on the White-throated Ground-Thrush. 187


The song of my two Ground-Thrushes is a very -reat

attraction. Although rarely singing at night like the charming

Blue Rock-Thrush {Avie. Mag, III., p . I03 ), they sing from early

dawn until nearly dark forTully nine months out of the twelve.

Jerdon, quoted above, says that the song is not often heard.

Perhaps, in the lonely jungle, the song may be there but not the

human ear to listen to it. A great deal of the sweetest song is

utteied in a low tone as the bird is hidden away in some dark .

quiet corner, and cannot be heard at any distance. Many of the

notes, however, are loud and full, but these are the least musical

an are uttered from the higher perches, and are probably

notes of defiance. Although the less musical-probably owino-

to my birds being hand-reared specimens—their clear ringing

voices have been cheering our hearts all through this dull cheer*

less winter, are falling on my ears now as I write, and have this

winter compelled the most captious of my neighbours, however

unwillingly, to admire the glorious singing of the birds. Possibly

this constant singing may be due to the circumstance that there

are just the two males who pass the time in railing at one

another Repeatedly I have heard the one utter a series of notes

a kind of “ O you great big doited old fool’’-which has been

echoed back, note for note, by the other, with precisely the

same intonation, and this has been repeated some half-dozen

imes by each bird. During August they slow down ; and,

although they do not sing fully out again until December, before

the moult is over they commence recording and warbling in low

gentle tones. It is pleasing beyond expression in words, when

one is busy m the garden or attending to the food in the


« J" 00 ” 1 ’ *° filld one of these handsome fellows close by,

absolutely fearless as regards your presence, pouring out his

little heart 111 sweetest melody.


I Wuot myself noticed any inclination on the part of

these Thrushes to mutate the notes of other birds ; my bird-

woman however, who is more with them than I am, declared

before Clmstmas that they had learnt several new songs. The

song is certainly very varied.


As a rule, when singing, they hold up their heads in an

ordmary posttton, delaying the white throat from which the



