A MISTAKEN NOTION 279 



to me unfinished and to need a few conclud- 

 ing notes. A vireo, the one who called all 

 day about the house "ee-ay," following it 

 with what sounded like "kee-ter! kee-ter! 

 kee-ter ! " occasionally concluded this stand- 

 ard utterance with a short strain of a song 

 entirely different from any vireo-notes I 

 ever heard. An oven-bird, whose conven- 

 tional song, " teacher ! teacher ! teacher ! " 

 was heard all day, now and then varied the 

 monotony by running on into half a dozen 

 notes of quite another character, as if he had 

 half a mind to add his flight-song. 



I do not wish to imply that a bird has but 

 one song. A greatly mistaken notion which 

 has wide circulation and belief among per- 

 sons who are not observers is embodied in 

 these verses by Dr. Holland : 



" The robin repeats his two musical notes, 

 The meadow-lark sings his one refrain, 

 And steadily over and over again 

 The same song swells from a hundred throats. 

 Each sings its word or its phrase, and then 

 It has nothing further to sing or to say." 



So far is this from true, that the indi- 

 viduality of bird-utterances is sufficiently 

 marked to distinguish those of the same spe- 



