THE GRASSHOPPER WARBLER. 



Ill 



the difference was produced by a rising and lulling of the 

 breeze, or whether the musician actually altered its note 

 and intensity of noise (or must I call it music?), I could 

 never decide. As long as I fancied the performer to be 

 an insect, I was inclined to believe that one of the first 

 suppositions was correct; for it seemed hardly possible 

 that the purely mechanical action of an insect's thighs 

 against its body could produce variety of sound — as well 



THE GKASSHOPPER WARBLER. 



expect varied intonations from a mill-wheel or saw-pit. 

 Attentive observation, and the knowledge that the noise 

 in question proceeded not from the exterior of an insect, 

 but from the throat of a bird, has led me to form another 

 conclusion. I am not surprised at my having fallen into 

 the error ; for the song of this bird is but an exaggeration 

 of the grasshopper's note^ and resembles the noise pro- 

 duced by pulling out the line from the winch, of a fishing- 



