LEAF AND TENDRIL 



birds in their attempts to form their nests. The 

 mud wall attracted them as if it had been a natural 

 earth bank, and in trying to reach the proper depth 

 for their nests, six feet or more, they invariably 

 came through and out on the other side. Still they 

 kept on drilling. Says Darwin : — 



"I do not doubt that each bird' as often as it 

 came to daylight on the opposite side, was greatly 

 surprised at the marvelous fact." 



I do not suppose the bird really experienced any 

 feeling of surprise at all, any more than the blue- 

 bird above referred to did, when it looked into the 

 vacant room and did not see the object of its wrath. 

 The feeling of surprise comes to beings that under- 

 stand the relation of cause and eflFect, which evi- 

 dently the lower animals do not. Had the casarita 

 been capable of the feeling of surprise, it would have 

 been capable of seeing its own mistake. 



Our high-hole is at times guilty of the same folly. 

 When he drums on the metal ventilator or the tin 

 leader upon your house, he has found a new thing, 

 but it suits his purpose to make a noise to attract the 

 attention of the female rather better than the dry 

 stub did. And when he excavates a limb or tree- 

 trunk for his nest, he acts like a reasonable being; 

 but when he drills a hole through the clapboards of 

 an empty building, and, not finding that the interior 

 is what he wants, drills again and again, or perfo- 

 rates over and over the covering of an ice-house and 

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