6 7 S APPENDIX. 



may pofiibly alfo account for the inferiority in 

 point of plumage. 



I mall now confider how far the finging of 

 birds refembles our known mufical intervals, which 

 are never marked more minutely than to half 

 notes •, becaule, though we can form every grada- 

 tion from half-note to half-note, by drawing the 

 finger gently over the firing of a violin, or cover- 

 ing by degrees the hole of a flute ; yet we cannot 

 produce fuch a minute interval at command,, 

 when a quarter-note for example might be required. 



Ligon, indeed, in his hiftory of Barbadoes, hath 

 the following paflage : " The next bird is of the 

 M colour of the fieldfare ; but the head is too large 

 " for the body -, and for that reafon fhe is called 

 " a counfellor. She performs that with her voice, 

 " which no instrument can play, or voice can fing •, 

 " and that is quarter-notes, her fong being com- 

 " pofed of them, and every one a note higher than 

 " another." 



Ligofi appears, from other parts of his work, to 

 have been mufical ; but I fhould doubt much whe- 

 ther he was quite lure of thefe quarter intervals, fo 

 as to fpeak of them with precifion. 



Some paffages of the fong in a few kinds of birds 

 correfpond with the intervals of our mufical fcale 

 (of which the cuckow is a ftriking and known i ri- 

 ft ance) : much the greater part, however, of fuch 

 fong is not capable of mufical notations. 



This arifes from three caufes : the firft is, that 



the 



