BIRD-SONGS. 



WHY do birds sing ? Has their music a mean- 

 ing, or is it all a matter of blind impulse ? Some 

 bright morning in March, as you go out-of-doors, 

 you are greeted by the notes of the first robin. 

 Perched in a leafless tree, there he sits, facing 

 the sun like a genuine fire-worshiper, and sing- 

 ing as though he would pour'out his very soul. 

 What is he thinking about ? What spirit pos- 

 sesses him ? 



It is easy to ask questions until the simplest 

 matter comes to seem, what at bottom it really 

 is, a thing altogether mysterious ; but if our robin 

 could understand us, he would, likely enough, 

 reply : 



" Why do you talk in this way, as if it were 

 something requiring explanation that a bird 

 should sing ? You seem to have forgotten that 

 everybody sings, or almost everybody. Think 

 of the insects, the bees and the crickets and 

 the locusts, to say nothing of your intimate 

 friends, the mosquitoes ! Think, too, of the frogs 



