"Come in," when the bell moved, and the visitor was embarrassed
at seeing nobody after having been invited to open the door.

Instances in which the cries of birds had an incontestable and precise
signification are numerous; let me refer to a few of the best known.
The cackle of a hen, after having laid an egg and left her nest, is
decidedly characteristic. Her clucking when she is impelled to sit on
her eggs, or when she is calling her chicks, is no less demonstrative.
There is not a farmer who does not recognize it and understand it. In
these things we see the relation between the tone of the prating or
cluck of the hen and her acts. But when a nightingale sings all night,
or a goldfinch whistles, or a raven croaks, we cannot so easily
interpret the significance of their inarticulate sounds. The finch
calls its mate by uttering a few notes followed by a long trill.
Matches of a barbarous character, based on this habit, I were held in
the north of France while I was living at Lille, between 1855 and
1860. I do not know whether they have been suppressed or not, but the
laws for the protection of animals ought to take cognizance of them.
The gamesters put out the eyes of the male finches, and made them,
thus blinded, compete as singers, for which purpose they brought their
cages into proximity. When the birds heard and recognized one
another's voices, they made their appeal to the female; the one that
renewed his amorous trills most frequently, protracted them longest
and to the last, gained the prize. The bird that was declared victor
received a medal amid the applause of a large and enthusiastic crowd;
and considerable wagers were staked upon the result. I have heard that
these poor blinded birds sometimes fell down exhausted with singing,
and kept on calling the absent female till they died, not being
willing to yield to a rival, who on his side was also keeping up his
equally useless appeals.

These finch contests were suggested after the meaning of the song of
the birds was learned. But when these birds, which are more usually
isolated--whence they have been named _Fringilla coelebs_, or
celibates--hop around our houses and also utter their amorous trills
at another than the mating season, they are evidently not calling the
female. Should we not then seek to determine by the tone whether their
call, which is always the same, is amorous or not?

In countries where flocks of turkeys are raised one can learn very
qu