210 HABITS OF BIRDS. 
accompaniment. Neither is his strain altogether 
imitative. His own native notes, which are easily 
distinguishable by such as are well acquainted with 
those of our various song-birds, are bold and full, 
and varied seemingly beyond all limits. ‘They con- 
sist of short expressions of two, three, or, at the 
most, five or six syllables, generally interspersed 
with imitations, and all of them uttered with great 
emphasis and rapidity; and continued, with undi- 
minished ardour, for half an hour or an heur at a 
time. His expanded wings and tail, glistening with 
white, and the buoyant gayety of his action, arrest- 
ing the eye, as his song irresistibly does the ear. 
He sweeps round with enthusiastic ecstasy; he 
mounts and descends as his song swells or dies 
away; and as my friend Mr. Bartram has beauti- 
fully expressed it, ‘He bounds aloft with the celer- 
ity of an arrow, as if to recover or recall his very 
soul, expired in the last elevated strain.’ While 
thus exerting himself, a bystander, destitute of sight, 
would suppose that the whole feathered tribe had 
assembled together on a trial of skill, each striving 
to produce his utmost effect, so perfect are his 
imitations. He many times deceives the sports- 
man, and sends him in search of birds that perhaps 
are not within miles of him, but whose notes he 
exactly imitates: even birds themselves are fre- 
quently imposed on by this admirable mimic, and 
are decoyed by the fancied calls of their mates, or 
dive with precipitation into the depth of thickets, at 
the scream of what they suppose to be the sparrow- 
hawk. 
“The mocking-bird loses little of the power and 
energy of his song by confinement. In his domes- 
ticated state, when he commences his career of 
song, it is impossible to stand by uninterested. He 
whistles for the dog ; Cesar starts up, wags his tail, 
and runs to meet his master. He squeaks out like 
a hurt chicken, and the hen hurries about with hang- 
