BRITISH WARBLERS 



season before commencing to breed ? And is it not suggestive 

 that breeding operations commenced so soon after the pool 

 was discovered by the first individual ? To Darwin it was 

 somewhat of a mystery how it came about that within the 

 same district during the height of the breeding season there 

 should be so many males and females always ready to repair 

 the loss of a mated bird, and in the "Descent of Man" he 

 gives the results of experiments showing to what an amazing 

 extent new mates will be forthcoming — results which from my 

 own experience I believe to be in no degree exaggerated — and 

 he considered that an explanation might be found in the fact 

 that certain males and females do not succeed at the proper 

 season in exciting one another's love, and consequently do not 

 pair. Which are we then to believe— that males seek the 

 females, or that the females seek the males? Or must we 

 assume that a mutual search takes place, the sexes wandering 

 about on the chance of ultimately discovering a suitable 

 partner ? No one who has studied the habits of the migratory 

 species can seriously entertain this latter possibility, for 

 whether the principle of breeding territory be accepted or not, 

 this fact is patent, that the males settle and remain in a 

 certain restricted area even before they are paired. Therefore 

 if one sex does really seek the other, it can only be the females 

 that seek the males. But since we see, on the one hand, a 

 proportion of the males settling in their respective territories 

 and there remaining, and since on the other we know that a 

 proportion are wanderers with no fixed abode, and find that 

 the males that remain in one place invariably secure a mate, 

 while those that are wanderers appear to be always ready to 

 pair when an opportunity arises, surely a more simple and 

 more probable explanation of the fact that certain birds 

 remain unpaired is afforded by the law of territory, the 

 unpaired males being those which have been unsuccessful in 

 securing a territory, the unpaired females those which have 

 been unsuccessful in finding unpaired males in possession of a 

 home. A curious feature with regard to the unpaired birds is 



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