WILD LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY. 325 



your approach to suppose that the robin does not 

 know that the cuckoo is not of its order is past credit. 

 The robin is much too intelligent. Why, then, does he 

 feed the intruder ? There is something here approach- 

 ing to the sentiment of humanity, as we should call 

 it, towards the fellow-creature. 



The cuckoo remained in the cage for some time after 

 it had attained sufficient size to shift for itself, but 

 the robins did not desert it : they clearly understood 

 that while thus confined it had no power of obtaining 

 food, and must starve. Unfortunately, a cat at last 

 discovered the cuckoo, which was found on the ground 

 dead, but not eaten. The robins came to the spot 

 afterwards not with food, but as if they missed their 

 charge. 



The easy explanation of a blind instinct is not satis- 

 factory to me. On the other hand, the doctrine of 

 heredity hardly explains the facts, because how few 

 birds' ancestors can have had experience in cuckoo- 

 rearing ! There is no analogy with the cases of goats 

 and other animals suckling strange species ; because 

 in those instances there is the motive at all events 

 in the beginning of relief from the painful pressure 

 of the milk. But the robins had no such interested 

 motive ; all their interests were to get rid of their 

 visitor. May we not suppose, then, that what was 

 begun through the operation of hereditary instinct 

 <that is, the feeding of the cuckoo, while still small and 

 before the young robins had been ejected was con- 

 tinued from an affection that gradually grew up for 



