64 
FOREST AND STREAM, 
[July 23, 1898. 
of recovered cripples, of hook or gun, than of sound 
' individuals. Clearly then, however it may be that birds 
and fish acquire their increased wariness, when much 
pursued, it is most illogical to say that it is by heredity 
or ataA'ism. 
Now let us see how the theory will check up with all 
the other facts that we know about heredity. Accord- 
ing to this theory, ducks which have suffered pain, from 
mistaking a wooden decoy for a sister duck, and trout 
which have had their mouths snagged from sampling 
new varieties of fly, will transmit to their posterity, born 
after those experiences, an instinctive fear of the awk- 
ward, wooden-looking .duck, and a decided suspicion of 
all insects with crooked and barbed tails. Now, if a few 
experiences of pain following certain appearances would 
. Impress the progeny of an animal with a dread of those 
appearances, we would have hundreds of examples of it 
occurring around us daily, and the fact would be gen- 
erally recognized. One litter of pups, for instance, would 
be born Avhich would run from the sight of a -Whip 
before they had ever known a blow; while another 
would run from the cook with a pan of hot water, with- 
out ever waiting to be scalded. Crucial test experiments 
would long ago have been suggested, devised and made. 
• We would have a science of it, and would know the 
value of more or less reiterated experiences of father, 
mother, grandparents, etc. And there are many curious 
and useful results which could be brought about. But 
all experience shows that acquired knowledge is not 
transmitted to posterity. Children will never be born 
knowing the multiplication table because their ances- 
tors know it. I am not denying the value of cross breed- 
ing and selection in producing the highest possible de- 
velopment of all natural instincts, abilities or powers, or 
' any natural variations of any physical form. For in- 
stance, by selection we might breed a variety of v dogs 
with very short tails. But -we twOuld never accomplish 
•it by amputating the tails. Nor, if we always amputated 
with shears, could we ever breed a fear of shears in the 
progeny. Great, is heredity and wonderful are^ts works. 
It is the great centripetal force of nature. But-'it is not 
everything. There is very much beside it in the prob- 
' lem. And especially it is not to be confounded' with 
what we may call, for a name, the centrifugal force of 
nature. By that I mean the force which does adapt 
things to their surroundings, in very spite, as it were, of 
the opposing influences of heredity. It is this centri- 
fugal force which teaches wariness to the fish and' cau- 
tion to the duck, when men begin to pursue them, with- 
out even waiting for a single generation to pass away. 
This is the force to which we owe the endless variety of 
natural forms in every kingdom of life. , It., has the dis- 
position and the ability to conform every , .creature to 
its. "environment. If a simple access of wariness,, and 
■ .caution; is not enough, a new sense or a new organ v are 
*-<flot -beyond .its powers. What is this strange, this wpn-. 
derful force? Its existence cannot be. denied, and 1 .since.; 
•! Darwin pointed out the marvelous wonders of its} ,wprk,j 
nobody tries to deny it. But what is iff 
And now we can make clear the too common mis- 
conception of what Darwin taught, which I have before 
^referred to as the casus of this belli. Darwin never pre- 
tended to say what this force was. But many, who claim 
to be his followers, assume to know all about it. They 
say that all changes and variations are produced by 
chance. And thus they have a beautiful and simple 
scheme for all things. 
Chance produces- infinite variety. Heredity seeks to 
perpetuate all that chance produces, but environment, 
otherwise called natural selection, steps in and culls out 
all varieties not distinctly beneficial, and lo ! we have the 
universe as we see it. Great are chance, heredity, en- 
vironment; and greatest of these is chance! No fish 
will suspect a hook; no duck will shun a decoy; no dove 
will fear a hawk — unless three of its grandparents out of 
four have suffered pain and wounds by hook, shot or 
talon, but still escaped with life before becoming an an- 
cestor! Now perhaps it is possible that this trinity, of 
chance, heredity and environment, given the material 
and a planet eternally habitable to work in, might pos- 
sibly organize some sort of a world. But I think chance 
Would forever keep spoiling things faster than environ- 
ment could adjust them. And certainly the world which 
we inhabit is not at all the sort and type of world which 
would be produced where chance was the initial force. 
For we are full of infinite fine touches, which chance 
alone could never impart, and which must have had 
their origin therefore in the original centrifugal force. 
