But the identification of the purple finch, after all, depends
quite as much upon his song as his color. In March, when flocks of these birds
come north, he has begun to sing a little; by the beginning of May he is
desperately in love, and sudden, joyous peals of music from the elm or
evergreen trees on the lawn enliven the garden. How could his little brown
lady-love fail to be impressed with a suitor so gayly dressed, so tender and
solicitous, so deliciously sweet-voiced? With fuller, richer song than the
warbling vireo's, which Nuttall has said it resembles, a perfect ecstasy of
love, pours incessantly from his throat during the early summer days. There is
a suggestion of the robins love-song in his, but its copiousness, variety, and
rapidity give it a character all its own.
In some old, neglected hedge or low tree about the countryplace a flat, grassy
nest, lined with horsehair, contains four or five green eggs in June, and the
old birds are devotion itself to each other, and soon to their young, sparrowy
brood.
But when parental duties are over, the finches leave our lawns and gardens to
join flocks of their own kind in more remote orchards or woods, their favorite
haunts. Their subdued warble may be heard during October and later, as if the
birds were humming to themselves.
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