Birds. 3973 



abortions, the offspring of weak parents, unfit to rank with their fel- 

 lows : and if they have assumed an unusual colour in after-life from 

 any cause, this, too, must be from constitutional debility, whether su- 

 perinduced by accident or any other cause. For I hold that in all 

 these anomalous cases, an unwonted variety of colour betokens phy- 

 sical weakness, no less certainly than bright well-marked plumage 

 usually betokens good health and strength. To pretend to account 

 for these freaks of Nature, thus deformed from their birth, is to attempt 

 to account for all deformities in the animal kingdom ; these are the 

 exceptions which prove the rule, how uniform and undeviating Na- 

 ture's laws are. 



There is a difference of opinion among naturalists as to whether or 

 no these white or party-coloured varieties transmit their colours to 

 their offspring. Mr. Waterton, in writing of the pheasant, says that 

 he has never been able to perceive this ; on the other hand, a corre- 

 spondent in the 'Zoologist' states his conviction that such is the case, 

 and brings very strong proof in support of his opinion, (Zool. 873) : 

 the fact (I suppose) being, that in some cases, though not always, the 

 variety in colour is handed down from the parent to the progeny. In 

 proof of this, Bishop Stanley also gives an account of some rooks 

 which, for several successive years, occupied the same nest, and inva- 

 riably produced two white ones, proving not only the hereditary co- 

 lour, but also the weakness of the parent birds, four or five being the 

 usual complement for a nest. Blyth goes still further than this, and 

 states that " when creatures are taken from their particular natural 

 haunts, a disposition in the next generation to vary in hue is com- 

 monly evinced more or less, according to the species ; efforts, as it 

 were, of Nature to accommodate the offspring to the change : and so 

 remarkable is this in some species, that the breeders of white and 

 pied pheasants declare that albino or mottled individuals may almost 

 always be raised from an ordinarily coloured pair, by merely confining 

 the latter in a room whitewashed, or splashed with whitening." 



I confess I am not yet quite prepared to assent to this, to me, rather 

 startling statement, though I do not forget the marvellous results of 

 Jacob's somewhat similar experiments ; and am well aware what al- 

 most incredible efforts Nature often makes to overcome obstacles, and 

 produce her customary results. Of one thing I am quite convinced, 

 that be this variation in colour hereditary or no, attainable at will or 

 no, I should be far more inclined to destroy such innovators as dege- 

 nerate, than to encourage them for the sake of variety. 



With regard to those birds which, being at first of the natural hue, 



