Organic Natures Riddle 321 



psychical state analogous to what I have before denominated 

 * consentience.' Now, as to the lower animals : birds unques- 

 tionably possess instinctive powers. Chickens, two minutes 

 after they have left the Q^^g} will follow with their eyes the 

 movements of crawling insects, and peck at them, judging 

 distance and direction with almost infallible accuracy. They 

 will instinctively appreciate sounds, readily running towards 

 an invisible hen hidden in a box, when they hear her ' call.' 

 Some young birds, also, have an innate, instinctive horror 

 of the sight of a hawk and of the sound of its voice. 

 Swallows, titmice, tomtits, and wrens, after having been 

 confined from birth, are capable of flying successfully at 

 once, when liberated, on their wings having attained the 

 necessary growth to render flight possible. The Duke of 

 Argyll 2 relates some very interesting particulars about the 

 instincts of birds, especially of the water ousel, the merganser, 

 and the wild duck. Even as to the class of beasts the follow- 

 ing case has been recorded:^ ' Five young polecats were found 

 comfortably embedded in dry withered grass ; and in a side 

 hole, of proper dimensions for such a larder, were forty frogs 

 and two toads, all alive, but merely capable of sprawling a 

 little. On examination the whole number, toads and all, 

 proved to have been purposely and dexterously bitten through 

 the brain.' Evidently the parent polecat had thus provided 

 the young with food which could be kept perfectly fresh, 

 because alive, and yet was rendered quite unable to escape. 

 This singular instinct is like others which are yet more 

 fully developed amongst insects — a class of animals the 

 instincts of which are so numerous, wonderful, and noto- 

 rious that it will be, probably, enough to refer to one or 

 two examples. The female carpenter bee, in order to 



^ As Mr. Spalding has shown. To him I am indebted for the other facts 

 about young birds given in the text. 

 2 The Unity of Nature, chap. iii. 

 2 See Magazine of Natural History, vol. vi. p. 206. 



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