282 THE MOUNTAINS OF CALIFOKNIA 



The storm was reflected in every gesture, and not 

 one cheerful note, not to say song, came from a 

 single bill ; their cowering, joyless endurance offer 

 ing a striking contrast to the spontaneous, irre 

 pressible gladness of the Ouzel, who could no more 

 help exhaling sweet song than a rose sweet fra 

 grance. He must sing though the heavens fall. I re 

 member noticing the distress of a pair of robins 

 during the violent earthquake of the year 1872, when 

 the pines of the Valley, with strange movements, 

 flapped and waved their branches, and beetling 

 rock-brows came thundering down to the meadows 

 in tremendous avalanches. It did not occur to me 

 in the midst of the excitement of other observa 

 tions to look for the ouzels, but I doubt not they 

 were singing straight on through it all, regarding 

 the terrible rock-thunder as fearlessly as they do the 

 booming of the waterfalls. 



What may be regarded as the separate songs of 

 the Ouzel are exceedingly difficult of description, 

 because they are so variable and at the same time 

 so confluent. Though I have been acquainted with 

 my favorite ten years, and during most of this time 

 have heard him sing nearly every day, I still detect 

 notes and strains that seem new to me. Nearly all 

 of his music is sweet and tender, lapsing from his 

 round breast like water over the smooth lip of a 

 pool, then breaking farther on into a sparkling 

 foam of melodious notes, which glow with subdued 

 enthusiasm, yet without expressing much of the 

 strong, gushing ecstasy of the bobolink or skylark. 



The more striking strains are perfect arabesques 

 of melody, composed of a few full, round, mellow 



