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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Naturalist in La Plata
+
+Author: W. H. Hudson
+
+Posting Date: April 12, 2014 [EBook #7446]
+Release Date: February, 2005
+First Posted: May 1, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Eric Eldred
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA
+
+BY
+
+W. H. HUDSON, C.M.Z.S.
+
+
+JOINT AUTHOR OF "ARGENTINE ORNITHOLOGY"
+
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. SMIT
+
+THIRD EDITION.
+
+NEW YORK
+D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
+1895
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The plan I have followed in this work has been to sift and arrange the
+facts I have gathered concerning the habits of the animals best known to
+me, preserving those only, which, in my judgment, appeared worth
+recording. In some instances a variety of subjects have linked
+themselves together in my mind, and have been grouped under one heading;
+consequently the scope of the book is not indicated by the list of
+contents: this want is, however, made good by an index at the end.
+
+It is seldom an easy matter to give a suitable name to a book of this
+description. I am conscious that the one I have made choice of displays
+a lack of originality; also, that this kind of title has been used
+hitherto for works constructed more or less on the plan of the famous
+_Naturalist on the Amazons._ After I have made this apology the reader,
+on his part, will readily admit that, in treating of the Natural History
+of a district so well known, and often described as the southern portion
+of La Plata, which has a temperate climate, and where nature is neither
+exuberant nor grand, a personal narrative would have seemed superfluous.
+
+The greater portion of the matter contained in this volume has already
+seen the light in the form of papers contributed to the _Field,_ with
+other journals that treat of Natural History; and to the monthly
+magazines:--_Longmans', The Nineteenth Century, The Gentleman's
+Magazine,_ and others: I am indebted to the Editors and Proprietors of
+these periodicals for kindly allowing me to make use of this material.
+
+Of all animals, birds have perhaps afforded me most pleasure; but most
+of the fresh knowledge I have collected in this department is contained
+in a larger work _(Argentine Ornithology),_ of which Dr. P. L. Sclater
+is part author. As I have not gone over any of the subjects dealt with
+in that work, bird-life has not received more than a fair share of
+attention in the present volume.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE DESERT PAMPAS
+
+CHAPTER II. CUB PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA
+
+CHAPTER III. WAVE OF LIFE
+
+CHAPTER IV. SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS
+
+CHAPTER V. FEAR IN BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER VI. PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE MEPHITIC SKUNK
+
+CHAPTER VIII. MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS
+
+CHAPTER IX. DRAGON-FLY STORMS
+
+CHAPTER X. MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS
+
+CHAPTER XI. HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS
+
+CHAPTER XII. A NOBLE WASP
+
+CHAPTER XIII. NATURE'S NIGHT-LIGHTS
+
+CHAPTER XIV. FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS
+
+CHAPTER XV. THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT
+
+CHAPTER XVI. HUMMING-BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE CRESTED SCREAMER
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. THE WOODHEWER FAMILY
+
+CHAPTER XIX. MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE
+
+CHAPTER XX. BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE DYING HUANACO
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. HORSE AND MAN
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. SEEN AND LOST
+
+APPENDIX
+
+INDEX
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA,
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE DESERT PAMPAS.
+
+
+During recent years we have heard much about the great and rapid changes
+now going on in the plants and animals of all the temperate regions of
+the globe colonized by Europeans. These changes, if taken merely as
+evidence of material progress, must be a matter of rejoicing to those
+who are satisfied, and more than satisfied, with our system of
+civilization, or method of outwitting Nature by the removal of all
+checks on the undue increase of our own species. To one who finds a
+charm in things as they exist in the unconquered provinces of Nature's
+dominions, and who, not being over-anxious to reach the end of his
+journey, is content to perform it on horseback, or in a waggon drawn by
+bullocks, it is permissible to lament the altered aspect of the earth's
+surface, together with the disappearance of numberless noble and
+beautiful forms, both of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. For he
+cannot find it in his heart to love the forms by which they are
+replaced; these are cultivated and domesticated, and have only become
+useful to man at the cost of that grace and spirit which freedom and
+wildness give. In numbers they are many--twenty-five millions of sheep
+in this district, fifty millions in that, a hundred millions in a
+third--but how few are the species in place of those destroyed? and when
+the owner of many sheep and much wheat desires variety--for he possesses
+this instinctive desire, albeit in conflict with and overborne by the
+perverted instinct of destruction--what is there left to him, beyond his
+very own, except the weeds that spring up in his fields under all skies,
+ringing him round with old-world monotonous forms, as tenacious of their
+undesired union with him as the rats and cockroaches that inhabit his
+house?
+
+We hear most frequently of North America, New Zealand, and Australia in
+this connection; but nowhere on the globe has civilization "written
+strange defeatures" more markedly than on that great area of level
+country called by English writers _the pampas_, but by the Spanish more
+appropriately _La Pampa_--from the Quichua word signifying open space or
+country--since it forms in most part one continuous plain, extending on
+its eastern border from the river Parana, in latitude 32 degrees, to the
+Patagonian formation on the river Colorado, and comprising about two
+hundred thousand square miles of humid, grassy country.
+
+This district has been colonized by Europeans since the middle of the
+sixteenth century; but down to within a very few years ago immigration
+was on too limited a scale to make any very great change; and, speaking
+only of the pampean country, the conquered territory was a long,
+thinly-settled strip, purely pastoral, and the Indians, with their
+primitive mode of warfare, were able to keep back the invaders from the
+greater portion of their ancestral hunting-grounds. Not twenty years
+ago a ride of two hundred miles, starting from the capital city,
+Buenos Ayres, was enough to place one well beyond the furthest
+south-western frontier outpost. In 1879 the Argentine Government
+determined to rid the country of the aborigines, or, at all events, to
+break their hostile and predatory spirit once for all; with the result
+that the entire area of the grassy pampas, with a great portion of
+the sterile pampas and Patagonia, has been made available to the
+emigrant. There is no longer anything to deter the starvelings
+of the Old World from possessing themselves of this new land of
+promise, flowing, like Australia, with milk and tallow, if not with
+honey; any emasculated migrant from a Genoese or Neapolitan
+slum is now competent to "fight the wilderness" out there, with his
+eight-shilling fowling-piece and the implements of his trade. The
+barbarians no longer exist to frighten his soul with dreadful war cries;
+they have moved away to another more remote and shadowy region, called
+in their own language _Alhuemapu_, and not known to geographers. For
+the results so long and ardently wished for have swiftly followed on
+General Roca's military expedition; and the changes witnessed during the
+last decade on the pampas exceed in magnitude those which had been
+previously effected by three centuries of occupation.
+
+In view of this wave of change now rapidly sweeping away the old
+order, with whatever beauty and grace it possessed, it might not seem
+inopportune at the present moment to give a rapid sketch, from the field
+naturalist's point of view, of the great plain, as it existed before the
+agencies introduced by European colonists had done their work, and as it
+still exists in its remoter parts.
+
+The humid, grassy, pampean country extends, roughly speaking, half-way
+from the Atlantic Ocean and the Plata and Paraná rivers to the Andes,
+and passes gradually into the "Monte Formation," or _sterile pampa_--a
+sandy, more or less barren district, producing a dry, harsh, ligneous
+vegetation, principally thorny bushes and low trees, of which the chañar
+(Gurliaca decorticans) is the most common; hence the name of
+"Chañar-steppe" used by some writers: and this formation extends
+southwards down into Patagonia. Scientists have not yet been able to
+explain why the pampas, with a humid climate, and a soil exceedingly
+rich, have produced nothing but grass, while the dry, sterile
+territories on their north, west, and south borders have an arborescent
+vegetation. Darwin's conjecture that the extreme violence of the
+_pampero,_ or south-west wind, prevented trees from growing, is now
+proved to have been ill-founded since the introduction of the Eucalyptus
+globulus; for this noble tree attains to an extraordinary height on the
+pampas, and exhibits there a luxuriance of foliage never seen in
+Australia.
+
+To this level area--my "parish of Selborne," or, at all events, a goodly
+portion of it--with the sea on one hand, and on the other the
+practically infinite expanse of grassy desert--another sea, not "in vast
+fluctuations fixed," but in comparative calm--I should like to conduct
+the reader in imagination: a country all the easier to be imagined on
+account of the absence of mountains, woods, lakes, and rivers. There is,
+indeed, little to be imagined--not even a sense of vastness; and Darwin,
+touching on this point, in the _Journal of a Naturalist,_ aptly
+says:--"At sea, a person's eye being six feet above the surface of the
+water, his horizon is two miles and four-fifths distant. In like manner,
+the more level the plain, the more nearly does the horizon approach
+within these narrow limits; and this, in my opinion, entirely destroys
+the grandeur which one would have imagined that a vast plain would have
+possessed."
+
+I remember my first experience of a hill, after having been always shut
+within "these narrow limits." It was one of the range of sierras near
+Cape Corrientes, and not above eight hundred feet high; yet, when I had
+gained the summit, I was amazed at the vastness of the earth, as it
+appeared to me from that modest elevation. Persons born and bred on the
+pampas, when they first visit a mountainous district, frequently
+experience a sensation as of "a ball in the throat" which seems to
+prevent free respiration.
+
+In most places the rich, dry soil is occupied by a coarse grass, three
+or four feet high, growing in large tussocks, and all the year round of
+a deep green; a few slender herbs and trefoils, with long, twining
+stems, maintain a frail existence among the tussocks; but the strong
+grass crowds out most plants, and scarcely a flower relieves its uniform
+everlasting verdure. There are patches, sometimes large areas, where it
+does not grow, and these are carpeted by small creeping herbs of a
+livelier green, and are gay in spring with flowers, chiefly of the
+composite and papilionaceous kinds; and verbenas, scarlet, purple, rose,
+and white. On moist or marshy grounds there are also several lilies,
+yellow, white, and red, two or three flags, and various other small
+flowers; but altogether the flora of the pampas is the poorest in
+species of any fertile district on the globe. On moist clayey ground
+flourishes the stately pampa grass, Gynerium argenteum, the spears of
+which often attain a height of eight or nine feet. I have ridden through
+many leagues of this grass with the feathery spikes high as my head, and
+often higher. It would be impossible for me to give anything like an
+adequate idea of the exquisite loveliness, at certain times and seasons,
+of this queen of grasses, the chief glory of the solitary pampa.
+Everyone is familiar with it in cultivation; but the garden-plant has a
+sadly decaying, draggled look at all times, and to my mind, is often
+positively ugly with its dense withering mass of coarse leaves, drooping
+on the ground, and bundle of spikes, always of the same dead white or
+dirty cream-colour. Now colour--the various ethereal tints that give a
+blush to its cloud-like purity--is one of the chief beauties of this
+grass on its native soil; and travellers who have galloped across the
+pampas at a season of the year when the spikes are dead, and white as
+paper or parchment, have certainly missed its greatest charm. The plant
+is social, and in some places where scarcely any other kind exists it
+covers large areas with a sea of fleecy-white plumes; in late summer,
+and in autumn, the tints are seen, varying from the most delicate rose,
+tender and illusive as the blush on the white under-plumage of some
+gulls, to purple and violaceous. At no time does it look so perfect as
+in the evening, before and after sunset, when the softened light imparts
+a mistiness to the crowding plumes, and the traveller cannot help
+fancying that the tints, which then seem richest, are caught from the
+level rays of the sun, or reflected from the coloured vapours of the
+afterglow.
+
+The last occasion on which I saw the pampa grass in its full beauty was
+at the close of a bright day in March, ending in one of those perfect
+sunsets seen only in the wilderness, where no lines of house or hedge
+mar the enchanting disorder of nature, and the earth and sky tints are
+in harmony. I had been travelling all day with one companion, and for
+two hours we had ridden through the matchless grass, which spread away
+for miles on every side, the myriads of white spears, touched with
+varied colour, blending in the distance and appearing almost like the
+surface of a cloud. Hearing a swishing sound behind us, we turned
+sharply round, and saw, not forty yards away in our rear, a party of
+five mounted Indians, coming swiftly towards us: but at the very moment
+we saw them their animals came to a dead halt, and at the same instant
+the five riders leaped up, and stood erect on their horses' backs.
+Satisfied that they had no intention of attacking us, and were only
+looking out for strayed horses, we continued watching them for some
+time, as they stood gazing away over the plain in different directions,
+motionless and silent, like bronze men on strange horse-shaped pedestals
+of dark stone; so dark in their copper skins and long black hair,
+against the far-off ethereal sky, flushed with amber light; and at their
+feet, and all around, the cloud of white and faintly-blushing plumes.
+That farewell scene was printed very vividly on my memory, but cannot be
+shown to another, nor could it be even if a Ruskin's pen or a Turner's
+pencil were mine; for the flight of the sea-mew is not more impossible
+to us than the power to picture forth the image of Nature in our souls,
+when she reveals herself in one of those "special moments" which have
+"special grace" in situations where her wild beauty has never been
+spoiled by man.
+
+At other hours and seasons the general aspect of the plain is
+monotonous, and in spite of the unobstructed view, and the unfailing
+verdure and sunshine, somewhat melancholy, although never sombre: and
+doubtless the depressed and melancholy feeling the pampa inspires in
+those who are unfamiliar with it is due in a great measure to the
+paucity of life, and to the profound silence. The wind, as may well be
+imagined on that extensive level area, is seldom at rest; there, as in
+the forest, it is a "bard of many breathings," and the strings it
+breathes upon give out an endless variety of sorrowful sounds, from the
+sharp fitful sibilations of the dry wiry grasses on the barren places,
+to the long mysterious moans that swell and die in the tall polished
+rushes of the marsh. It is also curious to note that with a few
+exceptions the resident birds are comparatively very silent, even those
+belonging to groups which elsewhere are highly loquacious. The reason of
+this is not far to seek. In woods and thickets, where birds abound
+most, they are continually losing sight of each other, and are only
+prevented from scattering by calling often; while the muffling effect on
+sound of the close foliage, to' which may be added a spirit of emulation
+where many voices are heard, incites most species, especially those that
+are social, to exert their voices to the utmost pitch in singing,
+calling, and screaming. On the open pampas, birds, which are not
+compelled to live concealed on the surface, can see each other at long
+distances, and perpetual calling is not needful: moreover, in that still
+atmosphere sound travels far. As a rule their voices are strangely
+subdued; nature's silence has infected them, and they have become silent
+by habit. This is not the case with aquatic species, which are nearly
+all migrants from noisier regions, and mass themselves in lagoons and
+marshes, where they are all loquacious together. It is also noteworthy
+that the subdued bird-voices, some of which are exceedingly sweet and
+expressive, and the notes of many of the insects and batrachians have a
+great resemblance, and seem to be in accord with the aeolian tones of
+the wind in reeds and grasses: a stranger to the pampas, even a
+naturalist accustomed to a different fauna, will often find it hard to
+distinguish between bird, frog, and insect voices.
+
+The mammalia is poor in species, and with the single exception of the
+well-known vizcacha (Lagostomus trichodactylus), there is not one of
+which it can truly be said that it is in any special way the product of
+the pampas, or, in other words, that its instincts are better suited to
+the conditions of the pampas than to those of other districts. As a
+fact, this large rodent inhabits a vast extent of country, north, west,
+and south of the true pampas, but nowhere is he so thoroughly on his
+native heath as on the great grassy plain. There, to some extent, he
+even makes his own conditions, like the beaver. He lives in a small
+community of twenty or thirty members, in a village of deep-chambered
+burrows, all with their pit-like entrances closely grouped together; and
+as the village endures for ever, or for an indefinite time, the earth
+constantly being brought up forms a mound thirty or forty feet in
+diameter; and this protects the habitation from floods on low or level
+ground. Again, he is not swift of foot, and all rapacious beasts are his
+enemies; he also loves to feed on tender succulent herbs and grasses, to
+seek for which he would have to go far afield among the giant grass,
+where his watchful foes are lying in wait to seize him; he saves himself
+from this danger by making a clearing all round his abode, on which a
+smooth turf is formed; and here the animals feed and have their evening
+pastimes in comparative security: for when an enemy approaches, he is
+easily seen; the note of alarm is sounded, and the whole company
+scuttles away to their refuge. In districts having a different soil and
+vegetation, as in Patagonia, the vizcachas' curious, unique instincts
+are of no special advantage, which makes it seem probable that they have
+been formed on the pampas.
+
+How marvellous a thing it seems that the two species of mammalians--the
+beaver and the vizcacha--that most nearly simulate men's intelligent
+actions in their social organizing instincts, and their habitations,
+which are made to endure, should belong to an order so low down as the
+Rodents! And in the case of the latter species, it adds to the marvel
+when we find that the vizcacha, according to Water-house, is the lowest
+of the order in its marsupial affinities.
+
+The vizcacha is the most common rodent on the pampas, and the Rodent
+order is represented by the largest number of species. The finest is the
+so-called Patagonian hare--Dolichotis patagonica--a beautiful animal
+twice as large as a hare, with ears shorter and more rounded, and legs
+relatively much longer. The fur is grey and chestnut brown. It is
+diurnal in its habits, lives in kennels, and is usually met with in
+pairs, or small flocks. It is better suited to a sterile country like
+Patagonia than to the grassy humid plain; nevertheless it was found
+throughout the whole of the pampas; but in a country where the wisdom of
+a Sir William Harcourt was never needed to slip the leash, this king of
+the Rodentia is now nearly extinct.
+
+A common rodent is the coypú--Myiopotamus coypú--yellowish in colour
+with bright red incisors; a rat in shape, and as large as an otter. It
+is aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where there are no banks it
+makes a platform nest among the rushes. Of an evening they are all out
+swimming and playing in the water, conversing together in their strange
+tones, which sound like the moans and cries of wounded and suffering
+men; and among them the mother-coypú is seen with her progeny, numbering
+eight or nine, with as many on her back as she can accommodate, while
+the others swim after her, crying for a ride.
+
+With reference to this animal, which, as we have seen, is prolific, a
+strange thing once happened in Buenos Ayres. The coypú was much more
+abundant fifty years ago than now, and its skin, which has a fine fur
+under the long coarse hair, was largely exported to Europe. About that
+time the Dictator Rosas issued a decree prohibiting the hunting of the
+coypú. The result was that the animals increased and multiplied
+exceedingly, and, abandoning their aquatic habits, they became
+terrestrial and migratory, and swarmed everywhere in search of food.
+Suddenly a mysterious malady fell on them, from which they quickly
+perished, and became almost extinct.
+
+What a blessed thing it would be for poor rabbit-worried Australia if a
+similar plague should visit that country, and fall on the right animal!
+On the other hand, what a calamity if the infection, wide-spread,
+incurable, and swift as the wind in its course, should attack the
+too-numerous sheep! And who knows what mysterious, unheard-of
+retributions that revengeful deity Nature may not be meditating in her
+secret heart for the loss of her wild four-footed children slain by
+settlers, and the spoiling of her ancient beautiful order!
+
+A small pampa rodent worthy of notice is the Cavia australis, called
+_cui_ in the vernacular from its voice: a timid, social, mouse-coloured
+little creature, with a low gurgling language, like running babbling
+waters; in habits resembling its domestic pied relation the guinea pig.
+It loves to run on clean ground, and on the pampas makes little
+rat-roads all about its hiding-place, which little roads tell a story to
+the fox, and such like; therefore the little cavy's habits, and the
+habits of all cavies, I fancy, are not so well suited to the humid
+grassy region as to other districts, with sterile ground to run and play
+upon, and thickets in which to hide.
+
+A more interesting animal is the Ctenomys magellanica, a little less
+than the rat in size, with a shorter tail, pale grey fur, and red
+incisors. It is called _tuco-tuco_ from its voice, and _oculto_ from its
+habits; for it is a dweller underground, and requires a loose, sandy
+soil in which, like the mole, it may _swim_ beneath the surface.
+Consequently the pampa, with its heavy, moist mould, is not the tuco's
+proper place; nevertheless, wherever there is a stretch of sandy soil,
+or a range of dunes, there it is found living; not seen, but heard; for
+all day long and all night sounds its voice, resonant and loud, like a
+succession of blows from a hammer; as if a company of gnomes were
+toiling far down underfoot, beating on their anvils, first with strong
+measured strokes, then with lighter and faster, and with a swing and
+rhythm as if the little men were beating in time to some rude chant
+unheard above the surface. How came these isolated colonies of a species
+so subterranean in habits, and requiring a sandy soil to move in, so far
+from their proper district--that sterile country from which they are
+separated by wide, unsuitable areas? They cannot perform long overland
+journeys like the rat. Perhaps the dunes have travelled, carrying their
+little cattle with them.
+
+Greatest among the carnivores are the two cat-monarchs of South America,
+the jaguar and puma. Whatever may be their relative positions elsewhere,
+on the pampas the puma is mightiest, being much more abundant and better
+able to thrive than its spotted rival. Versatile in its preying habits,
+its presence on the pampa is not surprising; but probably only an
+extreme abundance of large mammalian prey, which has not existed in
+recent times, could have, tempted an animal of the river and
+forest-loving habits of the jaguar to colonize this cold, treeless, and
+comparatively waterless desert. There are two other important cats. The
+grass-cat, not unlike Felis catus in its robust form and dark colour,
+but a larger, more powerful animal, inexpressibly savage in disposition.
+The second, Felis geoffroyi, is a larger and more beautiful animal,
+coloured like a leopard; it is called wood-cat, and, as the name would
+seem to indicate, is an intruder from wooded districts north of the
+pampas.
+
+There are two canines: one is Azara's beautiful grey fox-like dog,
+purely a fox in habits, and common everywhere. The other is far more
+interesting and extremely rare; it is called _aguará,_ its nearest ally
+being the _aguará-guazú,_ the Canis jubatus or maned wolf of
+naturalists, found north of the pampean district. The aguará is smaller
+and has no mane; it is like the dingo in size, but slimmer and with a
+sharper nose, and lias a much brighter red colour. At night when camping
+out I have heard its dismal screams, but the screamer was sought in
+vain; while from the gauchos of the frontier I could only learn that it
+is a harmless, shy, solitary animal, that ever flies to remoter wilds
+from its destroyer, man. They offered me a skin--what more could I want?
+Simple souls! it was no more to me than the skin of a dead dog, with
+long, bright red hair. Those who love dead animals may have them in any
+number by digging with a. spade in that vast sepulchre of the pampas,
+where perished the hosts of antiquity. I love the living that are above
+the earth; and how small a remnant they are in South America we know,
+and now yearly becoming more precious as it dwindles away.
+
+The pestiferous skunk is universal; and there are two quaint-looking
+weasels, intensely black in colour, and grey on the back and flat crown.
+One, the Galictis barbara, is a large bold animal that hunts in
+companies; and when these long-bodied creatures sit up erect, glaring
+with beady eyes, grinning and chattering at the passer-by, they look
+like little friars in black robes and grey cowls; but the expression on
+their round faces is malignant and bloodthirsty beyond anything in
+nature, and it would perhaps be more decent to liken them to devils
+rather than to humans.
+
+On the pampas there is, strictly speaking, only one ruminant, the Cervus
+campestris, which is common. The most curious thing about this animal is
+that the male emits a rank, musky odour, so powerful that when the wind
+blows from it the effluvium comes in nauseating gusts to the nostrils
+from a distance exceeding two miles. It is really astonishing that only
+one small ruminant should be found on this immense grassy area, so
+admirably suited to herbivorous quadrupeds, a portion of which at the
+present moment affords sufficient pasture to eighty millions of sheep,
+cattle, and horses. In La Plata the author of _The Mammoth and the
+Flood_ will find few to quarrel with his doctrine.
+
+Of Edentates there are four. The giant armadillo does not range so far,
+and the delicate little pink fairy armadillo, the truncated
+Chlamydophorus, is a dweller in the sand-dunes of Mendoza, and has never
+colonized the grassy pampas. The Tatusia hybrida, called "little mule"
+from the length of its ears, and the Dasypus tricinctus, which, when
+disturbed, rolls itself into a ball, the wedge-shaped head and
+wedge-shaped tail admirably fitting into the deep-cut shell side by
+side; and the _quirquincho_ (Dasypus minutus), all inhabit the pampa,
+are diurnal, and feed exclusively on insects, chiefly ants. Wherever the
+country becomes settled, these three disappear, owing to the dulness of
+their senses, especially that of sight, and to the diurnal habit, which
+was an advantage to them, and enabled them to survive when rapacious
+animals, which are mostly nocturnal, were their only enemies. The
+fourth, and most important, is the hairy armadillo, with habits which
+are in strange contrast to those of its perishing congeners, and which
+seem to mock many hard-and-fast rules concerning animal life. It is
+omnivorous, and will thrive on anything from grass to flesh, found dead
+and in all stages of decay, or captured by means of its own strategy.
+Furthermore, its habits change to suit its conditions: thus, where
+nocturnal carnivores are its enemies, it is diurnal; but where man
+appears as a chief persecutor, it becomes nocturnal. It is much hunted
+for its flesh, dogs being trained for the purpose; yet it actually
+becomes more abundant as population increases in any district; and, if
+versatility in habits or adaptiveness can be taken as a measure of
+intelligence, this poor armadillo, a survival of the past, so old on the
+earth as to have existed contemporaneously with the giant glyptodon, is
+the superior of the large-brained cats and canines.
+
+To finish with the mammalia, there are two interesting opossums, both of
+the genus Didelphys, but in habits as wide apart as cat from otter. One
+of these marsupials appears so much at home on the plains that I almost
+regret having said that the vizcacha alone gives us the idea of being in
+its habits the _product_ of the pampas. This animal--Didelphys
+crassicaudata--has a long slender, wedge-, shaped head and body,
+admirably adapted for pushing through the thick grass and rushes; for it
+is both terrestrial and aquatic, therefore well suited to inhabit low,
+level plains liable to be flooded. On dry land its habits are similar to
+those of a weasel; in lagoons, where it dives and swims with great ease,
+it constructs a globular nest suspended from the rushes. The fur is
+soft, of a rich yellow, reddish above, and on the sides and under
+surfaces varying in some parts to orange, in others exhibiting beautiful
+copper and terra-cotta tints. These lovely tints and the metallic lustre
+soon fade from the fur, otherwise this animal would be much sought after
+in the interests of those who love to decorate themselves with the
+spoils of beautiful dead animals--beast and bird. The other opossum is
+the black and white Didelphys azarae; and it is indeed strange to find
+this animal on the pampas, although its presence there is not so
+mysterious as that of the tuco-tuco. It shuffles along slowly and
+awkwardly on the ground, but is a great traveller nevertheless. Tschudi
+met it mountaineering on the Andes at an enormous altitude, and, true to
+its lawless nature, it confronted me in Patagonia, where the books say
+no marsupial dwells. In every way it is adapted to an arboreal life, yet
+it is everywhere found on the level country, far removed from the
+conditions which one would imagine to be necessary to its existence. For
+how many thousands of years has this marsupial been a dweller on the
+plain, all its best faculties unexercised, its beautiful grasping hands
+pressed to the ground, and its prehensile tail dragged like an idle rope
+behind it! Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will take to it as
+readily as a duck to water, or an armadillo to earth, climbing up the
+trunk and about the branches with a monkey-like agility. How reluctant
+Nature seems in some cases to undo her own work! How long she will
+allow a specialized organ, with the correlated instinct, to rest without
+use, yet ready to flash forth on the instant, bright and keen-edged, as
+in the ancient days of strife, ages past, before peace came to dwell on
+earth!
+
+The avi-fauna is relatively much richer than the mammalia, owing to the
+large number of aquatic species, most of which are migratory with their
+"breeding" or "subsistence-areas" on the pampas. In more senses than one
+they constitute a "floating population," and their habits have in no way
+been modified by the conditions of the country. The order, including
+storks, ibises, herons, spoonbills, and flamingoes, counts about
+eighteen species; and the most noteworthy birds in it are two great
+ibises nearly as large as turkeys, with mighty resonant voices. The duck
+order is very rich, numbering at least twenty species, including two
+beautiful upland geese, winter visitors from Magellanic lands, and two
+swans, the lovely black-necked, and the pure white with rosy bill. Of
+rails, or ralline birds, there are ten or twelve, ranging from a small
+spotted creature no bigger than a thrush to some large majestic birds.
+One is the courlan, called "crazy widow" from its mourning plumage and
+long melancholy screams, which on still evenings may be heard a league
+away. Another is the graceful variegated _ypicaha,_ fond of social
+gatherings, where the birds perform a dance and make the desolate
+marshes resound with their insane humanlike voices. A smaller kind,
+Porphyriops melanops, has a night-cry like a burst of shrill hysterical
+laughter, which has won for it the name of "witch;" while another,
+Rallus rythyrhynchus, is called "little donkey" from its braying cries.
+Strange eerie voices have all these birds. Of the remaining aquatic
+species, the most important is the spur-winged crested screamer; a noble
+bird as large as a swan, yet its favourite pastime is to soar upwards
+until it loses itself to sight in the blue ether, whenca it pours forth
+its resounding choral notes, which reach the distant earth clarified,
+and with a rhythmic swell and fall as of chiming bells. It also sings by
+night, "counting the hours," the gauchos say, and where they have
+congregated together in tens of thousands the mighty roar of their
+combined voices produces an astonishingly grand effect.
+
+The largest aquatic order is that of the Limicolse--snipes, plover, and
+their allies--which has about twenty-five species. The vociferous
+spur-winged lapwing; the beautiful black and white stilt; a true snipe,
+and a painted snipe, are, strictly speaking, the only residents; and it
+is astonishing to find, that, of the five-and-twenty species, at least
+thirteen are visitors from North America, several of them having their
+breeding-places quite away in the Arctic regions. This is one of those
+facts concerning the annual migration of birds which almost stagger
+belief; for among them are species with widely different habits, upland,
+marsh and sea-shore birds, and in their great biannual journey they pass
+through a variety of climates, visiting many countries where the
+conditions seem suited to their requirements. Nevertheless, in
+September, and even as early as August, they begin to arrive on the
+pampas, the golden plover often still wearing his black nuptial dress;
+singly and in pairs, in small flocks, and in clouds they come--curlew,
+godwit, plover, tatler, tringa--piping the wild notes to which the
+Greenlander listened in June, now to the gaucho herdsman on the green
+plains of La Plata, then to the wild Indian in his remote village; and
+soon, further south, to the houseless huanaco-hunter in the grey
+wilderness of Patagonia.
+
+Here is a puzzle for ornithologists. In summer on the pampas we have a
+godwit--Limosa hudsonica; in March it goes north to breed; later in the
+season flocks of the same species arrive from the south to winter on the
+pampas. And besides this godwit, there are several other North American
+species, which have colonies in the southern hemi-spere, with a reversed
+migration and breeding season. Why do these southern birds winter so far
+south? Do they really breed in Patagonia? If so, their migration is an
+extremely limited one compared with that of the northern birds--seven or
+eight hundred miles, on the outside, in one case, against almost as many
+thousands of miles in the other. Considering that some species which
+migrate as far south as Patagonia breed in the Arctic regions as far
+north as latitude 82 degrees, and probably higher still, it would be
+strange indeed if none of the birds which winter in Patagonia and on the
+pampas were summer visitors to that great austral continent, which has
+an estimated area twice as large as that of Europe, and a climate milder
+than the arctic one. The migrants would have about six hundred miles of
+sea to cross from Tierra del Fuego; but we know that the golden plover
+and other species, which sometimes touch at the Bermudas when
+travelling, fly much further than that without resting. The fact that a
+common Argentine titlark, a non-migrant and a weak flyer, has been met
+with at the South Shetland Islands, close to the antarctic continent,
+shows that the journey may be easily accomplished by birds with strong
+flight; and that even the winter climate of that unknown land is not too
+severe to allow an accidental colonist, like this small delicate bird,
+to survive. The godwit, already mentioned, has been observed in flocks
+at the Falkland Islands in May, that is, three months after the same
+species had taken its autumal departure from the neighbouring mainland.
+Can it be believed that these late visitors to the Falklands were
+breeders in Patagonia, and had migrated east to winter in so bleak a
+region? It is far more probable that they came from the south. Officers
+of sailing ships beating round Cape Horn might be able to settle this
+question definitely by looking out, and listening at night, for flights
+of birds, travelling north from about the first week in January to the
+end of February; and in September and October travelling south. Probably
+not fewer than a dozen species of the plover order are breeders on the
+great austral continent; also other aquatic birds--ducks and geese; and
+many Passerine birds, chiefly of the Tyrant family.
+
+Should the long projected Australasian expedition to the South Polar
+regions ever be carried to a successful issue, there will probably be
+important results for ornithology, in spite of the astounding theory
+which has found a recent advocate in Canon Tristram, that all life
+originated at the North Pole, whence it spread over the globe, but never
+succeeded in crossing the deep sea surrounding the antarctic continent,
+which has consequently remained till now desolate, "a giant ash (and
+ice) of death." Nor is it unlikely that animals of a higher class than
+birds exist there; and the discovery of new mammalians, differing in
+type from those we know, would certainly be glad tidings to most
+students of nature.
+
+Land birds on the pampas are few in species and in numbers. This may be
+accounted for by the absence of trees and other elevations on which
+birds prefer to roost and nest; and by the scarcity of food. Insects are
+few in dry situations; and the large perennial grasses, which occupy
+most of the ground, yield a miserable yearly harvest of a few minute
+seeds; so that this district is a poor one both for soft and hard billed
+birds. Hawks of several genera, in moderate numbers, are there, but
+generally keep to the marshes. Eagles and vultures are somewhat
+unworthily represented by carrion-hawks (Polyborinae); the lordly
+carancho, almost eagle-like in size, black and crested, with a very
+large, pale blue, hooked beak--his battle axe: and his humble follower
+and jackal, the brown and harrier-like chimango. These nest on the
+ground, are versatile in their habits, carrion-eaters, also killers on
+their own account, and, like wild dogs, sometimes hunt in bands, which
+gives them an advantage. They are the unfailing attendants of all
+flesh-hunters, human or feline; and also furiously pursue and persecute
+all eagles and true vultures that venture on that great sea of grass, to
+wander thereafter, for ever lost and harried, "the Hagars and Ishmaels
+of their kind."
+
+The owls are few and all of wide-ranging species. The most common is the
+burrowing-owl, found in both Americas. Not a retiring owl this, but all
+day long, in cold and in heat, it stands exposed at the mouth of its
+kennel, or on the vizcacha's mound, staring at the passer-by with an
+expression of grave surprise and reprehension in its round yellow eyes;
+male and female invariably together, standing stiff and erect, almost
+touching--of all birds that pair for life the most Darby and Joan like.
+
+Of the remaining land birds, numbering about forty species, a few that
+are most attractive on account of their beauty, engaging habits, or
+large size, may be mentioned here. On the southern portion of the pampas
+the military starling (Sturnella) is found, and looks like the European
+starling, with the added beauty of a scarlet breast: among resident
+pampas birds the only one with a touch of brilliant colouring. It has a
+pleasing, careless song, uttered on the wing, and in winter congregates
+in great flocks, to travel slowly northwards over the plains. When thus
+travelling the birds observe a kind of order, and the flock feeding
+along the ground shows a very extended front--a representation in
+bird-life of the "thin red line"--and advances by the hindmost birds
+constantly flying over the others and alighting in the front ranks.
+
+Among the tyrant-birds are several species of the beautiful wing-banded
+genus, snow-white in colour, with black on the wings and tail: these are
+extremely graceful birds, and strong flyers, and in desert places, where
+man seldom intrudes, they gather to follow the traveller, calling to
+each other with low whistling notes, and in the distance look like white
+flowers as they perch on the topmost stems of the tall bending grasses.
+
+The most characteristic pampean birds are the tinamous--called
+partridges in the vernacular--the rufous tinamou, large as a fowl, and
+the spotted tinamou, which is about the size of the English partridge.
+Their habits are identical: both lay eggs of a beautiful wine-purple
+colour, and in both species the young acquire the adult plumage and
+power of flight when very small, and fly better than the adults. They
+have small heads, slender curved beaks, unfeathered legs and feet, and
+are tailless; the plumage is deep yellowish, marked with black and brown
+above. They live concealed, skulking like rails through the tall grass,
+fly reluctantly, and when driven up, their flight is exceedingly noisy
+and violent, the bird soon exhausting itself. They are solitary, but
+many live in proximity, frequently calling to each other with soft
+plaintive voices. The evening call-notes of the larger bird are
+flute-like in character, and singularly sweet and expressive.
+
+The last figure to be introduced into this sketch--which is not a
+catalogue--is that of the Rhea. Glyptodon, Toxodon, Mylodon,
+Megatherium, have passed away, leaving no descendants, and only pigmy
+representatives if any; but among the feathered inhabitants of the pampa
+the grand archaic ostrich of America survives from a time when there
+were also giants among the avians. Vain as such efforts usually are, one
+cannot help trying to imagine something of the past history of this
+majestic bird, before man came to lead the long chase now about to end
+so mournfully. Its fleetness, great staying powers, and beautiful
+strategy when hunted, make it seem probable that it was not without
+pursuers, other than the felines, among its ancient enemies, long-winded
+and tenacious of their quarry; and these were perhaps of a type still
+represented by the wolf or hound-like aguará and aguara-guazú. It might
+be supposed that when almost all the larger forms, both mammal and bird,
+were overtaken by destruction, and when the existing rhea was on the
+verge of extinction, these long-legged swift canines changed their
+habits and lost their bold spirit, degenerating at last into hunters of
+small birds and mammals, on which they are said to live.
+
+The rhea possesses a unique habit, which is a puzzle to us, although it
+probably once had some significance--namely, that of running, when
+hunted, with one wing raised vertically, like a great sail--a veritable
+"ship of the wilderness." In every way it is adapted to the conditions
+of the pampas in a far greater degree than other pampean birds, only
+excepting the rufous and spotted tinamous. Its commanding stature gives
+it a wide horizon; and its dim, pale, bluish-grey colour assimilates to
+that of the haze, and renders it invisible at even a moderate distance.
+Its large form fades out of sight mysteriously, and the hunter strains
+his eyes in vain to distinguish it on the blue expanse. Its figure and
+carriage have a quaint majestic grace, somewhat unavian in character,
+and peculiar to itself. There are few more strangely fascinating sights
+in nature than that of the old black-necked cock bird, standing with
+raised agitated wings among the tall plumed grasses, and calling
+together his scattered hens with hollow boomings and long mysterious
+suspira-tions, as if a wind blowing high up in the void sky had found a
+voice. Rhea-hunting with the bolas, on a horse possessing both speed and
+endurance, and trained to follow the bird in all his quick doublings, is
+unquestionably one of the most fascinating forms of sport ever invented,
+by man. The quarry has even more than that fair chance of escape,
+without which all sport degenerates into mere butchery, unworthy of
+rational beings; moreover, in this unique method of hunting the ostrich
+the capture depends on a preparedness for all the shifts and sudden
+changes of course practised by the bird when closely followed, which is
+like instinct or intuition; and, finally, in a dexterity in casting the
+bolas at the right moment, with a certain aim, which no amount of
+practice can give to those who are not to the manner born.
+
+This 'wild mirth of the desert,' which the gaucho has known for the last
+three centuries, is now passing away, for the rhea's fleetness can no
+longer avail him. He may scorn the horse and his rider, what time he
+lifts himself up, but the cowardly murderous methods of science, and a
+systematic war of extermination, have left him no chance. And with the
+rhea go the flamingo, antique and splendid; and the swans in their
+bridal plumage; and the rufous tinamou--sweet and mournful melodist of
+the eventide; and the noble crested screamer, that clarion-voiced
+watch-bird of the night in the wilderness. Those, and the other large
+avians, together with the finest of the mammalians, will shortly be lost
+to the pampas utterly as the great bustard is to England, and as the
+wild turkey and bison and many other species will shortly be lost to
+North America. What a wail there would be in the world if a sudden
+destruction were to fall on the accumulated art-treasures of the
+National Gallery, and the marbles in the British Museum, and the
+contents of the King's Library--the old prints and' mediaeval
+illuminations! And these are only the work of human hands and
+brains--impressions of individual genius on perishable material,
+immortal only in the sense that the silken cocoon of the dead moth is
+so, because they continue to exist and shine when the artist's hands and
+brain are dust:--and man has the long day of life before him in which to
+do again things like these, and better than these, if there is any truth
+in evolution. But the forms of life in the two higher vertebrate classes
+are Nature's most perfect work; and the life of even a single species is
+of incalculably greater value to mankind, for what it teaches and would
+continue to teach, than all the chiselled marbles and painted canvases
+the world contains; though doubtless there are many persons who are
+devoted to art, but blind to some things greater than art, who will set
+me down as a Philistine for saying so. And, above all others, we should
+protect and hold sacred those types, Nature's masterpieces, which are
+first singled out for destruction on account of their size, or
+splendour, or rarity, and that false detestable glory which is accorded
+to their most successful slayers. In ancient times the spirit of life
+shone brightest in these; and when others that shared the earth with
+them were taken by death they were left, being more worthy of
+perpetuation. Like immortal flowers they have drifted down to us on the
+ocean of time, and their strangeness and beauty bring to our
+imaginations a dream and a picture of that unknown world, immeasurably
+far removed, where man was not: and when they perish, something of
+gladness goes out from nature, and the sunshine loses something of its
+brightness. Nor does their loss affect us and our times only. The
+species now being exterminated, not only in South America but everywhere
+on the globe, are, so far as we know, untouched by decadence. They are
+links in a chain, and branches on the tree of life, with their roots in
+a past inconceivably remote; and but for our action they would continue
+to flourish, reaching outward to an equally distant future, blossoming
+into higher and more beautiful forms, and gladdening innumerable
+generations of our descendants. But we think nothing of all this: we
+must give full scope to our passion for taking life, though by so doing
+we "ruin the great work of time;" not in the sense in which the poet
+used those words, but in one truer, and wider, and infinitely sadder.
+Only when this sporting rage has spent itself, when there are no longer
+any animals of the larger kinds remaining, the loss we are now
+inflicting on this our heritage, in which we have a life-interest only,
+will be rightly appreciated. It is hardly to be supposed or hoped that
+posterity will feel satisfied with our monographs of extinct species,
+and the few crumbling bones and faded feathers, which may possibly
+survive half a dozen centuries in some happily-placed museum. On the
+contrary, such dreary mementoes will only serve to remind them of their
+loss; and if they remember us at all, it will only be to hate our
+memory, and our age--this enlightened, scientific, humanitarian age,
+which should have for a motto "Let us slay all noble and beautiful
+things, for tomorrow we die."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE PUMA, OB LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The Puma has been singularly unfortunate in its biographers. Formerly it
+often happened that writers were led away by isolated and highly
+exaggerated incidents to attribute very shining qualities to their
+favourite animals; the lion of the Old World thus came to be regarded as
+brave and I magnanimous above all beasts of the field--the Bayard of the
+four-footed kind, a reputation which these prosaic and sceptical times
+have not suffered it to keep. Precisely the contrary has happened with
+the puma of literature; for, although to those personally acquainted
+with the habits of this lesser lion of the New World it is known to
+possess a marvellous courage and daring, it is nevertheless
+always spoken of in books of natural history as the most pusillanimous
+of the larger carnivores. It does not attack man, and Azara is perfectly
+correct when he affirms that it never hurts, or threatens to hurt, man
+or child, even when it finds them sleeping. This, however, is not a full
+statement of the facts; the puma will not even defend itself against
+man. How natural, then, to conclude that it is too timid to attack a
+human being, or to defend itself, but scarcely philosophical; for even
+the most cowardly carnivores we know--dogs and hyaenas, for
+instance--will readily attack a disabled or sleeping man when pressed by
+hunger; and when driven to desperation no animal is too small or too
+feeble to make a show of resistance. In such a case "even the armadillo
+defends itself," as the gaucho proverb says. Besides, the conclusion is
+in contradiction to many other well-known facts. Putting-aside the
+puma's passivity in the presence of man, it is a bold hunter that
+invariably prefers large to small game; in desert places killing
+peccary, tapir, ostrich, deer, huanaco, &c., all powerful, well-armed,
+or swift animals. Huanaco skeletons seen in Patagonia almost invariably
+have the neck dislocated, showing that the puma was the executioner.
+Those only who have hunted the huanaco on the sterile plains and
+mountains it inhabits know how wary, keen-scented, and fleet of foot it
+is. I once spent several weeks with a surveying party in a district
+where pumas were very abundant, and saw not less than half a dozen deer
+every day, freshly killed in most cases, and all with dislocated necks.
+Where prey is scarce and difficult to capture, the puma, after
+satisfying its hunger, invariably conceals the animal it has killed,
+covering it over carefully with grass and brushwood; these deer,
+however, had all been left exposed to the caracaras and foxes after a
+portion of the breast had been eaten, and in many cases the flesh had
+not been touched, the captor having satisfied itself with sucking the
+blood. It struck me very forcibly that the puma of the desert pampas is,
+among mammals, like the peregrine falcon of the same district among
+birds; for there this wide-ranging raptor only attacks comparatively
+large birds, and, after fastidiously picking a meal from the flesh of
+the head and neck, abandons the untouched body to the polybori and other
+hawks of the more ignoble sort.
+
+In pastoral districts the puma is very destructive to the larger
+domestic animals, and has an extraordinary fondness for horseflesh. This
+was first noticed by Molina, whose _Natural History of Chili_ was
+written a century and a half ago. In Patagonia I heard on all sides that
+it was extremely difficult to breed horses, as the colts were mostly
+killed by the pumas. A native told me that on one occasion, while
+driving his horses home through the thicket, a puma sprang out of the
+bushes on to a colt following behind the troop, killing it before his
+eyes and not more than six yards from his horse's head. In this
+instance, my informant said, the puma alighted directly on the colt's
+back, with one fore foot grasping its bosom, while with the other it
+seized the head, and, giving it a violent wrench, dislocated the neck.
+The colt fell to the earth as if shot, and he affirmed that it was dead
+before it touched the ground.
+
+Naturalists have thought it strange that the horse, once common
+throughout America, should have become extinct over a continent
+apparently so well suited to it and where it now multiplies so greatly.
+As a fact wherever pumas abound the wild horse of the present time,
+introduced from Europe, can hardly maintain its existence. Formerly in
+many places horses ran wild and multiplied to an amazing extent, but
+this happened, I believe, only in districts where the puma was scarce or
+had already been driven out by man. My own experience is that on the
+desert pampas wild horses are exceedingly scarce, and from all accounts
+it is the same throughout Patagonia.
+
+Next to horseflesh, sheep is preferred, and where the puma can come at a
+flock, he will not trouble himself to attack horned cattle. In Patagonia
+especially I found this to be the case. I resided for some time at an
+estancia close to the town of El Carmen, on the Rio Negro, which during
+my stay was infested by a very bold and cunning puma. To protect the
+sheep from his attacks an enclosure was made of upright willow-poles
+fifteen feet long, while the gate, by which he would have to enter, was
+close to the house and nearly six feet high. In spite of the
+difficulties thus put in the way, and of the presence of several large
+dogs, also of the watch we kept in the hope of shooting him, every
+cloudy night he came, and after killing one or more sheep got safely
+away. One dark night he killed four sheep; I detected him in the act,
+and going up to the gate, was trying to make out his invisible form in
+the gloom as he flitted about knocking the sheep over, when suddenly he
+leaped clear over my head and made his escape, the bullets I sent after
+him in the dark failing to hit him. Yet at this place twelve or fourteen
+calves, belonging to the milch cows, were every night shut into a small
+brushwood pen, at a distance from the house where the enemy could easily
+have destroyed every one of them. When I expressed surprise at this
+arrangement, the owner said that the puma was not fond of calves' flesh,
+and came only for the sheep. Frequently after his nocturnal visits we
+found, by tracing his footprints in the loose sand, that he had actually
+used the calves' pen as a place of concealment while waiting to make his
+attack on the sheep.
+
+The puma often kills full-grown cows and horses, but exhibits a still
+greater daring when attacking the jaguar, the largest of American
+carnivores, although, compared with its swift, agile enemy, as heavy as
+a rhinoceros. Azara states that it is generally believed in La Plata and
+Paraguay that the puma attacks and conquers the jaguar; but he did not
+credit what he heard, which was not strange, since he had already set
+the puma down as a cowardly animal, because it does not attempt to harm
+man or child. Nevertheless, it is well known that where the two species
+inhabit the same district they are at enmity, the puma being the
+persistent persecutor of the jaguar, following and harassing it as a
+tyrant-bird harasses an eagle or hawk, moving about it with such
+rapidity as to confuse it, and, when an opportunity occurs, springing
+upon its back and inflicting terrible wounds with teeth and claws.
+Jaguars with scarred backs are frequently killed, and others, not long
+escaped from their tormentors, have been found so greatly lacerated that
+they were easily overcome by the hunters.
+
+In Kingsley's American _Standard Natural History_, it is stated that the
+puma in North California has a feud with the grizzly bear similar to
+that of the southern animal with the jaguar. In its encounter with the
+grizzly it is said to be always the victor; and this is borne out by the
+finding of the bodies of bears, which have evidently perished in the
+struggle.
+
+How strange that this most cunning, bold, and bloodthirsty of the
+Felidae, the persecutor of the jaguar and the scourge of the ruminants
+in the regions it inhabits, able to kill its prey with the celerity of a
+rifle bullet, never attacks a human being! Even the cowardly,
+carrion-feeding dog will attack a man when it can do so with impunity;
+but in places where the puma is the only large beast of prey, it is
+notorious that it is there perfectly safe for even a small child to go
+out and sleep on the plain. At the same time it will not fly from man
+(though the contrary is always stated in books of Natural History)
+except in places where it is continually persecuted. Nor is this all: it
+will not, as a rule, even defend itself against man, although in some
+rare instances it has been known to do so.
+
+The mysterious, gentle instinct of this ungentle species, which causes
+the gauchos of the pampas to name it man's friend--"amigo del
+cristiano"--has been persistently ignored by all travellers and
+naturalists who have mentioned the puma. They have thus made it a very
+incongruous creature, strong enough to kill a horse, yet so cowardly
+withal that it invariably flies from a human being--even from a sleeping
+child! Possibly its real reputation was known to some of those who havo
+spoken about it; if so, they attributed what they heard to the love of
+the marvellous and the romantic, natural to the non-scientific mind; or
+else preferred not to import into their writings matter which has so
+great a likeness to fable, and might have the effect of imperilling
+their reputation for sober-mindedness.
+
+It is, however, possible that the singular instinct of tho southern
+puma, which is unique among animals in a state of nature, is not
+possessed by the entire species, ranging as it does over a hundred
+degrees of latitude, from British North America to Tierra del Fuego. The
+widely different conditions of life in the various regions it inhabits
+must necessarily have caused some divergence. Concerning its habits in
+the dense forests of the Amazonian region, where it must have developed
+special instincts suited to its semi-arboreal life, scarcely anything
+has been recorded. Everyone is, however, familiar with the dreaded
+cougar, catamount, or panther--sometimes called "painter"--of North
+American literature, thrilling descriptions of encounters with this
+imaginary man-eating monster being freely scattered through the
+backwoods or border romances, many of them written by authors who have
+the reputation of being true to nature. It may be true that this cougar
+of a cold climate did occasionally attack man, or, as it is often
+stated, follow him in the forest with the intention of springing on him
+unawares; but on this point nothing definite will ever be known, as the
+pioneers hunters of the past were only anxious to shoot cougar and not
+to study its instinct and disposition. It is now many years since
+Audubon and Bachman wrote, "This animal, which has excited so much
+terror in the minds of the ignorant and timid, has been nearly
+exterminated in all the Atlantic States, and we do not recollect a
+single well-authenticated instance where any hunter's life fell a
+sacrifice in a cougar hunt." It might be added, I believe, that no
+authentic instance has been recorded of the puma making an unprovoked
+attack on any human being. In South America also the traveller in the
+wilderness is sometimes followed by a puma; but he would certainly be
+very much surprised if told that it follows with the intention of
+springing on him unawares and devouring his flesh.
+
+I have spoken of the comparative ease with which the puma overcomes even
+large animals, comparing it in this respect with the peregrine falcon;
+but all predacious species are liable to frequent failures, sometimes to
+fatal mishaps, and even the cunning, swift-killing puma is no exception.
+Its attacks are successfully resisted by the ass, which does not, like
+the horse, lose his presence of mind, but when assaulted thrusts his
+head well down between its fore-legs and kicks violently until the enemy
+is thrown or driven off. Pigs, when in large herds, also safely defy the
+puma, massing themselves together for defence in their well-known
+manner, and presenting a serried line of tusks to the aggressor. During
+my stay in Patagonia a puma met its fate in a manner so singular that
+the incident caused considerable sensation among the settlers on the Rio
+Negro at the time. A man named Linares, the chief of the tame Indians
+settled in the neighbourhood of El Carmen, while riding near the river
+had his curiosity aroused by the appearance and behaviour of a young cow
+standing alone in the grass, her head, armed with long and exceedingly
+sharp horns, much raised, and watching his approach in a manner which
+betokened a state of dangerous excitement. She had recently dropped her
+calf, and he at once conjectured that it had been attacked, and perhaps
+killed, by some animal of prey. To satisfy himself on this point he
+began to search for it, and while thus engaged the cow repeatedly
+charged him with the greatest fury. Presently he discovered the calf
+lying dead among the long grass; and by its side lay a full-grown puma,
+also dead, and with a large wound in its side, just behind the shoulder.
+The calf had been killed by the puma, for its throat showed the wounds
+of large teeth, and the puma had been killed by the cow. When he saw it
+he could, he affirmed, scarcely believe the evidence of his own senses,
+for was an unheard-of thing that a puma should be injured by any other
+animal. His opinion was that it had come down from the hills in a
+starving condition, and having sprung upon the calf, the taste of blood
+had made it for a moment careless of its own safety, and during that
+moment the infuriated cow had charged, and driving one of her long sharp
+horns into some vital part, killed it instantly.
