A MUSICAL KEY. 



EXTREMELY IMPORTANT TO THOSE WHO DO NOT READ 



MUSIC. 



Success in identifying a bird's song depends more upon 

 the ability of the ear to discriminate differences of 

 rhythm than differences of tone ; for, every species fol- 

 lows its own unalterable law in rhythmic time, no matter 

 how different are the songs of birds of the same species. 

 This is an apparently irrefragable principle which is the 

 key to an immediate recognition of the singer. 



But there are those who entertain a contrary opinion. 

 Mr. Maurice Thompson, in Sylvan Secrets, w r rites: "There 

 is no such element as the rhythmic beat in any bird-song 

 that I have heard. Modulation and fine shades of ' color* 

 as the musical critic has it, together with melodious 

 phrasing take the place of rhythm. . . . The absence of 

 true rhythm probably is significant of a want of power to 

 appreciate genuine music, the bird's comprehension com- 

 passing no more than the value of sweet sounds merely 

 as such." Now if the writer means what he says about 

 the "rhythmic beat " he is certainly all astray, but if he 

 is confusing mechanical time with the rhythm or ' ' metre" 

 of poetry he is not only wrong but misleading in his use 

 of terms, for no English word expresses rhythmus oetter 

 than the word " time," and I shall presently demonstrate 

 the fact that birds know how to keep time perfectly. 

 But metre is a different thing, it implies proportion, and 

 of that the wild bird naturally knows but little. 



The most obvious explanation of a "rhythmic boat" 

 is the drum beat. Here it is : 



E*oh line represents a h*lf second, tfterffire } =M to a. minute. 



Any child would know what you were representing if 

 you tapped that way on the table. Now the question at 

 once arises, is there any bird that sings in accordance 



xxv 



