132 LOCUSTS AND WILD HONEY 



voice of the coon, or the call and clang of wild geese 

 and ducks, or the war-cry of savage tribes, is this 

 true ; but not true in the same sense of domesticated 

 or semi- domesticated animals and fowls. How differ- 

 ent the voice of the common duck or goose from that 

 of the wild species, or of the tame dove from that 

 of the turtle of the fields and groves ! Where could 

 the English house sparrow have acquired that un- 

 musical voice but amid the sounds of hoofs and 

 wheels, and the discords of the street? And the 

 ordinary notes and calls of so many of the British 

 birds, according to their biographers, are harsh and 

 disagreeable ; even the nightingale has an ugly, gut- 

 tural "chuck." The missel-thrush has a harsh 

 scream; the jay a note like "wrack," "wrack;" the 

 fieldfare a rasping chatter; the blackbird, which is 

 our robin cut in ebony, will sometimes crow like a 

 cock and cackle like a hen; the flocks of starlings 

 make a noise like a steam saw-mill ; the whitethroat 

 has a disagreeable note ; the swift a discordant scream ; 

 and the bunting a harsh song. Among our song- 

 birds, on the contrary, it is rare to hear a harsh or 

 displeasing voice. Even their notes of anger and 

 alarm are more or less soft. 



I would not imply that our birds are the better 

 songsters, but that their songs, if briefer and feebler, 

 are also more wild and plaintive, — in fact, that they 

 are softer-voiced. The British birds, as I have 

 stated, are more domestic than ours; a much larger 

 number build about houses and towers and outbuild- 

 ings. The titmouse with us is exclusively a wood- 



