346 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



imitation of the movements of the parents when in search of food ; 

 judgment as to localities, on the part of the young, and allied circum- 

 stances connected with procuring food, come by experience. Watch 

 a restless little creeper, during these chill winter mornings (Certhia 

 farniliaris), as it flies from tree to tree, and clambers over and about 

 the rough bark. It seems, indeed, a mere automaton, driven, and not 

 going of its own free-will ; but, if we continue our observations but a 

 little longer, we shall find it really a discriminating creature, passing 

 by certain trees that are to us all one with those visited. It is not 

 chance, but a consciousness of the uselessness of search, that deter- 

 mines its flight to some more distant rather than a nearer tree. 



As an example of the knowledge gained by young birds through 

 imitation, let us take young woodpeckers. On leaving the nest, they 

 accompany their parents, but are not fed by them. Like the old 

 birds, they immediately commence to climb the trunks and branches 

 of the trees. Having been fed with insects when in the nest, they 

 are already able to recognize their proper food, and devour the 

 visible insects they may discover on the outer surface of the bark. 

 Now, was it the example set by their parents, or the peculiar con- 

 struction of their bill and feet, that was the cause of their having 

 sought the trees, and climbed over them in the peculiar manner com- 

 mon to their kind ? I think, clearly the former. Now, merely clam- 

 bering over the bark of trees would not enable them to secure sufii- 

 cient food, and imitation could not extend beyond this point ; but 

 here experience comes into play, and the gradual acquirement of the 

 whole routine is easily traced. The bark of trees is nearly always 

 cracked, and in the crevices are more insects than on the surface, and 

 the habit, soon acquired, of search in the cracks of the bark is the one 

 step from searching over the exposed surface to search beneath. Imi- 

 tation led the ignorant young bird to the thrifty growth of timber, 

 and not the tangled hedge-rows. Experience taught him the accus- 

 tomed haunts of those insects on which Nature bids him prey. If we 

 go back into the remote past, and recall the ancestral woodpecker, 

 we can with no undue use of the imagination picture to ourselves the 

 first steps that led the good climber to find in the half-decayed bark 

 the nourishing food abounding there ; and now let us return to the 

 present, and seek for some variation in the habits of the birds of to- 

 day. As an instance, the " flicker," or golden-winged woodpecker, 

 leaves the timber-lands, and in loose flocks, often in company with 

 robins, wanders over pasture-fields and meadows in search of food, 

 more especially the crickets, and not under fences do they look for 

 them, but under the dry droppings of the cattle. Here is an instance 

 where accident, it may be, gave origin to, and experience has con- 

 firmed into a habit, a decided variation from normal woodpecker life. 

 Now, a young woodpecker leaving its nest June 1st, if dissociated 

 from its kind, would never leave the woodlands, and, seeking the 



