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    A Tale of Two Sparrows
    A Tale of Two Sparrows
    A Tale of Two Sparrows
    Ebook96 pages1 hour

    A Tale of Two Sparrows

    By Jacques Van Heerden

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    About this ebook

    Do birds talk?
    Of course they do! Some, as Mark Twain said, can talk a blue streak, while others have a very limited vocabulary not all that unlike humans, after all!
    Billy is a little sparrow who lives in sunny South Africa. In his own peculiar way he tells us a bit about himself, his great love, Sally, their children, their friends and foes. And there is Madame Helena De Troy, an old owl lady who lives in the church tower behind the tree where their nest is. Together they contemplate the meaning of life and death and when Billy finally gets the answer, it is something which also has meaning for us.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAuthorHouse UK
    Release dateJan 23, 2014
    ISBN9781491891117
    A Tale of Two Sparrows
    Author

    Jacques Van Heerden

    Jacques van Heerden (b. 1941 in Pretoria, South Africa) has a PhD in Zoology (based on a few Triassic dinosaurs from South Africa), ten years experience as a fulltime paleontologist and 33 years teaching experience at tertiary level. The latter included reviews of the evolution of plants, invertebrates and vertebrates and the specific adaptations of animals to their environment. For the last 15 years he has been doing research on pseudoscorpions, tiny (2-8 mm) relatives of spiders and scorpions. He is also a committed Christian. He lives with his wife, Elza, in Louis Trichardt (=Makhado) in the Limpopo Province of South Africa. They have three sons (one in Britian, one in the USA and one in Cape Town), of whom two are married, and four grandchildren.

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      Book preview

      A Tale of Two Sparrows - Jacques Van Heerden

      © 2014 Jacques van Heerden. All rights reserved.

      No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

      Published by AuthorHouse 01/22/2014

      ISBN: 978-1-4918-9080-6 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4918-9111-7 (e)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2014901135

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

      and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Contents

      Preface By The Interpreter

      1

      2

      3

      4

      5

      6

      7

      8

      9

      10

      11

      12

      PREFACE BY THE INTERPRETER

      It has long been known that birds communicate by means of sound, and it was surmised that they have a simple vocabulary which basically consists of food, alarm and courting signals. It is only recently that it has become possible to do computer analysis of bird sounds and now it is abundantly clear that what was previously taken as a simple language, is in fact highly complicated: in a manner akin to Egyptian hieroglyphics or the Morse Code, a combination of sounds has a different meaning dependent upon the sequence and ‘placement’ (pitch and intonation) of sounds. In A Tramp Abroad Mark Twain related a story entitled ‘Jim Baker’s Bluejay Yarn’ in which the amazing vocabulary of the North American bluejay was demonstrated. Hitherto this has been regarded as mere fiction; however, with this new contribution the bluejay ‘yarn’ may actually prove to be a perfect tapestry.

      The current interpreter (‘author’ would convey the impression that the current tale originated with him), transcribed this tale from local sparrow-talk into local human-talk with the aid of a one hundred and five year old parrot, who once ate ten pages of the Unabridged Oxford and has since been regarded as a ‘bird of letters’. The specially developed computer programme, SSPI (Sparrow Speech Professional Interpreter) running in Curtains OS X, has proved indispensable. Unfortunately, as with every translation, there are finer nuances in the original which are lost in translation, and even more so when it is a double translation. Some difficulties arose, for instance, in the transliteration of chip, chíp, chîp and chi-ip, where so much depends on the intonation of the word—not to mention the very slight difference between cheep and cheap—and because bird lip-reading is still in its very infancy as a science (or an art), it is often sheer guesswork. The sounds have to be interpreted in the context of the life setting, which makes the matter quite complex. Despite these shortcomings, we do believe that this work represents a major advance in our understanding of our little feathery friends and what makes them go ‘tick-tick’ at times.

      For the sake of the reader, many sparrow circumscriptions, such as ‘spiky creeper on horizon’ for a barb wire fence, ‘talking tubes’ for telephone lines, and ‘thunder-animals’ for motorcars, have been simplified to facilitate understanding. Furthermore, sparrow names for other birds are most often onomatopoeic, but are usually transliterated here for the sake of the keen naturalist who happens to be hard of hearing, like the author. On the other hand, other terms are transcribed as faithfully and directly as possible from ‘sparrowtalk’ because of the special charm of the original.

      For the sake of other animal lovers, I want to state emphatically that no animals were harmed in the course of gathering the information contained in this tome, but a few mosquitoes had a near-death experience.

      My sincere thanks to my elder sister, Wannia Marais, for the cover painting. I am also indebted to my two young friends, Yani Steyn and Jo Spoelstra, who made the text drawings for this little story. And a heartfelt thanks to my wife Elza for her continual support, the Ladybird of my life to whom this story is lovingly dedicated. I also appreciate the assistance I had from the staff of AuthorHouse, London, for the preparation of the printed format and marketing this little book. And thanks to you, my reader, for indulging yourself into reading it. My desire is that you will truly enjoy it!

      Above all I thank God who created a world of such beauty and joy, and for whom each creature—including a little sparrow—is precious. May we all come to appreciate this present Eden.

      1

      Sally and I are taking a short break before going in search of food again, sitting on one of the dead branches in the top of the old tree near our nest. From here we can survey all that goes past. It had been a long, cold winter, but the spring rainfall has brought a freshness to all Nature; our tree has put forth a few new shoots and elsewhere I’ve seen trees with a complete make-over of fresh green leaves. A couple of young sparrows are now ‘spooning’ among the bare branches at the top of our tree, fluttering back and forth, she alternating between coyness and forwardness, he ardently pursuing her wherever she goes. That brings back lots of memories . . . .

      The first time I saw Sally was when we were circling over the tree as a flock of young birds, so young and so carefree and so very ignorant. I distinctly remember that special thrill when I first became aware of her at my side, her wingtip almost touching mine. I was singing the Male Bachelor Sparrow Song, which goes like this:

      I’m just a little sparrow

      And this a simple song

      I’m calling for a mate

      To whom I can belong.

      I’ll care for you, I’ll care for you!

      I promise that I’II share!

      I’ll share with you, I’ll share with you

      Because, in fact, I care.¹

      When we settled on the tree it was next to each other, and it was as though we had always known one another. You know what I mean: so much can be said with the eyes, or a gentle tweak of the beak, like a smile waiting to break into laughter, a slow throw-back of the head, or a graceful pecking at a tail feather. Body language, or feather talk, they call it. Then our eyes met, a sort of glancing blow. For me, it was love at first sight, and it was like forever.

      If you have also been young once, you will know how fear and joy are then sort of bubbling up inside you. Joy makes you want to sing so the whole world can hear that you are in love. Fear makes you jumpy, scared that someone else may spot your prize and seize her before you have had the opportunity of courting her as a real lady bird should be courted.

      A latecomer settled on

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