8 The Field Naturalist's Quarterly Feb. 



seen by too inquisitive eyes. The vast majority steal away 

 into the solitudes they love and lay them down unseen, 

 where the leaves shall presently cover them from the sight 

 of friends and enemies alike. 



We rarely discover them at such times, for the instinct of 

 the animal is to go away as far as possible into the deepest 

 coverts. We see only the exceptional cases, the quail in the 

 hawk's grip, the squirrel limp and quiet under the paw of 

 cat or weasel ; but the unnumbered multitudes that choose 

 their own place and close their eyes for the last time, as 

 peacefully as ever they lay down to sleep, are hidden from 

 our sight. 



There is a curious animal trait which may account for 

 this, and also explain why we have such curious, foolish 

 conceptions of animal death as a tragic, violent thing. All 

 animals and birds have a strong distrust and antipathy for 

 any queerness or irregularity among their own kind. Ex- 

 cept in rare cases, no animals or birds will tolerate any 

 cripple or deformed or sickly member among them. They 

 set upon him fiercely and drive him away. So when an 

 animal, grown old and feeble, feels the queerness of some 

 new thing stealing upon him, he slips away, in obedience to 

 a law of protection that he has noted all his life, and, know- 

 ing no such thing as death, thinks he is but escaping dis- 

 comfort when he lies down in hiding for the last time. 



A score of times, with both wild and domestic animals, I 

 have watched this and wondered. Sometimes it is entirely 

 unconscious, as with an old bear that I found one summer 

 who had laid him down for his winter sleep under the roots, 

 as usual, but did not waken when the snows were gone and 

 the spring sun called him cheerily. Sometimes it is a trium- 

 phant sense of cunning, as with certain ducks that, when 

 wounded, dive and grasp a root under water, and die there, 

 thinking how perfectly they escape their enemies. Some- 

 times it is a faint unknown instinct that calls them they 

 know not whither, as with the caribou, many of whom go 

 far away to a spot they have never seen, where generations 

 of their ancestors have preceded them, and there lie down 

 with the larches swaying above them gently, wondering why 

 they are so sleepy, and why they care not for good moss and 



