12 YERTEBRATA. 
Barrington remarks that " some passages in the song of a few kinds of birds correspond with 
the intervals of our musical scale, but that much the greater part of such a song is not capable 
of musical notation, because — first, the rapidit)^ is often too great, and it is also so uncertain where 
they may stop, that it is impossible to reduce the passages to form a musical bar in any time 
whatsoever; secondly, on account of the pitch of most birds being considerably higher than the 
most shrill notes of instruments of the greatest compass ; and lastly, because the intervals used by 
birds are commonly so minute that we cannot judge at all of them from the more gross intervals 
into which our musical octave is divided " We shall not follow this accomplished naturalist through 
the whole of his interesting observations upon this subject. The table which follows will serve 
to show his estimate of the comparative merits of some of the leading feathered vocalists. 
BARKINGTON^S TABXE OF MUSICAL BIRDS. 
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Designed to exhibit tlie comparatiye merit of British Song Birds. 
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Twenty is supposed to be the point of absolute perfection. 
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1. Nightingale . . 
19 
14 
19 
19 
19 
2. Blackcap, or Mock-Nightingale 
14 
12 
12 
14 
14 
3. Skylark 
4 
19 
4 
18 
18 
4. Woodlark 
18 
4 
12 
8 
6. Titlark 
12 
12 
s 
12 
12 
12 
16 
16 
18 
7. Goldfinch 
4 
19 
12 
12 
8. Chaffinch 
4 
12 
4 
8 
8 
4 
4 
4 
4 
6 
10. Thrush 
4 
4 
4 
4 
4 
11. Blackbird 
4 
4 
0 
2 
2 
12. Eobin 
6 
16 
12 
12 
12 
0 
12 
0 
4 
4 
6 
0 
6 
4 
4 
0 
0 
2 
2 
2 
\ 
0 
4 
4 
0 
4 
ol 
4 
4 
There have been frequent attempts to express the calls as well as the songs of birds by words, 
but we think with little success. To the ears of diiferent persons, these sounds usually suggest very 
dilferent words. In some cases it is no doubt otherwise. AVaterton tells us that in the awful and 
interminable forests of Demerara, the night-bound stranger sees a spectral shape flit before him sud- 
denly,, crying out, " Who are you ; who, who are you ?" Another instantly approaches, and, as if 
commanding some infernal agent to apply the lash to a slave, exclaims — "Work away, work away, 
work away !" A third appears, and mournfully cries — " Willy come go ; willy, willy, willy come 
go !" AVilson tells us that the benighted traveler in our western wilds, seated by his camp-fire, is 
often saluted by a boding wing sweeping down from the trees, with a cry — " Wagh ho, wagh ho, 
who cooks for you all ?" Buffon says that one of his servants, who slept in a turret of a castle, 
heard an owl exclaiming — "Poopoo, poopoo, aime, heme, edme," and supposing himself called, 
replied — " Who are you there below I My name's Peter, not Edme." There is no mistaking 
the strange, hurried cry of the Southern goat-sucker — " Chuck Will's Widow ! Chuck Will's 
Widow!" and the "Whip Tom Kelly, Whip Tom Kelly," of the tufted titmouse, is equally distinct. 
But there are other notes of birds the sounds or associations of which are more equivocal. To 
our English ears the monotonous, but still wild and plaintive cry of the wbippoorwill, would seem 
to be unmistakably distinct, but to the ears of the Delaware Indian it was simply a repetition of 
" Weecollis, weecolHs." One man thinks he frequently hears the name of "Jim Richardson, Jim 
Richardson," in the merry jingle of the boblink ; another as definitely makes out the name of 
"Tom Denney, Tom Denney." The popular school-boy report of his lay is "Bob-o-link, bob-o- 
litik, Tom Denney, Tom Denney, come and pay me the two-and-sixpence you have owed me this 
year and a half. Come, Tom Denney, Tom Denney ; tshe, tshe, tsh, tsh, tshe!" but others consider 
the impertinent dun as addressed to Jim Richardson. Among the multitude of interpretations of 
the song of this bird is the following, which seems to us to express much of its jolly, rollicking 
humor : 