+
+The puma is, with the exception of some monkeys, the most playful animal
+in existence. The young of all the Felidae spend a large portion of
+their time in characteristic gambols; the adults, however, acquire a
+grave and dignified demeanour, only the female playing on occasions with
+her offspring; but this she always does with a certain formality of
+manner, as if the relaxation were indulged in not spontaneously, but for
+the sake of the young and as being a necessary part of their education.
+Some writer has described the lion's assumption of gaiety as more grim
+than its most serious moods. The puma at heart is always a kitten,
+taking unmeasured delight in its frolics, and when, as often happens,
+one lives alone in the desert, it will amuse itself by the hour fighting
+mock battles or playing at hide-and-seek with imaginary companions, and
+lying in wait and putting all its wonderful strategy in practice to
+capture a passing butterfly. Azara kept a young male for four months,
+which spent its whole time playing with the slaves. This animal, he
+says, would not refuse any food offered to it; but when not hungry it
+would bury the meat in the sand, and when inclined to eat dig it up,
+and, taking it to the water-trough, wash it clean. I have only known one
+puma kept as a pet, and this animal, in seven or eight years had never
+shown a trace of ill-temper. When approached, he would lie down, purring
+loudly, and twist himself about a person's legs, begging to be caressed.
+A string or handkerchief drawn about was sufficient to keep him in a
+happy state of excitement for an hour; and when one person was tired of
+playing with him he was ready for a game with the next comer.
+
+I was told by a person who had spent most of his life on the pampas that
+on one occasion, when travelling in the neighbourhood of Cape
+Corrientes, his horse died under him, and he was compelled to continue
+his journey on foot, burdened with his heavy native horse-gear. At night
+he made his bed under the shelter of a rock, on the slope of a stony
+sierra; a bright moon was shining, and about nine o'clock in the evening
+four pumas appeared, two adults with their two half-grown young. Not
+feeling the least alarm at their presence, he did not stir; and after a
+while they began to gambol together close to him, concealing themselves
+from each other among the rocks, just as kittens do, and frequently
+while pursuing one another leaping over him. He continued watching them
+until past midnight, then fell asleep, and did not wake until morning,
+when they had left him.
+
+This man was an Englishman by birth, but having gone very young to South
+America he had taken kindly to the semi-barbarous life of the gauchos,
+and had imbibed all their peculiar notions, one of which is that human
+life is not worth very much. "What does it matter?" they often say, and
+shrug their shoulders, when told of a comrade's death; "so many
+beautiful horses die!" I asked him if he had ever killed a puma, and he
+replied that he had killed only one and had sworn never to kill another.
+He said that while out one day with another gaucho looking for cattle a
+puma was found. It sat up with its back against a stone, and did not
+move even when his companion threw the noose of his lasso over its neck.
+My informant then dismounted, and, drawing his knife, advanced to kill
+it: still the puma made no attempt to free itself from the lasso, but it
+seemed to know, he said, what was coming, for it began to tremble, the
+tears ran from its eyes, and it whined in the most pitiful manner. He
+killed it as it sat there unresisting before him, but after
+accomplishing the deed felt that he had committed a murder. It was the
+only thing ho had ever done in his life, he added, which filled him with
+remorse when he remembered it. This I thought a rather startling
+declaration, as I knew that he had killed several individuals of his own
+species in duels, fought with knives, in the fashion of the gauchos.
+
+All who have killed or witnessed the killing of the puma--and I have
+questioned scores of hunters on this point--agree that it resigns itself
+in this unresisting, pathetic manner to death at the hands of man.
+Claudio Gay, in his _Natural History of Chili,_ says, "When attacked by
+man its energy and daring at once forsake it, and it becomes a weak,
+inoffensive animal, and trembling, and uttering piteous moans, and
+shedding abundant tears, it seems to implore compassion from a generous
+enemy." The enemy is not often generous; but many gauchos have assured
+me, when speaking on this subject, that although they kill the puma
+readily to protect their domestic animals, they consider it an evil
+thing to take its life in desert places, where it is man's only friend
+among the wild animals.
+
+When the hunter is accompanied by dogs, then the puma, instead of
+drooping and shedding tears, is roused to a sublime rage: its hair
+stands erect; its eyes shine like balls of green flame; it spits and
+snarls like a furious torn cat. The hunter's presence seems at such
+times to be ignored altogether, its whole attention being given to the
+dogs and its rage directed against them. In Patagonia a sheep-farming
+Scotchman, with whom I spent some days, showed me the skulls of five
+pumas which he had shot in the vicinity of his ranche. One was of an
+exceptionally large individual, and I here relate what he told me of his
+encounter with this animal, as it shows just how the puma almost
+invariably behaves when attacked by man and dogs. He was out on foot
+with his flock, when the dogs discovered the animal concealed among the
+bushes. He had left his gun at home, and having no weapon, and finding
+that the dogs dared not attack it where it sat in a defiant attitude
+with its back against a thorny bush, he looked about and found a large
+dry stick, and going boldly up to it tried to stun it with a violent
+blow on the head. But though it never looked at him, its fiery eyes
+gazing steadily at the dogs all the time, he could not hit it, for with
+a quick side movement it avoided every blow. The small heed the puma
+paid him, and the apparent ease with which it avoided his best-aimed
+blows, only served to rouse his spirit, and at length striking with
+increased force his stick came to the ground and was broken to pieces.
+For some moments he now stood within two yards of the animal perfectly
+defenceless and not knowing what to do. Suddenly it sprang past him,
+actually brushing against his arm with its side, and began pursuing the
+dogs round and round among the bushes. In the end my informant's partner
+appeared on the scene with his rifle, and the puma was shot.
+
+In encounters of this kind the most curious thing is that the puma
+steadfastly refuses to recognize an enemy in man, although it finds him
+acting in concert with its hated canine foe, about whose hostile
+intentions it has no such delusion.
+
+Several years ago a paragraph, which reached me in South America,
+appeared in the English papers relating an incident characteristic of
+the puma in a wild beast show in this country. The animal was taken out
+of its cage and led about the grounds by its keeper, followed by a large
+number of spectators. Suddenly it was struck motionless by some object
+in the crowd, at which it gazed steadily with a look of intense
+excitement; then springing violently away it dragged the chain from the
+keeper's hand and dashed in among the people, who immediately fled
+screaming in all directions. Their fears were, however, idle, the object
+of the puma's rage being a dog which it had spied among the crowd.
+
+It is said that when taken adult pumas invariably pine away and die;
+when brought up in captivity they invariably make playful, affectionate
+pets, and are gentle towards all human beings, but very seldom overcome
+their instinctive animosity towards the dog.
+
+One of the very few authentic instances I have met with of this animal
+defending itself against a human being was related to me at a place on
+the pampas called Saladillo. At the time of my visit there jaguars and
+pumas were very abundant and extremely destructive to the cattle and
+horses. Sheep it had not yet been considered worth while to introduce,
+but immense herds of pigs were kept at every estancia, these animals
+being able to protect themselves. One gaucho had so repeatedly
+distinguished himself by his boldness and dexterity in killing jaguars
+that he was by general consent made the leader of every tiger-hunt. One
+day the comandante of the district got twelve or fourteen men together,
+the tiger-slayer among them, and started in search of a jaguar which had
+been seen that morning in the neighbourhood of his estancia. The animal
+was eventually found and surrounded, and as it was crouching among some
+clumps of tall pampas grass, where throwing a lasso over its neck would
+be a somewhat difficult and dangerous operation, all gave way to the
+famous hunter, who at once uncoiled his lasso and proceeded in a
+leisurely manner to form the loop. While thus engaged he made the
+mistake of allowing his horse, which had grown restive, to turn aside
+from the hunted animal. The jaguar, instantly taking advantage of the
+oversight, burst from its cover and sprang first on to the haunches of
+the horse, then seizing the hunter by his poncho dragged him to the
+earth, and would no doubt have quickly despatched him if a lasso, thrown
+by one of the other men, had not closed round its neck at this critical
+moment. It was quickly dragged off, and eventually killed. But the
+discomfited hunter did not stay to assist at the finish. He arose from
+the ground unharmed, but in a violent passion and blaspheming horribly,
+for he knew that his reputation, which he priced above everything, had
+suffered a great blow, and that he would be mercilessly ridiculed by his
+associates. Getting on his horse he rode away by himself from the scene
+of his misadventure. Of what happened to him on his homeward ride there
+were no witnesses; but his own account was as follows, and inasmuch as
+it told against his own prowess it was readily believed: Before riding a
+league, and while his bosom was still burning with rage, a puma started
+up from the long grass in his path, but made no attempt to run away; it
+merely sat up, he said, and looked at him in a provokingly fearless
+manner. To slay this animal with his knife, and so revenge himself on it
+for the defeat he had just suffered, was his first thought. He alighted
+and secured his horse by tying its fore feet together, then, drawing his
+long, heavy knife, rushed at the puma. Still it did not stir. Raising
+his weapon he struck with a force which would have split the animal's
+skull open if the blow had fallen where it was intended to fall, but
+with a quick movement the puma avoided it, and at the same time lifted a
+foot and with lightning rapidity dealt the aggressor a blow on the face,
+its unsheathed claws literally dragging down the flesh from his cheek,
+laying the bone bare. After inflicting this terrible punishment and
+eyeing its fallen foe for a few seconds it trotted quietly away. The
+wounded man succeeded in getting on to his horse and reaching his home.
+The hanging flesh was restored to its place and the ghastly rents sewn
+up, and in the end he recovered: but he was disfigured for life; his
+temper also completely changed; he became morose and morbidly sensitive
+to the ridicule of his neighbours, and he never again ventured to join
+them in their hunting expeditions. I inquired of the comandante, and of
+others, whether any case had come to their knowledge in that district in
+which the puma had shown anything beyond a mere passive friendliness
+towards man; in reply they related the following incident, which had
+occurred at the Saladillo a few years before my visit: The men all went
+out one day beyond the frontier to form a _cerco,_ as it is called, to
+hunt ostriches and other game. The hunters, numbering about thirty,
+spread themselves round in a vast ring and, advancing towards the
+centre, drove the animals before them. During the excitement of the
+chase which followed, while they were all engaged in preventing the
+ostriches, deer, &c., from doubling back and escaping, it was not
+noticed that one of the hunters had disappeared; his horse, however,
+returned to its home during the evening, and on the next morning a fresh
+hunt for the lost man was organized. He was eventually found lying on
+the ground with a broken leg, where he had been thrown at the beginning
+of the hunt. He related that about an hour after it had become dark a
+puma appeared and sat near him, but did not seem to notice him. After a
+while it became restless, frequently going away and returning, and
+finally it kept away so long, that he thought it had left him for good.
+About midnight he heard the deep roar of a jaguar, and gave himself up
+for lost. By raising himself on his elbow he was able to see the outline
+of the beast crouching near him, but its face was turned from him, and
+it appeared to be intently watching some object on which it was about to
+spring. Presently it crept out of sight, then he heard snarlings and
+growlings and the sharp yell of a puma, and he knew that the two beasts
+were fighting. Before morning he saw the jaguar several times, but the
+puma renewed the contest with it again and again until morning appeared,
+after which he saw and heard no more of them.
+
+Extraordinary as this story sounds, it did not seem so to me when I
+heard it, for I had already met with many anecdotes of a similar nature
+in various parts of the country, some of them vastly more interesting
+than the one I have just narrated; only I did not get them at first
+hand, and am consequently not able to vouch for their accuracy; but in
+this case it seemed to me that there was really no room for doubt. All
+that I had previously heard had compelled me to believe that the puma
+really does possess a unique instinct of friendliness for man, the
+origin of which, like that of many other well-known instincts of
+animals, must remain a mystery. The fact that the puma never makes an
+unprovoked attack on a human being, or eats human flesh, and that it
+refuses, except in some very rare cases, even to defend itself, does not
+seem really less wonderful in an animal of its bold and sanguinary
+temper thau that it should follow the traveller in the wilderness, or
+come near him when he lies sleeping or disabled, and even occasionally
+defend him from its enemy the jaguar. We know that certain sounds,
+colours, or smells, which are not particularly noticed by most animals,
+produce an extraordinary effect on some species; and it is possible to
+believe, I think, that the human form or countenance, or the odour of
+the human body, may also have the effect on the puma of suspending its
+predatory instincts and inspiring it with a gentleness towards man,
+which we are only accustomed to see in our domesticated carnivores or in
+feral animals towards those of their own species. Wolves, when pressed
+with hunger, will sometimes devour a fellow wolf; as a rule, however,
+rapacious animals will starve to death rather than prey on one of their
+own kind, nor is it a common thing for them to attack other species
+possessing instincts similar to their own. The puma, we have seen,
+violently attacks other large carnivores, not to feed on them, but
+merely to satisfy its animosity; and, while respecting man, it is,
+within the tropics, a great hunter and eater of monkeys, which of all
+animals most resemble men. We can only conclude with Humboldt that there
+is something mysterious in the hatreds and affections of animals.
+
+The view here taken of the puma's character imparts, I think, a fresh
+interest to some things concerning the species, which have appeared in
+historical and other works, and which I propose to discuss briefly in
+this place.
+
+There is a remarkable passage in Byron's _Narrative of the loss of the
+Wager,_ which was quoted by Admiral Fitzroy in his _Voyage of the
+Beagle,_ to prove that tho puma inhabits Tierra del Fuego and the
+adjacent islands; no other large beast of prey being known in that part
+of America. "I heard," he says, "a growling close by me, which made me
+think it advisable to retire as soon as possible: the woods were, so
+gloomy I could see nothing; but, as I retired, this noise followed me
+close till I got out of them. Some of our men did assure me that they
+had seen a very large beast in the woods. . . I proposed to four of the
+people to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from the
+bell tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam, which I had
+discovered in a walk that way on our first landing. This we covered to
+windward with seaweed; and, lighting a fire, laid ourselves down in
+hopes of finding a remedy for our hunger in sleep; but we had not long
+composed ourselves before one of our company was disturbed by the
+blowing of some animal at his face; and, upon opening his eyes, was not
+a little astonished to see by the glimmering of the fire, a large beast
+standing over him. He had presence of mind enough to snatch a brand from
+the fire, which was now very low, and thrust it at the nose of tho
+animal, which thereupon made off. . . . In the morning we were not a
+little anxious to know how our companions had fared; and this anxiety
+was increased upon our tracing the footsteps of the beast in the sand,
+in a direction towards the bell tent. The impression was deep and plain,
+of a large round foot well furnished with claws. Upon acquainting the
+people in the tent with the circumstances of our story, we found that
+they had been visited by the same unwelcome guest."
+
+Mr. Andrew Murray, in his work on the Geographical Distribution of
+Mammals, gives the Straits of Magellan as the extreme southern limit of
+the puma's range, and in discussing the above passage from Byron he
+writes: "This reference, however, gives no support to the notion of the
+animal alluded to having been a puma. . . . The description of the
+footprints clearly shows that the animal could not have been a puma.
+None of the cat tribe leave any trace of a claw in their footprints. . .
+The dogs, on the other hand, leave a very well-defined claw-mark. . . .
+Commodore Byron and his party had therefore suffered a false alarm. The
+creature which had disturbed them was, doubtless, one of the harmless
+domestic dogs of the natives."
+
+The assurance that the bold hardy adventurer and his men suffered a
+false alarm, and were thrown into a great state of excitement at the
+appearance of one of the wretched domestic dogs of the Fuegians, with
+which they were familiar, comes charmingly, it must be said, from a
+closet naturalist, who surveys the world of savage beasts from his
+London study. He apparently forgets that Commodore Byron lived in a time
+when the painful accuracy and excessive minuteness we are accustomed to
+was not expected from a writer, whenever he happened to touch on any
+matters connected with zoology.
+
+This kind of criticism, which seizes on a slight inaccuracy in one
+passage, and totally ignores an important statement in another--as, for
+instance, that of the "great beast" seen in the woods--might be extended
+to other portions of the book, and Byron's entire narrative made to
+appear as purely a work of the imagination as Peter Wilkin's adventures
+in those same antarctic seas.
+
+Mr. J. W. Boddam Whetham, in his work _Across Central America_ (1877),
+gives an anecdote of the puma, which he heard at Sacluk, in Guatemala,
+and which strangely resembles some of the stories I have heard on the
+pampas. He writes: "The following event, most extraordinary if true, is
+said to have occurred in this forest to a mahogany-cutter, who had been
+out marking trees. As he was returning to his hut, he suddenly felt a
+soft body pressing against him, and on looking down saw a cougar, which,
+with tail erect, and purring like a cat, twisted itself in and out of
+his legs, and glided round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if with
+laughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on, and the
+terrible animal still circled about, now rolling over, and now touching
+him with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse. At last the suspense
+became too great, and with a loud shout he struck desperately at the
+creature with his axe. It bounded on one side and crouched snarling and
+showing its teeth. Just as it was about to spring, the man's companion,
+who had heard his call, appeared in the distance, and with a growl the
+beast vanished into the thick bushes."
+
+Now, after allowing for exaggeration, if there is no foundation for
+stories of this character, it is really a very wonderful coincidence
+that they should be met with in countries so widely separated as
+Patagonia and Central America. Pumas, doubtless, are scarce in
+Guatemala; and, as in other places where they have met with nothing but
+persecution from man, they are shy of him; but had this adventure
+occurred on the pampas, where they are better known, the person
+concerned in it would not have said that the puma played with him as a
+cat with a mouse, but rather as a tame cat plays with a child; nor,
+probably, would he have been terrified into imagining that the animal,
+even after its caresses had met with so rough a return, was about to
+spring on him.
+
+In Clavigero's _History of Lower California,_ it is related that a very
+extraordinary state of things was discovered to exist in that country by
+the first missionaries who settled there at the end of the seventeenth
+century, and which was actually owing to the pumas. The author says that
+there were no bears or tigers (jaguars); these had most probably been
+driven out by their old enemies; but the pumas had increased to a
+prodigious extent, so that the whole peninsula was overrun by them; and
+this was owing to the superstitious regard in which they were held by
+the natives, who not only did not kill them, but never ventured to
+disturb them in any way. The Indians were actually to some extent
+dependent on the puma's success in hunting for their subsistence; they
+watched the movements of the vultures in order to discover the spot in
+which the remains of any animal it had captured had been left by the
+puma, and whenever the birds were seen circling about persistently over
+one place, they hastened to take possession of the carcass, discovered
+in this way. The domestic animals, imported by the missionaries, were
+quickly destroyed by the virtual masters of the country, and against
+these enemies the Jesuits preached a crusade in vain: for although the
+Indians readily embraced Christianity and were baptized, they were not
+to be shaken in their notions concerning the sacred _Chimbicá,_ as the
+puma was called. The missions languished in consequence; the priests
+existed in a state of semi-starvation, depending on provisions sent to
+them at long intervals from the distant Mexican settlements; and for
+many years all their efforts to raise the savages from their miserable
+condition were thrown away. At length, in 1701, the mission of Loreto
+was taken charge of by one Padre Ugarte, described by Clavigero as a
+person of indomitable energy, and great physical strength and courage, a
+true muscular Christian, who occasionally varied his method of
+instruction by administering corporal chastisements to his hearers when
+they laughed at his doctrines, or at the mistakes he made in their
+language, while preaching to them. Ugarte, like his predecessors, could
+not move the Indians to hunt the puma, but he was a man of action, with
+a wholesome belief in the efficacy of example, and his opportunity came
+at last.
+
+One day, while riding in the wood, he saw at a distance a puma walking
+deliberately towards him. Alighting from his mule, he took up a large
+stone and advanced to meet the animal, and when sufficiently near hurled
+the missile with such precision and force that he knocked ifc down
+senseless. After killing it, he found that the heaviest part of his task
+remained, as it was necessary for the success of his project to carry
+the beast, still warm and bleeding, to the Indian village; but mow his
+mule steadfastly refused to approach it. Father Ugarte was not,
+however, to be defeated, and partly by stratagem, partly by force, he
+finally succeeded in getting the puma on to the mule's back, after which
+he rode in triumph to the settlement. The Indians at first thought it
+all a trick of their priest, who was so anxious to involve them in a
+conflict with the pumas, and standing at a distance they began jeering
+at him, and exclaiming that he had found the animal dead! But when they
+were induced to approach, and saw that it was still warm and bleeding,
+they were astonished beyond measure, and began to watch the priest
+narrowly, thinking that he would presently drop down and die in sight of
+them all. It was their belief that death would quickly overtake the
+slayer of a puma. As this did not happen, the priest gained a great
+influence over them, and in the end they were persuaded to turn their
+weapons against the Chimbicá.
+
+Clavigero has nothing to say concerning the origin of this Californian
+superstition; but with some knowledge of the puma's character, it is not
+difficult to imagine what it may have been. No doubt these savages had
+been very well acquainted from ancient times with the animal's instinct
+of friendliness toward man, and its extreme hatred of other carnivores,
+which prey on the human species; and finding it ranged on their side, as
+it were, in the hard struggle of life in the desert, they were induced
+to spare it, and even to regard it as a friend; and such a feeling,
+among primitive men, might in the course of time degenerate into such a
+superstition as that of the Californians.
+
+I shall, in conclusion, relate here the story of Maldonada, which is not
+generally known, although familiar to Buenos Ayreans as the story of
+Lady Godiva's ride through Coventry is to the people of that town. The
+case of Maldonada is circumstantially narrated by Rui Diaz de Guzman, in
+his history of the colonization of the Plata: he was a person high in
+authority in the young colonies, and is regarded by students of South
+American history as an accurate and sober-minded chronicler of the
+events of his own times. He relates that in the year 1536 the settlers
+at Buenos Ayres, having exhausted their provisions, and being compelled
+by hostile Indians to keep within their pallisades, were reduced to the
+verge of starvation. The Governor Mendoza went off to seek help from the
+other colonies up the river, deputing his authority to one Captain Ruiz,
+who, according to all accounts, displayed an excessively tyrannous and
+truculent disposition while in power. The people were finally reduced to
+a ration of sis ounces of flour per day for each person; but as the
+flour was putrid and only made them ill, they were forced to live on any
+small animals they could capture, including snakes, frogs and toads.
+Some horrible details are given by Rui Diaz, and other writers; one, Del
+Barco Centenera, affirms that of two thousand persons in the town
+eighteen hundred perished of hunger. During this unhappy time, beasts of
+prey in large numbers were attracted to the settlement by the effluvium
+of the corpses, buried just outside the pallisades; and this made the
+condition of the survivors more miserable still, since they could
+venture into the neighbouring woods only at the risk of a violent death.
+Nevertheless, many did so venture, and among these was the young woman
+Maldonada, who, losing herself in the forest, strayed to a distance, and
+was eventually found by a party of Indians, and carried by them to their
+village.
+
+Some months later, Captain Ruiz discovered her whereabouts, and
+persuaded the savages to bring her to the settlement; then, accusing her
+of having gone to the Indian village in order to betray the colony, he
+condemned her to be devoured by wild beasts. She was taken to a wood at
+a distance of a league from the town, and left there, tied to a tree,
+for the space of two nights and a day. A party of soldiers then went to
+the spot, expecting to find her bones picked clean by the beasts, but
+were greatly astonished to find Maldonada still alive, without hurt or
+scratch. She told them that a puma had come to her aid, and had kept at
+her side, defending her life against all the other beasts that
+approached her. She was instantly released, and taken back to the town,
+her deliverance through the action of the puma probably being looked on
+as direct interposition of Providence to save her.
+
+Rui Diaz concludes with the following paragraph, in which he affirms
+that he knew the woman Maldonada, which may be taken as proof that she
+was among the few that survived the first disastrous settlement and
+lived on to more fortunate times: his pious pun on her name would be
+lost in a translation:--"De esta manera quedo libre la que ofrecieron a
+las fieras: la cual mujer yo la conoci, y la llamaban la Maldonada, que
+mas bien se le podia llamar la BIENDONADA; pues por este suceso se ha de
+ver no haber merecido el castigo á que la ofrecieron."
+
+If such a thing were to happen now, in any portion of southern South
+America, where the puma's disposition is best known, it would not be
+looked on as a miracle, as it was, and that unavoidably, in the case of
+Maldonada.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A WAVE OF LIFE,
+
+
+For many years, while living in my own home on the pampas, I kept a
+journal, in which all my daily observations on the habits of animals and
+kindred matters were carefully noted. Turning back to 1872-3, I find my
+jottings for that season contain a history of one of those waves of
+life--for I can think of no better name for the phenomenon in
+question--that are of such frequent occurrence in thinly-settled
+regions, though in countries like England, seen very rarely, and on a
+very limited scale. An exceptionally bounteous season, the accidental
+mitigation of a check, or other favourable circumstance, often causes an
+increase so sudden and inordinate of small prolific species, that when
+we actually witness it we are no longer surprised at the notion
+prevalent amongst the common people that mice, frogs, crickets, &c., are
+occasionally rained down from the clouds.
+
+In the summer of 1872-3 we had plenty of sunshine, with frequent
+showers; so that the hot months brought no dearth of wild flowers, as in
+most years. The abundance of flowers resulted in a wonderful increase of
+humble bees. I have never known them so plentiful before; in and about
+the plantation adjoining my house I found, during the season, no fewer
+than seventeen nests.
+
+The season was also favourable for mice; that is, of course, favourable
+for the time being, unfavourable in the long run, since the short-lived,
+undue preponderance of a species is invariably followed by a long period
+of undue depression. These prolific little creatures were soon so
+abundant that the dogs subsisted almost exclusively on them; the fowls
+also, from incessantly pursuing and killing them, became quite rapacious
+in their manner; whilst the sulphur tyrant-birds (Pitangus) and the
+Guira cuckoos preyed on nothing but mice.
+
+The domestic cats, as they invariably do in such plentiful seasons,
+absented themselves from the house, assuming all the habits of their
+wild congeners, and slinking from the sight of man--even of a former
+fireside companion--with a shy secrecy in their motions, an apparent
+affectation of fear, almost ludicrous to see. Foxes, weasels, and
+opossums fared sumptuously. Even for the common armadillo (Dasypus
+villosus) it was a season of affluence, for this creature is very adroit
+in capturing mice. This fact might seem surprising to anyone who marks
+the uncouth figure, toothless gums, and the motions--anything but light
+and graceful--of the armadillo and perhaps fancying that, to be a
+dexterous mouser, an animal should bear some resemblance in habits and
+structure to the felidas. But animals, like men, are compelled to adapt
+themselves to their surroundings; new habits are acquired, and the exact
+co-relation between habit and structure is seldom maintained.
+
+I kept an armadillo at this time, and good cheer and the sedentary life
+he led in captivity made him excessively fat; but the mousing exploits
+of even this individual were most interesting. Occasionally I took him
+into the fields to give him a taste of liberty, though at such times I
+always took the precaution to keep hold of a cord fastened to one of his
+hind legs; for as often as he came to a kennel of one of his wild
+fellows, he would attempt to escape into it. He invariably travelled
+with an ungainly trotting gait, carrying his nose, beagle-like, close to
+the ground. His sense of smell was exceedingly acute, and when near his
+prey he became agitated, and quickened his motions, pausing frequently
+to sniff the earth, till, discovering the exact spot where the mouse
+lurked, he would stop and creep cautiously to it; then, after slowly
+raising himself to a sitting posture, spring suddenly forwards, throwing
+his body like a trap over the mouse, or nest of mice, concealed beneath
+the grass.
+
+A curious instance of intelligence in a cat was brought to my notice at
+this time by one of my neighbours, a native. His children had made the
+discovery that some excitement and fun was to be had by placing a long
+hollow stalk of the giant thistle with a mouse in it--and every hollow
+stalk at this time had one for a tenant--before a cat, and then watching
+her movements. Smelling her prey, she would spring at one end of the
+stalk--the end towards which the mouse would be moving at the same time,
+but would catch nothing, for the mouse, instead of running out, would
+turn back to run to the other end; whereupon the cat, all excitement,
+would jump there to seize it; and so the contest would continue for a
+long time, an exhibition of the cleverness and the stupidity of
+instinct, both of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several cats
+at the house, and all acted in the same way except one. When a stalk was
+placed before this cat, instead of becoming excited like the others, it
+went quickly to one end and smelt' at the opening, then, satisfied that
+its prey was inside, it deliberately bit a long piece out of the stalk
+with its teeth, then another strip, and so on progressively, until the
+entire stick had been opened up to within six or eight inches of the
+further end, when the mouse came out and was caught. Every stalk placed
+before this cat was demolished in the same businesslike way; but the
+other cats, though they were made to look on while the stick was being
+broken up by their fellow, could never learn the trick.
+
+In the autumn of the year countless numbers of storks (Ciconia maguari)
+and of short-eared owls (Otus brachyotus) made their appearance. They
+had also come to assist at the general feast.
+
+Remembering the opinion of Mr. E. Newman, quoted by Darwin, that
+two-thirds of the humble bees in England are annually destroyed by mice,
+I determined to continue observing these insects, in order to ascertain
+whether the same thing occurred on the pampas. I carefully revisited all
+the nests I had found, and was amazed at the rapid disappearance of all
+the bees. I was quite convinced that the mice had devoured or driven
+them out, for the weather was still warm, and flowers and fruit on which
+humble bees feed were very abundant.
+
+After cold weather set in the storks went away, probably on account of
+the scarcity of water, for the owls remained. So numerous were they
+during the winter, that any evening after sunset I could count forty or
+fifty individuals hovering over the trees about my house. Unfortunately
+they did not confine their attentions to the mice, but became
+destructive to the birds as well. I frequently watched them at dusk,
+beating about the trees and bushes in a systematic manner, often a dozen
+or more of them wheeling together about one tree, like so many moths
+about a candle, and one occasionally dashing through the branches until
+a pigeon--usually the Zenaida maculata--or other bird was scared from
+its perch. The instant the bird left the tree they would all give chase,
+disappearing in the darkness. I could not endure to see the havoc they
+were making amongst the ovenbirds (Furnarius rufus--a species for which
+I have a regard and affection almost superstitious), so I began to shoot
+the marauders. Very soon, however, I found it was impossible to protect
+my little favourites. Night after night the owls mustered in their usual
+numbers, so rapidly were the gaps I made in their ranks refilled. I grew
+sick of the cruel war in which I had so hopelessly joined, and resolved,
+not without pain, to let things take their course. A singular
+circumstance was that the owls began to breed in the middle of winter.
+The field-labourers and boys found many nests with eggs and young birds
+in the neighbourhood. I saw one nest in July, our coldest month, with
+three half-grown young birds in it. They were excessively fat, and,
+though it was noon-day, had their crops full. There were three mice and
+two young cavies (Cavia australis) lying untouched in the nest.
+
+The short-eared owl is of a wandering disposition, ard performs long
+journeys at all seasons of the year in search of districts where food is
+abundant; and perhaps these winter-breeders came from a region where
+scarcity of prey, or some such cause, had prevented them from nesting at
+their usual time in summer.
+
+The gradual increase or decrease continually going on in many species
+about us is little remarked; but the sudden infrequent appearance in
+vast numbers of large and comparatively rare species is regarded by most
+people as a very wonderful phenomenon, not easily explained. On the
+pampas, whenever grasshoppers, mice, frogs or crickets become
+excessively abundant we confidently look for the appearance of
+multitudes of the birds that prey on them. However obvious may be the
+cause of the first phenomenon--the sudden inordinate increase during a
+favourable year of a species always prolific--the attendant one always
+creates astonishment: For how, it is asked, do these largo birds, seldom
+seen at other times, receive information in the distant regions they
+inhabit of an abundance of food in any particular locality? Years have
+perhaps passed during which, scarcely an individual of these kinds has
+been seen: all at once armies of the majestic white storks are seen
+conspicuously marching about the plain in all directions; while the
+night air resounds with the solemn hootings of innumerable owls. It is
+plain that these birds have been drawn from over an immense area to one
+spot; and the question is how have they been drawn?
+
+Many large birds possessing great powers of flight are, when not
+occupied with the business of propagation, incessantly wandering from
+place to place in search of food. They are not, as a rule, regular
+migrants, for their wanderings begin and end irrespective of seasons,
+and where they find abundance they remain the whole year. They fly at a
+very great height, and traverse immense distances. When the favourite
+food of any one of these species is plentiful in any particular region
+all the individuals that discover it remain, and attract to them all of
+their kind passing overhead. This happens on the pampas with the stork,
+the short-eared owl, the hooded gull and the dominican or black-backed
+gull--the leading species among the feathered nomads: a few first appear
+like harbingers; these are presently joined by new comers in
+considerable numbers, and before long they are in myriads. Inconceivable
+numbers of birds are, doubtless, in these regions, continually passing
+over us unseen. It was once a subject of very great wonder to me that
+flocks of black-necked swans should almost always appear flying by
+immediately after a shower of rain, even when none had been visible for
+a long time before, and when they must have come from a very great
+distance. When the reason at length occurred to me, I felt very much
+disgusted with myself for being puzzled over so very simple a matter.
+After rain a flying swan may be visible to the eye at a vastly greater
+distance than during fair weather; the sun shining on its intense white
+plumage against the dark background of a rain-cloud making it
+exceedingly conspicuous. The fact that swans are almost always seen
+after rain shows only that they are almost always passing.
+
+Whenever we are visited by a dust-storm on the pampas myriads of hooded
+gulls--Larus macnlipen-nis--appear flying before the dark dust-cloud,
+even when not a gull has been seen for months. Dust-storms are of rare
+occurrence, and come only after a long drought, and, the water-courses
+being all dry, the gulls cannot have been living in the region over
+which the storm passes. Yet in seasons of drought gulls must be
+continually passing by at a great height, seeing but not seen, except
+when driven together and forced towards the earth by the fury of the
+storm.
+
+By August (1873) the owls had vanished, and they had, indeed, good cause
+for leaving. The winter had been one of continued drought; the dry grass
+and herbage of the preceding year had been consumed by the cattle and
+wild animals, or had turned to dust, and with the disappearance of their
+food and cover the mice had ceased to be. The famine-stricken cats
+sneaked back to the house. It was pitiful to see the little burrowing
+owls; for these birds, not having the powerful wings and prescient
+instincts of the vagrant Otus brachyotus, are compelled to face the
+poverty from which the others escape. Just as abundance had before made
+the domestic cats wild, scarcity now made the burrowing owls tame and
+fearless of man. They were so reduced as scarcely to be able to fly, and
+hung about the houses all day long on the look-out for some stray morsel
+of food. I have frequently seen one alight and advance within two or
+three yards of the door-step, probably attracted by the smell of roasted
+meat. The weather continued dry until late in spring, so reducing the
+sheep and cattle that incredible numbers perished during a month of cold
+and rainy weather that followed the drought.
+
+How clearly we can see in all this that the tendency to multiply
+rapidly, so advantageous in normal seasons, becomes almost fatal to a
+species in seasons of exceptional abundance. Cover and food without
+limit enabled the mice to increase at such an amazing rate that the
+lesser checks interposed by predatory species were for a while
+inappreciable. But as the mice increased, so did their enemies.
+Insectivorous and other species acquired the habits of owls and weasels,
+preying exclusively on them; while to this innumerable army of residents
+was shortly added multitudes of wandering birds coming from distant
+regions. No sooner had the herbage perished, depriving the little
+victims of cover and food, than the effects of the war became apparent.
+In autumn the earth so teemed with them that one could scarcely walk
+anywhere without treading on mice; while out of every hollow weed-stalk
+lying on the ground dozens could be shaken; but so rapidly had they
+devoured, by the trained army of persecutors, that in spring it was hard
+to find a survivor, even in the barns and houses. The fact that species
+tend to increase in a geometrical ratio makes these great and sudden
+changes frequent in many regions of the earth; but it is not often they
+present themselves so vividly as in the foregoing instance, for here,
+scene after scene in one of Nature's silent passionless tragedies opens
+before us, countless myriads of highly organized beings rising into
+existence only to perish almost immediately, scarcely a hard-pressed
+remnant remaining after the great reaction to continue the species.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS.
+
+
+Strictly speaking, the only weapons of vertebrates are teeth, claws,
+horns, and spurs. Horns belong only to the ruminants, and the spur is a
+rare weapon. There are also many animals in which teeth and claws are
+not suited to inflict injury, or in which the proper instincts and
+courage to use and develop them are wanted; and these would seem, to be
+in a very defenceless condition. Defenceless they are in one sense, but
+as a fact they are no worse off than the well-armed species, having
+either a protective colouring or a greater swiftness or cunning to
+assist them in escaping from their enemies. And there are also many of
+these practically toothless and clawless species which have yet been
+provided with other organs and means of offence and defence out of
+Nature's curious armoury, and concerning a few of these species I
+propose to speak in this place.
+
+Probably such distinctive weapons as horns, spurs, tusks and spines
+would be much more common in nature if the conditions of life always
+remained the same. But these things are long in fashioning; meanwhile,
+conditions are changing; climate, soil, vegetation vary; foes and rivals
+diminish or increase; the old go, and others with different weapons and
+a new strategy take their place; and just as a skilful man "fighting the
+wilderness" fashions a plough from a hunting-knife, turns his implements
+into weapons of war, and for everything he possesses discovers a use
+never contemplated by its maker, so does Nature--only with an ingenuity
+exceeding that of man--use the means she has to meet all contingencies,
+and enable her creatures, seemingly so ill-provided, to maintain their
+fight for life. Natural selection, like an angry man, can make a weapon
+of anything; and, using the word in this wide sense, the mucous
+secretions the huanaco discharges into the face of an adversary, and the
+pestilential drops "distilled" by the skunk, are weapons, and may be as
+effectual in defensive warfare as spines, fangs and tushes.
+
+I do not know of a more striking instance in the animal kingdom of
+adaptation of structure to habit than is afforded by the hairy
+armadillo--Dasypus villosus. He appears to us, roughly speaking, to
+resemble an ant-eater saddled with a dish cover; yet this creature, with
+the cunning Avhich Nature has given it to supplement all deficiencies,
+has discovered in its bony encumbrance a highly efficient weapon of
+offence. Most other edentates are diurnal and almost exclusively
+insectivorous, some feeding only on ants; they have unchangeable habits,
+very limited intelligence, and vanish before civilization. The hairy
+armadillo alone has struck out a line for itself. Like its fast
+disappearing congeners, it is an insect-eater still, but does not like
+them seek its food on the surface and in the ant-hill only; all kinds of
+insects are preyed on, and by means of its keen scent it discovers worms
+and larvae several inches beneath the surface. Its method of taking
+worms and grubs resembles that of probing birds, for it throws up no
+earth, but forces its sharp snout and wedge-shaped head down to the
+required depth; and probably while working it moves round in a circle,
+for the hole is conical, though the head of the animal is flat. Where it
+has found a rich hunting-ground, the earth is seen pitted with hundreds
+of these neat symmetrical bores. It is also an enemy to ground-nesting
+birds, being fond of eggs and fledglings; and when unable to capture
+prey it will feed on carrion as readily as a wild dog or vulture,
+returning night after night to the carcase of a horse or cow as long as
+the flesh lasts. Failing animal food, it subsists on vegetable diet; and
+I have frequently found their stomachs stuffed with clover, and,
+stranger still, with the large, hard grains of the maize, swallowed
+entire.
+
+It is not, therefore, strange that at all seasons, and even when other
+animals are starving, the hairy armadillo is always fat and vigorous. In
+the desert it is diurnal; but where man appears it becomes more and more
+nocturnal, and in populous districts does not go abroad until long after
+dark. Yet when a district becomes thickly settled it increases in
+numbers; so readily does it adapt itself to new conditions. It is not to
+be wondered at that the gauchos, keen observers of nature as they are,
+should make this species the hero of many of their fables of the "Uncle
+Remus" type, representing it as a versatile creature, exceedingly
+fertile in expedients, and duping its sworn friend the fox in various
+ways, just as "Brer Rabbit" serves the fox in the North American fables.
+
+The hairy armadillo will, doubtless, long survive all the other
+armadillos, and on this account alone it will have an ever-increasing
+interest for the naturalist. I have elsewhere described how it captures
+mice; when preying on snakes it proceeds in another manner. A friend of
+mine, a careful observer, who was engaged in cattle-breeding amongst the
+stony sierras near Cape Corrientes, described to me an encounter he
+witnessed between an armadillo and a poisonous snake. While seated on
+the hillside one day he observed a snake, about twenty inches in length,
+lying coiled up on a stoue five or six yards beneath him. By-and-by, a
+hairy armadillo appeared trotting directly towards it. Apparently the
+snake perceived and feared its approach, for it quickly uncoiled itself
+and began gliding away. Instantly the armadillo rushed on to it, and,
+squatting close down, began swaying its body backward and forward with a
+regular sawing motion, thus lacerating its victim with the sharp,
+deep-cut edges of its bony covering. The snake struggled to free itself,
+biting savagely at its aggressor, for its head and neck were disengaged.
+Its bites made no impression, and very soon it dropped its head, and
+when its enemy drew off, it was dead and very much mangled. The
+armadillo at once began its meal, taking the tail in its mouth and
+slowly progressing towards the head; but when about a third of the snake
+still remained it seemed satisfied, and, leaving that portion, trotted
+away.
+
+Altogether, in its rapacious and varied habits this armadillo appears to
+have some points of resemblance with the hedgehog; and possibly, like
+the little European mammal it resembles, it is not harmed by the bite of
+venomous snakes.
+
+I once had a cat that killed every snake it found, purely for sport,
+since it never ate them. It would jump nimbly round and across its
+victim, occasionally dealing it a blow with its cruel claws. The enemies
+of the snake are legion. Burrowing owls feed largely on them; so do
+herons and storks, killing them with a blow of their javelin beaks, and
+swallowing them entire. The sulphur tyrant-bird picks up the young snake
+by the tail, and, flying to a branch or stone, uses it like a flail till
+its life is battered out. The bird is highly commended in consequence,
+reminding one of very ancient words: "Happy shall he be that taketh thy
+little ones and dasheth them against the stones." In arraying such a
+variety of enemies against the snake, nature has made ample amends for
+having endowed it with deadly weapons. Besides, the power possessed by
+venomous snakes only seems to us disproportionate; it is not really so,
+except in occasional individual encounters. Venomous snakes are always
+greatly outnumbered by non-venomous ones in the same district; at any
+rate this is the case on the pampas. The greater activity of the latter
+counts for more in the result than the deadly weapons of the former.
+
+The large teguexin lizard of the pampas, called iguana by the country
+people, is a notable snake-killer. Snakes have in fact, no more
+formidable enemy, for he is quick to see, and swift to overtake them. He
+is practically invulnerable, and deals them sudden death with his
+powerful tail. The gauchos say that dogs attacking the iguana are
+sometimes known to have their legs broken, and I do not doubt it. A
+friend of mine was out riding one day after his cattle, and having
+attached one end of his lasso to the saddle, He let it trail on the
+ground. He noticed a large iguana lying apparently asleep in the sun,
+and though he rode by it very closely, it did not stir; but no sooner
+had he passed it, than it raised its head, and fixed its attention on
+the forty feet of lasso slowly trailing by. Suddenly it rushed after the
+rope, and dealt it a succession of violent blows with its tail. When the
+whole of the lasso, several yards of which had been pounded in vain, had
+been dragged by, the lizard, with uplifted head, continued gazing after
+it with the greatest astonishment. Never had such a wonderful snake
+crossed its path before!
+
+Molina, in his _Natural History of Chill,_ says the vizcacha uses its
+tail as a weapon; but then Molina is not always reliable. I have
+observed vizcachas all my life, and never detected them making use of
+any weapon except their chisel teeth. The tail is certainly very
+curious, being straight at the base, then curving up outwardly, and
+slightly down again at the tip, resembling the spout of a china teapot.
+The under surface of the straight portion of the base is padded with a
+thick, naked, corneous skin; and, when the animal performs the curious
+sportive antics in which it occasionally indulges, it gives rapid
+loud-sounding blows on the ground with this part of the tail. The
+peculiar form of the tail also makes it a capital support, enabling the
+vizcacha to sit erect, with ease and security.
+
+The frog is a most timid, inoffensive creature, saving itself, when
+pursued, by a series of saltatory feats unparalleled amongst
+vertebrates. Consequently, when I find a frog, I have no hesitation in
+placing my hands upon it, and the cold sensation it gives one is the
+worse result I fear. It came to pass, however, that I once encountered a
+frog that was not like other frogs, for it possessed an instinct and
+weapons of offence which greatly astonished me. I was out snipe shooting
+one day when, peering into an old disused burrow, two or three feet
+deep, I perceived a burly-looking frog sitting it. It was larger and
+stouter-looking than our common Rana, though like it in colour, and I at
+once dropped on to my knees and set about its capture. Though it watched
+me attentively, the frog remained perfectly motionless, and this greatly
+surprised me. Before I was sufficiently near to make a grab, it sprang
+straight at my hand, and, catching two of my fingers round with its fore
+legs, administered a hug so sudden and violent as to cause an acute
+sensation of pain; then, at the very instant I experienced this feeling,
+which made me start back quickly, it released its hold and bounded out
+and away. I flew after it, and barely managed to overtake it before it
+could gain the water. Holding it firmly pressed behind the shoulders, it
+was powerless to attack me, and I then noticed the enormous development
+of the muscles of the fore legs, usually small in frogs, bulging out in
+this individual, like a second pair of thighs, and giving-it a strangely
+bold and formidable appearance. On holding my gun within its reach, it
+clasped the barrel with such energy as to bruise the skin of its breast
+and legs. After allowing it to partially exhaust itself in these
+fruitless huggings, I experimented by letting it seize my hand again,
+and I noticed that invariably after each squeeze it made a quick,
+violent attempt to free itself. Believing that I had discovered a frog
+differing in structure from all known species, and possessing a strange
+unique instinct of self-preservation, I carried my captive home,
+intending to show it to Dr. Burmeister, the director of the National
+Museum at Buenos Ayres-Unfortunately, after I had kept it some days, it
+effected its escape by pushing up the glass cover of its box, and I have
+never since met with another individual like it. That this singular
+frog has it in its power to seriously injure an opponent is, of course,
+out of the question; but its unexpected attack must be of great
+advantage. The effect of the sudden opening of an umbrella in the face
+of an angry bull gives, I think, only a faint idea of the astonishment
+and confusion it must cause an adversary by its leap, quick as
+lightning, and the violent hug it administers; and in the confusion it
+finds time to escape. I cannot for a moment believe that an instinct so
+admirable, correlated as it is with the structure of the fore legs, can
+be merely an individual variation; and I confidently expect that all I
+have said about my lost frog will some day be confirmed by others. Rana
+luctator would be a good name for this species.
+
+The toad is a slow-moving creature that puts itself in the way of
+persecution; yet, strange to say, the acrid juice it exudes when
+irritated is a surer protection to it than venomous fangs are to the
+deadliest snake. Toads are, in fact, with a very few exceptions, only
+attacked and devoured by snakes, by lizards, and by their own venomous
+relative, Ceratophrys ornata. Possibly the cold sluggish natures of all
+these creatures protects them against the toad's secretion, which would
+be poison to most warm-blooded animals, but I am not so sure that all
+fish enjoy a like immunity. I one day noticed a good-sized fish (bagras)
+floating, belly upmost, on the water. It had apparently just died, and
+had such a glossy, well-nourished look about it, and appeared so full, I
+was curious to know the cause of its death. On opening it I found its
+stomach quite filled with a very large toad it had swallowed. The toad
+looked perfectly fresh, not even a faint discoloration of the skin
+showing that the gastric juices had begun to take effect; the fish, in
+fact, must have died immediately after swallowing the toad. The country
+people in South America believe that the milky secretion exuded by the
+toad possesses wonderful curative properties; it is their invariable
+specific for shingles--a painful, dangerous malady common amongst them,
+and to cure it living toads are applied to the inflamed parb. I dare say
+learned physicians would laugh at this cure, but then, if I mistake not,
+the learned have in past times laughed at other specifics used by the
+vulgar, but which now have honourable places in the
+pharmacopoeia--pepsine, for example. More than two centuries ago (very
+ancient times for South America) the gauchos were accustomed to take
+the lining of the rhea's stomach, dried and powdered, for ailments
+caused by impaired digestion; and the remedy is popular still. Science
+has gone over to them, and the ostrich-hunter now makes a double profit,
+one from the feathers, and the other from the dried stomachs which he
+supplies to the chemists of Buenos Ayres. Yet he was formerly told that
+to take the stomach of the ostrich to improve his digestion was as wild
+an idea as it would be to swallow birds' feathers in order to fly.
+
+I just now called Ceratophrys ornata venomous, though its teeth are not
+formed to inject poison into the veins, like serpents' teeth. It is a
+singular creature, known as _escuerzo_ in the vernacular, and though
+beautiful in colour, is in form hideous beyond description. The skin is
+of a rich brilliant green, with chocolate-coloured patches, oval in
+form, and symmetrically disposed. The lips are bright yellow, the
+cavernous mouth pale flesh colour, the throat and under-surface dull
+white. The body is lumpy, and about the size of a large man's fist. The
+eyes, placed on the summit of a disproportionately large head, are
+embedded in horn-like protuberances, capable of being elevated or
+depressed at pleasure. When the creature is undisturbed, the eyes, which
+are of a pale gold colour, look out as from a couple of watch towers,
+but when touched on the head or menaced, the prominences sink down to a
+level with the head, closing the eyes completely, and giving the
+creature the appearance of being eyeless. The upper jaw is armed with
+minute teeth, and there are two teeth in the centre of the lower jaw,
+the remaining portions of the jaw being armed with two exceedingly
+sharp-edged bony plates. In place of a tongue, it has a round muscular
+process with a rough flat disc the size of a halfpenny.
+
+It is common all over the pampas, ranging as far south as the Rio
+Colorado in Patagonia. In the breeding season it congregates in pools,
+and one is then struck by their extraordinary vocal powers, which they
+exercise by night. The performance in no way resembles the series of
+percussive sounds uttered by most batrachians. The notes it utters are
+long, as of a wind instrument, not unmelodious, and so powerful as to
+make themselves heard distinctly a mile off on still evenings. After the
+amorous period these toads retire to moist places and sit inactive,
+buried just deep enough to leave the broad green back on a level with
+the surface, and it is then very difficult to detect them. In this
+position they wait for their prey--frogs, toads, birds, and small
+mammals. Often they capture and attempt to swallow things too large for
+them, a mistake often made by snakes. In very wet springs they sometimes
+come about houses and lie in wait for chickens and ducklings. In
+disposition they are most truculent, savagely biting at anything that
+comes near them; and when they bite they hang on with the tenacity of a
+bulldog, poisoning the blood with their glandular secretions. When
+teased, the creature swells itself out to such an extent one almost
+expects to see him burst; he follows his tormentors about with slow
+awkward leaps, his vast mouth wide open, and uttering an incessant harsh
+croaking sound. A gaucho I knew was once bitten by one. He sat down on
+the grass, and, dropping his hand at his side, had it seized, and only
+freed himself by using his hunting knife to force the creature's mouth
+open. He washed and bandaged the wound, and no bad result followed; but
+when the toad cannot be shaken off, then the result is different. One
+summer two horses were found dead on the plain near my home. One, while
+lying down, had been seized by a fold in the skin near the belly; the
+other had been grasped by the nose while cropping grass. In both
+instances the vicious toad was found dead, with jaws tightly closed,
+still hanging to the dead horse. Perhaps they are sometimes incapable of
+letting go at will, and like honey bees, destroy themselves in these
+savage attacks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+FEAR IN BIRDS.
+
+
+The statement that birds instinctively fear man is frequently met with
+in zoological works written since the _Origin of Species_ appeared; but
+almost the only reason--absolutely the only plausible reason, all the
+rest being mere supposition--given in support of such a notion is that
+birds in desert islands show at first no fear of man, but afterwards,
+finding him a dangerous neighbour, they become wild; and their young
+also grow up wild. It is thus assumed that the habit acquired by the
+former has become hereditary in the latter--or, at all events, that in
+time it becomes hereditary. Instincts, which are few in number in any
+species, and practically endure for ever, are not, presumably, acquired
+with such extraordinary facility.
+
+Birds become shy where persecuted, and the young, even when not
+disturbed, learn a shy habit from the parents, and from other adults
+they associate with. I have found small birds shyer in desert places,
+where the human form was altogether strange to them, than in
+thickly-settled districts. Large birds are actually shyer than the small
+ones, although, to the civilized or shooting man they seem astonishingly
+tame where they have never been fired at. I have frequently walked quite
+openly to within twenty-five or thirty yards of a flock of flamingoes
+without alarming them. This, however, was when they were in the water,
+or on the opposite side of a stream. Having no experience of guns, they
+fancied themselves secure as long as a strip of water separated them
+from the approaching object. When standing on dry land they would not
+allow so near an approach. Sparrows in England aro very much tamer than
+the sparrows I have observed in desert places, where they seldom see a
+human being. Nevertheless young sparrows in England are very much tamer
+than old birds, as anyone may see for himself. During the past summer,
+while living near Kew Gardens, I watched the sparrows a great deal, and
+fed forty or fifty of them every day from a back window. The bread and
+seed was thrown on to a low roof just outside the window, and I noticed
+that the young birds when first able to fly were always brought by the
+parents to this feeding place, and that after two or three visits they
+would begin to come of their own accord. At such times they would
+venture quite close to me, showing as little suspicion as young
+chickens. The adults, however, although so much less shy than birds of
+other species, were extremely suspicious, snatching up the bread and
+flying away; or, if they remained, hopping about in a startled manner,
+craning their necks to view me, and making so many gestures and motions,
+and little chirps of alarm, that presently the young would become
+infected with fear. The lesson was taught them in a surprisingly short
+time; their suspicion was seen to increase day by day, and about a week
+later they were scarcely to be distinguished, in behaviour from the
+adults. It is plain that, with these little birds, fear of man is an
+associate feeling, and that, unless it had been taught them, his
+presence would trouble them as little as does that of horse, sheep, or
+cow. But how about the larger species, used as food, and which have had
+a longer and sadder experience of man's destructive power?
