24 BIRDS AND MAN 



who is keenly interested in the language of 

 birds, and has listened with dehght to a great 

 variety of species, should be as rich in such 

 impressions as the musician is with regard to 

 musical sounds. Unconsciously he has all his 

 Ufe been training the faculty. 



With regard to the durabiUty of the images, 

 it may be thought by some that, speaking of 

 birds, only those which are revived and restored, 

 so to speak, from time to time by fresh sense- 

 impressions remain permanently distinct. That 

 would naturally be the first conclusion most 

 persons would arrive at, considering that the 

 sound-images which exist in their minds are of 

 the species found in their own country, which 

 they are able to hear occasionally, even if at very 

 long intervals in some cases. My own experience 

 proves that it is not so ; that a man may cut 

 himself off from the bird life he knows, to make 

 his home in another region of the globe thousands 

 of miles away, and after a period exceeding a 

 quarter of a century, during which he has 

 become intimate with a whoUy different bird Ufe, 

 to find that the old sound-images, which have 

 never been refreshed with new sense-impressions. 



