Taming Wild Birds without a Cage 229 



takes food from their hand. Such persons are popularly sup- 

 posed to possess a mysterious power of fascination or a superior 

 knowledge of woodcraft, but all this belongs in the catalogue of 

 vulgar errors. It depends less upon the individuality of the 

 person than that of the animal. Individual variation knows 

 hardly a limit, whether in man or beast. Some birds are natu- 

 rally tame and confiding, while their next-door neighbors of the 

 same kin and living in the same field may possess a temperament 

 of such an opposite character as to baffle every attempt to 

 dispel their fears. 



The power of remaining motionless like a stone or stump in 

 the woods is often enough to win the temporary confidence of 

 both mammal and bird, and many will doubtless recall illustra- 

 tions of this fact from their own experience. This suggests an 

 early episode which impressed itself rather strongly at the time. 

 With raised fishing-pole in hand I was sitting quietly by the 

 river, possibly watching the common sunfish or bream standing 

 guard over their nests, which they defend with such fiery pug- 

 nacity, when I suddenly had a "bite." Looking up, I saw a 

 Kingbird comfortably perched on the end of my rod. He 

 doubtless had a nest in the alders close by. 



It is easy to conceive a state in which all animals would be 

 tame, but it would not be the state of nature known to us which 

 has developed under the laws of battle, the survival of the 

 strongest, the wariest, the best protected or concealed, or the 

 most intelligent. The higher animals either prey on one an- 

 other or on the helpless invertebrates, or are preyed upon, and 

 with most, tameness would soon lead to extinction. Wildness 

 or wariness is not only the law of their nature, but the very 

 condition of their existence. The animal which fails to profit 

 by experience, or at least to the extent of learning caution, and 

 thus displaying the rudiments of intelligence, must go to the 

 wall, unless the conditions of its life are exceptional or nature 

 grants it some extraordinary favor in the form of instincts, 

 great reproductive powers, or protective coloring. 



While most animals are wild in the state of nature and 

 many are almost untamable, a comparatively large number 