If we study any single natural object, as for instance a 
mallard duck, we will find as many coincidences and 
adjustments in his structure, plumage, functions, etc., as 
we will find coincidences and adjustments of the letters 
of the alphabet in a printed newspaper. Every feather 
'will have thousands of them. It would be just as reason- 
able to argue that a newspaper could have been pro- 
duced by an accidental assemblage of type, and pre- 
served by an environment of newsdealers who appreciat- 
ed that it would sell, and- naturally selected it, as to 
suppose that the infinite coincidences about the duck are 
the offspring of chance, assorted and preserved by en- 
vironment. The cases are exactly parallel, and the mind 
which can accept chance as an element in the origin of 
the duck could accept it also for the production of the 
newspaper. The theory I hold in opposition to this 
theory of chance I can most briefly express by calling 
it a blue-print theory. That is to say, that all changes 
and modifications of natural forms, which have re- 
sulted in nature's present variety, were preceded by 
such an intelligent foresight and adjustment as would 
be paralleled in human affairs by making a preliminary 
blue-print. For only by such a device can we be sure 
of successful operation, and adjust delicate niceties of- 
structure, function and ornament. One illustration is as 
good as a hundred. The venomous serpent is not the 
result of chance variations of the serpent type; some 
with fangs, but no poison, and others with poison, but no 
'fangs, and at last an accidental union of the two in 
the same individual, preserved by environment. The 
long front tooth, the strange- hollow bored through it, 
the poison gland, the reservoir, the modified bones 
and muscles and instincts, the chemical composition of 
the venom, and the adjustment of the dose to the in- 
tended victims must have all been considered and adopt- 
ed, together. Or, humanly speaking, there must have 
been a blue-print of him before there was ever a 
venomous serpent. There are too many coincidences of 
structure (all utterly useless and in the way when alone, 
but when combined forming a powerful weapon) for 
chance to have cut any more figure in his existence than 
it does in that of a loaded gun. Indeed the loaded gun 
is but a poor comparison, a wretched abortion of a 
machine, in comparison with the serpent. He is a 
mathematical demonstration that something which 
plans originates all nature's variety. Accident then must 
be utterly, at once and forever, ruled out of consideration 
in our study of the mysteries of her infinite array of 
beautiful and delicate machinery, and of her endless 
gallery of exquisite sculpture and painting. What we 
have called her centrifugal force — that which produces 
variety and imparts instincts, as needed, to creatures 
devoid of reason — is a force with far closer and more ex- 
act control than environment and natural selection could 
•ever acquire, and all its work is stamped with blue-print 
characteristics — with the marks of intelligent foresight. 
What this force is it needs a greater than Darwin to 
say. But we may frame more or less complete working 
theories of its methods upon studies of phenomena, 
after we are once got rid of the idea that its essence is 
blind chance. To recur to the case of new instincts 
becoming necessary to animals, from the advent of new 
dangers. The facts seem to require a theory which shall 
provide as follows: That the instinct of each animal of 
any community shall promptly profit by any important 
or vital experience of any other animal of that com- 
munity — even though and especially if the experience re- 
sults in death. For it is certainly most illogical to 
provide for animals (as the heredity or the "three- 
wounded-grandparents" theory does) instincts founded 
only upon escapes. Escapes are misleading. Death exr 
periences only are truly instructive. Now is it possible 
to frame arty theory which will fulfil the requirements 
stated above? Something like the following, I am sure, 
has suggested itself in some shape to thousands of 
observers, and can be found more or less clearly ex- 
pressed or implied by a very great number of writers. 
For a single example, Dr. Livingston, the African ex- 
plorer, records phenomena witnessed among wild ani- 
mals leading him to suggest the existence of a "Guard- 
ian Spirit" watching over each race. But the same 
idea is practically embodied, along with very much 
else which needs to be taken account of, in the following- 
conception. 
No one can carefully consider any living organization 
as a machine without feeling that beside the conscious 
ego which animates it there resides within it, be it man 
or animal, another and separate intelligence absolutely 
governing and controlling many of its most important 
functions. For a name let us call this second intel- 
ligence sub-ego, though clearly it was the first comer, 
and if either is to be considered as the owner of the body 
and the host it is sub-ego and ego is but the guest. 
