160 OUTDOOR LIFE IN ENGLAND 



whitethroat as follows : ' As we walk along, a 

 rough, grating sound, something like the noise of 

 a diminutive corn-crake, is heard on the other side 

 of the hedge, stopping when we stop, and sound- 

 ing ahead of us as we walk on. This is the 

 teasing way of the greater whitethroat. ... If 

 you give him time, however, he will show himself, 

 flirting up to the top of the hedge, crooning, crak- 

 ing, and popping into it again ; then flying out a 

 little way, cheerily singing a soft and truly 

 warbling song, with fluttering wings and roughened 

 feathers, and then perhaps perching on a twig to 

 repeat it.' 



Of the lesser whitethroat he says : * The larger 

 bird warbles, but the lesser one, after a little 

 preliminary soliloquy in an undertone, bursts out 

 into a succession of high notes, all of exactly the 

 same pitch.' 



With reference to the larger of these birds, the 

 Rev. C. A. Johns states that, ' though not 

 naturally a nocturnal musician, it does not, like 

 most other birds when disturbed at night, quietly 

 steal away to another place of shelter, but bursts 

 into repeated snatches of song, though this song 

 is rarely heard except in the months of May and 

 June.' I have frequently heard birds twittering 

 at night when disturbed, and there are some one 

 or two birds which may justly be termed 

 ' nocturnal musicians ' ; but I have no recollection 

 of anything which could be termed a song pro- 

 ceeding from the whitethroat under such circum- 



