156 BIRD HAUNTS AND NATURE MEMORIES 



disease is rare, though parasitical disease, in which some 

 other organism benefits, is commoner. And so long as 

 there is life and health there is every indication that those 

 possessing it find enjoyment and pleasure in the possession. 

 Each animal to exist at all must be alert and fit, ever 

 watchful to avoid danger, ever quick and strong to over- 

 come an adversary or obtain a victim. But fear, as we 

 understand it, is absent; the weaker creature watches 

 for danger, but has no apprehension; the alertness is not 

 merely instinctive but largely reflex. The quickest to act 

 without waste of time for thought is the one which sur- 

 vives and leaves progeny; the weakling goes to the wall. 

 The heedless butterfly, flitting from flower to flower, 

 bent on pure animal satisfaction, for it does not need the 

 sweets it sips, dodges the onslaught of the shrike, and at 

 once continues its hunt for pleasure. The young lap- 

 wing crouches when the peregrine's shadow crosses the 

 moor, but continues to feed immediately the terror has 

 departed. The whitethroat, which dived into the hedge 

 when the sparrowhawk swooped, sings again whilst the 

 hunter chases another possible victim. The mouse, which 

 froze when the owl reeled past, attends to its ablu- 

 tions immediately the coast is clear. All these avoid the 

 danger, but are not unnerved; they do not think before- 

 hand about what may happen; they brood not on the 

 terrors of the past. If we watch the play of animals, 

 listen to the singing of birds, observe the busy hunt for 

 material satisfaction of the insects, we see no suggestion 

 of fear or misery; their alertness is hardly uneasy, though 

 if the hare is startled or the bird's nest threatened there 

 are certain indications of anxiety in the one case un- 

 certainty about where and when to escape, in the second 

 a parental attachment to property. Immediately the 

 animal realises that it or its home is no longer en- 

 dangered it appears by its behaviour to again enjoy the 



