74 • Ornithology. 



their state of nature. Let us look to the birds in their natural 

 wild state, and see if any well-attested instances are to be 

 found where tliey have laid more eggs successively, by taking 

 one from the nest daily. For instance, the number laid by 

 the robin is commonly five, sometimes only three or four, and 

 rarely six; will the taking away the daily-laid egg produce 

 the seventh or eight? No: we believe there never was an 

 instance. A bird will only lay the usual number peculiar to 

 the species ; and if, at the period of incubation, it perceives 

 the nest emptied, it is deserted. The link of. nature having 

 been broken, the female stimulates to love again, and soon 

 brings forward by that stimulus, aided by the male fecundity 

 anew lot of eggs; never more than the former,'*and usually 

 less, because this is a forced production, at the additional 

 expense of the vigor of the bird, and loss of animal parts, 

 which is the cause of a great variation as to the number of 

 eggs laid by domestic fowls, depending entirely on the 

 strength of the constitution and the nourishment of the food. 

 In all animals taken immediately under the care of man, the 

 dictates of nature are partly suppressed, their food changed, 

 habits and manners altered, and disease often ensues, which 

 is the origin of the great variety of colors in reclaimed ani- 

 mals. 



Nature pursues invariably one course ; therefore to draw 

 a general rule of her actions we must strictly adhere to her 

 in an unmolested, uncultivated state ; for if we deviate from 

 that we must infallibly err. We do not mean to say acci- 

 dental varieties do not take place in animals unreclaimed, 

 but such lusus are by no means common ; and when we see 

 a bird materially deviate in color from its species, we may 

 consider it as a constitutional defect, that the natural secre- 

 tions are changed or suppressed with which the feathers are 

 dyed. To enter minutely into a discussion on this head 

 would swell this article beyond its limits ; all we wish is, to 

 point out the necessity of strictly adhering to nature for ob- 

 servations on natural causes. A domestic fowl which will sit 

 for six weeks upon an empty nest, is not to be produced as a 

 proof of the actions of nature. Will any bird, in its natural 

 wild state, continue to sit on its nest after the eggs are taken 

 out? One egg, indeed, is sometimes sufficient to produce 

 the act of incubation ; but what is it then that prevents the 

 secondary egg from coming forward, when it is well known 

 if a bird is prevented from setting, she soon resumes her desire 

 of propagation natural to every animated being? Because 

 the very act of incubation is the effective cause ; the line 



