live together in peace and love and to agree as we do in our nests. We will build pretty houses which you will like to see. We will play about your garden and flower beds ourselves like flowers on wings, without any cost to you. We will destroy the wicked insects and worms that spoil your cherries and currants and plums and apples and roses. We will give you our best songs, and make the spring more beautiful and the summer sweeter to you. Every June morning when you go out into the field, oriole and bluebird and blackbird and bobolink will fly after you and make the day more delightful to you. And when you go home tired after sundown, vesper sparrow will tell you how grateful we are. When you sit down on your porch after dark, fifebird and hermit thrush and wood thrush will sing to you; and even whip-poor-will will cheer you up a little. We know where we are safe. In a little while all the birds will come to live in Massachusetts again, and everybody who loves music will like to make a summer home with you.

The signers are:

Brown Thrasher,
Robert o Lincoln,
Hermit Thrush,
Vesper Sparrow,
Robin Redbreast,
Song Sparrow,
Scarlet Tanager,
Summer Redbird,
Blue Heron,
Humming Bird,
Yellowbird,
Whip-poor-will,
Water Wagtail,
Woodpecker,
Pigeon Woodpecker,
Indigo Bird,
Yellowthroat,
Wilsons Thrush,
Chickadee,
Kingbird,
Swallow,
Cedar Bird,
Cowbird,
Martin,
Veery,
Chewink,
Vireo,
Oriole,
Blackbird,
Fifebird,
Wren,
Linnet,
Pewee,
Phoebe,
Yoke Bird,
Lark,
Sandpiper.

It should be noted that the result of this petition was the passage of a law by the Legislature of Massachusetts forbidding the wearing of parts of wild birds. A bill forbidding the transportation of feathers or the skins of birds from one state to another was also introduced by Senator Hoar in the United States Senate.

2. At this first exercise it would be well to have read “Our New Neighbors at Ponkapog,” by T. B. Aldrich.

3. The best essays that have been written by the pupils during their preliminary study may be given. If the school has not made this preliminary study, select subjects and have essays written according to the directions already given, allowing as much time as possible for original observations.

4. Have recitations from the poets. These will add a peculiar charm to the occasion. A short list of suitable poems will be given. Many others may be found in a book called “Voices of the Speechless,” published by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

The works of John Burroughs, Bradford Torrey, Maurice Thompson, Mrs. Olive Thorne Miller, and Dr. C. C. Abbott abound in passages which are excellent for recitation. It is surprising how familiar the best-known novelists have been and are with birds. In appreciation of them they are second only to the poets. Charles Reade’s description of the lark’s song in the mines of Australia, in “Never Too Late to Mend,” is an inspiring recitation.

5. Short quotations from well known authors should be given, if possible, by every pupil in the school. We give a few taken almost at random:

Away over the hayfield the lark floated in the blue, making the air quiver with his singing; the robin, perched on a fence, looked at us saucily and piped a few notes by way of remark; the blackbird was heard, flute-throated, down in the hollow recesses of the wood; and the thrush, in a holly tree by the wayside, sang out his sweet, clear song that seemed to rise in strength as the wind awoke a sudden rustling through the long woods of birch and oak. WILLIAM BLACK, in Adventures of a Phaeton.

We seemed to hear all the sounds within a great compass in the hedges and in the roadside trees, far away in woods or hidden up in the level grayness of the clouds: twi, twi, trrrr-weet! droom, droom, phloee! tuck, tuck, tuck, tuck, feer! that was the silvery chorus from thousands of throats. It seemed to us that all the fields and hedges had but one voice, and that it was clear and sweet and piercing. WILLIAM BLACK, Ibid.

Silvia could hear the twittering of the young starlings in their nests as their parents went and came carrying food, and the loud and joyful “tirr-a-wee, tirr-a-wee, prooit, tweet!” of the thrushes, and the low currooing of the wood pigeon, and the soft call of the cuckoo, that seemed to come in whenever an interval of silence fitted. The swallows dipped and flashed and circled over the bosom of the lake. There were blackbirds eagerly but cautiously at work, with their spasmodic trippings, on the lawn. A robin perched on the iron railing eyed her curiously and seemed more disposed to approach than to retreat. WILLIAM BLACK, in Green Pastures and Piccadilly.

A jay fled screaming through the wood, just one brief
glimpse of brilliant blue being visible. WILLIAM BLACK,
Ibid.

And as they came near to one dark patch of shrubbery, lo!
the strange silence was burst asunder by the rich, full song
of a nightingale. WILLIAM BLACK, Ibid.

