BIRD PORTRAITS 
THE SONG SPARROW 
AFTER a severe winter, while snow and ice still remind us of 
the past, the Song Sparrow, mounting to the top of some bush or 
small tree, repeats his cheerful tinkling song, “helping,” as Thoreau 
says, “to crack the ice” in the ponds. Few people are so unobserv- 
ant as not to notice this bright strain, after the silence of winter. 
A peculiarity of the song is the amount of variation shown by 
different individuals and often by the same bird. At almost regular 
distances along the bushy roadside, or over the hedge-intersected 
fields, one will meet on the early spring mornings one Song 
Sparrow after another, each restricted to his part of the road or 
field. If one notices the songs of each, it is evident that, though 
the songs have the same general character, there are almost as 
many ways of beginning a strain as there are singers. Moreover, 
the same bird has been observed to alter his song in a short space of 
time to two or three different variations. Probably, if one’s ear were 
acute enough, all birds of one species would be found to sing with 
slight differences, but few show in so marked a degree as the Song 
Sparrow the tendency to variation which characterizes a species. 
In early April, the Song Sparrow builds a nest of grass, either 
on the ground beneath a tuft of grass, or under some brambles, or 
less frequently a few feet above the ground, in a bush or on the 
lower limbs of a tree. In the latter situation, twigs are of course 
necessary for the support of the structure. Here again the bird 
shows a tendency to vary in its habits. The eggs are from four 
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