Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/448

 They are popularly supposed to migrate coastwards only when the great lakes of the interior begin to fail. This, however, is not an unfailing test of a dry season, as in long-dead summers I have had occasion to note. They are not too dignified, in despite of their quasi-sacred hierophantic traditions, to eat grasshoppers. As these enemies alike of farmers and squatters are now despoiling every green thing, let us hope that the ibis contingent may have appetites proportioned to the length of their bills and the duration of their journey. A white variety of the species is occasionally noted, but he is rare in comparison with the darker kind.

By the creek bank, in the early morn, the well-remembered note of the kingfisher, so closely associated with our youth, sounds close and clear. Yonder he sits upon the dead limb of the overhanging tree—greenish blue, purple-breasted as of yore. Stonelike he plunges into the deep pool, reappearing with a small fish or allied water-dweller. More beautiful is his relative the lesser kingfisher, metallic in sheen, with crimson breast—flashing like a feathered gem through the river shades, or burning like a flame spot against the mouldering log on which he sits. Of palest fawn colour, with long black filament at the back of his head, that graceful heron, the 'nankeen bird' of the colonist, is also of the company; the white-necked, dark-blue crane, and that black-robed river pirate the cormorant. While on the bird question, surely none are more delicately bright, more exquisitely neat of plumage and flawless of tone, than the Columba tribe. Ancient of birth are they as 'the doves from the rocks,' and principally for their conjugal fidelity have been honoured, by the choice of Mr. Darwin, as exemplars in working out experiments connected with the origin of species. In western wanderings I find five varieties of the pigeon proper. The beautiful bronze-wing, the squatter, and the crested pigeon. Besides these, two varieties of the dove are among the most exquisitely lovely of feathered creatures. Both are very small—one scarcely larger than a sparrow. The 'bronze-wing' is too well known to need description. The 'squatter pigeon' is a plainer likeness, with a spot of white on either cheek, and, as its name implies, is unwilling to fly up, being struck down occasionally with the whip or a short throwing stick in the act of rising. The crested pigeon, the most graceful and attractive