Often I buy birds not for keeping but freeing them.
It is my hobby to give them joy and freedom. This is very expensive. It is nor
always possible to enjoy it. It requires a lot of money. Even a treasure may
not be a enough.
It is also perhaps of doubtful utility from the
point of vie of the birds. They may get caught soon after I give them freedom back
they come to the market for resale. But I feel happy at giving them their
natural freedom even though for a few days or even hours.
Some weeks back I saw a pair of nightingales in a
pedestals cage. They were eyeing the outside world wistfully. The had
forgotten their gift of music and song. I bought them. Next day at sunrise I
gave them their freedom.
The flew off and settled on the branch of a mango
tree. They were happy because I could catch a tune of their song. They seemed to
be saying. “Thanking you, Rosie! Thank you, Rosie!”
I had put a little rosy thread round their legs for
identification. Often I found them back on our mulberry tree or up in the pup
pit ta plant or down in the pomegranate grove. They became my pets even though I
put them in no cage. They were fond of singing and swinging round my house.
These nightingales soon became my great favourites.
It was a strange experience. One day they sat very close to me and did not try
to escape when I caught them all of a sudden. I fed them and they brought a big
cage to keep them safe from the cat or the dog in my house. The pair was happy
and always singing. It was because of their songs that I liked them more than
any other bird.
These birds had given a meaning to the philosophy
of love. They had grown as fonder of me as I was of them. Perhaps they proved
the truth in an old saying: “Through love and kindness can tame even the
wildest on the earth.”