82 



KNOWLEDGE. 



[April 1, 1897. 



could often be heard from the thickets, even through the 

 charm of birds there, and it had always the same tone. It 

 was heard at no particular time of day, but often alternated 

 with the link or uliit of the chaffinch. Several weeks 

 passed before the bird uttering this note was clearly visible 

 as the male chaffinch, and I have no doubt the occurrence 

 had throughout been limited to this species and sex. The 

 cry was remarlcably distinct. It could be well suggested 

 by ;i'<', and in tone closely resembled the coarse final song- 

 note, zahee or ;.s7i(;r.'.s, of the greenfinch ; but it was not 

 one-half so long as this sound. It also resembled the short 

 note jink- which the male yellowhammer often utters con- 

 tentedly from an elevated perch. It was never uttered in 

 my hearing by the female chaffinch, nor by the young. At 

 the end of June it was once slightly varied, and I have no 

 record of it after that month. It was obviously used pai-tly 

 as an alarm note, for I heard it .employed, together with 

 the Jink, to rate a jay, a dog, and, I think, myself. The 

 note was also given m the song, but only at one particular 

 part of it, which will be indicated. Dr. A. G. Butler 

 informs me that the song of the chaffinch is popularly 

 supposed to suggest the words written under the following 

 notation, which is intended to represent the general run 

 of the song : — 



lu an - - ther nioutli 



will come a wheat-ear . . 



Sometimes the penultimate note, the hard " wheat," is 

 replaced by a double sound, so that the " wheat-ear " 

 sounds like " tissicar," and sometimes these last syllables 

 are themselves doubled. In this particular the chaffinch 

 exhibits the common feature of greater variation at the 

 end than at the beginning of a song. I have often noticed 

 that the hard note "wheat" is emphasized variously by 

 different chaffinches, being sometimes prominent, and, in 

 other birds, hardly audible. 



When the cry ^i-e is given in song it takes the place of 

 the hard " wheat," and terminates the strain, which may 

 then be rendered : " In another month will come a zee." 

 There is never a note after the zee, which, indeed, seems 

 to require some effort, for when it is given alternately with 

 the Jink or the whit, there is a slightly increased pause 

 before the zee, and a longer one after it. 



I have always considered the hard note "wheat" as 

 having a family resemblance to certain coarse notes of the 

 greenfinch, lesser redpole, and some other finches ; and it 

 is quite possible that the :ee is a survival from an earlier 

 type of song, in which the chaffinch uttered a few pre- 

 liminary hurried notes followed by a coarse note, in the 

 manner of a greenfinch. The notes of the chaffinch have 

 been here discussed at some length as serving to indicate 

 a method of observation which may usefully be followed in 

 the study of bird-song. I may add that Mr. Holte Mac- 

 pherson also heard the new note, and considered it to be a 

 local variety. 



The family resemblance between the voices of allied 

 species may be easily investigated in spring, when songs 

 and alarms arc heard from every side. It is most notice- 

 able in alarms and call-notes. In the warblers, for 

 instance, we hear a short hard note, tnrk, slightly modified 

 in the blackcap and the whitethroats ; and a low nor of 

 warning, which I have once heard from the blackcap, but 

 which is a common utterance of the nightingale, sedge 

 warbler, and the whitethroats. The love-calls are equally 

 interesting, and are sometimes given in the course of a 

 characteristic flight, such as the straight, cuckoo-like 

 flight of the male chaffinch, the slow fanning flight of the 



greenfinch, and occasional extravagant evolutions of a 

 titmouse. 



But the most fascinating feature of bird-song is the 

 mimicry often incidental to it. At first this is not easily 

 detected, probably because our previous experiences of the 

 kind have been limited to the performances of parrots. 

 The parrot seems to make a special effort to mimic, but 

 most song-birds appear to repeat the notes of others 

 merely as a means of varying their own songs. One or 

 two, however, such as tlie starling and sedge warbler, 

 seem to mimic intentionally, and it is to these that the 

 observer should first attend. Iiy practice his hearing will 

 be enabled to follow the rapid vocalization of these birds, 

 and will become acute to recognize their often exact 

 mimicry. The skylark next, and afterwards the thrush, 

 robin, and whitethroat, may be listened to with the con- 

 viction that occasionally an excellent imitation will be 

 perceived. On the other hand, but a little mimicry will 

 be observed in songs of the wild linnet and goldfinch ; and 

 not once in a year will it be found in any other British 

 finch, nor in our buntings, pipits, wagtails, titmice, hedge 

 sparrow, or wren, although several of these birds will 

 imitate when kept in a cage. The difficulty in observing 

 may be the reason why bird-song as a subject for scientific 

 investigation has been neglected, and why ornithologists 

 have generally dismissed in a brief sentence or two the 

 songs of their favourites, and have only quite recently 

 done justice to the clever music of even the best mockers. 



The thrush is not nearly so mimetic as the sedge 

 warbler and the starling, but the accuracy of which it is 

 capable in this respect may be inferred from the following 

 incident. One May day at Stroud I was listening to a 

 thrush, and was naming its imitations, as they occurred, 

 to my brother, Mr. !<]. N. Witchell, he being much in- 

 terested in birds and their ways. The thrush several times 

 repeated very clearly a call-note of the butcher-bird, with 

 which my brother was not acquainted. On the next day 

 he was crossing Painswick Hill, and suddenly heard 

 behind him a repeated cry, which he at once recognized as 

 that which the thrush had uttered in its song. Turning, 

 he saw a butcher-bird coming lilting along behind him, 

 quite in the open, so that there could be no doubt of its 

 having uttered the cry in question. 



ENGLISH MEDALS.-I. 



By G. P. Hill, M.A. 



THE most obvious feature of the history of the medal- 

 lie art in England is that the great majority of 

 pieces of any artistic importance were produced 

 by foreigners. Out of a total of some two hundred 

 medallists working before 1760, whose medals 

 iUustrate English history, hardly more than twenty-five 

 were Englishmen. Even at the present time, when there 

 has been a slight revival in the art — although unfortunately 

 too limited — the man to whom it is due bears a French 

 name. Nor can it be said that England succeeded, as a 

 rule, in impressing an English character on the art of the 

 foreigners who worked for her. There has never really 

 been an l-'nglish school of medallists of any excellence, 

 except, perhaps, at the time of the Commonwealth. 



Of the medals* relating to English history, the earliest 

 are two curious French pieces struck by Charles VII., and 

 recording the expulsion of the English from Franca in 

 1451. The date is expressed chronogrammatically, i.e., 



* From this series must be excludeil all counters or tokens, und 

 pieces -n-liich serve a purpose other than purely commemorative. 



