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Updated: June 7, 2025


This to the ear is 'A daw flew by with crackling cry'; and though our poet's glossary tells us that dor = dor-hawk or nightjar, it really is not so. A dor is a beetle so called from its making a dorring noise, and the name, like churr and burr, is better with its double R and trill.

In a few minutes, only a faint orange burned in the west, dimly illuminating with its band of light the huddled figure on his low wood seat, his right hand still pressed against a faintly beating heart. Dusk gathered; the first white stars appeared; out of the shadowy fields a nightjar purred. But there was only the silence of the falling dew among the graves.

As a set-off to these early visits of the cuckoo, a nightjar has hunted round the islet for moths, both at dusk and during the night, when its note may often be heard. This is a fairly long list of interesting birds revisiting a portion of the river which the London boundary crosses.

He soon woke up, and withdrew to the chapel, and on his return we talked together for three-quarters of an hour about the brown owl, the nightjar, and other birds.

Only one other English bird has so quiet a flight, and that is the nightjar, another creature of the darkness, which, though no cousin to these nocturnal birds of prey, is known in some parts of the country as the "fern-owl." Visitors unprepared for the eerie woodland music of these autumn nights shudder when they hear the cry of the owl, as if it suggested midnight crime.

"Fine night for a ride, Phil. Listen! That's the churning of the nightjar going up to Ballure glen. Well, good-night! Good-night, and God bless you, old fellow!" Kate inside heard the deadened sound of Philip's "Goodnight," the crunch of the mare's hoofs on the gravel and the clink of the bit in her teeth.

Gallienne, in his remarks published with Professor Ansted's list, says "The Nightjar breeds here, and I have obtained it summer and winter." Mr. MacCulloch tells me the Goatsucker is looked upon by the Guernsey people as a bird of ill-omen and a companion of witches in their aërial rambles.

Not far off was a camp of quarrelsome Flying Foxes, and the melancholy Nightjar in the distance was fulfilling its mission of making all the bush creatures miserable with its incessant, mournful "mo-poke! mo-poke!" As Dot could understand all the voices, it amused her to listen to the wrangles of the Flying Foxes, as they ate the fruit of a wild fig tree near by.

Needless to say, there is no truth whatever in the accusation, for the nightjar would find no more pleasure in drinking milk than we should in eating moths. Here, then, are two night-voices of very different calibre. These are not our only birds that break the silence on moonlight nights in June.

What a contrast to London at night, where many a poor fellow must be tossing restlessly in the stifling atmosphere! As we return towards the old manor house the nightjar, or goatsucker, is droning loudly, and a nightingale actually a nightingale! is singing in the copse. These birds seldom visit us in the Cotswolds. In the deserted garden the scent of fresh-mown hay is filling the air, and

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