as I waited, breathless, to see what would happen next, the damsel
coquettishly flitted to another branch. Then the whole scene was
repeated; the most singular and graceful evolutions, the songs, and the
gradual approach. Sometimes, after alighting on a top twig, he dropped
down through the branches, singing, in a way to suggest the "dropping
song" so graphically described by Maurice Thompson, but never really
falling, and never touching the ground. Each performance ended in his
reaching the twig which she occupied and her flight to another, until at
last, by some apparently mutual agreement, both flew, and I saw no more.

A remarkable "dance" which I also saw, with the same bird as principal
actor, seems to me another phase of the wooing, though I must say it
resembled a war-dance as well; but love is so like war among the lower
orders, even of men, that it is hard to distinguish between them. I
shall not try to decide, only to relate, and, I beg to say, without the
smallest exaggeration. The dances I saw were strictly _pas-de-deux_,
and they always began by a flash of wings and two birds alighting on the
grass, about a foot apart. Both instantly drew themselves up perfectly
erect, tail elevated at an angle of forty-five degrees, and wings held
straight down at the sides. Then followed a most droll dance. Number one
stood like a statue, while number two pranced around, with short,
mincing steps and dainty little hops which did not advance him an inch;
first he passed down the right, then turned and went down the left, all
in the queer, unnatural manner of short hops and steps, and holding
himself rigidly erect, while number one always faced the dancer,
whichever way he turned. After a few moments of this movement, number
one decided to participate, and when his partner moved to the right he
did the same; to the left he still accompanied him, always facing, and
maintaining the exact distance from him. Then number two described a
circle around number one, who turned to face him with short hops where
he stood. Next followed a _chasse_ of both birds to the right; then a
separation, one dancing to the right and the other to the left, always
facing, and always slowly and with dignity. This stately minuet they
kept up for some time, and appeared so much like a pair of
old-fashioned human dancers that when, on one occasion, number two
varied the performance by a spring over the head of his partner, I was
startled, as if an old