When this magnificent creature
commenced to sing, the very air was burdened with a thousand different
notes; but his voice rose clear and melodiously loud above them all.
As I listened, one song after another ceased suddenly, until, in a few
minutes, and before I could realize that it was so, I found myself
hearkening to that solitary voice. This is a positive fact. I looked
around me in astonishment. What! Are they awed? But his song only now
grew more exulting, and, as if feeling his triumph, he bounded yet
higher, with each new gush, and in swift and quivering raptures dived,
skimmed, and floated round--round--then rose to fall again more boldly
on the billowy storm of sound.
... This curious phenomenon I have witnessed many times since. Even in
the morning choir, when every little throat seems strained in emulation,
if the mocking-bird breathes forth in one of its mad, bewildered, and
bewildering extravaganzas, the other birds pause almost invariably, and
remain silent until his song is done. This, I assure you, is no figment
of the imagination, or illusion of an excited fancy; it is just as
substantial a fact as any other one in natural history. Whether the
other birds stop from envy, as has been said, or from awe, cannot be so
well ascertained, but I believe it is from the sentiment of awe, for as
I certainly have felt it myself in listening to the mocking-bird, I do
not know why these inferior creatures should not also.
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