The noisy
pitta bustles along the edge of the jungle rousing all the sleepy heads
with sharp interrogative whistles before there is the least paling of the
Eastern sky. He scents the sun as the ghost of Hamlet's father the
morning air. His version of "Sleepers, wake," echoes in the silence in
sharp, staccato notes. Seldom heard during the heat of the day, they are
oft repeated at dusk and late in the evening. Of all the birds of the day
his voice is the last as well as the first, and from that the natives
derive his name, "Wung-go-bah."
As the dawn hastens a subdued fugue of chirps and whistles, soft,
continuous and quite distinct from the cheerful individual notes and
calls with which the glare is greeted, completes a circle of sounds.
Wheresoever he stands the listener is in the centre of ripples of melody
which blend with the silence almost as speedily as the half lights flee
before the pompous rays of the imperial sun. This charming melody is but
a general exclamation of pleasure on the recovery of the day from the
apprehension of the night, a mutual recognition, an interchange of
matutinal compliments. Those who take part in it may be jealous rivals in
a few minutes, but the first impulse of each new day is a universal
paean, not loud and vaunting, but mellow, sweet and unselfish.
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