The hours of silence are not barren for the nightingale. He gathers his ideas and reflects; he broods over the songs which he has heard or has himself attempted; he modifies and improves them with perfect tact and taste. For the false notes of an ignorant master he substitutes ingenious and harmonious variations. The imperfect strain which he has learned, but has not repeated, he then reproduces; but made indeed his own, appropriated by his own genius, and converted into a nightingale's melody.

"Do not be discouraged," says a quaint old writer, "if the young bird be not willing to repeat your lesson, and continue to warble; soon he will show you that he has not forgotten the lessons received in autumn and winter—a fit season for meditation, owing to the length of the nights; he will repeat them in the spring-time."

It is very interesting to follow, during the winter, the nightingale's thoughts, in his darkened cage, wrapped round with a green cloth, which partially deceives his gaze, and reminds him of his forest. In December he begins to dream aloud, to descant, to describe in pathetic notes the things passing before his mind—the loved and absent objects. Mayhap he then forgets that migration has been forbidden him, and thinks he has arrived in Africa or in Syria, in lands lighted by a more generous sun. It may be that he sees this sun; sees the rose reblossom, and recommences for her, as say the Persian poets, his hymn of impossible love,—"O sun! O sea! O rose!"—(RÜckert.)

For myself, I believe simply that this noble and pathetic hymn, with its lofty accent, is nought else but himself, his life of love and combat, his nightingale's drama. He beholds the woods, the beloved object which transfigures them. He sees her tender vivacity, and the thousand graces of the winged life which we are unable to perceive. He speaks to her; she answers him. He takes upon himself two characters, and, to the full, sonorous voice of the male, replies in soft, brief utterances. What then? I doubt not that already the rapturousness of his life breaks upon him—the tender intimacy of the nest, the little lowly dwelling which would have been his Eden. He believes in it; he shuts his eyes, and completes the illusion. The egg is hatched; his Yule-tide miracle disclosed; his son issues forth—the future nightingale, even at its birth sublimely melodious. He listens ecstatically, in the night of his gloomy cage, to the future song of his offspring.

And all this, to be sure, passes before him in a poetical confusion, where obstacles and strife break up and disturb love's festival. No happiness here below is pure. A third intervenes. The captive in his solitude grows irritated and eager; he struggles visibly against his unseen adversary—that other, the unworthy rival which is present to his mind.

The scene is developed before him, just as it would have transpired in spring, when the male birds returning, towards March or April, and before the re-appearance of the hens, resolve to decide among themselves their great duel of jealousy. For when the latter arrive, all must be calm and peaceful; there should prevail nothing but love, tranquillity, and tenderness. The battle endures some fifteen days; and if the female birds return sooner, the effort grows deadly. The story of Roland is literally realized; he sounded his ivory horn, even to the extinction of strength and life. These, too, sing until their last breath—until death: they will triumph or die.

If it be true, as we are assured, that the lovers are two or three times more numerous than the lady-loves, you may conceive the violence of this burning emulousness, in which, perhaps, lurks the first spark and the secret of their genius.

The fate of the vanquished is terrible—worse than death. He is constrained to fly; to quit the province, the country; to sink into the comrade of the lower races of birds; while his song is degraded into a patois. He forgets and disgraces himself; becomes vulgarized among this vulgar people; little by little growing ignorant of his own tongue, of theirs, of any tongue. We sometimes discover among these exiles birds which preserve only the external likeness of the nightingale.

Though the rival is expelled, nothing as yet is done. The victor must please, must subdue her. Oh! bright moment, soft inspiration of the new song which shall touch that little proud Wild-heart, and compel it to abandon liberty for love! The test imposed by the hen-bird in other species is assistance in building or excavating the nest; that the male may show he is skilful, and will take his offspring to his heart. The effect is sometimes admirable. The woodpecker, as we have seen, is elevated from a workman into an artist, and from a carpenter into a sculptor. But, alas! the nightingale does not possess this talent; he knows not how to do anything. The least among the small birds is a hundred times more adroit with his bill, his wing, his claw. He has only his voice which he can make use of; there his power breaks forth, there he will be irresistible. Others may display their works, but his work is himself; he shows, he reveals himself, and he appears sublime and grand.

I have never heard him at this solemn moment without thinking that not only should he touch her heart, but transform, ennoble, and exalt her, inspire her with a lofty ideal, with the enchanted dream of a glorious nightingale which shall be hereafter the offspring of their love.

Let us resume. So far, we have particularized three songs.

The drama of the battle-song, with its alternations of envy, pride, bravado, stern and jealous fury.

