INTRODUCTION 



general statements cannot justly be founded on 

 the behaviour of a few individuals. 



During a period of eighteen months I went on 

 with my work of recording, but at considerable 

 personal inconvenience. My profession demanding 

 all the middle hours of week-days, there were com- 

 paratively few opportunities for making notes at 

 that time ; but on nearly every fine morning, the 

 whole year through, I was early abroad in the 

 woods and fields, armed with telescope and note- 

 book ; and when the evenings were long enough, 

 the same course was pursued. Occasionally, my 

 notes were all entered in a ledger, as though to 

 the account of the several birds observed. In the 

 spring of 1889 I began to condense the results of 

 this work, and found myself in the possession of 

 records of the songs of a large number of our 

 commoner birds, heard in Gloucestershire and also 

 in or near Bath, Weston-super-Mare, Clifton, and 

 Bournemouth. I had notes on the songs of some 

 seventy thrushes, nearly sixty robins, many star- 

 lings, skylarks, finches, and other singers. A care- 

 ful comparison of the records revealed that imitative 

 birds had reproduced the cries of other birds especi- 

 ally frequent in their haunts. The skylark had 

 been partial to field-birds ; the robin to those of 



