THE STARLING 125 



against the' blue of a summer sky. There the bird stands, engrossed 

 in its performance, the feathers of its throat putted out, its wings 

 hanging somewhat limply, and at intervals waving somewhat in- 

 eptly, as if they felt they had a part to play, but were uncertain 

 what. Thus he sings, and, though no doubt proud of his own 

 peculiar notes, is not above borrowing those of his neighbours, 

 even those of the house-sparrow. His imitations are often exact 

 enough to deceive a practised ear. They are not by any means con- 

 fined to the notes of birds. Mr. A. H. Macpherson relates that in 

 1SST, at Trinity College, Oxford, he heard a starling on the roof at the 

 opposite side of the quadrangle attempting to imitate the chapel bell, 

 which was then ringing. To his surprise he noticed that, in addition 

 to imitating the sound, the bird was swaying its whole body from side 

 to side in imitation of the movement of the bell. Another bird repro- 

 duced so exactly the mewing of a cat that the person hearing it went 

 several times to open his door to let in his cat, only to find no cat 

 there. 1 



But the song of the starling just described, even when uttered on 

 some radiant chimney-pot, is a poor thing compared to the rapturous 

 music that he makes when the impulses of spring are stirring in his 

 veins. Then he becomes heroic, a giant, twice his ordinary size, all 

 his feathers ruffled out, while his whole body throbs with the strength 

 of his love. At one moment he will stand moving his head from 

 side to side, pouring his ecstatic notes to right and then to left. At 

 another he will pour them upwards, his quivering wings raised in 

 sympathy above his back, his tail bent in contrast stiffly downward. 

 Then lastly he will pour them straight in front or down, both tail 

 and wing bent down, the latter so stretched that the tip reaches 

 below the feet, and hides them and the legs from view like a screen. 

 These curious acts of his love-play he will perform again and again, 

 though not, of course, necessarily in the same order, or exactly the 



1 Both these examples are quoted by C. A. Witchell in his Evolution of Bird Song, 

 p. 212. 