+
+The rhea, or South American ostrich, philosophers tell us, is a very
+ancient bird on the earth; and from its great size and inability to
+escape by flight, and its excellence as food, especially to savages, who
+prefer fat rank-flavoured flesh, it must have been systematically
+persecuted by man as long as, or longer than, any bird now existing on
+the globe. If fear of man ever becomes hereditary in birds, we ought
+certainly to find some trace of such an instinct in this species. I have
+been unable to detect any, though I have observed scores of young rheas
+in captivity, taken before the parent bird had taught them what to fear.
+I also once kept a brood myself, captured just after they had hatched
+out. With regard to food they were almost, or perhaps quite,
+independent, spending most of the time catching flies, grasshoppers, and
+other insects with surprising dexterity; but of the dangers encompassing
+the young rhea they knew absolutely frothing. They would follow me about
+as if they took me for their parent; and, whenever I imitated the loud
+snorting or rasping warning-call emitted the old bird in moments of
+danger, they would to me in the greatest terror, though no animal was in
+sight, and, squatting at my feet, endeavour to conceal themselves by
+thrusting their heads and long necks up my trousers. If I had caused a
+person to dress in white or yellow clothes for several consecutive days,
+and had then uttered the warning cry each time he showed himself to the
+birds, I have no doubt that they would soon have acquired a habit of
+running in terror from him, even without the warning cry, and that the
+fear of a person in white or yellow would have continued all their
+lives. Up to within about twenty years ago, rheas were seldom or never
+shot in La Plata and Patagonia, but were always hunted on horseback and
+caught with the bolas. The sight of a mounted man would set them off at
+once, while a person on foot could walk quite openly to within easy
+shooting distance of them; yet their fear of a horseman dates only two
+hundred years back--a very short time, when we consider that, before the
+Indian borrowed the horse from the invader, he must have systematically
+pursued the rhea on foot for centuries. The rhea changed its habits when
+the hunter changed his, and now, if an _estanciero_ puts down ostrich
+hunting on his estate, in a very few years the birds, although wild
+birds still, become as fearless and familiar as domestic animals. I have
+known old and ill-tempered males to become a perfect nuisance on some
+estancias, running after and attacking every person, whether on foot or
+on horseback, that ventured near them. An old instinct of a whole race
+could not be thus readily lost here and there on isolated estates
+wherever a proprietor chose to protect his birds for half a dozen years.
+
+I suppose the Talegallus--the best-known brush-turkey--must be looked on
+as an exception to all other birds with regard to the point I am
+considering; for this abnormal form buries its eggs in the huge mound
+made by the male, and troubles herself no more about them. When the
+young is fully developed it simply kicks the coffin to pieces in which
+its mother interred it, and, burrowing its way up to the sunshine,
+enters on the pleasures and pains of an independent existence from
+earliest infancy--that is, if a species born into the world in full
+possession of all the wisdom of the ancients, can be said ever to know
+infancy. At all events, from Mr. Bartlett's observations on the young
+hatched in the Zoological Gardens, it appears that they took no notice
+of the old birds, but lived quite independently from the moment they
+came out of the ground, even flying up into a tree and roosting
+separately at night. I am not sure, however, that these observations are
+quite conclusive; for it is certain that captivity plays strange pranks
+with the instincts of some species, and it is just possible that in a
+state of nature the old birds exercise at first some slight parental
+supervision, and, like all other species, have a peculiar cry to warn
+the young of the dangers to be avoided. If this is not so, then the
+young Talegallus must fly or hide with instinctive tear from every
+living thing that approaches it. I, at any rate, find it hard to believe
+that it has a knowledge, independent of experience, of the different
+habits of man and kangaroo, and dis-criminates at first sight between
+animals that are dangerous to it and those that are not. This
+interesting point will probably never be determined, as, most unhappily,
+the Australians are just now zealously engaged in exterminating their
+most wonderful bird for the sake of its miserable flesh; and with less
+excuse than the Maories could plead with regard to the moa, since they
+cannot deny that they have mutton and rabbit enough to satisfy hunger.
+
+Whether birds fear or have instinctive knowledge of any of their enemies
+is a much larger question. Species that run freely on the ground from
+the time of quitting the shell know their proper food, and avoid
+whatever is injurious. Have all young birds a similarly discriminating
+instinct with regard to their enemies? Darwin says, "Fear of any
+particular enemy is certainly an instinctive quality, as may be seen in
+nestling birds." Here, even man seems to be included among the enemies
+feared instinctively; and in another passage he says, "Young chickens
+have lost, wholly from habit, that fear of the dog and cat which, no
+doubt, was originally instinctive in them." My own observations point to
+a contrary conclusion; and I may say that I have had unrivalled
+opportunities for studying the habits of young birds.
+
+Animals of all classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear from
+any strange object approaching them. A piece of newspaper carried
+accidentally by the wind is as great an object of terror to an
+inexperienced young bird as a buzzard sweeping down with death in its
+talons. Among birds not yet able to fly there are, however, some curious
+exceptions; thus the young of most owls and pigeons are excited to anger
+rather than fear, and, puffing themselves up, snap and strike at an
+intruder with their beaks. Other fledglings simply shrink down in the
+nest or squat 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 approaches 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 corning 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 wild 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 what may be seen in nestling birds, n very young, and
+before their education has begun, if quietly approached and touched,
+they open their bills and take food as readily from a man as from the
+parent bird. But if while being thus fed the parent returns and emits
+the warning note, they instantly cease their hunger-cries, close their
+gaping mouths, and crouch down frightened in the nest. This fear caused
+by the parent bird's warning note begins to manifest itself even before
+the young are hatched--and my observations on this point refer to
+several species in three widely separated orders. When the little
+prisoner is hammering at its shell, and uttering its feeble _peep,_ as
+if begging to be let out, if the warning note is uttered, even at a
+considerable distance, the strokes and complaining instantly cease, and
+the chick will then remain quiescent in the shell for a long time, or
+until the parent, by a changed note, conveys to it an intimation that
+the danger is over. Another proof that the nestling has absolutely no
+instinctive knowledge of particular enemies, but is taught to fear them
+by the parents, is to be found in the striking contrast between the
+habits of parasitical and genuine young in the nest, and after they have
+left it, while still unable to find their own food. I have had no
+opportunities of observing the habits of the young cuckoo in England
+with regard to this point, and do not know whether other observers have
+paid any attention to the matter or not, but I am very familiar with the
+manners of the parasitical starling or cow-bird of South America. The
+warning cries of the foster parent have no effect on the young cow-bird
+at any time. Until they are able to fly they will readily devour worms
+from the hand of a man, even when the old birds are hovering close by
+and screaming their danger notes, and while their own young, if the
+parasite has allowed any to survive in the nest, are crouching down in
+the greatest fear. After the cow-bird has left the nest it is still
+stupidly tame, and more than once I have seen one carried off from its
+elevated perch by a milvago hawk, when, if it had understood the warning
+cry of the foster parent, it would have dropped down into the bush or
+grass and escaped. But as soon as the young cow-birds are able to shift
+for themselves, and begin to associate with their own kind, their habits
+change, and they become suspicious and wild like other birds.
+
+On this point--the later period at which the parasitical young bird
+acquires fear of man--and also bearing on the whole subject under
+discussion, I shall add here some observations I once made on a dove
+hatched and reared by a pigeon at my home on the pampas. A very large
+ombú tree grew not far from the dove-cote, and some of the pigeons used
+to make their nests on the lower horizontal branches. One summer a dove
+of the most common species, Zenaida maculata, in size a third less than
+the domestic pigeon, chanced to drop an egg in one of these nests, and a
+young dove was hatched and reared; and, in due time, when able to fly,
+it was brought to the dove-cote. I watched it a great deal, and it was
+evident that this foster-young, though' with the pigeons, was not nor
+ever would be of them, for it could not take kiudly to their flippant
+flirty ways. Whenever a male approached it, and with guttural noises and
+strange gestures made a pompous declaration of amorous feelings, the
+dove would strike vigorously at its undesirable lover, and drive him
+off, big as he was; and, as a rule, it would sit apart, afoot or so,
+from the others. The dove was also a male; but its male companions, with
+instinct tainted by domestication, were ignorant alike of its sex and
+different species. Now, it chanced that my pigeons, never being fed and
+always finding their own living on the plain like wild birds, were,
+although still domestic, not nearly so tame as pigeons usually are in
+England. They would not allow a person to approach within two or three
+yards of them without flying, and if grain was thrown to them they would
+come to it very suspiciously, or not at all. And, of course, the young
+pigeons always acquired the exact degree of suspicion shown by the
+adults as soon as they were able to fly and consort with the others. But
+the foundling Zenaida did not know what their startled gestures and
+notes of fear meant when a person approached too near, and as he saw
+none of his own kind, he did not acquire their suspicious habit. On the
+contrary, he was perfectly tame, although by parentage a wild bird, and
+showed no more fear of a man than of a horse. Throughout the winter it
+remained with the pigeons, going afield every day with them, and
+returning to the dove-cote; but as spring approached the slight tie
+which united him to them began to be loosened; their company grew less
+and less congenial, and he began to lead a solitary life. But he did not
+go to the trees yet. He came to the house, and his favourite perch was
+on the low overhanging roof of a vine-covered porch, just over the main
+entrance. Here he would pass several hours every day, taking no notice
+of the people passing in and out at all times; and when the weather grew
+warm he would swell out his breast and coo mournfully by the hour for
+our pleasure.
+
+We can, no doubt, learn best by observing the behaviour of nestlings and
+young birds; nevertheless, I find much even in the confirmed habits of
+adults to strengthen me in the belief that fear of particular enemies is
+in nearly all cases--for I will not say all--the result of experience
+and tradition.
+
+Hawks are the most open, violent, and persistent enemies birds have; and
+it is really wonderful to see how well the persecuted kinds appear to
+know the power for mischief possessed by different raptorial species,
+and how exactly the amount of alarm exhibited is in proportion to the
+extent of the danger to be apprehended. Some raptors never attack birds,
+others only occasionally; still others prey only on the young and
+feeble; and, speaking of La Plata district, where I have observed hawks,
+from the milvago chimango--chiefly a carrion-eater--to the destructive
+peregrine falcon, there is a very great variety of predatory habits, and
+all degrees of courage to be found; yet all these raptors are treated
+differently by species liable to be preyed on, and have just as much
+respect paid them as their strength and daring entitles them to, and no
+more, So much discrimination must seem almost incredible to those who
+are not very familiar with the manners of wild birds; I do not think it
+could exist if the fear shown resulted from instinct or inherited habit.
+There would be no end to the blunders of such an instinct as that; and
+in regions where hawks are extremely abundant most of the birds would be
+in a constant state of trepidation. On the pampas the appearance of the
+comparatively harmless chimango excites not the least alarm among small
+birds, yet at a distance it closely resembles a henharrier, and it also
+readily attacks young, sick, and wounded birds; all others know how
+little they have to fear from it. When it appears unexpectedly,
+sweeping over a hedge or grove with a rapid flight, it is sometimes
+mistaken for a more dangerous species; there is then a little flutter of
+alarm, some birds springing into the air, but in two or three seconds of
+time they discover their mistake, and settle down quietly again, taking
+no further notice of the despised carrion-eater. On the other hand, I
+have frequently mistaken a harrier (Circus cinereus, in the brown state
+of plumage) for a chimango, and have only discovered my mistake by
+seeing the commotion among the small birds. The harrier I have
+mentioned, also the C. macropterus, feed partly on small birds, which
+they flush from the ground and strike down with their claws. When the
+harrier appears moving along with a loitering flight near the surface,
+it is everywhere attended by a little whirlwind of alarm, small birds
+screaming or chirping excitedly and diving into the grass or bushes; but
+the alarm does not spread far, and subsides as soon as the hawk has
+passed on its way. Buzzards (Buteo and Urubitinga) are much more feared,
+and create a more widespread alarm, and they ars certainly more
+destructive to birds than harriers. Another curious instance is that of
+the sociable hawk (Rostrhanrus sociabilis). This bird spends the summer
+and breeds in marshes in La Plata, and birds pay no attention to it, for
+it feeds exclusively on water-snails (Ampullaria). But when it visits
+woods and plantations to roost, during migration, its appearance creates
+as much alarm as that of a true buzzard, which it closely resembles.
+Wood-birds, unaccustomed to see it, do not know its peculiar preying
+habits, and how little they need fear its presence. I may also mention
+that the birds of La Plata seem to fear the kite-like Elanus less than
+other hawks, and I believe that its singular resemblance to the common
+gull of the district in its size, snowy-white plumage and manner of
+flight, has a deceptive effect on most species, and makes them so little
+suspicious of it.
+
+The wide-ranging peregrine falcon is a common species in La Plata,
+although, oddly enough, not included in any notice of the avifauna of
+that region before 1888. The consternation caused among birds by its
+appearance is vastly greater than that produced by any of the raptors I
+have mentioned: and it is unquestionably very much more destructive to
+birds, since it preys exclusively on them, and, as a rule, merely picks
+the flesh from the head and neck, and leaves the untouched body to its
+jackal, the carrion-hawk. When the peregrine appears speeding through
+the air in a straight line at a great height, the feathered world, as
+far as one able to see, is thrown into the greatest commo-tion, all
+birds, from the smallest up to species large as duck, ibis, and curlew,
+rushing about in the air as if distracted. When the falcon has
+disappeared in the sky, and the wave of terror attending its progress
+subsides behind it, the birds still continue wild and excited for some
+time, showing how deeply they have been moved; for, as a rule, fear is
+exceedingly transitory in its effects on animals.
+
+I must, before concluding this part of my subject, mention another
+raptor, also a true falcon, but differing from the peregrine in being
+exclusively a marsh-hawk. In size it is nearly a third less than the
+male peregrine, which it resembles in its sharp wings and manner of
+flight, but its flight is much more rapid. The whole plumage, is
+uniformly of a dark grey colour. Unfortunately, though I have observed
+it not fewer than a hundred times, I have never been able to procure a
+specimen, nor do I find that it is like any American falcon already
+described; so that for the present it must remain nameless. Judging
+solely from the effect produced by the appearance of this hawk, it must
+be even more daring and destructive than its larger relation, the
+peregrine. It flies at a great height, and sometimes descends vertically
+and with extraordinary velocity, the wings producing a sound like a
+deep-toned horn. The sound is doubtless produced at will, and is
+certainly less advantageous to the hawk than to the birds it pursues. No
+doubt it can afford to despise the wing-power of its quarry; and I have
+sometimes thought that it takes a tyrannous delight in witnessing the
+consternation caused by its hollow trumpeting sound. This may be only a
+fancy, but some hawks do certainly take pleasure in pursuing and
+striking birds when not seeking prey. The peregrine has been observed,
+Baird says, capturing birds, only to kill and drop them. Many of the
+Felidae, we know, evince a similar habit; only these prolong their
+pleasure by practising a more refined and deliberate cruelty.
+
+The sudden appearance overhead of this hawk produces an effect wonderful
+to witness. I have frequently seen all the inhabitants of a marsh struck
+with panic, acting as if demented, and suddenly grown careless to all
+other dangers; and on such occasions I have looked up confident of
+seeing the sharp-winged death, suspended above them in the sky. All
+birds that happen to be on the wing drop down as if shot into the reeds
+or water; ducks away from the margin stretch out their necks
+horizontally and drag their bodies, as if wounded, into closer cover;
+not one bird is found bold enough to rise up and wheel about the
+marauder--a usual proceeding in the case of other hawks; while, at every
+sudden stoop the falcon makes, threatening to dash down on his prey, a
+low cry of terror rises from the birds beneath; a sound expressive of an
+emotion so contagious that it quickly runs like a murmur all over the
+marsh, as if a gust of wind had swept moaning through, the rushes. As
+long as the falcon hangs overhead, always at a height of about forty
+yards, threatening at intervals to dash down, this murmuring sound, made
+up of many hundreds of individual cries, is heard swelling and dying
+away, and occasionally, when he drops lower than usual, rising to a
+sharp scream of terror.
+
+Sometimes when I have been riding over marshy ground, one of these hawks
+has placed himself directly over my head, within fifteen or twenty yards
+of me; and it has perhaps acquired the habit of following a horseman in
+this way in order to strike at any birds driven up. On one occasion my
+horse almost trod on a couple of snipe squatting terrified in the short
+grass. The instant they rose the hawk struck at one, the end of his wing
+violently smiting my cheek as he stooped, and striking at the snipe on a
+level with the knees of my horse. The snipe escaped by diving under the
+bridle, and immediately dropped down on the other side of me, and the
+hawk, rising up, flew away.
+
+To return. I think I am justified in believing that fear of hawks, like
+fear of men, is, in very nearly all cases, the result of experience and
+tradition. Nevertheless, I think it probable that in some species which
+have always lived in the open, continually exposed to attack, and which
+are preferred as food by raptors, such as duck, snipe, and plover, the
+fear of the falcon may be an inherited habit. Among passerine birds I am
+also inclined to think that swallows show inherited fear of hawks.
+Swallows and humming-birds have least to fear from raptors; yet, while
+humming-birds readily pursue and tease hawks, thinking as little of them
+as of pigeons or herons, swallows everywhere manifest the greatest
+terror at the approach of a true falcon; and they also fear other birds
+of prey, though in a much less degree. It has been said that the
+European hobby occasionally catches swal-lows on the wing, but this
+seems a rare and exceptional habit, and in South America I have never
+seen any bird of prey attempt the pursuit of a swallow. The question
+then arises, how did this unnecessary fear, so universal in swallows,
+originate? Can it be a survival of a far past--a time when some
+wide-ranging small falcon, aerial in habits as the swallow itself,
+preyed by preference on hirundines only?
+
+[NOTE.-Herbert Spencer, who accepts Darwin's inference, explains how the
+fear of man, acquired by experience, becomes instinctive in birds, in
+the following passage: "It is well known that in newly-discovered lands
+not inhabited by man, birds are so devoid of fear as to allow themselves
+to be knocked over with sticks; but that, in the course of generations,
+they acquire such a dread of man as to fly on his approach: and that
+this dread is manifested by young as well as by old. Now unless this
+change be ascribed to the killing-off of the least fearful, and the
+preservation and multiplication of the most fearful which, considering
+the comparatively small number killed by man, is an inadequate cause, it
+must be ascribed to accumulated experience; and each experience must be
+held to have a share in producing it. We must conclude that in each bird
+that escapes with injuries inflicted by man, or is alarmed by the
+outcries of other members of the flock (gregarious creatures of any
+intelligence being necessarily more or less sympathetic), there is
+established an association of ideas between the human aspect and the
+pains, direct and in-direct, suffered from human agency. And we must
+further con-clude, that the state of consciousness which compels the
+bird to take flight, is at first nothing more than an ideal reproduction
+of those painful impressions which before followed man's approach; that
+such ideal reproduction becomes more vivid and more massive as the
+painful experiences, direct or sympathetic, increase; and that thus the
+emotion, in its incipient state, is nothing else than an aggregation of
+the revived pains before experience.
+
+"As, in the course of generations, the young birds of this race begin to
+display a fear of man before yet they have been injured by him, it is an
+unavoidable inference that the nervous system of the race has been
+organically modified by these experiences, we have no choice but to
+conclude, that when a young bird is led to fly, it is because the
+impression produced in its senses by the approaching man entails,
+through an incipiently reflex action, a partial excitement of all those
+nerves which in its ancestors had been excited under the like
+conditions; that this partial excitement has its accompanying painful
+consciousness, and that the vague painful consciousness thus arising
+constitutes emotion proper--_emotion undecomposable into specific
+experiences, and, therefore, seemingly homogeneous"_ (Essays, vol. i. p.
+320.)]
+
+It is comforting to know that the "unavoidable inference" is, after all,
+erroneous, and that the nervous system in birds has not yet been
+organically altered as a result of man's persecution; for in that case
+it would take long to undo the mischief, and we should be indeed far
+from that "better friendship" with the children of the air which many of
+us would like to see.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS.
+
+
+Under this heading I have put together several notes from my journals on
+subjects which have no connection with each other, except that they
+relate chiefly to the parental instincts of some animals I have
+observed, and to the instincts of the young at a very early period of
+life.
+
+While taking bats one day in December, I captured a female of our common
+Buenos Ayrean species (Molossus bonariensis), with her two young
+attached to her, so large that it seemed incredible she should be able
+to fly and take insects with such a weight to drag her down. The young
+were about a third less in size than the mother, so that she had to
+carry a weight greatly exceeding that of her own body. They were
+fastened to her breast and belly, one on each side, as when first born;
+and, possibly, the young bat does not change its position, or move, like
+the young developed opossum, to other parts of the body, until mature
+enough to begin an independent life. On forcibly separating them from
+their parent, I found that they were not yet able to fly, but when set
+free fluttered feebly to the ground. This bat certainly appeared more
+burdened with its young than any animal I had ever observed. I have seen
+an old female opossum (Didelphys azarae) with eleven young, large as old
+rats--the mother being less than a cat in size--all clinging to various
+parts of her body; yet able to climb swiftly and with the greatest
+agility in the higher branches of a tree. The actual weight was in this
+case relatively much greater than in that of the female bat: but then
+the opossum never quitted its hold on the tree, and it also supplemented
+its hand-like feet, furnished with crooked claws, with its teeth and
+long prehensile tail. The poor bat had to seek its living in the empty
+air, pursuing its prey with the swiftness of a swallow, and it seemed
+wonderful to me that she should have been able to carry about that great
+burden with her one pair of wings, and withal to be active enough to
+supply herself and her young with food.
+
+In the end I released her, and saw her fly away and disappear among the
+trees, after which I put back the two young bats in the place I had
+taken them from, among the thick-clustering foliage of a small acacia
+tree. When set free they began to work their way upwards through the
+leaves and slender twigs in the most adroit manner, catching a twig with
+their teeth, then embracing a whole cluster of leaves with their wings,
+just as a person would take up a quantity of loose clothes and hold them
+tight by pressing them against the chest. The body would then emerge
+above the clasped leaves, and a higher twig would be caught by the
+teeth; and so on successively, until they had got as high as they
+wished, when they proceeded to hook themselves to a twig and assume the
+inverted position side by side; after which, one drew in its head and
+went to sleep, while the other began licking the end of its wing, where
+my finger and thumb had pressed the delicate membrane. Later in the day
+I attempted to feed them with small insects, but they rejected my
+friendly attentions in the most unmistakable manner, snapping viciously
+at me every time I approached them. In the evening, I stationed myself
+close to the tree, and presently had the satisfaction of seeing the
+mother return, flying straight to the spot where I had taken her, and in
+a few moments she was away again and over the trees with her twins.
+
+Assuming that these two young bats had, before I found them, existed
+like parasites clinging to the parent, their adroit actions when
+liberated, and their angry demonstrations at my approach, were very
+astonishing; for in all other mammals born in a perfectly helpless
+state, like rodents, weasels, edentates, and even marsupials, the
+instincts of self-preservation are gradually developed after the period
+of activity begins, when the mother leads them out, and they play with
+her and Avith each other. In the bat the instincts must ripen to
+perfection without exercise or training, and while the animal exists as
+passively as a fruit on its stem.
+
+I have observed that the helpless young of some of the mammals I have
+just mentioned seem at first to have no instinctive understanding of the
+language of alarm and fear in the parent, as all young-birds have, even
+before their eyes are open. Nor is it necessary that they should have
+such an instinct, since, in most cases, they are well concealed in
+kennels or other safe places; but when, through some accident, they are
+exposed, the want of such an instinct makes the task of protecting them
+doubly hard for the parent. I once surprised a weasel (Galictis barbara)
+in the act of removing her young, or conducting them, rather; and when
+she was forced to quit them, although still keeping close by, and
+uttering the most piercing cries of anger and solicitude, the young
+continued piteously crying out in their shrill voices and moving about
+in circles, without making the slightest attempt to escape, or to
+conceal themselves, as young birds do.
+
+Some field mice breed on the surface of the ground in ill-constructed
+nests, and their young are certainly the most helpless things in nature.
+It is possible that where this dangerous habit exists, the parent has
+some admirable complex instincts to safeguard her young, in addition to
+the ordinary instincts of most animals of this kind. This idea was
+suggested to me by the action of a female mouse which I witnessed by
+chance. While walking in a field of stubble one day in autumn, near
+Buenos Ayres, I suddenly heard, issuing from near my feet, a chorus of
+shrill squealing voices--the familiar excessively sharp little needles
+of sound emitted by young, blind and naked mice, when they are disturbed
+or in pain. Looking down, I saw close to my foot a nest of them--there
+were nine in all, wriggling about and squealing; for the parent,
+frightened at my step, had just sprung from them, overturning in her
+hurry to escape the slight loosely-felted dome of fine grass and
+thistledown which had covered them. I saw her running away, but after
+going six or seven yards she stopped, and, turning partly round so as to
+watch me, waited in fear and trembling. I remained perfectly
+motionless--a sure way to allay fear and suspicion in any wild
+creature,--and in a few moments she returned, but with the utmost
+caution, frequently pausing to start and tremble, and masking her
+approach with corn stumps and little inequalities in the surface of the
+ground, until, reaching the nest, she took one of the young in her
+mouth, and ran rapidly away to a distance of eight or nine yards and
+concealed it in a tuft of dry grass.
+
+Leaving it, she returned a second time, in the same cautious manner, and
+taking another, ran with it to the same spot, and concealed it along
+with the first. It was curious that the first young mouse had continued
+squealing after being hidden by the mother, for I could hear it
+distinctly, the air being very still, but when the second mouse had been
+placed with it, the squealing ceased. A third time the old mouse came,
+and then instead of going to the same spot, as I had expected, she ran
+off in an opposite direction and disappeared among the dry weeds; a
+fourth was carried to the same place as the third; and in this way they
+were all removed to a distance of some yards from the nest, and placed
+in couples, until the last and odd one remained. In due time she came
+for it, and ran away with it in a new direction, and was soon out of
+sight; and although I waited fully ten minutes, she did not return; nor
+could I afterwards find any of the young mice when I looked for them, or
+even hear them squeal.
+
+I have frequently observed newly-born lambs on the pampas, and have
+never failed to be surprised at the extreme imbecility they display in
+their actions; although this may be due partly to inherited degeneracy
+caused by domestication. This imbecile condition continues for two,
+sometimes for three days, during which time the lamb apparently acts
+purely from instincts, which are far from perfect; but after that,
+experience and its dam teach it a better way. When born its first
+impulse is to struggle up on to its feet; its second to suck, but here
+it does not discriminate like the newly-hatched bird that picks up its
+proper food, or it does not know what to suck. It will take into its
+mouth whatever comes near, in most cases a tuft of wool on its dam's
+neck; and at this it will continue sucking for an indefinite time. It is
+highly probable that the strong-smelling secretion of the sheep's udder
+attracts the lamb at length to that part; and that without something of
+the kind to guide it, in many cases it would actually starve without
+finding the teats. I have often seen lambs many hours after birth still
+confining their attention to the most accessible locks of wool on the
+neck or fore legs of the dams, and believe that in such cases the long
+time it took them to find the source of nourishment arose from a
+defective sense of smell. Its next important instinct, which comes into
+play from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels it to follow after
+any object receding from it, and, on the other hand, to run from
+anything approaching it. If the dam turns round and approaches it from
+even a very short distance, it will start back and run from her in fear,
+and will not understand her voice when she bleats to it: at the same
+time it will confidently follow after a man, dog, horse, or any other
+animal moving from it. A very common experience on the pampas, in the
+sheep-country, is to see a lamb start up from sleep and follow the
+rider, running along close to the heels of the horse. This is
+distressing to a merciful man, tor he cannot shake the little simpleton
+off, and if he rides on, no matter how fast, it will keep up him, or
+keep him in sight, for half a mile or a mile, and never recover its dam.
+The gaucho, who is not merciful, frequently saves himself all trouble
+and delay by knocking it senseless with a blow of his whip-handle, and
+without checking his horse. I have seen a lamb, about two days old,
+start up from sleep, and immediately start off in pursuit of a puff ball
+about as big as a man's head, carried past it over the smooth turf by
+the wind, and chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until the
+dry ball was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse grass. This
+blundering instiuct is quickly laid aside when the lamb has learned to
+distinguish its dam from other objects, and its dam's voice from other
+sounds. When four or five days old it will start from sleep, but instead
+of rushing blindly away after any receding object, it first looks about
+it, and will then recognize and run to its dam.
+
+I have often been struck with the superiority of the pampa or
+creolla--the old native breed of sheep--in the greater vigour of the
+young when born over the improved European varieties. The pampa descends
+to us from the first sheep introduced into La Plata about three
+centuries ago, and is a tall, gaunt bony animal, with lean dry flesh,
+like venison, and long straight wool, like goats' hair. In their
+struggle for existence in a country subject to sudden great changes of
+temperature, to drought, and failure of grass, they have in a great
+measure lost the qualities which make the sheep valuable to man as a
+food and wool-producing animal; but on the other hand they have to some
+extent recovered the vigour of a wild animal, being hardy enough to
+exist without any shelter, and requiring from their master man only
+protection from the larger carnivores. They are keen-scented, swift of
+foot and Wonderfully active, and thrive where other breeds would quickly
+starve. I have often seen a lamb dropped on the frosty ground in
+bitterly cold windy weather in midwinter, and in less than five seconds
+struggle to its feet, and seem as vigorous as any day-old lamb of other
+breeds. The dam, impatient at the short delay, and not waiting to give
+it suck, has then started off at a brisk trot after the flock, scattered
+and galloping before the wind like huanacos rather than sheep, with the
+lamb, scarcely a minute in the world, running freely at her side.
+Notwithstanding its great vigour it has been proved that the pampa sheep
+has not so far outgrown the domestic taint as to be able to maintain its
+own existence when left entirely to itself. During the first half of
+this century, when cattle-breeding began to be profitable, and wool was
+not worth the trouble of shearing, and the gaucho workman would not eat
+mutton when beef was to be had, some of the estancieros on the southern
+pampas determined to get rid of their sheep, which were of no value to
+them; and many flocks were driven a distance out and lost in the wilds.
+Out of many thousands thus turned loose to shift for themselves, not one
+pair survived to propagate a new race of feral sheep; in a short time
+pumas, wild dogs, and other beasts of prey, had destroyed them all. The
+sterling qualities of the pampa sheep had their value in other times; at
+present the improved kinds are alone considered worth having, and the
+original sheep of the country is now rapidly disappearing, though still
+found in remote and poor districts, especially in the province of
+Cordova; and probably before long it will become extinct, together with
+the curious pug-nosed cow of the pampas.
+
+I have had frequent opportunities of observing the young, from one to
+three days old, of the Cervus campestris--the common deer of the pampas,
+and the perfection of its instincts at that tender age seem very
+wonderful in a ruminant. When the doe with, fawn is approached by a
+horseman, even when accompanied with dogs, she stands perfectly
+motionless, gazing fixedly at the enemy, the fawn motionless at her
+side; and suddenly, as if at a preconcerted signal, the fawn rushes
+directly away from her at its utmost speed; and going to a distance of
+six hundred to a thousand yards conceals itself in a hollow in the
+ground or among the long grass, lying down very close with neck
+stretched out horizontally, and will thus remain until sought by the
+dam. When very young if found in its hiding-place it will allow itself
+to be taken, making no further effort to escape. After the fawn has run
+away the doe still maintains her statuesque attitude, as if resolved to
+await the onset, and only when the dogs are close to her she also rushes
+away, but invariably in a direction as nearly opposite to that taken by
+the fawn as possible. At first she runs slowly, with a limping gait, and
+frequently pausing, as if to entice her enemies on, like a partridge,
+duck or plover when driven from its young; but as they begin to press
+her more closely her speed increases, becoming greater the further she
+succeeds in leading them from the starting-point.
+
+The alarm-cry of this deer is a peculiar whistling bark, a low but
+far-reaching sound; but when approaching a doe with young I have never
+been able to hear it, nor have I seen any movement on the part of the
+doe. Yet it is clear that in some mysterious way she inspires the fawn
+with sudden violent fear; while the fawn, on its side, instead of being
+affected like the young in other mammals, and sticking closer to its
+mother, acts in a contrary way, and runs from her.
+
+Of the birds I am acquainted with, the beautiful jacana (Parra jacana)
+appears to come into the world with its faculties and powers in the most
+advanced state. It is, in fact, ready to begin active life from the very
+moment of leaving the shell, as I once accidentally observed. I found a
+nest on a small mound of earth in a shallow lagoon, containing four
+eggs, with the shells already chipped by the birds in them. Two yards
+from the small nest mound there was a second mound covered with coarse
+grass. I got off my horse to examine the nest, and the old birds,
+excited beyond measure, fluttered round me close by pouring out their
+shrill rapidly-reiterated cries in an unbroken stream, sounding very
+much like a policeman's rattle. While I was looking closely at one of
+the eggs lying on the palm of my hand, all at once the cracked shell
+parted, and at the same moment the young bird leaped from my hand and
+fell into the water. I am quite sure that the young bird's sudden escape
+from the shell and my hand was the result of a violent effort on its
+part to free itself; and it was doubtless inspired to make the effort by
+the loud persistent screaming of the parent birds, which it heard while
+in the shell. Stooping to pick it up to save it from perishing, I soon
+saw that my assistance was not required, for immediately on dropping
+into the water, it put out its neck, and with the body nearly submerged,
+like a wounded duck trying to escape observation, it swam rapidly to the
+second small mound I have mentioned, and, escaping from the water,
+concealed itself in the grass, lying close and perfectly motionless like
+a young plover.
+
+In the case of the pampa or creolla sheep, I have shown that during its
+long, rough life in La Plata, this variety has in some measure recovered
+the natural vigour and ability to maintain existence in adverse
+circumstances of its wild ancestors. As much can be said of the creolla
+fowl of the pampas; and some observations of mine on the habits of this
+variety will perhaps serve to throw light on a vexed question of Natural
+History--namely, the cackling of the hen after laying, an instinct which
+has been described as "useless" and "disadvantageous." In fowls that
+live unconfined, and which are allowed to lay where they like, the
+instinct, as we know it, is certainly detrimental, since egg-eating dogs
+and pigs soon learn the cause of the outcry, and acquire a habit of
+rushing off to find the egg when they hear it. The question then arises:
+Does the wild jungle fowl possess the same pernicious instinct?
+
+The creolla is no doubt the descendant of the fowl originally introduced
+about three centuries ago by the first colonists in La Plata, and has
+probably not only been uncrossed with any other improved variety, such
+as are now fast taking its place, and has lived a much freer life than
+is usual with the fowl in Europe. It is a rather small, lean, extremely
+active bird, lays about a dozen eggs, and hatches them all, and is of a
+yellowish red colour--a hue which is common, I believe, in the old
+barn-door fowl of England. The creolla fowl is strong on the wing, and
+much more carnivorous and rapacious in habits than other breeds; mice,
+frogs, and small snakes are eagerly hunted and devoured by it. At my
+home on the pampas a number of these fowls were kept, and were allowed
+to range freely about the plantation, which was large, and the adjacent
+grounds, where there were thickets of giant cardoon thistle, red-weed,
+thorn apple, &c. They always nested at a distance from the house, and it
+was almost impossible ever to find their eggs, on account of the extreme
+circumspection they observed in going to and from their nests; and when
+they succeeded in escaping foxes, skunks, weasels, and opossums, which,
+strange to say, they often did, they would rear their chickens away out
+of sight and hearing of the house, and only bring them home when winter
+deprived them of their leafy covering and made food scarce. During the
+summer, in my rambles about the plantation, T would occasionally
+surprise one of these half-wild hens with her brood; her distracted
+screams and motions would then cause her chicks to scatter and vanish in
+all directions, and, until the supposed danger was past, they would lie
+as close and well-concealed as young partridges. These fowls in summer
+always lived in small parties, each party composed of one cock and as
+many hens as he could collect--usually three or four. Each family
+occupied its own feeding ground, where it would pass a greater portion
+of each day. The hen would nest at a considerable distance from the
+feeding ground, sometimes as far as four or five hundred yards away.
+After laying an egg she would quit the nest, not walking from it as
+other fowls do, but flying, the flight extending to a distance of from
+fifteen to about fifty yards; after which, still keeping silence, she
+would walk or run, until, arrived at the feeding ground, she would begin
+to cackle. At once the cock, if within hearing, would utter a responsive
+cackle, whereupon she would run to him and cackle no more. Frequently
+the cackling call-note would not be uttered more than two or three
+times, sometimes only once, and in a much lower tone than in fowls of
+other breeds.
+
+If we may assume that these fowls, in their long, semi-independent
+existence in La Plata, have reverted to the original instincts of the
+wild Gallus bankiva, we can see here how advantageous the cackling
+instinct must be in enabling the hen in dense tropical jungles to rejoin
+the flock after laying an egg. If there are egg-eating animals in the
+jungle intelligent enough to discover the meaning of such a short,
+subdued cackling call, they would still be unable to find the nest by
+going back on the bird's scent, since she flies from the nest in the
+first place; and the wild bird probably flies further than the creolla
+hen of La Plata. The clamorous cackling of our fowls would appear then
+to be nothing more than a perversion of a very useful instinct.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE MEPHITIC SKUNK.
+
+
+It might possibly give the reader some faint conception of the odious
+character of this creature (for adjectives are weak to describo it) when
+I say that, in talking to strangers from abroad, I have never thought it
+necessary to speak of sunstroke, jaguars, or the assassin's knife, but
+have never omitted to warn them of the skunk, minutely describing its
+habits and personal appearance.
+
+I knew an Englishman who, on taking a first gallop across the pampas,
+saw one, and, quickly dismounting, hurled himself bodily on to it to
+effect its capture. Poor man! he did not know that the little animal is
+never unwilling to be caught. Men have been blinded for ever by a
+discharge of the fiery liquid full in their faces. On a mucous membrane
+it burns like sulphuric acid, say the unfortunates who have had the
+experience. How does nature protect the skunk itself from the injurious
+effects of its potent fluid? I have not unfrequently found individuals
+stone-blind, sometimes moving so briskly about that the blindness must
+have been of long standing--very possibly in some cases an accidental
+drop discharged by the animal itself has caused the loss of sight. When
+coming to close quarters with a skunk, by covering up the face, one's
+clothes only are ruined. But this is not all one has to fear from an
+encounter; the worst is that effluvium, after which crushed garlic is
+lavender, which tortures the olfactory nerves, and appears to pervade
+the whole system like a pestilent ether, nauseating one until
+sea-sickness seems almost a pleasant sensation in comparison.
+
+To those who know the skunk only from reputation, my words might seem
+too strong; many, however, who have come to close quarters with the
+little animal will think them ridiculously weak. And consider what must
+the feelings be of one who has had the following experience--not an
+uncommon experience on the pampas. There is to be a dance at a
+neighbouring house a few miles away; he has been looking forward to it,
+and, dressing himself with due care, mounts his horse and sets out full
+of joyous anticipations. It is a dark windy evening, but there is a
+convenient bridle-path through the dense thicket of giant thistles, and
+striking it he puts his horse into a swinging gallop. Unhappily the path
+is already occupied by a skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, in
+obedience to the promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get out
+of it, until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kicked
+football into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as high as
+his knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider, after coming out
+into the open, dismounts and walks away twenty yards from his animal,
+and literally _smells_ himself all over, and with a feeling of profound
+relief pronounces himself Not the minutest drop of the diabolical spray
+has touched his dancing shoes! Springing into the saddle he proceeds to
+his journey's end, is warmly welcomed by his host, and speedily
+forgetting his slight misadventure, mingles with a happy crowd of
+friends. In a little while people begin exchanging whispers and
+significant glances; men are seen smiling at nothing in particular; the
+hostess wears a clouded face; the ladies cough and put their scented
+handkerchiefs to their noses, and presently they begin to feel faint and
+retire from the room. Our hero begins to notice that there is something
+wrong, and presently discovers its cause; he, unhappily, has been the
+last person in the room to remark that familiar but most abominable
+odour, rising like a deadly exhalation from the floor, conquering all
+other odours, and every moment becoming more powerful. A drop _has_
+touched his shoe after all; and fearing to be found out, and edging
+towards the door, he makes his escape, and is speedily riding home
+again; knowing full well that his sudden and early departure from the
+scene will be quickly discovered and set down to the right cause.
+
+In that not always trustworthy book _The Natural History of Chili,_
+Molina tells us how they deal with the animal in the trans-Andine
+regions. "When one appears," he says, "some of the company begiu by
+caressing it, until an opportunity offers for one of them to seize it by
+the tail. In this position the muscles become contracted, the animal is
+unable to eject its fluid, and is quickly despatched." One might just as
+well talk of caressing a cobra de capello; yet this laughable fiction
+finds believers all over South and North America. Professor Baird
+gravely introduces it into his great work on the mammalia. I was once
+talking about animals in a rancho, when a person present (an Argentine
+officer) told that, while visiting an Indian encampment, he had asked
+the savages how they contrived to kill skunks without making even a life
+in the desert intolerable. A grave old Cacique informed him that the
+secret was to go boldly up to the animal, take it by the tail, and
+despatch it; for, he said, when you fear it not at all, then it respects
+your courage and dies like a lamb--sweetly. The officer, continuing his
+story, said that on quitting the Indian camp he started a skunk, and,
+glad of an opportunity to test the truth of what he had heard,
+dismounted and proceeded to put the Indian plan in practice. Here the
+story abruptly ended, and when I eagerly demanded to hear the sequel,
+the amateur hunter of furs lit a cigarette and vacantly watched the
+ascending smoke. The Indians aro grave jokers, they seldom smile; and
+this old traditional skunk-joke, which has run the length of a
+continent, finding its way into many wise books, is their revenge on a
+superior race.
+
+I have shot a great many eagles, and occasionally a carancho (Polyborus
+tharus), with the plumage smelling strongly of skunk, which shows that
+these birds, pressed by hunger, often commit the fearful mistake of
+attacking the animal. My friend Mr. Ernest Gibson, of Buenos Ayres, in a
+communication to the _Ibis,_ describes an encounter he actually
+witnessed between a carancho and a skunk. Riding home one afternoon, he
+spied a skunk "shuffling along in the erratic manner usual to that
+odoriferous quadruped;" following it at a very short distance was an
+eagle-vulture, evidently bent on mischief. Every time the bird came near
+the bushy tail rose menacingly; then the carancho would fall behind,
+and, after a few moments' hesitation, follow on again. At length,
+growing bolder, it sprung forward, seizing the threatening tail with its
+claw, but immediately after "began staggering about with dishevelled
+plumage, tearful eyes, and a profoundly woe-begone expression on its
+vulture face. The skunk, after turning and regarding its victim with an
+I-told-you-so look for a few moments, trotted unconcernedly off."
+
+I was told in Patagonia by a man named Molinos, who was frequently
+employed by the Government as guide to expeditions in the desert, that
+everywhere throughout that country the skunk is abundant. Some years ago
+he was sent with two other men to find and treat with an Indian chief
+whose whereabouts were not known. Far in the interior Molinos was
+overtaken by a severe winter, his horses died of thirst and fatigue, and
+during the three bitterest months of the year he kept himself and his
+followers alive by eating the flesh of skunks, the only wild animal that
+never failed them. No doubt, on those vast sterile plains where the
+skunk abounds, and goes about by day and by night careless of enemies,
+the terrible nature of its defensive weapon is the first lesson
+experience teaches to every young eagle, fox, wild cat, and puma.
+
+Dogs kill skunks when made to do so, but it is not a sport they delight
+in. One moonlight night, at home, I went out to where the dogs, twelve
+in number, were sleeping: while I stood there a skunk appeared and
+deliberately came towards me, passing through the dogs where they lay,
+and one by one as he passed them they rose up, and, with their tails
+between their legs, skulked off. When made to kill skunks often they
+become seasoned; but always perform the loathsome task expeditiously,
+then rush away with frothing mouths to rub their faces in the wet clay
+and rid themselves of the fiery sensation. At one time I possessed only
+one dog that could be made to face a skunk, and as the little robbers
+were very plentiful, and continually coining about the house in their
+usual open, bold way, it was rather hard for the poor brute. This dog
+detested them quite as strongly as the others, only he was more
+obedient, faithful, and brave. Whenever I bade him attack one of them
+he would come close up to me and look up into my face with piteous
+pleading eyes, then, finding that he was not to be let off from the
+repulsive task, he would charge upon the doomed animal with a blind fury
+wonderful to see. Seizing it between his teeth, he would shake it madly,
+crushing its bones, then hurl it several feet from him, only to rush
+again and again upon it to repeat the operation, doubtless with a
+Caligula-like wish in his frantic breast that all the skunks on the
+globe had but one backbone.
+
+I was once on a visit to a sheep-farming brother, far away on the
+southern frontier of Buenos Ayres, and amongst the dogs I found there
+was one most interesting creature, He was a great, lumbering, stupid,
+good-tempered brute, so greedy that when you offered him a piece of meat
+he would swallow half your arm, and so obedient that at a word he would
+dash himself against the horns of a bull, and face death and danger in
+any shape. But, my brother told me, he would not face a skunk--he would
+die first. One day I took him out and found a skunk, and for upwards of
+half an hour I sat on my horse vainly cheering on my cowardly follower,
+and urging him to battle. The very sight of the enemy gave him a fit of
+the shivers; and when the irascible little enemy began to advance
+against us, going through the performance by means of which he generally
+puts his foes to flight without resorting to malodorous
+measures--stamping his little feet in rage, jumping up, spluttering and
+hissing and flourishing his brush like a warlike banner above his
+head--then hardly could I restrain my dog from turning tail and flying
+home in abject terror. My cruel persistence was rewarded at last.
+Continued shouts, cheers, and hand-clappings began to stir the brute to
+a kind of frenzy. Torn by conflicting emotions, he began to revolve
+about the skunk at a lumbering gallop, barking, howling, and bristling
+up his hair; and at last, shutting his eyes, and with a yell of
+desperation, he charged. I fully expected to see the enemy torn to
+pieces in a few seconds, but when the dog was still four or five feet
+from him the fatal discharge came, and he dropped down as if shot dead.
+For some time he lay on the earth perfectly motionless, watched and
+gently bedewed by the victorious skunk; then he got up and crept whining
+away. Gradually he quickened his pace, finally breaking into a frantic
+run. In vain I followed him, shouting at the top of my lungs; he stayed
+not to listen, and very speedily vanished from sight--a white speck on
+the vast level plain. At noon on the following day he made his
+appearance, gaunt and befouled with mud, staggering forward like a
+galvanized skeleton. Too worn out even to eat, he flung himself down,
+and for hours lay like a dead thing, sleeping off the effects of those
+few drops of perfume.
+
+Dogs, I concluded, like men, have their idiosyncrasies; but I had gained
+my point, and proved once more--if any proof were needed--the truth of
+that noble panegyric of Bacon's on our faithful servant and companion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS.
+
+
+There is in La Plata a large handsome grasshopper (Zoniopoda tarsata),
+the habits of which in its larva and imago stages are in strange
+contrast, like those in certain lepidoptera, in which the caterpillars
+form societies and act in concert. The adult has a greenish protective
+colouring, brown and green banded thighs, bright red hind wings, seen
+only during flight. It is solitary and excessively shy in its habits,
+living always in concealment among the dense foliage near the surface of
+the ground. The yonng are intensely black, like grasshoppers cut out of
+jet or ebony, and gregarious in habit, living in bands of forty or fifty
+to three or four hundred; and so little shy, that they may sometimes be
+taken up by handfuls before they begin to scatter in alarm. Their
+gregarious habits and blackness--of all hues in nature the most obvious
+to the sight--would alone be enough to make them the most conspicuous of
+insects; but they have still other habits which appear as if specially
+designed to bring them more prominently into notice. Thus, they all keep
+so close together at all times as to have their bodies actually
+touching, and when travelling, move so slowly that the laziest snail
+might easily overtake and pass one of their bands, and even disappear
+beyond their limited horizon in a very short time.
+
+They often select an exposed weed to feed on, clustering together on its
+summit above the surrounding verdure, an exceedingly conspicuous object
+to every eye in the neighbourhood. They also frequently change their
+feeding-ground; at such times they deliberately cross wide roads and
+other open spaces, barren of grass, where, moving so slowly that they
+scarcely seem to move at all, they look at a distance like a piece of
+black velvet lying on the ground. Thus in every imaginable way they
+expose themselves and invite attack; yet, in spite of it all, I have
+never detected birds preying on them, and I have sometimes kept one of
+these black societies under observation near my house for several days,
+watching them at intervals, in places where the trees overhead were the
+resort of Icterine and tyrant birds, Guira cuckoos, and other species,
+all great hunters after grasshoppers. A young grasshopper is, moreover,
+a morsel that seldom comes amiss to any bird, whether insect or seed
+eater; and, as a rule, it is extremely shy, nimble, and inconspicuous.
+It seems clear that, although the young Zoniopoda does not mimic in its
+form any black protected insect, it nevertheless owes its safety to its
+blackness, together with the habit it possesses of exposing itself in so
+open and bold a manner. Blackness is so common in large protected
+insects, as, for instance, in the un-palatable leaf-cutting ants,
+scorpions, mygale spiders, wasps, and other dangerous kinds, that it is
+manifestly a "warning colour," the most universal and best known in
+nature; and the grasshopper, I believe, furthermore mimics the fearless
+demeanour of the protected or venomous species, which birds and other
+insect-eaters know and respect. It might be supposed that the young
+Zoniopoda is itself unpalatable; but this is scarcely probable, for when
+the deceptive black mask is once dropped, the excessive shyness, love of
+concealment, and protective colouring of the insect show that it is much
+sought after by birds.
+
+While setting this down as an undoubted case of "mimicry," although it
+differs in some respects from all other cases I have seen reported, I
+cannot help remarking that this most useful word appears to be in some
+danger of losing the meaning originally attached to it in zoology. There
+are now very few cases of an accidental resemblance found between two
+species in nature which are not set down by someone to "mimicry," some
+in which even the wildest imagination might well fail to see any
+possible benefit to the supposed mimic. In cases where the outward
+resemblance of some feeble animal to a widely different and
+well-protected species, or to some object like a leaf or stick, and
+where such resemblance is manifestly advantageous and has reacted on and
+modified the life habits, it is conceivable that slight spontaneous
+variations in the structure and colouring of the unprotected species
+have been taken advantage of by the principle of natural selection, and
+a case of "mimicry" set up, to become more and more perfect in time, as
+successive casual variations in the same direction increased the
+resemblance.
+
+The stick-insect is perhaps the most perfect example where resemblance
+to an inanimate object has been the result aimed at, so to speak, by
+nature; the resemblance of the volucella fly to the humble-bee, on which
+it is parasitical, is the most familiar example of one species growing
+like another to its own advantage, since only by means of its deceptive
+likeness to the humble-bee is it able to penetrate into the nest with
+impunity. These two cases, with others of a similar character, were
+first called cases of "mimicry" by Kirby and Spence, in their
+ever-delightful _Introduction to Entomology--_an old book, but,
+curiously enough in these days of popular treatises on all matters of
+the kind, still the only general work on insects in the English language
+which one who is not an entomologist can read with pleasure.
+
+A second case of mimicry not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen in
+another grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa of
+Thun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and thorax
+chocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen steel-blue or
+purple, a colour I have not seen in any other insects of this family.
+The fore wings have a protective colouring; the hind wings are bright
+red. When at rest, with the red and purple tints concealed, it is only a
+very pretty grasshopper, but the instant it takes wing it becomes the
+fac-simile of a very common wasp of the genus Pepris. These wasps vary
+greatly in size, some being as large as the hornet; they are solitary,
+and feed on the honey of flowers and on fruit, and, besides being
+furnished with stings like other wasps--though their sting is nok so
+venomous as in other genera--they also, when angry, emit a most
+abominable odour, and are thus doubly protected against their enemies.
+Their excessive tameness, slow flight, and indolent motions serve to
+show that they are not accustomed to be interfered with. All these
+strong-smelling wasps have steel-blue or purple bodies, and bright red
+wings. So exactly does the Rhomalea grasshopper mimic the Pepris when
+flying, that I have been deceived scores of times. I have even seen it
+on the leaves, and, after it has flown and settled once more, I have
+gone to look at it again, to make sure that my eyes had not deceived me.
+It is curious to see how this resemblance has reacted on and modified
+the habits of the grasshopper. It is a great flyer, and far more aerial
+in its habits than any other insect I am acquainted with in this family,
+living always in trees, instead of on or near the surface of the ground.
+It is abundant in orchards and plantations round Buenos Ayres, where its
+long and peculiarly soft, breezy note may be heard all summer. If the
+ancient Athenians possessed so charming an insect as this, their great
+regard for the grasshopper was not strange: I only wish that the
+"Athenians of South America," as my fellow-townsmen sometimes call
+themselves in moments of exaltation, had a feeling of the samo kind--the
+regard which does _not_ impale its object on a pin--for the pretty
+light-hearted songster of their groves and gardens.
+
+When taken in the hand, it has the habit, common to most grasshoppers,
+of pouring out an inky fluid from its mouth; only the discharge is
+unusually copious in this species. It has another habit in defending
+itself which is very curious. When captured it instantly curls its body
+round, as a wasp does to sting. The suddenness of this action has more
+than once caused me to drop an insect I had taken, actually thinking for
+the moment that I had taken hold of a wasp. Whether birds would be
+deceived and made to drop it or not is a question it would not be easy
+to settle; but the instinct certainly looks like 'one of a series of
+small adaptations, all tending to make the resemblance to a wasp more
+complete and effective.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+DRAGON-FLY STORMS.
