-■^^« ^p^g -^^^ EVOLUTION 



gathering and secreting bright and conspicuous ob- 

 jects, especially metallic objects. 



It may perhaps be mentioned that many different 

 kinds of birds, especially among the larger parrots, 

 crows and mynahs, are able to duplicate more or less 

 extensively and correctly the sounds, though not the 

 intent, of human speech. They are the only creatures 

 which are able to do this. 



Among the mammals only the rodents can be com- 

 pared to birds in the diversity of their mental traits. 

 Many make rather elaborate nests on or in the ground, 

 in grass or rushes, or among the branches or in holes 

 in trees. The nests of rodents are almost always 

 entered from the side or from below and are seldom 

 open above like the nests of many birds. Perhaps the 

 most interesting of the peculiarities of rodents is to 

 be found in the construction of dams by beavers. 



Some of the insectivores, as the moles and shrews, 

 make more or less perfect nests, and some of the 

 Madagascan lemurs make rather complicated nests 

 entered from the side high in the trees, like birds. 

 But in neither of these groups is this habit so general 

 or so well developed as it is in rodents. 



A number of rodents, as the wood-rats and the 

 Norway rat, have the interesting habit of accumulat- 

 ing bright and conspicuous objects more or less after 

 the fashion of the crows. 



Very many rodents have the hoarding habit, storing 



up large quantities of food to last them through the 



winter, or through the dry season, or through some 



other time when food may be expected to be scarce. 



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