Even the cow bunting feels the musical tendency, and aspires to its expression, with the rest.  Perched upon the topmost branch beside his mate or mates,—­for he is quite a polygamist, and usually has two or three demure little ladies in faded black beside him,—­generally in the early part of the day, he seems literally to vomit up his notes.  Apparently with much labor and effort, they gurgle and blubber up out of him, falling on the ear with a peculiar subtile ring, as of turning water from a glass bottle, and not without a certain pleasing cadence.

Neither is the common woodpecker entirely insensible to the wooing of the spring, and, like the partridge, testifies his appreciation of melody after quite a primitive fashion.  Passing through the woods on some clear, still morning in March, while the metallic ring and tension of winter are still in the earth and air, the silence is suddenly broken by long, resonant hammering upon a dry limb or stub.  It is Downy beating a reveille to spring.  In the utter stillness and amid the rigid forms we listen with pleasure; and, as it comes to my ear oftener at this season than at any other, I freely exonerate the author of it from the imputation of any gastronomic motives, and credit him with a genuine musical performance.

It is to be expected, therefore, that “yellow-hammer” will respond to the general tendency, and contribute his part to the spring chorus.  His April call is his finest touch, his most musical expression.

I recall an ancient maple standing sentry to a large sugar-bush, that, year after year, afforded protection to a brood of yellow-hammers in its decayed heart.  A week or two before nesting seemed actually to have begun, three or four of these birds might be seen, on almost any bright morning, gamboling and courting amid its decayed branches.  Sometimes you would hear only a gentle persuasive cooing, or a quiet confidential chattering,—­then that long, loud call, taken up by first one, then another, as they sat about upon the naked limbs,—­anon, a sort of wild, rollicking laughter, intermingled with various cries, yelps, and squeals, as if some incident had excited their mirth and ridicule.  Whether this social hilarity and boisterousness is in celebration of the pairing or mating ceremony, or whether it is only a sort of annual “house-warming” common among high-holes on resuming their summer quarters, is a question upon which I reserve my judgment.

Unlike most of his kinsmen, the golden-wing prefers the fields and the borders of the forest to the deeper seclusion of the woods, and hence, contrary to the habit of his tribe, obtains most of his subsistence from the ground, probing it for ants and crickets.  He is not quite satisfied with being a woodpecker.  He courts the society of the robin and the finches, abandons the trees for the meadow, and feeds eagerly upon berries and grain.  What may be the final upshot of this course of living is a question worth the attention of Darwin.  Will his taking to the ground and his pedestrian feats result in lengthening his legs, his feeding upon berries and grains subdue his tints and soften his voice, and his associating with Robin put a song into his heart?