VOICES OF BIRDS. 
801 
muscles of the throat in birds, is infinitely greater than 
in the human race. The loudest shout of the peasant 
is but a feeble cry compared with that of the golden- 
eyed duck, the wild goose, or even this lark. The 
sweet song of this poor little bird, with a fate like that 
of the nightingale, renders it an object of capture and 
confinement, which few of them comparatively survive. 
I have known our country bird-catchers take them by 
a very simple but effectual method. Watching them 
to the ground, the wings of a hawk, or of the brown owl, 
stretched out, are drawn against the current of air by 
a string, as a paper kite, and. made to flutter and librate 
like a kestrel over the place where the woodlark has 
lodged, and so intimidates the bird, that it remains 
crouching and motionless as a stone on the ground: a 
hand net is brought over it, and it is caught. 
“ From various little scraps of intelligence scattered 
through the sacred and ancient writings, it appears 
certain, as it w r as reasonable to conclude, that the notes 
now used by birds, and the voices of animals, are the 
same as uttered by their earliest progenitors. The 
language of man, without any reference to the confusion 
accomplished at Babel, has been broken into innumer- 
able dialects, created or compounded as his wants 
occurred, or his ideas prompted, or obtained by inter- 
course w r ith others, as mental enlargement or novelty 
necessitated new words to express new sentiments. 
Could we find a people from Japan or the Pole, whose 
progress in mind has been stationary, without increase 
of idea, from national prejudice or impossibility of 
communication with others, we probably should find 
little or no alteration in the original language of that 
people ; so, by analogy of reasoning, the animal having no 
idea to prompt, no new want to express, no converse with 
others, (for a note caught and uttered merely is like a 
boy mocking the cuckoo,) so no new language is acquired. 
With civilized man, every thing is progressive ; with 
animals, where there is no mind, all is stationary. Even 
the voice of one species of birds, except in particular 
cases, seems not to be attended to by another species. 
