DOMESTICATED BIRDS 157 



homing instinct prevents them from wandering from their 

 accustomed places to take up again with a wilderness life. 



In their adhesion to domestication our common fowls 

 differ in a remarkable way from all other of our captive 

 animals except the dog, and these birds are * even more 

 ineradicably attached to man than their older companion. 

 While the dog will sometimes become half wild, or, as we 

 may phrase it, undomiciled, fowls seem incapable of maintain- 

 ing themselves apart from human care. In much ranging 

 of the wilderness I have never found one of these creatures 

 more than a thousand feet away from a human habitation. 

 When we consider how common must be the chances of 

 their going astray, and how easy it is in many parts of the 

 country, as in our Southern States, for them to obtain in 

 the wilderness food throughout the year, the fact that they 

 never go wild is indeed remarkable. It can only be explained 

 by the great development of the homing instinct which man 

 has brought about in their sympathetic souls. 



Although our unnatural process of breeding has done 

 much to degrade the original beauty of the cocks and hens, 

 destroying the delicate coloration of the feathers as well as 

 the admirable blending and contrasts of their pristine hues, 

 it seems likely that the effect on the physical and mental 

 development as a whole has not been unfavorable. Though 

 less courageous, they are stronger creatures than in their wild 

 state ; they are clearly more fecund ; they are gentler natured; 

 and, so far as I have been able to compare the high-bred with 

 the primitive forms, their range of expression through the 

 voice has been much increased, a feature which may be 

 noted in other domesticated species of birds, as, for instance, 

 in the canaries. The most remarkable alteration which has 



