28 INTRODUCTION. 



character of reason, that those things can be said of 

 them. 



The unreasoning productions of nature, whether ani- 

 mal or vegetable, need no teaching. Those powers 

 which are given them for the maintenance of then- 

 being, are perfect ; and the farther they recede from 

 man, the more astonishing is the perfection. We read 

 of old lions teaching young ones to rend their prey, of 

 old eagles teaching their young ones to fly in circles 

 and to stoop on their quarry ; and that animals may 

 have been found in situations that would tempt those 

 who look upon every part of animal conduct as if it 

 were human, to come to such conclusions, is very pos- 

 sible. But any such means are unnecessary ; for what- 

 ever may be the natural habits of the animal, it will 

 assume them with the most unerring certainty, though 

 it has never seen them practised. Nobody ever heard 

 of a cat being complained of as a mouser, because it 

 had been separated from its mother before she had ini- 

 tiated it in that art. Ducklings that have been hatched 

 under a hen, take to the water, in spite of all her warn- 

 ings to the contrary. The cuckoo, when hatched by 

 the hedge-sparrow, turns all its companions out of the 

 nest ; but the sparrow, true to her instinct, feeds and 

 cherishes the unnatural intruder ; while it, equally true 

 to its instinct, flies to pass the winter in unknown re- 

 gions without a guide, and returns the next season to 

 deposit its egg in perhaps the nest of its foster-mother. 

 As we descend in the scale, the instinct becomes still 

 more perfect, at least still more wonderful. The fly 

 deposits its egg in the substance which is best adapted 

 for nourishing its young, whether that be a leaf, a tree, 



