Songs With Variations

—Not being a noted scientific bird-lover, but just a common, ignorant, obscure bird-lover, it may be presumption to think that I can add anything to the sum of bird-lore already accumulated. Perhaps, too, what I have to tell is not new. Yet no one can be expected to read all that ever was written upon this rich subject, and I am able to say truthfully that I have still to meet with a mention of what has been my own little private, unaided discovery. Even among those friends of mine who watch the ways of wild songsters, I find nobody who has observed this particular fact ; or, observing, has given it thought; or, giving it thought, has, as itseems to me, rightly interpreted it.

Not long ago I heard some one say, “ The orioles don’t sing as they used to.” The tone bespoke a state of feeling such as Solomon certainly meant to reprehend when he wrote, “ Say not thou, What is the cause that the former days were better than these ? ” I, too, had noticed that the orioles were not singing as they used to sing year before last ; and year before last I noticed a distinct variation in their songs from the previous year. The fullest phrase I ever heard from an oriole consisted of seven notes, thus : —

I took it clown on paper right out of his mouth, and all the orioles I happened to hear for a long time after gave the same number and arrangement of notes, with the same rhythm, like a bugle-call. Then — very gradually it came about — I learned to listen for a variation in this perfect musical phrase. It was at the beginning of my interest in birds, and, being without assistance from people or books, it took me some years to recognize their songs by the tones, not by the themes. Thus I lost mv orioles for a time, often thinking I was listening to some other bird. Then discovering that there were two kinds of oriole, I naturally explained the difference to myself by this fact. But the orchard oriole is by no means a common bird in our region, and now, as the result of watching the gay and gorgeous individual of the Baltimore class that builds year after year outside my window, I am convinced that these birds never give quite the same song for many consecutive seasons. For a number of years this outdoor neighbor of mine used to come with the following cheerful greeting, — cheerful, with a pretty slurring note of sentiment : —

I’m here, my love, I’m here.

For so did the mellow notes plainly seem to speak. I could not feel certain that he meant me, particularly when I spied his not too coy companion blazing about the larchtree ; yet I always answered him back, that he might know he was welcome. Here was substantially the same phrase, less one note, but the bold joyousness that I had come to associate with him was wanting. Gradually he docked his song yet more, so that for the last year or two it has been, “ I ’m here, my love,” or only the curt announcement, “ I ’m here.” And I will add that all his relatives in the town where I live have of late been similarly sparing in their remarks.

So much for a single class. But I have noticed the same thing in many other kinds of bird, — the song sparrow, for instance. The song sparrow has the most elaborate theme of any that may be called the simpler singers, as contrasted with the bobolink, the catbird, the mocking-bird.

This summer, a friend told me that she was “ able to detect by their songs the nine different kinds of song sparrow.” She was very triumphant over it, and it gave me pain to explain to her what, from my own observation, I believed to be the truth, namely, that there are almost as many different songs as there are song sparrows ; moreover, that not only do individuals among them differ from one another in their arrangement of the three parts of their theme, or in the finish they bestow upon the separate parts, but the individual himself varies his notes from time to time, taking endless liberties with them according as the spirit moves him or his vocal powers permit. He may choose to stop short at the trill, though this is a rare occurrence ; more often he begins with it, ending with the three sharp notes. Again, he practices the turn which at best is an uncertain phrase, singing it over by itself a number of times ; quite discontented, it would seem, with its indeterminate character. Then, perhaps, he bursts out in a reckless, don’t-care manner, as if snapping his claws at practice and perfection, jumbling his notes together like a music-box suddenly gone mad. It is a mistake to think that all the birds of a kind are equally gifted with all their fellows, as if they were little mechanical toys Struck off by the gross, and warranted to produce precisely the same song. Why should it be so ? Men differ in this respect ; so do various domestic animals,—all of them, for aught I kuow. Two black-and-tan terriers living next door to each other have distinctive barks ; the one can boast of a far wider compass than his friend, — I mean his enemy, — as well as of a more hideously exasperating quality in the tones.

I have the honor of acquaintance, with a cat of high lineage. He is outwardly magnificent, and inwardly all that a cat should be,—the beau-ideal of cathood. But he has an inchoate mew. It is his one limitation, and one with which his owners do not quarrel. Cocks are notably many-voiced, and I doubt not that close observation would disclose fine characteristic shadings in the voices of those familiar creatures that respectively squawk, cluck, neigh, bray, and moo.

So, when we reflect that, next to man, the singing bird is, in the matter of vocal gifts, the most highly endowed of beings, it is hardly remarkable — except for the reason that people do not generally remark it — that he should have also the gift of varying expression.

Lately, I was obliged to stand up for the English sparrow’s powers of vocalization. (I have undergone much contumely in his defense on the score of morals.) Three intelligent, well-bred people sat in a row and simultaneously laughed me to scorn because I asserted that this canaille, at certain times of the year, has a very sweet and winning voice. (Methought I heard some one snicker just now.)

Robins’ voices vary widely. There be virago robins that shriek ; nervous robins that jerk out their tones ; lymphatic, conscientious robins that vocalize perfunctorily, giving never a note more or less, nor a compromising intonation. Then there are the rich-natured robins, whose capacity for joy and affection is expressed in the softest, richest, fullest sounds, in songs suggesting much more than mere unaccompanied melody, so sweet that the harmonies of each tone seem to be audible.

Does it sound fanciful to speak so of birds ? I have long thought that the voice, above all other physical manifestations, is the person; I have learned to go; by it largely in the interpretation of character. Few, perhaps, will grant me much in the way of bird personality. For my own part, I am willing to accept a psychology for pigs ; I question whether every common porker can be made proficient in whist. I will swear that I have discovered “ odds ” in mosquitoes ; there are gourmets and gormandizers among them, while in their “ operatics ” a sensitive ear may find scope for a wide exercise of taste. (I like the screamers, because they are the easiest caught.)

Wood thrushes make known their minute personalities by the differing musicalness that is in their throats. Sometimes they utter only the harsh click of the cicada, or squeak like the hinges of a little gate that needs oiling. I cannot be made to believe that a wood thrush with such a voice has the same soul-traits as that last wood thrush I heard. I did not see him, — one hardly ever sees him ; I could not tell whether he was far or near. He seemed to be far, very far, yet his song was near : it filled all the wood, not with its loudness, but with its penetrativeness. It gave me a deliciously superstitious feeling, a mythological thrill, a strange sense of extreme ancientness ; I was no analytic, investigating modern, but a simple, savage being with a rudimentary soul. I stood amid deep forests of the UrWelt, and heard tales of a vast past and a vaster future in the magic strains of this “ Prophet Bird.”