May 13, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



763 



ular editions of Science, every one of which 

 is supported not only by my own personal ob- 

 servation, but by the testimony of other hon- 

 est men whose word can be taken without 

 hesitation. 



The question naturally arises, and has in- 

 deed been asked with some irritation, why, 

 with all these facts at hand, a man does not 

 write as a scientist and produce his evidence. 

 The answer is threefold: (1) I am accustomed 

 to be believed when I speak. Ejiowing my 

 subject, and with the evidence of my own eyes 

 before me, it has hardly seemed necessary, for 

 the sake of a few critics who will not believe, 

 to refer to supplementary evidence, of which 

 I have a plenty ; to ' cross my throat,' boy 

 fashion, as an evidence of sincerity, and to 

 state after every observation: Mr. So-and-so 

 saw the same thing in Such-a-place ; if you 

 don't believe it, ask him. (2) I have gone 

 into the outdoor world as a nature lover, not 

 as a scientist; for recreation, not for work; 

 and my aim, as that of other nature writers, 

 is chiefly to influence other people to go out 

 of doors themselves, and by telling the whole 

 truth, so far as I can see it, to open their eyes 

 to the facts of animal life which the scientist, 

 as well as the vacationist, has overlooked, 

 under the supposition that birds and animals 

 are governed solely by instinct and reflex im- 

 pulses. And (3) while the scientist deals 

 with laws and generalizations and works large- 

 ly with species, I have dealt always with indi- 

 viduals, and have tried to understand every 

 animal from moose to woodmouse that I have 

 met in the wilderness. 



That birds and animals (and even the in- 

 sects, especially the solitary wasps and spiders) 

 differ greatly among themselves in individual 

 characteristics and habits, is now beyond a 

 question. Sooner or later science will collect 

 these individual differences and go to work 

 upon new laws and generalizations ; but at the 

 present moment when one goes into animal 

 individuality he crosses the borderland of 

 science into a realm where our present laws 

 and classifications apply only in the most gen- 

 eral way. Every animal he studies closely is 

 different from every other animal, for nature 

 seems to abhor repetition as she abhors a 



vacuiim. As among men, the differences, 

 which lie deep are much harder to detect than 

 the resemblances, which are mostly on the 

 surface. All the men of a city street are 

 alike from a third-story window, which is 

 nearer than we generally get to wild animals. 

 There are even women who declare that the 

 generalization holds true at a closer inspection 

 — ^but that is another matter. Two men in 

 dress suits will pass the same general social 

 muster at a dance or reception, and may be 

 indistinguishable across a small room; but it 

 will take some intimate acquaintance to dis- 

 cover that they are as far apart as Beelzebub 

 and Gabriel. And any one who has ever 

 learned to know intimately a litter of pups or 

 a litter of fox cubs will recognize instantly 

 that the same differences in character and 

 disposition which prevail among men prevail 

 also, though in less degree, among the beasts 

 of the field, and are the last things to be dis- 

 covered. 



Though the field is an immense one, and 

 practically unknown so far as wild animals 

 are concerned, there are as yet only a few 

 pioneers scattered over it. The facts are 

 plenty enough, but the observers who have the 

 patience and sympathy for the work are very 

 few, and it will be years before they make 

 any impression upon our general ignorance 

 about birds and animals. It must be said 

 also, of the nature students as distinct frona 

 the scientists, that they go into the field for 

 pure love of it, rather than from any desire 

 to make a book, or a theory, or to be enrolled 

 among the discoverers of science. The ele- 

 ment of personal taste also is a factor against 

 them; they hate to kill and destroy, to stuff 

 and label and put into a museum. 



The ornithologists, for instance — and I have 

 knovsm many of them intimately — have been 

 busy for years making collections of nests and 

 eggs and bird skins; they have determined 

 the range and distribution of species fairly 

 accurately, and have gathered much interest- 

 ing information as to food and breeding places 

 of our native birds. These are the acknowl- 

 edged ' scientists ' of the bird world ; and we 

 have watched their work with interest, though 

 at times with regret at the enormous and un- 



