United States or Burundi ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
An inquisitive hen runs up to see what good things there are to eat. In the garden beyond, the father works busily at his spading. The name which Millet gave to this picture is the French word Becquée, which cannot be translated into any corresponding word in English. It means a beakful, that is, the food which the mother bird holds in her beak to give to the nestlings.
I hoped that he would pluck up courage to feed his youngsters before my eyes; but his heart failed him, for presently he flew to another tree a little farther away, whence he again contemplated me. After this he kept changing his position, never uttering a sound, and always retaining hold of the beakful of caterpillars.
On one occasion I discovered that by changing my seat I could actually see the nest, which I much desired; so I removed while the birds were absent. Madam was the first to return, with a beakful of food; she saw me instantly, and was too much excited to dispose of her load. She came to my side of her tree, squawked loudly, flapping her wings and jerking herself about.
We must do as sometimes you see the swallows do when they go skimming across a lake, not stopping at every wave, yet now and then making a little splash as a beakful of water is scooped up, or perhaps a floating fly. And possibly you are wondering just why we took that last little dip of ours into the Crusades; but there was a reason.
I hoped to the kingbird, who at that moment sat demurely upon the picket fence below, apparently interested only in passing insects; and while I looked the question was answered by Madame Tyrannis herself, who came with the confidence of ownership, carrying a beakful of building material, and arranging it with great pains inside the structure.
So that by someone being admonished, in the midst of his draught of a large deep bowl full of excellent claret with these words Fair and softly, gossip, you suck up as if you were mad I give thee to the devil, said he; thou hast not found here thy little tippling sippers of Paris, that drink no more than the little bird called a spink or chaffinch, and never take in their beakful of liquor till they be bobbed on the tails after the manner of the sparrows.
With singular interest and deep suspense he awaited their decision. At last it came, and was favorable. The female bird came flying to the post with a beakful of fine dry grass, and her mate, on a spray near, broke out into his soft, rapturous song. The master of the house gave a great sigh of relief.
But his music was broken intermittent vocalizing now, often uttered past a beakful of food, and interspersed with spasmodic "chips" if danger threatened his mate and nestlings.
"I can carry away a great beakful of the yellow seeds, and each one will blossom into a golden flower for me for me for me!" He was wholly crazy, as you see. He thrust his bill deep into the gold dust of the floor, and greedily filled it more than full, till it dropped over his white, white feathers and splashed his coat so that he was no longer a white bird but a yellow bird.
Were any one to tell us of a chick which, for seven or eight months on end, kept itself in condition for running, always fit, always brisk, without taking the least beakful of nourishment from the day when it left the egg, we could find no words strong enough to express our incredulity. Now this paradox of activity maintained without the stay of food is realized by the Clotho Spider and others.
Word Of The Day