Tue ZooLocist—APRIL, 1872. 2999 
«Did man but encourage the birds which seek his society, there is no 
doubt his company would be more diligently sought after. By nature these 
light-hearted creatures are not distrustful, though they may become so when 
their confidence is abused; they are generally on familiar terms with other 
animals, and approach them without fear, and man also; but, unfortunately, 
on nearer acquaintance with the latter they must often learn, to their cost, 
that danger lurks beneath an appearance of too great intimacy; and this 
makes them as shy as they were formerly fearless. In uninhabited regions, 
like the steppes or primeval forest, and on desert islands, &c., the birds 
which inhabit them look upon the appearance of man certainly with 
astonishment, though not with fear. The auks, penguins, and eider ducks, 
which have their abode by thousands on the icebergs of the Polar seas, 
allowed themselves to be caught by the hand by those sailors who first 
landed on their domain. The larks of the Desert used to run fearlessly into 
my tent. The same may be observed in all places, where birds are conscious 
that shelter will be afforded them. On the other hand we see just as 
plainly how easily their trustful natures may become changed through rude 
experience. The Bohemian waxwings, which in hard winters sometimes 
appear among us, show from their behaviour that in their northern home 
they either never come in contact with man, or should they do so, they are 
treated with kindness; and when they leave us it is with a far different 
opinion of the ‘ lords of creation.’ Some birds appear distrustful and shy 
by nature; thus all long-legged birds are cautious; they avoid contact with 
man even in uninhabited localities, unless, like the common stork, they 
have been bred in his neighbourhood, I may say under his very eye, and 
are conscious of his friendly feeling toward them. The European black 
stork, however, will have nothing whatever to do with man, however much 
his white cousin may descant on the great advantages to be derived from the 
intimacy. The Marabou stork, or ‘adjutant’ of the East, parades the 
streets of all Indian towns, while the closely allied African form is never to 
’ be seen in one.”—P. 99. 
Why is this the case: why does the adjutant feel so thoroughly 
fearless in India? we presume because he is protected on account 
of his services asascavenger. It is probably otherwise in Africa, 
but this rather obvious explanation is not given. 
Immediately following is a passage in which the contentious 
character of polygamous birds is graphically set forth, but the 
example scarcely meets the case, for the young cockerel in question 
could scarcely have been acting on the sexual impulse which impels 
polygamists to do battle for their harem, since the bird attacked 
was of a species totally different from himself. 
