226 FRIENDS WORTH KNOWING. 



it is uttered "with the pleasing tranquillity of a careless 

 ploughboy whistling for his own amusement." It is a joy- 

 ous, contented song, standing out from the chorus that 

 greets our half-awakened ears at daylight as. brightly as its 

 author shines against the dewy foliage. T. W. Higginson 

 exclaims, " Yonder oriole fills with light and melody the 

 thousand branches of a neighborhood." It is a song vary- 

 ing with the tune and circumstances, and, as among all 

 birds, some orioles are better performers than others. Dr. 

 Brewer thought that when they first arrived, and were 

 awaiting the females, the voices of the males were loud 

 and somewhat shrill, as though in lamentation, and that 

 this song changed into a "richer, lower, and more pleasing 

 refrain" w r hen they were joined by their partners. The 

 quality of their music is certainly different in different 

 parts of the country, seeming, for example, to be more sub- 

 dued toward the northern limit of their range. 



A writer in an old number of Putnam's Magazine de- 

 scribes two orioles with which he had been acquainted for 

 several summers. These birds had taken up their resi- 

 dences within about a quarter of a mile of each other, one 

 in a public park, and the other in an orchard. "And often," 

 says the narrator, " have I heard the chief musician of the 

 orchard, on the topmost bough of an ancient apple-tree, sing, 



