It was March 5, 1898, when I heard the first song of this sparrow, and even then it was only a fragment of a song. But, the weather remaining pleasant, the sixteenth of the month brought a fine concert. The bird's song was a surprise to me. It began with a prolonged run so much like the opening tremolo of the white-throated sparrow that it might have led the most expert ornithologist astray. The fact is, I looked around for quite a while in search of a white-throat, thinking him still a little out of tune, and therefore unable to finish his chanson; and I was undeceived only by the singing of several Harris sparrows that with unusual boldness had perched in plain sight. The resemblance ceased, however, with the opening notes, for the western bird did not add the sweet, rhythmic triad of his white-throated cousin, the closing part of his song being only a somewhat labored trill of no distinct character, and not fulfilling the promise of his initial strain.
In the concerts of these birds--and frequently many of them would be trilling at the same time--they sang in several different keys, some of them striking the treble and others dropping almost to the alto. Occasionally two birds in different parts of a field would sing responsively, one trill running very high in the scale, the other an octave lower. It seemed almost as if the responsive exercise was engaged in intentionally.
The Harris sparrow has another song which is quite unlike his melodious trill. It is delivered in a loud voice of little musical quality, and the notes are pounded out in a percussive style, like the explosion in quick succession of a number of little cartridges. Yet you must be quite close to the bird in order to hear the queer canticle distinctly, and when you do hear it you will wonder why nature ever put such a song into a bird's larynx. The Harris sparrow also utters an explosive alarm-call, which expresses not a little petulance and concern.
One day a pretty picture was made by two of these birds that stood face to face on a brush heap, bowing at each other, each threatening to peck the other's head off, and both singing all the while at the top of their voices, yet each afraid, in spite of his bluster, to close with his opponent in actual contest. It was a miniature exhibition of the beak-to-beak challenging often indulged in by two rival cocks of the farmyard. For some minutes the little farce was kept up, then one of the birds became tired of the game and darted over to the next brush heap.