NATURE 



[Dec. 31, 1885 



little time to make himself acquainted with the accom- 

 plishments of the species he desires above all things to 

 shoot. Nor is this all. Doubtless there remains in the 

 minds of most people something of that ancient notion 

 that brilliant-plumaged birds utter only harsh, disagree- 

 able sounds ; while the sober-toned songsters of temperate 

 regions — especially those of Europe — have the gift of 

 melody ; that sweet songs are heard in England, and 

 screams and grating notes within the tropics. Only we 

 know now that the obscure species there are greatly in 

 excess of the brilliant ones. It is quite possible, how- 

 ever, that the tropics, so rich in other respects, though by 

 no means the realms " where birds forget to sing," do not 

 excel, or even equal, the temperate regions in the amount 

 and quality of their bird melody. Mr. im Thurn only 

 echoes the words of many English travellers in the tropics, 

 when he says, in his recent work on British Guiana : — 

 " The almost entire absence of sweet bird-notes at once 

 strikes the traveller who comes from thrush and warbler- 

 haunted temperate lands." Mr. Bates, on this subject, 

 says : — " The few sounds of birds are of that pensive and 

 mysterious character which intensities the feeling of soli- 

 tude rather than imparts a sense of life and cheerfulness." 



On the question of tropical bird-music much remains 

 to be said by future travellers ; but South America is not 

 all tropical, and travellers visiting the southern temperate 

 portion of that continent might have looked to find there 

 melodists equal to those of Europe and North America ; 

 for even assuming that to utter agreeable sounds a bird, 

 wherever found, must be fashioned after the pattern of 

 some European form, we find that the typical songsters 

 of the north — the thrushes, wrens, warblers, finches, &c. 

 — are well represented in the Plata, Chilian, and Patago- 

 nian regions. As a fact, the best songsters there belong 

 to the wide-ranging American genus Miiniis, while in the 

 more tropical Icterine family there is great variety of 

 language, and some exceedingly sweet voices. 



Of the great naturalists of recent times who have de- 

 preciated South American bird-music, I will mention 

 Darwin only, as \-ery great importance must always be 

 attached to his words, even when he fails to show his 

 usual discrimination. He says of the common Mimiis 

 calandriii : — " It is remarkable from possessing a song far 

 superior to that of any other bird in the country ; indeed, 

 it is nearly the only bird in South America which I have 

 observed to take its stand for the purpose of singing." 

 He then adds that the song is like that of the sedge 

 warbler. 



There are man\- better singers than the J/, calandria : 

 and as to its being nearly the only bird that takes its stand 

 for the purpose of singing, there are, in the Plata district 

 alone, a greater number of birds with that habit than in 

 England ; though, taking the number of species in the 

 two countries, the Plata singers are relatively fewer. It 

 is equally beside the mark to compare the sedge warbler 

 with the Calandria, the performance of the former bird 

 resembling that of "the other only as a slight sketch may 

 be said to resemble a finished painting. 



Darwin does not say much about the singing of birds, 

 and appears to have taken but little interest in the 

 subject, possibly because this species of natural melody 

 gave him little or no pleasure ; otherwise he could 

 scarcely have written of the Diuca Finch that " the male 

 during incubation has two or three pleasant notes, 

 which Molina, in an exaggerated description, has called 

 a. fine song." The fact is, the old Chilian naturalist 

 scarcely does justice to the song of the Diuca, which is 

 mellower in sound than any other finch-melody I am 

 acquainted with. Of his account of the singing of the 

 Thenca mocking-bird, the Thili, the black-headed finch, 

 Loyca, and various other species, Darwin says nothing. 



Not all the European writers whose words carry 

 weight, however, have turned a deaf, or, at any rate, a 

 very unappreciative ear to the bird-music of the great bird- 



continent. Azara is a notable exception. He was not 

 a mere collector, nor was he even a naturalist in the 

 strictest sense of the word ; but, made fit for his task by a 

 keen faculty of observation, and an insatiable craving for 

 knowledge of all kinds, he went into the forest to watch 

 the birds and write the history of their lives. In Spain 

 he had been familiar from childhood with the best 

 songsters of Europe, and in Paraguay he paid great 

 attention to the language of the species he noticed. He 

 makes mistakes sometimes, when speaking of the nesting 

 or other habits, but when describing their songs, he 

 records his own impressions only. With the works of 

 his contemporary, Buftbn, he only became acquainted 

 after having completed his own observations ; and the 

 voluminous strictures on the French naturalist, which 

 burden, and to some extent spoil, the otherwise delightful 

 " Apuntamientos," were only inserted after his own 

 descriptions had been written. 



In his introductory pages, entitled " De los Paxaros en 

 General," he refers to Buffon's well-known opinion con- 

 cerning the inferiority of American songsters, and says : — 

 " But if a choir of singers were selected in the Old World, 

 and compared with one of an equal number gathered in 

 Paraguay, I am not sure which would win the victory." 

 In another place, in allusion to the same subject, he 

 says : — " They are mistaken who think there are not as 

 many and as good singers here as in Europe." 



To return for a moment to Mr. Bates's words, already 

 quoted, bird-music of that " pensive and mysterious " cha- 

 racter he mentions is to many minds more pleasing than 

 the loud, cheerful, persistent singing of many highly- 

 esteemed British siitgers, like the chaffinch and song- 

 thrush. 



Mr. Bates also heard in the Amazonian forest, 

 " another bird that had a most sweet and melancholy 

 song, uttered in a plaintive key, commencing high, and 

 descending by harmonic intervals." 



Of the common house-wren of the Plata, Azara says 

 that its song is " in style comparable to that of the 

 nightingale, though its phrases are not so delicate and 

 expressive ; nevertheless, I count it amongst the first 

 songsters." He speaks even more highly of the voice of 

 the Todo Voz (Cistotliorus platensis), which greatly de- 

 lighted him with its sweet, varied, and expressive 

 melody. The members of this melodious genus, and of 

 the allied genera, are found throughout South America, 

 from Panama to Patagonia, and we know from others 

 besides Azara that their music does not dissolve away in 

 the tropics, or turn to harsh sounds. Mr. Wallace heard 

 a Cistotliorus singing very sweetly on the shores of the 

 Amazon, and D'Orbigny, in the " Voyage dans I'Amerique 

 Meridionale," thus describes the singing of the Thryo- 

 tlionis viodi<Iator, which he heard in Yungas, in Bolivia : — 

 " Perched on a bough overhanging the torrent, its rich 

 melodious voice seemed in strange contrast to the 

 melancholy aspect of its surroundings. Its voice, which 

 is not comparable with anything we have in Europe, 

 exceeds that of the nightingale in volume and expression, 

 if not inflexibility. Frequently it sounds like a tiielody 

 rendered by a flute at a great distance ; at other times its 

 sweet and varied cadences are mingled with clear 

 piercing tones or deep throat-notes, — in one word, a grave 

 music composed of the purest sounds. We have really 

 no words adequate to express the effect of this song, 

 heard in the midst of a nature so redundant, and of 

 mountain scenery so wild and savage." 



It might be thought that in this description allowance 

 must be made for the enthusiasm natural to a French- 

 man, but Mr. Bates, certainly the most sober-minded 

 naturalist that ever penetrated the Brazilian forests, gives 

 a scarcely less fascinating account of a melodist closely 

 allied to D'Orbigny's bird, if not identical with it. " I 

 frequently heard," he says, " in the neighbourhood 

 of these huts the realejo or organ-bird (Cyphorhinus 



