444 PHILOSOPHICAL TKANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1773. 



breeding up a bird of this age, as the odds against its being reared are ahnost in- 

 finite. The warmth indeed of incubation may be, in some measure, supplied by 

 cotton and fires; but these delicate animals require, in this state, being fed al- 

 most perpetually, while the nourishment they receive should not only be pre- 

 pared with great attention, but given in very small portions at a time. Yet he 

 has happened to see both a linnet and a goldfinch which were taken from their 

 nests when only 2 or 3 days old. The first of these belonged to Mr. Matthews, 

 an apothecary at Kensington, which, from a want of other sounds to imitate, 

 almost articulated the words pretty boy, as well as some other short sentences : 

 and Mr. Matthews assured him that he had neither the note nor call of any bird 

 whatsoever. 



The goldfinch was reared in the town of Knighton in Radnorshire, which 

 Mr. B. happened to hear as he was walking by the house where it was kept. He 

 thought a wren was singing, and he went into the house to inquire after it, as 

 that little bird seldom lives long in a cage. The people of the house however 

 told him, that they had no bird but a goldfinch, which they conceived to sing 

 its own natural note, as they called it; on which he staid a considerable time in 

 the room, while its notes were merely those of a wren, without the least mix- 

 ture of goldfinch. On further inquiries, he found that the bird had been taken 

 from the nest when only 2 or 3 days old; that it was hung in a window which 

 was opposite to a small garden, whence the nestling had undoubtedly acquired 

 the notes of the wren, without having had any opportunity of learning even the 

 call of the goldfinch. 



These facts seem to prove very decisively, that birds have not any innate ideas 

 of the notes which are supposed to be peculiar to each species. But it will pos- 

 sibly be asked, why in a wild state they adhere so steadily to the same song, in 

 so nmch that it is well known, before the bird is heard, what notes you are to 

 expect from him. This however arises entirely from the nestlings attending only 

 to the instruction of the parent binl, while it disregards the notes of all others, 

 which may perhaps be singing round him. But, to prove this decisively, Mr. B. 

 took a common sparrow from the nest when it was fledged, and educated him 

 under a linnet: the bird however by accident heard a goldfinch also, and his song 

 was therefore a mixture of the linnet and goldfinch. Mr. B. educated a young 

 robin under a very fine nightingale; which however began already to be out of 

 song, and was perfectly mute in less than a fortnight. This robin afterwards 

 sung 3 parts in 4 nightingale, and the rest of his song was what the bird-cat- 

 chers call rubbish, or no particular note whatever. He educated a nestling robin 

 under a woodlark-linnet, which was full in song, and hung very near to him for 

 a month together: after which, the robin was removed to another house, where 

 he could only hear a skylark-linnet. The consequence was, that the nestling 



