NOVEMBER 265 



ova in the shallows and, long before these are hatched 

 into sentient creatures, the parents have dropped back 

 into the deeper waters, and if ever they meet their 

 own offspring in after-life, are very apt to regard them 

 as legitimate food. 



It was written of old: 'The fear of you and the 

 dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, 

 and upon every fowl of the air; and upon all that 

 moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the 

 sea ' ; and this, in truth, has come to pass. Neverthe- 

 less, judging from Mr. Lloyd Morgan's observations of 

 the chicks of domestic fowls, wild ducks, pheasants, 

 partridges, moorhens, and plovers reared in an incu- 

 bator, the dread of man, as such, is neither innate nor 

 congenital. Neither does it precede man into parts of 

 the earth whither he has not previously penetrated: 

 witness the confidence, sadly misplaced as a rule, shown 

 in him by penguins and other birds in polar regions, 

 until they get to know him better. 



In weak species the instinct of concealment appears 

 to be inborn and congenital, for Mr. W. H. Hudson 

 has recorded that, when he had the egg of a jacana 

 (Parra jacana) in the palm of his hand, ' all at once 

 the cracked shell parted, and at the same moment the 

 young bird leaped from my hand and fell into the 

 water. ... I soon saw that my assistance was not 

 required, for, immediately on dropping into the water, 

 it . . . swam rapidly to a small mound, and, escaping 

 from the water, concealed itself in the grass, lying close 

 and perfectly motionless, like a young plover.' ^ 



' The Naturalist in La Plata, p. 112. 



