THE MOCKING-BIRD. 171 
Bartram has beautifully expressed it, ‘He bounds aloft with the 
celerity of an arrow, as if to recover or recall his very soul, 
expired in the last elevated strain. While thus exerting him- 
self, a bystander destitute of sight would suppose that the whole 
feathered tribes had assembled together, on a trial of skill, each 
striving to produce his utmost effect, so perfect are his imita- 
tions. He many times deceives the sportsman, 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 domesticated state, when he com- 
mences 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 hanging wings and bristled feathers, 
clucking to protect its injured brood. The barking of the dog, the 
mewing of the cat, the creaking of a passing wheelbarrow, follow 
with great truth and rapidity. He repeats the tune taught him by 
his master, though of considerable length, fully and faithfully. He 
runs over the quiveritigs of the Canary, and the clear whistlings 
of the Virginia Nightingale, or Red-bird, with such superior execu- 
tion and effect, that the mortified songsters feel their own inferiority, 
and become altogether silent, while he seems to triumph in their 
defeat by redoubling his exertions. 
«This excessive fondness for variety, however, in the opinion 
of some, injures his song. His elevated imitations of the Brown 
Thrush are frequently interrupted by the crowing of cocks; and 
the warblings of the Blue-bird, which he exquisitely manages, are 
mingled with the screaming of swallows, or the cackling of hens; 
amidst the simple melody of the Robin, we are suddenly surprised 
by the shrill reiterations of the Whippoorwill; while the notes of 
the Killdeer, Blue Jay, Martin, Baltimore, and twenty others, suc- 
ceed with such imposing reality, that we look round for the origi- 
1 Travels, p. 82. Introd. 
