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one season, therefore, it may be palatable, and intolerable at another. It seems to be no where in such request at present, as it was among the ancient Romans. There are several varieties of the song thrush in Europe, and three or four in America.

3. Fieldfare.

Turdus pilaris.-LINN.

TAIL FEATHERS black, the outermost at the inner edge tipped with white; head and rump hoary. There are three or four other varieties; as spotted with black; the head, neck, and body beneath, white; head and neck white, body as in the first, or white with large blackish spots. The bill is yellow; and the legs of a deep brown. This species forms a part of that unfortunate race of warblers which are the annual victims of the bird-catching art. They visit this country about Michaelmas, and leave it about March; and the bird-catchers attempt to take them during their passage. They live upon the fruit of the hawthorn, and almost every species of berry, during the winter, when they are seen in flocks, sometimes of a thousand in the same field.

They are more easily tamed than the other thrushes, but reward not, with their song, the labour bestowed on their education. Linnæus mentions an instance of one that was tamed in the house of a wine-merchant, that became so familiar as to drink wine out of the glasses upon the table. The effects of this liquor made it throw its feathers, which were renewed, after it had been confined for a while in the cage, and had been obliged to lead a more temperate life.

The numbers, as well as the appearance, of these birds in this country, seem to be determined by the rigour of the season; and they are said to have a presentiment of its cessation; whence, as long as they are in the field, the inhabitants of the country conclude that the severity of the winter is not past. Their summer residence is Syria, Southern Siberia, or the neighbouring districts, where they feed upon juniper-berries; whence their flesh contracts a bitterness, which some have thought agreeable. The young of the missel, when put into the nest of the fieldfare, are adopted by the female, and reared with the same care as her own; from which it has been rashly concluded that a mixed race might be procured by the union of these two species. No such breed, however, has ever been obtained, though many families of the former have been reared by the maternal care of the latter.

4. Blackbird, or Black-ouzel.

Turdus merula.-LINN.

BLACK; bill and eye-lids yellow. Three other varieties; one, the head white; another, body white; a third, variegated black and white. Inhabits Europe and Asia; frequents hedges and thickets, and lays four or five blueish-green spotted eggs. The blackbird has often been tamed; on account of its song. Its voice, however, is too loud and harsh for any place but the woods. It is said, indeed, to be capable of great improvement, from a faculty which it possesses of imitating the sounds of any musical instrument. Some, that have been well educated, sing part of an air very justly. We have not, however, witnessed any instance of their being able to retain a tune of any length or variety of

notes.

In their manners these birds differ considerably from the songthrush they neither travel, nor associate together in flocks; but, though more shy towards each other, they are less so with regard to man. They are easily tamed by him, and reside, from choice, near his habitation. Endowed with a piercing eye, and accustomed to be always on the watch against an enemy so near, they have acquired great credit for their cunning. On experience, however, they have been found to be more restless than artful, rather timid than distrustful; for there is hardly any kind of snare in which they may not be taken, provided the hand that lays it can render itself invisible.

When the blackbird is enclosed in the same cage with other songsters of inferior size, his restless habits are changed into an overbearing petulence: he incessantly pursues and torments his fellow-prisoners. He should never, therefore, be placed in the same apartment with smaller birds, nor allowed to enter a company to which his behaviour is so rude.

It has been asserted by the ancient naturalists, that the blackbird never moults, because he is heard to sing during winter, a period when the other birds are silent. Nature, however, seldom acknowledges any race of privileged beings which she exempts from her general laws. The more accurate observation of the moderns has discovered the moulting season of this bird, which is at the end of summer. Then they are seen, along with their young, sometimes almost half naked.

In spring they procreate very early. The nest is made of moss, grass, &c. lined with clay, and covered over afterwards with hay. They feed upon fruit, and insects of every kind.

5. Ring-ouzel.

Turdus torquatus.—LINN.

BLACKISH; bill yellowish; collar white. There are one or two other varieties from diversity of colour, which are called waterouzel and rock-ouzel. The French name merle is applied to all three. The middle of the breast of the ring-ouzel is beautifully ornamented with its crescent of pure white; the horns pointing to the hinder part of the neck. The water ouzel is the most retired of this solitary tribe: it is commonly seen single, hopping by small brooks, or steep banks. It lives upon insects and small fishes; and, though unprovided with webbed feet, will dive in pursuit of them. But the most beautiful of this tribe is the carnation or rosecoloured ouzel, which, Linnæus informs us, is an inhabitant of Lapland and Switzerland. One or two of these birds have been seen in Britain, where they were supposed to have strayed in their migrations from Lapland to the south of Europe. The breast, belly, back, and coverts of the wings of this beautiful species, are of the colour of a rose of two tints, of which the one is pale and the other deeper. The head, neck, wings, and tail, shine with different reflections of purple and green. The ouzel inhabits Europe, Asia, and Africa; is eleven inches long, migrates in flocks, and feeds on insects and berries.

