Description.—Above grey, brown on the rump; beneath light grey, white on the belly; wing black, crossed with a broad white band; tail white, except the two middle feathers, which are black; bill and feet black; eye orange-yellow: total length 9·5 inches, wing 4·8, tail 4·2. Female similar.
Hab. Paraguay, Argentine Republic, and Bolivia.
Azara first met with this king of the Mocking-birds in Paraguay a century ago; he named it “Calandria de las tres colas,” and described the plumage accurately, but was, I think, mistaken about the colour of the eye, which is orange-red and not olive-green. He says that it is a rare species, possessing no melodious notes, which proves at once that he never heard it sing. D’Orbigny obtained it in Bolivia, Bridges in Mendoza, and more recently it his been found by collectors in various parts of the Argentine country, even in Buenos Ayres, where, however, it is probably only an occasional visitor. But they have told us nothing of its song and of its miraculous mocking-powers. For my part I can think of no other way to describe the surpassing excellence of its melody, which delights the soul beyond all other bird-music, than by saying that this bird is among song-birds like the diamond among stones, which in its many-coloured splendour represents and exceeds the special beauty of every other gem.
I met with this species on the Rio Negro in Patagonia: it was there called Calandria blanca, a name not strictly accurate, since the bird is not all white, but certainly better than Azara’s strange invention of “Lark with three tails.”
The bird was not common in Patagonia, and its only language was a very loud harsh startled note, resembling that of the Mimus calandria; but it was past the love-season when I first met with it, and the natives all assured me that it possessed a very wonderful song, surpassing the songs of all other birds; also that it had the faculty of imitating other species. In manners and appearance it struck me as being utterly unlike a Mimus; in its flight and in the conspicuous white and black of the wings and tail, it looked like a Tyrant of the Tænioptera group. It was extremely shy, had a swift, easy, powerful flight, and, when approached, would rise up high in the air and soar away to a great distance. In February it disappeared from the Rio Negro and did not return till the following October, after the arrival of all the other migrants. It was then that I had the rare good fortune to hear it sing, and I shall never forget the sensation I experienced when listening to its matchless melody.
While walking through a chañar-wood one bright morning, my attention was suddenly arrested by notes issuing from a thicket close by, and to which I listened in delighted astonishment, so vastly superior in melody, strength, and variety did they seem to all other bird-music. That it was the song of a Mimus did not occur to me; for while the music came in a continuous stream, until I marvelled that the throat of any bird could sustain so powerful and varied a song for so long a time, it was never once degraded by the harsh cries, fantastical flights, and squealing buffooneries so frequently introduced by the Calandria, but every note was in harmony and uttered with a rapidity and joyous abandon no other bird is capable of, except, perhaps, the Sky-Lark; while the purity of the sounds gave to the whole performance something of the ethereal rapturous character of the Lark’s song when it comes to the listener from a great height in the air.
Presently this flow of exquisite unfamiliar music ceased, while I still remained standing amongst the trees, not daring to move for fear of scaring away the strange vocalist. After a short interval of silence I had a fresh surprise. From the very spot whence that torrent of melody had issued, burst out the shrill, confused, impetuous song of the small yellow-and-grey Patagonian Flycatcher (Stigmatura flavo-cinerea). It irritated me to hear this familiar and trivial song after the other, and I began to fear that my entertainer had flown away unobserved. But in another moment, from the same spot, came the mellow matin-song of the Diuca Finch, and this was quickly succeeded by the silvery bell-like trilling song of the [Churinche], or little Scarlet Tyrant-bird. Then followed many other familiar notes and songs—the flute-like evening-call of the Crested Tinamou, the gay hurried twittering of the Black-headed Goldfinch, and the leisurely-uttered, delicious strains of the Yellow Cardinal, all repeated with miraculous fidelity. How much was my wonder and admiration increased by the discovery that my one sweet singer had produced all these diverse strains! The discovery was only made when he began to repeat songs of species that never visit Patagonia. I knew then that I was at last listening to the famed White Mocking-bird, just returned from his winter travels, and repeating in this southern region the notes he had acquired in subtropical forests a thousand miles away.
These imitations at length ceased, after which the sweet vocalist resumed his own matchless song once more. I ventured then to creep a little nearer, and at length caught sight of him not fifteen yards away. I then found that the pleasure of listening to its melody was greatly enhanced when I could at the same time see the bird, so carried away with rapture does he seem while singing, so many and so beautiful are the gestures and motions with which his notes are accompanied. He passes incessantly from bush to bush, scarcely alighting on their summits, and at times dropping down beneath the foliage; then, at intervals, soaring to a height of a hundred feet above the thicket, with a flight slow as that of a Heron, or mounting suddenly upwards with a wild, hurried, zigzag motion; then slowly circling downwards, to sit with tail outspread and the broad glistening white wings expanded, or languidly waved up and down like the wings of some great butterfly—an object beautiful to see.
When I first heard this bird sing I felt convinced that no other feathered songster on the globe could compare with it; for besides the faculty of reproducing the songs of other species, which it possesses in common with the Virginian Mocking-bird, it has a song of its own, which I believed matchless; and in this belief I was confirmed when, shortly after hearing it, I visited England, and found of how much less account than this Patagonian bird, which no poet has ever praised, were the sweetest of the famed melodists of the Old World.