HAUNTS OF THE MOCKING-BIRD. ut 



Whoever has closely observed the bird has 

 noted its " mounting song," a very frequent 

 performance, wherein the songster begins on 

 the lowest branch of a tree and appears liter- 

 ally to mount on its music, from bough to 

 bough, until the highest spray of the top is 

 reached, where it will sit for many minutes 

 flinging upon the air an ecstatic stream of 

 almost infinitely varied vocalization. But he 

 who has never heard the " dropping song " 

 has not discovered the last possibility of the 

 mocking-bird's voice. I have never found 

 any note of this extremely interesting habit of 

 the bird by any ornithologist, a habit which is, 

 I suspect, occasional, and connected with the 

 most tender part of the mating season. It is, 

 in a measure, the reverse of the "mounting 

 song," beginning where the latter leaves off. 

 I have heard it but four times, when I was 

 sure of it, during all my rambles and patient 

 observations in the chosen haunts of the bird ; 

 once in North Georgia, twice in the immediate 

 vicinity of Tallahassee, Florida, and once 

 near the St. Mark's River, as above men- 

 tioned. I have at several other times heard 

 the song, as I thought, but not being able to 

 see the bird, or clearly distinguish the peculiar 

 notes, I cannot register these as certainly cor- 

 rect. My attention was first called to this in- 

 teresting performance by an aged negro man, 

 who, being with me on an egg-hunting expe- 

 dition, cried out one morning, as a burst of 

 strangely rhapsodic music rang from a haw 

 thicket near our extemporized camp, " Lis'n, 

 mars, lis'n, dar, he's a droppin', he's a-drop- 

 pin', sho's yo' bo'nl" I could not see the 



