HABIT, INSTINCT, AND INTELLIGENCE. 151 



(4) The emotion of fear exercises a disturbing influence upon all instinctive 

 and acquired activities and attitudes, and these disrupting effects are tenaciously 

 retained. Acquired attitudes toward other birds, humans, and other animals can 

 thus be inculcated. Roosting habits will be disrupted with one experience. The 

 incubation activities are likewise permanently affected with a single experience. 

 The ability to be easily affected and permanently influenced by fright is very 

 essential for timid animals. Fear alone is hardly sufficient; a further value is 

 contributed by the retention of these effects. 



Pigeons thus have a facile intelligence for some things, but the capacity is 

 extremely limited in scope. Intelligence, in the main, supplements instinct and 

 ministers to the more fundamental needs in so far as these can not be completely 

 provided for by an instinctive organization. 



HABIT OF PLACE OR POSITION.' 



(1) On Apr. 25 I placed a nest-box containing a pair of newly-hatched young and the 

 male parent on the floor of the coop. This male is perfectly tame, having not the least 

 fear of being handled. He sat quietly on the nest-box while I placed it on the floor. After 

 remaining on the floor a few minutes he walked off from the nest and flew up to the empty 

 box which had previously contained the nest-box; he went into this box and sat down 

 as if covering the young. I repeated the same experiment several times on this and the 

 following day, and he behaved each time in the same way. The female on two occasions, 

 seeing the young left uncovered, took her place on the nest, although the nest was on 

 the floor and not in its usual place. In the case of the male it is evident that the habit 

 of sitting in a box 3 feet above the floor of the coop, at a fixed elevation and position, 

 had become so firmly established during the two preceding weeks of incubation that he 

 felt that he was in the wrong place. He takes and feels contented in the place to which 

 he was accustomed, notwithstanding that the nest and young have been removed. The 

 nest-box and young do not satisfy him, except in their usual place.' He leaves them with- 

 out any signs of hesitation, unless the few moments of delay be such. He is apparently 

 quite blind to the purpose of his instinct of brooding. The habit of place is stronger than 

 the stimuli supplied by nest and young. He would probably leave them to die of cold and 

 hunger. The female in this case displays a higher power of adaptation a better apprecia- 

 tion of the needs. 



On Apr. 28, at 2 h 30 m p.m., I fed the female on the floor of the coop; the male, seeing 

 this, left the young and came down to eat. While he was eating I again placed the nest- 

 box on the floor. After a minute or two he turned around, looked at the box with young, 

 and then flew up to the empty box; not finding his young, he turned right-about-face, 

 as if to leave the box, but soon decided to remain, and went in and sat down as if all 

 was right. Meanwhile the female went to the young on the floor and fed them both at 

 once. She certainly understands her business better than the male. But it is also evident 

 that the male is conscious of not finding the young as he expected to do, for his turning around 

 as if to leave the box shows that. 



On the following morning, at 9 o'clock, after the male had taken the nest, I again 

 raised the nest-box out of the containing-box, holding it a minute or two at the level of 

 the latter; then I lowered it half way to the floor, held it there for about 3 minutes, and then 

 placed it on the floor. The male sat on as if he would remain, but after 5 minutes he got 

 off to attack a male in the adjoining coop, ate a little and drank; he then went up to the 



1 Numerous other instances of memory for "position" are given in the chapter on the Homing Instinct. EDITOR, 



