NOTES BY THE WAY. 155 



LOVE AND WAR AMONG THE BIRDS. 



IN the spring movements of the fishes up the 

 stream, toward their spawning beds, the females are 

 the pioneers, appearing some days in advance of the 

 males. With the birds the reverse is the case, the 

 males coming a week or ten days before the females. 

 The female fish is usually the larger and stronger, 

 and perhaps better able to take the lead ; among 

 most reptiles the same fact holds, and throughout the 

 insect world there is to my knowledge no exception 

 to the rule. Among the birds the only exception I 

 am aware of is in the case of the birds of prey. 

 Here the female is the larger and stronger. If you 

 see an exceptionally large and powerful eagle, rest 

 assured the sex is feminine. But higher in the scale 

 the male comes to the front and leads in size and 

 strength. 



But the first familiar spring birds are cocks ; hence 

 the songs and tilts and rivalries. Hence also the fact 

 that they are slightly in excess of the other sex, to 

 make up for this greater exposure ; apparently no 

 courting is done in the South, and no matches are 

 pre-arranged. The males leave irregularly without 

 ,iny hint, I suspect, to the females as to when and 

 where they will meet them. In the case of the pas- 

 senger pigeon, however, the two sexes travel to- 

 gether, as they do among the migrating water-fowls. 



With the song-birds, love-making begins as soon a 



