Most birds are endowed with considerable powers of mimicry, the exercise of which, under favourable circumstances, seems, we have observed, to afford them great delight. The bird most celebrated in this respect is, perhaps, the mocking-thrush of America, the singularly expressive and appropriate name of which, among the Mexican aborigines, is Cencontlatlolli, which means four hundred tongues or languages, conferred upon it in honour and acknowledgment of the fact that, with a rich and varied song of its own, it correctly imitates all other songs and sounds as well. Though we have nothing equal to the four-hundred-tongued wonder of America, many of our native British birds are in truth excellent mimics, particularly after they have been some time in confinement, the tedium and irksomeness of their imprisonment being probably alleviated by a constant exercise of their gifts in this way, until individuals sometimes attain to a mastery in the art that is perfectly astonishing. Amongst our pets at present is a goldfinch cock, a very fine bird, still perfect at all points, though he must be at least a dozen years old, during ten of which he has been in our possession as a favourite cage-bird. He is a magnificent singer, and the wisest little fellow in the world; you only wonder, indeed, how such a rich flood of song, clear and long sustained, can issue from such a tiny throat, and how such a little scarlet-capped head can contain so much intelligence and sagacity. "Cowie"--for so he is called, after the bird-catcher from whom we purchased him--is above all things an extraordinary mimic. We have never, indeed, known any bird to equal him in this respect. The chirping of the sparrow in the hedge opposite the window at which usually hangs his cage; the twittering of swallows, as they flit past on their zigzag insect cruise; the fink, fink of the lively chaffinch; the chirr of the ox-eye tit; the bell-like jingle of the blackbird scolding a prowling cat; the lugubrious notes of the corn bunting's evening plaint; the love-cheep of the lesser white-throat; and the quick rasping utterances of the excited wren, into whose proper territories a rival has dared to intrude;--these are each and all imitated by our little pet with marvellous exactness of note, emphasis, and tone. The querulous cheeping of a chicken that has met with some little accident, or for the moment lost sight of its mother, he mimics to the life; and he will on such occasions stand on tip-toe, stretch his neck to the utmost, or cling parrot-like to the topmost wire of his cage, in order to catch a glimpse of the victim of his ridicule. When tired of this, the commoner and coarser part of his art, he will burst suddenly into song, which he will continue sometimes for an hour on end, introducing voluntaries and variations without number, in which you can readily distinguish longer or shorter strophes from the songs of almost all the birds he has ever had a chance of hearing. Any one,