A PINCH OF SALT 



try must see one or more young cowbirds being fed 

 by their foster-parents every season, yet no com- 

 petent observer has ever reported any care of the 

 young bird by its real parent. If this were true, it 

 would make the cowbird only half parasitical — an 

 unheard-of phenomenon. 



The same writer tells this incident about a grouse 

 that had a nest near his cabin. One morning he 

 heard a strange cry in the direction of the nest, and 

 taking the path that led to it, he met the grouse 

 running toward him with one wing pressed close to 

 her side, and fighting off two robber crows with the 

 other. Under the closed wing the grouse was carry- 

 ing an egg, which she had managed to save from the 

 ruin of her nest. The bird was coming to the hermit 

 for succor. Now, am I skeptical about such a story, 

 put down in apparent good faith in a book of natural 

 history as a real occurrence, because I have never 

 seen the like.^ No; I am skeptical because the in- 

 cident is so contrary to all that we know about 

 grouse and all other wild birds. Our belief in nearly 

 all matters takes the line of least resistance, and it is 

 easier for me to believe that the writer deceived 

 himself, than that such a thing ever happened. In 

 the first place, a grouse could not pick up an egg 

 with her wing when crows were trying to rob her, 

 and, in the second place, she would not think far 

 enough to do it if she had the power. What was she 

 going to do with the egg ? Bring it to the hermit for 

 179 



