118 PHILLIDA AND COR1DON. 



sic, one strain of the hermit thrush is to my 

 mind worth the whole of it; just as a single 

 movement of Beethoven's is better than a world 

 of Liszt transcriptions. But in its own way it 

 is unsurpassable. 



Still, though this is a meagre and quite un- 

 exaggerated account of the ordinary song of the 

 brown thrush, I have discovered that even he 

 can be outdone by himself. One morning 

 in early May I came upon three birds of this 

 species, all singing at once, in a kind of jealous 

 frenzy. As they sang they continually shifted 

 from tree to tree, and one in particular (the 

 one nearest to where I stood) could hardly be 

 quiet a moment. Once he sang with full power 

 while on the ground (or close to it, for he was 

 just then behind a low bush), after which he 

 mounted to the very tip of a tall pine, which 

 bent beneath his weight. In the midst of the 

 hurly-burly one of the trio suddenly sounded 

 the whip-poor-will's call twice, an absolutely 

 perfect reproduction. 1 



The significance of all this sound and fury, 

 what the prize was, if any, and who obtained 



1 " That's the wise thrush: he sings each song twice over, 

 Lest you should think he never could recapture 

 The first fine careless rapture! " 



The "authorities" long since forbade Harporhynchus rufus to 

 play the mimic. Probably in the excitement of the moment this 

 fellow forgot himself. 



