246 In Touch with Nature. 



from all entanglement, the cat-bird perches on a 

 convenient limb of the nearest tree and gives 

 himself up to song. This is not a mere repetition 

 of the chirps and twitters that marked every 

 movement when busy about the nest or intent upon 

 securing food. These were not by any means 

 monotonous twangings of a single string, but 

 highly varied, and clearly had reference to the 

 various demands of the moment. A low chuckle 

 calls his mate ; a shrill chirp warns her of possible 

 danger ; the scarcely audible utterances when near 

 each other, when " billing and cooing," are clearly 

 the interchange of ideas ; but now, how vastly 

 different and yet equally significant ! 



The self-released bird needs, or thinks he needs, 

 rest and recreation, and for the time gives him- 

 self up to song. He rejoices in his own musical 

 powers. Every note of every other bird that is 

 within the compass of his voice he repeats, and, 

 withal, sounds many a matchless note wholly his 

 own. From side to side he tosses his head as if 

 such movements affected his voice. His body 

 sways to and fro or pitches forward as the sounds 

 grow shriller, and then, as if exhausted by the 



