276 The Naturalist in La Plata. 



song is in this slow gradation from the somewhat 

 throaty notes emitted by the bird when ascending 

 to the excessively attenuated sounds at the close. 



In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one 

 species more the white-banded mocking-bird of 

 Patagonia, which greatly excels all other songsters 

 known to me in the copiousness, variety and bril- 

 liant character of its music. Concealed in the 

 foliage this bird will sing by the half-hour, repro- 

 ducing with miraculous fidelity the more or less 

 melodious set songs of a score of species a 

 strange and beautiful performance ; but wonderful 

 as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceases to 

 admire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, 

 as if to show by contrast his unapproachable su- 

 periority, bursts into his own divine song, uttered 

 with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, 

 but greatly exceeding, that of the skylark '* singing 

 at heaven's gate ; " the notes issuing in a continuous 

 torrent ; the voice so brilliant and infinitely varied, 

 that if " rivalry and emulation " have as large a 

 place in feathered breasts as some imagine all that 

 hear this surpassing melody might well languish 

 ever after in silent despair. 



In a vast majority of the finest musical per- 

 formances the same notes are uttered in the same 

 order, and after an interval the song is repeated 

 without any variation : and it seems impossible that 

 we could in any other way have such beautiful con- 

 trasts and harmonious lights and shades the whole 

 song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played in 

 tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in 

 the mocking-bird's song : the notes never come in the 