As to the importance of its functions, like the Vestal 
( Virgins, it is charged with the care of the very spark 
I of life itself, which requires the perpetual fanning of 
many vital processes. The ego may sleep, or be drugged, 
■Jp or even become insane, but sub-ego is ever at its post, 
j Nor is it any lifeless and automatic mechanism, as it 
. were, a spring running a clock. It is an intelligence, 
jj repairing accidents and meeting emergency with re- 
• ' source. If flesh is torn, injured portions are thrown 
j out and new flesh formed. If bone is broken, new bone 
I is built exactly where and as needed. The tablets of 
^ memory seem to be in its keeping, and to naught else 
• can we assign that mysterious power which has fixed 
limits to the size, strength and longevity of every race, 
. upon the minute and exact regulation of which the very 
survival and present supremacy of the human race 
itself has depended. But it is not necessary for our 
present purposes to speculate further upon the powers, 
mental or physical, of the sub-ego, inviting and prolific 
. as the field may be. All that need be here said is that, 
chance being ruled out, the onus is upon those who 
would reject the existence of a sub-ego to suggest a 
working theory more in accordance with observed phe- 
nomena. Until that is done sub-ego is a legitimate spec- 
ulation. Its existence granted, all operations of animal 
instinct must be ascribed to it, whether habitual or 
newly acquired. They are but promptings to the ego 
from the sub-ego, which constructed and tuns the mech- 
anism of its body. And the evidence is overwhelming 
that the whole sum of the life and death experiences of 
every individual of its race is available in some way to 
each sub-ego. In other words, we must predicate some 
telepathic communication or its equivalent between the 
sub-egos of each race. So far the phenomena of nature 
will bear us out with evidence as endless as that sup- 
porting the theory of gravitation. 
Finally, in our conception of the character of our orig- 
inal or centrifugal force there can be no compromise 
between the theories of chance- and design. Design 
may avail itself of experience gained by chance to reach 
a higher foresight, but the two theories will no more 
mix in accounting for a duck than in accounting for a 
rtewsparjer; and if one single phenomenon of nature re- 
quires design in our centrifugal force, it is as absurd 
. after that to try and show how chance may have cut a 
figure in this or that phenomenon as it would be to debate 
and to split hairs over the influence of chance upon the 
development or improvement of steam engines. 
- To recapitulate. Individual acquirements are not 
transmitted to posterity. The three crippled grand- 
parent theory is totally inadequate. Chance could no 
more produce the creation we see than the newspapers 
we read. Practically a blue-print of every species pre- 
ceded- its first appearance. A sub-ego precedes every 
ego, superintends its entire life and imparts all necessary 
race instincts. And finally there is in some manner the 
equivalent oi telepathic communication between sub- 
egos of the same species. E. P. Alexander. 
"Puffins answered an advertisement in which somebody 
offered to sell him the secret for preventing trousers 
from getting fringes round the bottom," "What did 
they fell him?" "To wear knickerbockers." — Tit-Bits. 
He — "I only pay fifty cents an hour for this boat." 
She — "That's why I like it. It's a regular bargain sail." 
—Harper's Drawer. 
A Mongolian Pheasant's Nest, 
Malden, Mass. — Editor Forest and Stream: As a 
constant reader of the Forest and Stream, I have 
taken great interest in the notes from all over the United 
States on the Mongolian pheasant for the last five years, 
and I thought perhaps some of my sporting friends 
might enjoy a few lines from near Boston. The Mon- 
golian pheasant is found in a large part of the State; I 
have seen and heard of it on good authority seventy-five 
miles from Boston. But most, all the birds seen are 
males. The reason of this is, I am told, that about nine 
males are liberated to one female. 
I was taken to the nest of the bird I send you a photo 
of by my old-time friend of the field and woods, Minat, 
on the 2d of May, in the Medford woods. We have 
spent many pleasant hours with the rod and gun, but 
this was the first hunt with the camera we had ever 
taken together; and the results were as fascinating as 
with either rod or gun. 1 presume many a sportsman 
who enjoys nature has taken his^ friends out on a warm 
spring morning to let them take a peep at a partridge 
nest he has found on some of his rambles. When on 
such an expedition your guide -halts ami says: "There 
is the bird on the nest, right by that stump." For a 
short space of time, that you may think hours, you 
would have no sight for the bird; but at last you catch 
the sparkle of its eye and say: "Strange, but I could not 
see the bird at first sight." It is plain enough after you 
have seen it. It was just the same with the pheasant 
nest as with a partridge nest. I was within a few feet 
and could not see the bird, though she was in plain 
sight, so near was her color to the ground. The nest 
was on the east side of a pine and oak wood, on a small 
hill near a swamp, and in open ground. The only 
things to coyer her were a few twigs that had been cut off 
and some very small blueberry brush. I could go all 
around her, and I put the camera within 4ft. of her. 