The song of solicitation, of soft and tender entreaty, but mingled with haughty movements of an almost imperious impatience, wherein genius is visibly astonished that it still remains unrecognized, is irritated at the delay, and laments it; returning quickly, however, to its tone of reverent pleading.

Finally comes the song of triumph: "I am the conqueror, I am loved, the king, the divinity, and the creator." In this last word lies all the intensity of life and love; for it is she, above all, that creates, mirroring and reflecting his genius, and so transforming herself that henceforth there is not in her a movement, a breath, a flutter of the wings, which does not owe its melodiousness to him, rendered visible in this enchanted grace.

Thence spring the nest, the egg, the infant. All these are an embodied and living song. And this is the reason that he does not stir from her for a moment, during the sacred labour of incubation. He does not remain in the nest, but on a neighbouring branch, slightly elevated above it. He knows marvellously well that his voice is most potent at a distance. From this exalted position, the all-powerful magician continues to fascinate and fertilize the nest; he co-operates in the great mystery, and still inspires with song, and heart, and breath, and will, and tenderness.

This is the time that you should hear him, should hear him in his native woods, should participate in the emotions of this powerful fecundity, the most proper perhaps to reveal, to enable us to comprehend here below the great hidden Deity which eludes us. He recedes before us at every step, and science does no more than put a little further back the veil wherein he conceals himself. "Behold," said Moses, "behold him who passes, I have seen him by the skirts." "Is it not he," said LinnÉ, "who passes? I have seen him in outline." And for myself, I close my eyes; I perceive him with an agitated heart, I feel him stirring within me on a night enchanted by the voice of the nightingale.

Let us draw near; it is a lover: yet keep you distant, for it is a god. The melody, now vibrating with a glowing appeal to the senses, anon grows sublime and amplified by the effects of the wind; it is a strain of sacred harmony which swells through all the forest. Near at hand, it is occupied with the nest, their love, the son which will be born; but afar, another is the beloved, another is the son: it is Nature, mother and daughter, eternal love, which hymns and glorifies itself; it is the infinite of love which loves in all things and sings in all; these are the tendernesses, the canticles, the songs of gratitude, which go up from earth to heaven.

"Child, I have felt this in our southern fields, during the beautiful starry nights, near my father's house. At a later time, I felt it more keenly, especially in the vicinity of Nantes, in the lonesome vineyard of which I have spoken in a preceding page. The nights, less sparkling, were lightly veiled with a warm haze, through which the stars discreetly sent their tender glances. A nightingale nestled on the ground, in a spot but half concealed, under my cedar tree, and among the periwinkle-flowers. He began towards midnight, and continued until dawn; happily, manifestly proud, in his solitary vigil, and filling the majestic silence with his voice. No one interrupted him except, near morning, the cock, a creature of a different world, a stranger to the songs of the spirit, but a punctual sentinel, who felt himself conscientiously compelled to indicate the hour and warn the workman.

"The other persisted for some time in his strain, seeming to say, like Juliet to Romeo: 'No, it is not the day.'

"His stationing himself near us showed that he feared nothing, that he knew how profound a security he might enjoy by the side of two hermits of work, very busy, very benevolent, and not less occupied than the winged solitary in their song and their dream. We could watch him at our ease, either fluttering about en famille, or maintaining a rivalry in song with a haughty neighbour who sometimes came to brave him. In course of time we became, I think, rather agreeable to him, as assiduous auditors, amateurs, perhaps connoisseurs. The nightingale feels the want of appreciation and applause; he plainly has a great regard for man's attentive ear, and fully comprehends his admiration.

"Once more I can see him, at some ten or fifteen paces distant, hopping forward in accordance with my movements, preserving the same interval between us, so as to keep always out of reach, but at the same time to be heard and admired.

"The attire in which you are clothed is by no means a matter of indifference to him. I have observed that birds in general do not like black, and that they are afraid of it. I was dressed quite to his fancy, in white shaded with lilac, with a straw hat ornamented with a few blossoms. Every minute I could see him fix upon me his black eye, of a singular vivacity, wild and gentle, sometimes a little proud, which said plainly, 'I am free, and I have wings; against me thou canst do nothing. But I am very willing to sing for thee.'

"We had a succession of severe storms at breeding-time, and on one occasion the thunder rolled near us. No scene can be more affecting than the approach of these moments: the air fails; fish rise to the surface in order to breathe a little; the flower bends languidly; everything suffers, and tears flow unbidden. I could see clearly that his feelings were in unison with the general distress. From his bosom, oppressed like mine, broke a kind of hoarse sob, like a wild cry.