oldys] RECORDING BIRD MUSIC 187 



well-balanced song of three divisions (see notation 3)? And why 

 did the singer always repeat this arrangement of notes without 

 change? Why does the four-phrase twilight song of the wood- 

 pewee often follow the same form of construction that marks 

 many of our own four-line hymns and ballads ? How came it that 

 an olive-backed thrush I listened to on Mackinac Island one sum- 

 mer day a year or two ago based his song of four phrases (sung 

 invarably in the same order) on a pleasing alternation of dominant 

 and tonic harmony (see notation 4) ? Why do meadowlarks, and 

 to a certain extent other birds, sing duets in which phrase and 

 response are musically related (see notation 5) ? These and many 

 similar questions will present themselves to the mind of the student 

 and impose on him a pressing duty to give to the world the results 

 of his research. And here let me say that the same gratifying 

 vista opens out before the student in any line of research. Many, 

 especially the young, have an impression that the investigations of 

 the past have so exhausted the field of inquiry that it is difficult 

 to find any pathway that has not been already well trodden. This 

 is a great mistake. Unexplored virgin territory enough to occupy 

 the whole of mankind for ages lies about us on every hand. Often 

 it is but a step from the broad highway of common knowledge to a 

 vast and most inviting wilderness where the life may be spent in 

 original discovery. To paraphrase a remark attributed to Dr. 

 Abercrombie, what we don't know about this world of ours would 

 make an Encyclopedia beside which the great Encyclopedia 

 Brittanica would look like a World's Almanac. 



Hence, apart from all question of enjoyment and the physical 

 benefit yielded by a healthful out-door occupation, there is a 

 demand for explorers in the field of bird music that should be 

 heeded by all who are capable of responding. Hundreds of thous- 

 ands of beautiful, unique, and interesting songs now "waste their 

 sweetness on the desert air" and will die with the death of the 

 singer. These songs, which would be of so much value and 

 pertinency to the intellectual world, will, as matters now stand, 

 be lost forever for lack of a recorder. With more students at work 

 many such songs could be rescued from oblivion and made to 

 serve a useful purpose in extending ornithological knowledge and 

 aiding to supply a more substantial basis for philosophical specula- 

 tion. 



