INTRODUCTORY 23 



ally acquired for its protection from sudden rises in 

 the water level or the wash of the waves), when that 

 nest may be made at some considerable distance from 

 any water whatever. The direct results of a bird's 

 reasoning faculties in respect to nest-making may be 

 seen in many directions. The wonderful way that so 

 many species copy surrounding objects, and thus by 

 assimilating their nest materials most cunningly con- 

 ceal their home, or the equally amazing forethought 

 of others that suspend their nests from tapering 

 branches often over water, or of others yet again (the 

 Tailor Birds) that knot the threads by which the leaf is 

 drawn into a cone in which the nest is built — may be 

 given as appropriate examples. An entire chapter 

 of the present book would not by any means exhaust 

 the specially prominent instances of a reasoning 

 power employed in avine architecture ; to the birds'- 

 nesting student of birds it becomes manifest, wherever 

 his observations and searches may lead him. 



It now becomes interesting to enquire what relation 

 exists between the tools or appliances that a bird may 

 have at its command and the quality or style of the 

 nest it is able to produce with them. Is the archi- 

 tectural skill subservient to the tools, or to what other 

 influences are the endless types of nests otherwise 

 due ? Now I think we should be very careful in im- 

 puting the various apparent imperfections on the one 

 hand, or the amazing skill on the other, in the archi- 

 tectural qualities of birds' nests to the appliances or 



