CHAPTER IV 



THE CALL-NOTE 



It may fairly be said that any bird-cry which induces 

 a bird to approach another is a "call-note," whether 

 it be a danger-signal, a combat -cry, or an alarm. 

 But naturalists have distinguished in nearly every 

 kind, and certainly in all British kinds of extended 

 song, specific notes which they have observed 

 to be used only for the purpose of attracting birds ; 

 and these notes they have termed " call-notes." It 

 is true that different writers have sometimes mistaken 

 the nature of such cries, and have not only given 

 conflicting descriptions of call-notes, but have also 

 considered some battle-cries to be of this character. 

 The two following instances are examples : — The 

 call -note of the marsh titmouse {Parus palustris) 

 has been variously described, but no description 

 is better than that of the late Mr. Sterland. In 

 his Birds of Sherwood Forest, p. '^6, he says of 



