owlark has a new song. How or
where he got it is a mystery; it seems to be in some way the gift of
those great, smooth, flowery, treeless, dimpled hills. But the swallow
was familiar, and the robin and the wren and the highhole, while the
woodchuck I saw and heard in Wyoming might have been the "chuck" of my
native hills. The eagle is an eagle the world over. When I was a boy I
saw, one autumn day, an eagle descend with extended talons upon the
backs of a herd of young cattle that were accompanied by a
cosset-sheep and were feeding upon a high hill. The object of the
eagle seemed to be to separate the one sheep from the cattle, or to
frighten them all into breaking their necks in trying to escape him.
But neither result did he achieve. In the Yellowstone Park, President
Roosevelt and Major Pitcher saw a golden eagle trying the same tactics
upon a herd of elk that contained one yearling. The eagle doubtless
had his eye upon the yearling, though he would probably have been
quite satisfied to have driven one of the older ones down a precipice.
His chances of a dinner would have been equally good.

There is one particular in which the bird families are much more human
than our four-footed kindred. I refer to the practice of courtship.
The male of all birds, so far as I know, pays suit to the female and
seeks to please and attract her.[2] This the quadrupeds do not do;
there is no period of courtship among them, and no mating or pairing
as among the birds. The male fights for the female, but he does not
seek to win her by delicate attentions. If there are any exceptions to
this rule, I do not know them. There seems to be among the birds
something that is like what is called romantic love. The choice of
mate seems always to rest with the female,[2] while among the mammals
the female shows no preference at all.

[2] Except in the case of certain birds of India and Australia.

Among our own birds, the prettiest thing I know of attending the
period of courtship, or preliminary to the match-making, is the spring
musical festival and reunion of the goldfinches, which often lasts for
days, through rain and shine. In April or May, apparently all the
goldfinches from a large area collect in the top of an elm or a maple
and unite in a prolonged musical festival. Is it a contest among the
males for the favor of the females, or is it the spontaneous
expression of the gladness of the whole clan at the return of the
season of life