48 TREATISE ON 



the preference to a bird from the nest, and not 

 trouble oui'selves mth caught birds. The thrush 

 breeds early in spring, and has one, two, and 

 sometimes three broods in the year. The female 

 generally begins to make her nest in March, and 

 young thrushes have been seen about the middle 

 of April. 



The Honourable Daines Barrington says, in his 

 scale of the comparative merits of singing birds, 

 (in which twenty is the supposed point of absolute 

 perfection,) that the song of the thrush has only 

 four of melloAvness, sprightliness, compass, and 

 execution, while the hedge-sparrow's note possesses 

 six of mellowness, six of plaintiveness, four of 

 compass, and four of execution. Now, Avith defe- 

 rence to that gentleman's opinion, we think very 

 little of the hedge-sparrow as a song-bu'd, while 

 we rank the thrush very high in the scale of song- 

 sters. If we really understand the terms mellow, 

 sprightly, plaintive, &c. we should say, that the 

 natural note of the hedge-sparrow has no mellow- 

 ness, four sprightliness, two plaintiveness, two 

 compass, and three execution ; while the song of I 

 the thrush has sixteen melloY^Tiess, six sprightli- 

 ness, ten plaintiveness, twelve compass, and eight 

 execution. But this is probably a matter of opi- 



