179
Hotel de TíÈte d'Or. Dinant, Blegium.[sic] [Belgium.]
1897
July 12
(No.3).
  The Skylark, however, has so little in common with this
order of singers that he cannot justly be compared with them.
He belongs rather with the class of loud, rapid, voluble song-
sters of which our Bobolink is a familiar example. But the
Bobolink, although scarcely less blithe and joyous than the
Skylark, is infinitely inferior to the latter as a musician.
  The songs of the different Skylarks heard to-day varied
comparatively little in respective merit but the repertory of
each bird comprise an infinite variety of themes which were
given in unbroken succession, one following another without
the slightest pauses between.
  Besides the Skylarks I saw in these fields Stone Chats,
Gray and Yellow Wagtails, Swallows, Martins and Swifts. A low 
grasshopper-like churring song coming from the fields of grain
was perhaps that of the Grasshopper Warbler. The Wagtails had
a flight call exactly like the tzee of our Kingbird but neither
they nor the Stone Chats sang.
  In the woods or shrubbery along the cliff I heard a Song
Thrush, a Chiff-chaff, and several Warblers of a species un-
known to me. Swifts in great numbers and a few Jackdaws were
dashing about over the town at evening.