INSTINCTS AND HABITS IN CHICKS 17 



ward attempt to bite its wing. After a spell of violent chirping, 

 it missed twice, and hit as often, a spot on the board upon which 

 it stood, following which it lifted a foot to scratch its head and 

 lost its balance. Then four pecks at a crumb missed, but a 

 fifth was successful and the crumb was swallowed — the first 

 perfect reaction. Thereupon came a series of 79 pecking reac- 

 tions in no one of which a particle of food was hit, seized, and 

 swallowed in a chain reflex. In many of these reactions the 

 head wobbled from side to side as the bill moved slowly toward 

 the object pecked at. On the twentieth reaction in this series 

 of 79, the object was seized in the bill and apparently rejected 

 by the chick. Prior to this, excluding the one perfect reaction, 

 bits of food had been seized on two occasions but dropped through 

 seeming lack of skill. Just preceding an interval occupied in 

 preening the feathers of its wings, an interval which marked the 

 end of the 79-reactions series, there occurred a group of five 

 reactions, in three of which the object was struck and in the other 

 two seized. It is but fair to state that many of the pecking 

 reactions were not in the direction of food particles, there being 

 something about the bare surface upon which the chick stood 

 that drew the reactions forth. In the summary of the chick's 

 record these reactions have been classified with the I's. At 

 this point it was incidentally noticed that the chick followed 

 with both head and eyes a movement of the experimenter's 

 hand. After the above mentioned preening diversion, twelve 

 more pecking reactions ensued: seven I's, one 2, and four 3's. 

 Then the animal hesitated long enough to scratch its bill with 

 its foot. The next nine reactions, of which three were i's, five 

 2's, and one a 3, came out in straggling order, interrupted by 

 gaping, pecking of toes, scratching the bill, and preening the 

 feathers of the breast. 



When tested by a moving object, a moist bit of bread swing- 

 ing by a black silk thread, the chick's first impulse was mani- 

 festly toward it, but later it acted as if afraid. During these 

 tests the chick appeared in no danger, except by accident, of 

 stepping off the edge of the piece of cardboard upon which it 

 was placed, when the cardboard was so arranged that the outer 

 edge of it coincided with an edge of the experiment table. The 

 animal could easily be pushed away from the edge but, when 

 near the edge, resisted strongly if pushed toward it. This same 



