who judges of this bird from that of his own wren would do it great injustice, for in tone and execution it is far superior: he sings with great energy.

From the sample of the last-mentioned twenty-seven birds, it will be perceived that the American song-birds are far superior to those of Europe.

CHAP. III.

OF THE NIGHTINGALE, AND OTHER SOFT-BILLED SONGBIRDS.

The nightingale is not only famous among the moderus for its singing, but almost every one of the ancients who undertook to describe beautiful Nature has contributed to raise its reputation. "The nightingale," says Pliny," that, for fifteen days and nights, hid in the thickest shades, continues her note without intermission, deserves our attention and wonder. How sur prising that so great a voice can reside in so small a body-such perseverance in so minute an animal! With what a musical propriety are the sounds it produces modulated!-the note at one time drawn out with a long breath, now stealing off into a different cadence, now interrupted by a break, then changing into a new note by an unexpected transition, now seeming to renew the same strain, and then deceiving expectation! She sometimes seems to murmur within herself-full, deep, sharp, swift, drawling, trembling-now at the top, the middle, and the bottom of the scale! In short, in that little bill seems to reside all the melody which man has vainly laboured to bring from a variety of musical instruments. Some even seem to be possessed of a different song from the rest, and contend with each other with great ardour. The bird, overcome, is then seen only to discontinue its song with its life."

This most favoured of the feathered tribe visits England in the beginning of April, and leaves us in August. It is found but in some of the southern parts of the country, being totally unknown in Scotland, Ireland, or North Wales. They frequent thick hedges and low coppices, and generally keep in the middle of the bush, so that they are rarely seen. They begin their song in the evening, and generally continue it for the whole night. For weeks together, if undisturbed, they sit upon the same tree; and Shakspeare rightly describes the nightingale sitting nightly in the same place, which I have frequently observed she seldom departs from.

From Pliny's description, we should be led to believe this bird possessed of a persevering strain; but, though it is in fact so with the nightingale in Italy, yet in our hedges in England the little songsters is by no means so liberal of her music. His note is soft, various, and interrupted; he seldom holds it without a pause above the time that one can count twenty. The nightingale's pausing song would be the proper epithet for this bird's music with us, which is the more pleasing than the war bling of any other bird, because it is heard at a time when all the rest are silent.

In the beginning of May the nightingale prepares to make its nest, which is formed of the leaves of trees, straw, and moss. The nest, being very eagerly sought after, is as cunningly secreted; so that very few of them are found by the boys when they go upon these pursuits. It is built at the bottom of hedges, where the bushes are thickest and best covered. While the female continues sitting, the male, (at a good distance, but always within hearing) cheers the patient hour with his voice, and, by the short interruption of his song, often gives her warning of approaching danger. She lays four or five eggs, of which but a part in our cold climate come to maturity.

The delicacy, or rather the fame, of this bird's music has induced many to abridge its liberty to secure its song. Indeed, the greatest part of what has been written concerning it in our country consists in directions how to manage it for domestic singing; while the history of the bird is confined to dry receipts or fitting it to the cage. Its song, however, in captivity is not so very alluring; and the tyranny of taking it from those hedges where only it is most pleasing still more depreciates its imprisoned efforts. Gesner assures us that it is not only the most agrecable songster in a cage, but that it is possessed of a most admirable faculty of talking. He tells the following story in proof of his assertion, which he says was communicated to him by a friend. "While I was at Ratisbone," says his correspondent, "I put up at an inn, the sign of the Golden Crown, where my host had three nightingales. What I am going to repeat is wonderful, almost incredible, and yet it is true. The nightingales were placed separately, so that each was shut up by itself in a dark cage. It happened at that time, being the spring of the year, when those birds are wont to sing indefatigably, that I was so afflicted with the stone that I could sleep but very little all night. It was usual then, about midnight, when there was no noise in the house, but all still, to hear the two nightingales jangling and talking with each other, and plainly imitating men's discourses. For my part I was almost astonished with wonder; for at this time, when all else was quiet, they held conference together, and repeated whatever they had heard among the guests by day. Those two that were most notable and masters of this art were scarce ten feet distant from one another. The third hung more remote, so that I could not so well hear it as I lay in bed. But it is wonderful to tell how these two provoked each other; and, by answering, invited and drew one another to speak. Yet did they not confound their words or talk both together, but rather utter them alternately and of course. Besides the daily discourse of the guests, they chaunted out two stories, which generally held them from midnight till morning; and that with such modulations and inflections that no man could have believed to come from such little creatures. When I asked the host if they had been taught, or whether he observed their talking in the night, he answered no; the whole family said the same. But I, who could not sleep for nights together, was perfectly sensible of their discourse. One of their stories was concerning the tapster and his wife, who refused to follow him to the wars as he had desired her; for the husband endeavoured to persuade his wife (as far as I understood by the birds) that he would leave his service in that inn, and go to the wars in hopes of plunder. But she refused to follow him, resolving to stay either at Ratisbone or go to Nuremberg. There was a long and earnest contention between them; and all this dialogue the birds repeated. They even repeated the unseemly words which were cast out between them, and which ought rather to have been suppressed and kept a secret. But the birds, not knowing the difference between modest, immodest, honest, and filthy words, did out with them. The other story was concerning the war the emperor was then threatening against the Protestants; which the birds probably heard from some of the generals that had con ferences in the house. These things they repeated in the night after twelve o'clock, when there was a deep silence. But in the day-time for the most part they were silent, and seemed to do nothing but meditate and resolve with themselves upon what the guests conferred together as they sat at table, or in their walks. I verily had never believed our Pliny writing so many wonderful things concerning these little creatures, had I not myself seen and heard them uttering such things as I have related. Neither even yet can I write of all, or call to remembrance every particular that I have heard.”