+
+
+One of the most curious things I have encountered in my observations on
+animal life relates to a habit of the larger species of dragon-flies
+inhabiting the Pampas and Patagonia. Dragon-flies are abundant
+throughout the country wherever there is water. There are several
+species, all more or less brilliantly coloured. The kinds that excited
+my wonder, from their habits, are twice as large as the common widely
+distributed insects, being three inches to four inches in length, and as
+a rule they are sober-coloured, although there is one species--the
+largest among them--entirely of a brilliant scarlet. This kind is,
+however, exceedingly rare. All the different kinds (of the large
+dragon-flies) when travelling associate together, and occasionally, in a
+flight composed of countless thousands, one of these brilliant-hued
+individuals will catch the eye, appearing as conspicuous among the
+others as a poppy or scarlet geranium growing alone in an otherwise
+flowerless field. The most common species--and in some cases the entire
+flight seems to be composed of this kind only--is the Aeschna
+bonariensis Raml, the prevailing colour of which is pale blue. But the
+really wonderful thing about them all alike is, that they appear only
+when flying before the southwest wind, called _pampero_--the wind that
+blows from the interior of the pampas. The pampero is a dry, cold wind,
+exceedingly violent. It bursts on the plains very suddenly, and usually
+lasts only a short time, sometimes not more than ten minutes; it comes
+irregularly, and at all seasons of the year, but is most frequent in the
+hot season, and after exceptionally sultry weather. It is in summer and
+autumn that the large dragon-flies appear; not _with_ the wind, but--and
+this is the most curious part of the matter--in advance of it; and
+inasmuch as these insects are not seen in the country at other times,
+and frequently appear in seasons of prolonged drought, when all the
+marshes and watercourses for many hundreds of miles are dry, they must
+of course traverse immense distances, flying before the wind at a speed
+of seventy or eighty miles an hour. On some occasions they appear almost
+simultaneously with the wind, going by like a flash, and instantly
+disappearing from sight. You have scarcely time to see them before the
+wind strikes you. As a rule, however, they make their appearance from
+five to fifteen minutes before the wind strikes; and when they are in
+great numbers the air, to a height of ten or twelve feet above the
+surface of the ground, is all at once seen to be full of them, rushing
+past with extraordinary velocity in a north-easterly direction. In very
+oppressive weather, and when the swiftly advancing pampero brings no
+moving mountains of mingled cloud and dust, and is consequently not
+expected, the sudden apparition of the dragon-fly is a most welcome one,
+for then an immediate burst of cold wind is confidently looked for. In
+the expressive vernacular of the gauchos the large dragon-fly is called
+_hijo del pampero_--son of the south-west wind.
+
+It is clear that these great and frequent dragonfly movements are not
+explicable on any current hypothesis regarding the annual migrations of
+birds, the occasional migrations of butterflies, or the migrations of
+some mammals, like the reindeer and buffalo of Arctic America, which,
+according to Rae and other observers, perform long journeys north and
+south at regular seasons, "from a sense of polarity." Neither this
+hypothetical sense in animals, nor "historical memory" will account for
+the dragon-fly storms, as the phenomenon of the pampas might be called,
+since the insects do not pass and repass between "breeding and
+subsistence areas," but all journey in a north-easterly direction; and
+of the countless millions flying like thistledown before the great
+pampero wind, not one solitary traveller ever returns.
+
+The cause of the flight is probably dynamical, affecting the insects
+with a sudden panic, and compelling them to rush away before the
+approaching tempest. The mystery is that they should fly from the wind
+before it reaches them, and yet travel in the same direction with it.
+When they pass over the level, treeless country, not one insect lags
+behind, or permits the wind to overtake it; but, on arriving at a wood
+or large plantation they swarm into it, as if seeking shelter from some
+swift-pursuing enemy, and on such occasions they sometimes remain
+clinging to the trees while the wind spends its force. This is
+particularly the case when the wind blows up at a late hour of the day;
+then, on the following morning, the dragon-flies are seen clustering to
+the foliage in such numbers that many trees are covered with them, a
+large tree often appearing as if hung with curtains of some brown
+glistening material, too thick to show the green leaves beneath.
+
+In Patagonia, where the phenomenon of dragon-fly storms is also known,
+an Englishman residing at the Rio Negro related to me the following
+occurrence which he witnessed there. A race meeting was being held near
+the town of El Carmen, on a high exposed piece of ground, when, shortly
+before sunset, a violent pampero wind came up, laden with dense
+dust-clouds. A few moments before the storm broke, the air all at once
+became obscured with a prodigious cloud of dragon-flies. About a hundred
+men, most of them on horseback, were congregated on the course at the
+time, and the insects, instead of rushing by in their usual way, settled
+on the people in such quantities that men and horses were quickly
+covered with clinging masses of them. My informant said--and this agrees
+with my own observation--that he was greatly impressed by the appearance
+of terror shown by the insects; they clung to him as if for dear life,
+so that he had the greatest difficulty in ridding himself of them.
+
+Weissenborn, in London's _Magazine of Natural History_ (N. S. vol. iii.)
+describes a great migration of dragon-flies which he witnessed in
+Germany in 1839, and also mentions a similar phenomenon occurring in
+1816, and extending over a large portion of Europe. But in these cases
+the movement took place at the end of May, and the insects travelled due
+south; their migrations were therefore similar to those of birds and
+butterflies, and were probably due to the same cause. I have been unable
+to find any mention of a phenomenon resembling the one with which we are
+so familiar on the pampas, and which, strangely enough, has not been
+recorded by any European naturalists who have travelled there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS.
+
+
+There cannot be a doubt that some animals possess an instinctive
+knowledge of their enemies--or, at all events, of some of their
+enemies--though I do not believe that this faculty is so common as many
+naturalists imagine. The most striking example I am acquainted with is
+seen in gnats or mosquitoes, and in the minute South American sandflies
+(Simulia), when a dragon-fly appears in a place where they are holding
+their aerial pastimes. The sudden appearance of a ghost among human
+revellers could not produce a greater panic. I have spoken in the last
+chapter of periodical storms or waves of dragon-flies in the Plata
+region, and mentioned incidentally that the appearance of these insects
+is most welcome in oppressively hot weather, since they are known to
+come just in advance of a rush of cool wind. In La Plata we also look
+for the dragon-fly, and rejoice at its coming, for another reason. We
+know that the presence of this noble insect will cause the clouds of
+stinging gnats and flies, which make life a burden, to vanish like
+smoke.
+
+When a flight of dragon-flies passes over the country many remain along
+the route, as I have said, sheltering themselves wherever trees occur;
+and, after the storm blows over, these strangers and stragglers remain
+for some days hawking for prey in the neighbourhood. It is curious to
+note that they do not show any disposition to seek for watercourses. It
+may be that they feel lost in a strange region, or that the panic they
+have suffered, in their long flight before the wind, has unsettled their
+instincts; for it is certain that they do not, like the dragon-fly in
+Mrs. Browning's poem, "return to dream upon the river." They lead
+instead a kind of vagabond existence, hanging about the plantations, and
+roaming over the surrounding plains. It is then remarked that gnats and
+sand-flies apparently cease to exist, even in places where they have
+been most abundant. They have not been devoured by the dragon-flies,
+which are perhaps very few in number; they have simply got out of the
+way, and will remain in close concealment until their enemies take their
+departure, or have all been devoured by martins, tyrant birds, and the
+big robber-flies or devil's dykes--no name is bad enough for them--of
+the family Asilidaa. During these peaceful gnatless days, if a person
+thrusts himself into the bushes or herbage in some dark sheltered place,
+he will soon begin to hear the thin familiar sounds, as of "horns of
+elf-land faintly blowing"; and presently, from the ground and the under
+surface of every leaf, the ghost-like withered little starvelings will
+appear in scores and in hundreds to settle on him, fear not having
+blunted their keen appetites.
+
+When riding over the pampas on a hot still day, with a pertinacious
+cloud of gnats or sandflies hovering just above my head and keeping me
+company for miles, I have always devoutly wished for a stray dragon-fly
+to show himself. Frequently the wish has been fulfilled, the dragon-fly,
+apparently "sagacious of his quarry from afar," sweeping straight at his
+prey, and instantly, as if by miracle, the stinging rain has ceased and
+the noxious cloud vanished from overhead, to be re-formed no more. This
+has always seemed very extraordinary to me; for in other matters gnats
+do not appear to possess even that proverbial small dose of intellect
+for which we give most insects credit. Before the advent of the
+dragon-fly it has perhaps happened that I have been vigorously striking
+at them, making it very unpleasant for them, and also killing and
+disabling many hundreds--a larger number than the most voracious
+dragon-fly could devour in the course of a whole day; and yet, after
+brushing and beating them off until my arms have ached with the
+exertion, they have continued to rush blindly on their fate, exhibiting
+not the faintest symptom of fear. I suppose that for centuries
+mosquitoes have, in this way, been brushed and beaten away with hands
+and with tails, without learning caution. It is not in their knowledge
+that there are hands and tails. A large animal is simply a field on
+which they confidently settle to feed, sounding shrill flourishes on
+their little trumpets to show how fearless they are. But the dragon-fly
+is very ancient on the earth, and if, during the Devonian epoch, when it
+existed, it preyed on some blood-sucking insect from which or Culicidae
+have come, then these stupid little insects have certainly had ample
+time in which to learn well at least one lesson.
+
+There is not in all organic nature, to my mind, any instance of wasted
+energy comparable in magnitude with the mosquito's thirst for blood, and
+the instincts and elaborate blood-pumping apparatus with which it is
+related. The amount of pollen given off by some wind-fertilized
+trees--so great in some places that it covers hundreds of square miles
+of earth and water with a film of yellow dust---strikes us as an amazing
+waste of material on the part of nature; but in these cases we readily
+see that this excessive prodigality is necessary to continue the
+species, and that a sufficient number of flowers would not be
+impregnated unless the entire trees were bathed for days in the
+fertilizing cloud, in which only one out of many millions of floating
+particles can ever hit the mark. The mosquito is able to procreate
+without ever satisfying its ravenous appetite for blood. To swell its
+grey thread-like abdomen to a coral bead is a delight to the insect, but
+not necessary to its existence, like food and water to ours; it is the
+great prize in the lottery of life, which few can ever succeed in
+drawing. In a hot summer, when one has ridden perhaps for half a day
+over a low-lying or wet district, through an atmosphere literally
+obscured with a fog of mosquitoes, this fact strikes the mind very
+forcibly, for in such places it frequently is the case that mammals do
+not exist, or are exceedingly rare. In Europe it is different. There, as
+Reaumur said, possibly one gnat in every hundred may be able to gratify
+its appetite for blood; but of the gnats in many districts in South
+America it would be nearer the mark to say that only one in a hundred
+millions can ever do so.
+
+Curtis discovered that only the female mosquito bites or sucks blood,
+the male being without tongue or mandibles; and he asks, What, then,
+does the male feed on? He conjectures that it feeds on flowers; but, had
+he visited some swampy places in hot countries, where flowers are few
+and the insects more numerous than the sands on the seashore, he would
+most probably have said that the males subsist on decaying vegetable
+matter and moisture of slime. It is, however, more important to know
+what the female subsists on. We know that she thirsts for warm mammalian
+blood, that she seeks it with avidity, and is provided with an admirable
+organ for its extraction--only, unfortunately for her, she does not get
+it, or, at all events, the few happy individuals that do get it are
+swamped in the infinite multitude of those that are doomed by nature to
+total abstinence.
+
+I should like to know whether this belief of Curtis, shared by Westwood
+and other distinguished entomologists, but originally put forward merely
+as a conjecture, has ever been tested by careful observation and
+experiment. If not, then it is strange that it should have crept into
+many important works, where it is stated not as a mere guess, but as an
+established fact. Thus, Van Beneden, in his work on parasites, while
+classing female mosquitoes with his "miserable wretches," yet says, "If
+blood fails them, they live, like the males, on the juices of flowers."
+If this be so, it is quite certain that the juices fail to satisfy them;
+and that, like Dr. Tanner, who was ravenously hungry during his forty
+days' fast, in spite of his frequent sips of water, the mosquito still
+craves for something better than a cool vegetarian diet. I cannot help
+thinking, though the idea may seem fanciful, that mosquitoes feed on
+nothing. We know that the ephemerae take no refreshment in the imago
+state, the mouth being aborted or atrophied in these short-lived
+creatures; but we also know that they belong to an exceedingly ancient
+tribe, and possibly, after the earth had ceased to produce their proper
+nourishment there came in their history a long hungry period, which did
+not kill them, but lasted until their feeding instincts became obsolete,
+the mouth lost its use, and their life in its perfect state dwindled to
+its present length.
+
+In any case, how unsatisfactory is the mosquitoes' existence, and what a
+curious position they occupy in nature! Let us suppose that, owing to
+some great change in the conditions of the earth, rapacious birds were
+no longer able to capture prey, and that, by a corresponding change in
+their organizations, they were able to subsist on the air they breathed,
+with perhaps an occasional green leaf and a sip of water, and yet
+retained the old craving for solid food, and the old predatory instincts
+and powers undiminished; they would be in the position of mosquitoes in
+the imago state. And if then fifty or a hundred individuals were to
+succeed every year in capturing something and making one hearty meal,
+these few fortunate diners would bear about the same proportion to all
+the raptors on the globe as the mosquitoes that succeed in sucking blood
+to their unsuccessful fellows. In the case of the hawks, the effect of
+the few meals on the entire rapacious family or order would certainly be
+_nil;_ and it is impossible to believe for a moment that the
+comparatively infinitesimal amount of blood sucked by mosquitoes can.
+serve to invigorate the species. The wonder is that the machinery, which
+accomplishes nothing, should continue in such perfect working order.
+
+When we consider the insect's delicate organ, so admirably fitted for
+the purpose to which it is applied, it becomes difficult to believe that
+it could have been so perfected except in a condition of things utterly
+unlike the present. There must have been a time when mosquitoes found
+their proper nourishment, and when warm mammalian blood was as necessary
+to their existence as honey is to that of the bee, or insect food to the
+dragon-fly.
+
+This applies to many blood-sucking insects besides mosquitoes, and with
+special force to the tick tribes (Ixodes), which swarm throughout
+Central and South America; for in these degraded spiders the whole body
+has been manifestly modified to fit it for a parasitical life; while the
+habits of the insect during its blind, helpless, waiting existence on
+trees, and its sudden great development when it succeeds in attaching
+itself to an animal body, also point irresistibly to the same
+conclusion. In the sunny uplands they act (writes Captain Burton) like
+the mosquitoes of the hot, humid Beiramar. "The nuisance is general; it
+seems to be in the air; every blade of grass has its colony; clusters of
+hundreds adhere to the twigs; myriads are found in the bush clumps. Lean
+and flat when growing to the leaves, the tick catches man or beast
+brushing by, fattens rapidly, and, at the end-of a week's good living,
+drops off, _plena cruoris."_ When on trees, Belt says, they
+instinctively place themselves on the extreme tips of leaves and shoots,
+with their hind legs stretching out, each foot armed with two hooks or
+claws, with which to lay hold of any animal brushing by. During this
+wretched, incom-plete existence (from which, in most cases, it is never
+destined to emerge), its greatest length is about one-fourth of an inch;
+but where it fastens itself to an animal the abdomen increases to a
+globe as big as a medium-sized Barcelona nut. Being silvery-grey or
+white in colour, it becomes, when thus distended, very conspicuous on
+any dark surface. I have frequently seen black, smooth-haired dogs with
+their coats, turned into a perfect garden of these white spider-flowers
+or mushrooms. The white globe is leathery, and nothing can injure it;
+and the poor beast cannot rub, bite, or scratch it off, as it is
+anchored to his flesh by eight sets of hooks and a triangle of teeth.
+
+The ticks inhabiting regions rich in bird and insect life, but with few
+mammals, are in the same condition as mosquitoes, as far as the supply
+of blood goes; and, like the mosquitoes, they are compelled and able to
+exist without the nourishment best suited to them. They are nature's
+miserable castaways, parasitical tribes lost in a great dry wilderness
+where no blood is; and every marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hunger
+gnawing its vitals, and every forest tick, blindly feeling with its
+grappling-irons for the beast that never brushes by, seems to tell us of
+a world peopled with gigantic forms, mammalian and reptilian, which once
+afforded abundant pasture to the parasite, and which the parasite
+perhaps assisted to overthrow.
+
+It is almost necessary to transport oneself to the vast tick-infested
+wilderness of the New World to appreciate the full significance of a
+passage in Belt's _Naturalist in Nicaragua,_ in which it is suggested
+that man's hairless condition was perhaps brought about by natural
+selection in tropical regions, where he was greatly troubled with
+parasites of this kind. It is certain that if in such a country as
+Brazil he possessed a hairy coat, affording cover to the tick and
+enabling it to get a footing on the body, his condition would be a very
+sad one. Savages abhor hairs on the body, and even pluck them off their
+faces. This seems like a survival of an ancient habit acquired when the
+whole body was clothed with hair; and if primitive man ever possessed
+such a habit, nature only followed his lead in giving him a hairless
+offspring.
+
+Is it not also probable that the small amount of mammalian life in South
+America, and the aquatic habits of nearly all the large animals in the
+warmer districts, is due to the persecutions of the tick?
+
+The only way in which a large animal can rid itself of the pest is by
+going into the water or wallowing in the mud; and this perhaps accounts
+for the more or less aquatic habits of the jaguar, aguará-guazú, the
+large Cervus paluclosus, tapir, capybara, and peccary. Monkeys, which
+are most abundant, are a notable exception; but these animals have the
+habit of attending to each other's skins, and spend a great deal of
+their time in picking off the parasites. But how do birds escape the
+ticks, since these parasites do not confine their attacks to any one
+class of aninials, but attach themselves impartially to any living thing
+coming within reach of their hooks, from snake to man? My own
+observations bearing on this point refer less to the Ixodes than to the
+minute bete-rouge, which is excessively abundant in the Plata district,
+where it is known as _bicho colorado,_ and in size and habits resembles
+the English Leptus autumnalis. It is so small that, notwithstanding its
+bright scarlet colour, it can only be discerned by bringing the eye
+close to it; and being, moreover, exceedingly active and abundant in all
+shady places in summer--making life a misery to careless human
+beings--it must be very much more dangerous to birds than the larger
+sedentary Ixodes. The bete-rouge invariably lodges beneath the wings of
+birds, where the loose scanty plumage affords easy access to the skin.
+Domestic birds suffer a great deal from its persecutions, and their
+young, if allowed to run about in shady places, die of the irritation.
+Wild birds, however, seem to be very little troubled, and most of those
+I have examined have been almost entirely free from parasites. Probably
+they are much more sensitive than the domestic birds, and able to feel
+and pick off the insects with their beaks before they have penetrated
+into the skin. I believe they are also able to protect themselves in
+another way, namely, by preventing the parasites from reaching their
+bodies at all. I was out under the trees one day with a pet oven-bird
+(Furnarius rufus), which had full liberty to range about at will, and
+noticed that at short intervals it went through the motions of picking
+something from its toes or legs, though I could see nothing on them. At
+length I approached my eyes to within a few inches of the bird's feet,
+and discovered that the large dry branch on which it stood was covered
+with a multitude of parasites, all running rapidly about like foraging
+ants, and whenever one came to the bird's feet it at once ran up the
+leg. Every time this happened, so far as I could see, the bird felt it.
+and quickly and deftly picked it off with the point of its bill. It
+seemed very astonishing that the horny covering of the toes and legs
+should be so exquisitely sensitive, for the insects are so small and
+light that they cannot be felt on the hand, even when a score of them
+are running over it; but the fact is as I have stated, and it is highly
+probable, I think, that most wild birds keep themselves free from these
+little torments in the same way.
+
+Some observations of mine on a species of Orni-thomyia--a fly
+parasitical on birds--might possibly be of use in considering the
+question of the anomalous position in nature of insects possessing the
+instincts and aptitudes of parasites, and organs manifestly modified to
+suit a parasitical mode of life, yet compelled and able to exist free,
+feeding, perhaps, on vegetable juices, or, like the ephemerae, on
+nothing at all. For it must be borne in mind that I do not assert that
+these "occasional" or "accidental" parasites, as some one calls them,
+explaining nothing, do not feed on such juices. I do not know what they
+feed on. I only know that the joyful alacrity with which gnats and
+stinging flies of all kinds abandon the leaves, supposed to afford them
+pasture, to attack a warm-blooded animal, serves to show how strong the
+impulse is, and how ineradicable the instinct, which must have had an
+origin. Perhaps the habits of the bird-fly I have mentioned will serve
+to show how, in some cases, the free life of some blood-sucking flies
+and other insects might have originated.
+
+Kirby and Spence, in their _Introduction,_ mention that one or two
+species of Ornithomyia have been observed flying about and alighting on
+men; and in one case the fly extracted blood and was caught, the species
+being thus placed beyond doubt. This circumstance led the authors to
+believe that the insect, when the bird it is parasitical on dies,
+takes to flight and migrates from body to body, occasionally tasting
+blood until, coming to the right body--to wit, that of a bird, or of a
+particular species of bird--it once more establishes itself permanently
+in the plumage. I fancy that the insect sometimes leads a freer life and
+ranges much more than the authors imagined; and I refer to Kirby and
+Spence, with apologies to those who regard the _Introduction_ as out of
+date, only because I am not aware that we have any later observations on
+the subject.
+
+There is in La Plata a small very common Dendrocolaptine bird--Anumbius
+acuticaudatus--much infested by an Ornithomyia, a pretty, pale insect,
+half the size of a house-fly, and elegantly striped with green. It is a
+very large parasite for so small a bird, yet so cunning and alert is it,
+and so swiftly is it able to swim through the plumage, that the bird is
+unable to rid itself of so undesirable a companion. The bird lives with
+its mate all the year round, much of the time with its grown-up young,
+in its nest--a large structure, in which so much building-material is
+used that the bird is called in the vernacular Leñatero, or
+Firewood-gatherer. On warm bright days without wind, during the absence
+of the birds, I have frequently seen a company of from half a dozen to a
+dozen or fifteen of the parasitical fly wheeling about in the air above
+the nest, hovering and gambolling together, just like house-flies in a
+room in summer; but always on the appearance of the birds, returning
+from their feeding-ground, they would instantly drop down and disappear
+into the nest. How curious this instinct seems! The fly regards the
+bird, which affords it the warmth and food essential to life, as its
+only deadly enemy; and with an inherited wisdom, like that of the
+mosquito with regard to the dragon-fly, or of the horse-fly with regard
+to the Monedula wasp, vanishes like smoke from its presence, and only
+approaches the bird secretly from a place of concealment.
+
+The parasitical habit tends inevitably to degrade the species acquiring
+it, dulling its senses and faculties, especially those of sight and
+locomotion; but the Ornithomyia seems an exception, its dependent life
+having had a contrary effect; the extreme sensitiveness, keenness of
+sight, and quickness of the bird having reacted on the insect, giving it
+a subtlety in its habits and motions almost without a parallel even
+among free insects. A man with a blood-sucking flat-bodied flying
+squirrel, concealing itself among his clothing and gliding and dodging
+all over his body with so much artifice and rapidity as to defeat all
+efforts made to capturo it or knock it off, would be a case parallel to
+that of the bird-fly on the small bird. It might be supposed that the
+Firewood-gatherer, like some ants that keep domestic pets, makes a pet
+of the fly; for it is a very pretty insect, barred with green, and with
+rainbow reflections on its wings--and birds are believed by some
+theorists to possess aesthetic tastes; but the discomfort of having such
+a vampire on the body would, I imagine, be too great to allow a kindly
+instinct of that nature to grow up. Moreover, I have on several
+occasions seen the bird making frantic efforts to capture one of the
+flies, which had incautiously flown up from the nest at the wrong
+moment. Bird and fly seem to know each other wonderfully well.
+
+Here, then, we have a parasitical insect specialized in the highest
+degree, yet retaining all its pristine faculties unimpaired, its love of
+liberty, and of associating in numbers together for sportive exercises,
+and well able to take care of itself during its free intervals. And
+probably when thrown on the world, as when nests are blown down, or the
+birds get killed, or change their quarters, as they often do, it is able
+to exist for some time without avian blood. Let us then imagine some of
+these orphaned colonies, unable to find birds, but through a slight
+change in habits or organization able to exist in the imago state
+without sucking blood until they laid their eggs; and succeeding
+generations, still better able to stand the altered conditions of life
+until they become practically independent (like gnats), multiplying
+greatly, and disporting themselves in clouds over forests, yet still
+retaining the old hunger for blood and the power to draw it, and ready
+at any moment to return to the ancestral habit. It might be said that if
+such a result were possible it would have occurred, but that we find no
+insect like the Ornithomyia existing independently. With the bird-fly it
+has not occurred, as far as we know; but in the past history of some
+independent parasites it is possible that something similar to the
+imaginary case I have sketched may have taken place. The bush-tick is a
+more highly specialized, certainly a more degraded, creature than the
+bird-fly, and the very fact of its existence seems to show that it is
+possible for even the lowest of the fallen race of parasites to start
+afresh in life under new conditions, and to reascend in the scale of
+being, although still bearing about it the marks of former degeneracy.
+
+The connection between the flea and the mammal it feeds on is even less
+close than that which exists between the Ornithomyia and bird. The fact
+that fleas are so common and universal--for in all lands we have them,
+like the poor, always with us; and that they are found on all mammals,
+from the king of beasts to the small modest mouse--seems to show a great
+amount of variability and adaptiveness, as well as a very high
+antiquity. It has often been reported that fleas have been found hopping
+on the ground in desert places, where they could not have been dropped
+by man or beast; and it has been assumed that these "independent" fleas
+must, like gnats and ticks, subsist on vegetable juices. There is no
+doubt that they are able to exist and propagate for one or two years
+after being deprived of their proper aliment; houses shut up for a year
+or longer are sometimes found infested with them; possibly in the
+absence of "vegetable juices" they flourish on dust. I have never
+detected them hopping on the ground in uninhabited places, although I
+once found them in Patagonia, in a hamlet which had been attacked and
+depopulated by the Indians about twenty months before my visit. On
+entering one of the deserted huts I found the floor literally swarming
+with fleas, and in less than ten seconds my legs, to the height of my
+knees, were almost black with their numbers. This proves that they are
+able toincrease greatly for a period without blood; but I doubt that
+they can go on existing and increasing for an indefinite time; perhaps
+their true position, with regard to the parasitical habit, is midway
+between that of the strict parasite which never leaves the body, and
+that of independent parasites like the Culex and the Ixodes, and all
+those which are able to exist free for ever, and are parasitical only
+when the opportunity offers.
+
+Entomologists regard the flea as a degraded fly. Certainly it is very
+much more degraded than the bird-borne Ornithomyia, with its subtle
+motions and instinct, its power of flight and social pastimes. The poor
+pulex has lost every trace of wings; nevertheless, in its fallen
+condition it has developed some remarkable qualities and saltatory
+powers, which give it a lower kind of glory; and, compared with another
+parasite with which it shares the human species, it is almost a noble
+insect. Darwin has some remarks about the smallness of the brain of an
+ant, assuming that this insect possesses a very high intelligence, but I
+doubt very much that the ant, which moves in a groove, is mentally the
+superior of the unsocial flea. The last is certainly the most teachable;
+and if fleas were generally domesticated and made pets of, probably
+there would be as many stories about their marvellous intelligence and
+fidelity to man as we now hear about our over-praised "friend" the dog.
+
+With regard to size, the flea probably started on its downward course as
+a comparatively large insect, probably larger than the Ornithomyia. That
+insect has been able to maintain its existence, without dwindling like
+the Leptus into a mere speck, through the great modification in organs
+and instinct, which adapt it so beautifully to the feathery element in
+which it moves. The bush-tick, wingless from the beginning, and
+diverging in another direction, has probably been greatly increased in
+size by its parasitical habit; this seems proven by the fact, that as
+long as it is parasitical on nothing it remains small, but when able to
+fasten itself to an animal it rapidly developes to a great size. Again,
+the big globe of its abdomen is coriaceous and elastic, and is probably
+as devoid of sensation as a ball of india-rubber. The insect, being made
+fast by hooks and teeth to its victim, all efforts to remove it only
+increase the pain it causes; and animals that know it well do not
+attempt to rub, scratch, or bite it off, therefore the great size and
+the conspicuous colour of the tick are positive advantages to it. The
+flea, without the subtlety and highly-specialized organs of the
+Ornithomyia, or the stick-fast powers and leathery body of the Ixodes,
+can only escape its vigilant enemies by making itself invisible; hence
+every variation, i.e. increase in jumping-power and diminished bulk,
+tending towards this result, has been taken advantage of by natural
+selection.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS.
+
+
+Two humble-bees, Bombus thoracicus and B. violaceus, are found on the
+pampas; the first, with a primrose yellow thorax, and the extremity of
+the abdomen bright rufous, slightly resembles the English B. terrestris;
+the rarer species, which is a trifle smaller than the first, is of a
+uniform intense black, the body having the appearance of velvet, the
+wings being of a deep violaceous blue.
+
+A census of the humble-bees in any garden or field always shows that the
+yellow bees outnumber the black in the proportion of about seven to one;
+and I have also found their nests for many years in the same proportion;
+about seven nests of the yellow to one nest of the black species. In
+habits they are almost identical, and when two species so closely allied
+are found inhabiting the same locality, it is only reasonable to infer
+that one possesses some advantage over the other, and that the least
+favoured species will eventually disappear. In this case, where one so
+greatly outnumbers the other, it might be thought that the rarer species
+is dying out, or that, on the contrary, it is a new-comer destined to
+supplant the older more numerous species. Yet, during the twenty years I
+have observed them, there has occurred no change in their relative
+positions; though both have greatly increased in numbers during that
+time, owing to the spread of cultivation. And yet it would scarcely be
+too much to expect some marked change in a period so long as that, even
+through the slow-working agency of natural selection; for it is not as
+if there had been an exact balance of power between them. In the same
+period of time I have seen several species, once common, almost or quite
+disappear, while others, very low down as to numbers, have been exalted
+to the first rank. In insect life especially, these changes have been
+numerous, rapid, and widespread.
+
+In the district where, as a boy, I chased and caught tinamous, and also
+chased ostriches, but failed to catch them, the continued presence of
+our two humble-bees, sucking the same flowers and making their nests in
+the same situations, has remained a puzzle to my mind.
+
+The site of the nest is usually a slight depression in the soil in the
+shelter of a cardoon bush. The bees deepen the hollow by burrowing in
+the earth; and when the spring foliage sheltering it withers up, they
+construct a dome-shaped covering of small sticks, thorns, and leaves
+bitten into extremely minute pieces. They sometimes take possession of a
+small hole or cavity in the ground, and save themselves the labour of
+excavation.
+
+Their architecture closely resembles that of B. terrestris. They make
+rudely-shaped oval honey-cells, varying from half an inch to an inch and
+a half in length, the smaller ones being the first made; later in the
+season the old cocoons are utilized for storing honey. The wax is
+chocolate-coloured, and almost the only difference I can find in the
+economy of the two species is that the black bee uses a large quantity
+of wax in plastering the interior of its nest. The egg-cell of the
+yellow bee always contains from twelve to sixteen eggs; that of the
+black bee from ten to fourteen; and the eggs of this species are the
+largest though the bee is smallest. At the entrance on the edge of the
+mound one bee is usually stationed, and, when approached, it hums a
+shrill challenge, and throws itself into a menacing attitude. The sting
+is exceedingly painful.
+
+One summer I was so fortunate as to discover two nests of the two kinds
+within twelve yards of each other, and I resolved to watch them very
+carefully, in order to see whether the two species ever came into
+collision, as sometimes happens with ants of different species living
+close together. Several times I saw a yellow bee leave its own nest and
+hover round or settle on the neighbouring one, upon which the sentinel
+black bee would attack and drive it off. One day, while watching, I was
+delighted to see a yellow bee actually enter its neighbour's nest, the
+sentinel being off duty. In about five minutes' time it came out again
+and flew away unmolested. I concluded from this that humble-bees, like
+their relations of the hive, occasionally plunder each other's sweets.
+On another occasion I found a black bee dead at the entrance of the
+yellow bees' nest; doubtless this individual had been caught in the act
+of stealing honey, and, after it had been stung to death, it had been
+dragged out and left there as a warning to others with like felonious
+intentions.
+
+There is one striking difference between the two species. The yellow bee
+is inodorous; the black bee, when angry and attacking, emits an
+exceedingly powerful odour: curiously enough, this smell is identical in
+character with that made when angry by all the wasps of the South
+American genus Pepris--dark blue wasps with red wings. This odour at
+first produces a stinging sensation on the nerve of smell, but when
+inhaled in large measure becomes very nauseating. On one occasion, while
+I was opening a nest, several of the bees buzzing round my head and
+thrusting their stings through the veil I wore for protection, gave out
+so pungent a smell that I found it unendurable, and was compelled to
+retreat.
+
+It seems strange that a species armed with a venomous sting and
+possessing the fierce courage of the humble-bee should also have this
+repulsive odour for a protection. It is, in fact, as incongruous as it
+would be were our soldiers provided with guns and swords first, and
+after with phials of assafoatida to be uncorked in the face of an enemy.
+
+Why, or how, animals came to be possessed of the power of emitting
+pestiferous odours is a mystery; we only see that natural selection has,
+in some mstances, chiefly among insects, taken advantage of it to
+furnish some of the weaker, more unprotected species with a means of
+escape from their enemies. The most stinking example I know is that of a
+large hairy caterpillar I have found on dry wood in Patagonia, and
+which, when touched, emits an intensely nauseous effluvium. Happily it
+is very volatile, but while it lasts it is even more detestable than
+that of the skunk.
+
+The skunk itself offers perhaps the one instance amongst the higher
+vertebrates of an animal in which all the original instincts of
+self-preservation have died out, giving place to this lower kind of
+protection. All the other members of the family it belongs to are
+cunning, swift of foot, and, when overtaken, fierce-tempered and well
+able to defend themselves with their powerful well-armed jaws.
+
+For some occult reason they are provided with a gland charged with a
+malodorous secretion; and out of this mysterious liquor Nature has
+elaborated the skunk's inglorious weapon. The skunk alone when attacked
+makes no attempt to escape or to defend itself by biting; but, thrown by
+its agitation into a violent convulsion, involuntarily discharges its
+foetid liquor into the face of an opponent. When this animal had once
+ceased to use so good a weapon as its teeth in defending itself,
+degenerating at the same time into a slow-moving creature, without fear
+and without cunning, the strength and vileness of its odour would be
+continually increased by the cumulative process of natural selection:
+and how effective the protection has become is shown by the abundance of
+the species throughout the whole American continent. It is lucky for
+mankind--especially for naturalists and sportsmen--that other species
+have not been improved in the same direction.
+
+But what can we say of the common deer of the pampas (Cervus
+campestris), the male of which gives out an effluvium quite as
+far-reaching although not so abominable in character as that of the
+Mephitis? It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human nostril when the
+perfumer of the wilderness is not even in sight. Yet it is not a
+protection; on the contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling
+white plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a direct disadvantage,
+informing all enemies for leagues around of its whereabouts. It is not,
+therefore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer are never very
+abundant; the only wonder is that, like the ancient horse of America,
+they have not become extinct.
+
+The gauchos of the pampas, however, give _a reason_ for the powerful
+smell of the male deer; and, after some hesitation, I have determined to
+set it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, as he thinks
+proper. I neither believe nor disbelieve it; for although I do not put
+great faith in gaucho natural history, my own observations have not
+infrequently confirmed statements of theirs, which a sceptical person
+would have regarded as wild indeed. To give one instance: I heard a
+gaucho relate that while out riding he had been pursued for a
+considerable distance by a large spider; his hearers laughed at him for
+a romancer; but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, both when on
+foot and on horseback, by a large wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I
+did not join in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of C. campestris
+is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just as pyrethrum powder is to most
+insects, and even go so far as to describe its effect as fatal to them;
+according to this, the smell is therefore a protection to the deer. In
+places where venomous snakes are extremely abundant, as in the Sierra
+district on the southern pampas of Buenos Ayres, the gaucho frequently
+ties a strip of the male deer's skin, which retains its powerful odour
+for an indefinite time, round the neck of a valuable horse as a
+protection. It is certain that domestic animals are frequently lost here
+through snake-bites. The most common poisonous species--the
+Craspedo-cephalus alternatus, called _Vivora de la Cruz_ in the
+vernacular--has neither bright colour nor warning rattle to keep off
+heavy hoofs, and is moreover of so sluggish a temperament that it will
+allow itself to be trodden on before stirring, with the result that its
+fangs are not infrequently struck into the nose or foot of browsing
+beast. Considering, then, the conditions in which C. campestris is
+placed--and it might also be supposed that venomous snakes have in past
+times been much more numerous than they are now--it is not impossible to
+believe that the powerful smell it emits has been made protective,
+especially when we see in other species how repulsive odours have been
+turned to account by the principle of natural selection.
+
+After all, perhaps the wild naturalist of the pampas knows what he is
+about when he ties a strip of deer-skin to the neck of his steed and
+turns him loose to graze among the snakes.
+
+The gaucho also affirms that the deer cherishes a wonderful animosity
+against snakes; that it becomes greatly excited when it sees one, and
+proceeds at once to destroy it; _they say,_ by running round and round
+it in a circle, emitting its violent smell in larger measure, until the
+snake dies of suffocation. It is hard to believe that the effect can be
+so great; but that the deer is a snake hater and killer is certainly
+true: in North America, Ceylon, and other districts deer have been
+observed excitedly leaping on serpents, and killing them with their
+sharp cutting hoofs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+A NOBLE WASP.
+
+_(Monedula punctata.)_
+
+
+Naturalists, like kings and emperors, have their favourites, and as my
+zoological sympathies, which are wider than my knowledge, embrace all
+classes of beings, there are of course several insects for which I have
+a special regard; a few in each of the principal orders. My chief
+favourite among the hymenopteras is the one representative of the
+curious genus Monedula known in La Plata. It is handsome and has
+original habits, but it is specially interesting to me for another
+reason: I can remember the time when it was extremely rare on the
+pampas, so rare that in boyhood the sight of one used to be a great
+event to me; and I have watched its rapid increase year by year till it
+has come to be one of our commonest species. Its singular habits and
+intelligence give it a still better claim to notice. It is a big, showy,
+loud-buzzing insect, with pink head and legs, wings with brown
+reflections, and body encircled with alternate bands of black and pale
+gold, and has a preference for large composite flowers, on the honey of
+which it feeds. Its young is, however, an insect-eater; but the Monedula
+does not, like other burrowing or sand wasps, put away a store of
+insects or spiders, partially paralyzed, as a provision for the grub
+till it reaches the pupa state; it actually supplies the grub with
+fresh-caught insects as long as food is required, killing the prey it
+captures outright, and bringing it in to its young; so that its habits,
+in this particular, are more bird- than wasp-like.
+
+The wasp lays its solitary egg at the extremity of a hole it excavates
+for itself on a bare hard piece of ground, and many holes are usually
+found close together. When the grub--for I have never been able to find
+more than one in a hole--has come out from the egg, the parent begins to
+bring in insects, carefully filling up the mouth of the hole with loose
+earth after every visit. Without this precaution, which entails a vast
+amount of labour, I do not believe one grub out of every fifty would
+survive, so overrun are these barren spots of ground used as
+breeding-places with hunting spiders, ants, and tiger-beetles. The grub
+is a voracious eater, but the diligent mother brings in as much as it
+can devour. I have often found as many as six or seven insects,
+apparently fresh killed, and not yet touched by the pampered little
+glutton, coiled up in the midst of them waiting for an appetite.
+
+The Monedula is an adroit fly-catcher, for though it kills numbers of
+fire-flies and other insects, flies are always preferred, possibly
+because they are so little encumbered with wings, and are also more
+easily devoured. It occasionally captures insects on the wing, but the
+more usual method is to pounce down on its prey when it is at rest. At
+one time, before I had learnt their habits, I used frequently to be
+startled by two or three or more of these wasps rushing towards my face,
+and continuing hovering before it, loudly buzzing, attending me in my
+walks about the fields. The reason of this curious proceeding is that
+the Monedula preys largely on stinging flies, having learnt from
+experience that the stinging fly will generally neglect its own safety
+when it has once fastened on a good spot to draw blood from. When a man
+or horse stands perfectly motionless the wasps take no notice, but the
+moment any movement is made of hand, tail, or stamping hoof, they rush
+to the rescue, expecting to find a stinging fly. On the other hand, the
+horse has learnt to know and value this fly-scourge, and will stand very
+quietly with half a dozen loud Avasps hovering in an alarming manner
+close to his head, well knowing that every fly that settles on him will
+be instantly snatched away, and that the boisterous Monedula is a better
+protection even than the tail--which, by the way, the horse wears very
+long in Buenos Ayres.
+
+I have, in conclusion, to relate an incident I onco witnessed, and which
+does not show the Monedula in a very amiable light. I was leaning over a
+gate watching one of these wasps feeding on a sunflower. A small
+leaf-cutting bee was hurrying about with its shrill busy hum in the
+vicinity, and in due time came to the sunflower and settled on it. The
+Monedula became irritated, possibly at the shrill voice and bustling
+manner of its neighbour, and, after watching it for a few moments on the
+flower, deliberately rushed at and drove it off. The leaf-cutter quickly
+returned, however--for bees are always extremely averse to leaving a
+flower unexplored--but was again driven away with threats and
+demonstrations on the part of the Monedula. The little thing went off
+and sunned itself on a leaf for a time, then returned to the flower,
+only to be instantly ejected again. Other attempts were made, but the
+big wasp now kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, and
+would not allow it to come within several inches of the flower without
+throwing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee retired to
+sun itself once more, apparently determined to wait for the big tyrant
+to go away; but the other seemed to know what was wanted, and spitefully
+made up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter then gave up the
+contest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it hovered, hawk-like, above
+the Monedula for a moment, then pounced down on its back, and clung
+there, furiously biting, until its animosity was thoroughly appeased;
+then it flew off, leaving the other master of the field certainly, but
+greatly discomposed, and perhaps seriously injured about the base of the
+wings. I was rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for a
+leaf-cutting bee can use its teeth as deftly as a tailor can his shears.
+
+Doubtless to bees, as to men, revenge is sweeter than honey. But, in the
+face of mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale of
+organization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything so
+intelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "which
+implies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the person
+(or bee) offended?" According to Bain _(Mental and Moral Science)_ only
+the highest animals--stags and bulls he mentions-can be credited with
+the developed form of anger, which, he describes as an excitement caused
+by pain, reaching the centres of activity, and containing an impulse
+knowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if man
+only is meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel of
+gunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the breast of
+nearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high according to Bain,
+though I myself should place him nearly on a level mentally with the
+majority of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable of
+a wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag can
+manifestly have no associations, personal or political, for the bull,
+shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another instance of
+misdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar as that of the bull
+and red rag, is used as an illustration by one of the prophets: "My
+heritage is unto me as a speckled bird; the birds round, about are
+against it." I have frequently seen the birds of a thicket gather round
+some singularly marked accidental visitor, and finally drive him with
+great anger from the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in a
+little here, since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured or
+marked, might be looked on as a bird of prey.
+
+The flesh-fly laying its eggs on the carrion-flower is only a striking
+instance of the mistakes all instincts are liable to, never more
+markedly than in the inherited tendency to fits of frenzied excitement:
+the feeling is frequently excited by the wrong object, and explodes at
+inopportune moments.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+NATURE'S NIGHT LIGHTS.
+
+_(Remarks about Fireflies and other matters.)_
+
+
+It was formerly supposed that the light of the firefly (in any family
+possessing the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks of
+other insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirby
+and Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all the
+attention it would receive from modern entomologists: just at present
+any observer who lived in the pre-Darwin days is regarded as one of the
+ancients. The reasons given for the notion or theory in the celebrated
+_Introduction to Entomology_ were not conclusive; nevertheless it was
+not an improbable supposition of the authors'; while the theory which
+has taken its place in recent zoological writings seems in every way
+even less satisfactory.
+
+Let us first examine the antiquated theory, as it must now be called. By
+bringing a raptorial insect and a firefly together, we find that the
+flashing light of the latter does actually scare away the former, and is
+therefore, for the moment, a protection as effectual as the camp-fire
+the traveller lights in a district abounding with beasts of prey.
+Notwithstanding this fact, and assuming that we have here the whole
+reason of the existence of the light-emitting power, a study of the
+firefly's habits compels us to believe that the insect would be just as
+well off without the power as with it. Probably it experiences some
+pleasure in emitting flashes of light during its evening pastimes, but
+this could scarcely be considered an advantage in its struggle for
+existence, and it certainly does not account for the possession of the
+faculty.
+
+About the habits of Pyrophorus, the large tropical firefly which has the
+seat of its luminosity on the upper surface of the thorax, nothing
+definite appears to be known; but it has been said that this instinct is
+altogether nocturnal. The Pyrophorus is only found in the sub-tropical
+portion of the Argentine country, and I have never met with it. With the
+widely-separated Cratomorphus, and the tortoise-shaped Aspisoma, which
+emit the light from the abdomen, I am familiar; one species of
+Cratomorphus--a long slender insect with yellow wing-cases marked with
+two parallel black lines--is "the firefly" known to every one and
+excessively abundant in the southern countries of La Plata. This insect
+is strictly diurnal in its habits--as much so, in fact, as diurnal
+butterflies. They are seen flying about, wooing their mates, and feeding
+on composite and umbelliferous flowers at all hours of the day, and are
+as active as wasps during the full glare of noon. Birds do not feed on
+them, owing to the disagreeable odour, resembling that of phosphorus,
+they emit, and probably because they are to be uneatable; but their
+insect enemies are not so squeamish, and devour them readily, just as
+they also do the blister-fly, which one would imagine a morsel fitted to
+disagree with any stomach. One of their enemies is the Monedula wasp;
+another, a fly, of the rapacious Asilidas family; and this fly is also a
+wasp in appearance, having a purple body and bright red wings, like a
+Pepris, and this mimetic resemblance doubtless serves it as a protection
+against birds. A majority of raptorial insects are, however, nocturnal,
+and from all these enemies that go about under cover of night, the
+firefly, as Kirby and Spence rightly conjectured, protects itself, or
+rather is involuntarily protected, by means of its frequent flashing
+light. We are thus forced to the conclusion that, while the common house
+fly and many other diurnal insects spend a considerable portion of the
+daylight in purely sportive exercises, the firefly, possessing in its
+light a protection from nocturnal enemies, puts off its pastimes until
+the evening; then, when its carnival of two or three hours' duration is
+over, retires also to rest, putting out its candle, and so exposing
+itself to the dangers which surround other diurnal species during the
+hours of darkness. I have spoken of the firefly's pastimes advisedly,
+for I have really never been able to detect it doing anything in the
+evening beyond flitting aimlessly about, like house flies in a room,
+hovering and revolving in company by the hour, apparently for amusement.
+Thus, the more closely we look at the facts, the more unsatisfactory
+does the explanation seem. That the firefly should have become possessed
+of so elaborate a machinery, producing incidentally such splendid
+results, merely as a protection against one set of enemies for a portion
+only of the period during which they are active, is altogether
+incredible.
+
+The current theory, which we owe to Belt, is a prettier one. Certain
+insects (also certain Batrachians, reptiles, &c.) are unpalatable to the
+rapacious kinds; it is therefore a direct advantage to these unpalatable
+species to be distinguishable from all the persecuted, and the more
+conspicuous and well-known they are, the less likely are they to be
+mistaken by birds, insectivorous mammals, &c., for eatable kinds and
+caught or injured. Hence we find that many such species have acquired
+for their protection very brilliant or strongly-contrasted
+colours--warning colours--which insect-eaters come to know.
+
+The firefly, a soft-bodied, slow-flying insect, is easily caught and
+injured, but it is not fit for food, and, therefore, says the theory,
+lest it should be injured or killed by mistake, it has a fiery spark to
+warn enemies---birds, bats, and rapacious insects--that it is uneatable.
+
+The theory of warning colours is an excellent one, but it has been
+pushed too far. We have seen that one of the most common fireflies is
+diurnal in habits, or, at any rate, that it performs all the important
+business of its life by day, when it has neither bright colour nor light
+to warn its bird enemies; and out of every hundred species of
+insect-eating birds at least ninety-nine are diurnal. Raptorial insects,
+as I have said, feed freely on fireflies, so that the supposed warning
+is not for them, and it would be hard to believe that the magnificent
+display made by luminous insects is useful only in preventing accidental
+injuries to them from a few crepuscular bats and goatsuckers. And to
+believe even this we should first have to assume that bats and
+goatsuckers are differently constituted from all other creatures; for in
+other animals--insects, birds, and mammalians--the appearance of fire by
+night seems to confuse and frighten, but it certainly cannot be said to
+_warn,_ in the sense in which that word is used when we speak of the
+brilliant colours of some butterflies, or even of the gestures of some
+venomous snakes, and of the sounds they emit.
+
+Thus we can see that, while the old theory of Kirby and Spence had some
+facts to support it, the one now in vogue is purely fanciful. Until some
+better suggestion is made, it would perhaps be as well to consider the
+luminous organ as having "no very close and direct relation to present
+habits of life." About their present habits, however, especially their
+crepuscular habits, there is yet much to learn. One thing I have
+observed in them has always seemed very strange to me. Occasionally an
+individual insect is seen shining with a very large and steady light, or
+with a light which very gradually decreases and increases in power, and
+at such times it is less active than at others, remaining for long
+intervals motionless on the leaves, or moving with a very slow flight.
+In South America a firefly displaying this abnormal splendour is said to
+be dying, and it is easy to imagine how such a notion originated. The
+belief is, however, erroneous, for sometimes, on very rare occasions,
+all the insects in one place are simultaneously affected in the same
+way, and at such times they mass themselves together in myriads, as if
+for migration, or for some other great purpose. Mr. Bigg-Wither, in
+South Brazil, and D'Albertis, in New Guinea, noticed these firefly
+gatherings; I also once had the rare good fortune to witness a
+phenomenon of the kind on a very grand scale. Riding on the pampas one
+dark evening an hour after sunset, and passing from high ground
+overgrown with giant thistles to a low plain covered with long grass,
+bordering a stream of water, I found it all ablaze with myriads of
+fireflies. I noticed that all the insects gave out an exceptionally
+large, brilliant light, which shone almost steadily. The long grass was
+thickly studded with them, while they literally swarmed in the air, all
+moving up the valley with a singularly slow and languid flight. When I
+galloped down into this river of phosphorescent fire, my horse plunged
+and snorted with alarm. I succeeded at length in quieting him, and then
+rode slowly through, compelled to keep my mouth and eyes closed, so
+thickly did the insects rain on to my face. The air was laden with the
+sickening phosphorous smell they emit, but when I had once got free of
+the broad fiery zone, stretching away on either hand for miles along the
+moist valley, I stood still and gazed back for some time on a scene the
+most wonderful and enchanting I have ever witnessed.
+
+The fascinating and confusing effect which the appearance of fire at
+night has on animals is a most interesting subject; and although it is
+not probable that anything very fresh remains to be said about it, I am
+tempted to add here the results of my own experience.
+
+When travelling by night, I have frequently been struck with the
+behaviour of my horse at the sight of natural fire, or appearance of
+fire, always so different from that caused by the sight of fire
+artificially created. The steady gleam from the open window or door of a
+distant house, or even the unsteady wind-tossed flame of some lonely
+camp-fire, has only served to rouse a fresh spirit in him and the desire
+to reach it; whereas those infrequent displays of fire which nature
+exhibits, such as lightning, or the ignis fatuus, or even a cloud of
+fireflies, has always produced a disquieting effect. Experience has
+evidently taught the domestic horse to distinguish a light kindled by
+man from all others; and, knowing its character, he is just as well able
+as his rider to go towards it without experiencing that confusion of
+mind caused by a glare in the darkness, the origin and nature of which
+is a mystery. The artificially-lighted fire is to the horse only the
+possible goal of the journey, and is associated with the thought of rest
+and food. Wild animals, as a rule, at any rate in thinly-settled
+districts, do not know the meaning of any fire; it only excites
+curiosity and fear in them; and they are most disturbed at the sight of
+fires made by man, which are brighter and steadier than most natural
+fires. We can understand this sensation in animals, since we ourselves
+experience a similar one (although in a less degree and not associated
+with fear) in the effect which mere brightness has on us, both by day
+and night.
+
+On riding across the monotonous grey Patagonian uplands, where often for
+hours one sees not the faintest tinge of bright colour, the intense
+glowing crimson of a cactus-fruit, or the broad shining white bosom of
+the Patagonian eagle-buzzard (Buteo erythronotus), perched on the summit
+of a distant bush, has had a strangely fascinating effect on me, so that
+I have been unable to take my eyes off it as long as it continued before
+me. Or in passing through extensive desolate marshes, the dazzling white
+plumage of a stationary egret has exercised the same attraction. At
+night we experience the sensation in a greater degree, when the silver
+sheen of the moon makes a broad path on the water; or when a meteor
+leaves a glowing track across the sky; while a still more familiar
+instance is seen in the powerful attraction on the sight of glowing
+embers in a darkened room. The mere brightness, or vividness of the
+contrast, fascinates the mind; but the effect on man is comparatively
+weak, owing to his fiery education and to his familiarity with brilliant
+dyes artificially obtained from nature. How strong this attraction of
+mere brightness, even where there is no mystery about it, is to wild
+animals is shown by birds of prey almost invariably singling out white
+or bright-plumaged birds for attack where bright and sober-coloured
+kinds are mingled together. By night the attraction is immeasurably
+greater than by day, and the light of a fire steadily gazed at quickly
+confuses the mind. The fires which, travellers make for their protection
+actually serve to attract the beasts of prey, but the confusion and fear
+caused by the bright glare makes it safe for the traveller to lie down
+and sleep in the light. Mammals do not lose their heads altogether,
+because they are walking on firm ground where muscular exertion and an
+exercise of judgment are necessary at every step; whereas birds floating
+buoyantly and with little effort through the air are quickly bewildered.
+Incredible numbers of migratory birds kill them-selves by dashing
+against the windows of lighthouses; on bright moonlight nights the
+voyagers are comparatively safe; but during dark cloudy weather the
+slaughter is very great; over six hundred birds were killed by striking
+a lighthouse in Central America in a single night. On insects the effect
+is the same as on the higher animals: on the ground they are attracted
+by the light, but keep, like wolves and tigers, at a safe distance from
+it; when rushing through the air and unable to keep their eyes from it
+they fly into it, or else revolve about it, until, coming too close,
+their wings are singed.
