134 THE FINCHES 



others have advanced more refinedly in this direction, expunged the 

 grosser element of food from the meeting bills, and made the touch a 

 kiss. If birds (and they are many) who go through this form do not 

 kiss, then neither do we. The thing is so obvious that those who 

 have seen it and still dream of human superiority in this respect, 

 must be altogether mastered, as many indeed are, by the charms of 

 this train of thought. Birds and men kiss, then I do not know that 

 others of our earth do and, in either case, probably, the custom 

 began in something quite practical. Do any male birds who are 

 bound by no duty of feeding their young act in this way when they 

 court? Does the ostrich or talegallus, the duck or the plover, the 

 guinea-fowl, pheasant, partridge, or any other of the Gallince? If 

 not, then this, as I hold, supports my view as to the origin of such 

 affectionate behaviour in others, since, for a superstructure, there 

 must needs first have been a foundation. On the other hand, 

 birds such as pigeons who most bill and coo, are assiduous feeders 

 of their offspring, as are those also who feed their mates, whilst 

 in some the two habits in question kissing and conjugal feeding 

 are combined, or the one seems passing into the other. There are 

 the gulls, for instance, and the parrots or, at any rate, some of 

 them. 



But does any British finch kiss ? I believe, without disparage- 

 ment to the others, that the bullfinch does, since it is not always, 

 when the birds touch their bills, that there is anything more solid 

 between them. Often, when one may have thought otherwise, it has 

 not been so. He has bent over her, with black lips parted, and 

 she has raised hers to his, and they have met, but that was all 

 there was no food ; it was a kiss. Such was unmistakably the 

 opinion of Naumann, who was well acquainted with bullfinches in 

 freedom and captivity, and reports of them, alike in both, that they 

 often " zartlich mit einander tdndeln und sich schnabeln " (tenderly bill 

 and caress one another). Were feeding here the explanation, it 

 would imply inaccuracy either of statement or observation, neither 



