vi On tfie Songs of Birds 131 



might seem at first hearing to lend themselves fairly 

 well to notation ; but of others, such as the Nightin- 

 gale's or the Eobin's, I would say without hesitation 

 that any attempt so to represent them would be pure 

 waste of time. A poet can be translated from his 

 own language into another with some show of 

 success ; but to write the song of the Kobin on a 

 musical stave is in my opinion not only to translate 

 him but to traduce him. You may imitate a bird's 

 song, it is true, on some instrument made especially 

 for the purpose ; but that is a very different thing 

 from writing down on music-paper either the song 

 itself or the imitation of it. 



There is a very plain reason why all such attempts 

 should be futile. The birds use no fixed intervals 

 such as those in our artificial scale ; their voices are 

 wholly free and unfettered by convention, and they 

 can make free use of any of the infinite number of 

 intervals which in reality exist between one of our 

 tones and another. This is simply the result of the 

 nature of the bird's vocal apparatus, of the com- 

 bination of syrinx, windpipe, and muscular system ; 

 the windpipe being so elastic, as I have already 



the Blackcap's warble, in which I am unable to trace any resem- 

 blance to the song as I know it. Many other curious examples are 

 given in an interesting book called Woodnotes Wild, by S. P. 

 Chancy (Boston, U.S., 1892), together with a useful bibliography of 

 the subject. Mr. Chancy was an ardent lover of birds, and a 

 musician as well ; and I sincerely regret that I am unable to judge 

 of his success in dealing with the songs of American birds. 