+
+I find that when I am on horseback, going at a swinging gallop, a bright
+light affects me far more powerfully than when I am trudging along on
+foot. A person mounted on a bicycle and speeding over a level plain on a
+dark night, with nothing to guide him except the idea of the direction
+in his mind, would be to some extent in the position of the migratory
+bird. An exceptionally brilliant ignis fatuus flying before him would
+affect him as the gleam of a lamp placed high above the surface affects
+the migrants: he would not be able to keep his eyes from it, but would
+quickly lose the sense of direction, and probably end his career much as
+the bird does, by breaking his machine and perhaps his bones against
+some unseen obstruction in the way.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS.
+
+
+Some time ago, while turning over a quantity of rubbish in a little-used
+room, I disturbed a large black spider. Rushing forth, just in time to
+save itself from destruction through the capsizing of a pile of books,
+it paused for one moment, took a swift comprehensive glance at the
+position, then scuttled away across the floor, and was lost in an
+obscure corner of the room. This incident served to remind me of a fact
+I was nearly forgetting, that England is not a spiderless country. A
+foreigner, however intelligent, coming from warmer regions, might very
+easily make that mistake. In Buenos Ayres, the land of my nativity,
+earth teems with these interesting little creatures. They abound in and
+on the water, they swarm in the grass and herbage, which everywhere
+glistens with the silvery veil they spin over it. Indeed it is scarcely
+an exaggeration to say that there is an atmosphere of spiders, for they
+are always floating about invisible in the air; their filmy threads are
+unfelt when they fly against you; and often enough you are not even
+aware of the little arrested aeronaut hurrying over your face with feet
+lighter than the lightest thistledown.
+
+It is somewhat strange that although, where other tribes of living
+creatures are concerned, I am something of a naturalist, spiders I have
+always observed and admired in a non-scientific spirit, and this must be
+my excuse for mentioning the habits of some spiders without giving their
+specific names--an omission always vexing to the severely-technical
+naturalist. They have ministered to the love of the beautiful, the
+grotesque, and the marvellous in me; but I have never _collected_ a
+spider, and if I wished to preserve one should not know how to do it. I
+have been "familiar with the face" of these monsters so long that I have
+even learnt to love them; and I believe that if Emerson rightly predicts
+that spiders are amongst the things to be expelled from earth by the
+perfected man of the future, then a great charm and element of interest
+will be lost to nature. Though loving them, I cannot, of course, feel
+the same degree of affection towards all the members of so various a
+family. The fairy gossamer, scarce seen, a creature of wind and
+sunshine; the gem-like Epeira in the centre of its Starry web; even the
+terrestrial Salticus, with its puma-like strategy, certainly appeal more
+to our aesthetic feelings than does the slow heavy Mygale, looking at a
+distance of twenty yards away, as he approaches you, like a gigantic
+cockroach mounted on stilts. The rash fury with which the female
+wolf-spider defends her young is very admirable; but the admiration she
+excites is mingled with other feelings when we remember that the brave
+mother proves to her consort a cruel and cannibal spouse.
+
+Possibly my affection for spiders is due in a great measure to the
+compassion I have always felt for them. Pity, 'tis said, is akin to
+love; and who can help experiencing that tender emotion that considers
+the heavy affliction nature has laid on the spiders in compensation for
+the paltry drop of venom with which she, unasked, endowed them! And
+here, of course, I am alluding to the wasps. These insects, with a
+refinement of cruelty, prefer not to kill their victims outright, but
+merely maim them, then house them in cells where the grubs can vivisect
+them at leisure. This is one of those revolting facts the fastidious
+soul cannot escape from in warm climates; for in and out of open windows
+and doors, all day long, all the summer through, comes the busy
+beautiful mason-wasp. A long body, wonderfully slim at the waist, bright
+yellow legs and thorax, and a dark crimson abdomen,--what object can be
+prettier to look at? But in her life this wasp is not beautiful. At
+home in summer they were the pests of my life, for nothing would serve
+to keep them out. One day, while we were seated at dinner, a clay nest,
+which a wasp had succeeded in completing unobserved, detached itself
+from the ceiling and fell with a crash on to the table, where it was
+shattered to pieces, scattering a shower of green half-living spiders
+round it. I shall never forget the feeling of intense repugnance I
+experienced at the sight, coupled with detestation of the pretty but
+cruel little architect. There is, amongst our wasps, even a more
+accomplished spider-scourge than the mason-wasp, and I will here give a
+brief account of its habits. On the grassy pampas, dry bare spots of
+soil are resorted to by a class of spiders that either make or take
+little holes in the ground to reside in, and from which they rush forth
+to seize their prey. They also frequently sit inside their dens and
+patiently wait there for the intrusion of some bungling insect. Now, in
+summer, to a dry spot of ground like this, comes a small wasp, scarcely
+longer than a blue-bottle fly, body and wings of a deep shining purplish
+blue colour, with only a white mark like a collar on the thorax. It
+flirts its blue wings, hurrying about here and there, and is extremely
+active, and of a slender graceful figure--the type of an assassin. It
+visits and explores every crack and hole in the ground, and, if you
+watch it attentively, you will at length see it, on arriving at a hole,
+give a little start backwards. It knows that a spider lies concealed
+within. Presently, having apparently matured a plan of attack, it
+disappears into the hole and remains there for some time. Then, just
+when you are beginning to think that the little blue explorer has been
+trapped, out it rushes, flying in terror, apparently, from the spider
+who issues close behind in hot pursuit; but, before they are three
+inches away from the hole, quick as lightning the wasp turns on its
+follower, and the two become locked together in a deadly embrace.
+Looking like one insect, they spin rapidly round for a few moments, then
+up springs the wasp--victorious. The wretched victim is not dead; its
+legs move a little, but its soft body is paralyzed, and lies collapsed,
+flabby, and powerless as a stranded jellyfish. And this is the
+invariable result of every such conflict. In other classes of beings,
+even the weakest hunted thing occasionally succeeds in inflicting pain
+on its persecutor, and the small trembling mouse, unable to save itself,
+can sometimes make the cat shriek with paiu; but there is no weak spot
+in the wasp's armour, no fatal error of judgment, not even an accident,
+ever to save the wretched victim from its fate. And now comes the most
+iniquitous part of the proceeding. When the wasp has sufficiently rested
+after the struggle, it deliberately drags the disabled spider back into
+its own hole, and, having packed it away at the extremity, lays an egg
+alongside of it, then, coming out again, gathers dust and rubbish with
+which it fills up and obliterates the hole; and, having thus concluded
+its Machiavellian task, it flies cheerfully off in quest of another
+victim.
+
+The extensive Epeira family supply the mason-wasps and other
+spider-killers with the majority of their victims. These spiders have
+soft, plump, succulent bodies like pats of butter; they inhabit trees
+and bushes chiefly, where their geometric webs-betray their whereabouts;
+they are timid, comparatively innocuous, and reluctant to quit the
+shelter of their green bower, made of a rolled-up leaf; so that there
+are many reasons why they should be persecuted. They exhibit a great
+variety of curious forms; many are also very richly coloured; but even
+their brightest hues--orange, silver, scarlet--have not been given
+without regard to the colouring of their surroundings. Green-leafed
+bushes arc frequented by vividly green Epeiras, but the imitative
+resemblance does not quite end here. The green spider's method of
+escape, when the bush is roughly shaken, is to drop itself down on the
+earth, where it lies simulating death. In falling, it drops just as a
+green leaf would drop, that is, not quite so rapidly as a round, solid
+body like a beetle or spider. Now in the bushes there is another Epeira,
+in size and form like the last, but differing in colour; for instead of
+a vivid green, it is of a faded yellowish white--the exact hue of a
+dead, dried-up leaf. This spider, when it lets itself drop--for it has
+the same protective habit as the other--falls not so rapidly as a green
+freshly broken off leaf or as the green spider would fall, but with a
+slower motion, precisely like a leaf withered up till it has become
+almost light as a feather. It is not difficult to imagine how this comes
+about: either a thicker line, or a greater stiffness or tenacity of the
+viscid fluid composing the web and attached to the point the spider
+drops from, causes one to fall slower than the other. But how many
+tentative variations in the stiffness of the web material must there
+have been before the precise degree was attained enabling the two
+distinct species, differing in colour, to complete their resemblance to
+falling leaves--a fresh green leaf in one case and a dead, withered leaf
+in the other!
+
+The Tetragnatha--a genus of the Epeira family, and known also in
+England--are small spiders found on the margin of streams. Their bodies
+are slender, oblong, and resembling a canoe in shape; and when they sit
+lengthwise on a stem or blade of grass, their long, hair-like legs
+arranged straight before and behind them, it is difficult to detect
+them, so closely do they resemble a discoloured stripe on the herbage. A
+species of Tetragnatha with a curious modification of structure abounds
+on the pampas. The long leg of this spider is no thicker than a bristle
+from a pig's back, but at the extremity it is flattened and broad,
+giving it a striking resemblance to an oar. These spiders are only found
+in herbage overhanging the borders of streams: they are very numerous,
+and, having a pugnacious temper, are incessantly quarrelling; and it
+frequently happens that in these encounters, or where they are pursuing
+each other through the leaves, they drop into the water below. I
+believe, in fact, that they often drop themselves purposely into it as
+the readiest means of escape when hard pressed. When this happens, the
+advantage of the modified structure of the legs is seen. The fallen
+spider, sitting boat-like on the surface, throws out its long legs, and,
+dipping the broad ends into the water, literally rows itself rapidly to
+land.
+
+The gossamer-spider, most spiritual of living things, of which there are
+numerous species, some extremely beautiful in colouring and markings, is
+the most numerous of our spiders. Only when the declining sun flings a
+broad track of shiny silver light on the plain does one get some faint
+conception of the unnumbered millions of these buoyant little creatures
+busy weaving their gauzy veil over the earth and floating unseen, like
+an ethereal vital dust, in the atmosphere.
+
+This spider carries within its diminutive abdomen a secret which will
+possibly serve to vex subtle intellects for a long time to come; for it
+is hard to believe that merely by mechanical force, even aided by
+currents of air, a creature half as big as a barley grain can
+instantaneously snoot out filaments twenty or thirty inches long, and by
+means of which it floats itself in the air.
+
+Naturalists are now giving a great deal of attention to the migrations
+of birds in different parts of the world: might not insect and spider
+migrations be included with advantage to science in their observations?
+The common notion is that the gossamer makes use of its unique method of
+locomotion, only to shift its quarters, impelled by want of food or
+unfavourable conditions--perhaps only by a roving disposition. I believe
+that besides these incessant flittings about from place to place
+throughout the summer the gossamer-spiders have great periodical
+migrations which are, as a rule, in-visible, since a single floating web
+cannot be remarked, and each individual rises and floats away by itself
+from its own locality when influenced by the instinct. When great
+numbers of spiders rise up simultaneously over a large area, then,
+sometimes, the movement forces itself on our attention; for at such
+times the whole sky may be filled with visible masses of floating web.
+All the great movements of gossamers I have observed have occurred in
+the autumn, or, at any rate, several weeks after the summer solstice;
+and, like the migrations of birds at the same season of the year, have
+been in a northerly direction. I do not assert or believe that the
+migratory instinct in the gossamer is universal. In a moist island, like
+England, for instance, where the condition of the atmosphere is seldom
+favourable, and where the little voyagers would often be blown by
+adverse winds to perish far out at sea, it is difficult to believe that
+such migrations take place. But where they inhabit a vast area of land,
+as in South America, extending without interruption from the equator to
+the cold Magellanic regions, and where there is a long autumn of dry,
+hot weather, then such an instinct as migration might have been
+developed. For this is not a faculty merely of a few birds: the impulse
+to migrate at certain seasons affects birds, insects, and even mammals.
+In a few birds only is it highly developed, but the elementary feeling,
+out of which the wonderful habit of the swallow has grown, exists widely
+throughout animated nature. On the continent of Europe it also seems
+probable that a great autumnal movement of these spiders takes place;
+although, I must confess, I have no grounds for this statement, except
+that the floating gossamer is called in Germany "Der fliegender
+Summer"--the flying or departing summer.
+
+I have stated that all migrations of gossamers I have witnessed have
+been in the autumn; excepting in one instance, these flights occurred
+when the weather was still hot and dry. The exceptionally late migration
+was on March 22--a full month after the departure of martins,
+humming-birds, flycatchers, and most other true bird-migrants. It struck
+me as being so remarkable, and seems to lend so much force to the idea I
+have suggested, that I wish to give here an exact copy of the entries
+made at the time and on the spot in my notebook.
+
+"March 22. This afternoon, while I was out shooting, the
+gossamer-spiders presented an appearance quite new to me. Walking along
+a stream (the Conchitas, near Buenos Ayres), I noticed a broad white
+line skirting the low wet ground. This I found was caused by gossamer
+web lying in such quantities over the earth as almost to hide the grass
+ad thistles under it. The white zone was about twenty yards wide, and
+outside it only a few scattered webs were visible on the grass; its
+exact length I did not ascertain, but followed it for about two miles
+without finding the end. The spiders were so numerous that they
+continually baulked one another in their efforts to rise in the air. As
+soon as one threw out its lines they would become entangled with those
+of another spider, lanced out at the same moment; both spiders would
+immediately seem to know the cause of the trouble, for as soon as their
+lines fouled they would rush angrily towards each other, each trying to
+drive the other from the elevation. Notwithstanding these difficulties,
+numbers were continually floating off on the breeze which blew from the
+south.
+
+"I noticed three distinct species: one with a round scarlet body;
+another, velvet black, with large square cephalothorax and small pointed
+abdomen; the third and most abundant kind were of different shades of
+olive green, and varied greatly in size, the largest being fully a
+quarter of an inch in length. Apparently these spiders had been driven
+up from the low ground along the stream where it was wet, and had
+congregated along the borders of the dry ground in readiness to migrate.
+
+"25th. Went again to visit the spiders, scarcely expecting to find them,
+as, since first seeing them, we have had much wind and rain. To my
+surprise I found them in greatly increased numbers: on the tops of
+cardoons, posts, and other elevated situations they were literally lying
+together in heaps. Most of them were large and of the olive-coloured
+species; their size had probably prevented them from getting away
+earlier, but they were now floating off in great numbers, the weather
+being calm and tolerably dry. To-day I noticed a new species with a grey
+body, elegantly striped with black, and pink legs--a very pretty spider.
+
+"26th. Went again to-day and found that the whole vast army of
+gossamers, with the exception of a few stragglers sitting on posts and
+dry stalks, had vanished. They had taken advantage of the short spell of
+fine weather we are now having, after an unusually wet and boisterous
+autumn, to make their escape."
+
+Here it seemed to me that a conjunction of circumstances--first, the
+unfavourable season preventing migration at the proper time, and
+secondly, the strip of valley out of which the spiders had been driven
+to the higher ground till they were massed together--only served to make
+visible and evident that a vast annual migration takes place which we
+have only to look closely for to discover.
+
+One of the most original spiders in Buenos Ayres--mentally original, I
+mean--is a species of Pholcus; a quiet, inoffensive creature found in
+houses, and so abundant that they literally swarm where they are not
+frequently swept away from ceilings and obscure corners. Certainly it
+seems a poor spider after the dynamical and migratory gossamer; but it
+happens, curiously enough, that a study of the habits of this dusty
+domestic creature leads us incidentally into the realms of fable and
+romance. It is remarkable for the extreme length of its legs, and
+resembles in colour and general appearance a crane fly, but is double
+the size of that insect. It has a singular method of protecting itself:
+when attacked or approached even, gathering its feet together and
+fastening them to the centre of its web, it swings itself round and
+round with the velocity of a whirligig, so that it appears like a mist
+on the web, offering no point for an enemy to strike at. "When a fly is
+captured the spider approaches it cautiously and spins a web round it,
+continually narrowing the circle it describes, until the victim is
+inclosed in a cocoon-like covering. This is a common method with
+spiders; but the intelligence--for I can call it by no other word--of
+the Pholcus has supplemented this instinctive procedure with a very
+curious and unique habit. The Pholcus, in spite of its size, is a weak
+creature, possessing little venom to despatch its prey with, so that it
+makes a long and laborious task of killing a fly. A fly when caught in
+a web is a noisy creature, and it thus happens that when the
+Daddylonglegs--as Anglo-Argentines have dubbed this species--succeeds in
+snaring a captive the shrill outrageous cries of the victim are heard
+for a long time--often for ten or twelve minutes. This noise greatly
+excites other spiders in the vicinity, and presently they are seen
+quitting their webs and flurrying to the scene of conflict. Sometimes
+the captor is driven off, and then the strongest or most daring spider
+carries away the fly. But where a large colony are allowed to continue
+for a long time in undisturbed possession of a ceiling, when one has
+caught a fly he proceeds rapidly to throw a covering of web over it,
+then, cutting it away, drops it down and lets it hang suspended by a
+line at a distance of two or three feet from the ceiling. The other
+spiders arrive on the scene, and after a short investigation retreat to
+their own webs, and when the coast is clear our spider proceeds to draw
+up the captive fly, which is by this time exhausted with its struggles."
+
+Now, I have repeatedly remarked that all spiders, when the shrill
+humming of an insect caught in a web is heard near them, become
+agitated, like the Pholcus, and will, in the same way, quit their own
+webs and hurry to the point the sound proceeds from. This fact convinced
+me many years ago that spiders are attracted by the sound of musical
+instruments, such as violins, concertinas, guitars, &c., simply because
+the sound produces the same effect on them as the shrill buzzing of a
+captive fly. I have frequently seen spiders come down walls or from
+ceilings, attracted by the sound of a guitar, softly played; and by
+gently touching metal strings, stretched on a piece of wood, I have
+succeeded in attracting spiders on to the strings, within two or three
+inches of my fingers; and I always noticed that the spiders seemed to be
+eagerly searching for something which they evidently expected to find
+there, moving about in an excited manner and looking very hungry and
+fierce. I have no doubt that Pelisson's historical spider in the
+Bastille came down in a mood and with a manner just as ferocious when
+the prisoner called it with musical sounds to be fed.
+
+The spiders I have spoken of up till now are timid, inoffensive
+creatures, chiefly of the Epeira family; but there are many others
+exceedingly high-spirited and, like some of the most touchy
+hymenopteras, always prepared to "greatly quarrel" over matters of
+little moment. The Mygales, of which we have several species, are not to
+be treated with contempt. One is extremely abundant on the pampas, the
+Mygale fusca, a veritable monster, covered with dark brown hair, and
+called in the vernacular _aranea peluda_--hairy spider. In the hot
+month of December these spiders take to roaming about on the open plain,
+and are then everywhere seen travelling in a straight line with a slow
+even pace. They are very great in attitudes, and when one is approached
+it immediately throws itself back, like a pugilist preparing for an
+encounter, and stands up so erect on its four hind feet that the under
+surface of its body is displayed. Humble-bees are commonly supposed to
+carry the palm in attitudinizing; and it is wonderful to see the
+grotesque motions of these irascible insects when their nest is
+approached, elevating their abdomens and two or three legs at a time, so
+that they resemble a troupe of acrobats balancing themselves on their
+heads or hands, and kicking their legs about in the air. And to impress
+the intruder with the dangerous significance of this display they hum a
+shrill warning or challenge, and stab at the air with their naked
+stings, from which limpid drops of venom are seen to exude. These
+threatening gestures probably have an effect. In the case of the hairy
+spider, I do not think any creature, however stupid, could mistake its
+meaning when it stands suddenly up, a figure horribly grotesque; then,
+dropping down on all eights, charges violently forwards. Their long,
+shiny black, sickle-shaped falces are dangerous weapons. I knew a native
+woman who had been bitten on the leg, and who, after fourteen years,
+still suffered at intervals acute pains in the limb.
+
+The king of the spiders on the pampas is, however, not a Mygale, but a
+Lycosa of extraordinary size, light grey in colour, with a black ring
+round its middle. It is active and swift, and irritable to such a degree
+that one can scarcely help thinking that in this species nature has
+overshot her mark.
+
+When a person passes near one--say, within three or four yards of its
+lurking-place--it starts up and gives chase, and will often follow for a
+distance of thirty or forty yards. I came once very nearly being bitten
+by one of these savage creatures Riding at an easy trot over the dry
+grass, I suddenly observed a spider pursuing me, leaping swiftly along
+and keeping up with my beast. I aimed a blow with my whip, and the point
+of the lash struck the ground close to it, when it instantly leaped upon
+and ran up the lash, and was actually within three or four inches of my
+hand when I flung the whip from me.
+
+The gauchos have a very quaint ballad which tells that the city of
+Cordova was once invaded by an army of monstrous spiders, and that the
+townspeople went out with beating drums and flags flying to repel the
+invasion, and that after firing several volleys they were forced to turn
+and fly for their lives. I have no doubt that a sudden great increase of
+the man-chasing spiders, in a year exceptionally favourable to them,
+suggested this fable to some rhyming satirist of the town.
+
+In conclusion of this part of my subject, I will describe a single
+combat of a very terrible nature I once witnessed between two little
+spiders belong-ing to the same species. One had a small web against a
+wall, and of this web the other coveted possession. After vainly trying
+by a series of strategic movements to drive out the lawful owner, it
+rushed on to the web, and the two envenomed httle duellists closed in
+mortal combat. They did nothing so vulgar and natural as to make use of
+their falces, and never once actually touched each other, but the fight
+was none the less deadly. Rapidly revolving about, or leaping over, or
+passing under, each other, each endeavoured to impede or entangle his
+adversary, and the dexterity with which each avoided the cunningly
+thrown snare, trying at the same time to entangle its opponent, was
+wonderful to see. At length, after this equal battle had raged for some
+time, one of the combatants made some fatal mistake, and for a moment
+there occurred a break in his motions; instantly the other perceived his
+advantage, and began leaping backwards and forwards across his
+struggling adversary with such rapidity as to confuse the sight,
+producing the appearance of two spiders attacking a third one lying
+between them. He then changed his tactics, and began revolving round and
+round his prisoner, and very soon the poor vanquished wretch--the
+aggressor, let us hope, in the interests of justice--was closely wrapped
+in a silvery cocoon, which, unlike the cocoon the caterpillar weaves for
+itself, was also its winding-sheet.
+
+In the foregoing pages I have thrown together some of the most salient
+facts I have noted; but the spider-world still remains to me a
+wonderland of which I know comparatively nothing. Nor is any very
+intimate knowledge of spiders to be got from books, though numberless
+lists of new species are constantly being printed; for they have not yet
+had, like the social bees and ants, many loving and patient chroniclers
+of their ways. The Hubens and Lubbocks have been many; the Moggridges
+few. But even a very slight study of these most versatile and
+accomplished of nature's children gives rise to some interesting
+reflections. One fact that strikes the mind very forcibly is the
+world-wide distribution of groups of species possessing highly developed
+instincts. One is the zebra-striped Salticus, with its unique
+strategy--that is to say, unique amongst spiders. It is said that the
+Australian savage approaches a kangaroo in the open by getting up in
+sight of its prey and standing perfectly motionless till he is regarded
+as an inanimate object, and every time the animal's attention wanders
+advancing a step or two until sufficiently near to hurl his spear. The
+Salticus approaches a fly in the same manner, till near enough to make
+its spring. Another is the Trapdoor spider. Another the Dolomedes, that
+runs over the surface of the water in pursuit of its prey, and dives
+down to escape from its enemies; and, strangest of all, the Argyroneta,
+that has its luminous dwelling at the bottom of streams; and just as a
+mason carries bricks and mortar to its building, so does this spider
+carry down bubbles of air from the surface to enlarge its mysterious
+house, in which it lays its eggs and rears its young. Community of
+descent must be supposed of species having such curious and complex
+instincts; but how came these feeble creatures, unable to transport
+themselves over seas and continents like the aerial gossamer, to be so
+widely distributed, and inhabiting regions with such different
+conditions? This can only be attributed to the enormous antiquity of the
+species, and of this antiquity the earliness in which the instinct
+manifests itself in the young spiders is taken as evidence.
+
+A more important matter, the intelligence of spiders, has not yet
+received the attention it deserves. The question of insect
+intelligence--naturalists are agreed that insects do possess
+intelligence--is an extremely difficult one; probably some of our
+conclusions on this matter will have to be reconsidered. For instance,
+we regard the Order Hymenoptera as the most intelligent because most of
+the social insects are included in it; but it has not yet been proved,
+probably never will be proved, that the social instincts resulted from
+intelligence which has "lapsed." Whether ants and bees were more
+intelligent than other insects during the early stages of their organic
+societies or not, it will hardly be disputed by any naturalist who has
+observed insects for long that many solitary species display more
+intelligence in their actions than those that live in communities.
+
+The nature of the spider's food and the difficulties in the way of
+providing for their wants impose on them a life of solitude: hunger,
+perpetual watchfulness, and the sense of danger have given them a
+character of mixed ferocity and timidity. But these very conditions,
+which have made it impossible for them to form societies like some
+insects and progress to a state of things resembling civilization in
+men, have served to develop the mind that is in a spider, making of him
+a very clever barbarian-The spider's only weapon of defence---his
+falces--are as poor a protection against the assaults of his insect foes
+as are teeth and finger-nails in man employed against wolves, bears, and
+tigers. And the spider is here even worse off than man, since his
+enemies are winged and able to sweep down instantly on him from above;
+they are also protected with an invulnerable shield, and are armedwith
+deadly stings. Like man, also, the spider has a soft, unprotected body,
+while his muscular strength, compared with that of the insects he has to
+contend with, is almost _nil._ His position in nature then, with
+relation to his enemies, is like that of man; only the spider has this
+disadvantage, that he cannot combine with others for protection. That he
+does protect himself and maintains his place in nature is due, not to
+special instincts, which are utterly insufficient, but to the
+intelligence which supplements them. At the same time this superior
+cunning is closely related with, and probably results indirectly from,
+the web he is provided with, and which is almost of the nature of an
+artificial aid. Let us take the imaginary case of a man-like monkey, or
+of an arboreal man, born with a cord of great length attached to his
+waist, which could be either dragged after him or carried in a coil.
+After many accidents, experience would eventually teach him to put it to
+some use; practice would make him more and more skilful in handling it,
+and, indirectly, it would be the means of developing his latent mental
+faculties. He would begin by using it, as the monkey does its prehensile
+tail, to swing himself from branch to branch, and finally, to escape
+from an enemy or in pursuit of his prey, he would be able by means of
+his cord to drop himself with safety from the tallest trees, or fly down
+the steepest precipices. He would coil up his cord to make a bed to lie
+on, and also use it for binding branches together when building himself
+a refuge. In a close fight, he would endeavour to entangle an adversary,
+and at last he would learn to make a snare with it to capture his prey.
+To all these, and to a hundred other uses, the spider has put his web.
+And when we see him spread his beautiful geometric snare, held by lines
+fixed to widely separated points, while he sits concealed in his
+web-lined retreat amongst the leaves where every touch on the
+far-reaching structure is telegraphed to him by the communicating line
+faithfully as if a nerve had been touched, we must admire the wonderful
+perfection to which he has attained in the use of his cord. By these
+means he is able to conquer creatures too swift and strong for him, and
+make them his prey. When we see him repairing damages, weighting his
+light fabric in windy weather with pebbles or sticks, as a fisher
+weights his net, and cutting loose a captive whose great strength
+threatens the destruction of the web, then we begin to suspect that he
+has, above his special instinct, a reason that guides, modifies, and in
+many ways supplements it. It is not, however, only on these great
+occasions, when the end is sought by unusual means, that spiders show
+their intelligence; for even these things might be considered by some as
+merely parts of one great complex instinct; but at all times, in all
+things, the observer who watches them closely cannot fail to be
+convinced that they possess a guiding principle which is not mere
+instinct. What the stick or stone was to primitive man, when he had made
+the discovery that by holding it in his hand he greatly increased the
+force of his blow, the possession of a web has been to the spider in
+developing that spark of intellect which it possesses in common with all
+animal organisms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT.
+
+
+Most people are familiar with the phenomenon of "death-feigning,"
+commonly seen in coleopterous insects, and in many spiders. This highly
+curious instinct is also possessed by some vertebrates. In insects it is
+probably due to temporary paralysis occasioned by sudden concussion, for
+when beetles alight abruptly, though voluntarily, they assume that
+appearance of death, which lasts for a few moments. Some species,
+indeed, are so highly sensitive that the slightest touch, or even a
+sudden menace, will instantly throw them into this motionless,
+death-simulating condition. Curiously enough, the same causes which
+produce this trance in slow-moving species, like those of Scarabseus for
+example, have a precisely contrary effect on species endowed with great
+activity. Rapacious beetles, when disturbed, scuttle quickly out of
+sight, and some water-beetles spin about the surface, in circles or
+zigzag lines, so rapidly as to confuse the eye. Our common long-legged
+spiders (Pholcus) when approached draw their feet together in the middle
+of the web, and spin the body round with such velocity as to resemble a
+whirligig.
+
+Certain mammals and birds also possess the death-simulating instinct,
+though it is hardly possible to believe that the action springs from the
+same immediate cause in vertebrates and in insects. In the latter it
+appears to be a purely physical instinct, the direct result of an
+extraneous cause, and resembling the motions of a plant. In mammals and
+birds it is evident that violent emotion, and not the rough handling
+experienced, is the final cause of the swoon.
+
+Passing over venomous snakes, skunks, and a few other species in which
+the presence of danger excites only anger, fear has a powerful, and in
+some cases a disabling, effect on animals; and it is this paralyzing
+effect of fear on which the death-feigning instinct, found only in a few
+widely-separated species, has probably been built up by the slow
+cumulative process of natural selection.
+
+I have met with some curious instances of the paralyzing effect of fear.
+I was told by some hunters in an outlying district of the pampas of its
+effect on a jaguar they started, and which took refuge in a dense clump
+of dry reeds. Though they could see it, it was impossible to throw the
+lasso over its head, and, after vainly trying to dislodge it, they at
+length set fire to the reeds. Still it refused to stir, but lay with
+head erect, fiercely glaring at them through the flames. Finally it
+disappeared from sight in the black smoke; and when the fire had burnt
+itself out, it was found, dead and charred, in the same spot.
+
+On the pampas the gauchos frequently take the black-necked swan by
+frightening it. When the birds are feeding or resting on the grass, two
+or three men or boys on horseback go quietly to leeward of the flock,
+and when opposite to it suddenly wheel and charge it at full speed,
+uttering loud shouts, by which the birds are thrown into such terror
+that they are incapable of flying, and are quickly despatched.
+
+I have also seen gaucho boys catch the Silver-bill (Lichenops
+perspicillata) by hurling a stick or stone at the bird, then rushing at
+it, when it sits perfectly still, disabled by fear, and allows itself to
+be taken. I myself once succeeded in taking a small bird of another
+species in the same way.
+
+Amongst mammals our common fox (Canis azarae), and one of the opossums
+(Didelphys azarae), are strangely subject to the death-simulating swoon.
+For it does indeed seem strange that animals so powerful, fierce, and
+able to inflict such terrible injury with their teeth should also
+possess this safeguard, apparently more suited to weak inactive
+creatures that cannot resist or escape from an enemy and to animals very
+low down in the scale of being. When a fox is caught in a trap or run
+down by dogs he fights savagely at first, but by-and-by relaxes his
+efforts, drops on the ground, and apparently yields up the ghost. The
+deception is so well carried out, that dogs are constantly taken in by
+it, and no one, not previously acquainted with this clever trickery of
+nature, but would at once pronounce the creature dead, and worthy of
+some praise for having perished in so brave a spirit. Now, when in this
+condition of feigning death, I am quite sure that the animal does not
+altogether lose consciousness. It is exceedingly difficult to discover
+any evidence of life in the opossum; but when one withdraws a little way
+from the feigning fox, and watches him very attentively, a slight
+opening of the eye may be detected; and, finally, when left to himself,
+he does not recover and start up like an animal that has been stunned,
+but slowly and cautiously raises his head first, and only gets up when
+his foes are at a safe distance. Yet I have seen gauchos, who are very
+cruel to animals, practise the most barbarous experiments on a captive
+fox without being able to rouse it into exhibiting any sign of life.
+This has greatly puzzled me, since, if death-feigning is simply a
+cunning habit, the animal could not suffer itself to be mutilated
+without wincing. I can only believe that the fox, though not insensible,
+as its behaviour on being left to itself appears to prove, yet has its
+body thrown by extreme terror into that benumbed condition which
+simulates death, and during which it is unable to feel the tortures
+practised on it.
+
+The swoon sometimes actually takes place before the animal has been
+touched, and even when the exciting cause is at a considerable distance.
+I was once riding with a gaucho, when we saw, on the open level ground
+before us, a fox, not yet fully grown, standing still and watching our
+approach. All at once it dropped, and when we came up to the spot it was
+lying stretched out, with eyes closed, and apparently dead. Before
+passing on my companion, who said it was not the first time he had seen
+such a thing, lashed it vigorously with his whip for some moments, but
+without producing the slightest effect.
+
+The death-feigning instinct is possessed in a very marked degree by the
+spotted tinamou or common partridge of the pampas (Nothura maculosa).
+When captured, after a few violent struggles to escape, it drops its
+head, gasps two or three times, and to all appearances dies. If, when
+you have seen this, you release your hold, the eyes open instantly, and,
+with startling suddenness and a noise of wings, it is up and away, and
+beyond your reach for ever. Possibly, while your grasp is on the bird it
+does actually become insensible, though its recovery from that condition
+is almost instantaneous. Birds when captured do sometimes die in the
+hand, purely from terror. The tinamou is excessively timid, and
+sometimes when birds of this species are chased--for gaucho boys
+frequently run them down on horseback--and when they find no burrows or
+thickets to escape into, they actually drop down dead on the plain.
+Probably, when they feign death in their captor's hand, they are in
+reality very near to death.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+HUMMING-BIRDS.
+
+
+Humming-birds are perhaps the very loveliest things in nature, and many
+celebrated writers have exhausted their descriptive powers in vain
+efforts to picture them to the imagination. The temptation was certainly
+great, after describing the rich setting of tropical foliage and flower,
+to speak at length of the wonderful gem contained within it; but they
+would in this case have been wise to imitate that modest novel-writer
+who introduced a blank space on the page where the description of his
+matchless heroine should have appeared. After all that has been written,
+the first sight of a living humming-bird, so unlike in its beauty all
+other beautiful things, comes like a revelation to the mind. To give any
+true conception of it by means of mere word-painting is not more
+impossible than it would be to bottle up a supply of the "living
+sunbeams" themselves, and convey them across the Atlantic to scatter
+them in a sparkling shower over the face of England.
+
+Doubtless many who have never seen them in a state of nature imagine
+that a tolerably correct idea of their appearance can be gained from
+Gould's colossal monograph. The pictures there, however, only represent
+dead humming-birds. A dead robin is, for purposes of bird-portraiture,
+as good as a live robin; the same may be said of even many
+brilliant-plumaged species less aerial in their habits than
+humming-birds. In butterflies the whole beauty is seldom seen until the
+insect is dead, or, at any rate, captive. It was not when Wallace saw
+the Ornithoptera croesus flying about, but only when he held it in his
+hands, and opened its glorious wings, that the sight of its beauty
+overcame him so powerfully. The special kind of beauty which makes the
+first sight of a humming-bird a revelation depends on the swift singular
+motions as much as on the intense gem-like and metallic brilliancy of
+the plumage.
+
+The minute exquisite form, when the bird hovers on misty wings, probing
+the flowers with its coral spear, the fan-like tail expanded, and
+poising motionless, exhibits the feathers shot with many hues; and the
+next moment vanishes, or all but vanishes, then reappears at another
+flower only to vanish again, and so on successively, showing its
+splendours not continuously, but like the intermitted flashes of the
+firefly--this forms a picture of airy grace and loveliness that baffles
+description. All this glory disappears when the bird is dead, and even
+when it alights to rest on a bough. Sitting still, it looks like an
+exceedingly attenuated kingfisher, without the pretty plumage of that
+bird, but retaining its stiff artificial manner. No artist has been so
+bold as to attempt to depict the bird as it actually appears, when
+balanced before a flower the swift motion of the wings obliterates their
+form, making them seem like a mist encircling the body; yet it is
+precisely this formless cloud on which the glittering body hangs
+suspended, which contributes most to give the humming-bird its wonderful
+sprite-like or extra-natural appearance. How strange, then, to find
+bird-painters persisting in their efforts to show the humming-bird
+flying! When they draw it stiff and upright on its perch the picture is
+honest, if ugly; the more ambitious representation is a delusion and a
+mockery.
+
+Coming to the actual colouring--the changeful tints that glow with such
+intensity on the scale-like feathers, it is curious to find that Gould
+seems to have thought that all difficulties here had been successfully
+overcome. The "new process" he spoke so confidently about might no doubt
+be used with advantage in reproducing the coarser metallic reflections
+on a black plumage, such as we see in the corvine birds; but the
+glittering garment of the humming-bird, like the silvery lace woven by
+the Epeira, gemmed with dew and touched with rainbow-coloured light, has
+never been and never can be imitated by art.
+
+On this subject one of the latest observers of humming-birds, Mr.
+Everard im Thurn, in his work on British Guiana, has the following
+passage:--"Hardly more than one point of colour is in reality ever
+visible in any one humming-bird at one and the same time, for each point
+only shows its peculiar and glittering colour when the light falls upon
+it from a particular direction. A true representation of one of these
+birds would show it in somewhat sombre colours, except just at the one
+point which, when the bird is in the position chosen for representation,
+meets the light at the requisite angle, and that point alone should be
+shown in full brilliance of colour. A flowery shrub is sometimes seen
+surrounded by a cloud of humming-birds, all of one species, and each, of
+course, in a different position. If someone would draw such a scene as
+that, showing a different detail of colour in each bird, according to
+its position, then some idea of the actual appearance of the bird might
+be given to one who had never seen an example."
+
+It is hardly to be expected that anyone will carry out the above
+suggestion, and produce a monograph with pages ten or fifteen feet wide
+by eighteen feet long, each one showing a cloud of humming-birds of one
+species flitting about a flowery bush; but even in such a picture as
+that would be, the birds, suspended on unlovely angular projections
+instead of "hazy semicircles of indistinctness," and each with an
+immovable fleck of brightness on the otherwise sombre plumage, would be
+as unlike living humming-birds as anything in the older monographs.
+
+Whether the glittering iridescent tints and singular ornaments for which
+this family is famous result from the cumulative process of conscious or
+voluntary sexual selection, as Darwin thought, or are merely the outcome
+of a superabundant vitality, as Dr. A. R.. Wallace so strongly
+maintains, is a question which science has not yet answered
+satisfactorily. The tendency to or habit of varying in the direction of
+rich colouring and beautiful or fantastic ornament, might, for all we
+know to the contrary, have descended to humming-birds from some
+diminutive, curiously-shaped, bright-tinted, flying reptile of arboreal
+habits that lived in some far-off epoch in the world's history. It is
+not, at all events, maintained by anyone that _all_ birds sprang
+originally from one reptilian stock; and the true position of
+humming-birds in a natural classification has not yet been settled, for
+no intermediate forms exist connecting them with any other group, To the
+ordinary mind they appear utterly unlike all other feathered creatures,
+and as much entitled to stand apart as, for instance, the pigeon and
+ostrich families. It has been maintained by some writers that they are
+anatomically related to the swifts, although the differences separating
+the two families appear so great as almost to stagger belief in this
+notion. Now, however, the very latest authority on this subject, Dr.
+Schufeldt, has come to the conclusion that swifts are only greatly
+modified Passeres, and that the humming-birds should form an order by
+themselves.
+
+Leaving this question, and regarding them simply with the ornithological
+eye that does not see far below the surface of things, when we have
+sufficiently admired the unique beauty and marvellous velocity of
+humming-birds, there is little more to be said about them. They are
+lovely to the eye--indescribably so; and it is not strange that Gould
+wrote rapturously of the time when he was at length "permitted to revel
+in the delight of seeing the humming-bird in a state of nature." The
+feeling, he wrote, which animated him with regard to these most
+wonderful works of creation it was impossible to describe, and could
+only be appreciated by those who have made natural history a study, and
+who "pursue the investigations of her charming mysteries with ardour and
+delight." This we can understand; but to what an astonishing degree the
+feeling was carried in him, when, after remarking that enthusiasm and
+excitement with regard to most things in life become lessened and
+eventually deadened by time in most of us, he was able to add, "not
+so, however, I believe, with those who take up the study of the Family
+of Humming-birds!" It can only be supposed that he regarded natural
+history principally as a "science of dead animals--a _necrology_," and
+collected humming-birds just as others collect Roman coins, birds' eggs,
+old weapons, or blue china, their zeal in the pursuit and faith in its
+importance increasing with the growth of their treasures, until they at
+last come to believe that though all the enthusiasms and excitements
+which give a zest to the lives of other men fade and perish with time,
+it is not so with their particular pursuit. The more rational kind of
+pleasure experienced by the ornithologist in studying habits and
+disposition no doubt results in a great measure from the fact that the
+actions of the feathered people have a savour of intelligence in them.
+Whatever his theory or conviction about the origin of instincts may
+happen to be, or even if he has no convictions on the subject, it must
+nevertheless seem plain to him that intelligence is, after all, in most
+cases, the guiding principle of life, supplementing and modifying habits
+to bring them into closer harmony with the environment, and enlivening
+every day with countless little acts which result from judgment and
+experience, and form no part of the inherited complex instincts. The
+longer he observes any one species or individual, the more does he find
+in it to reward his attention; this is not the case, however, with
+humming-birds, which possess the avian body but do not rank mentally
+with birds. The pleasure one takes in their beauty soon evaporates, and
+is succeeded by no fresh interest, so monotonous and mechanical are all
+their actions; and we accordingly find that those who are most familiar
+with them from personal observation have very little to say about them.
+A score of hummingbirds, of as many distinct species, are less to the
+student of habits than one little brown-plurnaged bird haunting his
+garden or the rush-bed of a neighbouring stream; and, doubtless, for a
+reason similar to that which makes a lovely human face uninformed by
+intellect seem less permanently attractive than many a homelier
+countenance. He grows tired of seeing the feathered fairies perpetually
+weaving their aerial ballet-dance about the flowers, and finds it a
+relief to watch the little finch or wren or flycatcher of shy temper and
+obscure protective colouring. Perhaps it possesses a graceful form and
+melodious voice to give it aesthetic value, but even without such
+accessories he can observe it day by day with increasing interest and
+pleasure; and it only adds piquancy to the feeling to know that the
+little bird also watches him with a certain amount of intelligent
+curiosity and a great deal of suspicion, and that it studiously
+endeavours to conceal from him all the little secrets its life which he
+is bent on discovering.
+
+It has frequently been remarked that humming birds are more like insects
+than birds in disposition. Some species, on quitting their perch,
+perform wide bee-like circles about the tree before shooting away in a
+straight line. Their aimless attacks on other species approaching or
+passing near them, even on large birds like hawks and pigeons, is a
+habit they have in common with many solitary wood-boring bees. They
+also, like dragon-flies and other insects, attack each other when they
+come together while feeding; and in this case their action strangely
+resembles that of a couple of butterflies, as they revolve about each
+other and rise vertically to a great height in the air. Again, like
+insects, they are undisturbed at the presence of man while feeding, or
+even when engaged in building and incubation; and like various solitary
+bees, wasps, &c., they frequently come close to a person walking or
+standing, to hover suspended in the air within a few inches of his face;
+and if then struck at they often, insect-like, return to circle round
+his head. All other birds, even those which display the least
+versatility, and in districts where man is seldom seen, show as much
+caution as curiosity in his presence; they recognize in the upright
+unfamiliar form a living being and a possible enemy. Mr. Whiteley, who
+observed humming-birds in Peru, says it is an amusing sight to watch the
+Lesbia nuna attempting to pass to a distant spot in a straight line
+during a high wind, which, acting on the long tail feathers, carries it
+quite away from the point aimed at. Insects presenting a large surface
+to the wind are always blown from their course in the same way, for even
+in the most windy districts they never appear to learn to guide
+themselves; and I have often seen a butterfly endeavouring to reach an
+isolated flower blown from it a dozen times before it finally succeeded
+or gave up the contest. Birds when shaping their course, unless young
+and inexperienced, always make allowance for the force of the wind.
+Humming-birds often fly into open rooms, impelled apparently by a
+fearless curiosity, and may then be chased about until they drop
+exhausted or are beaten down and caught, and, as Gould says, "if then
+taken into the hand, they almost immediately feed on any sweet, or pump
+up any liquid that may be offered to them, without betraying either fear
+or resentment at the previous treatment." Wasps and bees taken in the
+same way endeavour to sting their captor, as most people know from
+experience, nor do they cease struggling violently to free themselves;
+but the dragon-fly is like the humming-bird, and is no sooner caught
+after much ill-treatment, than it will greedily devour as many flies and
+mosquitoes as one likes to offer it. Only in beings very low in the
+scale of nature do we see the instinct of self-preservation in this
+extremely simple condition, unmixed with reason or feeling, and so
+transient in its effects. The same insensibility to danger is seen when
+humming-birds are captured and confined in a room, and when, before a
+day is over, they will flutter about their captor's face and even take
+nectar from his lips.
+
+Some observers have thought that hummingbirds come nearest to
+humble-bees in their actions. I do not think so. Mr. Bates writes: "They
+do not proceed in that methodical manner which bees follow, taking the
+flowers seriatim, but skip about from one part of a tree to another in
+the most capricious manner." I have observed humble-bees a great deal,
+and feel convinced that they arc among the most highly intelligent of
+the social hymenoptera. Humming-birds, to my mind, have a much closer
+resemblance to the solitary wood-boring bees and to dragon-flies. It
+must also be borne in mind that insects have very little time in which
+to acquire experience, and that a large portion of their life, in the
+imago state, is taken up with the complex business of reproduction.
+
+The Trochilidae, although confined to one continent, promise to exceed
+all other families--even the cosmopolitan finches and warblers--in
+number of species. At present over five hundred are known, or as many as
+all the species of birds in Europe together; and good reasons exist for
+believing that very many more--not less perhaps than one or two hundred
+species--yet remain to be discovered. The most prolific region, and
+where humming-birds are most highly developed, is known to be West
+Brazil and the eastern slopes of the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. This
+is precisely the least known portion of South America; the few
+naturalists and collectors who have reached it have returned laden with
+spoil, to tell us of a region surpassing all others in the
+superabundance and beauty of its bird life. Nothing, however, which can
+be said concerning these vast unexplored areas of tropical mountain and
+forest so forcibly impresses us with the idea of the unknown riches
+contained in them as the story of the Loddigesia mirabilis. This is
+perhaps the most wonderful humming-bird known, and no one who had not
+previously seen it figured could possibly form an idea of what it is
+like from a mere description. An outline sketch of it would probably be
+taken by most people as a fantastic design representing a bird-form in
+combination with leaves, in size and shape resembling poplar leaves, but
+on leaf-stalks of an impossible length, curving and crossing each other
+so as to form geometrical figures unlike anything in nature. Yet this
+bird (a single specimen) was obtained in Peru half a century ago, and
+for upwards of twenty years after its discovery Gould tried to obtain
+others, offering as much as fifty pounds for one; but no second specimen
+ever gladdened his eyes, nor was anything more heard of it until
+Stolzmann refound it in the year 1880.
+
+The addition of many new species to the long list would, however, be a
+matter of small interest, unless fresh facts concerning their habits and
+structure were at the same time brought to light; but we can scarcely
+expect that the as yet unknown species will supply any link connecting
+the Trochilidae with other existing families of birds. The eventual
+conclusion will perhaps be that this family has come down independently
+from an exceedingly remote past, and with scarcely any modification.
+While within certain very narrow limits humming-birds vary more than
+other families, outside of these limits they appear relatively
+stationary; and, conversely, other birds exhibit least variability in
+the one direction in which humming-birds vary excessively. On account of
+a trivial difference in habit they have sometimes been separated in two
+sub-families: the Phaethornithinae, found in shady tropical forests; and
+the Trochilinae, comprising humming-birds which inhabit open sunny
+places--and to this division they mostly belong. In both of these purely
+arbitrary groups, however, the aerial habits and manner of feeding
+poised in the air are identical, although the birds living in shady
+forests, where flowers are scarce, obtain their food principally from
+the under surfaces of leaves. In their procreant habits the uniformity
+is also very great. In all cases the nest is small, deep, cup-shaped, or
+conical, composed of soft felted materials, and lined inside with
+vegetable down. The eggs are white, and never exceed two in number.
+Broadly speaking, they resemble each other as closely in habits as in
+structure; the greatest differences in habit in the most widely
+separated genera being no greater than may be found in two wrens or
+sparrows of the same genus.
+
+This persistence of character in humming-birds, both as regards
+structure and habit, seems the more remarkable when we consider their
+very wide distribution over a continent so varied in its conditions, and
+where they range from the lowest levels to the limit of perpetual snow
+on the Andes, and from the tropics to the wintry Magellanic district;
+also that a majority of genera inhabit very circumscribed areas--these
+facts, as Dr. Wallace remarks, clearly pointing to a very high
+antiquity.
+
+It is perhaps a law of nature that when a species (or group) fits itself
+to a place not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to no
+opposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so great a
+perfection as to be able easily to overcome all opposition, the
+character eventually loses its original plasticity, or tendency to vary,
+since improvement in such a case would be superfluous, and becomes, so
+to speak, crystallized in that form which continues thereafter
+unaltered. It is, at any rate, clear that while all other birds rub
+together in the struggle for existence, the humming-bird, owing to its
+aerial life and peculiar manner of seeking its food, is absolutely
+untouched by this kind of warfare, and is accordingly as far removed
+from all competition with other birds as the solitary savage is removed
+from the struggle of life affecting and modifying men in crowded
+communities. The lower kind of competition affecting hummingbirds, that
+with insects and, within the family, of species with species, has
+probably only served to intensify their unique characteristics, and,
+perhaps, to lower their intelligence.
+
+Not only are they removed from that indirect struggle for existence
+which acts so powerfully on other families, but they are also, by their
+habits and the unequalled velocity of their flight, placed out of reach
+of that direct war waged on all other small birds by the rapacious
+kinds--birds, mammals, and reptiles. One result of this immunity is that
+humming-birds are excessively numerous, albeit such slow breeders; for,
+as we have seen, they only lay two eggs, and not only so, but the second
+egg is often dropped so long after incubation has begun in the first
+that only one is really hatched. Yet Belt expressed the opinion that in
+Nicaragua, where he observed humming-birds, they out-numbered all the
+other birds together. Considering how abundant birds of all kinds are in
+that district, and that most of them have a protective colouring and lay
+several eggs, it would be impossible to accept such a statement unless
+we believed that humming-birds have, practically, no enemies.
+
+Another result of their immunity from persecution is the splendid
+colouring and strange and beautiful feather ornaments distinguishing
+them above all other birds; and excessive variation in this direction is
+due, it seems to me, to the very causes which serve to check variation
+in all other directions. In their plumage, as Martin long ago wrote,
+nature has strained at every variety of effect and revelled in an
+infinitude of modifications. How wonderful their garb is, with colours
+so varied, so intense, yet seemingly so evanescent!--the glittering
+mantle of powdered gold; the emerald green that changes to velvet black;
+ruby reds and luminous scarlets; dull bronze that brightens and burns
+like polished brass, and pale neutral tints that kindle to rose and
+lilac-coloured flame. And to the glory of prismatic colouring are added
+feather decorations, such as the racket-plumes and downy muffs of
+Spathura, the crest and frills of Lophornis, the sapphire gorget burning
+on the snow-white breast of Oreotrochilus, the fiery tail of Cometes,
+and, amongst grotesque forms, the long pointed crest-feathers,
+representing horns, and flowing-white beard adorning the piebald
+goat-like face of Oxypogon.
+
+Excessive variation in this direction is checked in nearly all other
+birds by the need of a protective colouring, few kinds so greatly
+excelling in strength and activity as to be able to maintain their
+existence without it. Bright feathers constitute a double danger, for
+not only do they render their possessor conspicuous, but, just as the
+butterfly chooses the gayest flower, so do hawks deliberately single out
+from many obscure birds the one with brilliant plumage; but the
+rapacious kinds do not waste their energies in the vain pursuit of
+hummingbirds. These are in the position of neutrals, free to range at
+will amidst the combatants, insulting all alike, and flaunting their
+splendid colours with impunity. They are nature's favourites, endowed
+with faculties bordering on the miraculous, and all other kinds, gentle
+or fierce, ask only to be left alone by them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE CRESTED SCREAMER.
+
+_(Chalina chavarria.)_
+
+
+Amongst the feathered notables from all parts of the world found
+gathered at the Zoological Gardens in London is the Crested Screamer
+from South America. It is in many respects a very singular species, and
+its large size, great strength, and majestic demeanour, with the
+surprising docility and intelligence it displays when domesticated, give
+it a character amongst birds somewhat like that of the elephant amongst
+mammals. Briefly and roughly to describe it: in size it is like a swan,
+in shape like a lapwing, only with a powerful curved gallinaceous beak.
+It is adorned with a long pointed crest and a black neck-ring, the
+plumage being otherwise of a pale slaty blue, while the legs and the
+naked skin about the eyes are bright red. On each wing, in both sexes,
+there are two formidable spurs; the first one, on the second joint, is
+an inch and a half long, nearly straight, triangular, and exceedingly
+sharp; the second spur, on the last joint, being smaller, broad, and
+curved, and roughly resembling in shape and size a lion's claw. There is
+another stinking peculiarity. The skin is _emphysematous_--that is,
+bloated and yielding to pressure. It crackles when touched, and the
+surface, when the feathers are removed, presents a swollen bubbly
+appearance; for under the skin there is a layer of air-bubbles extending
+over the whole body and even down the legs under the horny tesselated
+skin to the toes, the legs thus having a somewhat massive appearance.
