216 HABITS OF BIRDS. 



or teaching them of what animals to be afraid, the 

 same remarks will apply. We have seen, for ex- 

 ample, a young brood of the gallinule (Gallinula 

 chloropus, LINN.), evidently not above two days 

 old, dive instantaneously, even before the watchful 

 mother seemed to have time to warn them of our 

 approach, and certainly before she followed them 

 under water. The same thing occurs in other 

 parts of nature : thus we have observed a shoal 

 of salmon fry, whose size was less than that of 

 minnows, and whose age we knew could be only 

 a few days, as we had witnessed the deposition 

 of the spawn whence they were hatched, all simul- 

 taneously exhibiting alarm, and running under the 

 over-hanging brow of a stream for protection ; yet 

 this could not be the consequence of the instruction 

 of their mother, whom they had never seen, and who 

 was far on her way to the sea, thirty miles off, before 

 they had been hatched*. 



We think it highly probable that the instances of 

 the eagle and the stork, above quoted, admit of a 

 similar solution into instinctive motives independent 

 of instruction. Even the case of the hen who leads 

 her chickens so assiduously to where they may find 

 food, though it appears to be more like instruction 

 than the instances of the eagle and the stork, is 

 far from being conclusive ; for chickens which are 

 hatched artificially seem to be at no loss in learning 

 to feed, though they have no mother ; and ducks 

 hatched under a hen will take the water in spite of 

 her most anxious warnings. 



The swallows and sparrows, which, from building 

 in our houses, are more under common observation 

 than most wild birds, may readily be fancied to be 

 seen instructing their young to fly. The whole 

 family may have got out of the nest and have perched 

 * J.R. 



