126 BIRDS AND MAN 



could be said of any other migrant's song — 

 nightingale, tree-pipit, blackcap, garden warbler, 

 swallow, and a dozen more. But it does not 

 explain the individual and very special charm 

 of this particular bird — ^what I have ventured 

 to call the secret of the willow wren. After 

 all, it is not a deeply hidden secret, and has 

 indeed been half guessed or hinted by various 

 writers on bird melody ; and as it also happens 

 to be the secret of other singers besides the 

 willow-wren, we may, I think, find in it an ex- 

 planation of the fact that the best singers do 

 not invariably please us so well as some that 

 are considered inferior. 



The song of the willow wren has been called 

 singular and unique among our birds ; and Mr, 

 Warde Fowler, who has best described it, says 

 that it forms an almost perfect cadence, and 

 adds, " by which I mean that it descends gradu- 

 ally, not, of course, on the notes of our musical 

 scale, by which no birds in their natural state 

 would deign to be fettered, but through fractions 

 of one or perhaps two of our tones, and without 

 returning upward at the end." Now, this ar- 

 rangement of its notes, although very rare and 



