62 
BY TEE WAYSIDE 
(Continued from p. 59) 
know them cannot be answered, now, at 
least, in any positive way. For my 
own part, however, I believe they see 
it in the sky and in the fields about them, 
smell it in the air, and taste it in the 
food they eat. What I mean is this: 
At the time these birds leave the south 
in the spring or the north in the fall 
the sun rises in a definite place in the 
east, has a definite altitude at noon and 
sets in a definite place at night. Certain 
stars fill the sky after sunset and certain 
others before daybreak. Certain flowers 
are in bloom and fill the air with their 
fragrance, certain fruits and seeds are 
ripe, and certain insects can be found 
for food. Now all of these, recurring as 
they do, leave memories with each and 
every bird which are associated one with 
another and with the periods of migra¬ 
tion. When these scenes and events re¬ 
peat themselves in the birds’ experience 
the great law of association of ideas 
brings up the thought of the journey, 
they feel sure the time to go has arrived 
and are off. 
That odors, for example, do in our 
own case, turn the mind back upon 
experiences there can be no doubt. The 
fragrance of hay almost invariably car¬ 
ries me back to my boyhood days, and 
I rarely catch the odor of apples with¬ 
out going back to my mother ’s middle 
bureau drawer where apples from 
Grandmother’s orchard lay mellowing; 
and yet, that summer, with no apples 
for the children, is thirty years away. 
Do you say young birds of the year 
can have no such memories to be jogged 
by the events the season of migration 
brings before them, and therefore they 
should not move with the others? This 
may be true, and yet animals inherit 
from their ancestors in more directions 
and in greater amounts than we realize. 
Who tells the robin how, of what, and : 
what place to build its first nest? How 1 
does the cowbird, always reared by fos- 1 
ter-parents and unknown to its mother. ' 
know that it may shirk tHe responsibili- : 
ties of motherhood by stealthily deposit- 1 
ing its egg in the nest of some other ' 
bird? Do you say instinct guides in i 
these cases? True, no doubt, but what 
is instinct more than inherited experi¬ 
ences or memories? 
We have yet to consider the very diffi¬ 
cult question, how do birds direct their 
courses over these long journeys ? Many 
birds, like the bobolink, execute most of 
their migratory flight during the night, 
and others traverse leagues of trackless 
sea. How is it possible for tasks like 
these to be brought to successful issues 
by so many thousands of aeronauts, un¬ 
aided by either chart or compass? After i 
having expressed the belief that birds 
have keen powers of observation and 
great memories, which they put to serv¬ 
ice in their domestic relations, and that. I 
in obedience to the great law of associa- 
tion, they are started on their journeys 
at the appointed times, you will perhaps > 
expect no less than to have it here said 
that birds’ make their way northward 
and southward in the same coolheaded, 1 
observant way that a man, grown old in 
traveling in uncharted regions would 
do. This is, in short, my belief, though 
of course T express it as an opinion and 
not as something demonstrated. I have 
no doubt that birds are able to “ orient 
thems’elves” even more skillfully than 
we do, and that, by using their eyes in 
unclouded weather, they are able to de¬ 
termine which way is north and which 
is south to a certainty. If you ask me, li 
how? I should reply, in the same man¬ 
ner that the roving Indians do. Little 