A sudden sound sprang into the night, flooding all its darkness with its rich and piercing melody a joyous, clear, full-throated note, deep-gurgling now, and again rising with thrills and tremors into bursts of far-reaching silver song that seemed to shake the hollow air. A single nightingale had filled the woods with life. We cared no more for those distant and silent stars. It was enough to sit here in the gracious quiet and listen to the eager tremulous outpouring of this honeyed sound. WILLIAM BLACK, in Strange Adventures of a House-Boat.

Shoot and eat my birds! The next step beyond, and one would
hanker after Jenny Lind or Miss Kellogg. HENRY WARD
BEECHER.

There on the very topmost twig, that rises and falls with willowy motion, sits that ridiculous, sweet-singing bobolink, singing as a Roman candle fizzes, showers of sparkling notes. Ibid.

This poet affirms that our bobolink is superior to the nightingale:

Bobolink, that in the meadow,
Or beneath the orchard’s shadow,
Keepest up a constant rattle
Joyous as my children’s prattle,
Welcome to the North again,
Welcome to mine ear thy strain,
Welcome to mine eye the sight
Of thy buff, thy black and white.
Brighter plumes may greet the sun
By the banks of Amazon;
Sweeter tones may weave the spell
Of enchanting Philomel;
But the tropic bird would fail,
And the English nightingale,
If we should compare their worth
With thine endless, gushing mirth.

THOMAS HILL.

The mocking bird is a singer that has suffered much from its powers of mimicry. On ordinary occasions, and especially in the daytime, it insists on playing the harlequin. But when free in its own favorite haunts at night, it has a song, or rather songs, which are not only purely original, but are also more beautiful than any other bird music whatsoever. Once I listened to a mocking bird singing the livelong spring night, under the full moon, in a magnolia tree; and I do not think I shall ever forget its song.

The great tree was bathed in a flood of shining silver; I could see each twig, and mark every action of the singer, who was pouring forth such a rapture of ringing melody as I have never listened to before or since. Sometimes he would perch motionless for many minutes, his body quivering and thrilling with the outpour of music. Then he would drop softly from twig to twig till the lowest limb was reached, when he would rise, fluttering and leaping through the branches, his song never ceasing for an instant until he reached the summit of the tree and launched into the warm scent-laden air, floating in spirals, with outspread wings, until, as if spent, he sank gently back into the tree and down through the branches, while his song rose into an ecstasy of ardor and passion. His voice rang like a clarionet in rich, full tones, and his execution covered the widest possible compass; theme followed theme, a torrent of music, a swelling tide of harmony, in which scarcely any two bars were alike. I stayed till midnight listening to him; he was singing when I went to sleep; he was still singing when I woke a couple of hours later; he sang through the livelong night. THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

Amid the thunders of Sinai God uttered the rights of cattle, and said that they should have a Sabbath. “Thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy cattle.” He declared with infinite emphasis that the ox on the threshing-floor should have the privilege of eating some of the grain as he trod it out, and muzzling was forbidden. If young birds were taken from the nest for food, the despoiler’s life depended on the mother going free. God would not let the mother-bird suffer in one day the loss of her young and her own liberty. And he who regarded in olden time the conduct of man toward the brutes, to-day looks down from heaven and is interested in every minnow that swims the stream, and every rook that cleaves the air. DEWITT TALMAGE, D.D.

And how refreshing is the sight of the birdless bonnet! The face beneath, no matter how plain it may be, seems to possess a gentle charm. She might have had birds, this woman, for they are cheap enough and plentiful enough, heaven knows; but she has them not, therefore she must wear within things infinitely precious, namely, good sense, good taste, good feeling. Does any woman imagine these withered corpses (cured with arsenic), which she loves to carry about, are beautiful? Not so; the birds lost their beauty with their lives. CELIA THAXTER.

I walked up my garden path as I was coming home from shooting. My dog ran on before me; suddenly he went slower and crept carefully forward as if he scented game. I looked along the path and perceived a young sparrow, with its downy head and yellow bill. It had fallen from a nest (the wind was blowing hard through the young birch trees beside the path) and was sprawling motionless, helpless, on the ground, with its little wings outspread. My dog crept softly up to it, when suddenly an old black-breasted sparrow threw himself down from a neighboring tree and let himself fall like a stone directly under the dog’s nose, and, with ruffled feathers, sprang with a terrified twitter several times against his open, threatening mouth. He had flown down to protect his young at the sacrifice of himself. His little body trembled all over, his cry was hoarse, he was frightened to death; but he sacrificed himself. My dog must have seemed to him a gigantic monster, but for all that, he could not stay on his high, safe branch. A power stronger than himself drove him down. My dog stopped and drew back; it seemed as if he, too, respected this power. I hastened to call back the amazed dog, and reverently withdrew. Yes, don’t laugh; I felt a reverence for this little hero of a bird, with his paternal love.

