BIRD-SONGS. 39 



as striking as those of the robin, and sometimes 

 it is impossible not to feel that the artist is 

 making a deliberate effort to do something out 

 of the ordinary course, something better than 

 he has ever done before. Now and then he 

 prefaces his proper song with many discon- 

 nected, extremely staccato notes, following each 

 other at very distant and unexpected intervals 

 of pitch. It is this, I conclude, which is meant 

 by some writer (who it is I cannot now remem- 

 ber) when he criticises the wood thrush for 

 spending too much time in tuning his instru- 

 ment. But the fault is the critic's, I think ; to 

 my ear these preliminaries sound rather like 

 the recitative which goes before the grand aria. 



Still another musician who delights to take 

 liberties with his score is the towhee bunting, 

 or chewink. Indeed, he carries the matter so 

 far that sometimes it seems almost as if he 

 suspected the proximity of some self-conceited 

 ornithologist, and were determined, if possible, 

 to make a fool of him. And for my part, being 

 neither self-conceited nor an ornithologist, I am 

 willing to confess that I have once or twice 

 been so badly deceived that now the mere sight 

 of this Pipilo is, so to speak, a means of grace 

 to me. 



One more of these innovators (these heretics, 

 as they are most likely called by their more 



