66 
WILD SCENES AND SONG-BIRDS. 
emasculated Mexican in liis native Soiith. I shall take 
some occasion to prove this position more at large. 
But, my pursuit did not end with the day. At night I 
would retire to my room, as if to bed — wait until the night- 
song of the mocking bird began, which was usually about 
eleven o'clock. Then, disguised in a cloak and slouched 
hat, w^ould let myself down from the window of my bed-room 
and hie away to the fields and meadows ; for the moonlight 
was tremulous already with the silver arrows of those notes 
that came now, all at once, as if Cytherias' quiver had been 
emptied down the air, and then one after one would float in 
an ^olian sigh upon the ear, or in a sharp, ringing hiss 
go darting by ! O, the wonder of those songs beneath the 
moon ! The summer moonlight of southern Kentucky is 
not surpassed in the world for brilliancy and a peculiar soft 
transparency which causes the most striking contrasts of 
light and shade. The trees throw down shadows as black 
as solid midnight, while their tops, toward the moon, seem 
inspired of beams. Every object is thus startingl}^ defined. 
The smallest blade of grass stands out haloed in relief of its 
own black shadow. Objects are thus defined at astonishing 
distances, and, for the same cause, sounds transmitted with 
almost painful distinctness. With such accessories no music 
I have ever heard on earth, or expect to hear, has so affected 
me as the marvellous night-song of my favorite mocking- 
bird. 
It must be known that these creatures differ from each 
other as do men and women, in their vocal powers, and there 
is usually one bird in a neighborhood that supremely sur- 
passes all the rest. It is another most remarkable fact that 
all other mocking birds retire from the immediate neighbor- 
hood of this acknowledged monarch, to such a distance that 
you can hear but the faintest note from them in the pauses of 
his song, and that sounds as if they but prolonged its echo. 
I soon detected the monarch from the rest, and, as they 
never change their night-haunts much, unless repeatedly dis- 
