the male passes from A (la) to B flat (si bemol); that of the female, from G sharp (sol dièse) to A. The first note is short and transient, and has the effect which our musicians call sensible; so that it is not detached from the second, but seems to slip into it. Observe that, fortunately for the ear, they do not both sing at once; in fact, if while the male sounded B flat, the female struck A, or if the male uttered A, while the female gave G sharp, there would result the harshest and most insupportable of discords. We may add, that this dialogue is subjected to a constant and regular rhythm, with the measure of two times. The inspector assured me that, during their amours, these birds have a cry still sharper, but much more agreeable *."

With respect to birds singing at night, it is a great mistake to suppose the nightingale to be the only night songster, because it is the loudest and finest. By the quotation given above from Captain Cook, it appears that in New Zealand several birds sing all night, and in America the mock-bird sings as finely at night as during the day. In England the most remarkable night-singers, after the nightingale, are the sedge-bird (Curruca salicaria, FLEMING), and the dipper (Cinclus aquaticus, BECHSTEIN). Every summer for many years we have observed the sedgebird hurrying over its singular medley at all hours of the night, particularly by moonlight; and it seems peculiar to this bird, that it will sing the louder when a stone is thrown into the bush where it is singing, an experiment we have often tried, and usually with the same result. The dipper, we have no doubt, commonly sings during the night, but from the secluded streams which it frequents, it is seldom heard; though we have more than once heard it by accident on the river Ayr, and in the autumn of 1831 *Wood's Buffon, xix. 511, note.

we listened to one for a considerable time singing its finest notes two hours after sunset, on the romantic banks of the Devon, near the Rumbling Bridge, in Clackmannanshire.

Our other night song-birds seem only to sing occasionally, not regularly, such as the skylark, the redstart, and the red-breast. Among larger birds not usually reckoned song-birds, which emit their peculiar call-notes in the night, we may enumerate the quail, the corncrake, the partridge, the grouse, and more particularly the cock.

We have remarked that some species of cage-birds will readily sing at night when the candles are lit, while others will not sing a note. The black-cap, for example, mentioned in a former page, has never attempted to sing at night above once or twice; while Mr. Sweet found his redstart sing every night, as we find to be the case with our red-breasts. When a red-breast has been recently caught, indeed, he never attempts to sing during the day, and always essays his first cage-song after dark, venturing, by degrees, to extend his voice, before he try it in open day. We have had birds of this species who would sing in this manner every night for several weeks, without singing a note during the day. At present (January) we have a bird of this kind which seldom begins before eight o'clock at night, after another in a neighbouring cage, which sings equally through the day and after dark, has finished singing for the evening*.

It may be remarked also, that in cage-birds, though they will sometimes break out into their loudest notes at night, their song is for the most part soft, subdued, and warbling; such is the case at least with our redbreasts, and an aberdevine near them. Canaries and blackbirds, however, usually sing aloud at night, and * J. R.

the nightingale, so far as we have remarked, always. We have, however, heard some of these night songs, which were manifestly uttered while the bird was asleep, in the same way as we sometimes talk during sleep-a circumstance remarked by Dryden, who says,

"The little birds in dreams their songs repeat

On

We have even observed this in a wild bird. the night of the 6th April, 1811, about ten o'clock, a dunnock (Accentor modularis) was heard in a garden to go through its usual song more than a dozen times very faintly, but distinctly enough for the species to be recognised. The night was cold and frosty; but might it not be that the little musician was dreaming of summer and sunshine †? Aristotle, indeed, proposes the question, whether animals hatched from eggs ever dream ‡. Marcgrave in reply expressly says that his "parrot, Laura, often rose in the night and prattled while half asleep §."

* Indian Emperor.

P. 14.

J. Rennie on the Singing of Birds, Edinb. Mag. Jan. 1819, § Hist. Rerum Nat.

Hist. Anim. v. 10.

and some others, it occasionally makes choice of both localities.

. A nest precisely similar is built by the Maryland yellow-throat (Sylvia Marylandica), in the midst of a thicket of briars, the dome being made of dead leaves, bound together with dry grass and lined with hair *. We shall afterwards see that this nest is often selected by the parasite cow-bird for depositing her eggs. A more singular domed nest is built by another American warbler (Sylvia solitaria), which haunts thickets and shrubberies, is fond of visiting gardens, orchards, and willow-trees, and is also found in very sequestered woods, where it generally builds its nest. This," says Wilson, "is fixed in a thick bunch or tussock of long grass, sometimes sheltered by a briar bush. It is built in the form of an inverted cone or funnel, the bottom thickly bedded with dry beach leaves, the sides formed of the dry bark of strong weeds, and lined within with fine dry grass. These materials are not placed in the usual manner, circularly, but shelving downwards on all sides from the top; the mouth being wide, the bottom very narrow, filled with leaves, and the eggs or young occupying the middle †.”

66

The only other British warbler, besides those we have just noticed, which builds a domed nest, is that beautiful little bird the gold-crested wren (Regulus cristatus, RAY); but it does not build uniformly in this manner, a circumstance which has led to some confusion among our most accurate naturalists. Colonel Montagu, for example, denies that it builds a covered nest, upon the fact of one, of which he has given a most interesting history in his introduction, not being covered at top; while Albin, on the authority of Derham, describes it as having a side entrance. The truth is, that this bird, like many other species, *Wilson, Amer. Ornith, i. 89. + Ib. ii. 109.

always the effect of exciting proportional admiration, from the sympathy of the passive spectator with the active agent, who feels his incapability of executing the same feat in all its particulars.

A story is told of Goldsmith, that having gone with Johnson and Burke to see an exhibition of puppets, his vanity was hurt at their praising the agility displayed by the figures, which, with characteristic simplicity, he volunteered to equal, and began accordingly, in good earnest, to skip over the chairs in the room, without reflecting that it was not exactly the agility that had pleased them, and drawn forth their admiration, but the imitation of living actions, producing in their minds a train of comparison between the puppets and the motions of the animals imitated.

The truth of these views appears to be proved by the fact, that when the imitation is so perfect as to amount to a belief of its identity with what is imitated, no pleasure is produced by an observer, in consequence of his mind not being excited to institute a train of comparisons. In the case of the parrot, when the words are heard while the bird is unseen, the articulation never so nearly imitates humanity as to prevent the hearer from immediately recognizing the voice to be that of a bird; but were the imitation perfect (supposing the bird still unseen), instead of a hearer going into a comparison respecting the imitation, he would immediately infer that the words "Pretty Poll" were uttered by some person calling to a parrot, rather than suppose them to be uttered by a bird. We recollect an instance of a starling, which had been taught by an Ayrshire hair-dresser to repeat the words "Get up, Sir," with surprising correctness of articulation. The tone of voice was husky and whispering, and the first time we heard it from the bird, hanging in a dark