THE 00 LOG I ST. 



23 



fection, fright, or jealousy ; still others be- 

 lieve It to be the necessary ajj;eiit in obtain- 

 ing and maintaining their eqnilibrium which 

 seems, upon consideration, to be the real 

 cause. Dr. Cones, in connection with his 

 paper on the Solitary Sandpiper, indulges 

 in an elaborate rumination upon this odd 

 characteristic, which is worth reading by 

 all young ornithologists : 



" These Tattlers indulge on all occasions 

 a propensity tor nodding, like Lord Bnr- 

 leigh or the Chinese maiidai'ins in front of 

 tea shops ; and when they see sometliing 

 they cannot quite make out, seem to reason 

 with themselves, and finally come to a con- 

 clusion in tiiis way ; impressing themselves 

 l)eavily with a sense of their own logic. 

 They go through the bowing exercise with 

 a gravity that may quite upset that of a dis- 

 interested spectator, and yet all through the 

 performance, so ludicrous in itself, contrive 

 to preserve sometliing of the passive sedate- 

 ness that marks all their movements. This 

 bobbing of the head and foreparts is the 

 correspondent and countei-part of the still 

 morecurioiis actions of the Spotted Tattlers 

 or ' Tip-ups,' as they are a})tly called, iVom 

 this circumstance ; a queei' lialancing of the 

 body upon the legs, constituting an amuse- 

 ment of which these last-liamed birds are 

 extremely tbiul. As oiten as the Tip-up, 

 or ' Teeter-tail,' as it is also called, stops in 

 its pursuit of insects, the lore part of the 

 body is lowered a little, the head drawn in, 

 the legs silently bent, whilst the hinder parts 

 and tail are alternately hoisted with a pe- 

 culiar jerk, and drawn down again, with 

 the regiUai'ity of clock-work. The move- 

 ment is more conspicuous in the upward 

 than in the downward part of the perform- 

 ance ; as if the tail were spring-hinged, in 

 constant danger of flying up, and needing 

 constant presence of mind to keep it down. 

 It is aumsing to see an old male in the 

 I)reeding season busy with this operation. 

 Upon some rock jutting out of the water he 

 stands, swelling with amorous pride and 

 self-sufficiency, puffing out his plumage till' 

 he looks twice as big as natui'al, facing a- 

 bout on his narrow pedestal, and bowing 



with his hinder parts to all points of the 

 compass. A sensitive and fastidious per- 

 son might see something derisive, if not ac- 

 tually insulting, in this, and feel as Crusoe 

 may be presumed to have felt when the sav- 

 ages who attacked his ship in canoes show- 

 ed the signs of contumaceous scorn that De- 

 Foe records. But it would not be worth 

 while to feel offended, since this is only the 

 entirely oi-iginal and peculiar way the Tip- 

 up has ol" conducting his courtships. Or- 

 nithologists are not agi-eed upon the usefnl 

 purpose subserved in this way, and have as 

 yet failed to account for the extraordinary 

 performance." 



The Other Side. 



TVTILL TiiK (/oLOGisT allow me to offset 

 Mr. Severance's example of total de- 

 pravity among birds by another to which I 

 was eye-witness? On the loth of April, 

 1875, a pair of House Sparrows had built 

 a nest in a bird box on tlie edge of our Pub- 

 lic (harden exactly opposite 85 Boylstou 

 Street, Boston, and had hatched out a 

 brood oi' young ones, which were then 

 nearly Ih'dged. Austin Sunmer, Esq., who 

 lives at No. Hi^^ called my attention to the 

 untbi-tunate fate of this family. A pair of 

 Blue-birds came and ousted the entire lot 

 upon the ground below, and they were im- 

 mediately killed by the fall. Th.e Blue-birds 

 at once appi-opriated the box to their own 

 use, and are occupying it the present year. 

 ]Mr. Snnmer's whole family witn'essed the 

 performance, and I was called to see the 

 dead birds on the ground within an hour of 

 their untimely end. Now as I do not be- 

 lieve that either Blue-birds or Sparrows 

 have any moral responsibility or any sense 

 of right or wrong, I cannot, consistently 

 with my faith, call these Blue-birds nmr- 

 derers and thieves. Both, acting on the 

 prom{)tings which their creator has planted 

 in their little breasts, did as their nature in- 

 cited them. In this Wrens, Blue-birds, 

 White-bellied Swallows and Sparrows are 

 all alike. Thomas M. Brewek. 