Such is the sagacity ascribed to the nightingale; it is but to have high reputation for any one quality, and the world is ready enough to give us some for others to which we have very small pretensions. But there is a little bird, rather celebrated for its affection to mankind than its singing, which, however, in our climate has the sweetest note of all others. The reader already perceives that I mean the "red-breast," the well-known friend of man, that is found in every hedge, and makes it vocal. The note of other birds is louder, and their inflexions more capricious; but this bird's voice is soft, tender, and well-supported; and it is the more to be valued as we enjoy it the greatest part of the winter. If the nightingale's song has been compared to the fiddle, the red-breast's voice has all the delicacy of the flute.

The red-breast during the spring haunts the wood, the grove, and the garden; it retires to the thickest and shadiest hedge-rows to breed in. But in winter it seems to become more domestic, and often to claim protection from man. Most of the soft-billed birds-such as the nightingale, the swallow, and the tit-mouse-leave us in the winter, when their insect food is no longer offered in plenty; but the red-breast continues with us the year round, and endeavours to support the famine of winter by chirping round the warm habitations of mankind, by coming into those shelters where the rigour of the season is artificially expelled, and where insects themselves are found in greater numbers, attracted by the same cause. This bird breeds in different places; in some countries its nest is usually found in the crevice of some mossy bank, or at the foot of a hawthorn in the hedge-rows; in others, it chooses the thickest coverts, and hides its nest with oak leaves. The eggs are from four to five, of a dull white with redish streaks.

The lark, whether the sky-lark, the wood-lark, or the tit-lark, being all distinguishable from other little birds by the length of their heel, are louder in their song than either of the former, but not so pleasing. Indeed, the music of every bird in captivity produces no very pleasing sensations; it is but the mirth of a little animal insensible of its unfortunate situation; it is the landscape, the grove, the golden break of day, the contest upon the hawthorn, the fluttering from branch to branch, the soaring in the air, and the answering of its young, that gives the bird's song its true relish. These, united, improve each other, and raise the mind to a state of the highest yet most harmless exultation. Nothing can in this situation of mind be more pleasing than to see the lark warbling upon the wing-raising its note as it soars until it seems lost in the immense heights above us; the note continuing, the bird itself unseen, to see it then descending with a swell as it comes from the clouds, yet sinking by degrees as it approaches its nest-the spot where all its affections are centred-the spot that has prompted all this joy.

The lark builds its nest upon the ground, beneath some turf that serves to hide and shelter it. The female lays four or five eggs, of a dusky hue in colour, somewhat like those of a plover. It is while she is sitting that the male thus usually entertains her with his singing; and while he is risen to an imperceptible height, yet he still has his loved partner in his eye, nor once loses sight of the nest either while he ascends or is descending. This harmony continues several months, beginning early in the spring on pairing. In winter they assemble in flocks, when their song forsakes them, and the bird-catchers destroy them in great numbers for the tables of the luxurious.

The black cap and the wren, though so very diminutive, are yet prized by some for their singing. The former is called by some the mock-nightingale; and the latter is admired for the loudness of its note, compared to the little body from whence it issues. It must be confessed that this disproportion between the voice of a bird and its size in some measure demands our wonder.

