WAYS OF NATURE 
matter. This emergency must have occurred for ages, 
and it, again, called only for the first step from cause 
to effect, and called for the use of no intermediate 
agent. If the robin were to hold a leaf or a branch 
above his mate at such times, that would imply 
reflection. 
It is said that elephants in India will besmear 
themselves with mud as a protection against insects, 
and that they will break branches from the trees 
and use them to brush away the flies. If this is true, 
it shows, I think, something beyond instinct in the 
elephant; it shows reflection. 
All birds are secretive about their nests, and dis- 
play great cunning in hiding them; but whether they 
know the value of adaptive material, such as moss, 
lichens, and dried grass, in helping to conceal them, 
admits of doubt, because they so often use the re- 
sults of our own arts, as paper, rags, strings, tinsel, 
in such a reckless way. In a perfectly wild state they 
use natural material because it is the handiest and 
there is really no other. The phcebe uses the moss 
on or near the rocks where she builds; the sparrows, 
the bobolinks, and the meadowlarks use the dry 
grass of the bank or of the meadow bottom where 
the nest is placed. 
The English writer to whom I have referred says 
that the wren builds the outside of its nest of old hay 
straws when placing it in the side of a rick, of green 
moss when it is situated in a mossy bank, and of 
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