JULY. INSTINCT OF ANIMALS. 265 



worms and grubs which are washed off the banks 

 and fields into the water. 



Very few birds or, comparatively speaking, even 

 land animals fall victims to floods. The rabbits 

 manage to climb up into the highest furze bushes, 

 or even into the branches of trees, and it is very 

 seldom that any birds make their nests within reach 

 of this danger. In the same manner that terns and 

 other birds who lay their eggs on fhe seashore seem 

 to have an instinct which teaches them the exact 

 line to which the highest spring tides ever reach, so 

 do the land birds avoid building their nests in 

 places to which the land floods ever ascend. 



