The Eye sees what it comes to see. 143 



path in a lane with hedges each side a robin will dart 

 out of the hawthorn and pick up a worm or grub 

 almost under your feet ; then in his alarm at your 

 presence drop it, and rush back in a flutter. Other 

 birds will do the same thing, from which it would 

 seem that the old saying that the eye sees what it 

 comes to see is as applicable to them as to human 

 beings. Their eyes, ever on the watch for food, 

 instantly detect a tiny creeping thing several yards 

 distant, though concealed by grass ; but the com- 

 paratively immense bulk of a man appears to escape 

 notice till they fly almost up against it. 



I fancy that the hive bee and some kindred insects 

 have a special faculty of seeing color at a distance, 

 and that colors attract them. It can hardly be scent, 

 because when flowers are placed in a room and the 

 window left open the wind generally blows strongly 

 into the apartment, and odors will not travel against 

 a breeze. It seems natural that in both cases the 

 continual watch for certain things should enable bird 

 and insect to observe the faintest indication. Slugs, 

 caterpillars, and such creatures, too, in moving 

 among the grass, cause a slight agitation of the 

 grass-blades ; they lift up a leaf by crawling under 

 it, or depress it with their weight by getting on it. 

 This may enable the bird to detect their presence, 

 even when quite hidden by the herbage, experience 

 having taught it that when grass is moved by the 

 wind broad patches sway simultaneously, but when 

 an insect or caterpillar is the agent only a single leaf 

 or blade is stirred. 



At the farmhouse here, robins, wrens, and tomtits 

 are always hanging about the courtyard, especially 