+
+And now just a few words about the position of the screamer in
+systematic zoology. It is placed in the Family Palamedeidae, which
+contains only three species, but about the Order it belongs to there is
+much disagreement. It was formerly classed with the rails, and in
+popular books of Natural History still keeps its place with them. "Now
+the rail-tribe," says Professor Parker, speaking on this very matter,
+"has for a long time been burdened (on paper) with a very false army
+list. Everything alive that has had the misfortune to be possessed of
+large unwieldy feet has been added to this feeble-minded cowardly group,
+until it has become a mixed multitude with discordant voices and with
+manners and customs having no consonance or relation." He takes the
+screamer from the rail-tribe and classes it with the geese (as also does
+Professor Huxley), and concludes his study with these words:--"Amongst
+living birds there is not one possessing characters of higher interest,
+none that I am acquainted with come nearer, in some important points, to
+the lizard; and there are parts of the organization which make it very
+probable that it is one of the nearest living relations of the
+marvellous _Archaeopteryx_"--an intermediate form between birds and
+reptiles belonging to the Upper Jurassic period.
+
+The screamer's right to dwell with the geese has not been left
+unchallenged. The late Professor Garrod finds that "from considerations
+of pterylosis, visceral anatomy, myology, and osteology the screamer
+cannot be placed along with the Anserine birds." He finds that in some
+points it resembles the ostrich and rhea, and concludes: "It seems
+therefore to me that, summing these results, the screamer must have
+sprung from the primary avian stock as an independent offshoot at much
+the same time as did most of the other important families." This time,
+he further tells us, was when there occurred a general break-up of the
+ancient terrestrial bird-type, when the acquisition of wings brought
+many intruders into domains already occupied, calling forth a new
+struggle for existence, and bringing out many special qualities by means
+of natural selection.
+
+With this archaeological question I have little to do, and only quote
+the above great authorities to show that the screamer appears to be
+nearly the last descendant of an exceedingly ancient family, with little
+or no relationship to other existing families, and that its pedigree has
+been hopelessly lost in the night of an incalculable antiquity. I have
+only to speak of the bird as a part of the visible world and as it
+appears to the non-scientific lover of nature; for, curiously enough,
+while anatomists nave been laboriously seeking for the screamer's
+affinities in that "biological field which is as wide as the earth and
+deep as the sea," travellers and ornithologists have told us almost
+nothing about its strange character and habits.
+
+Though dressed with Quaker-like sobriety, and without the elegance of
+form distinguishing the swan or peacock, this bird yet appeals to the
+aesthetic feelings in man more than any species I am acquainted with.
+Voice is one of its strong points, as one might readily infer from the
+name: nevertheless the name is not an appropriate one, for though the
+bird certainly does scream, and that louder than the peacock, its scream
+is only a powerful note of alarm uttered occasionally, while the notes
+uttered at intervals in the night, or in the day-time, when it soars
+upwards like the lark of some far-off imaginary epoch in the world's
+history when all tilings, larks included, were on a gigantic scale, are.
+properly speaking, singing notes and in quality utterly unlike screams.
+Sometimes when walking across Regent's Park I bear the resounding cries
+of the bird confined there attempting to sing; above the concert of
+cranes, the screams of eagles and macaws, the howling of dogs and wolves
+and the muffled roar of lions, one can hear it all over the park. But
+those loud notes only sadden me. Exile and captivity have taken all
+joyousness from the noble singer, and a moist climate has made him
+hoarse; the long clear strains are no more, and he hurries through his
+series of confused shrieks as quickly as possible, as if ashamed of the
+performance. A lark singing high up in a sunny sky and a lark singing in
+a small cage hanging against a shady wall in a London street produce
+very different effects; and the spluttering medley of shrill and harsh
+sounds from the street singer scarcely seems to proceed from the same
+kind of bird as that matchless melody filling the blue heavens. There is
+even a greater difference in the notes of the crested screamer when
+heard in Regent's Park and when heard on the pampas, where the bird
+soars upwards until its bulky body disappears from sight, and from that
+vast elevation pours down a perpetual rain of jubilant sound.
+
+_Screamer_ being a misnomer, I prefer to call the bird by its vernacular
+name of _chajá,_ or _chakar_, a more convenient spelling.
+
+With the chakar the sexes are faithful, even in very large flocks the
+birds all being ranged in couples. When one bird begins to sing its
+partner immediately joins, but with notes entirely different in quality.
+Both birds have some short deep notes, the other notes of the female
+being long powerful notes with a trill in them; but over them sounds the
+clear piercing voice of the male, ringing forth at the close with great
+strength and purity. The song produces the effect of harmony, but,
+comparing it with human singing, it is less like a _duo_ than a
+_terzetto_ composed of bass, contralto, and soprano.
+
+At certain times, in districts favourable to them, the chakars often
+assemble in immense flocks, thousands of individuals being sometimes
+seen congregated together, and in these gatherings the birds frequently
+all sing in concert. They invariably--though without rising--sing at
+intervals during the night, "counting the hours," as the gauchos say;
+the first song being at about nine o'clock, the second at midnight, and
+the third just before dawn, but the hours vary in different districts.
+
+I was once travelling with a party of gauchos when, about midnight, it
+being intensely dark, a couple of chakars broke out singing right ahead
+of us, thus letting us know that we were approaching a watercourse,
+where we intended refreshing our horses. We found it nearly dry, and
+when we rode down to the rill of water meandering over the broad dry bed
+of the river, a flock of about a thousand chakars set up a perfect roar
+of alarm notes, all screaming together, with intervals of silence after;
+then they rose up with a mighty rush of wings. They settled down again a
+few hundred yards off, and all together burst forth in one of their
+grand midnight songs, making the plains echo for miles around.
+
+There is something strangely impressive in these spontaneous outbursts
+of a melody so powerful from one of these large flocks, and though
+accustomed to hear these birds from childhood, I have often been
+astonished at some new effect produced by a large multitude singing
+under certain conditions. Travelling alone one summer day, I carne at
+noon to a lake on the pampas called Kakel--a sheet of water narrow
+enough for one to see across. Chakars in countless numbers were gathered
+along its shores, but they were all ranged in well-defined flocks,
+averaging about five hundred birds in each flock. These flocks seemed to
+extend all round the lake, and had probably been driven by the drought
+from all the plains around to this spot. Presently one flock near me
+began singing, and continued their powerful chant for three or four
+minutes; when they ceased the next flock took up the strains, and after
+it the next, and so on until the notes of the flocks on the opposite
+shore came floating strong and clear across the water--then passed away,
+growing fainter and fainter, until once more the sound approached me
+travelling round to my side again. The effect was very curious, and I
+was astonished at the orderly way with which each flock waited its turn
+to sing, instead of a general outburst taking place after the first
+flock had given the signal. On another occasion I was still more
+impressed, for here the largest number of birds I have ever found
+congregated at one place all sung together. This was on the southern
+pampas, at a place called Gualicho, where I had ridden for an hour
+before sunset over a marshy plain where there was still much standing
+water in the rushy pools, though it was at the height of the dry season.
+This whole plain was covered with an endless flock of chakars, not in
+close order, but scattered about in pairs and small groups. In this
+desolate spot I found a small rancho inhabited by a gaucho and his
+family, and I spent the night with them. The birds were all about the
+house, apparently as tame as the domestic fowls, and when I went out to
+look for a spot for my horse to feed on, they would not fly away from
+me, but merely moved, a few steps out of my path About nine o'clock we
+were eating supper in the rancho when suddenly the entire multitude of
+birds covering the marsh for miles around burst forth into a tremendous
+evening song. It is impossible to describe the effect of this mighty
+rush of sound; but let the reader try to imagine half-a-million voices,
+each far more powerful than that one which makes itself heard all over
+Regent's Park, bursting forth on the silent atmosphere of that dark
+lonely plain. One peculiarity was that in this mighty noise, which
+sounded louder than the sea thundering on a rocky coast, I seemed to be
+able to distinguish hundreds, even thousands, of individual voices.
+Forgetting my supper, I sat motionless and overcome with astonishment,
+while the air, and even the frail rancho, seemed to be trembling in that
+tempest of sound. When it ceased my host remarked with a smile, "We are
+accustomed to this, señor--every evening we have this concert." It was a
+concert well worth riding a hundred miles to hear. But the chakar
+country is just now in a transitional state, and the precise conditions
+which made it possible for birds so large in size to form such immense
+congregations are rapidly passing away. In desert places, the bird
+subsists chiefly on leaves and seeds of aquatic plants; but when the
+vast level area of the pampas was settled by man, the ancient stiff
+grass-vegetation gave place to the soft clovers and grasses of Europe,
+and to this new food the birds took very kindly. Other circumstances
+also favoured their increase. They were never persecuted, for the
+natives do not eat them, though they are really very good--the flesh
+being something like wild goose in flavour. A _higher_ civilization is
+changing all this: the country is becoming rapidly overrun with
+emigrants, especially by Italians, the pitiless enemies of all
+bird-life.
+
+The chakars, like the skylark, love to soar upwards when singing, and at
+such times when they have risen till their dark bulky bodies appear like
+floating specks on the blue sky, or until they disappear from sight
+altogether, the notes become wonderfully etherealized by distance to a
+soft silvery sound, and it is then very delightful to listen to them.
+
+It seems strange that so ponderous a fowl with only six feet and a half
+spread of wings should possess a power of soaring equal to that of
+vultures and eagles. Even the vulture with its marvellous wing power
+soars chiefly from necessity, and when its crop is full finds no
+pleasure in "scaling the heavens by invisible stairs." The chakar leaves
+its grass-plot after feeding and soars purely for recreation, taking so
+much pleasure in its aerial exercises that in bright warm weather, in
+winter and spring, it spends a great part of the day in the upper
+regions of the air. On the earth its air is grave and its motions
+measured and majestic, and it rises with immense labour, the wings
+producing a sound like a high wind. But as the bird mounts higher,
+sweeping round as it ascends, just as vultures and eagles do, it
+gradually appears to become more buoyant, describing each succeeding
+circle with increasing grace. I can only account for this magnificent
+flight, beginning so laboriously, by supposing that the bubble space
+under the skin becomes inflated with an air lighter than atmospheric
+air, enabling a body so heavy with wings disproportionately short to
+float with such ease and evident enjoyment at the vast heights to which
+the bird ascends. The heavenward flight of a large bird is always a
+magnificent spectacle; that of the chakar is peculiarly fascinating on
+account of the resounding notes it sings while soaring, and in which the
+bird seems to exult in its sublime power and freedom.
+
+I was once very much surprised at the behaviour of a couple of chakars
+during a thunderstorm. On a still sultry day in summer I was standing
+watching masses of black cloud coming rapidly over the sky, while a
+hundred yards from me stood the two birds also apparently watching the
+approaching storm with interest. Presently the edge of the cloud touched
+the sun, and a twilight gloom fell on the earth. The very moment the sun
+disappeared the birds rose up and soon began singing their long'
+resounding notes, though it was loudly thundering at the time, while
+vivid flashes of lightning lit the black cloud overhead at short
+intervals. I watched their flight and listened to their notes, till
+suddenly as they made a wide sweep upwards they disappeared in the
+cloud, and at the same moment their voices became muffled, and seemed to
+come from an immense distance. The cloud continued emitting sharp
+flashes of lightning, but the birds never reappeared, and after six or
+seven minutes once more their notes sounded loud and clear above the
+muttering thunder. I suppose they had passed through the cloud into the
+clear atmosphere above it, but I was extremely surprised at their
+fearlessness; for as a rule when soaring birds see a storm coming they
+get out of its way, flying before it or stooping to the earth to seek
+shelter of some kind, for most living things appear to have a wholesome
+dread of thunder and lightning.
+
+When taken young the chakar becomes very tame and attached to man,
+showing no inclination to go back to a wild life. There was one kept at
+an estancia called Mangrullos, on the western frontier of Buenos Ayres,
+and the people of the house gave me a very curious account of it. The
+bird was a male, and had been reared by a soldier's wife at a frontier
+outpost called La Esperanza, about twenty-five miles from Mangrullos.
+Four years before I saw the bird the Indians had invaded the frontier,
+destroying the Esperanza settlement and all the estancias for some
+leagues around. For some weeks after the invasion the chakar wandered
+about the country, visiting all the ruined estancias, apparently in
+quest of human beings, and on arriving at Mangrullos, which had not been
+burnt and was still inhabited, it settled down at ones and never
+afterwards showed any disposition to go away. It was extremely tame,
+associating by day with the poultry, and going to roost with them at
+night OH a high perch, probably for the sake of companionship, for in a
+wild state the bird roosts on the ground. It was friendly towards all
+the members of the household except one, a peon, and against this person
+from the first the bird always displayed the greatest antipathy,
+threatening him with its wings, puffing itself out, and hissing like an
+angry goose. The man had a swarthy, beardless face, and it was
+conjectured that the chakar associated him in its mind with the savages
+who had destroyed its early home.
+
+Close to the house there was a lagoon, never dry, which was frequently
+visited by flocks of wild chakars. Whenever a flock appeared the tame
+bird would go out to join them; and though the chakars are mild-tempered
+birds and very rarely quarrel, albeit so well provided with formidable
+weapons, they invariably attacked the visitor with great fury, chasing
+him back to the house, and not ceasing their persecutions till the
+poultry-yard was reached. They appeared to regard this tame bird that
+dwelt with man as a kind of renegade, and hated him accordingly.
+
+Before he had been long at the estancia it began to be noticed that he
+followed the broods of young chickens about very assiduously, apparently
+taking great interest in their welfare, and even trying to entice them
+to follow him. A few newly-hatched chickens were at length offered to
+him as an experiment, and he immediately took charge of them with every
+token of satisfaction, conducting them about in search of food and
+imitating all the actions of a hen. Finding him so good a nurse, large
+broods were given to him, and the more the foster-chickens were the
+better he seemed pleased. It was very curious to see this big bird with
+thirty or forty little animated balls of yellow cotton following him
+about, while he moved majestically along, setting down his feet with the
+greatest care not to tread on them, and swelling himself up with jealous
+anger at the approach of a cat or dog.
+
+The intelligence, docility, and attachment to man displayed by the
+chakar in a domestic state, with perhaps other latent aptitudes only
+waiting to be developed by artificial selection, seem to make this
+species one peculiarly suited for man's protection, without which it
+must inevitably perish. It is sad to reflect that all our domestic
+animals have descended to us from those ancient times which we are
+accustomed to regard as dark or barbarous, while the effect of our
+modern so-called humane civilization has been purely destructive to
+animal life. Not one type do we rescue from the carnage going on at an
+ever-increasing rate over all the globe. To Australia and America, North
+and South, we look in vain for new domestic species, while even from
+Africa, with its numerous fine mammalian forms, and where England has
+been the conquering colonizing power for nearly a century, we take
+nothing. Even the sterling qualities of the elephant, the unique beauty
+of the zebra, appeal to us in vain. We are only teaching the tribes of
+that vast continent to exterminate a hundred noble species they would
+not tame. With grief and shame, even with dismay, we call to mind that
+our country is now a stupendous manufactory of destructive engines,
+which we are rapidly placing in the hands of all the savage and
+semi-savage peoples of the earth, thus ensuring the speedy destruction
+of all the finest types in the animal kingdom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE WOODHEWER FAMILY.
+
+_(Dendrocolaptidae.)_
+
+
+The South American Tree-creepers, or Woodhewers, as they are sometimes
+called, although confined exclusively to one continent, their range
+extending from Southern Mexico to the Magellanic islands, form one of
+the largest families of the order Passeres; no fewer than about two
+hundred and ninety species (referable to about forty-six genera) having
+been already described. As they are mostly small, inconspicuous,
+thicket-frequenting birds, shy and fond of concealment to excess, it is
+only reasonable to suppose that our list of this family is more
+incomplete than of any other family of birds known. Thus, in the
+southern Plata and north Pata-gonian districts, supposed to be
+exhausted, where my observations have been made, and where, owing to the
+open nature of the country, birds are more easily remarked than in the
+forests and marshes of the tropical region, I have made notes on the
+habits of five species, of which I did not preserve specimens, and
+which, as far as I know, have never been described and named. Probably
+long before the whole of South America has been "exhausted," there will
+be not less than four to five hundred Dendrocolaptine species known. And
+yet with the exception of that dry husk of knowledge, concerning size,
+form and colouration, which classifiers and cataloguers obtain from
+specimens, very little indeed--scarcely anything, in fact--is known
+about the Tree-creepers; and it would not be too much to say that there
+are many comparatively obscure and uninteresting species in Europe, any
+one of which has a larger literature than the entire Tree-creeper
+family. No separate work about these birds has seen the light, even in
+these days of monographs; but the reason of this comparative neglect is
+not far to seek. In the absence of any knowledge, except of the most
+fragmentary kind, of the life-habits of exotic species, the
+monograph-makers of the Old World naturally take up only the most
+important groups--i.e. the groups which most readily attract the
+traveller's eye with their gay conspicuous colouring, and which have
+acquired a wide celebrity. We thus have a succession of splendid and
+expensive works dealing separately with such groups as woodpeckers,
+trogons, humming-birds, tanagers, king-fishers, and birds of paradise;
+for with these, even if there be nothing to record beyond the usual
+dreary details and technicalities concerning geographical distribution,
+variations in size and markings of different species, &c., the little
+interest of the letter-press is compensated for in the accompanying
+plates, which are now produced on a scale of magnitude, and with so
+great a degree of perfection, as regards brilliant colouring, spirited
+attitudes and general fidelity to nature, that leaves little further
+improvement in this direction to be looked for. The Tree-creepers, being
+without the inferior charm of bright colour, offer no attraction to the
+bird-painter, whose share in the work of the pictorial monograph is, of
+course, all-important. Yet even the very slight knowledge we possess of
+this family is enough to show that in many respects it is one richly
+endowed, possessing characters of greater interest to the student of the
+instincts and mental faculties of birds, than any of |the gaily-tinted
+families I have mentioned.
+
+There is, in the Dendrocolaptidae, a splendid harvest for future
+observers of the habits of South American birds: some faint idea of its
+richness may perhaps be gathered from the small collection of the most
+salient facts known to us about them I have brought together and put in
+order in this place. And I am here departing a little from the plan
+usually observed in this book, which is chiefly occupied with matters of
+personal knowledge, seasoned with a little speculation; but in this case
+I have thought it best to supplement my own observations with those of
+others [Footnote: Azara; D'Orbigny; Darwin; Bridges; Frazer; Leotaud;
+Gaumer; Wallace; Bates; Cunningham; Stolzmann; Jelski; Durnford; Gibson;
+Burrows; Doering; White, &c.] who have collected and observed birds in
+South America, so as to give as comprehensive a survey of the family as
+I could.
+
+It is strange to find a Passerine family, numerous as the Tree-creepers,
+uniformly of one colour, or nearly so; for, with few exceptions, these
+birds have a brown plumage, without a particle of bright colour. But
+although they possess no brilliant or metallic tints, in some species,
+as we shall see, there are tints approaching to brightness.
+Notwithstanding this family likeness in colour, any person, not an
+ornithologist, looking at a collection of specimens comprising many
+genera, would hear with surprise and almost incredulity that they all
+belonged to one family, so great is the diversity exhibited in their
+structure. In size they vary from species smaller than the
+golden-crested wren to others larger than the woodcock; but the
+differences in size are as nothing compared with those shown in the form
+of the beak. Between the minute, straight, conical, tit-like beaks of
+the Laptasthenura--a tit in appearance and habits--and the extravagantly
+long, sword-shaped bill of Nasica, or the excessively attenuated,
+sickle-shaped organ in Xiphorynchus, the divergence is amazing, compared
+with what is found in other families; while between these two extremes
+there is a heterogeneous assemblage of birds with beaks like creepers,
+nuthatches, finches, tyrant-birds, woodpeckers, crows, and even curlews
+and ibises. In legs, feet and tails, there are corresponding
+differences. There are tails of all lengths and all forms; soft and
+stiff, square, acuminated, broad and fan-like, narrow and spine-like,
+and many as in the woodpeckers, and used as in that bird to support the
+body in climbing. An extremely curious modification is found in
+Sittosoma: the tail-feathers in this genus are long and graduated, and
+the shafts, projecting beyond the webs at the ends, curve downwards and
+form stiff hooks. Concerning the habits of these birds, it has only been
+reported that they climb on the trunks of trees: probably they are able
+to run vertically up or down with equal facility, and even to suspend
+themselves by their feather-hooks when engaged in dislodging insects.
+Another curious variation is found in Sylviothorhynchus, a small
+wren-like bird and the only member known of the genus, with a tail
+resembling that of the lyre-bird, the extravagantly long feathers being
+so narrow as to appear almost like shafts destitute of webs. This tail
+appears to be purely ornamental.
+
+This extreme variety in structure indicates a corresponding diversity in
+habits; and, assuming it to be a true doctrine that habits vary first
+and structure afterwards, anyone might infer from a study of their forms
+alone that these birds possess a singular plasticity, or tendency to
+vary, in their habits--or, in other words, that they are exceptionally
+intelligent; and that such a conclusion would be right I believe a study
+of their habits will serve to show.
+
+The same species is often found to differ in its manner of life in
+different localities. Some species of Xenops and Magarornis, like
+woodpeckers, climb vertically on tree-trunks in search of insect prey,
+but also, like tits, explore the smaller twigs and foliage at the
+extremity of the branches; so that the whole tree, from its root to its
+topmost foliage, is hunted over by them. The Sclerurus, although an
+inhabitant of the darkest forest, and provided with sharply-curved
+claws, never seeks its food on trees, but exclusively on the ground,
+among the decaying fallen leaves; but, strangely enough, when alarmed it
+flies to the trunk of the nearest tree, to which it clings in a vertical
+position, and, remaining silent and motionless, escapes observation by
+means of its dark protective colour. The Drymornis, a large bird, with
+feet and tail like a woodpecker, climbs on tree-trunks to seek its food;
+but also possesses the widely-different habit of resorting to the open
+plain, especially after a shower, to feed on larvae and earthworms,
+extracting them from a depth of three or four inches beneath the surface
+with its immense curved probing beak.
+
+Again, when we consider a large number of species of different groups,
+we find that there is not with the Tree-creepers, as with most families,
+any special habit or manner of life linking them together; but that, on
+the contrary, different genera, and, very frequently, different species
+belonging to one genus, possess habits peculiarly their own. In other
+families, even where the divergence is greatest, what may be taken as
+the original or ancestral habit is seldom or never quite obsolete in any
+of the members. This we see, for instance, in the woodpeckers, some of
+which have acquired the habit of seeking their food exclusively on the
+ground in open places, and even of nesting in the banks of streams. Yet
+all these wanderers, even those which have been structurally modified in
+accordance with their altered way of life, retain the primitive habit of
+clinging vertically to the trunks of trees, although the habit has lost
+its use. With the tyrant birds--a family showing an extraordinary amount
+of variation--it is the same; for the most divergent kinds are
+frequently seen reverting to the family habit of perching on an
+elevation, from which to make forays after passing insects, returning
+after each capture to the same stand. The thrushes, ranging all over the
+globe, afford another striking example. Without speaking of their
+nesting habits, their relationship appears in their love of fruit, in
+their gait, flight, statuesque attitudes, and abrupt motions.
+
+With the numerous Dendrocolaptine groups, so widely separated and
+apparently unrelated, it would be difficult indeed to say which, of
+their most striking habits is the ancestral one. Many of the smaller
+species live in trees or bushes, and in their habits resemble tits,
+warblers, wrens, and other kinds that subsist on small caterpillars,
+spiders, &c., gleaned from the leaves and smaller twigs. The Anumbius
+nests on trees, but feeds exclusively on the ground in open places;
+while other ground-feeders seek their food among dead leaves in dense
+gloomy forests. Coryphistera resembles the lark and pipit in its habits;
+Cinclodes, the wagtail; Geobates a Saxicola; Limnornis lives in reed
+beds growing in the water; Henicornis in reed beds growing out of the
+water; and many other ground species exist concealed in the grass on dry
+plains; Homorus seeks its food by digging in the loose soil and dead
+leaves about the roots of trees; while Geo-sitta, Furnarius, and
+Upercerthia obtain a livelihood chiefly by probing in the soil. It would
+not be possible within the present limits to mention in detail all the
+different modes of life of those species or groups which do not possess
+the tree-creeping habit; after them comes a long array of genera in
+which this habit is ingrained, and in which the greatly modified feet
+and claws are suited to a climbing existence. As these genera comprise
+the largest half of the family, also the largest birds in it, we might
+expect to find in the tree-creeping the parental habit of the
+Dendrocolaptidae, and that from these tropical forest groups have sprung
+the widely-diverging thicket, ground, marsh, sea-beach, and
+rock-frequenting groups. It happens, however, that these birds resemble
+each other only in their climbing feet; in the form of their beaks they
+are as wide apart as are nuthatches, woodpeckers, crows, and curlews.
+They also differ markedly in the manner of seeking their food. Some dig
+like woodpeckers in decayed wood; others probe only in soft rotten wood;
+while the humming-bird-billed Xiphorhynchus, with a beak too long and
+slender for probing, explores the interior of deep holes in the trunks
+to draw out nocturnal insects, spiders, and centipedes from their
+concealment. Xiphoco-laptes uses its sword-like beak as a lever,
+thrusting it under and forcing up the loose bark; while Dendrornis, with
+its stout corvine beak, tears the bark off.
+
+In the nesting habits the diversity is greatest. Some ground species
+excavate in the earth like kingfishers, only with greater skill, making
+cylindrical burrows often four to five feet deep, and terminating in a
+round chamber. Others build a massive oven-shaped structure of clay on a
+branch or other elevated site. Many of those that creep on trees nest in
+holes in the wood. The marsh-frequenting kinds attach spherical or oval
+domed nests to the reeds; and in some cases woven grass and clay are so
+ingeniously combined that the structure, while light as a basket, is
+perfectly impervious to the wet and practically indestructible. The most
+curious nests, however, are the large stick structures on trees and
+bushes, in the building and repairing of which the birds are in many
+cases employed more or less constantly all the year round. These stick
+nests vary greatly in form, size, and in other respects. Some have a
+spiral passage-way leading from the entrance to the nest cavity, and the
+cavity is in many cases only large enough to accommodate the bird; but
+in the gigantic structure of Homorus gutturalis it is so large that, if
+the upper half of the nest or dome were removed, a condor could
+comfortably hatch her eggs and rear her young in it. This nest is
+spherical. The allied Homorus lophotis builds a nest equally large, but
+with a small cavity for the eggs inside, and outwardly resembling a
+gigantic powder-flask, lying horizontally among the lower branches of a
+spreading tree. Pracellodomtis sibila-trix, a bird in size like the
+English house sparrow, also makes a huge nest, and places it on the
+twigs at the terminal end of a horizontal branch from twelve to fifteen
+feet above the ground; but when finished, the weight of the structure
+bears down the branch-end to within one or two feet of the surface. Mr.
+Barrows, who describes this nest, says: "When other branches of the same
+tree are similarly loaded, and other trees close at hand bear the same
+kind of fruit, the result is very picturesque." Synallaxis phryganophila
+makes a stick nest about a foot in depth, and from the top a tubular
+passage, formed of slender twigs interlaced, runs down the entire length
+of the nest, like a rain-pipe on the wall of a house, and then becoming
+external slopes upward, ending at a distance of two to three feet from
+the nest. Throughout South America there are several varieties of these
+fruit-and-stem or watering-pot shaped nests; they are not, however, all
+built by birds of one genus, while in the genus Synallaxis many species
+have no tubular passageways attached to their nests. One species--erythro
+thorax--in Yucatan, makes so large a nest of sticks, that the
+natives do not believe that so small a bird can be the builder. They say
+that when the _tzapatan_ begins to sing, all the birds in the forest
+repair to it, each one carrying a stick to add to the structure; only
+one, a tyrant-bird, brings two sticks, one for itself and one for the
+_urubú_ or vulture, that bird being considered too large, heavy, and
+ignorant of architecture to assist personally in the work.
+
+In the southern part of South America, where scattered thorn trees grow
+on a dry soil, these big nests are most abundant. "There are plains,"
+Mr. Barrows writes, "within two miles of the centre of this town
+(Concepcion, Argentine Republic), where I have stood and counted, from
+one point within a radius of twenty rods, over two hundred of these
+curious nests, varying in size from that of a small pumpkin to more than
+the volume of a barrel. Often a single tree will contain half a dozen
+nests or more; and, not unfrequently, the nests of several different
+species are seen crowding each other out of shape on the same bush or
+tree."
+
+It would be a mistake to think that the widely different nesting habits
+I have mentioned are found in different genera. I have just spoken of
+the big stick nests, with or without passage-ways, of the Synallaxes,
+yet the nest of one member of this group is simply a small straight tube
+of woven grass, the aperture only large enough to admit the finger, and
+open at both ends, so that the bird can pass in and out without turning
+round. Another species scoops a circular hollow in the soil, and builds
+over it a dome of fine woven grass. It should be mentioned that the
+nesting habits of only about fifteen out of the sixty-five species
+comprised in this genus are known to us. In the genus Furnarius the
+oven-shaped clay structure is known to be made by three species; a
+fourth builds a nest of sticks in a tree; a fifth burrows in the side of
+a bank, like a kingfisher.
+
+The explanation of the most striking features of the Dendrocolaptidae,
+their monotonous brown plumage, diversity of structure, versatile
+habits, and the marvellous development of the nest-making instinct which
+they exhibit is to be found, it appears to me, in the fact that they are
+the most defenceless of birds. They are timid, unresisting creatures,
+without strength or weapons; their movements arc less quick and vigorous
+than those of other kinds, and their flight is exceedingly feeble. The
+arboreal species flit at intervals from one tree to another; those that
+frequent thickets refuse to leave their chosen shelter; while those
+inhabiting grassy plains or marshes study concealment, and, when forced
+to rise, flutter away just above the surface, like flying-fish
+frightened from the water, and, when they have gone thirty or forty
+yards, dip into the grass or reeds again. Their life is thus one of
+perpetual danger in a far greater degree than with other passerine
+families, such as warblers, tyrants, finches, thrushes, &c.; while an
+exclusively insect diet, laboriously extracted from secret places, and
+inability to change their climate, contribute to make their existence a
+hard one. It has been with these birds as with human beings, bred in
+"misfortune's school," and subjected to keen competition. One of their
+most striking characteristics is a methodical, plodding, almost painful
+diligence of manner while seeking their food, so that when viewed side
+by side with other species, rejoicing in a gayer plumage and stronger
+flight, they seem like sober labourers that never rest among holiday
+people bent only on enjoyment. That they are able not only to maintain
+their existence, but to rise to the position of a dominant family, is
+due to an intelligence and adaptiveness exceeding that of other kinds,
+and which has been strengthened, and perhaps directly results from the
+hard conditions of their life.
+
+How great their adaptiveness and variability must be when we find that
+every portion of the South American continent is occupied by them; for
+there is really no climate, and no kind of soil or vegetation, which
+does not possess its appropriate species, modified in colour, form, and
+habits to suit the surrounding conditions. In the tropical region, so
+rich in bird life of all kinds, in forest, marsh, and savanna, they are
+everywhere abundant--food is plentiful there; but when we go to higher
+elevations avd cold sterile deserts, where their companion families of
+the tropics dwindle away and disappear, the creepers are still present,
+for they are evidently able to exist where other kinds would starve. On
+the stony plateaus of the Andes, and on the most barren spots in
+Patagonia, where no other bird is seen, there are small species of
+Synallaxis, which, in their obscure colour and motions on the ground,
+resemble mice rather than birds; indeed, the Quichua name for one of
+these Synallaxes is _ukatchtuka,_ or mouse-bird. How different is the
+life habit here from what we see in the tropical groups--the large birds
+with immense beaks, that run vertically on the trunks of the great
+forest trees!
+
+At the extreme southern extremity of the South American continent we
+find several species of Cin-clodes, seeking a subsistence like
+sandpipers on the beach; they also fly out to sea, and run about on the
+floating kelp, exploring the fronds for the small marine animals on
+which they live. In the dreary forests of Tierra del Fuego another
+creeper, Uxyurus, is by far the commonest bird. "Whether high up or low
+down, in the most gloomy, wet, and scarcely penetrable ravines," says
+Darwin, "this little bird is to be met with;" and Dr. Cunningham also
+relates that in these wintry, savage woods he was always attended in his
+walks by parties of these little creepers, which assembled to follow him
+out of curiosity.
+
+To birds placed at so great a disadvantage, by a feeble flight and other
+adverse circumstances, in the race of life bright colours would
+certainly prove fatal. It is true that brown is not in itself a
+protective colour, and the clear, almost silky browns and bright
+chestnut tints in several species are certainly not protective; but
+these species are sufficiently protected in other ways, and can afford
+to be without a strictly adaptive colour, so long as they are not
+conspicuous. In a majority of cases, however, the colour is undoubtedly
+protective, the brown hue being of a shade that assimilates very closely
+to the surroundings. There are pale yellowish browns, lined and mottled,
+in species living amidst a sere, scanty vegetation; earthy browns, in
+those frequenting open sterile or stony places; while the species that
+creep on trees in forests are dark brown in colour, and in many cases
+the feathers are mottled in such a manner as to make them curiously
+resemble the bark of a tree. The genera Lochmias and Sclerurus are the
+darkest, the plumage in these birds being nearly or quite black, washed
+or tinged with rhubarb yellow. Their black plumage would render them
+conspicuous in the sunshine, but they pass their lives in dense tropical
+forests, where the sun at noon sheds only a gloomy twilight.
+
+If "colour is ever tending to increase and to appear where it is
+absent," as Dr. Wallace believes, then we ought to find it varying in
+the direction of greater brightness in some species in a family so
+numerous and variable as the Dendrocolaptidae, however feeble and in
+need of a protective colouring these birds may be in a majority of
+pases. And this in effect we do find. In many of the dark-plumaged
+species that live in perpetual shade some parts are a very bright
+chestnut; while in a few that live in such close concealment as to be
+almost independent of protective colouring, the lower plumage has become
+pure white. A large number of species have a bright or nearly bright
+guiar spot. This is most remarkable in Synallaxis phryganophila, the
+chin being sulphur-yellow, beneath which is a spot of velvet-black, and
+on either side a white patch, the throat thus having three strongly
+contrasted colours, arranged in four divisions. The presence of this
+bright throat spot in so many species cannot very well be attributed to
+voluntary sexual selection, although believers in that theory are of
+course at liberty to imagine that when engaged in courtship, the male
+bird, or rather male and female both, as both sexes possess the spot,
+hold up their heads vertically to exhibit it. Perhaps it would be safer
+to look on it as a mere casual variation, which, like the exquisitely
+pencilled feathers and delicate tints on the concealed sides and under
+surfaces of the wings of many species possessing outwardly an obscure
+protective colouring, is neither injurious nor beneficial in any way,
+either to the birds or to the theory. It is more than probable, however,
+that in such small feeble-winged, persecuted birds, this spot of colour
+would prove highly dangerous on any conspicuous part of the body. In
+some of the more vigorous, active species, we can see a tendency towards
+a brighter colouring on large, exposed surfaces. In Auto-malus the tail
+is bright satiny rufous; in Pseudo-colaptes the entire under surface is
+rufous of a peculiar vivid tint, verging on orange or red; in Magarornis
+the bosom is black, and beautifully ornamented with small leaf-shaped
+spots of a delicate straw-colour. There are several other very pretty
+birds in this homely family; but the finest of all is Thripodectes
+flammulatus, the whole body being tortoise-shell colour, the wings and
+tail bright chesnut. The powerful tanager-like beak of this species
+seems also to show that it has diverged from its timid shade-loving
+congeners in another direction by becoming a seed and fruit eater.
+
+Probably the sober and generally protective colouring of the
+tree-creepers, even with the variability and adaptiveness displayed in
+their habits superadded, would be insufficient to preserve such feeble
+birds in the struggle of life without the further advantage derived from
+their wonderful nests. It has been said of domed nests that they are a
+danger rather than a protection, owing to their large size, which makes
+it easy for carnivorous species that prey on eggs and young birds to
+find them; while small open nests are usually well concealed. This may
+be the case with covered nests made of soft materials, loosely put
+together; but it cannot be said of the solid structure the tree-creeper
+bnilds, and which, as often as not, the bird erects in the most
+conspicuous place it can find, as if, writes Azara, it desired all the
+world to admire its work. The annual destruction of adult birds is very
+great--more than double that, I believe, which takes place in other
+passerine families. Their eggs and young are, however, practically safe
+in their great elaborate nests or deep burrows, and, as a rule, they lay
+more eggs than other kinds, the full complement being seldom less than
+five in the species I am acquainted with, while some lay as many as
+nine. Their nests are also made so as to keep out a greater pest than
+their carnivorous or egg-devouring enemies--namely, the parasitical
+starlings (Molo-thrus), which are found throughout South America, and
+are excessively abundant and destructive to birds' nests in some
+districts. In most cases, in the big, strong-domed nest or deep burrow,
+all the eggs are hatched and all the young reared, the thinning, out
+process commencing only after the brood has been led forth into a world
+beset with perils. With other families, on the contrary, the greatest
+amount of destruction falls on the eggs or fledglings. I have frequently
+kept a dozen or twenty pairs of different species--warblers, finches,
+tyrants, starlings, &c.--under observation during the breeding season,
+and have found that in some cases no young-were reared at all; in other
+cases one or two young; while, as often as not, the young actually
+reared were only parasitical starlings after all.
+
+I have still to speak of the voice of the tree-creepers, an important
+point in the study of these birds; for, though not accounted singers,
+some species emit remarkable sounds; moreover, language in birds is
+closely related to the social instinct. They seem to be rather solitary
+than gregarious; and this seems only natural in birds so timid,
+weak-winged, and hard pressed. It would also be natural to conclude from
+what has been said concerning their habits that they are comparatively
+silent; for, as a rule, vigorous social birds are loquacious and
+loud-voiced, while shy solitary kinds preservo silence, except in the
+love season. Nevertheless the creepers are loquacious and have loud
+resonant voices; this fact, however, does not really contradict a
+well-known principle, for the birds possess the social disposition in an
+eminent degree, only the social habit is kept down in them by the
+conditions of a life which makes solitude necessary. Thus, a large
+proportion of species are found to pair for life; and the only
+reasonable explanation of this habit in birds--one which is not very
+common in the mammalia--is that such species possess the social temper
+or feeling, and live in pairs only because they cannot afford to live in
+flocks. Strictly gregarious species pair only for the breeding season.
+In the creepers the attachment between the birds thus mated for life is
+very great, and, as Azara truly says of Anumbius, so fond of each
+other's society are these birds, that when one incubates the other sits
+at the entrance to the nest, and when one carries food to its young the
+other accompanies it, even if it has found nothing to cany. In these
+species that live in pairs, when the two birds are separated they are
+perpetually calling to each other, showing how impatient of solitude
+they are; while even from the more solitary kind, a high-pitched
+call-note is constantly heard in the woods, for these birds, debarred
+from associating together, satisfy their instinct by conversing with one
+another over long distances.
+
+The foregoing remarks apply to the Dendrocolap-tidae throughout the
+temperate countries of South America--the birds inhabiting extensive
+grassy plains and marshes, and districts with a scanty or scattered tree
+and bush vegetation. In the forest areas of the hotter regions it is
+different; there the birds form large gatherings or "wandering bands,"
+composed of all the different species found in each district, associated
+with birds of other families--wood-peckers, tyrant-birds, bush shrikes,
+and many others. These miscellaneous gatherings are not of rare
+occurrence, but out of the breeding season are formed daily, the birds
+beginning to assemble at about nine or ten o'clock in the morning,
+their number increasing through the day until it reaches its maximum
+between two and four o'clock in the afternoon, after which it begins to
+diminish, each bird going off to its customary shelter or
+dwelling-place. Mr. Bates, who first described these wandering bands,
+says that he could always find the particular band belonging to a
+district any day he wished, for when he failed to meet with it in one
+part of the forest he would try other paths, until he eventually found
+it. The great Amazonian forests, he tells us, appear strangely silent
+and devoid of bird life, and it is possible to ramble about for whole
+days without seeing or hearing birds. But now and then the surrounding
+trees and bushes appear suddenly swarming with them. "The bustling
+crowd loses no time, and, always moving in concert, each bird is
+occupied on its own account in searching bark, or leaf, or twig. In a
+few moments the host is gone, and the forest path remains deserted and
+silent as before." Stolzmann, who observed them in Peru, says that the
+sound caused by the busy crowd searching through the foliage, and the
+falling of dead leaves and twigs, resembles that produced by a shower of
+rain. The Indians of the Amazons, Mr. Bates writes, have a curious
+belief to explain these bird armies; they say that the Papa-uira,
+supposed to be a small grey bird, fascinates all the others, and leads
+them on a weary perpetual dance through the forest. It seems very
+wonderful that birds, at other times solitary, should thus combine daily
+in large numbers, including in their bands scores of widely different
+species, and in size ranging from those no larger than a wren to others
+as big as a magpie. It is certainly very advantageous to them. As Belt
+remarks, they play into each other's hands; for while the larger
+creepers explore the trunks of big trees, others run over the branches
+and cling to the lesser twigs, so that every tree in their route, from
+its roots to the topmost foliage, is thoroughly examined, and every
+spider and caterpillar taken, while the winged insects, driven from
+their lurking-places, are seized where they settle, or caught flying by
+the tyrant birds.
+
+I have observed the wandering bands only in Patagonia, where they are on
+a very small scale compared with those of the tropical forests. In the
+Patagonia thickets the small tit-like creeper, Laptas-thenura, is the
+prime mover; and after a considerable number of these have gathered,
+creepers of other species and genera unite with them, and finally the
+band, as it moves through the thickets, draws to itself other
+kinds--flycatchers, finches, &c.--many of the birds running or hopping
+on the ground to search for insects in the loose soil or under dead
+leaves, while others explore the thorny bushes. My observations of these
+small bands lead me to believe that everywhere in South America the
+Dendrocolaptidae are the first in combining to act in concert, and that
+the birds of other families follow their march and associate with them,
+knowing from experience that a rich harvest may be thus reaped. In the
+same way birds of various kinds follow the movements of a column of
+hunting ants, to catch the insects flying up from the earth to escape
+from their enemies; swallows also learn to keep company with the
+traveller on horseback, and, crossing and recrossing just before the
+hoofs, they catch the small twilight moths driven up from the grass.
+
+To return to the subject of voice. The tree-creepers do not possess
+melodious, or at any rate mellow notes, although in so numerous a family
+there is great variety of tone, ranging from a small reedy voice like
+the faint stridulation of a grasshopper, to the resounding,
+laughter-like, screaming concerts of Homorus, which may be heard
+distinctly two miles away. As a rule, the notes are loud ringing calls;
+and in many species the cry, rapidly reiterated, resembles a peal of
+laughter. With scarcely an exception, they possess no set song; but in
+most species that live always in pairs there are loud, vehement,
+gratulatory notes uttered by the two birds in concert when they meet
+after a brief separation. This habit they possess in common with birds
+of other families, as, for instance, the tyrants; but, in some creepers,
+out of this confused outburst of joyous sound has been developed a.
+musical performance very curious, and perhaps unique among birds. On
+meeting, the male and female, standing close together and facing each
+other, utter their clear ringing concert, one emitting loud single
+measured notes, while the notes of its fellow are rapid, rhythmical
+triplets; their voices have a joyous character, and seem to accord, thus
+producing a kind of harmony. This manner of singing is perhaps most
+perfect in the oven-bird, Furnarias, and it is very curious that the
+young birds, when only partially fledged, are constantly heard in the
+nest or oven apparently practising these duets in the intervals when the
+parents are absent; single measured notes, triplets, and long concluding
+trills are all repeated with wonderful fidelity, although these notes
+are in character utterly unlike the hunger cry, which is like that of
+other fledglings. I cannot help thinking that this fact of the young
+birds beginning to sing like the adults, while still confined in their
+dark cradle, is one of very considerable significance, especially when
+we consider the singular character of the performance; and that it might
+even be found to throw some light on the obscure question of the
+comparative antiquity of the different and widely separated
+Dendrocolaptine groups. It is a doctrine in evolutionary science that
+the early maturing of instincts in the young indicates a high antiquity
+for the species or group; and there is no reason why this principle
+should not be extended, in the case of birds at any rate, to language.
+It is true that Daines Barrington's notion that young song-birds learn
+to sing only by imitating the adults still holds its ground; and Darwin
+gives it his approval in his _Descent of Man._ It is perhaps one of
+those doctrines which are partially true, or which do not contain the
+whole truth; and it is possible to believe that, while many singing
+birds do so learn their songs, or acquire a greater proficiency in them
+from hearing the adults, in other species the song comes instinctively,
+and is, like other instincts and habits, purely an "inherited memory."
+
+The case of a species in another order of birds--Crypturi--strikes me as
+being similar to this of the oven-bird, and seems to lend some force to
+the suggestion I have made concerning the early development of voice in
+the young.
+
+Birds peculiar to South America are said by anatomists to be less
+specialized, lower, more ancient, than the birds of the northern
+continents, and among those which are considered lowest and most ancient
+are the Tinamous (rail and partridge like in their habits), birds that
+lead a solitary, retiring life, and in most cases have sweet melancholy
+voices. Rhynchotus rufescens, a bird the size of a fowl, inhabiting the
+pampas, is perhaps the sweetest-voiced, and sings with great frequency.
+Its song or call is heard oftenest towards the evening, and is composed
+of five modulated notes, flute-like in character, very expressive, and
+uttered by many individuals answering each other as they sit far apart
+concealed in the grass. As we might have expected, the faculties and
+instincts of the young of this species mature at a very early period;
+when extremely small, they abandon their parents to shift for themselves
+in solitude; and when not more than one-fourth the size they eventually
+attain, they acquire the adult plumage and are able to fly as well as an
+old bird. I observed a young bird of this species, less than a quail in
+size, at a house on the pampas, and was told that it had been taken from
+the nest when just breaking the shell; it had, therefore, never seen or
+heard the parent birds. Yet this small chick, every day at the approach
+of evening, would retire to the darkest corner of the dining room, and,
+concealed under a piece of furniture, would continue uttering its
+evening song for an hour or longer at short intervals, and rendering it
+so perfectly that I was greatly surprised to hear it; for a thrush or
+other songster at the same period of life, when attempting to sing, only
+produces a chirping sound.
+
+The early singing of the oven-bird fledgling is important, owing to the
+fact that the group it belongs to comprises the least specialized forms
+in the family. They are strong-legged, square-tailed, terrestrial birds,
+generally able to perch, have probing beaks, and build the most perfect
+mud or stick nests, or burrow in the ground. In the numerous
+tree-creeping groups, which, seem as unrelated to the oven-bird as the
+woodpecker is to the hoopoe, we find a score of wonderfully different
+forms of beak; but many of them retain the probing character, and are
+actually used to probe in rotten wood on trees, and to explore the holes
+and deep crevices in the trunk. We have also seen that some of these
+tree-creepers revert to the ancestral habit (if I may so call it) of
+seeking their food by probing in the soil. In others, like Dendrornis,
+in which the beak has lost this character, and is used to dig in the
+wood or to strip off the bark, it has not been highly specialized, and,
+compared with the woodpecker's beak, is a very imperfect organ,
+considering the purpose for which it is used. Yet, on the principle that
+"similar functional requirements frequently lead to the development of
+similar structures in animals which are otherwise very distinct"--as we
+see in the tubular tongue in honey-eaters and humming birds--we might
+have expected to find in the Dendrocolaptidae a better imitation of the
+woodpecker in so variable an organ as the beak, if not in the tongue.
+
+Probably the oven-birds, and their nearest relations--generalized,
+hardy, builders of strong nests, and prolific--represent the parental
+form; and when birds of this type had spread over the entire continent
+they became in different districts frequenters of marshes, forests,
+thickets and savannas. With altered life-habits the numerous divergent
+forms originated; some, like Xiphorynchus, retaining a probing beak in a
+wonderfully modified form, attenuated in an extreme degree, and bent
+like a sickle; others diverging more in the direction of nuthatches and
+woodpeckers.
+
+This sketch of the Dendrocolaptidae, necessarily slight and imperfect,
+is based on a knowledge of the habits of about sixty species, belonging
+to twenty-eight genera: from personal observation I am acquainted with
+less than thirty species. It is astonishing to find how little has been
+written about these most interesting birds in South America. One
+tree-creeper only, Furnarius rufus, the oven-bird _par excellence,_ has
+been mentioned, on account of its wonderful architecture, in almost
+every general work of natural history published during the present
+century; yet the oven-bird does not surpass, or even equal in interest,
+many others in this family of nearly three hundred members.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+
+In reading books of Natural History we meet with numerous instances of
+birds possessing the habit of assembling together, in many cases always
+at the same spot, to indulge in antics and dancing performances, with or
+without the accompaniment of music, vocal or instrumental; and by
+instrumental music is here meant all sounds other than vocal made
+habitually and during the more or less orderly performances; as, for
+instance, drumming and tapping noises; smiting of wings; and humming,
+whip-cracking, fan-shutting, grinding, scraping, and horn-blowing
+sounds, produced as a rule by the quills.
+
+There are human dances, in which only one person performs at a time, the
+rest of the company looking on; and some birds, in widely separated
+genera, have dances of this kind. A striking example is the Rupicola, or
+cock of-the-rock, of tropical South America. A mossy level spot of earth
+surrounded by bushes is selected for a dancing-place, and kept well
+cleared of sticks and stones; round this area the birds assemble, when a
+cock-bird, with vivid orange-scarlet crest and plumage, steps into it,
+and, with spreading wings and tail, begins a series of movements as if
+dancing a minuet; finally, carried away with excitement, he leaps and
+gyrates in the most astonishing manner, until, becoming exhausted, he
+retires, and another bird takes his place.
+
+In other species all the birds in a company unite in the set
+performances, and seem to obey an impulse which affects them
+simultaneously and in the same degree; but sometimes one bird prompts
+the others and takes a principal part. One of the most curious instances
+I have come across in reading is contained in Mr. Bigg-Wither's
+_Pioneering in South Brazil._ He relates that one morning in the dense
+forest his attention was roused by the unwonted sound of a bird
+singing--songsters being rare in that district. His men, immediately
+they caught the sound, invited him to follow them, hinting that he would
+probably witness a very curious sight. Cautiously making their way
+through the dense undergrowth, they finally came in sight of a small
+stony spot of ground, at the end of a tiny glade; and on this spot, some
+on the stone and some on the shrubs, were assembled a number of little
+birds, about the size of tom-tits, with lovely blue plumage and red
+top-knots. One was perched quite still on a twig, singing merrily, while
+the others were keeping time with wings and feet in a kind of dance, and
+all twittering an accompaniment. He watched them for some time, and was
+satisfied that they were having a ball and concert, and thoroughly
+enjoying themselves; they then became alarmed, and the performance
+abruptly terminated, the birds all going off in different directions.
+The natives told him that these little creatures were known as the
+"dancing birds."
+
+This species was probably solitary, except when assembling for the
+purpose of display; but in a majority of cases, especially in the
+Passerine order, the solitary species performs its antics alone, or with
+no witness but its mate. Azara, describing a small finch, which he aptly
+named _Oscilador,_ says that early and late in the day it mounts up
+vertically to a moderate height; then, flies off to a distance of
+twenty yards, describing a perfect curve in its passage; turning, it
+flies back over the imaginary line it has traced, and so on repeatedly,
+appearing like a pendulum swung in space by an invisible thread.
+
+Those who seek to know the cause and origin of this kind of display and
+of song in animals are referred to Darwin's _Descent of Man_ for an
+explanation. The greater part of that work is occupied with a laborious
+argument intended to prove that the love-feeling inspires the animals
+engaged in these exhibitions, and that sexual selection, or the
+voluntary selection of mates by the females, is the final cause of all
+set musical and dancing performances, as well as of bright and
+harmonious colouring, and of ornaments.
+
+The theory, with regard to birds is, that in the love-season, when the
+males are excited and engage in courtship, the females do not fall to
+the strongest and most active, nor to those that are first in the field;
+but that in a large number of species they are endowed with a faculty
+corresponding to the aesthetic feeling or taste in man, and deliberately
+select males for their superiority in some aesthetic quality, such as
+graceful or fantastic motions, melody of voice, brilliancy of colour, or
+perfection of ornaments. Doubtless all birds were originally
+plain-coloured, without ornaments and without melody, and it is assumed
+that so it would always have been in many cases but for the action of
+this principle, which, like natural selection, has gone on accumulating
+countless small variations, tending to give a greater lustre to the
+species in each case, and resulting in all that we most admire in the
+animal world--the Rupicola's flame-coloured mantle, the peacock's crest
+and starry train, the joyous melody of the lark, and the pretty or
+fantastic dancing performances of birds.
+
+My experience is that mammals and birds, with few exceptions--probably
+there are really no exceptions--possess the habit of indulging
+frequently in more or less regular or set performances, with or without
+sound, or composed of sound exclusively; and that these performances,
+which in many animals are only discordant cries and choruses,
+and uncouth, irregular motions, in the more aerial, graceful, and
+melodious kinds take immeasurably higher, more complex, and more
+beautiful forms. Among the mammalians the instinct appears
+almost universal; but their displays are, as a rule, less admirable than
+those seen in birds. There are some kinds, it is true, like the
+squirrels and monkeys, of arboreal habits, almost birdlike in their
+restless energy, and in the swiftness and certitude of their motions, in
+which the slightest impulse can be instantly expressed in graceful or
+fantastic action; others, like the Chinchillidae family, have greatly
+developed vocal organs, and resemble birds in loquacity; but mammals
+generally, compared with birds, are slow and heavy, and not so readily
+moved to exhibitions of the kind I am discussing.
