1 6 OUR FAVOURITE SONG BIRDS 



tions recorded, all showing that when the song is 

 regained it is frequently far from perfect. For days 

 the singers seem unable to utter the song complete. 

 In the case of the Chaffinch and the Yellow Bunting, 

 for instance, we have repeatedly remarked that the 

 final notes of the song have been omitted to the 

 extent of ninety per cent.! In many cases for a few 

 days nothing but a series of disconnected twitterings 

 have been uttered by some species, as though the 

 birds were trying to recall their long-lost song. 

 We have remarked the same thing in a Mule 

 Canary, after his moult. Many young birds are very 

 indifferent songsters, the art having apparently to 

 be learnt with considerable effort. Especially is this 

 apparent in the case of young Robins, which some- 

 times begin to sing btlore they have quite lost the 

 spotted dress of their youth. Some fully adult 

 individuals of probably every species are much finer 

 songsters than others, the music apparently im- 

 proving with the age of the bird up to a certain 

 period. We might here remark, that in some few 

 cases the female has been known to acquire musical 

 powers of high merit ; whilst in most others the 

 power of song is confined to a few low twittering 

 notes — which probably represent what was once the 

 best performance of the male at an earlier period 

 in the history of the species, the crude beginning of 

 a song which he has eventually developed into 

 music of bewitchinof sweetness. Several instances 