After I had taken her photo I pushed her from the 
nest and found thirteen eggs of very dark olive. When 
she left the- nest, she flew a few feet, then ran a few 
yards, then flew out of sight. On the 20th of May I 
went to the nest and found no trace of the happy family; 
I do not think she was disturbed, and I think aH the 
eggs were fertile. 
I hope to hear more through your paper of the pheas-^ 
ant, as I think it will soon be a game bird all over 
Massachusetts. C. E. Bailey. 
[We regret that the interesting photograph could not 
be reproduced.] 
An Unusual Nesting Place. 
Lakeside Park, N. Y., July 13. — While sitting on the 
porch of the Lakeside Park Hotel I noticed a bird that 
I thought was a house wren fly into the vines that cover 
the wire netting overhead, and looking up I saw a nest 
placed on the wire among the vines about 2j^ft. above 
my head; examining it I concluded that it was not 
that of a wren and that it contained a young bird. A few 
minutes later I saw on the lawn a pair of song spar- 
rows, the female without a tail; and I concluded that it 
was the bird I had taken for a wren. A moment after 
I saw her fly into the vine and feed a young bird that 
was sitting near the nest, and later' saw her feed the one 
in the nest. I was then convinced that the nest was that 
of the song sparrow> of which I was skeptical, as I had 
never known this species to build its nest other than 
on the ground, or more than 2ft. above it; and here it 
was placed on the wire netting about 10ft. from the 
ground, and nearly within reach of one's hand from the 
floor below, where people have walked and sat hundreds 
of times daily for the past month. A young lady guest 
of the hotel told me that she had seen the bird without 
a tail hopping around on the floor and supposed it was 
a young bird, but did not know of the nest. Taking in 
consideration the shyness of the song sparrow, I con- 
sider this an unusual nesting place for this species. 
There are many species of bird in the park surround- 
ing the hotel and its cottages, and as they are not dis- 
turbed they are. quite neighborly. I have seen three 
nests of the red-eyed vireo; that exquisite penciled basket 
affair hanging near the cottage. As I write this, a pair 
.of kingbirds, a dozen or more of cedar birds, and a 
phcebe can be seen catching flies in front of the cottage 
we occupy. Although not of the fly-catching family, the 
cedar bird seems to hold its own with its two fly-catching 
neighbors. ■ J. L, Davison. 
A West Virginia Panther. 
Mr. Andrew J. Price sends us this account, as given 
by a Pocahontas county paper, of the occurrence of a 
panther in the Cranberry Mountains of that county: 
It has been so long since there was a well authenticat- 
ed case of a panther being seen in the mountains of this 
county that the general belief has grown up that there 
was not a panther left. There seems to be no doubt 
that : there is a panther in the Cranberry Mountains. 
The first heard of it was from Ed. Patterson, who saw 
the tracks of some large animal which had been fol- 
lowing a deer trail in a muddy path. 
Last week Andrew and John Moore went to Cran- 
berry to fish. They are absolutely reliable, and are not 
given to exaggeration. They w r ere shy of believing 
that they saw a panther, and. the reader can judge 
whether it was one or not. They had fished down North 
Fork and had prepared to lay out at the forks. They 
got everything ready and started up the South Prong 
for a short fish. When they got up about half a mile, 
to the foot of the island, where the path comes in, they 
were standing close together, talking of turning batk. 
It was nearly sundown. John had his eyes turned up the 
river and saw the animal jump across the stream about 
a hundred yards above him. He remarked that he had 
seen a deer. They immediately started up the back chan- 
nel to get a sight of the animal if possible as it crossed 
the back channel. 
They were fortunate to the last degree. As they 
reached a point nearly opposite where it was seen, the 
panther came out of the brush ahead of them and walked 
slowly away in a diagonal direction. They saw at once 
that it was not a deer. They thought at once' that it 
was a cinnamon bear, but catching sight of its long, 
