590 



NATURE 



[January 6, 192 1 



It must be acknowledged that since the con- 

 clusion of the war there has been a remark- 

 able development in public opinion as to the 

 importance and value of education. The 

 demand for secondary education has increased 

 enormously, and the claims for admission 

 to technical colleges and universities have 

 been almost too great for their resources in teach- 

 ing staff and equipment. In the year 1913-14 the 

 number of full-time university students in the 

 British Isles was roughly 30,000, or about 65 per 

 10,000 of population. The figures available for 

 the year 1918-19 show that the number of 

 students had almost reached 40,000. The number 

 of students per 10,000 of population had jumped to 

 8-6; almost one in every thousand was receiving 

 university training. 



There has been but slight consideration given 

 in the Report of the Select Committee to the 

 enormous rise in the cost of materials and equip- 

 ment, especially in reference to the secondary 

 schools and technical institutions, during and since 

 the war, nor has sufficient weight been given to 

 the necessary rise in the salaries of the teaching 

 staff due to the increased cost of living. This 

 item alone accounts for 2i,ooo,oooZ. in the esti- 

 mated expenditure. If the schools and the higher 

 institutions of learning are to be staffed efficiently 

 with well educated and trained men and women, 

 adequate salaries and prospects, and an assured 

 provision such as the Teachers (Superannuation) 

 Act affords for the time when they are no longer 

 capable of rendering effective service, must be 

 offered. 



Mr. Fisher in a recent interview shows conclu- 

 sively with regard to the Report in question that 

 there are adequate safeguards in respect of ex- 

 travagant expenditure both on the part of the 

 Board of Education and on that of the public 

 represented by the ratepayer. The nation will be 

 well advised to encourage by all the means in its 

 power the desire which is so plainly manifest for a 

 longer life in the schools and for the advantages 

 of an efficient secondary and university education 

 for those who are qualified, to receive it. Now 

 that the war is over we are entering upon a serious 

 and strenuous time, when all the trained brain 

 power at our command will be needed to meet 

 the competition which we shall assuredly be called 

 upon to face, and after all, as Mr. Fisher truly 

 said in the interview before alluded to, "a nation 

 which can afford to spend 400 millions a year 

 upon drink and 100 millions upon tobacco is not 

 quite at the end of its resources. " 

 NO. 2671, VOL. 106] 



O' 



Territory and Bird Behaviour. 



Terriiory in Bird Life. By H. Eliot Howard. 

 Pp. xiii-(-3o8. (London: John Murray, 1920.) 

 Price 2 IS. net. 



N the publication of his " British Warblers " 

 (1907-14) Mr. H. Eliot Howard took rank 

 as a naturalist of marked ability, as an observer 

 who could be trusted, and as an interpreter well 

 trained in scientific method, fertile in suggestion, 

 cautious in application, and, above all, insistent 

 on the importance of keeping in close touch with 

 the evidence afforded by patient and systematic 

 field-work. A salient outcome of his monograph 

 was a re-grouping of the phenomena presented by 

 birds in their breeding haunts around a concept 

 of "territory." He has now marshalled the evi- 

 dence in favour of this hypothesis in a work which 

 neither the biologist nor the comparative psycho- 

 logist can afford to neglect. 



To grasp Mr. Howard's root idea, we must 

 recall the familiar routine of a bird's behaviour — 

 and it is clearly with behaviour that observation 

 must primarily deal. There is an orderly sequence 

 the biological value or utility of which is centred 

 in race-maintenance. Within this we can readily 

 distinguish successive phases which are contribu- 

 tory to the routine as a whole. In the life of the 

 wide-range migrant there is departure from t'.ie 

 south, arrival in England, settling down in some 

 part of the country, mating, sexual union, nest- 

 building, incubation, feeding and rearing of off- 

 spring, and then departure from the breeding' 

 quarters to the south. .\11 this is familiar enougn. 

 But closer observation discloses other facts. The 

 males arrive in advance of the females ; each male 

 settles down in a restricted area within which 

 some bush or tree is thenceforth his headquarters ; 

 the extent of this area is determined by the range 

 of flight in oft-repeated excursions from the head- 

 quarters, and constitutes the "territory," which 

 varies in size according to the species; the male 

 bird is intolerant of any intruder into this terri- 

 tory, especially of a male of his species, fights him, 

 and drives him out ; he sings with maximum vigour 

 at headquarters before any female is in evidence ; 

 this expression in song makes an attractive im- 

 pression on some hen bird when she arrives in 

 migration from the south; she becomes his mate, 

 lives with him within the territory, and helps to 

 drive out intruders. Mating is consummated, a 

 nest built, and a brood reared within the territory, 

 which affords, in the main, sustenance to the 

 family; and in due season they depart. Now, of 

 course, the sexual act may be regarded as the 

 pivot on which the whole system of behaviour 

 turns. But Mr. Howard contends that, to change 



