The Zoologist— Makch, 1869. 1583 



personal expeiieiices. /know they are right about those Ichneumons, 

 perfectly right; but how do they know it? How do those little 

 creatures know that the steel-coloured Ichneumon would as soon have 

 a luncheon oS them as off the gum, perhaps prefer them ! or indeed 

 that he in his experience of life visits this tree in the full expectation 

 of being able to get a wholesome meal off one or two flies ; or do they 

 know it at all ? and why, when they cannot endure the shadow of a 

 carnivorous fly, will they permit without difficulty the blundering 

 swing of the antennae of a Trachyderes right across their bodies, or let 

 a big Papilio almost walk over them ? There is a degree of discrimi- 

 nation in all these actions that is quite superior to the instinct of, we 

 will say, a Chlamys, which on the approach of danger makes itself in 

 an instant exactly like a bit of caterpillar's dung I That is inexplicable 

 enough, but that is simple and uniform; the rule of life among the 

 Chlamidae is, "if ever you are in the least frightened, roll yourself up 

 as tightly as you can;" it is their misfortune or their good fortune 

 that the result is that the sight of them would turn the stomach of any 

 respectable bird on the hunt for food. To this rule there is no excep- 

 tion ; a harmless butterfl}' accidentally touching them would meta- 

 morphose them into an unpleasant-looking cylinder just as soon as the 

 touch of my very dangerous finger and thumb. But here on this 

 gummy tree, the rendezvous of insects, you find something very 

 superior to this ; there is a discriminating power which is always 

 exercised aright, and which seems very much like the result of memory 

 and of experience : certainly the absence of any such discriminating 

 power might be in a moment fatal, putting an end to ail experiences : 

 it is the quick-witted who live, it is the dullards who are food for 

 Ichneumons ; although whence they got their wits I can tell as little 

 as I can tell why the old hen partridge makes her brood cower down 

 in the stubble at the sight of a distant hawk, while she cares nothing 

 at all for fifty crows or gulls ; all that is evident is, that such know- 

 ledge is essential to preservation of life, and that such knowledge has 

 been imparted to them by their Creator. — p, 152. 



Notes on Bird Parasites. By John Cordeaux, Esq. 



The theory that every distinct species of bird has its own charac- 

 teristic parasite, is probably a correct one. Comparatively little has 

 yet been done in this branch of Entomology, and excepting the 



