FIELD AND STUDY 



address, which, of course, would again be expressive 

 of his all-round conquering character. The positive 

 body will always dominate the negative, and that, 

 in short, is why the male dominates the female. 

 What country boy has not seen a female sparrow, 

 or robin, or bluebird, apparently a disinterested 

 spectator of the battles of her male suitors? If she 

 secretly wishes for the success of either of the com- 

 batants, she has the art of completely concealing 

 it. The victor takes the prize. 



That the singing of birds bears no analogy to the 

 singing of human beings, and is neither to please 

 themselves nor to please others, is obvious from at 

 least two facts: one is that birds with defective or 

 only half-articulate voices will sing just as joy- 

 ously and persistently as do birds whose instru- 

 ments are perfect. I have witnessed this in the case 

 of the hermit thrush, the bobolink, and the cockerel 

 of the barnyard. The birds of the wood, and of the 

 meadow, quite ignored their split whistles, and the 

 cockerel arched his neck and inflated his lungs and 

 went through with the motions of crowing just as 

 proudly and repeatedly as did the cock he w^as chal- 

 lenging. Then the seasonal and automatic charac- 

 ter of bird-songs, and their tireless persistence, mark 

 them off from all human performances. If a man or a 

 woman were to use his or her voice one thousandth 

 part as much as the singing bird uses its voice, he or 

 she would soon be so hoarse that speaking would be 



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