“514. BIRD—MESSENGERS—ECCLESIASTES 10:20”

Bird—Messengers—Ecc_10:20

In the tenth chapter of Ecclesiastes, there is a remarkable verse (Ecc_10:20) over which we have often mused: “Curse not the king, no not in thy thought; for a bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall tell the matter.”

This reminds one strongly of that marvellous “little bird” whose mythic existence perplexes infancy by the reports concerning our young misdoing, which it bears to our mothers, grandmothers, and nurses. From the text before us it would almost seem that this mysterious “bird,” which fills so important a place in our infant lore, came to us from the East, and was as well known to the Hebrews as to us, performing nearly the same functions for them as for ourselves. If the existence of this famous little bird was known in the time of Solomon, it would not be improper that he should allude to it—not of course as a fact, but as a popular expression—to illustrate the almost certainty with which, in spite of all precaution, conspiracies against the head of the state transpire.

It has, however, often struck us, that there may be an allusion to a real fact—the use of birds—that is, of carrier-pigeons, it conveying intelligence. That it is said “the bird of the air shall carry the voice,” favors this notion; and the more we have looked into the matter, the more probable it has appeared, this use of these birds being traceable back to very ancient times and although the earlier instances are mostly European, it is admitted that the bird itself, and this employment of it, were derived from the East, where its services are still highly valued. Formerly, relays of these birds were kept in constant readiness to carry expresses to all parts of the country, where they had been previously and purposely bred. It is related that when the governor of Diametta heard of the death of Orilio, he let fly a pigeon, under whose wing he had fastened a letter, to Cairo, whence another was dispatched to another place, and so on, until, in a few hours, the event was known all over Egypt. But the native use of the carrier-pigeon was known in much earlier times. Anacreon informs us that he held a correspondence with his lovely Bathyllus by means of a dove. Taurosthenes, by means of a pigeon, which he caused to be decked with purple, sent to his father, who lived in the isle of Egina, the news of his victory in the Olympic games, on the very day he had gained it. When Mutina was besieged, Brutus, within the walls, kept up an uninterrupted intercourse with Hirtius, by the assistance of pigeons, setting at naught every stratagem of the besieger, Antony, to stop or retard these aerial couriers. In the time of the Crusades, there were many instances of these birds being also made useful in the service of war. Tasso relates one during the siege of Jerusalem; and Joinville another during the crusade of St. Louis. The purposes for which they were generally reared were—to be sent from governors of besieged cities to generals who were coming to their assistance; from princes to their subjects, to apprise them of some important event; from governors to their princes, apprising them of distant conspiracies or insurrections; from military commanders, announcing victories or losses; or from love-sick heroes to their distant and desponding fair ones.

The Carrier Pigeon

Dr. Russell, in his Natural History of Aleppo, gives a particular account of the matter; and the process, as described by him, is doubtless the same that anciently prevailed, as there can be but little variation in the mode of reducing to man’s service the natural though marvellous instincts of a bird. Russell says that the carrier-pigeon was in former times employed to bring intelligence to Aleppo of the arrival of ships at Scanderoon. The name of the ship, the hour of her arrival, and whatever other particulars could be comprised in a small compass, were written on a slip of paper, and secured under the pigeon’s wing in such a manner as not to impede her flight; and her feet were bathed in vinegar with the view of keeping them cool, that the sight of water might not tempt her to alight, by which the journey would have been prolonged or the billet lost. “The practice,” says Russell, “has been disused for many years: but I heard it asserted by an English gentleman, in whose time it still subsisted, that he had known pigeons perform the journey in two hours and a half. The messenger had a young brood at Aleppo, and was sent down in an uncovered cage to Scanderoon, from whence, as soon as at liberty, she returned with all expedition to her nest.” Russell’s brother adds, from subsequent information, that, when let loose at Scanderoon, instead of bending their course towards the high mountains surrounding the plain, they mounted at once directly up, soaring still, almost perpendicularly, until out of sight, as if to surmount at once the obstacles intercepting the view of their place of destination.

Pigeons were also sent from and to Aleppo on far more distant journeys in opposite directions. The old traveller, Lithgow, says that one of them “would carry a letter between Babylon [Baghdad] and Aleppo, which is thirty days’ journey,” in forty-eight hours. It is recorded that a gentleman of Cologne, having business to transact in Paris, took with him two carrier-pigeons, which had young at the time, and, on arriving in Paris at ten o’clock in the morning, he tied a letter to each of his pigeons, and dispatched them at eleven precisely. One of them arrived in Cologne, at five minutes past one o’clock, the other nine minutes later, and consequently they had performed nearly 150 miles in an hour, reckoning their flight to have been in a direct line. The ordinary flight of the bird is about a mile in a minute.

In our own country, these birds seem to have been first and mostly used for the purpose of announcing to distant friends the death of some unhappy criminal—reminding one of the custom among the Romans of letting fly an eagle from the funeral pile to render the apotheosis of the deceased complete. More lately they have been used to convey intelligence of political movements, of the state of the public funds, of the result of races, and the like—though for all these purposes their use has been in a great measure, and will soon be wholly, superseded by express trains and electric telegraphs—the use of the birds, when other means are available, being much discouraged by the necessity of previously conveying them from the same place to which their message is to be borne.

It would seem that somewhat too much stress has been laid upon the bird having young ones at home, for birds will do this that have no young ones. It is its accustomed home the bird seeks, whether it has young there or not. It is influenced by an instinctive nostalgia, which in old birds can scarcely be eradicated by time. Confined for weeks or months, on gaining their liberty off they fly to the “old familiar spot,” and if taken away again, still return on the first opportunity. But how do they find their way? how do they even discern the direction in which their home lies? That in these unclear climes they are sometimes dispersed and lost in foggy weather, shows that they use their sight in pursuing their homeward course; but still the difficulty remains, How is that course determined? Naturalists have not succeeded in solving this difficulty. They confess that it is one of the mysteries which they are unable to fathom, and must be content to leave unexplained. We can only say, that these creatures have received from God a powerful instinct, inscrutable to man in its operations, though beautifully intelligible in its results—from God, through whose similar endowment, “the stork in the heavens knoweth her appointed times; and the turtle, the crane, and the swallow observe the time of their coming.” Jer_8:7.

Autor: JOHN KITTO