" Mistakeyi Instinct / " 103 



thing else. But " mistaken instinct " is a contradic- 

 tion in terms under any true definition of instinct 

 that we can think of. Mistaken here only means lack 

 of instinct and failure of reason which is not able to 

 make up for its absence. Yet we have cases of Birds, 

 as, for example, the reed-warbler we have told of, 

 that twice, not being able to turn out the intruded 

 eggs, built them over and removed them from the in- 

 fluence of the heat of its own body necessary to hatch 

 them. Here, surely, instinct and reason worked to- 

 gether to one end : not so in the cases Mr. Darwin 

 includes under "mistaken instinct." 



To Von Hartmann's definition of instinct, that it 

 is action taken in pursuance of an end, but without 

 conscious perception of what the " end is," Mr. 

 Romanes supplies the rider, that it is the uniformity 

 of instinctive action as performed by different indi- 

 viduals of the same species. As in all such cases of 

 definition, you"find assumptions contradicted by what 

 are meant to be qualifying clauses. Thus, even Von 

 Hartmann's " action taken in pursuance of an end " is 

 reason which he thus maladroitly qualifies by " with- 

 out conscious perception of what the end is." But how 

 can an end be pursued without more or less conscious 

 seeing what it is ? And Mr. Romanes then comes in 

 with a rider, in regard to which we would ask, is the 

 tendency of the members of the cuckoo tribe to in- 

 cubate an instinct, or is it not ? And in that case, 

 what is it, seeing that his " uniformity " of instinctive 

 action, as performed by different individuals of the 

 same species, will not here hold ? And all this points 

 to a more general question still. How are these 

 gentlemen to define strictly and consistently these 



