WHITE-THROATED SPARROW. 



dealings, and advises her admirers to let him alone! 

 The music expresses all the discouragement which is 

 embodied in the White-throat's song; observe how the 

 tones drop down the chromatic scale in precisely the 

 same way. 



There is always that attractiveness of novelty in this 

 Sparrow's music which enlists one's curiosity; the little 

 fellow sings Carmen's song in Tuckerman's Ravine un- 

 der the shadow of Mt. Washington, Turiddu's song 

 under the brow of Mt. Tecumseh, and the Di Provenza 

 from Traviata, in the Pemigewasset Valley. The ques- 

 tion arises, what will he do next, somewhere else ? Possi- 

 bly he will choose still another interval for his whistle 

 and advise that farmer " Peverly " to sow rye! In every 

 instance, however, he will not depart from his own pre- 

 conceived ideas of rhythm, which may or may not ex- 

 actly correspond with some operatic air which has stuck 

 in our own head. In the History of North American 

 Birds, by Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway, I find this; 

 " Notwithstanding the slighting manner in which the 

 song of this bird is spoken of by some writers, in certain 

 parts of the country its clear, prolonged, and peculiar 

 whistle has given it quite a local fame and popularity. 

 Among the White Mountains, where it breeds abun- 

 dantly, it is known as the Peabody-bird, and its remark- 

 ably clear whistle resounds in all their glens and secluded 

 recesses." That is a good summary of the popular esteem 

 in which this bird is held. Dr. M. L. Leach has written 

 an interesting account of the song of the White-throated 

 Sparrow, in the course of which he says (alluding to the 

 form already given in my records), " The arrangement 



99 



