Evening star., 1945-04-24
This and That
By Charles E. Trace1Dell,
FALLS CHURCH, Va

Dear Sir:
I think not enough attention Is paid
10 robins, even by those who love the
plrds. This Is the bird for my money.
he Is strong, beautiful, interesting. He
mas everything. Even his song Is pretty,
put l have found that many listeners
fail to recognize it.
In TACT, some Of my friends express
surprise when I say I love to hear
the robin sing They declare that they
nave never heard it sing, and want to
know what sort of singing it does.
l tell them that it is a sort of wild
Warble. Am I right about so describing
u! have spent many happy hours,
listening to this bird, and get as much
pleasure out of it as another man at
symphony concert
lhe robins song is not ALWAYS easy To
distinguish, especially when one is living
as am In community where there are
so many other birds. These have taken
10 the early spring in big way, and
nave set up such singing that often it
is hard to pick out the robins song.
1T can be done easily enough after
you get the idea of the song in your
head. 1t is not as clear cut as that of
the thrush, nor as bubbling as that of
the wren, but it is easy to pick out from
them all, after you have got the idea
OF 1t firmly fixed in your head, or heart,
or Wherever it is that songs are placed.
Ihere was an old song in my child
mood days, something about the blue
bird singing. I have forgotten the
words, although remember the tune
very well. I think it is too bad that
no one wrote song telling how the
robin sings, for if that had been done.
perhaps there would not be so many ma
ture lovers looking amazed If you mem
ton that this fine bird can really sing.
Sincerely yours, M. J. F.
1t is easy to sympathize with both
parties to this exceedingly minor con-
troversy.
Unless one is peculiarly interested in
wanting to hear the robin sing, it is
very easy to overlook it.
But once the two fine songs of this
bird become part of ones daily life,
1t is not possible to miss hearing them.
They become part of ones very lis
tening life
The listening life is one which needs
segregatlng, at times, it is SO intangible,
so easily mixed up with everything else.
and especially with mere noise.
Mere noise is not music, although It
sometimes may be. Noise is the con-
glomeratlon of articulate things, in
winch grouping we may include ma
chimes, at least by slight stretching of
Language. 1t does the language good to
be stretched now and then. Those timid
persons who shrink from the slight
stretching of language in honest hands
should study the history of the mother
tongue and see how it has come to be
what 1t is today. Stretching did It'll
Even wrenching, now and then. Today
there are SO many real things to shrink
at and from that it is difficult to see
how good people still manage to shrink
visibly when some one, with malice
aforethought, uses such word as "hoss"
for horse, but every one has seen and
heard it, and sometimes is led to feel
that such shrinkers are right. They
are not right. They are as wrong as
they can be.
Our festive robin, always at his green
table, is great singer, but it is true.
as our correspondent points out. that
many persons do not know it.
They lose the distinctive strains of
both the robins ordinary song and of
his rain song. The two are much alike,
but there is an urgency about the lat
ter. The robin sings all day long, but
more in the afternoon than middle
morning.
He joins that king of song, the wood
thrush, in the late evening. The thrush
song is more modulated, with definite
notfnrra sc%~ "a
less vigor, less of the lustiness which
comes straight from the wild heart of
nature.
Every friend Of birds should make it a
point this lovely spring to listen for and
learn to distinguish the robins singing !,
as thing in itself. to be known and
loved for its own merits, because he is
q master singer, after all, one Of the
original children Of song, born to sing
for his dinner.