Love, thought I, is mightier than death and the fear of
death; love alone inspires and is the life of all. IVAN
TOURGUENEFF.

The first sparrow of spring! The year beginning with younger hope than ever! The faint, silvery warblings heard over the partially bare and moist fields from the bluebird, the song sparrow, and the redwing, as if the last flakes of winter tinkled as they fell! H. D. THOREAU.

I heard a robin in the distance, the first I had heard for many a thousand years, methought, whose note I shall not forget for many a thousand more, the same sweet, powerful song as of yore. Ibid.

Walden is melting apace. A great field of ice has cracked off from the main body. I hear a song sparrow from the bushes on the shore, olit, olit, olit chip, chip, chip, che char che wis, wis, wis. He, too, is helping to crack the ice. Ibid.

The bluebird carries the sky on his back. Ibid.

6. One of the most interesting features of a Bird Day program will be the personations of birds.

The following was given by a boy in the seventh grade:

One day in February a gentleman and his wife stopped beside the wall of old Fort Marion, in St. Augustine, to listen to my song. The sun was shining brightly, and little white flowers were blooming in the green turf about the old fort. It was not time yet to build my nest, so I had nothing to do but sing and get my food and travel a little every day toward my Northern home.

I am about as large as a robin, and although there is nothing brilliant in my plumage I am not a homely bird. I like the songs of other birds and sometimes sing them. I frequently sing like my cousins, the catbirds and robins and thrushes. But I have my own song, which is unlike all the others. My mate and I build a large nest of small sticks, pieces of string, cotton, and weeds, in thick bushes or low trees. We have five eggs that are greenish blue and spotted with brown. We eat many beetles, larvae, and many kinds of insects which we find feeding upon plants. The worst enemy we have is man. He steals our children almost before we have taught them to sing, and puts them in cages. He is a monster.

Many poems have been written about me. One of the finest is
by Sidney Lanier, in which he calls me “yon trim Shakespeare
on the tree.”

Any one who has heard my song can never forget me.

What is my name?

7. Bird facts and proverbs form a valuable part of a program and may be given by some of the children. Let the pupils search for them and bring some similar to these:

Birds flock together in hard times.

A bird in the bush is worth two in the hand.

The American robin is not the same bird as the English.

The bluebird and robin may be harbingers of spring, but the
swallow is the harbinger of summer.

The dandelion tells me to look for the swallow; the
dog-toothed violet when to expect the wood thrush. JOHN
BURROUGHS.

It is not thought that any one bird spends the year in one
locality, but that all birds migrate, if only within a
limited range.

A loon was caught, by a set line for fishing, sixty-five
feet below the surface of a lake in New York, having dived
to that depth for a fish.

The wood pewee, like its relative, the phoebe, feeds
largely on the family of flies to which the house fly
belongs.

The birds of prey, the majority of which labor night and day
to destroy the enemies of the husbandman, are unceasingly
persecuted.

Seventy-five per cent of the food of the downy woodpecker is
insects.

The cow blackbird lays its eggs in other birds’ nests, one
in a nest. What happens afterwards?

Why should not a man love a bird? If the palm of one could clasp the pinion of the other, there would come together two of the greatest implements God and nature have ever given any two creatures to explore the world with, and when two bipeds gaze at each other, eye to eye, the intelligence in the one might well take off its hat to the subtle instincts in the other. JAMES NEWTON BASKETT.

A bird on the bonnet means so much less bread on the table. A bird in the orchard is a sort of scavenger and pomologist combined, and does his share in giving you a dish of fruit for dinner. The scarlet tanager looks like a living ruby in a green tree; but I speak bluntly it looks like a chunk of gore on a woman’s bonnet. In behalf of good taste and the birds, I enter my protest against this barbarous Custom. LEANDER T. KEYSER.

What does it cost, this garniture of death?
It costs the life which God alone can give;
It costs dull silence, where was music’s breath;
It costs dead joy, that foolish pride may live.
Ah, life, and joy, and song, depend upon it,
Are costly trimmings for a woman’s bonnet.

MAY RILEY SMITH.

The program may be diversified by songs about birds. Many suitable for this occasion will be found in a collection called “Songs of Happy Life,” made by Sarah J. Eddy. It is published by the Nature Study Publishing Company, of Providence, R. I.