THE LARK AND THE THRUSH. 
143 
itself, sweeps away with almost horizontal flight for a short distance, 
and disappears in the herbage.” “ In performing this evolution it has 
been known to take 15 to 20 minutes.” It is remarkable as being the 
only bird which sings in its flight. Perhaps, if we had never seen or 
heard one, we could only suppose that those who said they had were 
“drawing upon their imagination.” It ceases to sing in July and 
begins again in October. It begins its song at sunrise and has been 
heard in Cornwall as late as 11 o’clock at night. It sings in its cage 
hanging at the door of the poor man’s cottage in the country or dark 
alley of some smoky town, with as much spirit as if its six inches of 
turf could be measured by acres, and the roof of its little cage were 
the vault of heaven. 
To live in a country having such a charming accompaniment as 
the skylark should be a source of great happiness. The Americans 
regret its loss and the blank is felt in Australia—so much so that they 
have tried to import the bird into both countries; but “ Nature’s law 
is strict and difficult to understand,” and whenever the experiment 
has been tried it has failed. 
For a thorough appreciation of the lark’s song we should turn to 
the Life of a Scotch Naturalist, Thomas Edward. “Next to the 
mavis, the Lark or Laverock,” he says, “is the bird for me, and has been 
since I first learned to love the little warblers of the woods and fields. 
How oft, oh ! how oft, has the lark’s dewy couch been my bed, and its 
canopy, the high azure vault, been my only covering, while overtaken 
by night during my wanderings after Nature ; and oh! how sweet such 
nights are—and how short they seem—soothed as I have been to 
repose by the evening hymn of the lark, and aroused by their early 
lays at the first blink of morn.” 
The thrush is a bird of no less interest to all Europeans. It is 
distributed all over Europe as far north as Norway, and Cape Wrath 
in Scotland. Macgillivray’s account of the thrush is perhaps the best. 
He says: “ It is associated in my memory with the Hebrides, where it is 
perhaps more abundant than in most parts of Britain. There, in the 
calm summer evening, when the sun is setting and shedding a broad 
glare of ruddy light over the smooth surface of the ocean, when no 
sound comes over the ear save at intervals the faint murmur of the 
waves rushing into the caverns, the song of the thrush is poured forth 
from some granite rock, and returns with softer and sweeter modula¬ 
tions from the sides of the heathy mountains. There may be wilder 
and more marvellous songs, and the mocking bird may sing the 
requiem of the Bed Indian of the Ohio, or cheer the heart of the 
ruthless oppressor—the white man of many inventions: but to me 
it is all-sufficient, for it enters into the soul and melts the heart into 
tenderness. In other places the song of the thrush may be lively and 
cheering: here in the ocean-girt solitude it is gentle and soothing.” 
Its song is heard at all seasons, but especially in winter and summer, 
not only in sunshine but often in the midst of rain.—Rev. E. Davenport, 
Wellington College N. S. Society's Report. 
