THE MIGRATION OF BIRDS 



a train, it may find its way back. It is true, how- 

 ever, that we do not hear very much of the cats who 

 left their second home and did not return to their 

 first home. If a hive-bee, issuing from the hive, be 

 caught and imprisoned in a box and put into a 

 pocket, and be thus transported for an intricate 

 half-mile, and then released, it ascends into the air, 

 and makes a " bee-line " for home. The " homing " 

 of pigeons is alsc* a certainty, and the value of it is 

 not lessened by knowing that the power can be 

 greatly increased by training. But if we suppose 

 that birds have in a high degree the sense of direc- 

 tion and the homing faculty, we are not, of course, 

 explaining the wonder of the migratory bird's 

 success in way-finding, we are only saying that it 

 does not stand so much alone as it seemed at first 

 to do. 



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