THE BIRDS OF EDEN HALL.
WHEN Eden Hall became the home of the Musgraves by inheritance in the middle of the fifteenth century, the site must have delighted that "ancient and warlike family" in the brief intervals of repose which Border war left to these Wardens of the Western Marches. It has every feature which makes the ideal Cumberland setting for a house,—a mighty fell to look up to, woods and a wide lake, and flat pastures for the endless cattle, the envy and prey of the hungry Scotch raiders, the memory of whom is so recent and so little obliterated that in the last century there remained in certain houses in Castle Sowerby, the next parish, the spears armed with which the tenants of certain holdings were bound to ride with their landlord or his wife when they went abroad, and to appear in Penrith at Whitsuntide. The "Red Spears" are now only a name, and the banks of the Eden which run by the lands they held see no more lethal weapon than an occasional salmon gaff. The splendid rivers of Eiden Hall are perhaps its fairest inheritance. Not only does the Eden, wide and swift, sweep along the whole front of the estate, but on the south - east, dividing it from Westmoreland, the Eamont pours down from Tills- water, entering the Eden Valley through a gorge in the red sandstone, broken and weathered to an incredible degree, yet so full of sunbeams and reflected light that in it the trees and flowers blossom in an earlier spring, trout feed when they feed nowhere else, for the warmth is ever forcing a new brood of fly in these sheltered pools and rock-bordered deeps, and the early migrant birds sing from daybreak till dark in the larch woods and thickets on its banks. The view up the gorge ends in the blue peaks of Saddleback and Skiddaw, and eastwards and downwards is closed by Cross Fell, with its streaks of late-lying snow. Thus the Eamont River is the highway across Cumberland from the Lakes to the central chain of mountains for all kinds of birds, and even for the fish, which could, if so disposed, travel from Ullswater to merry Carlisle, and so to the Solway Firth. The sole drawback to the bird-paradise which this river and valley offer is the curious blighting gale which at times blows with monotonous regularity from the summit of Cross Fell, the highest peak of the Pennines. This is called the Helm Wind, which descends, violent and icy-cold, from a vast cap or helmet of whitish cloud which rests for days above, not upon, the summit of these fells. The "helmet" cloud rests sometimes for three, sometimes for nine, days over the fe • and while there chills all the valleys below. On the nearer villages it often descends suddenly, and with great violence, blowing down trees, overturning stacks, and injuring crops. Its howl, like a sea-gale's, may be heard for twenty miles, and though local historians deem that it has a touch of the sublime, it is odious alike to birds, flowers, men, and fish, and happily a natural phenomenon not known elsewhere in England.
When "the Helm is off," to use the local phrase, the bird-life in the valley wakes up again. Few, if any, inland rivers are so inter- esting to the naturalist, for in spring nearly all the birds by its banks are breeding, and many come f rom afar. Others are visitors for a day or week-end from the great bird colonies at Raven- glass Marshes or the mosses of the north-western coast. At the " watersmeet" of the Eden and Eamont, and on the flat meadows which border the big salmon pool, this chance meet- ing of the birds of the sea, the marsh, the shore, and the moor with the normal winged population of the northern valleys was most striking in the bright weather at the end of April. A pair of black-backed gulls, their black backs and black wings contrasting strongly with their pure white breasts and yellow beaks, were wheeling over the flashing river, or making long tacks across the meadows, equally on the look-out for trout or young rabbits. The presence of these rapacious birds gave considerable uneasiness to the partridges which swarm near the river, and which uttered their alarm-note in quite a different tone from the cluckings and other partridge conversation in which they were carrying on their pairing and occasional fighting. As the black-backs never seemed to catch a fish, we must suppose that the dead rabbits, of which a recent flood had brought down a considerable number, and which were also left about on the hillsides by the rabbiters employed so late in the spring that their carcases were useless as food, provided them with meals. On the Norfolk coast a fox was seen early in the month to try to take a fish from one of these big gulls, which had found it lying on the shore ; but the gull drove the fox off and finished its meal. A few lesser black-backed gulls, of which there are some protected colonies in the West of Cumber- land, also visited the river; and a pair or two of herring gulls put in an appearance for some days. At all hours the long, whistling notes of the curlews may be heard, either high in the sky above, or in the fields and meadows. They are said only to nest on the fells, but they spend nearly all the day in the valleys, where their wide wings and loud calls make them second only to the herons among the more conspicuous objects of the air. Float- ing and calling, sometimes in flocks of five or six, they come sliding down from the upper levels of the sky, and drop in descending spirals on to the meadows, where they feed. Occasionally they may be seen dancing like cranes, ap- parently a phase of the courting period. Other and smaller waders keep close to the courses of the rivers. Among these are the sandpipers, with their sharply pointed wings and neat brown-and-white plumage, the cheerful companions of the fishermen on nearly every Northern river, which make
their nests and lay their eggs, much like small plovers' eggs, in the banks. At the Eden Watersmeet the redshank also appears in spring, and its note is heard as constantly as on some salting by the Norfolk shore. On Cross Fell the dotterel also appears in spring, on its way further north ; but the dotterels make their migration not by the valleys, but along the highest summits of our hills and mountain ranges. On the meadows the peewits and the partridges share with the Eden Hall hares the rights of proprietorship, the peewits being perhaps the tamest of the three. They are perhaps the commonest of all the larger birds ; a pair or two are seen in every field, so tame that they forego the usual screaming and fuss which peewits deem it a point of honour to exhibit elsewhere in the nesting season. At midday they move down to certain parts of the river to drink, and then sit sunning themselves on the stones like domestic pigeons.
• There is a strong heronry in the woods by Eden Hall Lake. As the birds have no need to leave the estate during the breeding season to find food, they are astonishingly tame. In the Udford Gorge of the Eamont are several large and small rocks projecting from the middle of the river. On either side are the cliffs or high banks set with rowan and sycamore trees. The herons swing over the cliff, and spreading their wings, drop down on these rocks, where they sit "like stage herons," as a fisherman new to the river remarked, so exactly do they fit in with this typical piece of river scenery. They are so tame that if a fisherman keeps still they will pursue their own business regardless of him. One very old cock bird, with a long black tassel on his breast, pitched, not on one of the stones, but on a rather high bit of bank opposite. Here he proceeded to walk along, and crane over, looking for fish exactly as an angler looks over the bank if he is taking stock of a pool which he means to fish later. "Paul Pry" and other inquisitive persons are generally represented as having long noses. A heron certainly has, but it must be rather a dis- advantage to him. The bird continued to walk along till it came to a fallen tree-stem, over which it poked its head and peered in such a ridiculous fashion as to suggest the loan of a pair of spectacles. The Udford Gorge has a resident bird population of its own. Kingfishers and dippers pass up and down, and the latter occasionally catch a "bull head" or minnow. The jackdaws have a noisy colony in the cliffs, thrushes and blackbirds nest in the gorse bushes just below them, willow-warblers and wood-warblers sing there incessantly, and many pairs of partridges nest along the little fringe of moor just above the cliffs. But the noisiest and most in evidence of all during the spring are the cock pheasants. These birds always love the waterside ; but here they enjoy in addition two sunny banks, with ample cover of gorse on one side and heather on the other, and the morning and afternoon sun if they only choose to fly over the river. The rival cocks on either side constantly crow and invite the others to come over and fight, when the battle of Cumberland versus Westmoreland is carried on until one or the other is beaten and flies across the stream. If it happens to be the home of the winning bird, he instantly flies after the vanquished champion, and once more drives him home across the water.
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