DOMESTICATED BIRDS 159 



their own Image in a looking-glass. I have had game-cocks 

 attack my hand when it was held near the ground and given 

 an up-and-down movement in imitation of their antao-onist's 

 head. 



I once reared a game-cock by hand, keeping him secluded 

 from his kind until he was adult. I then placed him in a 

 large collection of barnyard fowl where there were half a 

 dozen mongrel cocks, a drake of the muscovy variety, several 

 ganders, and two turkey-gobblers. Immediately and in rapid 

 succession he settled his accounts with the males of his own 

 kind. He shortly overcame the drake and the ganders. He 

 then devoted what was left of his forces to battles with the 

 turkeys. Here he found himself in great difficulty, for the 

 reason that these great birds would seize him by the head 

 and lift his body off the ground. However, he soon learned 

 an ingenious trick which protected him from this dan<yer. 

 When gathering breath in the intervals between his assaults, 

 he would hover himself between his antagonist's legs, keepino- 

 step with the awkward creature in its efforts to get away from 

 him. In a few days he wore out these doughty foemen and 

 remained the battered master of the field. 



Although the indomitable valor of the game-cock may be 

 in some measure due to the selection which the breeder has 

 applied to the variety, there can be no question that it is 

 essentially natural to the species and is the result of an age- 

 long habit which in the nativfe wilds of the creature did much 

 to insure its safety. The antiquity of the state of mind may 

 be judged by the perfection to which the spurs have attained 

 and the remarkably skilful and definite way in which the 

 creatures use them. The spur, which has arisen from the 

 development of the scales and underlying bone of the bird's 



