810 Observations on the 
natural, not acquired ; and in order to deter- 
mine whether this is the case with their songs 
also, which are generally much more com- 
plex, and, consequently, have the appearance 
of being more artificial, the following ex- 
periments were made. 
In the summer of the present year, (1822,) 
I procured three young green grosbeaks,—a 
cock and two hens; which, as they did not 
see till the fourth day after they were ta- 
ken from the nest, must then have been 
only two days old.* 
These birds were reared by hand, in a 
house situated in the town of Manchester; 
where they had no opportunity of hearing 
the notes of any bird, except, perhaps, the 
occasional chirping of sparrows : nevertheless, 
they had all their appropriate calls, and the 
cock bird had the song peculiar to its species. 
It was hoped, at the time, that this ex- 
periment would be considered sufficiently de- 
cisive; but recollecting that some persons, 
for the sake of shewing their ingenuity in 
raising objections, might say that these birds 
remembered the notes of their parents, which 
they imitated as soon as they had acquired 
* From numerous observations that I have made, it appears that 
young birds usually begin to see about the sixth day after they are 
hatched, 
