14. 



How B irds learn t o Sing. 



Bradford Torrey, in the Atlantic: 

 With all this strong tendency on the 

 part of birds to vary their music, 

 how is it that there is still such a 

 decree of uniformity, so that as we 

 have said, every species may be 

 recognized by its notes? Why does 

 every red-eyed vireo sing in one 

 way and every white-eyed vireo in 

 another? Who teaches the young 

 chipper to trill and the young linnet 

 to warble? In short, how do birds 

 come by their music? Is it all a 

 matter of instinct, inherited habit, 

 or do they learn it? The answer 

 seems to be that birds sing as chil- 

 dren talk — by simple imitation. 

 Nobody imagines that the infant is 

 born with a language printed upon 

 his brain. The father and mother 

 may never have known a word of 

 any tongue except the English, but 

 if the child is brought up to hear 

 only Chinese he will infallibly speak 

 that and nothing else. And careful 

 experiments have shown that the 

 same is true of birds. Taken from 

 the nest, just after they leave the 

 shell, they invariably sing, not their 

 own so-called natural song, but the 

 song of their foster parents; provid- 

 ed, of course, that this is not any- 

 thing beyond their physical capacity. 

 The notorious house sparrow (our 

 English sparrow), in his wild or 

 semi-domesticated state, never makes 

 a musical sound; but if he is taken 

 in hand early enough he may be 

 taught to sing, so it is said, nearly 

 as well as the canary. Bechstein 

 relates that a Paris clergyman had 

 two of these sparrows which he had 



trained to speak, and among other 

 things, to recite several of the short- 

 er commandments, and the narrative 

 goes on to say that it was sometimes 

 very comical when the pair were 

 disputing over their food, to hear 

 one gravely admonish the other: 

 "Thou shalt not steal!" It would be 

 interesting to know why creatures 

 thus gifted do not sing of their own 

 motion. With their amiability and 

 sweet peaceableness they ought to be 

 caroling the whole year round. 



Birds sing by imitation, it is true, 

 but, as a rule, they imitate only the 

 notes which they hear during the 

 first few weeks after they are hatch- 

 ed. One of Mr. Barrington's linnets, 

 for example, after being educated 

 under a titlark, was put into a room 

 with two birds of his own species, 

 where he heard them sing freely 

 every day for three months. He 

 made no attempt to learn any- 

 thing from them, however, but kept 

 on singing what the titlark had 

 taught him, quite unconscious of 

 anvthing singular or unpatriotic in 

 such a course. This law, that im- 

 pressions received during the im- 

 maturity of the powers become the 

 unalterable habits of the after-life, Is 

 perhaps the most momentous of all 

 the laws in whose power we find our- 

 selves. Sometimes we are tempted 

 to call it cruel. But if it were an- 

 nulled it would be a strange world. 

 What a hurly-burly we should have 

 among the birds! There would be 

 no more telling them by their notes. 

 Thrushes and jays, wrens and chicka- 

 dees, finches and warblers, all would 

 be singing one grand medley. 



