THE SUMMIT OF THE YEARS 



of the artificial songbirds made in Paris or Switzer- 

 land, which, when wound up, really sing with spirit 

 and sweetness. In their season most of our birds sing 

 as if they also went by a kind of clockwork. 



They are wound up to go so long, usually two or 

 three months. Late in June they begin to show signs 

 of running down, and by and by we get only little 

 snatches and fragments of song from them. In May, 

 for instance, the song of the bobolink is full and rol- 

 licking, " a brook o' laughter," as Lowell says, run- 

 ning down the air. But in July the brook, like our 

 mountain streams during a dry time, has so nearly 

 dried up that we get only interrupted and fragmen- 

 tary trickles now and then. 



Moreover, a bird- voice has a kind of mechanical 

 uniformity and tirelessness; it seems as incapable of 

 fatigue or failure of any kind as does a clock. One 

 would as soon expect a bell or a watch or a meter to 

 get hoarse or tired as he would expect such a thing 

 of any of our wild sweet singers. An amount of 

 conscious effort with the voice on the part of a human 

 being, equal to what each of our songbirds puts forth 

 every day, would use up his strength, and his instru- 

 ment, too, in a mere fraction of the time. 



I have for two seasons timed the little bush spar- 

 row as he sings about my vineyards, and found that 

 for many hours a day, and every day in the month, 

 from April to midsummer, he sings his song regularly 

 six times a minute, making several thousand times 

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