IMITATION AND MIMICRY, 327 



night on the chimney top, pours forth the sweetest 

 and the most various notes of any bird whatever*." 



Pennant assures us that he himself heard " a caged 

 one" in England " imitate the mewing of a cat, 

 and the creaking of a sign in high winds," and that 

 it not only sang, but danced, performing a great 

 many gesticulations. He further tells us that it 

 imitates the notes of all birds, from the humming- 

 bird to the eagle f. 



The Hon. Daines Harrington, referring probably 

 to the same bird, tells us that its notes were chiefly, 

 if not entirely, imitations of the notes of other birds. 

 ** I have happened," he says, " to hear the American 

 mocking-bird in great perfection, at Messrs. Vogels 

 and Scott, in Love-lane, Eastcheap. During the 

 space of one minute he imitated the wood-lark, chaf- 

 finch, blackbird, thrush, and sparrow. 1 was told 

 also that he would bark like a dog ; so that the bird 

 seems to have no choice in his imitation ; though 

 his pipe comes nearest to our nightingale of any 

 bird I have yet met with. With regard to the 

 original notes, however, of this bird, we are still at 

 a loss, as this can only be known by those who are 

 accurately acquainted with the song of the other 

 American birds. Kalm, indeed, informs us that the 

 natural song is excellent J ; but this traveller seems 

 not to have been long enough in America to have 

 distinguished what were the genuine notes. With 

 us mimics do not often succeed but in imitations* 

 I have little doubt, however, but that this bird 

 would be fully equal to the song of the nightingale 

 in its whole compass; but then, from the attention 

 which the mocker pays to any other sort of disagree- 

 able noise, these capital notes would be always de- 

 based by a bad mixture ." 



Southey, in a few lines, embodies nearly all that 



* Anim. Nat. iii. 219. f Arctic Zool. ii. 334. 



J Travels, i. 219. Phil. Trans, vol. 62. pt. ii. p. 284. 



