THE PLAY OF ANIMALS. 151 



contortions of the whole body, the erection of the head 

 and neck feathers — all this leads one to expect a life- 

 and-death struggle, and behold! they scarcely do more 

 than touch each other with the tips of their wings, very 

 rarely with the beak. They rage and storm like 

 Homeric gods, but with no result." 



According to Darwin, a competent observer goes so 

 far as to say of the Tetrao umbellus: " The contest of the 

 males was only a pretence arranged to display them- 

 selves advantageously before the admiring females col- 

 lected near, for I have never been able to discover a 

 mutilated hero, and seldom one with more than a 

 feather turned." * Brehm and Naumann f both contrib- 

 ute to the following description of the remarkable be- 

 haviour of the willow wren, sometimes called the fight- 

 ing wren, which before the pairing is a particularly 

 peaceable bird: "But this quality disappears entirely 

 as soon as the pairing time arrives; it is now that 

 they deserve their second name, for the males fight con- 

 tinually and with no apparent cause J — if not over the 

 female, over a fly, a worm, a beetle, a place to perch, 

 anything or nothing. It is just the same whether fe- 

 males are present or not, whether they enjoy absolute 

 freedom or are in captivity, whether they have been 

 taken a few hours ago or have lived in a cage for years. 

 In short, they fight at all times and under all circum- 

 stances. When free, they collect at an appointed spot; 

 usually a moist elevation covered with short grass and 

 about two metres in diameter is chosen for the arena, 

 and is resorted to several times daily by a certain num- 



* Descent of Man, ii, p. 48. 

 f Naumann, vii, p. 535. 



t Among students, to be called a dunce, to be jostled, or eyen 

 gazed at, is cause enough. 

 12 



