riginal as, beyond all dispute, he is; and for that matter, I look upon
the solitary as very much his superior, in spite of--or, shall I say,
because of?--the latter's greater simplicity and reserve.

But if we hesitate thus about these two inconspicuous vireos, whom half
of those who do them the honor to read what is here said about them will
have never seen, how are we to deal with the scarlet tanager? Our
handsomest bird, and with musical aspirations as well, shall we put him
into the second class? It must be so, I fear: yet such justice is a
trial to the flesh; for what critic could ever quite leave out of
account the beauty of a _prima donna_ in passing judgment on her work?
Does not her angelic face sing to his eye, as Emerson says?

Formerly I gave the tanager credit for only one song,--the one which
suggests a robin laboring under an attack of hoarseness; but I have
discovered that he himself regards his _chip-cherr_ as of equal value.
At least, I have found him perched at the tip of a tall pine, and
repeating this inconsiderable and not very melodious trochee with all
earnestness and perseverance. Sometimes he rehearses it thus at
nightfall; but even so I cannot call it highly artistic. I am glad to
believe, however, that he does not care in the least for my opinion. Why
should he? He is too true a gallant to mind what anybody else thinks, so
long as _one_ is pleased; and she, no doubt, tells him every day that he
is the best singer in the grove. Beside his divine _chip-cherr_ the
rhapsody of the wood thrush is a mere nothing, if she is to be the
judge. Strange, indeed, that so shabbily dressed a creature as this
thrush should have the presumption to attempt to sing at all! "But
then," she charitably adds, "perhaps he is not to blame; such things
come by nature; and there are some birds, you know, who cannot tell the
difference between noise and music."

We trust that the tanager will improve as time goes on; but in any case
we are largely in his debt. How we should miss him if he were gone, or
even were become as rare as the summer red-bird and the cardinal are in
our latitude! As it is, he lights up our Northern woods with a truly
tropical splendor, the like of which no other of our birds can furnish.
Let us hold him in hearty esteem, and pray that he may never be
exterminated; no, not even to beautify the head-gear of our ladies, who,
if they only knew it, are already sufficiently bewitching.

What shall