SEXUAL SELECTION 495 



female goes gently toward Mm." Captain Stokes has de- 

 scribed the habits and "play-houses" of another species, 

 the Great Bower-bird, which was seen "amusing itself by 

 flying backward and forward, taking a shell alternately 

 from each side, and carrying it through the archway in its 

 mouth." These curious structures, formed solely as halls 

 of assemblage, where both sexes amuse themselves and pay 

 their court, must cost the birds much labor. The bower, 

 for instance, of the Fawn-breasted species is nearly four 

 feet in length, eighteen laches in height, and is raised on 

 a thick platform of sticks. 



Decoration. — I will first discuss the cases in which the 

 males are ornamented either exclusively or in a much 

 higher degree than' the females, and in a succeeding 

 chapter those in which both sexes are equally ornamented, 

 and finally the rare cases in which the female is somewhat 

 more brightly colored than the male. As with the artificial 

 ornaments used by savage and civilized men, so with the 

 natural ornaments of birds, the head is the chief seat of 

 decoration."' The ornaments, as mentioned at the com- 

 mencement of this chapter, are wonderfully diversified. 

 The plumes on the front or back of the head consist of 

 variously shaped feathers, sometimes capable of erection 

 or expansion, by which their beautiful colors are fully 

 displayed. Elegant ear-tufts (see Fig. 39, ante) are occa- 

 sionally present. The head is sometimes covered with vel- 

 vety down, as with the pheasant, or is naked and vividly 

 colored. The throat, also, is sometimes ornamented with 

 a beard, wattles, or caruncles. Such appendages are gen- 

 erally brightly colored, and no doubt serve as ornaments, 

 though not always ornamental in our eyes; for while the 

 male is in the act of courting the female, they often swell 

 and assume vivid tints, as in the male turkey. At such 



6' See remarks to this effect, on the "Feeling of Beauty Among Animals," 

 by Mr. J. Shaw, in the "Athenaeum,," Nov. 24, 1866, p. 681. 



