164 SECRETS OF ANIMAL LIFE 
subtle as well as thorough. ‘One twin, A, who 
happened to be in a town in Scotland, bought a set 
of champagne glasses which caught his attention, 
as a surprise for his brother B; while, at the same 
time, B, being in England, bought a similar set of 
precisely the same pattern as a surprise for A.” 
The price paid was doubtless precisely the same. 
The question which particularly interested Mr. 
Galton was how far diversity of environment and 
occupation affected twins who showed, to begin 
with, very close similarity. In some cases “ the 
resemblance of body and mind continued unaltered 
up to old age, notwithstanding very different con- 
ditions of life”; in other cases there was divergence 
usually traced to some form of illness affecting one 
of the twins, and this may have implied an initial 
difference which escaped detection. Nature is 
stronger than nurture. On the other hand, Mr. 
Galton found that twins which did not at first 
show “close similarity ” did not become any liker 
one another after prolonged influence of similar 
nurture. ‘‘ There is no escape from the conclusion 
that nature prevails enormously over nurture when 
the differences of nurture do not exceed what is 
commonly to be found among persons of the same 
rank of society and in the same country.” The 
cuckoo’s note is not affected by its early instruction 
in the language of its foster-parents. It should be 
carefully noticed, however, that some vefy striking 
cases are on record—e.g., in the late Mr. Benjamin 
Kidd’s Science of Power (1918)—of birds and 
