Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XXVIII. The Bird Sanctuary
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came a time when I almost wished that they had
not come, when I wished I could have signalled
to them far out on the sea to fly on, fly on with
the flock of wild geese high overhead, straight to
my own country far in the North where they
would be safe from man. For I knew that the
fair island that was a paradise to me was a hell to
them, like that other hell that awaited them
further on on their Via Crucis, Heligoland.
They came just before sunrise. All they asked
for was to rest for a while after their long flight
across the Mediterranean, the goal of the journey
was so far away, the land where they were
born and where they were to raise their young.
They came in thousands: woodpigeons, thrushes,
turtle-doves, waders, quails, golden orioles,
skylarks, nightingales, wagtails, chaffinches, swallows,
warblers, redbreasts and many other tiny artists
on their way to give spring concerts to the silent
forests and fields in the north. A couple of hours
later they fluttered helplessly in the nets the
cunning of man had stretched all over the island
from the cliffs by the sea high up to the slopes
of Monte Solaro and Monte Barbarossa. In the
evening they were packed by hundreds in small
wooden boxes without food and water and
despatched by steamers to Marseilles to be eaten with
delight in the smart restaurants of Paris. It was
a lucrative trade, Capri was for centuries the seat
of a bishop entirely financed by the sale of the
netted birds. “Il vescovo delle quaglie,” he was
called in Rome. Do you know how they are
caught in the nets? Hidden under the thickets,
between the poles, are caged decoy birds who
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