THE MOOSE 45 



we have not turned a deaf ear when she has 

 spoken, nor shut our eyes when the Great 

 Book of Life was opened, and page after page 

 turned that we might read. c< Personally," he 

 writes, " after many years of watching animals in 

 their native haunts, I am convinced that instinct 

 plays a smaller part than we have supposed : 

 that an animal's success or failure in the ceaseless 

 struggle for life depends, not upon instinct, 

 but upon the kind of training which the animal 

 receives from its mother. And the more I see 

 of children, the more sure am I that heredity 

 plays but a small part in the child's history and 

 destiny." 



In an article in The Zoologist (4th Ser. vol. vii. 

 Nov. 1903), "The Hybridisation of Columba 

 Palumbus," I have described the effects of 

 training and domestication upon the instincts of 

 a very wild bird : " This bird has shown much 

 attachment to me, cooing at the sound of my 

 voice, and flying to my hand or shoulder when 

 summoned by a signal. He is the most affec- 

 tionate bird I have ever possessed." Writing 

 to The Feathered World last July, I expressed 

 myself as follows : " A bird reared from the 

 nest at eight or nine days' old will invariably 



