replied.
"Tse! tse! tse! Whew! whew! whew!" said Dick; and finished off with"Duncan Grey" and the first half of "The Sprig of Shillelah."
"Love is the soul of a nate Irishman," he had been taught to say; but itwas as frequently, "Love is the soul of a nate Irish starling;" or,"_Is_ love the soul of a darling pretty Dick?" and so on.
One curious thing is worth noting: he never pronounced my dog's name--Theodore Nero--once while awake; but he often startled us at night bycalling the dog in clear ringing tones--talking in his sleep. He usedto be chattering and singing without intermission all day long; and ifever he was silent then I knew he was doing mischief; and if I wentquietly into the kitchen, I was sure to find him either tracing patternson a bar of soap, or examining and tearing to pieces a parcel ofnewly-arrived groceries. He was very fond of wines and spirits, butknew when he had enough. He was not permitted to come into the parlourwithout his cage; but sometimes at dinner, if the door were left ajar,he would silently enter like a little thief; when once fairly in, hewould fly on to the table, scream, and defy me. He was very fond of apretty child that used to come to see me. If Matty was lying on thesofa reading, Dick would come and sing on her head; then he would gothrough all the motions of washing and bathing on Matty's bonnie hair;which was, I thought, paying her a very pretty compliment.
When the sun shone in at my study window, I used to hang Dick's cagethere, as a treat to him. Dick would remain quiet for perhaps twentyminutes, then the stillness would feel irksome to him, and presently hewould stretch his head down towards me in a confidential sort of way,and begin to pester me with his silly questions.
"Doctor," he would commence, "_is_ it, is it a nate Irish pet?"
"Silence, and go asleep," I would make answer. "I want to write."
"Eh?" he would say. "_What_ is it? _What_ d'ye say?"
Then, if I didn't answer--
"_Is_ it sugar--snails--sugar, snails, and brandy?" Then, "Doctor,doctor!"
"Well, Dickie, what is it now?" I would answer.
"Doctor--whew." That meant I was to whistle to him.
"Shan't," I would say sulkily.
"Tse! tse! tse!" Dickie would say, and continue, "Doctor, will you goa-clinking?" I never could resist that. Going a-clinking meant goingfly-hawking. Dick always called a fly a clink; and this invitation Iwould receive a dozen times a day, and seldom refused. I would open thecage-door, and Dick would perch himself on my finger, and I would carryhim round the room, holding him up to the flies on the picture-frames.And he never missed one.
Once Dick fell into a bucket of water, and called lustily for the"doctor;" and I was only just in time to save him from a watery grave.When I got him out, he did not speak a word until he had gone to thefire and opened his wings and feathers out to dry, then he said: "Bravo!B-r-ravo" several times, and went forthwith and attacked Hezekiah.
Dick had a little travelling cage, for he often had to go with me bytrain; and no sooner did the train start than Dick used to commence totalk and whistle, very much to the astonishment of the passengers, forthe bird was up in the umbrella rack. Everybody was at once made awareof both my profession and character, for the jolting of the carriage notpleasing him, he used always to prelude his performance with, "Doctor,doctor, you r-r-rascal. What _is_ it, eh?" As Dick got older, I amsorry, as his biographer, to be compelled to say he grew more and moreunkind to his wife--attacked her regularly every morning and the lastthing at night, and half-starred her besides. Poor Hezekiah! She coulddo nothing in the world to please him. Sometimes, now, she used to peckhim back again; she was driven to it. I was sorry for Hezekiah, anddetermined to play pretty Dick a little trick. So one day, when he hadbeen bullying her worse than ever, I took Hezekiah out of the cage, andfastened a small pin to her bill, so as to protrude just a very littleway, and returned her. Dick walked up to her at once. "What," hewanted to know, "did she mean by going on shore without leave?"Hezekiah didn't answer, and accordingly received a dig in the back, thenanother, then a third; and then Hezekiah turned, and let him have onesharp attack. It was very amusing to see how Dick jumped, and his lookof astonishment as he said: "Eh? _What_ d'ye say? Hezekiah!Hezekiah!"
