BIRDS OF WINTER, SPRING, AND AUTUMN. 



Prof. TC. 6miths notation. 



Undoubtedly we both have listened to the same species 

 of Thrush, else the similarity of song-construction would 

 be wholly unaccountable. 



Wilson was apparently ignorant of the music of this 

 Thrush, and many other writers have been content with 

 recording the fact that the bird is an eminent vocalist, 

 but Mr. Cheney as a musician valued the singer as only 

 a musician can, and has compared the climax of the 

 song to the bursting of a musical rocket that fills the air 

 with silver tones 1 Yes, the tones are silver burnished 

 silver, and sweeter far than those of any instrument 

 created by the hand of man ! The singer, too, is a bird 

 of genius ; a gentle and retiring spirit ; the first of the 

 Thrushes to come, the last to go, the soonest to pipe his 

 joyous lay after the clearing away of the storm, the last 

 to sing the vesper hymn, and the earliest to open the 

 matutinal chorus at break of day. It was of him the 

 poet wrote : 



" I heard from morn to morn a merry Thrush 



Sing hymns of rapture, while I drank the sound 

 With joy and oft an unintruding guest, 

 I watched him. . . ." 



BIRDS OF WINTER, KAKLV SPRINd, AND LATE 

 AUTUMN 



This somewhat elastic classification includes three 

 members of the two Owl Families, Alcotiidce and Strigidce; 

 one member each of the Kingfisher Family, Alcedinida, 

 the Woodpecker Family, Picidce, the Flycatcher Family, 

 Tyrannidce, the Starling Family, Sturmdce, and the Wax- 

 uring Family, BombydUidce; and many members of the 

 Finch or Sparrow Family, Fringillidce. With four excep- 

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