A JOLLY FIELD BIRD. 135 



a real melody. What a pity there is not more 

 of it ! It usually consists of two prolonged 

 syllables blended together as if by a sort of 

 looj) or festoon and delivered with a swinging 

 movement that is the poetry of grace. Is it 

 not true that almost everything you hear makes 

 a picture in your mind ? Well, this is the 

 picture that is produced in my mind by the 

 song of the meadow lark when he whistles 

 the whole run at his best : 



Only the wavering line ought to be the color 

 of gleaming gold. Sometimes it is varied a 

 good deal, as, for instance, when the two- syl- 

 lables are run together as if they were one, or 

 when the song closes \^dth the upward instead 

 of the downward inflection. More than once 

 I have heard a lark in a certain meadow con- 

 clude his song with a peculiar note that 

 sounded as if a spring had got worked loose in 

 the music-box of his throat. 



One of the lark's oddest musical perform- 

 ances is his air song, which is a wild, continuous 

 medley lasting several minutes, and not de- 

 livered intermittently or at intervals, as is his 

 other song. This air song is sometimes rung 



