Evening star., 1949-02-21
This and That
Bv Charles Z. Trnce,Dell

Bird songs sound best around home.
Sometimes humans forget to hymn praises
for the gift of life. %
Multiplicity Of so many things, boring on
the human mind tends to make us forget.
The birds remember. though.
Perhaps they do not do so consciously.
That would be attributing too much to. them,
After all, It wdllnsbe unnecessary. sssss.s
The main 63ff1g is that they sing. and. in
singing, testify to the slories of this world
and the next. :, =
What is better for one. stepping out of the
house on a cold morning, than to be greeted
by q Caroline wren?
What voice!
High, loud, clear. it salutes the office-goer
in fine style.
It is unmistakable.
That is good point. So often one con-
fuses one voice with another. one feather
with another. one type with another.
Those warblers. for instance!
But this old Ca'olina wren. he sings so
loud, so clear and so Justify that even the
dumbest person cannot mistake him.
The song has q whirling character as II
made by something going around and
around.
One is reminded of the once-popular song,
"The Music Goes" etc.
Surely, this birds song does. It hits the
air as II the latter were made Of rubber.
1t fairly bounces.
1t is an amazing thing. that 80 tiny q
creature can make so much noise.
Actually. If 1t were confined in house.
no listener could stand 1t.
Here in the open, it sounds good.
A# %A
For all their sheer intensity, and the
amount of sound bird songs have q peculiar
sweetness
This applies not only to the "tweet, tweet"
types of sounds, but also to the ordinary
calls and songs.
Even the clink, clink Of some species, and
warning cries of others, have musical over
tones.
One does not have to be a music student
to accord these creatures first place in the
kingdom OF sound. Far more ought to have
been made of their music by humans than
has been done. Aside from few trills and
grace notes, incorporated in symphonies or
chamber music works. surprisingly little mas
been done with bird music.
We often have wondered why the wood
thrusl1's notes were never used as the basis
Of a beautiful waltz.
There have been many popular songs
about BIRDS but few that make any real
use of their own musical inventions. This
comes about partly because the sounds are
made by bird throats, and cannot be imi-
tated any too successfully by human instru-
ments. The melodies, If so they may be
called, are out-of- this world, in very real
sense. The bird world Is not at all like
mans world. Each living creature makes
his own world. It is not surprising that the
music of the birds possesses certain
stranseness, no matter how often we have
heard 1t. .
The amazing thing is that it also pos
sesses q certain familiarity that instantly
brings 1t into our own world.
Birds thus may be said to stand astride
two worlds, with one foot in their world and
the other in ours.
The Carolina wren, largest and friskiest
of its group, invites high heaven to our
dooryards.
There Is something OF the cardinal song
In this ones melody. bit from the reper-
toire of the titmouse.
The bird likes people.
One local resident found q pair spending
the winter In his rolled up shades on the
sleeping porch.
Needless to say, he did not roll the shades
down once all winter
Baskets hung In barns often contain Caro-
lima wren nests. The natural places are
brush heaps and holes in logs, or in bushes:
From four to six eggs are laid, white or
pinkish; In q nest lined with feathers and
fine grasses.