92 
NATURE NOTES 
The Parents' Review for April contains several papers likely to interest our 
readers, including continuations of the Rev. H. H. Moore’s account of “A 
Forgotten Pioneer of a Rational Education and his Experiment,” Mr. Dawes, that 
is, and his school at King’s Soniborne, fifty years ago ; and of Mrs. Maxwell F. 
Maxwell’s lantern-lecture on Hampstead Birds and Buildings, and a museum 
lecture, by E. C. Allen, on British Falcons and Hawks. 
Received ; East Herts Archaological Society, Annual Report for 1903 : The 
American Botanist for January; The Wilson Bulletin (Oberlin, Ohio), The 
Victorian Naturalist and The Plant World, for March ; The Naluralist, The 
Irish Naturalist, The Animals' Friend, Our Animal Friends, The Animal 
World, The Humanitarian, The Agricultural Economist, The Estate Magazine, 
and The Commonwealth for April. 
NATURAL HISTORY NOTES. 
100. The Quagga. — It does not appear to be clearly understood by every 
one that the Quagga (Equus quagga) of South Africa is now completely extinct. 
The extinction of this species took place comparatively recently, and it is much 
to be regretted that the Mountain Zebra {E. zebra) also threatens to disappear. 
There still remain a few herds which are rigorously protected in Africa, and we 
may congratulate the Zoological Society that they still possess one living e.\ample 
of the Mountain Zebra. 
March, 1904. VV. R.-D. 
101. Migration and Speed of Birds.— The authority which I can give 
respecting the supposed piloting of young birds by old ones on migration is Mr. 
Dixon, in his book, “Migration of Birds.” He holds that it is quite probable 
that the old birds who have failed to rear broods that season, or have not paired, 
or have lost their mates by accident, migrate about the same time that the young 
birds do, 'and hence show them the way. Whether this be correct or not, I think 
it far more natural and probable than another theory. Hence, I do not feel able 
to accept Mr. Daubeny’s theory, for it .seems to me utterly impossible that young 
birds should traverse vast distances, which they have never been over before, 
without some guide or clue to where they are going. If one looks on animals 
as mere machines, doing everything by blind instinct, and never reasoning or 
observing anything, perhaps this may be so. I would sooner accept Mr. Dixon's 
theory, difficult as it may be of rigid and positive proof, than I would accept the 
other. I feel sure that birds, with their wonderful senses of sight and observation, 
guide themselves on migration by landmarks. Thus, for example, a migration 
host, passing a range of hills or a river valley, note them and remember them on 
their return journey, and thus keep their course straight. How, then, could young 
birds who have never seen the country before accomplish this without some 
guide? If they get some piloting on their first journey, they note the way, and 
after that they remember the identical spots they passed, when on future migra- 
tions. Migration, I suppose, is simply a habit, which birds have acquired through 
thousands of years, a relic, probably, of the southward movement of all life in the 
Glacial Epoch, when the destructive ice swept everything before it. Now I 
cannot think that this habit, handed down through generations of birds, has 
degenerated into blind instinct, and that birds follow, subject to their instinct, 
year after year. Again, one must remember that many young birds are not 
fledged till almost the end of July, or beginning of August; this I have often 
found the ca.se. 
Mr. Daubeny says: “ There is no mistaking a young starling for an old one 
in the summer months.” Quite so. But I think that only holds good till the 
young have had their first moult. Now, if the young migrate after moulting, as 
they certainly do, surely it is not an unlikely thing to mistake an old bird for a 
young one, since the latter, after moulting, resembles the former identically. 
Then, as regards the speed of birds on migration, I think observers must have 
noticed how summer migrants, when they reach these shores, after touching the 