Hezekiah followed up her advantage. It was quite a new sensation forher to have the upper hand, and so she courageously chased him round andround the cage, until I opened the door and let Dick out.
But Hezekiah could not live always with a pin tied to her bill; so, forpeace' sake, I gave her away to a friend, and Dick was left alone in hisglory.
Poor Dickie! One day he was shelling peas to himself in the garden,when some boys startled him, and he flew away. I suppose he losthimself, and couldn't find his way back. At all events I only saw himonce again. I was going down through an avenue of trees about a milefrom the house, when a voice above in a tree hailed me: "Doctor! doctor!What _is_ it?" That was Dick; but a rook flew past and scared himagain, and away he flew--for ever.
That same evening, Ida, who had been absent for some little time,returned, and shyly handed me a letter.
"Whom is it from, I wonder, Ida," I said; "so late in the evening, too?"
"Oh, it is from Maggie," Ida replied.
"What!" I exclaimed; "from that impudent bird? Well, let us see whatshe has to say;" and opening the note, I read as follows:--
"Dear Master,--I fully endorse all you have written about the starling, especially as regards their treatment, and if you had added that they are pert, perky things, you wouldn't have been far out. Well, we magpies build our nests of sticks on the tops of tall trees, lining it first with clay, then with grass; our eggs are five in number, and if they weren't so like to a rook's they might be mistaken for a blackbird's. The nests are so big that before the little boys climb up the trees they think they have found a hawk's. In some parts of the country we are looked upon with a kind of superstitious awe. This is nonsense; there is nothing wrong about us; we may bring joy to people, as I do to you, dear Doctor, by my gentle loving ways, but we never bring grief. We like solitude, and keep ourselves in the wild state to ourselves. Perhaps if we went in flocks, and had as much to say for ourselves as those noisy brutes of rooks, we would be more thought of. Even in the domestic state we like our liberty, and think it terribly cruel to be obliged to mope all day long in a wicker cage. It is crueller still to hang us in draughts, or in too strong a sun; while to keep our cage damp and dirty cramps our legs and gives us such twinges of rheumatism in our poor unused wings, that we often long to die and be at rest.
"The treatment, Doctor, you prescribe for starlings will do nicely for us, and you know how easily we are taught to talk; and I'm sure I _do_ love you, Doctor, and haven't I, all for your sake, made friends with your black Persian cat and your big Newfoundland dog?
"No, I'm not a thief; I deny the charge. Only if you do leave silver spoons about, and gold pens, and shillings and sixpenny-bits--why--I-- I borrow them, that is all, and you can always find them in Maggie's cage.
"We can eat all that starlings eat; yes, and a great many things they would turn up their supercilious bills at. But, remember, we do like a little larger allowance of animal food than starlings do.
"No more at present, dear Doctor, but remains your loving and affectionate Magpie, Maggie."
N.b.--The grammatical error in the last sentence is Maggie's, not mine.
CHAPTER TEN.
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ROOK TOBY.
"A dewy freshness fills the silent air; No mist obscures, nor cloud, nor speck, nor stain Breaks the serene of heaven: In full-orbed glory, yonder moon divine Rolls through the dark-blue depths. Beneath her steady ray The desert-circle spreads; Like the round ocean, girdled with the sky. How beautiful is night?"
"It most have been on just such another night as this, Frank, thatSouthey penned these lines," I began.
"How about the dewy freshness?" said my wife, who is usually morepractical than poetic. "Don't you
think, dear, that Ida had better goin?"
"Oh! no, auntie," cried Ida; "I must stay and hear the story. It isn'tnine o'clock."
"No," Frank remarked, "barely nine o'clock, and yet the stars are allout; why, up in the north of Scotland people at this season of the yearcan see to read all night."
"How delightful!" cried Ida.
The nodding lilacs and starry syringas were mingling their perfume inthe evening air.
"Listen," said my wife; "yonder, close by us in the Portugal laurel, isthe nightingale."
"Yes," I replied, "but to-morrow