1903- Moffat.— 77/(? Spring Rivalry of Birds. 155 



of their life, an economic advantage of the greatest value. 

 And this is what seems to me to happen. Birds may, or may 

 not, realise the importance of protecting their future families 

 against the ills of congestion ; but they certainly seem to have 

 an instinctive feeling that the patch of ground on which a 

 pair is nesting belongs to that pair, and that no other pair of 

 the same species of bird has any right to attempt to nest upon 

 it. And, as land is a limited commodity, the cock birds in 

 spring have to fight one another to settle the question, which 

 shall possess a particular plot. After each of these battles 

 the beaten bird is driven away ; and, unless he succeeds in 

 dislodging another cock from another homestead, all his hopes 

 of matrimony for the remainder of the season seem to be 

 blighted. It is not that he can't find a mate, but that he has 

 no home to offer her ; and all his other attractions are, under 

 the circumstances, completely thrown away. The most tune- 

 ful of our birds of song — the I,ark, Blackbird, Thrush, and 

 Willow-wren, amongst others — always seem to take the result 

 of a stand-up fight as final. The female Willow-wren, for 

 example, may sometimes be seen sitting by, watching the 

 combat between two males of her species, at the close of 

 which the victor drives the vanquished away, and the lady 

 then throws in her lot with the conqueror as a matter of 

 course. When we see courtship on this mechanical method 

 always triumphant, even in the case of so beautiful a songster, 

 I think we must infer that there is very little free choice or 

 aesthetic selection, and that the hen bird is mainly guided by 

 prudential motives in accepting the owner of the soil. 



Before going further on this subject, I would like to quote 

 a few instances which prove what a violent objection cock 

 birds have in spring to the mere presence of other cock birds 

 of their own species in certain spots. One morning in March, 

 1898, at my home in county Wexford, I was told that a Black- 

 bird had lately been behaving in a very extraordinary way. 

 It used to come every morning to the kitchen window, and 

 continue for five or six hours at a stretch dashing itself against 

 the glass. At first people thought it would break the window, 

 but as this didn't happen they got quite used to it ; and the 

 *' thudding" went on day after day, all through the forenoon 

 and early afternoon, as monotonously as clockwork. I went 

 to see this wonderful Blackbird, and found that its action was 



