I2O Instinct and its Lessons 



for that by its very idea requires an instinctive prin- 

 ciple which is not habit. 



In such a case as this, we are therefore in presence 

 of instinct utterly divorced from those conditions in 

 which knowledge can be imparted. Yet how much do 

 creatures in such circumstances practically understand. 

 The Chicken will chip the shell, which to animals 

 stronger and more experienced than itself would be a 

 hopeless dungeon. Emerged from the shell, it knows 

 how to peck and run. I think it is White, of Selborne, 

 who says that if held up to a window it will eagerly 

 devour flies, but refuse a Wasp. That young ducks 

 will take to the water, in spite of all teaching, many a 

 perturbed foster-mother of a hen can witness. Young 

 cocks will spar before their spurs are grown ; and young 

 adders raise themselves to strike, when, as yet, they 

 have no fangs. A young Water-ousel taken from the 

 nest and brought to the water will dive and find hiding- 

 places to crouch in, as though familiar with the work. 

 Young wild-fowl hatched in captivity, as we may see in 

 the London parks, descrying a large bird in the air, will 

 at once take the alarm, hiding in the grass or skulking 

 in broken ground, so as to make themselves as incon- 

 spicuous as possible to a Hawk; providing against a 

 danger which they have not experienced, by a device 

 which they never have been taught. Young Gold-crests, 

 frightened suddenly from the nest they have never yet 

 left, will show themselves equally at home amongst the 

 foliage of a fir-tree, fluttering from twig to twig, and 

 running along branches with extreme dexterity. As the 

 Dipper in the water, and the Gold-crest among the firs, 

 so the young Swallow finds himself at home in the air. 

 Only two days ago an experience to this effect befell me 

 with a House-martin. A nest with young ones, being 

 found in the first week of October, 1 I observed it daily 

 to see whether, as in some cases, the migratory instinct 

 would overcome the parental, and induce the old birds 



1 1888. 



