MO CKING BIRD. l y Y 



consider whether the nightingale may not have a very for- 

 midable competitor in the American mocking bird, though 

 almost all travellers agree that the concert in the European 

 woods is superior to that of the other parts of the globe." " I 

 have happened, however, to hear the American mocking bird, 

 in great perfection, at Messrs Vogels and Scotts, in Love 

 Lane, Eastcheap. This bird is believed to be still living, and 

 hath been in England these six years. During the space of a 

 minute, he imitated the woodlark, chaffinch, blackbird, thrush, 

 and sparrow ; I was told also that he would bark like a dog ; 

 so that the bird seems to have no choice in his imitations, 

 though his pipe comes nearest to our nightingale of any bird 

 I have yet met with. With regard to the original notes, 

 however, of this bird, we are still at a loss, as this can only 

 be known by those who are accurately acquainted with the 

 song of the other American birds. Kalm indeed informs 

 us, that the natural song is excellent;* but this traveller 

 seems not to have been long enough in America to have dis- 

 tinguished what were the genuine notes : with us, mimics do 

 not often succeed but in imitations. I have little doubt, 

 however, but that this bird would be fully equal to the song 

 of the nightingale in its whole compass ; but then, from the 

 attention which the mocker pays to any other sort of dis- 

 agreeable noise, these capital notes would be always debased 

 by a bad mixture." 



On this extract I shall make a few remarks. If, as is here 

 conceded, the mocking bird be fully equal to the song of the 

 nightingale, and, as I can with confidence add, not only to 

 that, but to the song of almost every other bird, besides being 

 capable of exactly imitating various other sounds and voices 

 of animals, — his vocal powers are unquestionably superior to 

 those of the nightingale, which possesses its own native 

 notes alone. Further, if we consider, as is asserted by Mr 

 Barrington, that " one reason of the nightingale's being more 



* Travels, vol. i. p. 219. 



