looked on in astonishment. It seemed incredible that any creature could
sing while putting forth such tremendous muscular exertions; and yet, as
if to show that this was a mere nothing to him, the finch had no sooner
struck a perch than he broke forth again in his loudest and most
spirited manner, and continued without a pause for two or three times
the length of his longest ordinary efforts. "What lungs he must have!" I
said to myself; and at once fell to wondering what could have stirred
him up to such a pitch of excitement, and whether the bird he had been
pursuing was male or female. _He_ would have said, perhaps, if he had
said anything, that that was none of my business.

What I have been remarking with regard to the proneness of newly
discovered things to become all at once common was well illustrated for
me about this time by these same linnets, or purple finches. One rainy
morning, while making my accustomed rounds, enveloped in rubber, I
stopped to notice a blue-headed vireo, who, as I soon perceived, was
sitting lazily in the top of a locust-tree, looking rather disconsolate,
and ejaculating with not more than half his customary voice and
emphasis, _Mary Ware!--Mary Ware!_ His indolence struck me as very
surprising for a vireo; still I had no question about his identity (he
sat between me and the sun) till I changed my position, when behold! the
vireo was a linnet. A strange performance, indeed! What could have set
this fluent vocalist to practicing exercises of such an inferior,
disconnected, piecemeal sort? Within the next week or two, however, the
same game was played upon me several times, and in different places. No
doubt the trick is an old one, familiar to many observers, but to me it
had all the charm of novelty.

There are no birds so conservative but that they will now and then
indulge in some unexpected stroke of originality. Few are more artless
and regular in their musical efforts than the pine warblers; yet I have
seen one of these sitting at the tip of a tree, and repeating a trill
which toward the close invariably declined by an interval of perhaps
three tones. Even the chipping sparrow, whose lay is yet more monotonous
and formal than the pine warbler's, is not absolutely confined to his
score. I once heard him when his trill was divided into two portions,
the concluding half being much higher than the other--unless my ear was
at fault, exactly an octave higher. This singular refrain was give