212 Wild Birds 



select agreeable insects and dabs of meal, but to reject shining 

 tacks, burnt match ends, and stinging bees. It learns to asso- 

 ciate a definite experience with a definite object, and by con- 

 trolling its actions to profit by the experiences thus acquired. 

 In other words, it displays associative memory, which marks the 

 dawn of intelligence, and, as some students believe, of conscious- 

 ness also. Any animal which can learn or be taught accord- 

 ingly possesses memory of this kind. 



The wild bird learns to eat certain things, to avoid certain 

 enemies, to start at certain sounds, to ignore others; the young 

 Kingfisher even acquires the habit of walking backward (see 

 Chapter X.), while its instincts lead it to walk forward. It learns 

 to drink by first getting its bill wet, possibly by picking off 

 drops of dew from the grass, and by raising its head starts the 

 swallowing reflex. 



The mental life of animals is like a piece of fine weaving, in 

 which the original strands have been so often replaced by others 

 of different quality that the texture and pattern have been 

 essentially changed, and this change is going on all the time. 

 In animals standing as high as the birds, experience quickly 

 modifies the instincts, which, as we have seen, may be changed 

 or virtually replaced by habits. It should not therefore sur- 

 prise us if a bird's second nest were more nearly perfect than 

 its first, or if the third should prove better than the second, but 

 this would also depend upon other conditions. 



The power of forming habits is a sign of intelligence, but not 

 necessarily of reason in any of its higher grades or levels. The 

 intelligence may be a small grain and never destined to grow 

 into a flourishing tree of knowledge, but it must exist along with 

 the power of putting any experience to profitable use. 



The habits acquired by one generation are probably never 

 handed on to the next, but this is a subject about which the 

 dust of argument has not yet cleared away. 



The life of birds is one of instinct irradiated by gleams of in- 

 telligence. Their mental faculties exhibit a wide range of grada- 

 tion from excessive stupidity to a fair degree of intelligence, with 

 strong associative powers, rarely if ever the association of ideas 



