CHAPTER XII. 

 OTHER INSTINCTS. 



This chapter for the most part consists of miscellaneous observations of various 

 traits and behavior tendencies of pigeons, with some account of specific differences. 

 The significance and genetic relations of these characters are not discussed as a 

 rule. The topics are those of the author, but similar observations from various 

 manuscripts have been brought together by the editor. Unity and coherence 

 of treatment has proved difficult of attainment with some of these materials. 

 The topics have been grouped by the editor under the general heading of "Instinct" 

 for the sake of convenience; one may well question the applicability of this term 

 to some of the acts described. The first part of the first topic treated is a reprint 

 of a paper by the author, published in 1899 in Woods Hole Biological Lectures. 1 



TUMBLING AND POUTING. 



The evidence adduced to show that habit may pass into instinct can not here be 

 examined in detail. Romanes brings forward two cases the instincts of tumbling and pouting 

 in pigeons which he declares are alone sufficient to demonstrate the theory. We may, 

 therefore, take these as fair examples of the argument generally appealed to. 



After quoting Darwin's remarks on this subject, Romanes adds: 



"This case of the tumblers and pouters is singularly interesting and very apposite to the proposi- 

 tion before us; for not only are the actions utterly useless to the animals themselves, but they have 

 now become so ingrained into their psychology as to have become severally distinctive of different 

 breeds, and so not distinguishable from true instincts. This extension of an hereditary and useless 

 habit into a distinction of race or type is most important in the present connection. // these cases 

 stood alone, they would be enough to show that useless habits may become hereditary, and this to an extent 

 which renders them indistinguishable from true instincts." : 



Granting that we have here true instincts and I do not doubt that what proof have 

 we that they originated in habits? Did there pre-exist in the ancestors of these breeds 

 organized instinct bases, which, through the fancier's art of selective breeding, were grad- 

 ually strengthened until they attained the development which now characterizes the 

 tumblers and pouters? Or was there no such basis to start with, but only a new mode of 

 behavior, accidentally acquired by some one or more individuals, and then perpetuated 

 by transmission to their offspring and further developed by artificial selection? The original 

 action in either species is called a "habit," and this so-called habit must have been inherited; 

 ergo, habit can become instinct. Obviously, argument of that kind can have weight only 

 with those who overlook the test-point, namely, the real nature and origin of the initial 

 action. 



If the instinct had its inception in a true habit, i.e., in an action reduced to habit by 

 repetition in the individual, and not determined in any already existing hereditary activity, 

 is it at all credible that it could have been transmitted from parent to progeny? Does 

 not our general experience contradict such an assumption in the most positive manner? 

 But may not the habit have originated a great many times, and by repetition in successive 

 generations, gradually have become "stereotyped into a permanent instinct "? To suppose 



1 Republished by courtesy of Messrs. Ginn & Co., Boston. - Mental Evolution in Animals, p. 189. 



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