344 A HISTORY OF THE NIGHTINGALE. 



the tail more rufous ; under parts, and obscure eye-streak, pale greyish-brown. 

 The sexes are scarcely distinguishable ; but the young have a terminal pale spot 

 on each feather of the upper plumage, and the under parts are slightly edged 

 with dusky. They moult once in the year, and the young acquire their adult 

 dress previous to their departure in autumn, but retain their nestling primaries 

 until the second renewal of their others. 



In its systematic relations, the Nightingale may be considered as an ultimate 

 ramification of the great Thrush genus, in a particular direction, an unbroken 

 series of intermediate species ranging from the more characteristic Thrushes unto 

 this noted songster. It is but distantly related to the Fauvets, and the other 

 small insect-eating birds with which it is generally placed ; and, excepting the 

 small solitary Thrushes of North America, which display the gradation adverted 

 to, I am aware of no genus approaching it so nearly as that of the Robin. The 

 Nightingale and Robin have indeed been known to produce hybrids in a state of 

 confinement. 



It may be worth while here to remark, that the Robin also ranges in a series 

 of birds that grade in another direction from the radiating genus of Thrushes. 

 The division Geocincla of Mr. Gould includes the species that inteiwene. A 

 contiguous section — Petrocincla — passes into the Redstarts and Wheatears, and 

 the other equivalent divisions are comprehended under the term Saxicolince, ; all 

 the members of which are little else than small-sized Rock-thrushes, and agree in 

 possessing a mottled nestling plumage, as well as in many details of habit. They 

 are chiefly birds of open unsheltered localities, which habitually perch, conspi- 

 cuously, on the summits of objects ; but the Nightingales, like those Thrushes 

 from which they directly grade, are inhabitants of woodland districts, and rather 

 shy of observation. Two species are recognized, the larger of which (a native 

 of eastern Europe) is every way more Thrush-like than that of Britain, and has 

 even an obscurely spotted breast. In one of the Nightingale-like Thrushes of 

 North America, the breast-spots appear as if half obliterated ; and in another of 

 them the tail is rufous, as in the Nightingales. 



Our renowned, chorister arrives in the south of England about the middle of 

 April, and departs for warmer climates in September, though a straggler is now 

 and then seen in the following month. The poet Cowper addresses some stanzas 

 " To the Nightingale, which the author heard singing on New Year's day, 1792" ; 

 and Mr. Newman, in the Magazine of Natural History, records that " On 

 Dec. 12, either in 1823 or 1824," he "heard the Nightingale singing clearly and 

 distinctly, although not very loudly, at Godalming, Surrey" ; and he adds, that 

 in the neighbourhood, he has " frequently seen the Nightingale in October, and 

 once in November." In a state of captivity, this species commonly begins to sing 

 about Christmas, sometimes so early as in November, and comes into full song 



