156 BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



inflected ; little chirps and chirruping exclamations 

 and remarks, and a soft warbled note three or 

 four or more times repeated, and sometimes, the 

 singer fluttering up out of the foliage and hover- 

 ing in the air, displaying his green and yellow 

 plumage while emitting these lovely notes; and 

 again the trill, trill answering trill in different 

 keys; and again the music scream, as if some 

 Unsubstantial being, fairy or woodnymph had 

 screamed somewhere in her green hiding-place. 

 In London one frequently hears, especially in 

 the spring, half-a-dozen sparrows just met to- 

 gether in a garden tree, or among the ivy or 

 creeper on a wall, burst out suddenly into a con- 

 fused rapturous chorus of chirruping sounds, 

 mingled with others of a finer quality, liquid and 

 ringing. At such times one is vexed to think 

 that there are writers on birds who invariably 

 speak of the sparrow as a tuneless creature, a 

 harsh chirper, and nothing more. It strikes one 

 that such writers either wilfully abuse or are 

 ignorant of the right meaning of words, so wild 

 and glad in character are these concerts of town 

 sparrows, and so refreshing to the tired and 

 noise-vexed brain! But now when I listened to 



