LOVE AND COURTSHIP AMONG BIRDS. 273 



quered foe, but remorselessly kills the adversary who has been 

 incapacitated for further combat or for flight. Even those appa- 

 rently most harmless creatures, the swifts, occasionally kill their 

 rivals, for in their struggles, which are precisely like those of the 

 eagles and falcons, they strike their sharp claws into the breasts of 

 their foes, and tear the flesh so that the death of the wounded one 

 often results. 



Among all birds with voices the combat is preceded by a definite 

 challenge. Even the song of a singing bird is a weapon with which 

 he may gain a bloodless victory; the pairing-cry, which so well 

 expresses wooing, always excites jealousy. Whoever can imitate 

 the call of the cuckoo may entice the usually cautious bird to the 

 very tree under which he is standing. Whoever can adequately 

 mimic the complex whistle of the golden oriole, the cooing of the 

 wild pigeon and turtle-dove, the drumming of the woodpeckers 

 in a word, the wooing song or call-note of any bird may achieve 

 a similar result. When a second suitor appears on the scene he 

 announces his arrival by calling or singing. But he soon proceeds 

 to action; and thenceforward there rages between him and his rival 

 a strife as violent as those already described. In mad fury, calling, 

 screaming, and screeching, one chases the other hither and thither, 

 high in mid-air or in lower strata of the atmosphere, between tree- 

 tops or among the bushes, and just as in the pursuit of the female, 

 so in this chase one male provokes the other to passionate rage by 

 challenging calls, and even by song, by displaying his decorations, 

 and by other mocking behaviour. If the pursuer succeeds in catch- 

 ing his flying foe, he pecks him so hard with his bill that the 

 feathers fly about; if he lets him go, the pursued one turns in a 

 trice and renews the attack; if neither gives way they maul one 

 another thoroughly, whether they are in the air, among the branches, 

 or on the ground. Among them, too, the struggle is finally aban- 

 doned only when the female declares for one or other of the com- 

 batants. 



Ground-birds always fight on the ground, swimming-birds only 

 in the water. How obstinately the gallinaceous birds may do battle 

 is known to everyone who has watched two cocks fighting. Their 



(M70) 18 



