ful impression of his moon-lighted entrance, and the ravishing song of birds whose notes he had never before heard; for America, among all her birds of bright plumage and varied melody, cannot boast our unrivalled nightingale.

THE NIGHTINGALE.

Beautiful nightingale, who shall recall

Thy exquisite strains, on the ear as they fall!
Gently as night-dews descend on the green,

Their source like the night-falling dews all unseen.
And every note has a cadence as sweet

As sounds that gush out where the calm waters meet;
Soul-thrilling tones in deep solitude heard,

When by light breezes the waters were stirr'd.
Thy home is the wood on the echoing hill,
Or the verdant banks of the forest rill:
And soft as the south-wind the branches among,
Thy plaintive lament goes floating along.

Beautiful nightingale, who shall pourtray
All the varying turns of thy flowing lay!
And where is the lyre, whose chords shall reply,
To the notes of thy changeful melody!
We may linger indeed, and listen to thee,
But the linked chain of thy harmony

It is not for mortal hand to unbind,

Nor the clue of thy mazy music to find.

Thy home is the wood on the echoing hill,
Or the verdant banks of the forest rill,

And soft as the south-wind the branches among,
Thy plaintive lament goes floating along.

ORDER PASSERES.

The Black-Cap.

Sylvia Atricapilla.-LATH. La Fauvette à tête noire.-BUFF.

THIS blythe little bird visits us in the early days of April, and makes our gardens resound with its notes. So sweetly does it sing, that it has sometimes been called the mock nightingale. White describes it as having a full, sweet, deep, loud, and wild pipe, when flitting about from tree to tree; but he says it is, when calmly seated, heard to the greatest advantage. When pouring forth its full tide of song, it gives out strains of sweet, but inward melody, full of soft and gentle modulations, rivalled only by the nightingale. This tasteful observer of nature adds, that the wild sweetness of the black-cap's note, always brought to his recollection these lines in one of Shakespear's songs:

"And tune his merry throat,

Unto the wild bird's note."

The female black-caps do not arrive till week or two after the male birds. As soon as

of

they make their appearance, the male selects his mate, and looks about for a suitable place in which to build the nest. Having found a spot which pleases him, he appears to announce it to the female, by one of his sweetest and tenderest songs. The place chosen, is usually in the small bushes of eglantine, or hawthorn, or among the branches of the woodbine. The nest is slightly made of the dried stems and curled roots grass, with a little hair, bound together with the cotton of plants. The eggs, five in number, are of a reddish-brown colour, with spots of deep morone. The black-cap is a bird of a most amiable and affectionate temper: not only does he most assiduously share in the labours of the henbird in a state of freedom, but when taken captive with his family, he continues to feed the young ones and the female; even forcing the latter to eat, when the misery she experiences from her loss of freedom, would lead her to refuse all sustenance. In time, he becomes also much attached to the person who takes care of him. He will call his attendant with a particular note, and when he sees him approach, his tones become more expressive of affection. Like the nightingale, the fauvette, within the walls of its prison, seems as sensible to the approach of the season of emigration, as when flying, with unfet