Songs Without Words 



actually call him the Canada sparrow. "What's in 

 a name?" All sorts of phrases, in words of three 

 syllables, have been fitted to this strain in various 

 sections, yet however differently people record the 

 song, it is perhaps the only one written — the one 

 out of every ten submitted — by which the perse- 

 cuted ornithologist could correctly name the bird 

 without further description. The sets of triplicate 

 notes identify it, not the words which imagination 

 supplies. But print can convey no idea of the ex- 

 quisite quality of that high-pitched, piercing, sweet, 

 tenderly plaintive strain. Whistle it from memory, 

 in the cool of a spring day, in some deep northern 

 forest — perhaps not one, but a half a dozen white- 

 throats will pierce the evening stillness, complimen- 

 ting your poor performances as no opera singer 

 yet was encored. 



HOW BIRDS LEARN TO SING 



It is nature's only way to teach sound — by ear — 

 and still the most exact. As a child is born a certain 

 racial type of linguist and learns to speak by imita- 

 ting the words in daily use about him, so a bird 

 enters life the kind of singer that he is and learns his 

 notes by imitating those of his closest associates. 

 Only, the more clever young child, given an equal 

 opportunity to hear two languages, acquires one as 

 readily as the other; while the bird, in a state of 

 nature, usually confines its notes to the traditional 

 ones of its clan, although it may hear the notes of 

 scores of other species every day of its youth. Cer- 

 tain very young European goldfinches, isolated from 



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