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THE MOCKING BIRD. 



TURDUS POLYGLOTTUS, LiNN. 

 PLATE XXI. Male and Female. 



It is where the Great Magnolia shoots up its majestic trunk, crowned 

 with evergreen leaves, and decorated with a thousand beautiful flowers, 

 that perfume the air around ; where the forests and fields are adorned 

 with blossoms of every hue ; where the golden Orange ornaments the gar- 

 dens and groves ; where Bignonias of various kinds interlace their climb- 

 ing stems around the White-flowered Stuartia, and mounting still higher, 

 cover the summits of the lofty trees around, accompanied Avith innumer- 

 able Vines, that here and there festoon the dense foliage of the magnifi- 

 cent woods, lending to the vernal breeze a slight portion of the perfume 

 of their clustered flowers ; where a genial warmth seldom forsakes the at- 

 mosphere ; where berries and fruits of all descriptions are met with at 

 every step ; — in a word, kind reader, it is where Nature seems to have 

 paused, as she passed over the Earth, and opening her stores, to have 

 strewed with unsparing hand the diversified seeds from which have 

 sprung all the beautiful and splendid forms which I should in vain at- 

 tempt to describe, that the Mocking Bird should have fixed its abode, 

 there only that its wondrous song should be heard. 



But where is that favoured land ? — It is in that great continent to 

 whose distant shores Europe has sent forth her adventurous sons, to 

 wrest for themselves a habitation from the wild inhabitants of the forest, 

 and to convert the neglected soil into fields of exuberant fertility. It is, 

 reader, in Louisiana that these bounties of nature are in the greatest per- 

 fection. It is there that you should listen to the love-song of the Mock- 

 ing Bird, as I at this moment do. See how he flies round his mate, with 

 motions as light as those of the butterfly ! His tail is widely expanded, 

 he mounts in the air to a small distance, describes a circle, and, again 

 alighting, approaches his beloved one, his eyes gleaming with delight, 

 for she has already promised to be his and his only. His beautiful wings 

 are gently raised, he bows to his love, and again bouncing upwards, opens 

 his bill, and pours forth his melody, full of exultation at the conquest 

 which he has made. 



