822 
INSECTIVOROUS BIRDS. 
the task of rearing their young. In the Southern States, 
where they are seldom molested, with ready sagacity they 
seem to court the society of man, and fearlessly hop 
around the roof of the house, or fly before the planter’s 
door. When a dwelling is first settled in the wilderness, 
this bird is not seen sometimes in the vicinity for the 
first year ; but, at length, he pays his welcome visit to 
the new comer, gratified with the little advantages he 
discovers around him, and seeking out also the favor and 
fortuitous protection of human society. He becomes 
henceforth familiar, and only quarrels with the cat and 
dog, whose approach he instinctively dreads near his nest, 
and never ceases his complaints and attacks until they 
retreat from his sight. 
On the 26th of February I first heard the Mocking- 
Bird, that season, in one of the prairies of Alabama. 
He began by imitating the Carolina Woodpecker, tshooai 
tshooai , 3 tshow 5 1 show ’t show ; then, in the same breath, 
the sweetoot sweetoot of the Carolina Wren; by and by, 
woolit woolit J tu ’ tu of the Cardinal bird, and the peto 
peto peto of the Tufted Titmouse, with connecting tones 
of his own, uttered with an expression so refined and 
masterly, as if he aimed, by this display of his own powers, 
to make those inferior vocalists ashamed of their own 
song. It was truly astonishing, what a tender sweetness 
he contrived to blend amidst notes so harsh and disso- 
nant as those of the Woodpecker, which ever and anon, 
made, now, the chorus of his varied and fantastic 
song. In the lower parts of Georgia, by the beginning of 
March, they are already heard vying with each other, 
and with the Brown Thrush, rendering the new-clad 
forest vocal with the strains of their powerful melody. 
Like the Ferruginous Thrush, to which he is so nearly 
related, the Mocking-Bird chooses a solitary briar-bush 
