AMERICAN ROBIN. 
from six to twenty feet above the ground, in a tree near 
the house, sometimes under some sheltering projection 
of the house itself; it is coarsely constructed of grass, 
leaves, rootlets, and plant fibres woven into a mud wall 
or foundation, and lined with finer grasses. Egg a sub- 
dued green-blue without spots or rarely with fine brown 
ones. This bird is commonly distributed through east- 
ern North America as far west as the Rocky Mountains ; 
it is also found in eastern Mexico and Alaska; it breeds 
from Virginia and Kansas to the northern coast of Brit- 
ish America, and winters from southern Canada (irregu- 
larly) southward. The birds begin breeding from the 
last of March to the middle of May, and sometimes two, 
or even three broods are raised. The Robin is essentially 
a ground bird, and spends a great deal of his time search- 
ing the meadow and lawn for worms and grubs. 
The Robin’s song is such a perfectly familiar one that 
it scarcely seems necessary to furnish any records for 
other than the interest which attaches to the melody. 
Like all birds this one greatly varies not only in song 
but in quality of voice ; but every individual singer ad- 
heres closely to the mechanical rhythm common to the 
species. The notes are generally delivered in groups of 
three ; sometimes a sprinkling of two-note groups oc- 
curs, but this forms no considerable part of the song. 
Expressed by dots the song should appear thus: ... 
The form is that of a disconnected warble in rather a 
narrow compass of voice, and with very slight varia- 
tion. Some birds sing with an excellent pitch, others 
ramble along with no particular regard for key or 
melody. Indeed, it would require pages of explanations 
and notations to fully demonstrate the truth of such 
a statement; but it would be questionable whether such 
an analysis of individual variation possessed any value 
relatively with the study of bird music. It is sufficient 
to say that after an extended acquaintance with the 
songs of a number of Robins one finds that they are all 
distinctly different, and that one specimen in about ten 
is, musically speaking, worth all the others put together ! 
The following is an excellent example of good melody 
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