3IO BIRD WATCHING 



"Round the comer I can see, 

 Each is kneeling on his knee." 



Yet this bird may have been but another male, to 

 whom the next unseen notes that I heard were, 

 perhaps, due. Always I bless those birds whose 

 sexes are plainly distinguishable from each other. 



What was very noticeable in these nightingales — 

 and the remark applies to others that I have closely 

 listened to — was that, even when not singing against 

 each other, they made little noises in their throats, 

 and these, when distinctly heard, resolved them- 

 selves into a deep, guttural sound, which, though 

 far from unpleasing, could hardly be called anything 

 but a croak. This sound, as I have noticed, is very 

 frequently uttered. It often commences the song, or 

 is even intermingled with, though it can scarcely be 

 said to belong to, it. It does not, in this case, 

 diminish the beauty of the melody ; yet, did it stand 

 alone, the nightingale would be merely a somewhat 

 musical croaker. Probably this is what it once 

 has been, the low, croaking note representing the 

 original utterance of the bird, on which the song, by 

 successive variations, and choice of them on the part 

 of the female, has been founded. Just as in the dull 

 plumage of female pheasants and other birds, the 

 males of which are splendidly adorned, or in both 

 the sexes of some species belonging to the same 

 families, we see the early state of their common, 

 plain progenitors, so, in song-birds, the uninspired, 

 workaday voice of call-note or twitter — the spoken 

 language, as one may call it — probably represents the 

 humble roots from which the various trees of song, 

 with all their diversified branchings, and fluttering. 



