14.8 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XXI. No. 528 



oace a guarded and sacred preserve, is now a commons or thor- 

 oughfare through which any vagrant, motley procefi^ion of 

 thoughts may troop at will without let or hindrance. 



No doubt, too, this open, unguarded condition of consciousneps 

 may come upon us at times simply from our relaxing nervous 

 tension, as when we unharness the will and turn it loose, and 

 lapse generally into a state of mental passivity and listlessness. 

 It is then that, finding the door left ajar, these unbidden recollec- 

 tions oftenest make their intrusive entrance. 



Perchance, too, Unconscious Cerebration may take advantage 

 of the situation to display and call attention to some of its re- 

 markable curios, and, abusing the opportunity, lug in with these 

 certain annoying remembrances which we would it had left in 

 undisturbed oblivion. 



Perhaps one of the most significant and suggestive revelations 

 that comes to us from a thoughtful observation of these extraor- 

 dinary phenomena of involuntary recollection, Is the abundant 

 proof they furnish us of the unexpected and marvellous tenacity 

 of our impressions. 



It is made very manifest that those potential organic condi- 

 tions which were set up and established in the original process of 

 developing these impressions are still preserved to us intact, and 

 need only the proper excitant or stimulus to revive and rehabili- 

 tate them for us again and again. 



Being well assm-ed of this, it would seem profitable for us to 

 inquire to what extent, not yet realized, can we, by a deliberate 

 and persistent exercise of the will, control and compel these con- 

 ditions of revival. 



We are all conscious of doing a good deal of recollecting by 

 voluntary effort, but it is mostly those ordinary experiences which 

 are comparatively recent and fresh. When it comes to making 

 labored and prolonged effort to restore some elusive and faded 

 imai;e of a remote past, we are easily discouraged, and, even 

 though it be a momentous event in our lives, a vivid and com- 

 plete recollection of which might ^ave us from dishonor or utter 

 ruin; yet, after making a few hopeless and abortive attempts to 

 remember, we are apt to give up in despair, when, perhaps, had 

 we been fully possessed with an abiding faith in the enduring 

 nature of our impressions and in the possibility of our reviving 

 them, no matter how remotely fixed, we might have hopefully 

 and courageously continued our efforts, even for days or weeks 

 if necessary, until the missing fact was again brought mto the 

 fold of consciousness. 



Surely, if, as has often happened in human experience, 

 grave accidents or emergencies have resulted in so quickening 

 and rehabilitating certain conditions of the brain as to fully re- 

 store to the person recollection of events long supposed to be 

 irretrievably lost, it demonstrates the reasonableness of our em- 

 ploying and confidently relying upon systematic and patient effort 

 to compel the same active and exalted mental conditions to pro- 

 duce the same happy result. 



THE ARRANGEMENT AND NUMBER OF EGGS IN THE 

 NEST. 



BY DR MORRIS GIBBS, KALAMAZOO, MICH. 



All birds have a system or arrangement in depositing their 

 eggs in the nest, and there are very few species, if any, in which 

 some peculiarity is not to be seen, if careful observation is made. 

 Many birds so plainly and invariably show a tendency to a set 

 arrangement that their habit is generally known. It is of these 

 well-known examples that we will speak. 



The loon or great northern diver always deposits two eggs. 

 They are almost perfectly elliptical in shape and lie side by side. 

 The eggs are invariably found at over three fifths of the distance 

 from the front edge of the nest depression, that is, at about two- 

 fifths of the long diameter from the rear end of the elongated 

 hollow or nest proper. From the position of the eggs one can tell 

 how the bird sits on the nest, as we may reason that, with these 

 long-bodied birds, the abdomen, which supplies the direct heat, is 

 well back from the front of the hollow. This theory is verified 

 by watching the incubating bird. The turtle dove, night-hawk, 



whippiiorwill, and common domestic pigeon, each of which lays 

 two eggs at each setting, deposit the eggs side by side, although 

 this arrangement is frequently interfered with in the case of t! e 

 tame bird, not rarely with the result that one of the eggs does not 

 hatch. 