Quadrupeds in this respect may be considered as mutes to them. The peacock is louder than the lion, and the rabbit is not so loud as the wren. But it must be considered that birds are very differently formed; their lungs in some measure are extended through their whole body, while in quadrupeds they lie only in the breast. In birds there are a variety of cells that take in the air, and thus pour forth their contents at the little animal's command. The black-cap and the wren, therefore, are as respectable for their voices as they might be deemed inconsiderable for their size.

All these soft-billed birds thus prized for their singing are rendered domestic, and brought up with assiduity by such as are fond of their voices in a cage. The same method of treatment serves for all, as their food and their habits are nearly the same. The manner of taking and treating them, particularly the nightingale, is this:-A nightingale's nest may be found by observing the place where the male sings, and then by sticking two or three meal-worms (a kind of maggot found in flour) on same neighbouring thorn, which when he sees he will infallibly bear away to his young. By listening, he then may be heard with the female chirp ing to the young ones while they are feeding. When the nest is found, if the young are not fledged enough to be taken they must not be touched with the hands, for then the old ones will perceive it and entice them away. They should not be taken till they are almost as full of feathers as the old ones; and, though they refuse their meat, yet, by opening their bills, you may give them two or three small bits at a time, which will make them soon grow tame, when they will feed themselves. They should be put, nest and all, into a little basket, which should be covered up warm; and they should be fed every two hours. Their food should be sheep's hearts, or other raw flesh-meat, chopped very fine, and all the strings, skin, and fat taken away. But it should always be mixed with hen-eggs, boiled hard, upon which they will feed and thrive abundantly.

They should then be put in cages like the nightingale's back cage, with a little straw or dry moss at the bottom; but when they are grown up they should have ants' mold. They should be kept very clean, as indeed should be all singing-birds whatsoever; for otherwise they will have the cramp, and perhaps the claws will drop off. In autumn they will sometimes abstain from their food for a fortnight, unless two or three meal-worns be given them twice or thrice a week, or two or three spiders in a day; they must likewise have a little saffron. in their water. Figs chopped small among their meat will help them to recover their flesh. When their legs are cramped, they should be annointed with fresh butter or capons' fat three or four days together. If they grow melancholy, put white sugar-candy into their water, and feed them with sheep's heart, giving them three or four meal-worms in a day, and a few ants with their eggs. They should also have saffron in their water.

With regard to adult birds, those that are taken before the twenty-third of April are accounted the best, because after that they begin to pair. They usually haunt woods, coppices, and quickset hedges, where they may be taken in trap-cages baited with meal-worms. They should be placed as near the spot where the bird sings as possible; and before you fix the trap, turn up the earth twice the breadth of the cage, because they will there look for food. They are also taken with limetwigs, placing them upon the hedge where they usually sing; and there should be meal-worms stuck at proper places to draw them into the snare. After they are taken their wings should be gently tied with thread, to prevent their beating themselves against the cage. This should be first hung in a private place, that the bird may not be disturbed; and it should be fed every two hours at farthest, with sheep's heart and egg minced very fine, mixing it with meal-worms. However, the

1. SONG THRUSH OR THROSTLE 2 WHITE THROAT 3. WHITE EAR 4 WHINCHAT

Eng by WHLizars En

first food must be worms, ants, caterpillars, and flies. You must, to feed the bird, take it in your hand, and open the bill with a stick made thick at one end, giving it the insects, or four or five bits of food as big as peas, to entice it to eat. Its common food should be mixed with ants, so that when the bird goes to pick up the ants it may pick up some of that also. The nightingale when caged begins to sing about the latter end of November, and continues its song till June..

THE LARK FAMILY.

The "crested lark" This bird never flies in flocks like the common lark, nor does it fly so high: its notes are sweet and agreeable; it is rarely found in this country. It has a tuft surmounted on its head, larger than the common lark. The wings and tail are shorter, the bill longer; the former when folded extend half way down the tail. The feathers are of a deep grey, edges of a lighter tint, which cover the neck, body, and head. At each side of the head is a band of redish grey. The lower parts are of a darkish white tinted with red. It is an inhabitant of the continent. The nest is made on the ground, and the female lays five eggs twice a year, of ash colour sprinkled with blackish spots.

The wood-lark." This bird is often confounded with the crested lark, on account of the tuft surmounted on its head, which is considerably smaller than the former. They flock together and warble in the commencement of spring. When they pair, the male sets forth his melodious vocal powers until the young are hatched, when he ceases.

