308 BIRDS OF ILLINOIS. 



In History of North American Birds (Vol. II., pp. 150, 151), Dr. 

 Brewer thus describes the habits and song of this species : 



"In the earliest approaches of spring, in Louisiana, when small 

 flocks of male Bobolinks made their first appearance, they are said 

 by Mr. Audubon, to sing in concert ; and their song thus given is 

 at once exceedingly novel, interesting, and striking. Uttered with a 

 volubility that even borders upon the burlesque and the ludicrous, 

 the whole effect is greatly heightened by the singular and striking 

 manner in which first one singer and then another, one following 

 the other, until all have joined their voices, take up the note and 

 strike in, after the leader has set the example and given the signal. 

 In this manner sometimes a party of thirty or forty Bobolinks will 

 begin, one after the other, until the whole unite in producing an 

 extraordinary medley, to which no pen can do justice, but which is 

 described as very pleasant to listen to. All at once the music ceases 

 with a suddenness not less striking and extraordinary. These con- 

 certs are repeated from time to time, usually as often as the flock 

 alights. * * In New England the Bobolink treats us to no 



such concerts as those described by Audubon, where many voices 

 join in creating their peculiar, jingling melody. When they first ap- 

 pear, usually after the middle of May, they are in small parties, 

 composed of either sex, absorbed in their courtships and overflow- 

 ing with song. When two or three male Bobolinks, decked out in 

 their gayest spring apparel, are paying their attentions to the same 

 drab-colored female, contrasting so strikingly in her sober brown 

 dress, their performances are quite entertaining, each male endeav- 

 oring to out-sing the other. The female appears coy and retiring, 

 keeping closely to the ground, but always attended by the several 

 aspirants for her affection. After a contest, often quite exciting, 

 the rivalries are adjusted, the rejected suitors are driven off by their 

 more fortunate competitor, and the happy pair begin to put in order 

 a new home. It is in their love-quarrels that their song appears to 

 the greatest advantage. They pour out incessantly their strains of 

 quaint but charming music, now on the ground, now 7 on the wing, 

 now on the top of a fence, a low. bush, or the swaying stalk of a 

 plant that bends with their weight. The great length of their song, 

 the immense number of short and variable notes of which it is com- 

 posed, the volubility and confused rapidity with which they are 

 poured forth, the eccentric breaks, in the midst of which we detect 

 the words "bob-o-link" so distinctly enunciated, unite to form a 



