DUSKY, GRAY, AND SLATE-COLORED 341 



of delirious music that the woods and the streams stand 

 silent to listen." No bird has been oftener written 

 about. It would be difficult to say anything original 

 concerning him, but Mrs. Bailey's inimitable description 

 is worth quoting : 



" The Mocker almost sings with his wings. He has a 

 pretty trick of lifting them as his song waxes, a gesture 

 that not only serves to show off the white wing-patches, 

 but gives a charming touch of vivacity, an airy, almost 

 sublimated fervor to his love song. His fine frenzies 

 often carry him quite off his feet. From his chimney-top 

 perch he tosses himself up in the air and dances and 

 pirouettes as he sings, till he drops back, it would seem 

 from sheer lack of breath. He sings all day, and often 

 — if we would believe his audiences — he sings down 

 the chimney all night, and when camping in Mockerland 

 in the full of the moon, you can almost credit the con- 

 tention. A Mocker in one tree pipes up, and that wakes 

 his brother Mockers in other trees, and when they have 

 all done their parts every other sleepy little songster in 

 the neighborhood — be he sparrow or wren — rouses 

 enough to give a line of his song." 



His nest, placed often in the hedgerows bordering the 

 lawn, is presided over by his more quiet mate, who 

 broods for fourteen days on the mottled blue eggs. 

 There is no need to peek into the nest to ascertain 

 whether those eggs have hatched, for his fussincss pro- 

 claims the event to all who care to know. And now 

 come busy days. Both male and female Mockers flit 

 through the green like silent shadows hunting insects 



