PROTECTIVE COLOURING 15 



naturally seeks the protection of something of like 

 colour to itself : a blue tit flies to the top of a tree, 

 to the green leaves and blue sky so does the 

 nuthatch ; a robin seeks the brown shade of a 

 bush or laurel so does a blackbird. Of this I 

 am sure, as I have had abundant opportunities of 

 observing it at my window ; and so I cannot help 

 thinking that this young robin may well have felt 

 some comfort and security in the proximity of my 

 dark red-brown dress. But alas ! it was a false 

 security ; for one day, when it was at my very 

 feet, an angry and jealous robin, after scolding 

 it violently from the top of a wall, dashed down 

 upon the poor little thing in the most savage 

 manner ; and, after a flying fight in the air which 

 I was helpless to prevent, drove it away. I saw 

 it two or throe times afterwards ; but it soon 

 left. 



It is a mystery to me why some robins should 

 be so strangely tame and some so savage. Is it 

 perhaps against robin-law that a member of the 

 community should seek human fellowship and 

 crumbs ? Is it that the hen robin has an ear but 

 no voice, and is attracted by the human voice, as 

 it is by that of its own kind ? Or is it that the 

 younger birds have to be taught to be afraid of 

 danger, and that the savage attack of the older 

 robin was merely a severe lesson ? Whether 



