226 THE SOLITAIRE. 



first he never made the least effort to escape, but 

 seemed perfectly contented, so long as he was 

 alone. It was the presence of intruders as he 

 regarded them that he resented so fatally. 



One of this most interesting family, Town- 

 send's fly-catching thrush (^Myadestes Town- 

 sendii) is resident in the mountains of Colorado, 

 and it is pleasing to see how the most scientific 

 and the least emotional of chroniclers fall into 

 rapture over his song. " Never have I heard a 

 more delightful chorus of bird music," says one. 

 " The song can be compared to nothing uttered 

 by any other bird I have heard," says another. 

 " A most exquisite song in which the notes of 

 purple finch, wood thrush, and winter wren are 

 blended into a silvery cascade of melody that 

 ripples and dances down the mountain-side as 

 clear arid sparkling as the mountain brook," says 

 a third. 



Charles Dudley Warner, who found the clarin 

 a favorite cage bird in Mexico, says of his song 

 (in " Mexican Notes ") : " Its long, liquid, full- 

 throated note is more sweet and thrilling than 

 any other bird note I have ever heard ; it is 

 hardly a song, but a flood of melody, elevating, 

 inspiring as the skylark, but with a touch of the 

 tender melancholy of the nightingale in the 

 night." 



