NOTES ON THE COURTSHIP OF THE LAPWING. 225 



either arises or ever arose from imitation by the hen of the 

 cock seems in the highest degree fantastic, and the idea is 

 scarcely less improbable if we suppose that the cock's was the 

 later impulse which arose consciously or unconsciously from 

 experience of what the subsequent behaviour of the hen would be. 

 Until it is proved that it is the rule and not the exception 

 for the female bird to display in the same fashion as the male, 

 and for the male to share with the female the work of building 

 the nest, I submit that there are no grounds to suppose, apt 

 though the correspondence may be, that the two instincts (i. e. 

 of the collection of nesting material in courtship by the cock, 

 and of the making of the actual nest bj' the hen) have arisen 

 otherwise than independently of each other. 



[Note. — Since the foregoing notes were written I have learned 

 that in the ' Zoologist ' for 1911 Mr. S. B. Brock published an 

 article on the courtship of the Peewit, and that the conclusions 

 he drew as to the display are very similar to those I have put 

 forward above. — M. D. H.] 



