FAMILY Troglodytldi 



would necessitate the employment of both treble and 

 bass etafK 1 1 is song is no ordinary one; it is like 

 long rigmarole the drift of which is humorously incom- 

 prehensible, though the bird apparently consider- his 

 remarkable strophes both serious and important. ! 

 to him sometime while he is singing in the shadowy 

 tangles of the briers and willows through which winds 

 the brook with gurgling, petulant impatience, and you 

 will hear some unmistakable tuneful expostulations, 

 persuasions, and remonstrances, nearly half of which 

 are delivered sotto voce, and the rest with emphatic 

 insistence on some point which the bird considers vitally 

 important. When he has finished you will wonder 

 what it was all about whether he was telling the 

 brook that such fretful slipping over the pebbly shallows 

 was an undignified and needlessly noisy proceeding. But 

 the music is no index to the sentiments of the bird; the 

 drift of his remarks still remains a mystery even if one 

 reads with ease this simple notation: 



Dltero. 



The keys were* trifle dubious. 

 Bird -- 



softo voce. 



. Vaelicato. mff ' smorzdndo. 



Sonic of the notes are like those of the Robin, other- re- 

 semble those of the Red-eyed Vireo, and still others those 

 of the Chat. But the Catbird's music is all his own; he 

 suggests the songs of various birds never delivers the 

 notes in their way! His voice is not as strong as that of 

 the Thrasher, nor can be sing as well as that bird, but his 

 song is refined, sprightly, and interesting although <li-- 

 jointed, jumbled, and lacking in melody. His catlike 



j_e-~ou- u j every one knows, but not all are familial 

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