260 MENTAL FACULTIES sec. 



is literally mad as long as the pairing time continues, he 

 screams unceasingly, so violently that his voice breaks down, 

 constantly scours his neighbourhood, and sees in every other 

 his rival in love, the most hateful of all adversaries." -^ But 

 the female is the greater rover ; the male remains within a 

 more limited range. The former "roves throughout the 

 whole summer, that is, as long as its egg-laying period lasts, 

 irregularly through the ranges of various males, attaches 

 herself to none, but abandons herself to all who please her, 

 waits not to be sought, but starts of her own accord to seek 

 adventures, and after her desire is satisfied pays no further 

 attention to the mate who has just shown her favour. A 

 female which I watched near Berlin, which was recognisable 

 through having had a tail feather shot away, visited, so far as I 

 could discover, the stations of no less than five males, but 

 probably extended her excursions still farther. Every other 

 female doubtless behaves in the same way, as other observa- 

 tions prove almost to certainty." " I have often," remarks 

 Walter, " seen a male in company with a female when she 

 extended her excursions to a more distant region, e.g. across a 

 large lake, suddenly desert her and fly back, at first in a wide 

 circle, and then in a straight line to his own district. If the 

 female had already laid an ^gg in the latter she returned 

 thither, although not till another day. Only in case she 

 could not find another nest in the neighbourhood of the one 

 first used, she remained longer away, and was not seen again 

 for days." " On the other hand, other females now pass con- 

 stantly through the same district, and thus every male, if not 

 by every, at all events by some female, has his desires 

 satisfied. These dissolute and vasjabond habits in the female 

 give, in my opinion, the most simple and most satisfactory 

 explanation of certain facts connected with the deposition of 

 the eggs, which have hitherto been mysterious." ^ These 



^ Ibid. p. 213. ^ Brehm, second edition, vol. iv, pp. 211, 212. 



