242 Mr Blackball on the Instincts of Birds. 



throws also much hght on the operations of that mysterious 

 agency which regulates those actions of animated beings, that, 

 although attended with consciousness, do not result from obser- 

 vation, instruction, experience, or reflection, and have, there- 

 fore, generally been termed instinctive actions. 



When we consider how many creatures are objects o£ super- 

 stitious dread or veneration, and what multitudes, even in this 

 enlightened age and country, are sacrificed annually to mistaken 

 notions of their mischievous properties, reason and humanity 

 are alike shocked; and we deeply deplore the prevalence of errors, 

 which the zealous promulgation of more correct ideas and liberal 

 sentiments can alone effectually remedy. That useful bird, the 

 white owl, which, on account of the great number of mice it 

 destroys, ought to be carefully protected by the farmer, is fre- 

 quently looked upon with terror as a forerunner of death, which 

 it is supposed to announce by its loud and dissonant screams ; 

 and a small coleopterous insect, the Anobiam tessellatum of en- 

 tomologists, has obtained the appellation of Death-watch, from a 

 fancied connexion between the ticking sound it produces, and 

 that awful event. The raven and magpie are imagined, by per- 

 sons of weak intellect and timid dispositions, to prognosticate evil; 

 and this notion has been extended and perpetuated by the allu- 

 sions made to it in numerous legendary tales, and in the writings 

 of our poets. To take the life of a swallow or martin, or to 

 disturb their nests, is regarded as an unlucky event, portending 

 disaster to the unfeeling aggressor ; and the redbreast and wren 

 owe much of their security to popular prepossessions, equally 

 without any rational foundation. Many birds, which subsist 

 almost entirely on insects, as the cuckoo, redstart, and flycatcher, 

 are shot by ignorant gardeners and nurserymen, indiscriminate- 

 ly with those species which feed principally on the seeds of 

 plants and other vegetable productions. The goatsucker and 

 the hedgehog are falsely accused of sucking the teats of ani- 

 mals, and a price, usually paid out of the parish rates, is still 

 given for the latter in many parts of England*; and those 

 • Sixpence a-head, 1 am well informed, has been recently obtained for 

 hedgehogs in this parish. Now, it is truly disgraceful that any portion of 

 the public money should be expended to encourage the destruction of an in- 

 offensive animal, which derives its support from insects and vegetables, be- 

 cause, in the 'opinion of the vulgar, it is injurious to cattle. 