6. Mocking-bird, or Mimic Thrush.

Turdus polyglottus.-LINN.

DUSKY ash, beneath pale ash; primary quill feathers white on the outer half. Nine inches and a half long; feeds on berries, fruits, and insects. This bird forms a striking exception to the general character which naturalists have given of the birds of the new world. It is allowed by all travellers that the rich, lively, and brilliant hues of the feathered race, in that continent, are strongly counter-balanced by their harsh, monstrous, and disagreeable tones. The mocking-bird, however, is represented as the most melodious of all birds, the nightingale itself not excepted. To the charms of its natural song it adds the wonderful faculty of

Far from

counterfeiting the notes of every bird in the woods. ridiculing the songs which he repeats, he seems only to imitate in order to improve them, and to perfect and increase his own powers by exercising them in every possible manner. The mocking-bird not only sings with taste, but with action and vivacity: he accompanies every note, whether natural or acquired, with corresponding gestures of the body. If the air he warbles be brisk and lively, he beats time by the rapid and fluttering motions of his wings. If his voice, from a loud and full tone, die away by gentle cadences into a perfect silence more charming than melody itself, he is skimming at the same time, above his tree, gradually lessening the undulations of his wings, till at last he seems to rest suspended and motionless on the bosom of the air.

With all these qualifications that endear him to man, the mocking `bird is of a very ordinary appearance, compared with the other tenants of the American woods. The upper parts of the body are of a brownish-grey; and the breast and belly white. Under this plain appearance, which has neither lustre nor variety of colours, he amuses or deceives every animal in the forest.

He seems to sport with the hopes and fears of the small birds; at one time alluring them by the call of their mates, and then terrifying them, after their approach, with the screams of the eagle, or other birds of prey. As there is no bird which it cannot imitate, so there is none that it has not at times deceived by its call. It is found in Carolina, Jamaica, New Spain, and, in general, inhabits most of the warm or temperate climates of America. It is fond of the vicinity of man, and is easily domesticated. It perches on the trees around the planters' houses, and sometimes upon the chimney tops, where it remains all night, pouring forth the sweetest and most varied notes of any of the feathered tribes.

[Pantologia.

SECTION IX.

Pigeon.

Columba.-LINN.

THE tame pigeon, and all its beautiful varieties, derive their origin from one species, the stock dove; the English name implying its being the stock or stem from whence the other domestic kinds sprung. These birds, as Varro observes, take their (Latin)

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name, Columba, from their voice or cooing: and had he known it, he might have added the British, &c. for K'lommen, Kylohman, Kulm and Kolm, signify the same property and same bird. They were, and still are, in most parts of our island, in a state of nature; but probably the Romans taught us the method of making them domestic, and constructing pigeon-houses. Its character, in the state nearest that of its origin, is a deep bluish-ash colour; the breast dashed with a fine changeable green and purple; the sides of the neck with shining copper-colour; its wings marked with two black bars, one on the coverts of the wings, the other on the quillfeathers. The back white, and the tail barred near the end with black. The weight fourteen ounces,

In the wild state it breeds in holes of rocks, and hollows of trees, for which reason some writers style it columba cavernalis, in opposition, to the ring-dove, which makes its nests on the boughs of trees. Nature ever preserves some agreement in the manners, characters, and colours of birds, reclaimed from their wild state. This species of pigeon soon takes to build in artificial cavities, and from the temptations of a ready provision becomes easily domesticated. The drakes of the tame duck, however they may vary in colour, ever retain the mark of their origin from our English mallard, by the curled feathers of the tail; and the tame goose betrays its descent from the wild kind, by the invariable whiteness of its rump, which it always retains in both states.

Multitudes of these birds are observed to migrate into the south of England; and while the beech woods were suffered to cover large tracts of ground, they used to haunt them in, myriads, reaching in strings of a mile in length, as they went out in the morning to feed. They visit us the latest of any bird of passage, not appearing till November, and retire in the spring. I imagine that the summer haunts of these are in Sweden, for Mr. Eckmark makes their retreat thence coincide with their arrival here. But many breed here, as I have observed, on the cliffs of the coast of Wales, and of the Hebrides.

The varieties produced from the domestic pigeon are very numerous, and extremely elegant; these are distinguished by names expressive of their several properties, such as tumblers, carriers, jacobins, croppers, pouters, runts, turbits, owls, nuns, &c. The most celebrated of these is the carrier; which from the superior attachment that pigeon shews to its native place, is employed in

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