UNIVERSITY 



FACTORS IN ANIMAL LIFE 



Not until he has learned to resign himself to the 

 water as the animal does, and to go on all fours, 

 can he swim. As soon as the boy ceases to struggle 

 against his tendency to sink, assumes the horizontal 

 position, and strikes out as the animal does, with but 

 one thought, and that to apply his powers of locomo 

 tion to the medium about him, he swims as a matter 

 of course. It is said that children have sometimes 

 been known to swim when thrown into the water. 

 Their animal instincts were not thwarted by their 

 powers of reflection. Doubtless this never happened 

 to a grown person. Moreover, is it not probable that 

 the specific gravity of the hairless human body 

 is greater than that of the hair-covered animal, and 

 that it sinks, while that of the cat or dog floats ? 

 This, with the erect position of man, makes swim 

 ming with him an art that must be acquired. 



There is no better illustration of the action of 

 instinct as opposed to conscious intelligence than 

 is afforded by the parasitic birds, the cuckoo in 

 Europe and the cowbird in this country, birds that 

 lay their eggs in the nests of other birds. Darwin 

 speculates as to how this instinct came about, but 

 whatever may have been its genesis, it is now a fixed 

 habit among these birds. Moreover, the instinct of 

 the blind young alien, a day or two after it is hatched, 

 to throw or crowd its foster-brothers out of the nest 

 is a strange and anomalous act, and is as untaught 

 and unreasoned as anything in vegetable life. But 

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