The spotted sandpiper and killdeer plover, and I presume most 

 of the other snipe and plover, lay four eggs at a clutch. Tbe 

 eggs are arranged in the nest, or on the bare ground, with their 

 small ends together, and, as they are pyriform in shape, they join 

 in to perfection. The eggs of the snipe and plover groups are pro- 

 portionately exceeding large for the size of the bird, and the sav- 

 ing of space by this arrangement undoubtedly answers a purpose. 

 It is impossible to offer a solution to this problem of order at 

 present, unless we may suggest that it is a wise provision of some 

 ruling power, which so ordains the arrangement which best ad- 

 mits of the bird's covering the eggs thoroughly. It is fair to 

 doubt if a sandpiper could cover her four large eggs if they were 

 arranged in any other position besides that in which they are 

 found, with the four smaller ends pointing to a centre. This 

 species has a small body and is not provided with loose, fluffy 

 feathers, so well supplied to many grouse and other birds which 

 lay many eggs. On two occasions the order of the eggs in nests 

 of the spotted sandpiper was broken by us; an egg being turned 

 about with its point presented outward. One of these nests was 

 deserted, perhaps from the interference, but in the other the order 

 was found restored within a day. 



Perhaps no bird in America, certainly no other in Michigan, 

 equals the common bob- white or quail in the number of eggs it 

 sets upon. This species not infrequently lays eighteen eggs, and 

 even more are found in one nest, but I can assure the readers that 

 with any other shaped eggs the bob-white could never succeed as 

 a successful setter. I will suggest that my friends with collec- 

 tions at hand compare a set of twenty eggs of the quail with 

 twenty eggs of equal dimensions in longer and shorter diameter 

 of any other species, and observe which lot occupies the smaller 

 space. We may say, for illustration, that the bob-white's egg is 

 triangular, and fits in as no other egg, to my knowledge, can. 



With all birds which lay a good-sized clutch, so far as my ob- 

 servations go, the eggs are deposited in almost an exact circular 

 group. The bird must use excellent judgment in thus arranging 

 them, for it is only by this order that they can all be covered 

 properly. Not infrequently when a grouse is startled from her 

 eggs she tumbles one of her treasures from its bed. If the egg is 

 not too far removed, it will almost invariably be found returned 

 to its exact position in the nest within a few hours. 



I have been informed that the broivn pelicans steal eggs from 

 one another's nests, in order to till their complements, or at least 

 take possession of those they find lying on the ground and roll 

 them into their nests. Although this does not seem at all likely, 

 for various reasons. I cannot dispute it authoritatively, and. more 

 over, thei'e were strong proofs that such was the case in many 

 nests that I examined in Florida. These nests, which were n^ar 

 together, often contained four eggs, never more; one to three of 

 which were ready to hatch, the others being fresh, or nearly so. 

 And, again, there would be eggs in the same nest with young over 

 a week old, or young of ages quite ten days variation. But one 

 point was ever observable, the young, or eggs, or both, never ex- 

 ceeded four in number, showing, even if the charge of abduction 

 is proven, that the old birds know their limit. 



The cow- blackbird, in imposing its eggs on the care of other 

 birds, not rarely fails in the arrangement of affairs. It is fair to 

 allow that the cow-bird is perfectly able to distinguish its ov\n 

 eggs from those of the blue-bird, chipping-sparrow, and others, 

 which differ radically in size and color from its own speckled, 

 tough-shelled eggs; but I believe it often fails to distinguish its 

 eggs from the quite often similar ones of the chewink and oven- 

 bird. And this failure accounts for its depositing as high as four 

 and five eggs in the nests of the chewink, where there was but 

 one egg of the owner; and again laying four eggs in an oven-bird's 

 nest, which contained no eggs at all of the owner,— both cases 

 undoubtedly oversights, which resulted from its inability to dis- 

 tinguish. It is reasonable to allow that cow-birds have limits as 

 to the number to be deposited, otherwise some unfortunate warbler 



