CHICKADEE. 



or the rhythm of verse that a person would naturally 

 pronounce the syllables " chick-a " exactly twice as fast 

 as the " dees." In illustration of this, tap on these dots 



with a pencil and you will get the true 



relative value of the syllables " chick-a-dee-dee-dee-dee." 

 ' ' Lisp " the first two notes between the teeth and com- 

 bine a hum with a lisp for the other four, and you have 

 the Chickadee's call. The song of the bird is entirely 

 different, 



Come to me 



and is often mistakenly attributed to the Phoebe; but 

 poor tuneless Phoebe is intellectually incapable of such a 

 perfectly musical bit as this. Mr. Cheney says of these 

 two notes, "never were purer tones heard on earth.'' 

 Indeed, few small birds whistle their songs as clearly, 

 and separate the tones by such lucid intervals. The 

 charm too of the Chickadee's singing lies in the fact that 

 he knows the value of a well-sustained half -note, another 

 point which should be scored in the little musician's favor; 

 and truly, in this regard he is far ahead of the Canary, 

 for the latter wastes his energy splitting into hemi-demi- 

 semi-quavera every tone within the compass of an 

 octave. 



I may be overestimating the value of a melody so 

 meagre as that of the Chickadee, but if so it becomes 

 difficult to account for the charm that underlies the 

 music of all great composers, for constructively consid- 

 ered their melodies are mere elaborations of absolutely 

 simple themes. No better illustrations of this fact can 

 be produced than those I have introduced among the 

 pages in this book devoted to the Song Sparrow. The 

 best way to prove the musical value of the Chickadee's 

 two or three pure tones, is to connect together a few 

 such as one may easily obtain from three or four birds 

 which are singing together in their customary, delight- 

 ful, antiphonal way. This is what I make of the 

 fusion : 



229 



