m the female of
the English sparrow. The male is far the more ornate bird. His back is
striped with a richer brown; his head has two splendid dashes of
chestnut over the eyes; his throat and breast are splashed with red
and lustrous black; his bill is a clear fine black. Altogether the
bird is strikingly colored for a sparrow, and this characteristic is
the more remarkable when we see how quiet and somber is his more
modest mate. This brilliancy of male plumage in the presence of the
somber color of his mate would seem to indicate that the English
sparrow is eye-minded rather than ear-minded. It is true among human
beings that most of them are eye-minded. That is to say, they notice
things with their eyes chiefly. Memories they have are memories of
things seen; recollections of their friends bring up the appearance of
their friends. Their language is full of metaphors which imply form
and shape. But occasionally we come across an ear-minded person. He
remembers voices quite as well as he remembers faces. To him music is
an unending delight, and painting and sculpture fall into a distinctly
secondary place. This is ear-mindedness. Now, most of the sparrows
seem to be ear-minded, at least as far as their recognition of their
mates are concerned. In this group beauty of song is developed many
times oftener than is especial ornateness of plumage. The bird-lover
who is himself keen of ear is never tired of listening, when in the
field, for the two low notes with which the vesper sparrow introduces
a song, the rest of which is not at all unlike the one of his
song-sparrow cousin. The field sparrow begins more like the song
sparrow, but ends with an often repeated note, which not a little
resembles in general character the somewhat more monotonous song of
the grasshopper sparrow or of the chippy. In comparison with these
melodious birds the English sparrow makes no showing whatever. His
voice is harsh and querulous, although very occasionally it is
possible for the bird-lover to detect a note or two which would
indicate that, if he were properly educated, his voice might amount to
something. He wins his wife not by his pleasant voice, but by his
attractive appearance and his winning ways. We have every right to
infer from the character of its fellow birds of the sparrow family
that once the female and male sparrow were colored about alike. But
Madam English Sparrow was apparently eye-minded rather than
ear-minded. Whatever ple