180 THE FEATHERED TRIBES. 



AMERICAN MOCKING-BIRD.* 



The American mocking-bird is cliaraotcrised by the variety of its notes and the 

 extraordinary compass of its voice, and especially by its power of mimicking the notes of 

 other birds and even the noises of beasts. According to the testimony of Fernandez > 

 Nuremberg, and Sir Hans Sloane, this bird is not satisfied with the mere imitation of 

 sounds, but adds to them a softness and grace which the originals do not themselves 

 possess, and for which the Mexicans term it the bird of four hundred tongues. These 

 writers also mention that it mingles action with its song, accompanying the notes with 

 measured movements corresj)onding to the successive emotions which it was believed to 

 experience. It first rises slowly, with outstretched wings, and then sinks back to the 

 same spot, with its head hanging downwards, in a similar manner to that which the 

 sky-lark sometimes adopts. When it has advanced furthc^r in the song, it mounts aloft, 

 and then descends in a sjjiral direction ; and if tlic notes are brisk and lively, it describes 

 circles in the air. AVhcn the notes are loud and quick, it flaps its wings raj)idlj- ; and 

 when the notes are unequal, it bounds and flutters in unison ; but when becoming tired 

 with the exertion, its notes gradually soften, melt into tender strains, and at length die 

 away ; at the same time its action gradually diminishes, and it glides gentl}' and smoothly 

 above the spot on which it is about to alight, till the waving of its wings becomes 

 imperceptible, and finally ceasing, " the little musician remains in the air suspended and 

 motionless," as the kestrel sometimes does when watching for its pre}^ 



Goldsmith states that the mocking-bird is not only possessed of its own natural notes, 

 which are musical and solemn, but that it can assume the tone of every other animal to 

 be found in the forest, from the wolf to the raven. It seems even to delight to lead them 

 astray. He tells us that it will at one time allure the lesser birds with the call of their 

 mates, and then terrify them, when they have come near, with the screams of the eagle. 

 Tliere is no bird in the forest which it cannot mimic, and there is none that it has not 

 at times deceived by its call. But, unlike such as we usually see tamed for mimicldng 

 with us, the mocking-bird is ever surest to please when it is most itself. At those times it 

 usually frequents the houses of the American planters ; and, sitting all night on the 

 chimney-top, pours forth the sweetest and the most varied notes of any bird whatever. 



By far the most circumstantial account, however, of this wonderful bii'd (which Ray 

 has even gone so far as to place among the fabulous and doubtful species in his Appendix 

 to "N^'illoughby's Ornithology) is given by Wilson in a characteristically graphic passage. 

 " This celebrated and very extraordinary bird," he says, " in extent and variety of vocal 

 powers, stands luirivalled by the whole feathered songsters of this or jDerliaps any other 

 country ; and shall receive from us all that attention and respect which superior merit is 

 justly entitled to. The plumage of the mockmg-bird, though none of the homeliest, has 

 nothing gaudy or brilliant in it ; and, had he nothing else to recommend him, would 

 scarcely entitle him to notice ; but his figure is well proportioned, and even handsome. 

 The ease, elegance, and rapidity of his movements, the animation of his eye, and the 

 intelligence he displays in listening, and laying up lessons from almost every species of 

 the feathered creation within his hearing, are really surprising, and mark the peculiarity 

 of his genius. To these qualities we may add that of a voice, full, strong, and musical, 

 and capable of almost cvcrj' modulation, from the clear mellow tones of the wood-thrush, 

 to the savage scream of the bald eagle. In measure and accent he faitlitiilly follows his 

 originals; in force and sweetness of expression he greatly improves upon thorn. In his 

 native groves, mounted on the top of a tall bush or half-grown tree, in the dawn of the 

 dewy morning, while the woods are already vocal with a multitude of wai-blers, his 



• Orpheus Polyglottus. — Swains. 



