19 ORIOLES 1. The Orioles are beautiful birds of golden-yellow and black plumage except for the Maroon Oriole which is maroon and black. Three varieties of the Oriole, the Golden, the Black-headed and the Maroon, occur in the North India, the last in the Himalayas only. They are strictly arboreal and keep to the tree tops, rarely descending to the ground. They are very active birds and, though shy and secretive, indulge in aerial games, following each other from tree to tree and darting through the foliage with their bright plumage flashing in the sun. Their voice is a loud mellow whistle of several notes which is heard "alike in garden and forest, greeting the dawn and saluting the parting day." The yellow Orioles of both the species "often build in the same tree as holds a nest of the Black Drongo. That this is by design rather than accident can scarcely be doubted, considering how frequent the occurrence is. It is certain also that by this means the birds must enjoy a degree of protection against marauders like crows and tree- pies-inveterate stealers of other birds' eggs. The King Crow will tolerate the proximity of his harmless dependents with complacency, but a crow has only to show himself i precincts of the nest-tree to be furiously set upon and beaten off by the valiant, 'kotwal' and his wife" (Salim Ali). They eat fruits, chiefly the berries of Peepul, bunyan and other fig trees. 2. The oldest names for the Golden Oriole are to be found in the Rgveda-(i) g which it shares with the Golden Eagle, and (ii) pro- bably also gife. The "g" in the following well known verses are no other than the Golden, or some other Eagle and the Golden Oriole, nesting together on a fig tree, the Oriole, of course, for protection: "ढा सुपर्णा सयुजा सखाया समानं वृक्षं परिषस्वजाते तयोरन्यः पिप्पलं स्वाद्वत्त्यनश्नन्नन्यो अभिचाकशीति ॥ यत्रा सुपर्णा अमृतस्य भागमनिमेषं विदयाभिस्वरन्ति इनो विश्वस्य भुवनस्य गोपाः स मा धीरः पाकमनाविवेश ।। यस्मिन्वृक्षे मध्वदः सुपर्णा निविशन्ते सुवते चाधिविश्वे तस्येदाहुः पिप्पलं स्वाइग्रे तन्नोन्नशद्यः पितरं न वेद ॥ RV 1.164, 20-22. On the high probability of a pair of Orioles sharing a bunyan or Peepul tree with a pair of Eagles I cannot do better than reproduce Col. D. Radcliff's 73 Orioles remarks quoted by Hume in his book, Nests and Eggs, 2nd. ed.-"It is always the case with the larger Falcons that their fellow tenants of a rock or a tree are safe from molestation and in the breeding season actually look to them for protection." That birds of prey permit smaller birds to nest in close proximity to themselves including even those on which they normally prey is now acknowledged to be almost a universal fact (S. Baker on the Laggar Falcon in F.B.I. 2nd Edn.). The Golden Eagle has been known occasionally to place its nest on a tree but there is reason to believe that in the long past he did more often than now, for one of his oldest names is शाल्मल or शालमनीस्य ( nesting on Bombax malabaricum ) :-- "सु शू पर्वण्यवसानं महाद्रौ कृत्वा नीडं शल्मलौ तं महान्तम् गुरुमन्तं गरुडं वैनतेयं पतविराजमवसे जोहवीमि ॥" Suparnadhyâya, 31.1 The Imperial, the Steppe and the Tawny Eagles breed as a rule on trees. including the Peepul in the plains of North India and everyone of them is a gut in the wider sense of the word. It is, therefore, more than probable, nay, almost a certainty, that the author of the above verses had not only seen a pair each of Eagles and Orioles nesting together in a peepul but had also observed how the Eagles kept away all marauders from the tree and the Orioles were happy under the protection thus afforded to them. These facts combined with the grandeur of the tall, leafy tree laden with fruit brought to his vivid imagination the similar situation obtaining before weak and dependent humans and their heavenly protector, and he, therefore, proceeded to illustrate the great spiritual truth with a parable drawn from nature. 3. With the growth of the civilisation and culture of the city as against the earlier life of farm and village even the learned Brahmaņas lost touch with nature and forgot the names and identity of many of the birds so beloved of their early ancestors. This divorce between the city, which now became the principal seat of learning, and the village was completed long before the time of g (c. 700 to 1000 B.C.), for he too does not say what exactly were the two particular birds mentioned in these verses. He and his successors, commentators including , undoubtedly knew that was an Eagle, but their difficulty was about the second fruit eating gi and they, therefore, intepreted the verses in the best way they could. The air was already thick at the time with Upanişadic speculation and philosophy of the and R, and the verses describing the two birds sharing a common tree came in very handy to illustrate that philosophy. Accordingly Sayaṇa begins their exposition with- "अन लौकिकपक्षिद्वयदृष्टान्तेन जीवपरमात्मानौ स्तुयेते" without pausing to explain the actual physical basis of the verses. As late as 1935 V. K. Rajwade of Poona also wondered what bird it could be that
