FRIENDSHIP IN ANIMALS 79 



proceed from friendship but from the helping instinct 

 common in animals of social habits. We know it best 

 in the large mammals — cattle, swine, peccaries, deer, 

 elephants, and many more. Even the unsocial cat 

 will sometimes feed a fellow-cat. In birds it appears 

 to have its origin in the parental instinct of feeding 

 and protecting the young from danger. A young bird 

 that has lost its parents will sometimes find a response 

 to its hunger-call from a bird stranger, and in some 

 instances the stranger is of a different species. It 

 may be noted here that, in some species, the incu- 

 bating female when fed by the male reverts to the 

 hunger-cry and gestures of the young. The cry of 

 distress too in an old bird, when captured or injured, 

 which excites its fellows and brings them to its rescue, 

 is like the cry of distress and terror in the young. 



Many other cases one meets with of a close com- 

 panionship between individuals result from the 

 impatience of solitude in a social species. So in- 

 tolerable is loneliness to some animals that they will 

 attach themselves to any creature they can scrape 

 acquaintance with, without regard to its kind or 

 habits or of disparity in size. I remember a case of 

 this kind which was recorded many years ago, of a 

 pony confined by itself in a field and a partridge — 

 a solitary bird who was perhaps the only one of its 

 species in that place. They were always to be seen 

 together, the partridge keeping with the pony where 

 he grazed, and when he rested from grazing sitting 

 contentedly at his feet. No doubt this companionship 

 made their lonely lives less irksome. 



