138 ADVENTURES AMONG BIRDS 



the latest of the songsters, and would sing on the 

 coldest evenings, even when it was raining. 



My daily visits to this nest were greatly resented by 

 the birds. It was their misfortune that they had 

 builded their home so near me and had made it so 

 beautiful. I was also much interested in the various 

 cries and sounds they emitted when excited by my 

 presence. The male would flit and fly about at a 

 distance, uttering loud clacking or chacking cries 

 interspersed with a variety of little exclamatory notes, 

 while the female, more anxious, would dash at me, 

 chacking and screaming all the time. But the instant 

 I left the site their rage would vanish ; the male would 

 begin his set " wheero-wheero " whistle, while the 

 female would break out in a sort of song of her own 

 which resembled the first attempts at singing of a 

 young throstle — a medley composed of a variety of 

 guttural and squeaking notes interspersed with more 

 or less musical chirps. 



What struck me as most curious was that when 

 troubled with my presence at the nest they uttered 

 two distinct sounds which are not in the blackbird's 

 language but are part of the language of the typical 

 thrushes (Turdus) ; one was the prolonged, tremulous, 

 harsh and guttural alarm cry of the missel-thrush, the 

 other the low, long-drawn, wailing note of the throstle 

 when anxious about its nest or young, a note so high- 

 pitched as to be inaudible to some persons. It can only 

 be supposed that these different sounds, expressing 

 apprehension or anger, have been inherited by 



