276 The Naturalist in La Plala. 



song is in this slow gradation from the somewhat 

 throaty notes emitted h^ the bird when ascending 

 to the excessively attenuated sounds at the close. 



In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one 

 species more — the white-banded mocking-bird of 

 Patagonia, which greatly excels all other songsters 

 known to me in the copiousness, vai-iety and bril- 

 liant character of its music. Concealed in the 

 foliage this bird will sing by the half-hour, repro- 

 ducing with miraculous fidelity the more or less 

 melodious set songs of a score of species — a 

 strange and beautiful performance ; but wonderful 

 as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceases to 

 adtaire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, 

 as if to show by contrast his unapproachable su- 

 periority, bursts into his own divine song, uttered 

 with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, 

 but greatly exceeding, that of the skylark " singing 

 at heaven's gate ; " the notes issuing in a continuous 

 torrent ; the voice so brilliant and infinitely varied, 

 that if " rivalry and emulation " have as large a 

 place in feathered breasts as some imagine all that 

 hear this surpassing melody might well languish 

 ever after in silent despair. 



In a vast majority of the finest mu.sical per- 

 formances the same notes are uttered in the same 

 order, and after an interval the song is repeated 

 without any variation : and it seems impossible that 

 we could in aliy other way have such beautiful con- 

 trasts and harmonious lights and shades — the whole 

 song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played in 

 tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in 

 the mocking-bird's song : the notes never come in the 



