132 Summer Studies of Birds and Books chap. 



explained, as to be capable of producing, under the 

 action of the muscles, an infinite number of musical 

 intervals when the column of air in it is set vibrating 

 by the vibrations of the syrinx. It is not often that 

 birds hit upon a succession of even two or three notes 

 which closely correspond to intervals in our scale. 

 The Cuckoo does so, though not often very exactly, 

 and so too does the Song-thrush ; and very careful 

 training may bring some birds to whistle a human 

 tune, — at best a melancholy travesty, unworthy alike 

 of man and bird. Once, indeed, I heard a caged 

 Blackbird sing, as I fancied, a beautiful phrase which 

 occurs in the first allegro of Beethoven's Sonata for 

 piano and violin in G- major, No. 10 ; ^ and I made 

 inquiry, without result, whether the bird had ever 

 had a chance of hearing that beautiful movement. 

 Again, in the music of the older masters, who wrote 

 when music was fresh and young, I seem often to 

 hear the songs of birds. There is a quartet of 

 Mozart's for strings (No. 4 in B flat) which is full of 



The phrase is 



i^ 



^ 



EE. And this is 



not the only phrase in the movement which reminds me of the 

 Blackbird. The song of the Yellowhammer, which is said to have 

 suggested the famous opening notes of the Symphony in C minor, 

 is also to be caught here and there in the allegretto of the string 

 quartet in F major, Op. 59, No. 1. No one acquainted with the 

 great composer's method and power of developing his themes from 

 trifling origins by constant meditation will be astonished at these 

 apparent coincidences. 