The "short-toed lark." Its song is more melodious than the common lark, but it seldom sings in the middle of the day; it has a great propensity for powdering itself with dust, and will plunge into sand or ashes and wallow in it. It lays four eggs of a grey colour, spotted with a brownish grey; towards the thick end the spots

are more numerous,

The "clapper-lark." It has a cry resembling "pi-wit," and lays five eggs of a greenish-grey. It is a native of South Africa.

The red-backed lark" has an agreeable song, and is generally found amongst the bushes in a flat country.

The "double-crested lark" is so named in consequence of having two crests similar, only smaller, to the rested lark.

The Alpine lark." It is an inhabitant of the mounainous regions of the continent. Upon the Swiss Alps t is very common. It lays four or five eggs of a fine reenish-blue colour.

The

The" hedge warbler." This handsome bird has a note or song likened to the words "chiff, chaff, chiffy, chaffy." It is an unwearied songster, and the first migra tory member of the family heard in the season. eggs are seven, white, spotted with purple. Length between four and five inches. Upper parts oil-green, tinted with yellowish-grey. Between the bill and eyes, and over each eye, is a narrow, faint, yellowish-white streak. Wing-coverts pale yellowish-brown, margined with yellowish-grey. The whole of the under parts, including the under tail-coverts, pale primrose-yellow. Legs and feet blackish-brown.

The "wood-warbler." Though this and the hedgewarbler resemble each other in appearance, their habits are essentially different. The former prefers single and

lofty trees in preference to the woods. Its song is as unmelodious as the hedge-warbler, and uttered in a tremulous manner; it consists of one note uttered several times. The eggs are six, white, and spotted all over with purple. It subsists entirely on insect food, and is well worthy of protection, as it never touches fruit or berries of any kind. The top of the head and upper part is sulphur-yellow; the lower part of the feathers tinged with ash-grey; forehead and eye streaked with sulphur, inclining to gamboge-yellow; the throat, neck, cheeks, and marginal ridges of the thighs and wings pale-yellow; the rest pure white; the legs yellowish; brown tail, slightly forked; hair brown, edges yellow, except outer feather.

The "willow-warbler." Its song is confined to a few clear feeble notes, which are pleasing. The eggs are six or seven, of a very pale pink, spotted over with specks of reddish-brown. The upper parts pale-green, with a grey shade; wing-coverts and margins of quill feathers pale and sulphur-yellow. From the base of the bill a streak of primrose-yellow proceeds over the eyes; but not so well defined as in that of the wood-warbler; cheeks and throat primrose-yellow, passing into sulphuryellow on the breast; middle of the belly pure white; under tail-coverts primrose-yellow: quills and tail-hair brown, the latter slightly forked; and the margins of the feathers yellowish-white; wings reaching half the length of the tail; legs yellowish-brown; bill having the lower mandible yellowish, the upper brown.

The "palm-warbler" is an inhabitant of the West India Islands. It builds at the top of a lofty palm-tree, and has six notes, which are mellow and soft.

The warblers chiefly feed upon insects and their larvæ, seldom on fruits. They are a migratory bird. The colours of most consists of green, black, and yellow.

The "chat genus" are all inhabitants of the unfrequented heathy moor. They are common in Europe, they are wild and live in pairs.

The "fallow-chat" sojourns with us seven months; it arrives in March and departs in October; it is the shyest of the genus. The eggs are six, of a pale blueishgreen colour. Its note resembles the sound produced by knocking two stones together.

The "whin-chat." This bird arrives about a month later than the fallow-chat. It is a sluggish and inactive bird. Its song is sweet and melodious. It will be needless to give a further description; for if the reader will refer to the engraving it will furnish him with full particulars.

The "stone-chat." This bird is different to the above, as it remains throughout the year with us. Its song is very similar to that of the whin-chat, being low, soft, and sweet. The eggs are similar to those of the whinchat; it lays five or six of the same shape and colour; they only differ at the large end, having spots of a redishbrown colour.

The "white-ear" is a migratory bird, and arrives here in March. (See engraving.)

The "whitethroat." This bird arrives at the end of April, and greatly resembles the robin; it is abun dant in most parts of Britain. It has a monotonous note.-(See engraving.)

The black-capp'd fauvet" is only surpassed in its song by the brake nightingale and garden fauvet, and it is very near equal to the former. Although its colours are plain it is a very handsome bird. Its ordinary food is bruised hempseed and bread (when caged), occasionally a few insects, caterpillars, worms, and grubs; in summer a few raspberries, cherries, and currants; in winter a newly-roasted pear or apple: with this treatment it will sing nearly the whole year. The eggs are five, of a wood-brown colour tinged with red.

The "garden-fauvet." It arrives about the same time as the two preceding species, and migrates in September.