210 HABITS OF BIRDS. 



accompaniment. Neither is his strain altogether 

 imitative. His own native notes, which are easily 

 distinguishable by such as are well acquainted with 

 those of our various song-birds, are bold and full, 

 and varied seemingly beyond all limits. They con- 

 sist of short expressions of two, three, or, at the 

 most, five or six syllables, generally interspersed 

 with imitations, and all of them uttered with great 

 emphasis and rapidity ; and continued, with undi- 

 minished ardour, for half an hour or an hour at a 

 time. His expanded wings and tail, glistening with 

 white, and the buoyant gayety of his action, arrest- 

 ing the eye, as his song irresistibly does the ear. 

 He sweeps round with enthusiastic ecstasy; he 

 mounts and descends as his song swells or dies 

 away ; and as my friend Mr. Bartram has beauti- 

 fully expressed it, ' He bounds aloft with the celer- 

 ity of an arrow, as if to recover or recall his very 

 soul, expired in the last elevated strain.' While 

 thus exerting himself, a bystander, destitute of sight, 

 would suppose that the whole feathered tribe had 

 assembled together on a trial of skill, each striving 

 to produce his utmost effect, so perfect are his 

 imitations. He many times deceives the sports- 

 man, 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 domes- 

 ticated state, when he commences his career of 

 song, it is impossible to stand by uninterested. He 

 whistles for the dog ; Caesar starts up, wags his tail, 

 and runs to meet his master. He squeaks out like 

 a hurt chicken, and the hen hurries about with hang- 



