WILD LIFE OF ORCHARD AND FIELD 



are first to respond and start off, because they are 

 free of care ; and they keep well in advance, because 

 strong of wing. It is often ten days or a fortnight 

 after these jolly old fellows appear before the bulk 

 of the species they represent passes through our 

 fields, and these are mainly females and young 

 family or neighborhood parties that have kept 

 in company; and the last that are seen are al- 

 most invariably nestlings of the past season. There 

 is, then, no mystery as to the young; they are 

 guided by their elders or else they are lost. 



But how do the elders find their way? A full 

 answer to that question might take us back to the 

 beginning of things, and then not be satisfactory; 

 but we need not attempt so much. Let us say 

 simply that they have been taught the route and 

 remember it. If you care to believe that long in- 

 heritance has given them a special aptness towards 

 geography, I shall not object ; and this may amount 

 almost to a faculty in some cases, as those of sea- 

 crossing species. Such cases are not readily ex- 

 plained; nor is the ability of the human natives 

 of the South African veldt or the American forests 

 to strike a straight course to camp through an 

 unmarked wilderness. Nevertheless, I do not be- 

 lieve that birds have any special or peculiar "sense 



no 



