542 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



curruca) attracted my attention ; I noticed particularly the increased 

 care that was taken by the parent birds, as feeding-time approached, 

 against unwelcome discovery. It was manifested, first, in a cessation 

 of singing, and then in the combined efforts of the pair to divert strange 

 looks from the nest. The birds, when about to take food to their 

 young, were accustomed to fly down from opposite sides, and while one, 

 after many cross-flights through the overhanging foliage, slipped into 

 the nest, the other would flutter wildly hither and thither in another 

 part of the tree. The three half -fledged young birds, when able to 

 glide through the bushes, but not yet to fly, were dislodged from the 

 nest, and while two of them disappeared with the mother, I caught the 

 third, against the anxious remonstrances of the male, and hung it up in 

 a cage in my veranda. The old male stood faithful to his chick, evi- 

 dently concentrating his whole attention upon it, hopping around 

 among the trees and collecting insects for it from early in the morning 

 till the coming on of night, unceasingly, and never out of the neighbor- 

 hood. He was accustomed to sound a grating zapp, zapp, in which the 

 young one soon learned to join, in a variety of tones constituting a whole 

 gamut of modulated sounds, from the note of cheerful pleasure to 

 those of anxiety and anger, and was moved to utterance by the most 

 insignificant event in the cage or around it. 



I observed that the male bird, which had sung much less than usual 

 while the female was sitting, and had ceased to sing entirely as soon as 

 the young ones were hatched out, resumed his old habit of song as 

 soon as the fledgeling's domicile was changed from the nest to the 

 cage. He would execute a kind of strophe of from seven to nine clear, 

 ringing notes, having sometimes a joyous and sometimes a melancholy 

 expression. What was the meaning of the song which he thus re- 

 sumed ? Was it poured out to dispel the sorrow of the lonely orphaned 

 young one ? Did the absence of the female give the male a greater 

 liberty in the matter? Or, was it sung in hopes of bringing the 

 female back, or in rivalry with another male ? Pondering over such 

 questions as these led me to reflections and observations on the origin 

 and meaning of the songs of birds. 



While we may regard the ordinary vocal utterances of birds as ex- 

 pressions of their moods and wants, signals of intelligence, notes of 

 warning, or calls for help, their song proper must be supposed to de- 

 scribe their more deep-felt emotions and anxieties, and to be related 

 to their common expressions of sound as art is related to the handi- 

 crafts that minister to the necessities of life. Like art, the bird- 

 song also, repeatedly exercised, may become an habitual mode of ex- 

 pression. 



The majority of ornithologists agree in ascribing an erotic char- 

 acter to the songs of birds ; not only the melting melodies, but also 

 those of their tones that are discordant to the human ear, are regarded 

 as love-notes. Darwin finally, saving some reserves, came to accept 



