NATURAL HISTORY STUDIES 



paration of nest -making is followed up by the 

 patience of brooding, and that again by often 

 prolonged care, and even education. After brooding 

 there is the labour of feeding the young, which 

 often taxes to the utmost the energies of both 

 parents. Males away from the Bird-Berg, where 

 tens of thousands of guillemots lay their eggs on the 

 ledges of the cliffs, there is a " bank " where sand- 

 eels abound, and it is interesting to lie in a boat 

 and see the constant double stream of birds passing 

 overhead, all those returning to the cliffs having 

 a glistening fish in their mouth. We do not know 

 which most to wonder at, the appetite of the young- 

 sters, the unwearying industry of the parents, 

 or the supply of sand-eels. 



After the labour of feeding, comes the fine art of 

 education, for the young bird has always a great 

 deal to learn. Experiments have shown that the 

 young bird is not usually rich in inborn knowledge. 

 The chick hatched in an incubator, away from its 

 kind, has no inborn knowledge of the meaning of 

 its unseen mother's cluck. Even when thirsty it 

 does not recognize water as drinkable stuff, not 

 even when it walks through it. So innocent is it 

 that it will stuff its crop with worms of red worsted. 

 But it makes up for its small stock of ready-made 

 knowledge by an extraordinarily rapid power of 

 learning. And that is what the parent -birds work 

 with in educating their young in the ordinary 

 conditions of wild life. 



As all Mammals except the primitive duck-moles 

 and spiny ant-eaters bring forth their young alive, 



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