+
+The terrestrial dances, often very elaborate, of heavy birds, like those
+of the gallinaceous kind, are represented in the more volatile species
+by performances in the air, and these are very much more beautiful;
+while a very large number of birds--hawks, vultures, swifts, swallows,
+nightjars, storks, ibises, spoonbills, and gulls--circle about in the
+air, singly or in flocks. Sometimes, in serene weather, they rise to a
+vast altitude, and float about in one spot for an hour or longer at a
+stretch, showing a faint bird-cloud in the blue, that does not change
+its form, nor grow lighter and denser like a flock of starlings; but in
+the seeming confusion there is perfect order, and amidst many hundreds
+each swift- or slow-gliding figure keeps its proper distance with such
+exactitude that no two ever touch, even with the extremity of the
+long-wings, flapping or motionless:--such a multitude, and such
+miraculous precision in the endless curving motions of all the members
+of it, that the spectator can lie for an hour on his back without
+weariness watching this mystic cloud-dance in the empyrean.
+
+The black-faced ibis of Patagonia, a bird nearly as large as a turkey,
+indulges in a curious mad performance, usually in the evening when
+feeding-time is over. The birds of a flock, while winging their way to
+the roosting-place, all at once seem possessed with frenzy,
+simultaneously dashing downwards with amazing violence, doubling about
+in the most eccentric manner; and when close to the surface rising again
+to repeat the action, all the while making the air palpitate for miles
+around with their hard, metallic cries. Other ibises, also birds of
+other genera, have similar aerial performances.
+
+The displays of most ducks known to me take the form of mock fights on
+the water; one exception is the handsome and loquacious whistling
+widgeon of La Plata, which has a pretty aerial performance. A dozen or
+twenty birds rise up until they appear like small specks in the sky, and
+sometimes disappear from sight altogether; and at that great altitude
+they continue hovering in one spot, often for an hour or longer,
+alternately closing and separating; the fine, bright, whistling notes
+and flourishes of the male curiously harmonizing with the grave,
+measured notes of the female; and every time they close they slap each
+other on the wings so smartly that the sound can be distinctly heard,
+like applauding hand-claps, even after the birds have ceased to be
+visible.
+
+The rails, active, sprightly birds with powerful and varied voices, are
+great performers; but owing to the nature of the ground they inhabit and
+to their shy, suspicious character, it is not easy to observe their
+antics. The finest of the Platan rails is the ypecaha, a beautiful,
+active bird about the size of the fowl. A number of ypecahas have their
+assembling place on a small area of smooth, level ground, just above the
+water, and hemmed in by dense rush beds. First, one bird among the
+rushes emits a powerful cry, thrice repeated; and this is a note of
+invitation, quickly responded to by other birds from all sides as they
+hurriedly repair to the usual place. In a few moments they appear, to
+the number of a dozen or twenty, bursting from the rushes and running
+into the open space, and instantly beginning the performance. This is a
+tremendous screaming concert. The screams they utter have a certain
+resemblance to the human voice, exerted to its utmost pitch and
+expressive of extreme terror, frenzy, and despair. A long, piercing
+shriek, astonishing for its vehemence and power, is succeeded by a lower
+note, as if in the first the creature had well nigh exhausted itself:
+this double scream is repeated several times, and followed by other
+sounds, resembling, as they rise and fall, half smothered cries of pains
+and moans of anguish. Suddenly the unearthly shrieks are renewed in all
+their power. While screaming the birds rush from side to side, as if
+possessed with madness, the wings spread and vibrating, the long-beak
+wide open and raised vertically. This exhibition lasts three or four
+minntes, after which the assembly peacefully breaks up.
+
+The singular wattled, wing-spurred, and long-, toed jacana has a
+remarkable performance, which seems specially designed to bring out the
+concealed beauty of the silky, greenish-golden wing-quills-The birds go
+singly or in pairs, and a dozen or fifteen individuals may be found in a
+marshy place feeding within sight of each other. Occasionally, in
+response to a note of invitation, they all in a moment leave off feeding
+and fly to one spot, and, forming a close cluster, and emitting short,
+excited, rapidly repeated notes, display their wings, like beautiful
+flags grouped loosely together: some hold the wings up vertically and
+motionless; others, half open and vibrating rapidly, while still others
+wave them up and down with a slow, measured motion.
+
+In the ypecaha and jacana displays both sexes take part. A stranger
+performance is that of the spur-winged lapwing of the same region--a
+species resembling the lapwing of Europe, but a third larger, brighter
+coloured, and armed with spurs. The lapwing display, called by the
+natives its "dance," or "serious dance"--by which they mean square
+dance--requires three birds for its performance, and is, so far as I
+know, unique in this respect. The birds are so fond of it that they
+indulge in it all the year round, and at frequent intervals during the
+day, also on moonlight nights. If a person watches any two birds for
+some time--for they live in pairs--he will see another lapwing, one of a
+neighbouring couple, rise up and fly to them, leaving his own mate to
+guard their chosen ground; and instead of resenting this visit as an
+unwarranted intrusion on their domain, as they would certainly resent
+the approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it with notes and
+signs of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place themselves
+behind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid march, uttering
+resonant drumming notes in time with their movements; the notes of the
+pair behind being emitted in a stream, like a drum-roll, while the
+leader utters loud single notes at regular intervals. The march ceases;
+the leader elevates his wings and stands erect and motionless, still
+uttering loud notes; while the other two, with puffed-out plumage and
+standing exactly abreast stoop forward and downward until the tips of
+their beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their rhythmical voices to a
+murmur, remain for some time in this posture. The performance is then
+over and the visitor goes back to his own ground and mate, to receive a
+visitor himself later on.
+
+In the Passerine order, not the least remarkable displays are witnessed
+in birds that are not accounted songsters, as they do not possess the
+highly developed vocal organ confined to the suborder Oscines. The
+tyrant-birds, which represent in South America the fly-catchers of the
+Old World, all have displays of some kind; in a vast majority of cases
+these are simply joyous, excited duets between male and female, composed
+of impetuous and more or less confused notes and screams, accompanied
+with beating of wings and other gestures. In some species choruses take
+the place of duets, while in others entirely different forms of display
+have been developed. In one group--Cnipolegus--the male indulges in
+solitary antics, while the silent, modest-coloured female keeps in
+hiding. Thus, the male of Cnipolegus Hudsoni, an intensely
+black-plumaged species with a concealed white wing-band, takes his stand
+on a dead twig on the summit of a bush. At intervals he leaves his
+perch, displaying the intense white on the quills, and producing, as the
+wings are thrown open and shut alternately, the effect of successive
+flashes of light. Then suddenly the bird begins revolving in the air
+about its perch, like a moth wheeling round and close to the flame of a
+candle, emitting a series of sharp clicks and making a loud humming with
+the wings. While performing this aerial waltz the black and white on the
+quills mix, the wings appearing like a grey mist encircling the body.
+The fantastic dance over, the bird drops suddenly on to its perch again;
+and, until moved to another display, remains as stiff and motionless as
+a bird carved out of jet.
+
+The performance of the scissors-tail, another tyrant-bird, is also
+remarkable. This species is grey and white, with black head and tail and
+a crocus-yellow crest. On the wing it looks like a large swallow, but
+with the two outer tail-feathers a foot long. The scissors-tails always
+live in pairs, but at sunset several pairs assemble, the birds calling
+excitedly to each other; they then mount upwards, like rockets, to a
+great height in the anand, after wheeling about for a few moments,
+pro-cipitate themselves downwards with amazing violence in a wild
+zigzag, opening and shutting the long tail-feathers like a pair of
+shears, and producing loud whirring sounds, as of clocks being wound
+rapidly up, with a slight pause after each turn of the key. This aerial
+dance over, they alight in separate couples on the tree tops, each
+couple joining in a kind of duet of rapidly repeated, castanet-like
+sounds.
+
+The displays of the wood-hewers, or Dendrocolap-tidae, another extensive
+family, resemble those of the tyrant-birds in being chiefly duets, male
+and female singing excitedly in piercing or resonant voices, and with
+much action. The habit varies somewhat in the cachalote, a Patagonian
+species of the genus Homorus, about the size of the missel-thrush. Old
+and young birds live in a family together, and at intervals, on any fine
+day, they engage in a grand screaming contest, which may be heard
+distinctly at a distance of a mile and a half. One bird mounts on to a
+bush and calls, and instantly all the others hurry to the spot, and
+burst out into a chorus of piercing cries that sound like peals and
+shrieks of insane laughter. After the chorus, they all pursue each other
+wildly about among the bushes for some minutes.
+
+In some groups the usual duet-like performances have developed into a
+kind of harmonious singing, which is very curious and pleasant to hear.
+This is pre-eminently the case with the oven-birds, as D'Orbigney first
+remarked. Thus, in the red oven-bird, the first bird, on the appearance
+of its mate flying to join it, begins to emit loud, measured notes, and
+sometimes a continuous trill, somewhat metallic in sound; but
+immediately on the other bird striking in this introductory passage is
+changed to triplets, strongly accented on the first note, in a _tempo
+vivace;_ while the second bird utters loud single notes in the same
+time. While thus singing they stand facing each other, necks
+outstretched and tails expanded, the wings of the first bird vibrating
+rapidly to the rapid utterance, while those of the second bird beat
+measured time. The finale consists of three or four notes, uttered by
+the second bird alone, strong and clear, in an ascending scale, the last
+very piercing.
+
+In the melodists proper the displays, in a majority of cases, are
+exclusively vocal, the singer sitting still on his perch. In the
+Troupials, a family of starling-like birds numbering about one hundred
+and forty species, there are many that accompany singing with pretty or
+grotesque antics. The male screaming cow-bird of La Plata, when perched,
+emits a hollow-sounding internal note that swells at the end into a
+sharp metallic ring, almost bell-like: this is uttered with wings and
+tail spread and depressed, the whole plumage being puffed out as in a
+strutting turkey-cock, while the bird hops briskly up and down on its
+perch as if dancing. The bell-like note of the male is followed by an
+impetuous scream from the female, and the dance ends. Another species,
+the common Argentine cow-bird of La Plata, when courting puffs out his
+glossy rich violet plumage, and, with wings vibrating, emits a
+succession of deep internal notes, followed by a set song in clear,
+ringing tones; and then, suddenly taking wing, he flies straight away,
+close to the surface, fluttering like a moth, and at a distance of
+twenty to thirty yards turns and flies in a wide circle round the
+female, singing loudly all the time, hedging her in with melody as it
+were.
+
+Many songsters in widely different families possess the habit of soaring
+and falling alternately while singing, and in some cases all the aerial
+postures and movements, the swift or slow descent, vertical, often, with
+oscillations, or in a spiral, and sometimes with a succession of smooth
+oblique lapses, seem to have an admirable correspondence with the
+changing and falling voice--melody and motion being united in a more
+intimate and beautiful way than in the most perfect and poetic forms of
+human dancing.
+
+One of the soaring singers is a small yellow field-finch of La
+Plata--Sycalis luteola; and this species, like some others, changes the
+form of its display with the seasons. It lives in immense flocks, and
+during the cold season it has, like most finches, only aerial pastimes,
+the birds wheeling about in a cloud, pursuing each other with lively
+chirpings. In August, when the trees begin to blossom, the flock betakes
+itself to a plantation, and, sitting on the branches, the birds sing in
+a concert of innumerable voices, producing a great volume of sound, as
+of a high wind when heard at a distance. Heard near, it is a great mass
+of melody; not a confused tangle of musical sounds as when a host of
+Troupials sing in concert, but the notes, although numberless, seem to
+flow smoothly and separately, producing an effect on the ear similar to
+that which rain does on the sight, when the sun shines on and lightens
+up the myriads of falling drops all falling one way. In this manner the
+birds sing for hours, without intermission, every day. Then the passion
+of love infects them; the pleasant choir breaks up, and its ten thousand
+members scatter wide over the surrounding fields and pasture lands.
+During courtship the male has a feeble, sketchy music, but his singing
+is then accompanied with very charming love antics. His circlings about
+the hen-bird; his numberless advances and retreats, and little soarings
+above her when his voice swells with importunate passion; his fluttering
+lapses back to earth, where he lies prone with outspread, tremulous
+wings, a suppliant at her feet, his languishing voice meanwhile dying
+down to lispings--all these apt and graceful motions seem to express the
+very sickness of the heart. But the melody during this emotional period
+is nothing. After the business of pairing and nest-building is over, his
+musical displays take a new and finer form. He sits perched on a stalk
+above the grass, and at intervals soars up forty or fifty yards high;
+rising, he utters a series of long melodious notes; then he descends in
+a graceful spiral, the set of the motionless wings giving him the
+appearance of a slowly-falling parachute; the voice then also falls, the
+notes coming lower, sweeter, and more expressive until he reaches the
+surface. After alighting the song continues, the strains becoming
+longer, thinner, and clearer, until they dwindle to the finest threads
+of sound and faintest tinklings, as from a cithern touched by fairy
+fingers. The great charm of the song is in this slow gradation from the
+somewhat throaty notes emitted by the bird when ascendino-to the
+excessively attenuated sounds at the close.
+
+In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one species more--the
+white-banded mocking-bird of Patagonia, which greatly excels all other
+songsters known to me in the copiousness, variety and brilliant
+character of its music. Concealed in the foliage this bird will sing by
+the half-hour, reproducing with miraculous fidelity the more or less
+melodious set songs of a score of species--a strange and beautiful
+performance; but wonderful as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceases
+to admire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, as if to show by
+contrast his unapproachable superiority, bursts into his own divine
+song, uttered with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, but
+greatly exceeding, that of the skylark "singing at heaven's gate;" the
+notes issuing in a continuous torrent; the voice so brilliant and
+infinitely varied, that if "rivalry and emulation" have as large a place
+in feathered breasts as some imagine all that hear this surpassing
+melody might well languish ever after in silent despair.
+
+In a vast majority of the finest musical performances the same notes are
+uttered in the same order, and after an interval the song is repeated
+without any variation: and it seems impossible that we could in any
+other way have such beautiful contrasts and harmonious lights and
+shades--the whole song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played in
+tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in the mocking-bird's
+song: the notes never come in the same order again and again, but, as if
+inspired, in a changed order, with variations and new sounds: and here
+again it has some resemblance to the skylark's song, and might be
+described as the lark's song with endless variations and brightened and
+spiritualized in a degree that cannot be imagined.
+
+This mocking-bird is one of those species that accompany music with
+appropriate motions. And just as its song is, so to speak, inspired and
+an im-provization, unlike any song the bird has ever uttered, so its
+motions all have the same character of spontaneity, and follow no order,
+and yet have a grace and passion and a perfect harmony with the music
+unparalleled among birds possessing a similar habit. While singing he
+passes from bush to bush, sometimes delaying a few moments on and at
+others just touching the summits, and at times sinking out of sight in
+the foliage: then, in an access of rapture, soaring vertically to a
+height of a hundred feet, with measured wing-beats, like those of a
+heron: or, mounting suddenly in a wild, hurried zigzag, then slowly
+circling downwards, to sit at last with tail outspread fanwise, and
+vans, glistening white in the sunshine, expanded and vibrating, or waved
+languidly up and down, with, a motion like that of some broad-winged
+butterfly at rest on a flower.
+
+I wish now to put this question: What relation that we can see or
+imagine to the passion of love and the business of courtship, have these
+dancing and vocal performances in nine cases out of ten? In such cases,
+for instance, as that of the scissors-tail tyrant-bird, and its
+pyrotechnic evening displays, when a number of couples leave their nests
+containing eggs and young to join in a wild aerial dance: the mad
+exhibitions of ypecahas and ibises, and the jacanas' beautiful
+exhibition of grouped wings: the triplet dances of the spur-winged
+lapwing, to perform which two birds already mated are compelled to call
+in a third bird to complete the set: the harmonious duets of the
+oven-birds, and the duets and choruses of nearly all the wood-hewers,
+and the wing-slapping aerial displays of the whistling widgeons--will it
+be seriously contended that the female of this species makes choice of
+the male able to administer the most vigorous and artistic slaps?
+
+The believer in the theory would put all these cases lightly aside, to
+cite that of the male cow-bird practising antics before the female and
+drawing a wide circle of melody round her; or that of the jet-black,
+automaton-like, dancing tyrant-bird; and concerning this species he
+would probably say that the plain-plumaged female went about unseen,
+critically watching the dancing of different males, to discover the most
+excellent performer according to the traditional standard. And this was,
+in substance, what Darwin did. There are many species in which the male,
+singly or with others, practises antics or sings during the love-season
+before the female; and when all such cases, or rather those that are
+most striking and bizarre, are brought together, and when it is
+gratuitously asserted that the females _do_ choose the males that show
+off in the best manner or that sing best, a case for sexual selection
+seems to be made out. How unfair the argument is, based on these
+carefully selected cases gathered from all regions of the globe, and
+often not properly reported, is seen when we turn from the book to
+nature and closely consider the habits and actions of all the species
+inhabiting any _one_ district. We see then that such cases as those
+described and made so much of in the _Descent of Man,_ and cases like
+those mentioned in this chapter, are not essentially different in
+character, but are manifestations of one instinct, which appears to be
+almost universal among the animals. The explanation I have to offer lies
+very much on the surface and is very simple indeed, and, like that of
+Dr. Wallace with regard [Footnote: It is curious to find that Dr.
+Wallace's idea about colour has been independently hit upon by Ruskin.
+Of stones he writes in _Frondes Agrestis_:--"I have often had occasion
+to allude to the apparent connection of brilliancy of colour with vigour
+of life and purity of substance. This is pre-eminently the case in the
+mineral kingdom. The perfection with which the particles of any
+substance unite in crystallization, corresponds in that kingdom to the
+vital power in organic nature."] to colour and ornaments covers the
+whole of the facts. We see that the inferior animals, when the
+conditions of life are favourable, are subject to periodical fits of
+gladness affecting them powerfully and standing out in vivid contrast to
+their ordinary temper. And we know what this feeling is--this periodic
+intense elation which even civilized man occasionally experiences when
+in perfect health, more especially when young. There are moments when
+he is mad with joy, when he cannot keep still, when his impulse is to
+sing and shout aloud and laugh at nothing, to run and leap and exert
+himself in some extravagant way. Among the heavier mammalians the
+feeling is manifested in loud noises, bellowings and screamings, and in
+lumbering, uncouth motions--throwing up of heels, pretended panics, and
+ponderous mock battles.
+
+In smaller and livelier animals, with greater celerity and certitude in
+their motions, the feeling shows itself in more regular and often in
+more complex ways. Thus, Felidae when young, and, in very agile,
+sprightly species like the Puma, throughout life, simulate all the
+actions of an animal hunting its prey--sudden, intense excitement of
+discovery, concealment, gradual advance, masked by intervening objects,
+with intervals of watching, when they crouch motionless, the eyes
+flashing and tail waved from side to side; finally, the rush and spring,
+when the playfellow is captured, rolled over on his back and worried to
+imaginary death. Other species of the most diverse kinds, in which voice
+is greatly developed, join in noisy concerts and choruses; many of the
+cats may be mentioned, also dogs and foxes, capybaras and other
+loquacious rodents; and in the howling monkeys this kind of performance
+rises to the sublime uproar of the tropical forest at eventide.
+
+Birds are more subject to this universal joyous instinct than mammals,
+and there are times when some species are constantly overflowing with
+it; and as they are so much freer than mammals, more buoyant and
+graceful in action, more loquacious, and have voices so much finer,
+their gladness shows itself in a greater variety of ways, with more
+regular and beautiful motions, and with melody. But every species, or
+group of species, has its own inherited form or style of performance;
+and, however rude and irregular this may be, as in the case of the
+pretended stampedes and fights of wild cattle, that is the form in which
+the feeling will always be expressed. If all men, at some exceedingly
+remote period in their history, had agreed to express the common glad
+impulse, which they now express in such an infinite variety of ways or
+do not express at all, by dancing a minuet, and minuet-dancing had at
+last come to be instinctive, and taken to spontaneously by children at
+an early period, just as they take to walking "on their hind legs,"
+man's case would be like that of the inferior animals.
+
+I was one day watching a flock of plovers, quietly feeding on the
+ground, when, in a moment, all the birds were seized by a joyous
+madness, and each one, after making a vigorous peck at his nearest
+neighbour, began running wildly about, each trying in passing to peck
+other birds, while seeking by means of quick doublings to escape being
+pecked in turn. This species always expresses its glad impulse in the
+same way; but how different in form is this simple game of
+touch-who-touch-can from the triplet dances of the spur-winged lapwings,
+with their drumming music, pompous gestures, and military precision of
+movement! How different also from the aerial performance of another bird
+of the same family--the Brazilian stilt--in which one is pursued by the
+others, mounting upwards in a wild, eccentric flight until they are all
+but lost to view; and back to earth again, and then, skywards once more;
+the pursued bird when overtaken giving place to another individual, and
+the pursuing pack making the air ring with their melodious barking
+cries! How different again are all these from the aerial pastimes of the
+snipe, in which the bird, in its violent descent, is able to produce
+such wonderful, far-reaching sounds with its tail-feathers! The snipe,
+as a rule, is a solitary bird, and, like the oscillating finch mentioned
+early in this paper, is content to practise its pastimes without a
+witness. In the gregarious kinds all perform together: for this feeling,
+like fear, is eminently contagious, and the sight of one bird mad with
+joy will quickly make the whole flock mad. There are also species that
+always live in pairs, like the scissors-tails already mentioned, that
+periodically assemble in numbers for the purpose of display. The crested
+screamer, a very large bird, may also be mentioned: male and female sing
+somewhat harmoniously together, with voices of almost unparalleled
+power: but these birds also congregate in large numbers, and a thousand
+couples, or even several thousands, may be assembled together: and, at
+intervals, both by day and night, all sing in concert, their combined
+voices producing a thunderous melody which seems to shake the earth. As
+a rule, however, birds that live always in pairs do not assemble for the
+purpose of display, but the joyous instinct is expressed by duet-like
+performances between male and female. Thus, in the three South American
+Passerine families, the tyrant-birds, wood-hewers, and ant-thrushes,
+numbering together between eight and nine hundred species, a very large
+majority appear to have displays of this description.
+
+In my own experience, in cases where the male and female together, or
+assembled with others, take equal parts in the set displays, the sexes
+arc similar, or differ little; but where the female takes no part in the
+displays the superiority of the male in brightness of colour is very
+marked. One or two instances bearing on this point may be given.
+
+A scarlet-breasted troupial of La Plata perches conspicuously on a tall
+plant in afield, and at intervals soars up vertically, singing, and, at
+the highest ascending point, flight and song end in a kind of aerial
+somersault and vocal flourish at the same moment. Meanwhile, the
+dull-plumaged female is not seen and not heard: for not even a skulking
+crake lives in closer seclusion under the herbage--so widely have the
+sexes diverged in this species. Is the female, then, without an instinct
+so common r--has she no sudden fits of irrepressible gladness?
+Doubtless she has them, and manifests them down in her place of
+concealment in lively chirpings and quick motions--the simple, primitive
+form in which gladness is expressed in the class of birds. In the
+various species of the genus Cnipolegus, already mentioned, the
+difference in the sexes is just as great as in the case of the troupial:
+the solitary, intensely black, statuesque male has, we have seen, a set
+and highly fantastic performance; but on more than one occasion I have
+seen four or five females of one species meet together and have a little
+simple performance all to themselves--in form a kind of lively mock
+fight.
+
+It might be objected that when a bird takes its stand and repeats a set
+finished song at intervals for an hour at a stretch, remaining quietly
+perched, such a performance appears to be different in character from
+the irregular and simple displays which are unmistakably caused by a
+sudden glad impulse. But we are familiar with the truth that in organic
+nature great things result from small beginnings--a common flower, and
+our own bony skulls, to say nothing of the matter contained within them,
+are proofs of it. Only a limited number of species sing in a highly
+finished manner. Looking at many species, we find every gradation, every
+shade, from the simple joyous chirp and cry to the most perfect melody.
+Even in a single branch of the true vocalists we may see it--from the
+chirping bunting, and noisy but tuneless sparrow, to linnet and
+goldfinch and canary. Not only do a large majority of species show the
+singing instinct, or form of display, in a primitive, undeveloped state,
+but in that state it continues to show itself in the young of many birds
+in which melody is most highly developed in the adult. And where the
+development has been solely in the male the female never rises above
+that early stage; in her lively chirpings and little mock fights and
+chases, and other simple forms which gladness takes in birds, as well as
+in her plainer plumage, and absence of ornament, she represents the
+species at some remote period. And as with song so with antics and all
+set performances aerial or terrestrial, from those of the whale and the
+elephant to those of the smallest insect.
+
+Another point remains to be noticed, and that is the greater frequency
+and fulness in displays of all kinds, including song, during the love
+season. And here Dr. Wallace's colour and ornament theory helps us to an
+explanation. At the season of courtship, when the conditions of life are
+most favourable vitality is at its maximum, and naturally it is then
+that the proficiency in all kinds of dancing-antics, aerial and
+terrestrial, appears greatest, and that melody attains its highest
+perfection. This applies chiefly to birds, but even among birds there
+are exceptions, as we have seen in the case of the field-finch, Sycalis
+luteola. The love-excitement is doubtless pleasurable to them, and it
+takes the form in which keenly pleasurable emotions are habitually
+expressed, although not infrequently with variations due to the greater
+intensity of the feeling. In some migrants the males arrive before the
+females, and no sooner have they recovered from the effects of their
+journey than they burst out into rapturous singing; these are not
+love-strains, since the females have not yet arrived, and pairing-time
+is perhaps a mouth distant; their singing merely expresses their
+overflowing gladness. The forest at that season is vocal, not only with
+the fine melody of the true songsters, but with hoarse cawings, piercing
+cries, shrill duets, noisy choruses, drummings, boomings, trills,
+wood-tappings--every sound with which different species express the glad
+impulse; and birds like the parrot that only exert their powerful voices
+in screamings--because "they can do no other"--then scream their
+loudest. When courtship begins it has in many cases the effect of
+increasing the beauty of the performance, giving added sweetness, verve,
+and brilliance to the song, and freedom and grace to the gestures and
+motions. But, as I have said, there are exceptions. Thus, some birds
+that are good melodists at other times sing in a feeble, disjointed
+manner during courtship. In Patagonia I found that several of the birds
+with good voices--one a mocking bird--were, like the robin at home,
+autumn and winter songsters.
+
+The argument has been stated very binefly: but little would be gained by
+the mere multiplication of instances, since, however many, they would bo
+selected instances--from a single district, it is true, while those in
+the _Descent of Man_ were brought together from an immeasurably wider
+field; but the principle is the same in both cases, and to what I have
+written it may be objected that, if, instead of twenty-five, I had given
+a hundred cases, taking them as they came, they might have shown a
+larger proportion of instances like that of the cow-bird, in which the
+male has a set performance practised only during the love-season and in
+the presence of the female.
+
+It is, no doubt, true that all collections of facts relating to animal
+life present nature to us somewhat as a "fantastic realm"--unavoidably
+so, in a measure, since the writing would be too bulky, or too dry, or
+too something inconvenient, if we did not take only the most prominent
+facts that come before us, remove them from their places, where alone
+they can be seen in their proper relations to numerous other less
+prominent facts, and rearrange them patch work-wise to make up our
+literature. But I am convinced that any student of the subject who will
+cast aside his books--supposing that they have not already bred a habit
+in his mind of seeing only "in accordance with verbal statement"--and go
+directly to nature to note the actions of animals for himself--actions
+which, in many cases, appear to lose all significance when set down in
+writing--the result of such independent investigation will be a
+conviction that conscious sexual selection on the part of the female is
+not the cause of music and dancing performances in birds, nor of the
+brighter colours and ornaments that distinguish the male. It is true
+that the females of some species, both in the vertebrate and insect
+kingdoms, do exercise a preference; but in a vast majority of species
+the male takes the female he finds, or that he is able to win from other
+competitors; and if we go to the reptile class we find that in the
+ophidian order, which excels in variety and richness of colour, there is
+no such thing as preferential mating; and if we go to the insect class,
+we find that in butterflies, which surpass all creatures in their
+glorious beauty, the female gives herself up to the embrace of the first
+male that appears, or else is captured by the strongest male, just as
+she might be by a mantis or some other rapacious insect.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA.
+
+_(Lagostomus Trichodactylus.)_
+
+
+The vizcacha is perhaps the most characteristic of the South American
+Rodentia, [Footnote: "According to Mr. Waterhouse, of all rodents the
+vizcacha is most nearly related to marsupials; but in the points in
+which it approaches this order its relations are general, that is, not
+to any one marsupial species more than to another. As these points of
+affinity are believed to be real and not merely adaptive, they must be
+due in accordance with our view to inheritance from a common progenitor.
+Therefore wo must suppose either that all rodents, including the
+vizcacha, branched off from some ancient marsupial, which will naturally
+have been more or less intermediate in character with respect to all
+existing marsupials; or, that both lodents and marsupials branched off
+from a common progenitor. ... On either view we must suppose that the
+vizcacha has retained, by inheritance, more of the characters of its
+ancient progenitor than have other rodents."--DARWIN; _Origin of
+Species._] while its habits, in some respects, are more interesting than
+those of any other rodent known: it is, moreover, the most common mammal
+we have on the pampas; and all these considerations have induced me to
+write a very full account of its customs. It is necessary to add that
+since the following pages were written at my home on the pampas a great
+war of extermination has been waged against this animal by the
+landowners, which has been more fortunate in its results--or unfortunate
+if one's sympathies are with the vizcacha--than the war of the
+Australians against their imported rodent--the smaller and more prolific
+rabbit.
+
+The vizcachas on the pampas of Buenos Ayres live in societies, usually
+numbering twenty or thirty members. The village, which is called
+Vizcachera, is composed of a dozen or fifteen burrows or mouths; for one
+entrance often serves for two or more distinct holes. Often, where the
+ground is soft, there are twenty or thirty or more burrows in an old
+vizcachera; but on stony, or "tosca" soil even an old one may have no
+more than four or five burrows. They are deep wide-mouthed holes, placed
+very close together, the entire village covering an area of from one
+hundred to two hundred square feet of ground.
+
+The burrows vary greatly in extent; and usually in a vizcachera there
+are several that, at a distance of from four to six feet from the
+entrance, open into large circular chambers. From these chambers other
+burrows diverge in all directions, some running horizontally, others
+obliquely downwards to a maximum depth of six feet from the surface:
+some of these burrows or galleries communicate with those of other
+burrows. A vast amount of loose earth is thus brought up, and forms a
+very irregular mound, fifteen to thirty inches above the surrounding
+level.
+
+It will afford some conception of the numbers of these vizcacheras on
+the settled pampas when I say that, in some directions, a person might
+ride five hundred miles and never advance half a mile without seeing one
+or more of them. In districts where, as far as the eye can see, the
+plains are as level and smooth as a bowling-green, especially in winter
+when the grass is close-cropped, and where the rough giant-thistle has
+not sprung up, these mounds appear like brown or dark spots on a green
+surface. They are the only irregularities that occur to catch the eye,
+and consequently form an important feature in the scenery. In some
+places they are so near together that a person on horseback may count a
+hundred of them from one point of view.
+
+The sites of which the vizcacha invariably makes choice to work on, as
+well as his manner of burrow-ing, adapt him peculiarly to live and
+thrive on the open pampas. Other burrowing species seem always to fix
+upon some spot where there is a bank or a sudden depression in the soil,
+or where there is rank herbage, or a bush or tree, about the roots of
+which to begin their kennel. They are averse to commence digging on a
+clear level surface, either because it is not easy for them where they
+have nothing to rest their foreheads against while scratching, or
+because they possess a wary instinct that impels them to place the body
+in concealment whilst working on the surface, thus securing the
+concealment of the burrow after it is made. Certain it is that where
+large hedges have been planted on the pampas, multitudes of opossums,
+weasels, skunks, armadillos, &c., come and make their burrows beneath
+them; and where there are no hedges or trees, all these species make
+their kennels under bushes of the perennial thistle, or where there is a
+shelter of some kind. The vizcacha, on the contrary, chooses an open
+level spot, the cleanest he can find to burrow on. The first thing that
+strikes the observer when viewing the vizcachera closely is the enormous
+size of the entrance of the burrows, or, at least, of several of the
+central ones in the mound; for there are usually several smaller outside
+burrows. The pit-like opening to some of these principal burrows is
+often four to six feet across the mouth, and sometimes deep enough for a
+tall man to stand up waist-deep in. How these large entrances can be
+made on a level surface may be seen when the first burrow or burrows of
+an incipient vizcachera are formed. It is not possible to tell what
+induces a vizcacha to be the founder of a new community; for they
+increase very slowly, and furthermore are extremely fond of each other's
+society; and it is invariably one individual that leaves his native
+village to found a new and independent one. If it were to have better
+pasture at hand, then he would certainly remove to a considerable
+distance; but he merely goes from forty to fifty or sixty yards off to
+begin his work. Thus it is that in desert places, where these animals
+are rare, a solitary vizcachera is never seen; but there are always
+several close together, though there may be no others on the surrounding
+plain for leagues. When the vizcacha has made his habitation, it is but
+a single burrow, with only himself for an inhabitant, perhaps for many
+months. Sooner or later, however, others join him: and these will be the
+parents of innumerable generations; for they construct no temporary
+lodging-place, as do the armadillos and other species, but their
+posterity continues in the quiet possession of the habitations
+bequeathed to it; how long, it is impossible to say. Old men who have
+lived all their lives in one district remember that many of the
+vizcacheras around them existed when they were children. It is
+invariably a male that begins a new village, and makes his burrow in the
+following manner, though he does not always observe the same method. He
+works very straight into the earth, digging a hole twelve or fourteen
+inches wide, but not so deep, at an angle of about 25 degrees with the
+surface. But after he has progressed inwards a few feet, the vizcacha is
+no longer satisfied with merely scattering away the loose earth he
+fetches up, but cleans it away so far in a straight line from the
+entrance, and scratches so much on this line (apparently to make the
+slope gentler), that he soon forms a trench a foot or more in depth, and
+often three or four feet in length. Its use is, as I have inferred, to
+facilitate the conveying of the loose earth as far as possible from the
+entrance of the burrow. But after a while the animal is unwilling that
+it should accumulate even at the end of this long passage; he therefore
+proceeds to make two additional trenches, that form an acute, sometimes
+a right angle, converging into the first, so that when the whole is
+completed it takes the form of a capital Y.
+
+These trenches are continually deepened and lengthened as the burrow
+progresses, the angular segment of earth between them, scratched away,
+until by degrees it has been entirely conveyed off, and in its place is
+the one deep great unsymmetrical mouth I have already described. There
+are soils that will not admit of the animals working in this manner.
+Where there are large cakes of "tosca" near the surface, as in many
+localities on the southern pampas, the vizcacha makes its burrow as best
+he can, and without the regular trenches. In earths that crumble much,
+sand or gravel, he also works under great disadvantages.
+
+The burrows are made best in the black and red moulds of the pampas; but
+even in such soils the entrances of many burrows are made differently.
+In some the central trench is wanting, or is so short that there appear
+but two passages converging directly into the burrow; or these two
+trenches may be so curved inwards as to form the segment of a circle.
+Many other forms may also be noticed, but usually they appear to be only
+modifications of the most common Y-shaped system.
+
+As I have remarked that its manner of burrowing has peculiarly adapted
+the vizcacha to the pampas, it may be asked what particular advantage a
+species that makes a wide-mouthed burrow possesses over those that
+excavate in the usual way. On a declivity, or at the base of rocks or
+trees, there would be none; but on the perfectly level and shelterless
+pampas, the durability of the burrow, a circumstance favourable to the
+animal's preservation, is owing altogether to its being made in this
+way, and to several barrows being made together. The two outer trenches
+diverge so widely from the mouth that half the earth brought out is cast
+behind instead of before it, thus creating a mound of equal height about
+the entrance, by which it is secured from water during great rainfalls,
+while the cattle avoid treading over the great pit-like entrances. But
+the burrows of the dolichotis, armadillo, and other species, when made
+on perfectly level ground, are soon trod on and broken in by cattle; in
+summer they are choked up with dust and rubbish; and, the loose earth
+having all been thrown up together in a heap on one side, there is no
+barrier to the water which in every great rainfall flows in and
+obliterates the kennel, drowning or driving out the tenant.
+
+I have been minute in describing the habitations of the vizcacha, as I
+esteem the subject of prime importance in considering the zoology of
+this portion of America. The vizcacha does not benefit himself alone by
+his perhaps unique style of burrowing; but this habit has proved
+advantageous to several other species, and has been so favourable to two
+of our birds that they are among the most common species found here,
+whereas without these burrows they would have been exceedingly rare,
+since the natural banks in which they breed are scarcely found anywhere
+on the pampas. I refer to the Minera (Geositta cunicularia), which makes
+its breeding-holes in the bank-like sides of the vizcacha's burrow, and
+to the little swallow (Atticora cyanoleuca) which breeds in these
+excavations when forsaken by the Minera. Few old vizcacheras are seen
+without some of these little parasitical burrows in them.
+
+Birds are not the only beings in this way related to the vizcachas: the
+fox and the weasel of the pampas live almost altogether in them. Several
+insects also frequent these burrows that are seldom found anywhere else.
+Of these the most interesting are:--a large predacious nocturnal bug,
+shining black, with red wings; a nocturnal Cicindela, a beautiful
+insect, with dark green striated wing-cases and pale red legs; also
+several diminutive wingless wasps. Of the last I have counted six
+species, most of them marked with strongly contrasted colours, black,
+red, and white. There are also other wasps that prey on the spiders
+found on the vizcachera. All these and others are so numerous on the
+mounds that dozens of them might there be collected any summer day; but
+if sought for in other situations they are exceedingly rare. If the dry
+mound of soft earth which the vizcacha elevates amidst a waste of humid,
+close-growing grass is not absolutely necessary to the existence of all
+these species, it supplies them with at least one favourable condition,
+and without doubt thereby greatly increases their numbers: they, too,
+whether predacious or preyed on, have so many relations with other
+outside species, and these again with still others, that it would be no
+mere fancy to say that probably hundreds of species are either directly
+or indirectly affected in their struggle for existence by the
+vizcacheras so abundantly sprinkled over the pampas.
+
+In winter the vizcachas seldom leave their burrows till dark, but in
+summer come out before sunset; and the vizcachera is then a truly
+interesting spectacle. Usually one of the old males first appears, and
+sits on some prominent place on the mound, apparently in no haste to
+begin his evening meal. When approached from the front he stirs not, but
+eyes the intruder with a bold indifferent stare. If the person passes to
+one side, he deigns not to turn his head.
+
+Other vizcachas soon begin to appear, each one quietly taking up his
+station at his burrow's mouth, the females, known by their greatly
+inferior size and lighter grey colour, sitting upright on their
+haunches, as if to command a better view, and indicating by divers
+sounds and gestures that fear and curiosity struggles in them for
+mastery; for they are always wilder and sprightlier in their motions
+than the males. With eyes fixed on the intruder, at intervals they dodge
+the head, emitting at the same time an internal note with great
+vehemence; and suddenly, as the danger comes nearer, they plunge
+simultaneously, with a startled cry, into their burrows. But in some
+curiosity is the strongest emotion; for, in spite of their fellow's
+contagious example, and already half down the entrance, again they start
+up to scrutinize the stranger, and will then often permit him to walk
+within five or six paces of them.
+
+Standing on the mound there is frequently a pair of burrowing owls
+(Pholeoptynx cunicularia). These birds generally make their own burrows
+to breed in, or sometimes take possession of one of the lesser outside
+burrows of the village; but their favourite residence, when not engaged
+in tending their eggs or young, is on the vizcachera. Here a pair will
+sit all day; and I have often remarked a couple close together on the
+edge of the burrow; and when the vizcacha came out in the evening,
+though but a hand's breadth from them, they did not stir, nor did he
+notice them, so accustomed are these creatures to each other. Usually a
+couple of the little burrowing Geositta are also present. They are
+lively creatures, running with great rapidity about the mound and bare
+space that surrounds it, suddenly stopping and jerking their tails in a
+slow deliberate manner, and occasionally uttering their cry, a trill, or
+series of quick short clear notes, resembling somewhat the shrill
+excessive laughter of a child. Among the grave, stationary vizcachas, of
+which they take no heed, perhaps half a dozen or more little swallows
+(Atticora cyanoleuca) are seen, now clinging altogether to the bank-like
+entrance of a burrow, now hovering over it in a moth-like manner, as if
+uncertain where to alight, and anon sweeping about in circles, but never
+ceasing their low and sorrowful notes.
+
+The vizcachera with all its incongruous inhabitants thus collected upon
+it is to a stranger one of the most novel sights the pampas afford.
+
+The vizcacha appears to be a rather common species over all the
+extensive Argentine territory; but they are so exceedingly abundant on
+the pampas inhabited by man, and comparatively so rare in the desert
+places I have been in, that I was at first much surprised at finding
+them so unequally distributed. I have also mentioned that the vizcacha
+is a tame familiar creature. This is in the pastoral districts, where
+they are never disturbed; but in wild regions, where he is scarce, he is
+exceedingly wary, coming forth long after dark, and plunging into his
+burrow on the slightest alarm, so that it is a rare thing to get a sight
+of him. The reason is evident enough; in desert regions the vizcacha has
+several deadly enemies in the larger rapacious mammals. Of these the
+puma or lion (Felis concolor) is the most numerous, as it is also the
+swiftest, most subtle, and most voracious; for, as regards these traits,
+the jaguar (F. onca) is an inferior animal. To the insatiable bloody
+appetite of this creature nothing comes amiss; he takes the male ostrich
+by surprise, and slays that wariest of wild things on his nest; He
+captures little birds with the dexterity of a cat, and hunts for diurnal
+armadillos; he comes unawares upon the deer and huanaco, and, springing
+like lightning on them, dislocates their necks before their bodies touch
+the earth. Often after he has thus slain them, he leaves their bodies
+untouched for the Polyborus and vulture to feast on, so great a delight
+does he take in destroying life. The vizcacha falls an easy victim to
+this subtle creature; and it is not to be wondered at that it becomes
+wild to excess, and rare in regions hunted over by such an enemy, even
+when all other conditions are favourable to its increase. But as soon
+as these wild regions are settled by man the pumas are exterminated, and
+the sole remaining foe of the vizcacha is the fox, comparatively an
+insignificant one.
+
+The fox takes up his residence in a vizcachera, and succeeds, after
+some quarrelling (manifested in snarls, growls, and other subterranean
+warlike sounds), in ejecting the rightful owners of one of the burrows,
+which forthwith becomes his. Certainly the vizcachas are not much
+injured by being compelled to relinquish the use of one of their kennels
+for a season or permanently; for, if the locality suits him, the fox
+remains with them always. Soon they grow accustomed to the unwelcome
+stranger; he is quiet and unassuming in demeanour, and often in the
+evening sits on the mound in their company, until they regard him with
+the same indifference they do the burrowing owl. But in spring, when the
+young vizcachas are large enough to leave their cells, then the fox
+makes them his prey; and if it is a bitch fox, with a family of eight or
+nine young to provide for, she will grow so bold as to hunt her helpless
+quarry from hole to hole, and do battle with the old ones, and carry off
+the young in spite of them, so that all the young animals in the village
+are eventually destroyed. Often when the young foxes are large enough to
+follow their mother, the whole family takes leave of the vizcachera
+where such cruel havoc has been made to settle in another, there to
+continue their depredations. But the fox has ever a relentless foe in
+man, and meets with no end of bitter persecutions; it is consequently
+much more abundant in desert or thinly settled districts than in such as
+are populous, so that in these the check the vizcachas receive from the
+foxes is not appreciable.
+
+The abundance of cattle on the pampas has made it unnecessary to use the
+vizcacha as an article of food. His skin is of no value; therefore man,
+the destroyer of his enemies, has hitherto been the greatest benefactor
+of his species. Thus they have been permitted to multiply and spread
+themselves to an amazing extent, so that the half-domestic cattle on the
+pampas are not nearly so familiar with man, or so fearless of his
+presence as are the vizcachas. It is not that they do him no injury, but
+because they do it indirectly, that they have so long enjoyed immunity
+from persecution. It is amusing to see the sheep-farmer, the greatest
+sufferer from the vizcachas, regarding them with such indifference as to
+permit them to swarm on his "run," and burrow within a stone's throw of
+his dwelling with impunity, and yet going a distance from home to
+persecute with unreasonable animosity a fox, skunk, or opossum on
+account of the small annual loss it inflicts on the poultry-yard. That
+the vizcacha has comparatively no adverse conditions to war with
+wherever man is settled is evident when we consider its very slow rate
+of increase, and yet see them in such incalculable numbers. The female
+has but one litter in the year of two young, sometimes of three. She
+becomes pregnant late in April, and brings forth in September; the
+period of gestation is, I think, rather less than five months.
+
+The vizcacha is about two years growing. A full-sized male measures to
+the root of the tail twenty-two inches, and weighs from fourteen to
+fifteen pounds; the female is nineteen inches in length, and her
+greatest weight nine pounds. Probably it is a long-lived, and certainly
+it is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green substance to eat it
+never drinks water; but after a long summer drought, when for months it
+has subsisted on bits of dried thistle-stalks and old withered grass, if
+a shower falls it will come out of its burrows even at noonday and drink
+eagerly from the pools. It has been erroneously stated that vizcachas
+subsist on roots. Their food is grass and seeds; but they may also
+sometimes eat roots, as the ground is occasionally seen scratched up
+about the burrows. In March, when the stalks of the perennial cardoon or
+Castile thistle (Cynara cardunculus) are dry, the vizcachas fell them by
+gnawing about their roots, and afterwards tear to pieces the great dry
+flower-heads to get the seeds imbedded deeply in them, of which they
+seem very fond. Large patches of thistle are often found served thus,
+the ground about them literally white with the silvery bristles they
+have scattered. This cutting down tall plants to get the seeds at the
+top seems very like an act of pure intelligence; but the fact is, the
+vizcachas cut down every tall plant they can. I have seen whole acres of
+maize destroyed by them, yet the plants cut down were left untouched. If
+posts be put into the ground within range of their nightly rambles they
+will gnaw till they have felled them, unless of a wood hard enough to
+resist their chisel-like incisors.
+
+The strongest instinct of this animal is to clear the ground thoroughly
+about its burrows; and it is this destructive habit that makes it
+necessary for cultivators of the soil to destroy all the vizcachas in or
+near their fields. On the uninhabited pampas, where the long grasses
+grow, I have often admired the vizcachera; for it is there the centre of
+a clean space, often of half an acre in extent, on which there is an
+even close-shaven turf: this clearing is surrounded by the usual rough
+growth of herbs and giant grasses. In such situations this habit of
+clearing the ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affords
+them a comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, and
+over which they can fly to their burrows without meeting any
+obstruction, on the slightest alarm.
+
+Of course the instinct continues to operate where it is no longer of any
+advantage. In summer, when the thistles are green, even when growing
+near the burrows, and the giant thistle (Carduus mariana) springs up
+most luxuriantly right on the mound, the vizcachas will not touch them,
+either disliking the strong astringent sap, or repelled by the thorns
+with which they are armed. As soon as they dry, and the thorns become
+brittle, they are levelled; afterwards, when the animal begins to drag
+them about and cut them up, as his custom is, he accidentally discovers
+and feasts on the seed: for vizcachas are fond of exercising their teeth
+on hard substances, such as sticks and bones, just as cats are of
+"sharpening their claws" on trees.
+
+Another remarkable habit of the vizcacha, that of dragging to and
+heaping about the mouth of his burrow every stalk he cuts down, and
+every portable object that by dint of great strength he can carry, has
+been mentioned by Azara, Darwin, and others. On the level plains it is a
+useful habit; for as the vizcachas are continually deepening and
+widening their burrows, the earth thrown out soon covers up these
+materials, and so assists in raising the mound. On the Buenos-Ayrean
+pampas numbers of vizcacheras would annually be destroyed by water in
+the great sudden rainfalls were the mounds loss high. But this is only
+an advantage when the animals inhabit a perfectly level country subject
+to flooding rains; for where the surface is unequal they invariably
+prefer high to low ground to burrow on, and are thus secured from
+destruction by water; yet the instinct is as strong in such situations
+as on the level plains. The most that can be said of a habit apparently
+so obscure in its origin and uses is, that it appears to be part of the
+instinct of clearing the ground about the village. Every tall stalk the
+vizcacha cuts down, every portable object he finds, must be removed to
+make the surface clean and smooth; but while encumbered with it he does
+not proceed further from his burrows, but invariably re-tires towards
+them, and so deposits it upon the mound. So well known is this habit,
+that whatever article is lost by night--whip, pistol, or knife--the
+loser next morning visits the vizcacheras in the vicinity, quite sure of
+finding it there. People also visit the vizcacheras to pick up sticks
+for firewood.
+
+The vizcachas are cleanly in their habits; and the fur, though it has a
+strong earthy smell, is kept exceedingly neat. The hind leg and foot
+afford a very beautiful instance of adaptation. Propped by the hard
+curved tail, they sit up erect, and as firmly on the long horny disks on
+the undersides of the hind legs as a man stands on his feet. Most to be
+admired, on the middle toe the skin thickens into a round cushion, in
+which the curved teeth-like bristles are set; nicely graduated in
+length, so that "each particular hair" may come into contact with the
+skin when the animal scratches or combs itself. As to the uses of this
+appendage there can be no difference of opinion, as there is about the
+serrated claw in birds. It is quite obvious that the animal cannot
+scratch himself with his hind paw (as all mammals do) without making use
+of this natural comb. Then the entire foot is modified, so that this
+comb shall be well protected, and yet not be hindered from performing
+its office: thus the inner toe is pressed close to the middle one, and
+so depressed that it comes under the cushion of skin, and cannot
+possibly get before the bristles, or interfere their coming against the
+skin in scratching, as certainly be the case if this toe were free as
+outer one.
+
+Again, the vizcachas appear to form the deep trenches before the burrows
+by scratching the earth violently backwards with the hind claws. Now
+these straight, sharp, dagger-shaped claws, and especially the middle
+one, are so long that the vizcacha is able to perform all this rough
+work without the bristles coming into contact with the ground, and so
+getting worn by the friction. The Tehuelcho Indians in Patagonia comb
+their hair with a brush-comb very much like that on the vizcacha's toe,
+but in their case it does not properly fulfil its office, or else the
+savages make little use of it. Vizcachas have a remarkable way of
+dusting themselves: the animal suddenly throws himself on his back, and,
+bringing over his hind legs towards his head, depresses them till his
+feet touch the ground. In this strange posture he scratches up the earth
+with great rapidity, raising a little cloud of dust, then rights himself
+with a jerk, and, after an interval, repeats the dusting. Usually they
+scratch a hole in the ground to deposit their excrements in. Whilst
+opening one of the outside burrows that had no communication with the
+others, I once discovered a vast deposit of their dung (so great that it
+must have been accumulating for years) at the extremity. To ascertain
+whether this be a constant, or only a casual habit, it would be
+necessary to open up entirely a vast number of vizcacheras. When a
+vizcacha dies in his burrow the carcass is, after some days, dragged out
+and left upon the mound.
+
+The language of the vizcacha is wonderful for its variety. When the male
+is feeding he frequently pauses to utter a succession of loud,
+percussive, and somewhat jarring cries; these he utters in a leisurely
+manner, and immediately after goes on feeding. Often he utters this cry
+in a low grunting tone. One of his commonest expressions sounds like the
+violent hawking of a man clearing his throat. At other times he bursts
+into piercing tones that may be heard a mile off, beginning like the
+excited and quick-repeated squeals of a young pig, and growing longer,
+more attenuated, and quavering towards the end. After retiring alarmed
+into the burrows, he repeats at intervals a deep internal moan. All
+these, and many other indescribable guttural, sighing, shrill, and deep
+tones, are varied a thousand ways in strength and intonation, according
+to the age, sex, or emotions of the individual; and I doubt if there is
+in the world any other four-footed thing so loquacious, or with a
+dialect so extensive. I take great pleasure in going to some spot where
+they are abundant, and sitting quietly to listen to them; for they are
+holding a perpetual discussion, all night long, which the presence of a
+human being will not interrupt.
+
+At night, when the vizcachas are all out feeding, in places where they
+are very abundant (and in some districts they literally swarm) any very
+loud and sudden sound, as the report of a gun, or a clap of unexpected
+thunder, will produce a most extraordinary effect. No sooner has the
+report broken on the stillness of night than a perfect storm of cries
+bursts forth over the surrounding country. After eight or nine seconds
+there is in the storm a momentary hill or pause; and then it breaks
+forth again, apparently louder than before. There is so much difference
+in the tones of different animals that the cries of individuals close at
+hand may be distinguished amidst the roar of blended voices coming from
+a distance. It sounds as if thousands and tens of thousands of them
+were striving to express every emotion at the highest pitch of their
+voices; so that the effect is indescribable, and fills a stranger with
+astonishment. Should a gun be fired off several times, their cries
+become less each time; and after the third or fourth time it produces no
+effect. They have a peculiar, sharp, sudden, "far-darting" alarm-note
+when a dog is spied, that is repeated by all that hear it, and produces
+an instantaneous panic, sending every vizcacha flying to his burrow.
+
+But though they manifest such a terror of dogs when out feeding at night
+(for the slowest dog can overtake them), in the evening, when sitting
+upon their mounds, they treat them with tantalizing contempt. If the dog
+is a novice, the instant he spies the animal he rushes violently at it;
+the vizcacha waits the charge with imperturbable calmness till his enemy
+is within one or two yards, and then disappears into the burrow. After
+having been foiled in this way many times, the dog resorts to stratagem:
+he crouches down as if transformed for the nonce into a Felis, and
+steals on with wonderfully slow and cautious steps, his hair bristling,
+tail hanging, and eyes intent on his motionless intended victim; when
+within seven or eight yards he makes a sudden rush, but invariably with
+the same dis-appointing result. The persistence with which the dogs go
+on hoping against hope in this unprofitable game, in which they always
+act the stupid part, is highly amusing, and is very interesting to the
+naturalist; for it shows that the native dogs on the pampas have
+developed a very remarkable instinct, and one that might be perfected by
+artificial selection; but dogs with the hunting habits of the cat would,
+I think, be of little use to man. When it is required to train dogs to
+hunt the nocturnal armadillo (Dasypus villosus), then this deep-rooted
+(and, it might be added, hereditary) passion for vizcachas is
+excessively annoying, and it is often necessary to administer hundreds
+of blows and rebukes before a dog is induced to track an armadillo
+without leaving the scent every few moments to make futile grabs at his
+old enemies.
