BIRD NOTES. 



ANNE WAKELY JACKSON. 



DURING the late autumn days, 

 when the summer chorus has 

 dispersed, and only a few win 

 ter soloists remain to cheer us, 

 one is more than ever impressed by 

 the wonderful carrying power of bird 

 notes. Many of these notes are not at 

 all loud; and yet we hear them very 

 distinctly at a comparatively long dis 

 tance from their source. 



The ear that is trained to listen will 

 distinguish a bird's note above a great 

 variety of loud and distracting noises. 

 This is due, not to the loudness of the 

 note, but to the quality of its tone. 



We all know by experience, though 

 few of us, alas, profit by it that when 

 we wish to make ourselves heard, it is 

 not always necessary to raise our 

 voices, but only to use a different 

 quality of tone. 



Thus, some singers, when you hear 

 them in a small room, seem to com 

 pletely fill it with sound, while if they 

 sing in a large hall, they can scarcely 

 be heard at all beyond a certain dis 

 tance. Their voices lack carrying 

 power, and their notes apparently 

 escape almost directly after leaving 

 their mouths. 



It is this carrying quality, which can 

 be cultivated to a large extent in the 

 human voice, that we find in bird notes. 

 They produce their notes in a perfectly 

 natural way. They do not, like us, 

 have to be trained and taught to sing 

 naturally. 



I believe that nearly every human 

 voice has some sweet or agreeable 

 quality in it. If the owner would but 

 use that part, instead of inflicting the 

 harsh or strident or shrill part upon 

 the unfortunate listener, what a musical 

 world we should live in ! No discord 

 ant voices ! Think of it ! 



To go back to the birds. Here is an 

 example of the penetrating quality of 

 tone they possess. One morning I 

 was busily engaged in the back part of 

 the house, when my ear caught the 

 sound of a bird's note, and I deter 

 mined to follow it up. 



It led me to the front part of the 

 house, out of the front door, down the 



walk, across the street, and into a 

 neighbor's yard where I found my 

 "caller," a white-breasted nut-hatch, 

 carefully searching the bark of a tall 

 soft maple. His note did not sound 

 particularly loud when I stood there 

 near him. Yet I had heard it with per 

 fect distinctness in the rear of the house. 



What a penetrating quality there is 

 in the high, faint " skreeking " of the 

 brown creeper, and in the metallic 

 " pip " of the hairy woodpecker. 



The birds could teach us many a 

 lesson on " voice production," if we 

 would but listen to them. 



The person who has never learned to 

 listen, misses much of the beauty of 

 life. For him "that hath ears to hear," 

 when he goes abroad, the air is full of 

 subtle music. Not merely the music 

 of the birds, but other voices of nature 

 as well; the wind in the trees, the 

 rustle of leaves. 



The unthinking person walks along 

 the street, seeing nothing, hearing 

 nothing. What does he miss? Many 

 things. He misses yon tall tree, which 

 suggests such strength, such enduring 

 majesty. He misses the beautiful leaf 

 that lies in his path, a marvel of ex 

 quisitely blended coloring. He misses 

 the delicate tracery of slender twigs 

 and branches, with their background 

 of blue sky or gray cloud. He misses 

 the voices of his feathered friends who 

 would gladly cheer him on his way. 

 If he thinks of nature at all, he is apt 

 to think her beauties have departed 

 with the summer. Not so. If you 

 love nature, she will never withhold 

 some part of her beauty from you, no 

 matter how cold or windy or rainy the 

 day may be. If you see no beauty it 

 is not because it is entirely lacking, 

 but because you are blind to it. 



The love of nature is a great gift, a 

 gift that is within the reach of all of 

 us. Let us, then, cultivate this gift, 

 and we shall find beauty and harmony 

 and peace, such as we never dreamed 

 of before. Our lives will become 

 better and nobler for the contact with 

 nature, and we shall be brought into a 

 closer understanding of nature's God. 



