FACULTIES OF THE MIND. 933 
which often approaches the natural, and the presumption 
is strengthened by the circumstance, that the first attempts 
at song, termed recording, are merely repetitions of the na- 
tural cry of the bird. 
There is another feature in the song of birds which 
merits observation. 'They sing chiefly during the season 
of love, and in confinement, when in full health. Hence 
we may regard this language as connected with appetite 
and expressive of enjoyment or pleasure. 
All the individuals of a species acquire the same song in 
whatever country they have been hatched. Slight diffe- 
rences have indeed been observed; and hence, as we 
are informed by Barrineron, the London bird-catchers 
prefer the song of the Kentish gold-finches, but Essex chaf- 
finches, and the nightingale fanciers, a Surrey bird to those 
of Middlesex. These variations may be expected accord- 
ing to the constitution of individuals, affected by the food 
and temperature of the places in which they have been 
reared. They are, however, confined to narrow bounds, 
and require a very delicate and experienced observer to de- 
tect their existence. 
We have thought it expedient to offer these observations 
on the acquired language of birds, in order to enable us to 
form a more correct idea of the language of Man. In treat- 
ing of this branch of the subject, we shall confine ourselves 
to what may be termed the natural characters of human 
speech, leaving the details of its artificial arrangement. to 
the rhetorician and grammarian. 
Independent of the natural cries by which, im infancy, 
we express'our wants, we hear sounds uttered by the indi- 
viduals of our species around us, which we are disposed to 
imitate, and soon find ourselves equal to the task. These 
words or sounds we soon perceive to be the names employ- 
ed to designate particular objects; we learn to use them for 
