DISCUSSIONS ON INSTINCT 283 
offered. Repeatedly, before these small chickens, not 
twenty-four hours from the shell, and before they had 
been offered food, I have filled their shallow water-tray, 
and observed them toddle out to it, peck at it, or at 
once thrust their bills into it, to drink at once by up- 
lifting their heads, as all adult fowls do, the hen never 
putting her head out from the bars, or showing these 
young chicks how to do what they instinctively did. 
I have made the same experiments repeatedly with 
food, with the same result, 7.2. that chicks instinctively 
drink and eat without any example being set by the 
mother hen. Henry W. ELLIOTT. 
LakKEwoop, Ou10, 11th March 1896. 
THE INSTINCT OF PECKING. 
In discussing Prof. Morgan’s lecture on “ Instinct,” it 
has several times been stated that chickens pecked 
instinctively, but had to be taught to drink. There 
was a note in Nature last year, concerning some species 
of Asiatic pheasants—it may possibly have been the 
Jungle Fowl—to the effect that the young did not 
peck instinctively, and did not offer to take food 
spread before them. The natives seem aware of this 
peculiarity, and in the particular instance recorded, a 
native induced the young birds to peck by tapping on 
the ground with a pencil near the food. They seemed 
attracted by the sound and movement, and were thus 
induced to peck at the food. F, A. LUCAS. 
“ ScimNCE,” 13th March 1896. 
