116 HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS. 



notes of musical instruments, but more especially their 

 own songs and those of one another. The pleasing 

 myth that " the birds came in great flocks to listen to 

 the delightful strains of Orpheus' lute " savors more of 

 fact than many other things handed down as truths in 

 ancient history. Our unmusical English sparrow enjoys 

 the songs of other birds : on different occasions I have 

 seen several of them gather about a robin as he caroled 

 a pleasing song : when they came too near or in too 

 large numbers he would dart at them and drive them 

 out of the tree, but when he commenced again to sing, 

 some of them were quite sure to return. A friend sends 

 me an account of a bobolink, that, placed in a cage with 

 some canaries, exhibited great delight at their songs. 

 He did not sing himself, but with a peculiar ' cluck' 

 could always set the canaries singing. After a while he 

 began to learn their songs, note by note, and in the 

 course of a few weeks mastered the entire son^. Then 

 he commenced to lead the choir, and kept the others 

 going much of the time. 



Even the prosaic goose, an animal ridiculed in litera- 

 ture and the butt for flippant jokes, but really a very 

 intelligent fowl, and capable of forming the strongest 

 attachment to even man himself, is fond of music, and 

 a lively air on a violin will sometimes set a whole flock 

 wild with dehght. On one occasion, at a country wed- 

 ding, I was witness to a curious performance by one of 

 these animals. After dinner a lady entertained the 

 guests assembled on the lawn with music from an accor- 

 dion. A flock of geese were feeding in the road just 



