e accent of sanctity. Nothing is here of
self-consciousness; nothing of earthly pride or passion. If we chance to
overhear it and laud the singer, that is our affair. Simple-hearted
worshiper that he is, he has never dreamed of winning praise for himself
by the excellent manner in which he praises his Creator,--an absence of
thrift, which is very becoming in thrushes, though, I suppose, it is
hardly to be looked for in human choirs.

And yet, for all the unstudied ease and simplicity of the veery's
strain, he is a great master of _technique_. In his own artless way he
does what I have never heard any other bird attempt: he gives to his
melody all the force of harmony. How this unique and curious effect,
this vocal double-stopping, as a violinist might term it, is produced,
is not certainly known; but it would seem that it must be by an
_arpeggio_, struck with such consummate quickness and precision that the
ear is unable to follow it, and is conscious of nothing but the
resultant chord. At any rate, the thing itself is indisputable, and has
often been commented on.

Moreover, this is only half the veery's technical proficiency. Once in a
while, at least, he will favor you with a delightful feat of
ventriloquism; beginning to sing in single voice, as usual, and anon,
without any noticeable increase in the loudness of the tones, diffusing
the music throughout the wood, as if there were a bird in every tree,
all singing together in the strictest time. I am not sure that all
members of the species possess this power, and I have never seen the
performance alluded to in print; but I have heard it when the illusion
was complete, and the effect most beautiful.

Music so devout and unostentatious as the veery's does not appeal to the
hurried or the preoccupied. If you would enjoy it you must bring an ear
to hear. I have sometimes pleased myself with imagining a resemblance
between it and the poetry of George Herbert,--both uncared for by the
world, but both, on that very account, prized all the more dearly by the
few in every generation whose spirits are in tune with theirs.

This bird is one of a group of small thrushes called the _Hylocichlae_,
of which group we have five representatives in the Atlantic States: the
wood thrush; the Wilson, or tawny thrush; the hermit; the olive-backed,
or Swainson; and the gray-cheeked, or Alice's thrush. To the unpracticed
eye the five all look alike. All of them, too, have the same glorio