For fully an hour I lingered in that “embowered solitude,” watching the bird’s quaint behavior, which deserves more than a mere passing notice. He was not in the least shy or nervous, but seemed rather to court my presence. Almost every moment was spent in capturing insects on the wing or in sitting on a perch watching for them to flash into view. Like a genuine flycatcher, as soon as a buzzing insect hove in sight, he would dart out after it, and never once failed to secure his prize. Sometimes he would plunge swiftly downward after a gnat or a miller, and once, having caught a miller that was large and inclined to be refractory, he flew to the ground, beat it awhile on the clods, and then swallowed it with a consequential air which seemed to say, “That is my way of disposing of such cases!” Several times he mounted almost straight up from his perch, and twice he almost turned a somersault in pursuit of an insect. Once he clung like a titmouse to the bole of a sapling. I could often hear the snapping of his mandibles as he nabbed his prey. When an insect came between him and myself, he would fearlessly dash directly toward me, as if he meant to fly in my face or alight on my head, often coming within a few feet of me. He seemed to be as confiding as a child. When I stepped to the other end of the gravel-bank, going even a little beyond it, curiously enough, the bird pursued me; then, as an experiment, I walked back to my first post of observation, and, to my surprise, he followed me again. Was he really desirous of my company? Or did he know that I intended to ring his praises in type? At length I stole away a short distance among the trees, but presently a loud chirping in my rear arrested my attention. I turned back, and found it to be my new-made friend, the hooded warbler, who, strange to say, seemed to be calling me back to his haunt. Then I climbed to the top of the gravel-bank; he selected perches higher up in the saplings than before, so as to be nearer me,—at least, so it appeared. The affectionate little darling! The only other sound he uttered during the entire time of our hobnobbing—his and mine—was the slenderest hint of a song, which was really more of a twitter than a tune.
But at last I bade the little sorcerer a reluctant adieu. In a hollow of the woods I lay down on the green grass, and listened for half an hour to the lyrical medley of a brown thrasher perched on a treetop. It was indeed a wonderful performance, and the longer I listened the more its witchery grew upon me. My special purpose in bending my whole attention upon this performance was to see if the thrasher mimicked the songs of other birds. Many persons think him a genuine imitator; indeed, in some places he is called the northern mocking-bird. I am forced to say, however, that, as far as my observation goes, he does not mimic, but sings his own compositions, like the original genius he is. In all that song, and others since listened to, not a single strain did he utter that I could positively identify as belonging to the musical repertoire of another bird. It is true, he sometimes, in the midst of his song, uttered the alarm call of the robin; but as both birds belong to the same family, this was not to be wondered at, and affords no evidence of the gift of imitation. If the thrasher does mimic his fellow-minstrels, as many persons contend, the borrowed notes are so brief and so intermingled and blent with his own music as to be unrecognizable.
On the other hand, this tawny vocalist utters musical strains that are entirely unlike anything else in the whole realm of bird minstrelsy, proving his song to be characteristic. The brown thrasher is not a musical pirate, but an original composer,—a sort of Mozart or Beethoven in the bird world. And how wonderful are some of his slurred runs! Nothing in the domain of music could be finer, and the harsh notes he frequently interpolates only serve to accentuate and enhance the melody of those that are truly lyrical.
In his engaging book entitled “Birds in the Bush,” Bradford Torrey, who is second to none in the school of popular writers on feathered folk, characterizes this tawny vocalist in a most admirable manner. However, in regard to the matter of mimicry, his observations differ slightly from my own; yet I gladly quote what he says rather incidentally on the subject. One day he was listening to three thrashers singing simultaneously. “In the midst of the hurly-burly,” he writes, “one of the trio suddenly sounded the whippoorwill’s call twice,—an absolutely perfect reproduction.” Then he adds, somewhat jocosely, in a foot-note: “The ‘authorities’ long since forbade Harporhynchus rufus to play the mimic. Probably in the excitement of the moment this fellow forgot himself.” Of course, one cannot gainsay the testimony of so careful an observer and so conscientious a reporter as Mr. Torrey; yet it is possible that this whippoorwill call was only a slip of the thrasher’s voice and not an intended imitation; at all events, in my opinion, such vocal coincidences, whether accidental or designed, are of rare occurrence.
Since the foregoing observations were made and first published, I have often sought to prove them untrue, but have failed. No thrasher has ever, in my hearing, unmistakably plagiarized a single strain from his fellow-musicians. Fearing my ear for music might be defective, rendering me incapable of distinguishing correctly the various songs of birds, I put myself to the test in this way: On one of the streets of my native town there is a brilliant mocking-bird, whose cage is often hung out on a veranda. Again and again I have stopped to listen to his ringing medley, and have never failed to hear him distinctly mimic the songs and calls of other birds, such as the robin, blue jay, cardinal grossbeak, and red-headed woodpecker. Why should I be able instantly to detect the notes of other birds in the mocker’s song and never once be able to detect them in the song of the thrasher?
But it is fully time to return to my ramble. The gifted songster in the tree-top would sometimes pipe a strain of such exquisite sweetness that it seemed to surprise himself; he would pause a moment, as if to reflect upon it and fix it in mind for future use; and erelong he would repeat it, reminding his admiring auditor of Browning’s lines on the Wise Thrush,—
“He sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture.”
New strains were continually introduced. So loud and full were some of his notes that “the blue air trembled with his song,” and the woods fairly woke into echoes. It is really doubtful if the disparaging term “hurly-burly” should be applied to such peerless vocalization. It was bird opera music of the highest style, improvised for the occasion, and formed a fitting conclusion to this rare birds’ gala-day.