PREFACE 



My reader will find this volume quite a departure 

 in certain ways from the tone and spirit of my pre- 

 vious books, especially in regard to the subject of 

 animal intelUgence. Heretofore I have made the 

 most of every gleam of intelUgence of bird or four- 

 footed beast that came under my observation, often, 

 I fancy, making too much of it, and giving the wild 

 creatures credit for more " sense " than they really 

 possessed. The nature lover is always tempted to 

 do this very thing; his tendency is to humanize the 

 wild life about him, and to read his own traits and 

 moods into whatever he looks upon. I have never 

 consciously done this myself, at least to the extent 

 of willfully misleading my reader. But some of our 

 later nature writers have- been guilty of this fault, 

 and have so grossly exaggerated and misrepresented 

 the every-day wild life of our fields and woods that 

 their example has caused a strong reaction to take 

 place in my own mind, and has led me to set about 

 examining the whole subject of animal life and 

 instinct in a way I have never done before. 



In March, 1903, I contributed to "The Atlantic 

 Monthly " a paper called " Real and Sham Natural 

 History," which was as vigorous a protest as I could 

 v 



