correctness. We should l)e glad if some one, equally 

 capable, on this side of the Atlantic would give us 

 a collection of British bird - songs. The Reviewer 

 speaks of this work as an attempt — it is surely a 

 successful one. Any musician can understand it, and 

 if only the Reviewer had asked a friend to endeavour 

 to interpet " the dots on the lines and spaces," even 

 on the ubiquitous piano, we might have had a more 

 favourable first notice. 



A musician, if he will only take the trouble, can 

 analyse the song of a bird. He will listen to the 

 sounds more intenth^ than a non-expert would. It is 

 possible to hear and place definitely the different 

 intervals — octaves, fifths, fourths, thirds, slurs, and 

 glides; to mark the mode of expression — forte, piatio, 

 crescendo, dimiiniendo, sostemito, staccato. In the more 

 deliberate opening phrase of the Nightingale's song 

 one can do this easily ; but we acknowledge that 

 when the bird accelerates the pace, introducing the 

 trills, glides, and bewitching repeated staccato tones, 

 that it becomes more difficult to reduce the music to 

 a notation. And it is at this point that we may realize 

 the truth of the Italian boy's naive reply when asked 

 if he could read music : " Read music ! " he said, "no, 

 Excellenza, I make music, I hear music — for it is in 

 the air ! " 



To describe a bird's song in words is as futile as 

 to describe its brilliant plumage : a musical notation 

 is necessary in the one instance, even as a coloured 

 plate is essential in the other. 



In his Introduction Mr.. Mathews says 

 " vSyllables alone cannot express the song of a bird ; they 

 " are wholly inadequate, if not extremely unscientific. A 

 " syllable may be spoken or sung in any tone of voice, there- 



" fore it is useless in locating a. tone Now, as bird songs 



" are composed of a certain numl)er of related tones and a 

 " limited degree of pitch, there is but one way to record them: 



