Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 1 (1897).djvu/439

Rh I cannot quite agree with the latter part of the statement that the Willow Wren "is the most persistent singer of all our summer visitors, not ceasing until the middle of August." The Willow Wren, in my experience, becomes silent soon after the middle of June. The time varies a little in different years and different localities, and probably some may be heard singing very early in the morning in the first days of July in some years; for, like certain other birds, it sings in the small hours after it has ceased to sing in the daytime. But during the greater part of July it is silent. So far from ceasing in the middle of August, it is about that time (I said about the second week in my paper) that it strikes up its autumn song. I heard it this year on August 17th, and again yesterday (August 22nd). The Chiffchaff, whose spell of singing lasts from the end of March (the third week sometimes) until the last week in July in some years, does not open the autumn song so soon. In 1885, however, I heard a Chiffchaff on August 15th. In 1883 it was singing on October 1st. I have heard the Wren in September, also in the first week in August. The Starling often sings a little at the end of summer and in early autumn; for instance, on August 19th and 22nd this year.

The early autumn seems to be the only time of the year when the birds enjoy leisure and plenty. After the winter, when they generally have to work hard for food, come courtship, nesting, rearing young, and moulting. But when the last is over, it seems natural that in the warm hazy days of early autumn, when the birds have plenty of time to bask on the tree-tops and tall hedges, they should sing in a lazy, contented fashion. Also that the young birds of the year should try their voices, and produce weak and imperfect strains. Even the Rook adopts a soft caw; but I do not at this moment remember having heard in autumn the softer quavering croak which the Carrion Crow assumes in spring.