Fear in Birds, 
89 
pigeons are excited to anger ratlier than fear, and, 
puffing themselves up, snap and strike at an intruder 
with their beaks. Other fledglings simply shrink 
down in the nest or scpiat close on the ground, 
their fear, apparently, being in proportion to the 
suddenness with which the strange animal or object 
comes on them ; but, if the deadliest enemy ap- 
proaches with slow caution, as snakes do — and 
snakes must be very ancient enemies to birds — 
there is no fear or suspicion shown, even when the 
enemy is in full view and about to strike. This, it 
will be understood, is when no warning-cry is 
uttered by the parent bird. This shrinking, and, 
in some cases, hiding from an object coming swiftly 
towards them, is the '^‘wildness’' of young birds, 
which, Darwin says again, is greater in wild than 
in- domestic species. Of the extreme tameness of 
the young rhea I have already spoken ; I have also 
observed young tinamous, plovers, coots, &c., 
hatched by fowls, and found them as incapable of 
distinguishing friend from foe as the young of 
domestic birds. The only difference between the 
young of wdld and tame is that the former are, as a 
rule, much more sprightly and active. But there 
are many exceptions ; and if this greater alertness 
and activity is what is meant by wildness,” then 
the young of some wild birds—rhea, crested screamer, 
&c. — are actually much tamer than our newly- 
hatched chickens and ducklings. 
To return to wffiat may be seen in nestling birds. 
When very young, and before their education has 
well begun, if quietly approached and touched, they 
open their bills and take food as readily from a man 
