12 



CANARY BIRDS. 



others, who, perhaps, could judge only by the performance 

 of a few imported birds. One is not far from the truth in 

 asserting that the wild canaries sing very much as the tame 

 ones do in Europe. The song of the latter is by no means 

 artificially produced, but, although it may have been, now 

 and then, slightly altered through the influence exercised 

 by the song of strange birds, it has yet, on the whole, re- 

 mained what it originally was. Certain turns have been 

 transformed and brilliantly developed by education, others 

 have been preserved in greater purity and freshness by the 

 primitive state, but the character of both modes of singing- 

 harmonizes perfectly even now, and this circumstance bears 

 testimony to the value of the bird. All linnets, nightin- 

 gales, or tame canaries, however, are not of equal proficiency 

 as singers, nor can such equality be required of the wild 

 canaries ; among these, too, will be found some more and 

 some less powerful. Our decided opinion, however, is this : 

 we have never heard the sounds which resemble the note of 

 the nightingale, or the so-called " rolling," those soul-stirring 

 deep chest-tones, more beautifully executed than by wild 

 canaries, and, in the islands, by a few tame ones, which latter 

 had evidently undergone an apprenticeship with the wild 

 birds. . . F. Bocker judges them as follows : — The song of 

 the wild canary, cannot, on the whole ; satisfy those who are 

 acquainted with the canary of the " Hartz ; " the voice is 

 soft, fresh, and melodious ; when several birds sing together, 

 the impression produced is that as if a company of in- 

 sectivorous birds, especially the various kinds of hedge- 

 sparrows (warblers), were vieing in song with some linnets ; 

 at intervals one hears some whistling sounds rapidly uttered, 

 some isolated trills and some "clucking" parts; some in- 

 cipient rolls will also be heard in the song of the wild-bird. 

 It is true that one hears also occasionally the tabooed 

 " catch " of our canaries of the common breed, not so 



