Waving aloft thy dauntless wing
Thou joy’st thy love notes wild to sing.”
MISSEL THRUSH AT NEST.
This species sometimes imitates the notes of other birds, but not nearly to the same extent as its commoner relative, the Song Thrush, and renders them in such an undernote that they are difficult to hear on account of the singer not allowing the listener to approach very closely.
The call note is a harsh, rattling kind of cry, which, lengthened a little, and uttered with greater vehemence, becomes the alarm.
Although shy during the greater part of the year, this bird grows much bolder during the breeding season. I have known it build in a fruit tree within a few yards of the front door of a farmhouse, and have seen it attack a stuffed owl which had been placed near its nest, containing young ones, and knock it clean out of the tree.
THE DIPPER.
