Bird Music in South America. 153 
clouds; the tinkling bell is somewhere in the air, 
suspended on nothing; the invisible human crea- 
tures that whistle, and hum airs, and whisper to 
one another, and clap their hands and laugh, are 
not bound, like ourselves, to earth, but float hither 
and thither as they list. . 
Something of this aérial character is acquired by 
other sounds, even by the most terrestrial, when 
heard at a distance in a quiet atmosphere. And 
some of our finer sounds, as those of the flute and 
bugle and flageolet, and some others, when heard 
faintly in the open air, have the airy character of 
bird notes; with this difference, that they are dim 
and indistinct to the sense, while the bird’s note, 
although so airy, is of all sounds the most distinct. 
Mr. John Burroughes, in his excellent Impressions 
of some British Song Birds, has said, that many of 
the American songsters are shy wood-birds, seldom 
seen or heard near the habitations of man, while 
nearly all the British birds are semi-domesticated, 
and sing in gardens and orchards; that this fact, 
in connection with their more soft and plaintive 
voices, made American song birds seem less to 
the European traveller than his own. This state- 
ment would hold good, and even gain in force, if for 
North America we should substitute the hot or 
larger part of South America, or of the Neotropical 
region, which comprises the whole of America 
south of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Throughout 
the tropical and subtropical portions of this region, 
