124 WALLACE CRAIG 



made frequent flights upward in the direction of the female, or 

 in other directions, exhibiting high excitement and some be- 

 wilderment. ' When he flies up he always hovers, sometimes 

 over the female, sometimes over he knows not what." Some- 

 times he tries to reach me, sometimes not. After such an abor- 

 tive attempt at venting his passion "he chases the female as savage- 

 ly as ever, or more so, even jumping on her back. Then they 

 nest-call again. Then he chases her again." They reach the 

 stage of attempting to bill, which stimulates the male so that 

 he dashes up again in his passionate, hovering flight. " Thus 

 they repeat and repeat." 



July 20, both forenoon and afternoon, I let the birds come 

 together for a time, with the same results. 



July 21, I let the birds come together, and put a nest in the 

 cage. Once when the male was in the nest and the female at 

 the other end of the cage, he ' nest-calls to her a few times, 

 then suddenly he lifts himself and glares at her, chases and 

 worries 'her a long time, even pulling feathers out. Four times 

 during this onslaught he makes one of his peculiar passionate 

 flights; the first three times the flight was toward female, 

 as if with vague notion of alighting on her; the second time 

 he did alight on back of her neck but did nothing more. The 

 fourth time, in contrast, was a flight high (nearly two feet?) 

 in air." 



The same day the female began to sit in the nest, preparing 

 to lay. This fact checked the male somewhat in his activity 

 toward her; as it does every male. But the effect on this male 

 was interesting, thus: " Male jumps toward female, then turns 

 toward me, then pecks female, then runs toward me. Gives it 

 up. Soon at it again; drives female off nest and pecks her many 

 times, then tries to get to me, thus back and forth for long period. 

 Apparently it was his failure to reach me that drove him each 

 time to the female; then his contact with her restimulated him 

 so that he wanted to come to me." 



The first experience with a nest I shall describe in another 

 article, dealing with many birds. The first egg was laid July 

 22. Under the influence of the nest, the egg, and the sitting 

 female, Jack gradually succumbed to the brooding impluse and 

 ceased to show erotic activity. All through his brooding he 

 showed a tendency to come off the nest toward any human 



