NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 193 



sation which passed between two owls, reclaimed a sultan, 1 

 before delighting in conquest and devastation ; but I would 

 be thought only to mean that many of the winged tribes have 

 various sounds and voices adapted to express their various 

 passions, wants, and feelings ; such as anger, fear, love, 

 hatred, hunger, and the like. All species are not equally 

 eloquent; some are copious and fluent as it were in their 

 utterance, while others are confined to a few important 

 sounds : no bird, like the fish kind, is quite mute, though 

 some are rather silent. The language of birds is very ancient, 

 and, like other ancient modes of speech, very elliptical ; little 

 is said, but much is meant and understood. 



The notes of the eagle kind are shrill and piercing; and 

 about the season of nidification much diversified, as I have 

 been often assured by a curious observer of nature, who long 

 resided at Gibraltar, where eagles abound. The notes of our 

 hawks much resemble those of the king of birds. Owls have 

 very expressive notes ; they hoot in a fine vocal sound, much 

 resembling the vox humana> and reducible by a pitch-pipe to 

 a musical key. This note seems to express complacency and 

 rivalry among the males; they use also a quick call and a 

 horrible scream ; and can snore and hiss when they mean to 

 menace. Ravens, besides their loud croak, can exert a deep 

 and solemn note that makes the woods to echo ; the amorous 

 sound of a crow is strange and ridiculous ; rooks, in the breed- 

 ing season, attempt sometimes in the gaiety of their hearts to 

 sing, but with no great success ; the parrot kind have many 

 modulations of voice, as appears by their aptitude to learn 

 human sounds ; doves coo in an amorous and mournful man- 

 ner, and are emblems of despairing lovers ; the woodpecker 

 sets up a sort of loud and hearty laugh ; the fern-owl, or goat- 

 sucker, from the dusk till daybreak, serenades his mate with 

 the clattering of castanets. All the tuneful passeres express 

 their complacency by sweet modulations and a variety of 

 melody. The swallow, as has been observed in a former 

 letter, by a shrill alarm bespeaks the attention of the other 

 hirundines, and bids them be aware the hawk is at hand. 

 Aquatic and gregarious birds, especially the nocturnal, that 

 shift their quarters in the dark, are very noisy and loquacious ; 



