Mistress Cuckoo 
almost total lack of precise intervals of the scale, 
without which no song can be imitated, or ex- 
pressed in black and white. 
The cuckoo stands almost alone in the dis- 
tinct intonation of his pair of notes ; and their 
consequent ease of imitation, both in this re- 
spect, and as regards tone-color, not only has 
given the bird a world-wide reputation, but was 
the cause of its selection to represent Nature’s 
songsters in that fairy piece of tonal scenery so 
artfully devised by Beethoven, in one of the 
movements of the Pastoral Symphony, wherein 
the ear absorbs what commonly the eye alone 
can feed upon. 
Quite as important as tone-color, in deter- 
mining the character of a song, are rhythm, and 
inflection, or modulation, of the voicé. © This is 
shown in that delicious but decidedly character- 
less outpour of the goldfinch which is surpassingly 
sweet-toned, but incoherent and expressionless, 
from the total absence of any rhythmical swing 
and marked inflection. On the other hand, the 
song of the Baltimore oriole displays a definite 
and vigorously masculine character, in the em- 
phatically martial accent of one of his phrases ; 
and, in the midst of that inextricable maze of 
volubility known as the purple finch’s song, one 
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