Chapter XXIV: Nightingales in India

The nightingale shares with the Taj Mahal the distinction of being an object on which every person lavishes high praise. All who hear the song of the nightingale go into ecstasies over it; similarly, every human being who sets eyes on the Taj waxes enthusiastic at the sight thereof. Some years ago a writer in the _Globe_ stated that a patient investigator compiled a list of nearly two hundred epithets bestowed by poets alone on the nightingale’s song, and I doubt not that an equally patient investigator could compile an equally long list of adjectives lavished on the Taj Mahal by those who have attempted to describe that famous tomb. The consequence is that every superlative in the English language has been appropriated by some person, so that he who nowadays wishes to bestow something original in the way of praise on either the nightingale or the Taj is at his wit’s end to know what to say. Recently I met in a railway train a Portuguese gentleman who was paying a visit to India. Needless to say, I asked him what he thought of the Taj. He promptly replied: “_Le Taj, ah! c’est un bijou._” I feel that by way of paying the necessary homage to the nightingale I cannot do better than repeat “_c’est un bijou_.”

Ornithologists assure us that there are three species of nightingale. There is the Western nightingale (_Daulias luscinia_), which visits England in the summer and fills the woods with its glorious melody. Then there is the Eastern species or variety which is also known as the sprosser (_D. philomela_), and, lastly, the Persian nightingale, the _hazar-dastan_ or _bulbul_ of the Persian poets. This last variety is known to men of science as _Daulias golzii_.

It would puzzle the ordinary man to distinguish between these various races. The length of the tail is one test. If the nightingale have a tail well over three inches in length it is the Persian form, if well under three inches it is a Western nightingale, and if about three inches a sprosser. The nightingale, as every one knows, is a small bird varying from 6½ to 7½ inches in length. Both sexes dress alike and in the plainest manner possible, the upper plumage being russet brown and the lower pale buff.

As we have seen, one of the Persian names of the nightingale is “bulbul.” This has given rise to considerable misunderstanding regarding the existence of nightingales in India. Every one knows that India teems with bulbuls, and as “bulbul” is the Persian for nightingale, the average Englishman labours under the delusion that Hindustan abounds with nightingales which fill the soft Indian night with melody, at the time

“When mangoes redden and the asoka buds
Sweeten the breeze and Rama’s birthday comes.”

Now, as a matter of fact, the Indian bulbul has nothing whatever to do with the nightingale. There can, I think, be but little doubt that the Persian poets have misapplied the word “bulbul” in using it to denote the nightingale. The term “bulbul” is familiar to every native of India as meaning one of the Brachypodous birds belonging to the genera _Molpastes_, _Otocompsa_, etc., and as there are true bulbuls in Persia, one of which, _Molpastes leucotis_, is a good singer, it is probable that the poets, who are notoriously bad naturalists, have misapplied the name of this songster to an even better singer, namely, the nightingale. And this name, having been immortalised by Hafiz and others, will always remain. We must, therefore, be careful to distinguish between the true bulbuls, which are not very brilliant singers, and the nightingale, which in India is known as the _bulbul bostha_, or _bulbul basta_. Numbers of Persian nightingales are captured and sent in cages to India, where they are highly prized on account of their vocal powers. A good singing cock will fetch as much as Rs. 400 in Calcutta. The cock nightingale alone sings, and as he is indistinguishable in appearance from the hen, a would-be purchaser, before paying a long price for one of these birds, should insist on hearing it sing. Nightingales thrive in captivity if provided with a plentiful supply of insect food. The Western and Eastern forms have both bred in captivity, and the Persian variety will doubtless do likewise if given proper accommodation.

Indian bulbuls, then, are not nightingales. Nor are nightingales common in that country. Oates, it is true, includes _Daulias golzii_ among the birds of India, but, in my opinion, on insufficient evidence. He admits that it is of extreme rarity in the country, “only two instances of its occurrence being known.” Hume, in October, 1865, had a Persian nightingale sent to him, which was said to have been procured in the Oudh terai. It is probable that neither this specimen nor the other whose presence is recorded in India was a wild bird at all; as likely as not they were caged birds that had escaped from captivity! The nightingale is certainly a very retiring bird, and since, if it occurs in India, it can be only as a winter visitor when it is not in song, it is possible that it might be overlooked. But in face of the fact that many good ornithologists have spent long periods in Oudh without ever having seen a nightingale, and the bird has never been observed anywhere else in India, it seems most improbable that nightingales ever stray into India. What, then, are we to think of the statement of Dr. Hartert, a German ornithologist, who says of the Eastern nightingale that “it winters in Southern Arabia, parts of India (e.g. Oudh) and East Africa”?

Here we have an excellent illustration of the adage “A little learning is a dangerous thing,” a good example of how erroneous statements creep into scientific books. Dr. Hartert has heard that nightingales have been recorded in Oudh, so jumps to the conclusion that the species winters there, even as it does in Egypt. This statement will doubtless be copied, without acknowledgment, into many future text-books, for plagiarism is very rife among men of science; and thus the popular notion that nightingales are common in India will be fortified by scientific support! Nightingales undoubtedly do winter in India—but only in cages. We have many fine songsters in Hindustan, but the nightingale is not one of them.