Orioles, with their brilliant plumage and beautiful song, belong to the somber-hued, unmusical blackbird family. They are truly “the flower of the flock,”—gorgeous tropical flowers, too. They invariably arouse interest and almost always great admiration. So dashing are they that they do not remain long enough near us to let us know them well or love them. They remind me of brilliant opera-singers, elegantly attired, who are followed by the eager eyes of a host of people.

So many poets and writers of prose have sung the praise of orioles that it surprised me to learn that neither Thoreau nor Burroughs admired them. Thoreau wrote: “Two gold robins; they chatter like blackbirds; the fire bursts forth on their backs when they lift their wings.... But the note is not melodious and rich. It is at most a clear tone.”[106] Burroughs said: “I have no use for the oriole. He has not one musical note, and in grape time his bill is red, or purple, with the blood of our grapes.”[107]

A grape-eating propensity is not a trait common to orioles, according to Professor Beal’s report of their food habits. He says: “Brilliancy of plumage, sweetness of song, and food habits to which no exception can be taken are characteristics of the Baltimore oriole. During the stay of the oriole in the United States, vegetable matter amounts to only a little more than 16 per cent. of its food, so that the possibility of its doing much damage to crops is very limited. The bird is accused of eating peas to a considerable extent, but remains of such were found in only two cases. One writer says that it damages grapes, but none were found in the stomachs.”[108] Professor Beal lists caterpillars, beetles, bugs, ants, wasps, grasshoppers, and some spiders as the “fare of the oriole.”

The nest and nesting habits of these birds are unusually interesting. In Eaton’s “Birds of New York” occurs the following description:

“The female is an ideal mother, defending her young with great courage and caring for them in all kinds of weather. The young, however, are not such ideal offspring as she ought to expect. From the time they begin to feather out until several days after they have left the nest, they keep up a continual cry for food. In this way they are unquestionably located by many predaceous animals and thereby destroyed. The young orioles are usually out of the nest from the 20th of June to the 5th of July [in New York State], and are very soon led away by the old birds into the woods, groves, and dense hedgerows. Then we hear no more of the oriole’s song until the latter days of August or the first week in September, when, after the autumn molt has been completed, the males frequently burst into melody for a few days before departing for their winter home.

“As every one knows, the oriole builds a pensile nest, usually suspending it from the drooping branches of an elm tree, soft maple, apple tree, or in fact, any tree, though his preference seems to be for the elm. The main construction materials used by the oriole are gray plant-fibers, especially those from the outside of milkweed stalks, waste packing-cord and horsehair; sometimes pieces of rags and paper are discovered in the nest, but it is almost without exception a grayish bag as it appears from the outside, and is lined principally with horsehairs and softer materials, making a thick felted gourd-shaped structure.”

One morning this past May when the heat was unseasonable and overpowering, an oriole was observed fluttering anxiously near the nest where his mate sat on her eggs. The foliage had not developed sufficiently to shade her, so he alighted on the nest, a claw on either side of the cup-like opening. There he stood astride for the greater part of the day and protected her devotedly, like a chivalrous knight of old.