xviii INTRODUCTION. 



of blind Instinct* being solely employed in the fabrication of birds' nests is 

 not supported by one particle of proof. I do not for one moment deny the 

 existence of true instinct in some cases ; but so far as birds' nests are 

 concerned, no powers are revealed in their fabrication beyond those which 

 we ourselves possess in a higher or lower degree. A young Duck taking 

 to the water or a nestling Plover crouching to the earth and remaining 

 motionless are good examples of true instinct, or action performed without 

 instruction, experience, or previously acquired knowledge. In the same 

 manner a bird's impulse to build a nest is instinctive ; but the means it 

 adopts to carry out such an impulse are controlled by similar mental 

 faculties to those possessed by man. Mr. Wallace's theory that birds 

 do not make their nests instinctively, but by imitating the nests in which 

 they were reared that if they never saw or were not brought up in a nest 

 peculiar to their species they would be unable to construct one for them- 

 selves similar in position, form, and materials is probably the true solution 

 of this interesting problem. 



The question arises, How do birds build their nest, and especially their 

 first nest ? is it by blind Instinct or by other mental faculties ? To credit 

 the bird with such instinct, which because it seems so self-evident is taken to 

 be matter of fact, is to admit that it possesses intellectual powers infinitely 

 superior to those of man ; whilst the evidence that can be gathered on the 

 subject all goes to show that its intellectual powers are of precisely the 

 same kind as man's, but some of them, of course, are infinitely inferior in 

 degree, whilst others are unquestionably superior. Reason in birds can 

 only be regarded as rudimentary, though there is undoubted evidence of 

 its existence. The faculties a bird brings into play in nest-building are 

 probably these : the one that plays the greatest part is imitation, and the 

 next important faculty of the mind is memory, both of which are distinct 

 from what is popularly called reason, which together with hereditary habit 

 play the minor parts. All these powers are found in man, but, with the 

 exception of reason, in a much less pronounced degree, especially in civilized 

 man, in whom it has to a large extent replaced the lower faculties ; for the 



[* I am not able to understand what Mr. Dixon means by Instinct, and therefore do 

 not agree with his remarks on this faculty in various parts of the chapter. I regard the 

 word Instinct as the popular term for the mysterious impulses which scientific men call 

 Hereditary Habit ; and I think that it plays a great part, an overwhelmingly great part, 

 not only in Bird-nest building, but in every other action of every animal, man included. 

 Whether the explanation of Hereditary Habit be that it is transmitted unconscious 

 memory (see Butler's ' Life and Habit,' p. 198) is another question. All one can say 

 is, that this is a plausible hypothesis which, in the entire absence of any other, may 

 provisionally be accepted. If Hereditary Habit have the lion's share in the production of 

 a bird's nest, we must also allow that Memory, Imitation, and a rudimentary form of 

 Reason also play their subordinate parts. H. S.] 



