Chap. XIII. VOCAL MUSIC. 53 



this subject.^^ Barrington, however, admits that '*supe- 

 " riority in song gives to birds an amazing ascendancy 

 " over others, as is well known to bird-catchers." 



It is certain that there is an intense degree of rivalry 

 between the males in their singing. Bird-fanciers 

 match their birds to see which will sing longest ; and 

 I was told by Mr. Yarrell that a first-rate bird will 

 sometimes sing till he drops down almost dead, or, 

 according to Bechstein,^° quite dead from rupturing a 

 vessel in the lungs. Whatever the cause may be, 

 male birds, as I hear from Mr. Weir, often die sud- 

 denly during the season of song. That the habit of 

 singing is sometimes quite independent of love is clear, 

 for a sterile hybrid canary-bird has been described ^^ 

 as sino-ino^ whilst viewino^ itself in a mirror, and then 

 dashing at its own image ; it likewise attacked with 

 fury a female canary when put into the same cage. 

 The jealousy excited by the act of singing is constantly 

 taken advantage of by bird-catchers ; a male, in good 

 song, is hidden and protected, whilst a stuffed bird, sur- 

 rounded by limed twigs, is exposed to view. In this 

 manner a man, as Mr. Weir informs me, has caught, in 

 the course of a single day, fifty, and in one instance 

 seventy, .male chaffinches. The power and inclination 

 to sing differ so greatly with birds that although the 

 price of an ordinary male chaffinch is only sixpence, 

 Mr. Weir saw one bird for which the bird-catcher asked 

 three pounds ; the test of a really good singer being 

 that it will continue to sing whilst \he cage is swung 

 round the owner's head. 



That birds should sing from emulation as well as for 



-9 ' Philosophical Transactions,' 1773, p. 263. White's ' Natural His- 

 tory of Selborne,' vol. i. 1825, p. 246. 



3<^ ' Naturges. der Stubenvogel,' 1840, s. 252. 

 31 Mr. Bold, * Zoologist,' 1843-44, p. 659. 



