How to Attract the Birds 



anticipation of them ; and they still have enough 

 vitality left after they have helped raise two broods 

 and have molted their feathers, to express enjoyment 

 of life in song. Either or both of these physical 

 strains is enough to stop some birds' melody alto- 

 gether. One rarely hears a bobolink after the fourth 

 of July. Few birds, indeed, attempt to sing- after 

 family cares and midsummer heat and the growing 

 of new feathers deject their spirits. Such as continue 

 through these ordeals usually drop so many notes that 

 one can scarcely recognize the broken fragments of 

 their real song. But after the new suit of clothes is 

 well on, whether it is joy in the possession of them 

 or a returned sense of physical well-being, in early 

 autumn a second singing usually begins — not so 

 long, nor so exuberant, nor so pleasing, but still a 

 welcome reminder of spring joys. 



THE DEVELOPMENT OF BIRD AND 

 HUMAN MUSIC 



Whether the evolution of bird music has paral- 

 leled that of our own is not yet a settled question 

 among scientists, but a great mass of evidence seems 

 to prove that it has followed similar lines, and that 

 its tendency is still toward the same ideal. We 

 have already noted that it is the quality of voice, 

 not so much the intervals of the melodic scale, that 

 differentiates avian from human music. That sense 

 of rhythm is variously developed among birds we 

 realize on comparing the Carolina wren's precisely 

 emphasized beats with the jumbled jargon of that 

 rollicking polyglot, the Maryland yellow-throat. All 



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