364 THE NIGHTINGALE. 



tural syllable Err! be added, as Witt Err! it is the cal, 

 by which the male and female mutually invite one another. 

 The expression of displeasure or fear is the syllable Witt, 

 repeated several times ; and, at last, followed by Err ! That 

 of pleasure and content, either with its food or mate, is a 

 sharp Tack ! like the sound produced by striking the tongue 

 smartly against the roof of the mouth. In anger, jealousy, 

 or surprise, the Nightingale, like the Black-Cap and others of 

 its species, utters a shrill cry, resembling the call of the Jay, 

 or the mew of a cat. This may also be heard in the aviary, 

 when a bird, by the use of it, endeavours to interrupt and con- 

 fuse a rival in the midst of his song. And, lastly, in the 

 pairing season, when the male and female entice and pursue 

 one another through the trees, they utter a soft twittering 

 note. 



Such are the tunes which both sexes are able to produce ; 

 while the song, the variety and beauty of which has raised 

 the Nightingale to a pre-eminence over all other singing birds, 

 is the prerogative of the male alone. The bystander is asto- 

 nished to hear a song, which is so sonorous as to make his ears 

 tingle, proceed from so small a bird, and his astonishment is not 

 lessened when he discovers that the muscles of the larynx are 

 stronger in the Nightingale than in any other singing bird. 

 But it is not so much the strength, as the delightful variety 

 and ravishing harmony of the Nightingale's song, which ren- 

 ders it the favourite of every one who has not altogether lost 

 the sense of the beautiful. Sometimes it dwells for a minute 

 or more on a passage of detached mournful notes, which begin 

 softly, advance by degrees to a forte, and end in a dying fall. 

 At other times it utters a rapid succession of sharp sonorous 

 notes, and ends this, and the many other phrases of which its 

 song consists, with the single notes of an ascending chord. 

 There are, of course, various degrees of proficiency in the 

 Nightingale, as in other birds ; but in the song of a good per- 

 former have been enumerated, without reckoning smaller 

 distinctions, no less than twenty-four separate phrases, capable 

 of being expressed in articulate syllables and words. I have 

 noted down the following notes of the song of one which is 

 considered an admirable singer.* Could we penetrate into the 



* Vide Introduction Voice and Song of Birds. 



