VOCAL MUSIC. 363 



pairing does not depend exclusively on the mere strength and 

 courage of the male; for such males are generally decorated with 

 various ornaments, which often become more brilliant during the 

 breeding-season, and which are sedulously displayed before the 

 females. The males also endeavor to charm or excite their mates 

 by love-notes, songs, and antics; and the courtship is, in many in- 

 stances, a prolonged affair. Hence it is not probable that the fe- 

 males are indifferent to the charms of the opposite sex, or that 

 they are invariably compelled to yield to the victorious males. 

 It is more probable that the females are excited, either before or 

 after the conflict, by certain males, and thus unconsciously prefer 

 them. In the case of Tetrao umbellus, a good observer^" goes so 

 far as to believe that the battles of the males "are all a sham, per- 

 "formed to show themselves to the greatest advantage before the 

 "admiring females who assemble around; for I have never been 

 "able to find a maimed hero, and seldom more than a broken 

 "feather:" I shall have to recur to this subject, but I may here 

 add that with the Tetrao cupido of the United States, about a 

 score of males assemble at a particular spot, and strutting about, 

 make the whole air resound with their extraordinary noises. At 

 the first answer from a female the males begin to fight furiously, 

 and the weaker give way; but then, according to Audubon, both 

 the victors and vanquished search for the female, so that the 

 females must either then exert a choice, or the battle must be re- 

 newed. So, again, with one of the field-starlings of the United 

 States (Sturnella ludoviciana) the males engage in fierce conflicts, 

 "but at the sight of a female they all fly after her, as if mad."^* 



Vocal and Instrumental Miisic. — With birds the voice serves to 

 express various emotions, such as distress, fear, anger, triumph, or 

 mere happiness. It is apparently sometimes used to excite terror, 

 as in the case of the hissing noise made by some nestling-birds. 

 Audubon'^' relates that a night-heron (Ardea nycticorax, Linn.) 

 which he kept tame, used to hide itself when a cat approached, 

 and then "suddenly start up uttering one of the most frightful 

 "cries, apparently enjoying the cat's alarm and flight." The 

 common domestic cock clucks to the hen, and the hen to her 

 chickens, when a dainty morsel is found. The hen, when she 

 has laid an egg, "repeats the same note very often, and concludes 

 "with the sixth above, which she holds for a longer time;"™ and 

 thus she expresses her joy. Some social birds apparently call to 



2= 'Land and Water,' July 25th, 1868, p. 14. 



^Audubon's 'Ornitholoir. Biography;' on Tetrao cupido, vol. ii. p. 492; 

 on the Sturnus, vol. ii. p. 219. 

 -^ 'Ornithological Biograph.' vol. v. p. 601. 

 2" The Hon. Dalnes Barrington, 'Philosoph. Transact.' 1773, p. 252. 



