THE LANGUAGE OF BIRDS. 123 
wonder. How surprising, that so great a voice can 
reside in so small a body — such perseverance in so 
minute an animal ? With what a musical propriety- 
are the sounds it produces modulated ! The note 
at one time drawn out with a long breath, now 
stealing off into a different cadence ; now inter- 
rupted by a break, then changing into a new note, 
by an unexpected transition ; now seeming to renew 
the same strain, then deceiving expectation ! She 
sometimes seems to murmur within herself; fall, 
deep, swift, drawling, trembling ; now at the top, 
the middle, and the bottom of the scale ! In short, 
in that little bill seems to reside all the melody 
which man has vainly laboured to bring forth from a 
variety of instruments. Some even seem to be pos- 
sessed of a different song from the rest, and contend 
with each other with ardour. The bird overcome is 
then seen only to discontinue its song with its life.*' 
Gesner, likewise, relates the following story, shew- 
ing that the nightingale not only sings the sweetest o 
all birds in a cage, but that it also possesses the 
faculty of talking ; in proof of which, he commu- 
nicates the following anecdote, the truth of which 
I must leave to more scientific persons to deter- 
