1S84.J BiCKNELL uu the Si7igi7ig of Birds. I 33 



Sialia sialis. Bluebird. 



This beautiful and domestic species evinces a most impression- 

 able temj^erament, which responds with song to the faintest 

 suggestion of returning spring, and with silence to the earliest 

 foretastes of the sultriness and heat of summer. Its melody is 

 the first that comes to us with the new year, and is of those 

 which we earliest lose. So sensitive, indeed, is the Bluebird to 

 the slightest vernal influence that its cheerful warbling is often 

 sadly out of season, as when it is called forth by a mild, sugges- 

 tive day in January, or even in December. 



It might appear to be an open question whether these midwin- 

 ter songs are those concluding autumn singing or those inaugura- 

 ting the musical celebration of the spring. The truth is that they 

 result from the over-strained imaginations of too eager lovers ; 

 and thus ^ve get spring songs before the winter solstice. 



Within the last seven years the dates of introductory songs 

 have ranged between December 18 and February 10. According 

 to the character of the winter, continued song may date directly 

 from its introduction or be delaj^ed, with occasional efibrts oc- 

 cupying the interim, until spring becomes more assertive; but 

 singing seems rarely or never to be postponed beyond the final 

 winter month. 



March is pre-eminently the month of song. Before April has 

 ended their ardor has perceptibly waned, a change which pro- 

 gresses through May ; and sometimes in this, as in the following 

 month, singing is so infrequent that often it seems to be suspend- 

 ed, as it actually is in July. Sometimes no song ^N\\\ be heard 

 in this month ; again, isolated songs occur almost to its close. 



I do not find that I have any record of the Bluebird singing in 

 August ; but undoubtedly its song is to be heard in every month 

 of the year. From early July until about mid-September is a 

 time of general silence ; sometimes this is broken in the first 

 week of September, sometimes not until the last of the month. 



Singing seems to be rather inconstant in the fall, but usually 

 after the second week of September the cheerful warbling that 

 we have missed since June may occasionally again be heard un- 

 til the end of the following month. But I have no November 

 record. 