+
+The following instance will show how little suspicion of man the
+vizcachas have. A few years ago I went out shooting them on three
+consecutive evenings. I worked in a circle, constantly revisiting the
+same burrows, never going a greater distance from home than could be
+walked in four or five minutes. During the three evenings I shot sixty
+vizcachas dead; and probably as many more escaped badly wounded into
+their burrows; for they are hard to kill, and however badly wounded, if
+sitting near the burrow when struck, are almost certain to escape into
+it. But on the third evening I found them no wilder, and killed about as
+many as on the first. After this I gave up shooting them in disgust; it
+was dull sport, and to exterminate or frighten them away with a gun
+seemed an impossibility.
+
+It is a very unusual thing to eat the vizcacha, most people, and
+especially the gauchos, having a silly unaccountable prejudice against
+their flesh. I have found it very good, and while engaged writing this
+chapter have dined on it served up in various ways. The young animals
+are rather insipid, the old males tough, but the mature females are
+excellent--the flesh being tender, exceedingly white, fragrant to the
+nostrils, and with a very delicate game-flavour.
+
+Within the last ten years so much new land has been brought under
+cultivation that farmers have been compelled to destroy incredible
+numbers of vizcachas: many large "estancieros" (cattle-breeders) have
+followed the example set by the grain-growers, and have had them
+exterminated on their estates. Now all that Azara, on hearsay, tells
+about the vizcachas perishing in their burrows, when these are covered
+up, but that they can support life thus buried for a period of ten or
+twelve days, and that during that time animals will come from other
+villages and disinter them, unless frightened off with dogs, is strictly
+true. Country workmen are so well acquainted with these facts that they
+frequently undertake to destroy all the vizcacheras on an estate for so
+paltry a sum as ten-pence in English money for each one, and yet will
+make double the money at this work than they can at any other. By day
+they partly open up, then cover up the burrows with a great quantity of
+earth, and by night go round with dogs to drive away the vizcachas from
+the still open burrows that come to dig out their buried friends. After
+all the vizcacheras on an estate have been thus served, the workmen are
+usually bound by previous agreement to keep guard over them for a space
+of eight or ten days before they receive their hire: for the animals
+covered up are then supposed to be all dead. Some of these men I have
+talked with have assured me that living vizcachas have been found after
+fourteen days--a proof of their great endurance. There is nothing
+strange, I think, in the mere fact of the vizcacha being unable to work
+his way out when thus buried alive; for, for all I know to the contrary,
+other species may, when their burrows are well covered up, perish in the
+same manner; but it certainly is remarkable that other vizcachas should
+come from a distance to dig out those that are buried alive. In this
+good office they are exceedingly zealous; and I have frequently
+surprised them after sunrise, at a considerable distance from their own
+burrows, diligently scratching at those that had been covered up. The
+vizcachas are fond of each other's society, and live peaceably together;
+but their goodwill is not restricted to the members of their own little
+community; it extends to the whole species, so that as soon as night
+comes many animals leave their own and go to visit the adjacent
+villages. If one approaches a vizcachera at night, usually some of the
+vizcachas on it scamper off to distant burrows: these are neighbours
+merely come to pay a friendly visit. This intercourse is so frequent
+that little straight paths are formed from one vizcachera to another.
+The extreme attachment between members of different communities makes it
+appear less strange that they should assist each other: either the
+desire to see, as usual, their buried neighbours becomes intense enough
+to impel them to work their way to them; or cries of distress from the
+prisoners reach and incite them to attempt their deliverance. Many
+social species are thus powerfully affected by cries of distress from
+one of their fellows; and some will attempt a rescue in the face of
+great danger--the weasel and the peccary for example.
+
+Mild and sociable as the vizcachas are towards each other, each one is
+exceedingly jealous of any intrusion into his particular burrow, and
+indeed always resents such a breach of discipline with the utmost fury.
+Several individuals may reside in the compartments of the same burrow;
+but beyond themselves not even their next-door neighbour is permitted to
+enter; their hospitality ends where it begins, at the entrance. It is
+difficult to compel a vizcacha to enter a burrow not his own; even when
+hotly pursued by dogs they often refuse to do so. When driven into one,
+the instant their enemies retire a little space they rush out of it, as
+if they thought the hiding-place but little less dangerous than the open
+plain. I have frequently seen vizcachas, chased into the wrong burrows,
+summarily ejected by those inside: and sometimes they make their escape
+only after being well bitten for their offence.
+
+I have now stated the most interesting facts I have collected concerning
+the vizcacha: when others rewrite its history they doubtless will,
+according to the opportunities of observation they enjoy, be able to
+make some additions to it, but probably none of great consequence. I
+have observed this species in Patagonia and Buenos Ayres only; and as I
+have found that its habits are considerably modified by circumstances in
+the different localities where I have met with it, I am sure that other
+variations will occur in the more distant regions, where the conditions
+vary.
+
+The most remarkable thing to be said about the vizcacha is, that
+although regarded by Mr. Waterhouse, and others who have studied its
+affinities, as one of the lowest of the rodents, exhibiting strong
+Marsupial characters, the living animal appears to be more intelligent
+than other rodents, not of South America only, but also of those of a
+higher type in other continents. A parallel case is, perhaps, to be
+found in the hairy armadillo, an extremely versatile and intelligent
+animal, although only an edentate. And among birds the ypecaha--a large
+La Plata rail--might also be mentioned as an example of what ought not
+to be; for it is a bold and intelligent bird, more than a match for the
+fowl, both in courage and in cunning; and yet it is one of the family
+which Professor Parker--from the point of view of the
+anatomist--characterizes as a "feeble-minded, cowardly group."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+THE DYING HUANACO.
+
+
+Lest any one should misread the title to this chapter, I hasten to say
+that the huanaco, or guanaco as it is often spelt, is not a perishing
+species; nor, as things are, is it likely to perish soon, despite the
+fact that civilized men, Britons especially, are now enthusiastically
+engaged in the extermination of all the nobler mammalians:--a very
+glorious crusade, the triumphant conclusion of which will doubtless be
+witnessed by the succeeding generation, more favoured in this respect
+than ours. The huanaco, happily for it, exists in a barren, desolate
+region, in its greatest part waterless and uninhabitable to human
+beings; and the chapter-heading refers to a singular instinct of the
+dying animals, in very many cases allowed, by the exceptional conditions
+in which they are placed, to die naturally.
+
+And first, a few words about its place in nature and general habits. The
+huanaco is a small camel--small, that is, compared with its existing
+relation--without a hump, and, unlike the camel of the Old World,
+non-specializad; doubtless it is a very ancient animal on the earth, and
+for all we know to the contrary, may have existed contemporaneously with
+some of the earliest known representatives of the camel type, whose
+remains occur in the lower and upper miocene deposits--Poebrotherium,
+Protolabis, Procamelus, Pliauchenia, and Macrauchenia. It ranges from
+Tierra del Fuego and the adjacent islands, northwards over the whole of
+Patagonia, and along the Andes into Peru and Bolivia. On the great
+mountain chain it is both a wild and a domestic animal, since the llama,
+the beast of burden of the ancient Peruvians, is no doubt only a
+variety: but as man's slave it has changed so greatly from the original
+form that some naturalists have regarded the llama as a distinct
+species, which, like the camel of the East, exists only in a domestic
+state. It has had time enough to vary, as it is more than probable that
+the tamed and useful animal was inherited by the children of the sun
+from races and nations that came before them: and how far back Andean
+civilization extends may be inferred from the belief expressed by the
+famous American archaeologist, Squiers, that the ruined city of
+Tiahuanaco, in the vicinity of Lake Titicaca, is as old as Thebes and
+the Pyramids.
+
+It is, however, with the wild animal, the huanaco, that I am concerned.
+A full-grown male measures seven to eight feet in length, and four feet
+high to the shoulder; it is well clothed in a coat of thick woolly hair,
+of a pale reddish colour, Longest and palest on the under parts. In
+appearance it is very unlike the camel, in spite of the long legs and
+neck; in its finely-shaped head and long ears, and its proud and
+graceful carriage, it resembles an antelope rather than its huge and,
+from an aesthetic point of view, deformed Asiatic relation. In habits it
+is gregarious, and is usually seen in small herds, but herds numbering
+several hundreds or even a thousand are occasionally met with on the
+stony, desolate plateaus of Southern Patagonia; but the huanaco is able
+to thrive and grow fat where almost any other herbivore would starve.
+While the herd feeds one animal acts as sentinel, stationed on the
+hillside, and on the appearance of danger utters a shrill neigh of
+alarm, and instantly all take to flight. But although excessively shy
+and wary they are also very inquisitive, and have enough intelligence to
+know that a single horseman can do them no harm, for they will not only
+approach to look closely at him, but will sometimes follow him for
+miles. They are also excitable, and at times indulge in strange freaks.
+Darwin writes:--"On the mountains of Tierra del Fuego I have more than
+once seen a huanaco, on being approached, not only neigh and squeal, but
+prance and leap about in a most ridiculous manner, apparently in
+defiance as a challenge." And Captain King relates that while sailing
+into Port Desire he witnessed a chase of a huanaco after a fox, both
+animals evidently going at their greatest speed, so that they soon
+passed out of sight. I have known some tame huanacos, and in that state
+they make amusing intelligent pets, fond of being caressed, but often so
+frolicsome and mischievous as to be a nuisance to their master. It is
+well known that at the southern extremity of Patagonia the huanacos have
+a dying place, a spot to which all individuals inhabiting the
+surrounding plains repair at the approach of death to deposit their
+bones. Darwin and Fitzroy first recorded this strange instinct in their
+personal narratives, and their observations have since been fully
+confirmed by others. The best known of these dying or burial-places are
+on the banks of the Santa Cruz and Gallegos rivers, where the river
+valleys are covered with dense primeval thickets of bushes and trees of
+stunted growth; there the ground is covered with the bones of countless
+dead generations. "The animals," says Darwin, "in most cases must have
+crawled, before dying, beneath and among the bushes." A strange instinct
+in a creature so preeminently social in its habits; a dweller all its
+life long on the open, barren plateaus and mountain sides! What a
+subject for a painter! The grey wilderness of dwarf thorn trees, aged
+and grotesque and scanty-leaved, nourished for a thousand years on the
+bones that whiten the stony ground at their roots; the interior lit
+faintly with the rays of the departing sun, chill and grey, and silent
+and motionless--the huanacos' Golgotha. In the long centuries,
+stretching back into a dim immeasurable past, so many of this race have
+journeyed hither from the mountain and the plain to suffer the sharp
+pang of death, that, to the imagination, something of it all seems to
+have passed into that hushed and mournful nature. And now one more, the
+latest pilgrim, has come, all his little strength spent in his struggle
+to penetrate the close thicket; looking old and gaunt and ghostly in the
+twilight; with long ragged hair; staring into the gloom out of
+death-dimmed sunken eyes. England has one artist who might show it to us
+on canvas, who would be able to catch the feeling of such a scene--of
+that mysterious, passionless tragedy of nature--I refer to J. M. Swan,
+the painter of the "Prodigal Son" and the "Lioness Defending her Cubs."
+
+To his account of the animal's dying place and instinct, Darwin adds: "I
+do not at all understand the reason of this, but I may observe that the
+wounded huanacos at the Santa Cruz invariably walked towards the river."
+
+It would, no doubt, be rash to affirm of any instinct that it is
+absolutely unique; but, putting aside some doubtful reports about a
+custom of the Asiatic elephant, which may have originated in the account
+of Sindbad the Sailor's discovery of an elephant's burial place, we have
+no knowledge of an instinct similar to that of the huanaco in any other
+animal. So far as we know, it stands alone and apart, with nothing in
+the actions of other species leading up, or suggesting any family
+likeness to it. But what chiefly attracts the mind to it is its
+strangeness. It looks, in fact, less like an instinct of one of the
+inferior creatures than the superstitious observance of human beings,
+who have knowledge of death, and believe in a continued existence after
+dissolution; of a triba that in past times had conceived the idea that
+the liberated spirit is only able to find its way to its future abode by
+starting at death from the ancient dying-place of the tribe or family,
+and thence moving westward, or skyward, or underground, over the
+well-worn immemorial track, invisible to material eyes.
+
+But, although alone among animal instincts-in its strange and useless
+purpose--for it is as absolutely useless to the species or race as to
+the dying individual--it is not the only useless instinct we know of:
+there are many others, both simple and complex; and of such instincts we
+believe, with good reason, that they once played an important part in
+the life of the species, and were only rendered useless by changes in
+the condition of life, or in the organism, or in both. In other words,
+when the special conditions that gave them value no longer existed, the
+correlated and perfect instinct was not, in these cases, eradicated, but
+remained, in abeyance and still capable of being called into activity by
+a new and false stimulus simulating the old and true. Viewed in this
+way, the huanaco's instinct might be regarded as something remaining to
+the animal from a remote past, not altogether unaffected by time
+perhaps; and like some ceremonial usage among men that has long ceased
+to have any significance, or like a fragment of ancient history, or a
+tradition, which in the course of time has received some new and false
+interpretation. The false interpretation, to continue the metaphor, is,
+in this case, that the _purpose_ of the animal in going to a certain
+spot, to which it has probably never previously resorted, is to die
+there. A false interpretation, because, in the first place, it is
+incredible that an instinct of no advantage to the species, in its
+struggle for existence and predominance should arise and become
+permanent; and, in the second place, it is equally incredible that it
+could ever have been to the advantage of the species or race to, have a
+dying place. We must, then, suppose that there is in the sensations
+preceding death, when death comes slowly, some resemblance to the
+sensations experienced by the animal at a period when its curious
+instinct first took form and crystallized; these would be painful
+sensations that threatened life; and freedom from them, and safety to
+the animal, would only exist in a certain well-remembered spot. Further,
+we might assume that it was at first only the memory of a few
+individuals that caused the animals to seek the place of safety; that a
+habit was thus formed; that in time this traditional habit became
+instinctive, so that the animals, old and young, made their way
+unerringly to the place of refuge whenever the old danger returned. And
+such an instinct, slowly matured and made perfect to enable this animal
+to escape extinction during periods of great danger to mammalian life,
+lasting hundreds or even thousands of years, and destructive of
+numberless other species less hardy and adaptive than the generalized
+huanaco, might well continue to exist, to be occasionally called into
+life by a false stimulus, for many centuries after it had ceased to be
+of any advantage.
+
+Once we accept this explanation as probable--namely, that the huanaco,
+in withdrawing from the herd to drop down and die in the ancient dying
+ground, is in reality only seeking an historically remembered place of
+refuge, and not of death--the action of the animal loses much of its
+mysterious character; we come on to firm ground, and find that we are no
+longer considering an instinct absolutely unique, with no action or
+instinct in any other animal leading up or suggesting any family
+likeness to it, as I said before. We find, in fact, that there is at
+least one very important and very well-known instinct in another class
+of creatures, which has a strong resemblance to that of the huanaco, as
+I have interpreted it, and which may even serve to throw a side light on
+the origin of the huanaco's instinct. I refer to a habit of some
+ophidians, in temperate and cold countries, of returning annually to
+hybernate in the saine den.
+
+A typical instance is that of the rattlesnake in the colder parts of
+North America. On the approach of winter these reptiles go into hiding,
+and it has been observed that in some districts a very large number of
+individuals, hundreds, and even thousands, will repair from the
+surrounding country to the ancestral den. Here the serpents gather in a
+mass to remain in a wholly or semi-torpid condition until the return of
+spring brings them out again, to scatter abroad to their usual summer
+haunts. Clearly in this case the knowledge of the hyberna-ting den is
+not merely traditional--that is, handed down from generation to
+generation, through the young each year following the adults, and so
+forming the habit of repairing at certain seasons to a certain place;
+for the young serpent soon abandons its parent to lead an independent
+life; and on the approach of cold weather the hybernating den may be a
+long distance away, ten or twenty, or even thirty miles from the spot in
+which it was born. The annual return to the hybernating den is then a
+fixed unalterable instinct, like the autumnal migration of some birds to
+a warmer latitude. It is doubtless favourable to the serpents to
+hybernate in large numbers massed together; and the habit of resorting
+annually to the same spot once formed, we can imagine that the
+individuals--perhaps a single couple in the first place--frequenting
+some very deep, dry, and well-sheltered cavern, safe from enemies, would
+have a great advantage over others of their race; that they would be
+stronger and increase more, and spread during the summer months further
+and further from the cavern on all sides; and that the further afield
+they went the more would the instinct be perfected; since all the young
+serpents that did not have the instinct of returning unerringly to the
+ancestral refuge, and that, like the outsiders of their race, to put it
+in that way, merely crept into the first hole they found on the approach
+of the cold season, would be more liable to destruction. Probably most
+snakes get killed long before a natural decline sets in; to say that not
+one in a thousand dies of old age would probably be no exaggeration; but
+if they were as safe from enemies and accidents as some less prolific
+and more highly-organized animals, so that many would reach the natural
+term of life, and death came slowly, we can imagine that in such a
+heat-loving creature the failure of the vital powers would simulate the
+sensations caused by a falling temperature, and cause the old or sick
+serpent, even in midsummer, to creep instinctively away to the ancient
+refuge, where many a long life-killing frost had been safely tided over
+in the past.
+
+The huanaco has never been a hybernating animal; but we must assume
+that, like the crotalus of the north, he had formed a habit of
+congregating with his fellows at certain seasons at the same spot;
+further, that these were seasons of suffering to the animal--the
+suffering, or discomfort and danger, having in the first place given
+rise to the habit. Assuming again that the habit had existed so long as
+to become, like that of the reptile, a fixed, immutable instinct, a
+hereditary knowledge, so that the young huanacos, untaught by the
+adults, would go alone and unerringly to the meeting-place from any
+distance, it is but an easy step to the belief, that after the
+conditions had changed, and the refuges were no longer needed, this
+instinctive knowledge would still exist in them, and that they would
+take the old road when stimulated by the pain of a wound; or the
+miserable sensations experienced in disease or during the decay of the
+life-energy, when the senses grow dim, and the breath fails, and the
+blood is thin and cold.
+
+I presume that most persons who have observed animals a great deal have
+met with cases in which the animal has acted automatically, or
+instinctively, when the stimulus has been a false one. I will relate one
+such case, observed by myself, and which strikes me as being apposite to
+the question I am considering. It must be premised that this is an
+instance of an acquired habit; but this does not affect my argument,
+since I have all along assumed that the huanaco--a highly sagacious
+species in the highest class of vertebrates--first acquired a habit from
+experience of seeking a remembered refuge, and that such habit was the
+parent, as it were, or the first clay model, of the perfect and
+indestructible instinct that was to be.
+
+It is not an uncommon thing in the Argentino pampas--I have on two
+occasions witnessed it myself--for a riding-horse to come home, or to
+the gate of his owner's house, to die. I am speaking of riding-horses
+that are never doctored, nor treated mercifully; that look on their
+master as an enemy rather than a friend; horses that live out in the
+open, and have to be hunted to the corral or enclosure, or roughly
+captured with a lasso as they run, when their services are required. I
+retain a very vivid recollection of the first occasion of witnessing an
+action of this kind in a horse, although I was only a boy at the time.
+On going out one summer evening I saw one of the horses of the
+establishment standing unsaddled and unbridled leaning his head over the
+gate. Going to the spot, I stroked his nose, and then, turning to an old
+native who happened to be near, asked him what could be the meaning of
+such a thing. "I think he is going to die," he answered; "horses often
+come to the house to die." And next morning the poor beast was found
+lying dead not twenty yards from the gate; although he had not appeared
+ill when I stroked his nose on the previous evening; but when I saw him
+lying there dead, and remembered the old native's words, it seemed to me
+as marvellous and inexplicable that a horse should act in that way, as
+if some wild creature--a rhea, a fawn, or dolichotes--had come to exhale
+his last breath at the gates of his enemy and constant persecutor, man.
+
+I now believe that the sensations of sickness and approaching death in
+the riding-horse of the pampas resemble or similate the pains, so often
+experienced, of hunger, thirst and fatigue combined, together with the
+oppressive sensations caused by the ponderous native saddle, or recado,
+with its huge surcingle of raw hide drawn up so tightly as to hinder
+free respiration. The suffering animal remembers how at the last relief
+invariably came, when the twelve or fifteen hours' torture were over,
+the toil and the want, and when the great iron bridle and ponderous gear
+were removed, and he had freedom and food and drink and rest. At the
+gate or at the door of his master's house, the sudden relief had always
+come to him; and there does he sometimes go in his sickness, his fear
+overmastered by his suffering, to find it again.
+
+Discussing this question with a friend, who has a subtle mind and great
+experience of the horse in semi-barbarous countries, and of many other
+animals, wild and tame, in many regions of the globe, he put forward a
+different explanation of the action of the horse in coming home to die,
+which he thinks simpler and more probable than mine. It is, that a dying
+or ailing animal instinctively withdraws itself from its fellows--an
+action of self-preservation in the individual in opposition to the
+well-known instincts of the healthy animals, which impels the whole herd
+to turn upon and persecute the sickly member, thus destroying its
+chances of recovery. The desire of the suffering animal is not only to
+leave its fellows, but to get to some solitary place where they cannot
+follow, or would never find him, to escape at once from a great and
+pressing danger. But on the pastoral pampas, where horses are so
+numerous that on that level, treeless area they are always and
+everywhere visible, no hiding-place is discoverable. In such a case, the
+animal, goaded by its instinctive fear, turns to the one spot that
+horses avoid; and although that spot has hitherto been fearful to him,
+the old fear is forgotten in the present and far more vivid one; the
+vicinity of his master's house represents a solitary place to him, and
+he seeks it, just as the stricken deer seeks the interior of some close
+forest, oblivious for the time, in its anxiety to escape from the herd,
+of the dangers lurking in it, and which he formerly avoided.
+
+I have not set this explanation down merely because it does credit to my
+friend's ingenuity, but because it strikes me that it is the only
+alternative explanation that can be given of the animal's action in
+coming home to die. Another fact concerning the ill-tamed and
+barbarously treated horses of the pampas, which, to my mind, strengthens
+the view I have taken, remains to be mentioned. It is not an uncommon
+thing for one of these horses, after escaping, saddled and bridled, and
+wandering about for anight or night and day on the plains, to return of
+its own accord to the house. It is clear that in a case of this kind the
+animal comes home to seek relief. I have known one horse that always had
+to be hunted like a wild animal to be caught, and that invariably after
+being saddled tried to break loose, to return in this way to the gate
+after wandering about, saddled and bridled, for over twenty hours in
+uncomfortable freedom.
+
+The action of the riding-horse returning to a master he is accustomed to
+fly from, as from an enemy, to be released of saddle and bridle, is, no
+doubt more intelligent than that of the dying horse coming home to be
+relieved from his sufferings, but the motive is the same in both cases;
+at the gate the only pain the animal has ever experienced has invariably
+begun, and there it has ended, and when the spur of some new pain
+afflicts him--new and yet like the old--it is to the well-remembered
+hated gate that it urges him.
+
+To return to the huanaco. After tracing the dying instinct back to its
+hypothetical origin--namely, a habit acquired by the animal in some past
+period of seeking refuge from some kind of pain and danger at a certain
+spot, it is only natural to speculate a little further as to the nature
+of that danger and of the conditions the animal existed in.
+
+If the huanaco is as old on the earth as its antique generalized form
+have led naturalists to suppose, we can well believe that it has
+survived not only a great many lost mammalian types, but many changes in
+the conditions of its life. Let us then imagine that at some remote
+period a change took place in the climate of Patagonia, and that it
+became colder and colder, owing to some cause affecting only that
+portion of the antarctic region; such a cause, for instance, as a great
+accumulation of icebergs on the northern shores of the antarctic
+continent, extending century by century until a large portion of the now
+open sea became blocked up with solid ice. If the change was gradual and
+the snow became deeper each winter and lasted longer, an intelligent,
+gregarious, and exceedingly hardy and active animal like the huanaco,
+able to exist on the driest woody fibres, would stand the beat chance of
+maintaining its existence in such altered conditions, and would form new
+habits to meet the new danger. One would be that at the approach of a
+period of deep snow and deadly cold, all the herds frequenting one
+place would gather together at the most favourable spots in the river
+valleys, where the vegetation is dense and some food could be had while
+the surrounding country continued covered with deep snow. They would, in
+fact, make choice of exactly such localities as are now used for dying
+places. There they would be sheltered from the cutting-winds, the twigs
+and bark would supply them with food, the warmth from a great many
+individuals massed together would serve to keep the snow partially
+melted under foot, and would prevent their being smothered, while the
+stiff and closely interlaced branches would keep a roof of snow above
+them, and thus protected they would keep alive until the return of mild
+weather released them. In the course of many generations all weakly
+animals, and all in which the habit of seeking the refuge at the proper
+time was weak or uncertain in its action would perish, but their loss
+would be an advantage to the survivors.
+
+It is worthy of remark that it is only at the southern extremity of
+Patagonia that the huanacos have dying places. In Northern Patagonia,
+and on the Chilian and Peruvian Andes no such instinct has been
+observed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+My purpose in this paper is to discuss a group of curious and useless
+emotional instincts of social animals, which have not yet been properly
+explained. Excepting two of the number, placed first and last in the
+list, they are not related in their origin; consequently they are here
+grouped together arbitrarily, only for the reason that we are very
+familiar with them on account of their survival in our domestic animals,
+and because they are, as I have said, useless; also because they
+resemble each other, among the passions and actions of the lower
+animals, in their effect on our minds. This is in all cases unpleasant,
+and sometimes exceedingly painful, as when species that rank next to
+ourselves in their developed intelligence and organized societies, such
+as elephants, monkeys, dogs, and cattle, are seen under the domination
+of impulses, in some cases resembling insanity, and in others simulating
+the darkest passions of man.
+
+These instincts are:--
+
+(1) The excitement caused by the smell of blood, noticeable in horses
+and cattle among our domestic animals, and varying greatly in degree,
+from an emotion so slight as to be scarcely perceptible to the greatest
+extremes of rage or terror.
+
+(2) The angry excitement roused in some animals when a scarlet or
+bright-red cloth is shown to them. So well known is this apparently
+insane instinct in our cattle that it has given rise to a proverb and
+metaphor familiar in a variety of forms to everyone.
+
+(3) The persecution of a sick or weakly animal by its companions.
+
+(4) The sudden deadly fury that seizes on the herd or family at the
+sight of a companion in extreme distress. Herbivorous mammals at such
+times will trample and gore the distressed one to death. In the case of
+wolves, and other savage-tempered carnivorous species, the distressed
+fellow is frequently torn to pieces and devoured on the spot.
+
+To take the first two together. When we consider that blood is red; that
+the smell of it is, or may be, or has been, associated with that vivid
+hue in the animal's mind; that blood, seen and smelt is, or has been,
+associated with the sight of wounds and with cries of pain and rage or
+terror from the wounded or captive animal, there appears at first sight
+to be some reason for connecting these two instinctive passions as
+having the same origin--namely, terror and rage caused by the sight of a
+member of the herd struck down and bleeding, or struggling for life in
+the grasp of an enemy. I do not mean to say that such an image is
+actually present in the animal's mind, but that the inherited or
+instinctive passion is one in kind and in its working with the passion
+of the animal when experience and reason were its guides.
+
+But the more I consider the point the more am I inclined to regard these
+two instincts as separate in their origin, although I retain the belief
+that cattle and horses and several wild animals are violently excited by
+the smell of blood for the reason just given--namely, their inherited
+memory associates the smell of blood with the presence among them of
+some powerful enemy that threatens their life. To this point I shall
+return when dealing with the last and most painful of the instincts I am
+considering.
+
+The following incident will show how violently this blood passion
+sometimes affects cattle, when they are permitted to exist in a
+half-wild condition, as on the pampas. I was out with my gun one day, a
+few miles from home, when I came across a patch on the ground where the
+grass was pressed or trodden down and stained with blood. I concluded
+that some thievish gauchos had slaughtered a fat cow there on the
+previous night, and, to avoid detection, had somehow managed to carry
+the whole of it away on their horses. As I walked on, a herd of cattle,
+numbering about three hundred, appeared moving slowly on towards a small
+stream a mile away; they were travelling in a thin long line, and would
+pass the blood-stained spot at a distance of seven to eight hundred
+yards, but the wind from it would blow across their track. When the
+tainted wind struck the leaders of the herd they instantly stood still,
+raising their heads, then broke out into loud excited bellowings; and
+finally turning they started off at a fast trot, following up the scent
+in a straight line, until they arrived at the place where one of their
+kind had met its death. The contagion spread, and before long all the
+cattle were congregated on the fatal spot, and began moving round in a
+dense mass, bellowing continually.
+
+It may be remarked here that the animal has a peculiar language on
+occasions like this; it emits a succession of short bellowing cries,
+like excited exclamations, followed by a very loud cry, alternately
+sinking into a hoarse murmur, and rising to a kind of scream that grates
+harshly on the sense. Of the ordinary "cow-music" I am a great admirer,
+and take as much pleasure in it as in the cries and melody of birds and
+the sound of the wind in trees; but this performance of cattle excited
+by the smell of blood is most distressing to hear.
+
+The animals that had forced their way into the centre of the mass to the
+spot where the blood was, pawed the earth, and dug it up with their
+horns, and trampled each other down in their frantic excitement. It was
+terrible to see and hear them. The action of those on the border of the
+living mass in perpetually moving round in a circle with dolorous
+bellowings, was like that of the women in an Indian village when a
+warrior dies, and all night they shriek and howl with simulated grief,
+going round and round the dead man's hut in an endless procession.
+
+The "bull and red rag" instinct, as it may be called, comes next in
+order. It is a familiar fact that brightness in itself powerfully
+attracts most if not all animals. The higher mammalians are affected in
+the same way as birds and insects, although not in the same degree. This
+fact partly explains the rage of the bull. A scarlet flag fluttering in
+the wind or lying on the grass attracts his attention powerfully, as it
+does that of other animals; but though curious about the nature of the
+bright object, it does not anger him. His anger is excited--and this is
+the whole secret of the matter--when the colour is flaunted by a man;
+when it forces him to fix his attention on a man, i.e. an animal of
+another species that rules or drives him, and that he fears, but with
+only a slight fear, which may at any moment be overcome by his naturally
+bold aggressive disposition, Not only does the vivid colour compel him
+to fix his attention on the being that habitually interferes with his
+liberty, and is consequently regarded with unfriendly eyes, but it also
+produces the illusion on his mind that the man is near him, that he is
+approaching him in an aggressive manner: it is an insult, a challenge,
+which, being of so explosive a temper, he is not slow to accept.
+
+On the pampas I was once standing with some gauchos at the gate of a
+corral into which a herd of half-wild cattle had just been driven. One
+of the men, to show his courage and agility, got off his horse and
+boldly placed himself in the centre of the open gate. His action
+attracted the attention of one of the nearest cows, and lowering her
+horns she began watching him in a threatening manner. He then suddenly
+displayed the scarlet lining of his poncho, and instantly she charged
+him furiously: with a quick movement to one side he escaped her horns,
+and after we had driven her back, resumed his former position and
+challenged her again in the same way. The experiment was repeated not
+less than half a dozen times, and always with the same result. The
+cattle were all in a savage temper, and would have instantly charged him
+on his placing himself before them on foot without the display of
+scarlet cloth, but their fear of the mounted men, standing with lassos
+in their hand on either side of him, kept them in check. But whenever
+the attention of any one individual among them was forcibly drawn to him
+by the display of vivid colour, and fixed on him alone, the presence of
+the horsemen was forgotten and fear was swallowed by rage. It is a fact,
+I think, that most animals that exhibit angry excitement when a scarlet
+rag is flourished aggressively at them, are easily excited to anger at
+all times. Domestic geese and turkeys may be mentioned among birds: they
+do not fly at a grown person, but they will often fly at a child that
+challenges them in this way; and it is a fact that they do not at any
+time fear a child very much and will sometimes attack him without being
+challenged. I think that the probability of the view I have taken is
+increased by another fact--namely, that the sudden display of scarlet
+colour sometimes affects timid animals with an extreme fear, just as, on
+the other hand, it excites those that are bold and aggressive to anger.
+Domestic sheep, forinstance, that vary greatly in disposition in
+different races or breeds, and even in different individuals, may be
+affected in the two opposite ways, some exhibiting extreme terror and
+others only anger at a sudden display of scarlet colour by the shepherd
+or herder.
+
+The persecution of a sick animal by its companions comes next under
+consideration.
+
+It will have been remarked, with surprise by some readers, no doubt,
+that I have set down as two different instincts this persecution of a
+sick or weakly individual by its fellows, and the sudden deadly rage
+that sometimes impels the herd to turn upon and destroy a wounded or
+distressed companion. It is usual for writers on the instincts of
+animals to speak of them as one: and I presume that they regard this
+sudden deadly rage of several individuals against a companion as merely
+an extreme form of the common persecuting instinct or impulse. They are
+not really one, but are as distinct in origin and character as it is
+possible for any two instincts to be. The violent and fatal impulse
+starts simultaneously into life and action, and is contagious, affecting
+all the members of the herd like a sudden madness. The other is neither
+violent nor contagious: the persecution is intermittent: it is often
+confined to one or to a very few members of the herd, and seldom joined
+in by the chief member, the leader or head to whom all the others give
+way.
+
+Concerning this head of the herd, or flock, or pack, it is necessary to
+say something more. Some gregarious animals, particularly birds, live
+together in the most perfect peace and amity; and here no leader is
+required, because in their long association together as a species in
+flocks, they have attained to a oneness of mind, so to speak, which
+causes them to move or rest, and to act at all times harmoniously
+together, as if controlled and guided by an extrane-ous force. I may
+mention that the kindly instinct in animals, which is almost universal
+between male and female in the vertebrates, is most apparent in these
+harmoniously acting birds. Thus, in La Plata, I have remarked, in more
+than one species, that a lame or sick individual, unable to keop pace
+with the flock and find its food, has not only been waited for, but in
+some cases some of the flock have constantly attended it, keeping close
+to it both when flying and on the ground; and, I have no doubt, feeding
+it just as they would have fed their young.
+
+Naturally among such kinds no one member is of more consideration than
+another. But among mammals such equality and harmony is rare. The
+instinct of one and all is to lord it over the others, with the result
+that one more powerful or domineering gets the mastery, to keep it
+thereafter as long as he can. The lower animals are, in this respect,
+very much like us; and in all kinds that are at all fierce-tempered the
+mastery of one over all, and of a few under him over the others, is most
+salutary; indeed, it is inconceivable that they should be able to exist
+together under any other system.
+
+On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to
+keep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these
+animals a great deal, and presume that they are very much like feral
+dogs and wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but when
+a fight begins the head of the pack as a rule rushes to the spot,
+whereupon the fighters separate and march off in different directions,
+or else cast themselves down and deprecate their tyrant's wrath with
+abject gestures and whines. If the combatants are both strong and have
+worked themselves into a mad rage before their head puts in an
+appearance, it may go hard with him: they know him no longer, and all he
+can do is to join in the fray; then, if the fighters turn on him, he may
+be so injured that his power is gone, and the next best dog in the pack
+takes his place. The hottest contests are always between dogs that are
+well matched; neither will give place to the other, and so they fight it
+out; but from the foremost in strength and power down to the weakest
+there is a gradation of authority; each one knows just how far he can
+go, which companion he can bully when he is in a bad temper or wishes to
+assert himself, and to which he must humbly yield in his turn. In such a
+state the weakest one must always yield to all the others, and cast
+himself down, seeming to call himself a slave and worshipper of any
+other member of the pack that chooses to snarl at him, or command him to
+give up his bone with a good grace.
+
+This masterful or domineering temper, so common among social mammals, is
+the cause of the persecution of the sick and weakly. When an animal
+begins to ail he can no longer hold his own; he ceases to resent the
+occasional ill-natured attacks made on him; his non-combative condition
+is quickly discovered, and he at once drops down to a place below the
+lowest; it is common knowledge in the herd that he may be buffeted with
+impunity by all, even by those that have hitherto suffered buffets but
+have given none. But judging from my own observation, this persecution,
+is not, as a rule, severe, and is seldom fatal.
+
+It is often the case that a sick or injured animal withdraws and hides
+himself from the herd; the instinct of the "stricken deer" this might be
+called. But I do not think that we need assume that the ailing
+individual goes away to escape the danger of being ill-used by his
+companions. He is sick and drooping and consequently unfit to be with
+the healthy and vigorous; that is the simplest and probably the true
+explanation of his action; although in some cases he might be driven
+from them by persistent rough usage. However peaceably gregarious
+mammals may live together, and however fond of each other's company they
+may be, they do not, as a rule, treat each other gently. Furthermore,
+their games are exceedingly rough and require that they shall be in a
+vigorous state of health to escape injury. Horned animals have no
+buttons to the sharp weapons they prod and strike each other with in a
+sportive spirit. I have often witnessed the games of wild and half-wild
+horses with astonishment; for it seemed that broken bones must result
+from the sounding kicks they freely bestowed on one another. This
+roughness itself would be a sufficient cause for the action of the
+individual, sick and out of tune and untouched by the glad contagion of
+the others, in escaping from them; and to leave them would be to its
+advantage (and to that of the race) since, if not fatally injured or
+sick unto death, its chances of recovery to perfect health would be
+thereby greatly increased.
+
+It remains now to speak of that seemingly most cruel of instincts which
+stands last on my list. It is very common among gregarious animals that
+are at all combative in disposition, and still survives in our domestic
+cattle, although very rarely witnessed in England. My first experience
+of it was just before I had reached the age of five years. I was not at
+that early period trying to find out any of nature's secrets, but the
+scene I witnessed printed itself very vividly on my mind, so that I can
+recall it as well as if my years had been five-and-twenty; perhaps
+better. It was on a summer's evening, and I was out by myself at some
+distance from the house, playing about the high exposed roots of some
+old trees; on the other side of the trees the cattle, just returned from
+pasture, were gathered on the bare level ground. Hearing a great
+commotion among them, I climbed on to one of the high exposed roots,
+and, looking over, saw a cow on the ground, apparently unable to rise,
+moaning and bellowing in a distressed way, while a number of her
+companions were crowding round and goring her.
+
+What is the meaning of such an instinct? Darwin has but few words on the
+subject. "Can we believe," he says, in his posthumous _Essay on
+Instinct, "_when a wounded herbivorous animal returns to its own herd
+and is then attacked and gored, that this cruel and very common instinct
+is of any service to the species?" At the same time, he hints that such
+an instinct might in some circumstances be useful, and his hint has been
+developed into the current belief among naturalists on the subject. Here
+it is, in Dr. Romanes' words: "We may readily imagine that the instinct
+displayed by many herbivorous animals of goring sick and wounded
+companions, is really of use in countries where the presence of weak
+members in a herd is a source of danger to the herd from the prevalence
+of wild beasts." Here it is assumed that the sick are set upon and
+killed, but this is not the fact; sickness and decay from age or some
+other cause are slow things, and increase imperceptibly, so that the
+sight of a drooping member grows familiar to the herd, as does that of a
+member with some malformation, or unusual shade of colour, or altogether
+white, as in the case of an albino.
+
+Sick and weak members, as we have seen, while subject to some
+ill-treatment from their companions (only because they can be
+ill-treated with impunity), do not rouse the herd to a deadly animosity;
+the violent and fatal attack is often as not made on a member in perfect
+health and vigour and unwounded, although, owing to some accident, in
+great distress, and perhaps danger, at the moment.
+
+The instinct is, then, not only useless but actually detrimental; and,
+this being so, the action of the herd in destroying one of its members
+is not even to be regarded as an instinct proper, but rather as an
+aberration of an instinct, a blunder, into which animals sometimes fall
+when excited to action in unusual circumstances.
+
+The first thing that strikes us is that in these wild abnormal moments
+of social animals, they are acting in violent contradiction to the whole
+tenor of their lives; that in turning against a distressed fellow they
+oppose themselves to the law of their being, to the whole body of
+instincts, primary and secondary, and habits, which have made it
+possible for them to exist together in communities. It is, I think, by
+reflecting on the abnormal character of such an action that we are led
+to a true interpretation of this "dark saying of Nature."
+
+Every one is familiar with Bacon's famous passage about the dog, and the
+noble courage which that animal puts on when "maintained by a man; who
+is to him in place of a God, or _melior natura;_ which courage is
+manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a better
+nature than its own, could never attain." Not so. The dog is a social
+animal, and acts instinctively in concert with his fellows; and the
+courage he manifests is of the family, not the individual. In the
+domestic state the man he is accustomed to associate with and obey
+stands to him in the place of the controlling pack, and to his mind,
+which is canine and not human, _is_ the pack. A similar "noble courage,"
+greatly surpassing that exhibited on all other occasions, is displayed
+by an infinite number of mammals and birds of gregarious habits, when
+repelling the attacks of some powerful and dangerous enemy, or when they
+rush to the rescue of one of their captive fellows. Concerning this rage
+and desperate courage of social animals in the face of an enemy, we see
+(1) that it is excited by the distressed cries, or by the sight of a
+member of the herd or family dying from or struggling in the clutches of
+an enemy; (2) that it affects animals when a number af individuals are
+together, and is eminently contagious, like fear, that communicates
+itself, quick as lightning, from one to another until all are in a
+panic, and like the joyous emotion that impels the members of a herd or
+flock to rush simultaneously into play.
+
+Now, it is a pretty familiar fact that animals acting instinctively, as
+well as men acting intelligently, have at times their delusions and
+their illusions, and see things falsely, and are moved to action by a
+false stimulus to their own disadvantage. When the individuals of a herd
+or family are excited to a sudden deadly rage by the distressed cries of
+one of their fellows, or by the sight of its bleeding wounds and the
+smell of its blood, or when they see it frantically struggling on the
+ground, or in the cleft of a tree or rock, as if in the clutches of a
+powerful enemy, they do not turn on it to kill but to rescue it.
+
+In whatever way the rescuing instinct may have risen, whether simply
+through natural selection or, as is more probable, through an
+intelligent habit becoming fixed and hereditary, its effectiveness
+depends altogether on the emotion of overmastering rage excited in the
+animal--rage against a tangible visible enemy, or invisible, and excited
+by the cries or struggles of a suffering companion; clearly, then, it
+could not provide against the occasional rare accidents that animals
+meet with, which causes them to act precisely in the way they do when
+seized or struck down by an enemy. An illusion is the result of the
+emotion similar to the illusion produced by vivid expectation in
+ourselves, which has caused many a man to see in a friend and companion
+the adversary he looked to see, and to slay him in his false-seeing
+anger.
+
+An illusion just as great, leading to action equally violent, but
+ludicrous rather than painful to witness, may be seen in dogs, when
+encouraged by a man to the attack, and made by his cries and gestures to
+expect that some animal they are accustomed to hunt is about to be
+unearthed or overtaken; and if, when they are in this disposition, he
+cunningly exhibits and sets them on a dummy, made perhaps of old rags
+and leather and stuffed with straw, they will seize, worry, and tear it
+to pieces with the greatest fury, and without the faintest suspicion of
+its true character.
+
+That wild elephants will attack a distressed fellow seemed astonishing
+to Darwin, when he remembered the case of an elephant after escaping
+from a pit helping its fellow to escape also. But it is precisely the
+animals, high or low in the organic scale, that are social, and possess
+the instinct of helping each other, that will on occasions attack a
+fellow in misfortune--such an attack being no more than a blunder of the
+helping instinct.
+
+Felix de Azara records a rather cruel experiment on the temper of some
+tame rats confined in a cage. The person who kept them caught the tail
+of one of the animals and began sharply pinching it, keeping his hand
+concealed under the cage. Its cries of pain and struggles to free itself
+greatly excited the other rats; and after rushing wildly round for some
+moments they flew at their distressed companion, and fixing their teeth
+in its throat quickly dispatched it. In this case if the hand that held
+the tail had been visible and in the cage, the bites would undoubtedly
+have been inflicted on it; but no enemy was visible; yet the fury and
+impulse to attack an enemy was present in the animals. In such
+circumstances, the excitement must be discharged--the instinct obeyed,
+and in the absence of any other object of attack the illusion is
+produced and it discharges itself on the struggling companion. It is
+sometimes seen in dogs, when three or four or five are near together,
+that if one suddenly utters a howl or cry of pain, when no man is near
+it and no cause apparent, the others run to it, and seeing nothing, turn
+round and attack each other. Here the exciting cause--the cry for
+help--is not strong enough to produce the illusion which is sometimes
+fatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly thinks that the
+others, or one of the others, inflicted the injury, and his impulse is
+to take the part of the injured animal. If the cry for help--caused
+perhaps by a sudden cramp or the prick of a thorn--is not very sharp or
+intense, the other dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl at
+each other in a suspicious way.
+
+To go back to Azara's anecdote. Why, it may be asked--and this question
+has been put to me in conversation--if killing a distressed companion is
+of no advantage to the race, and if something must be attacked--why did
+not these rats in this instance attack the cage they were shut in, and
+bite at the woodwork and wires? Or, in the case related by Mr. Andrew
+Lang in _Longman's Magazine_ some time ago, in which the members of a
+herd of cattle in Scotland turned with sudden amazing fury on one of the
+cows that had got wedged between two rocks and was struggling with
+distressed bellowings to free itself--why did they not attack the
+prisoning rocks instead of goring their unfortunate comrade to death?
+For it is well known that animals will, on occasions, turn angrily upon
+and attack inanimate objects that cause them injury or hinder their
+freedom of action. And we know that this mythic faculty--the mind's
+projection of itself into visible nature--survives in ourselves, that
+there are exceptional moments in our lives when it comes back to us; no
+one, for instance, would be astonished to hear that any man, even a
+philosopher, had angrily kicked away or imprecated a stool or other
+inanimate object against which he had accidentally barked his shins. The
+answer is, that there is no connection between these two things--the
+universal mythic faculty of the mind, and that bold and violent instinct
+of social animals of rushing to the rescue of a stricken or distressed
+companion, which has a definite, a narrow, purpose--namely, to fall upon
+an enemy endowed not merely with the life and intelligence common to all
+things, including rocks, trees, and waters, but with animal form and
+motion.
+
+I had intended in this place to give other instances, observed in
+several widely-separated species, including monkeys; but it is not
+necessary, as I consider that all the facts, however varied, are covered
+by the theory I have suggested--even a fact I like the one mentioned in
+this chapter of cattle bellowing and madly digging up the ground where
+the blood of one of their kind had been spilt: also such a fact as that
+of wild cattle and other animals caught in a trap or enclosure attacking
+and destroying each other in their frenzy; and the fact that some
+fierce-tempered carnivorous mammals will devour the companion they have
+killed. It is an instinct of animals like wolves and peccaries to devour
+the enemy they have overcome and slain: thus, when the jaguar captures a
+peccary out of a drove, and does not quickly escape with his prize into
+a tree, he is instantly attacked and slain and then consumed, even to
+the skin and bones. This is the wolf's and the peccary's instinct; and
+the devouring of one of their own companions is an inevitable
+consequence of the mistake made in the first place of attacking and
+killing it. In no other circumstances, not even when starving, do they
+prey on their own species.
+
+If the explanation I have offered should seem a true or highly probable
+one, it will, I feel sure, prove acceptable to many lovers of animals,
+who, regarding tins seemingly ruthless instinct, not as an aberration
+but as in some vague way advantageous to animals in their struggle for
+existence, are yet unable to think of it without pain and horror;
+indeed, I know those who refuse to think of it at all, who would gladly
+disbelieve it if they could.
+
+It should be a relief to them to be able to look on it no longer as
+something ugly and hateful, a blot on nature, but as an illusion, a
+mistake, an unconscious crime, so to speak, that has for its motive the
+noblest passion that animals know--that sublime courage and daring which
+they exhibit in defence of a distressed companion. This fiery spirit in
+animals, which makes them forget their own safety, moves our hearts by
+its close resemblance to one of the most highly-prized human virtues;
+just as we are moved to intellectual admiration by the wonderful
+migratory instinct in birds that simulates some of the highest
+achievements of the mind of man. And we know that this beautiful
+instinct is also liable to mistakes--that many travellers leave us
+annually never to return. Such a mistake was undoubtedly the cause of
+the late visitation of Pallas' sand-grouse: owing perhaps to some
+unusual atmospheric or dynamic condition, or to some change in the
+nervous system of the birds, they deviated widely from their usual
+route, to scatter in countless thousands over the whole of Europe and
+perish slowly in climates not suited to them; while others, overpassing
+the cold strange continent, sped on over colder, stranger seas, to drop
+at last like aerolites, quenching their lives in the waves.
+
+Whether because it is true, as Professor Freeman and some others will
+have it, that humanity is a purely modern virtue; or because the
+doctrine of Darwin, by showing that we are related to other forms of
+life, that our best feelings have their roots low down in the temper and
+instincts of the social species, has brought us nearer in spirit to the
+inferior animals, it is certain that our regard for them has grown, and
+is growing, and that new facts and fresh inferences that make us think
+more highly of them are increasingly welcome.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+HORSE AND MAN.
+
+
+There is no mode of progression so delightful as riding on horseback.
+Walking, rowing, bicycling are pleasant exercises in their way, but the
+muscular exertion and constant exercise of judgment they call for occupy
+the mind partly to the exclusion of other things; so that a long walk
+may sometimes be only a long walk and nothing more. In riding
+we are not conscious of exertion, and as for that close observation and
+accurate discernment necessary in traversing the ground with speed and
+safety, it is left to the faithful servant that carries us. Pitfalls,
+hillocks, slippery places, the thousand little inequalities of the
+surface that have to be measured with infallible eye, these disturb us
+little. To fly or go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough and
+smooth alike, fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hills
+without climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearest
+approach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster bubbles
+and flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from the days of
+Montgolfier downwards have brought us no nearer to it. The aeronaut
+gasping for breath above the clouds offers only a sad spectacle of the
+imbecility of science and man's shattered hopes. To the free inhabitants
+of air we can only liken the mounted Arab, vanishing, hawklike, over the
+boundless desert.
+
+In riding there is always exhilarating motion; yet, if the scenery
+encountered be charming, you are apparently sitting still, while,
+river-like, it flows toward and past you, ever giving place to fresh
+visions of beauty. Above all, the mind is free, as when one lies idly on
+the grass gazing up into the sky. And, speaking of myself, there is even
+more than this immunity from any tax on the understanding such as we
+require in walking; the rhythmic motion, the sensation as of night,
+acting on the brain like a stimulus. That anyone should be able to think
+better lying, sitting, or standing, than when speeding along on
+horseback, is to me incomprehensible. This is doubtless due to early
+training and long use; for on those great pampas where I first saw the
+light and was taught at a tender age to ride, we come to look on man as
+a parasitical creature, fitted by nature to occupy the back of a horse,
+in which position only he has full and free use of all his faculties.
+Possibly the gaucho--the horseman of the pampas--is born with this idea
+in his brain; if so, it would only be reasonable to suppose that its
+correlative exists in a modification of structure. Certain it is that an
+intoxicated gaucho lifted on to the back of his horse is perfectly safe
+in his seat. The horse may do his best to rid himself of his burden; the
+rider's legs--or posterior arms as they might appropriately be
+called--retain their iron grip, notwithstanding the fuddled brain.
+
+The gaucho is more or less bow-legged; and, of course, the more crooked
+his legs are, the better for him in his struggle for existence. Off his
+horse his motions are awkward, like those of certain tardigrade mammals
+of arboreal habits when removed from their tree. He waddles in his walk;
+his hands feel for the reins; his toes turn inwards like a duck's. And
+here, perhaps, we can see why foreign travellers, judging him from their
+own standpoint, invariably bring against him the charge of laziness. On
+horseback he is of all men most active. His patient endurance under
+privations that would drive other men to despair, his laborious days and
+feats of horsemanship, the long journeys he performs without rest or
+food, seem to simple dwellers on the surface of the earth almost like
+miracles. Deprive him of his horse, and he can do nothing but sit on
+the ground cross-legged, or _en cuclillas_,--on his heels. You have, to
+use his own figurative language, cut off his feet.
+
+Darwin in his earlier years appears not to have possessed the power of
+reading men with that miraculous intelligence always distinguishing his
+researches concerning other and lower orders of beings. In the _Voyage
+of a Naturalist,_ speaking of this supposed indolence of the gauchos, he
+tells that in one place where workmen were in great request, seeing a
+poor gaucho sitting in a listless attitude, he asked him why he did not
+work. The man's answer was that _he was too poor to work!_ The
+philosopher was astonished and amused at the reply, but failed to
+understand it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of brief
+phrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned? The
+poor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been stolen--a thing
+of frequent occurrence in that country, or, perhaps, that some minion of
+the Government of the moment had seized them for the use of the State.
+
+To return to the starting point, the pleasures of riding do not flow
+exclusively from the agreeable sensations attendant on flight-like
+motion; there is also the knowledge, sweet in itself, that not a mere
+cunningly fashioned machine, like that fabled horse of brass "on which
+the Tartar king did ride," sustains us; but a something with life and
+thought, like ourselves, that feels what we feel, understands us, and
+keenly participates in our pleasures. Take, for example, the horse on
+which some quiet old country gentleman is accustomed to travel; how
+soberly and evenly he jogs along, picking his way over the ground. But
+let him fall into the hands of a lively youngster, and how soon he picks
+up a frisky spirit! Were horses less plastic, more the creatures of
+custom than they are, it would always be necessary, before buying one,
+to inquire into the disposition of its owner.
+
+When I was thirteen years old I was smitten with love for a horse I once
+saw--an untamable-looking brute, that rolled his eyes, turbulently,
+under a cloud of black mane tumbling over his forehead. I could not take
+my sight off this proud, beautiful creature, and I longed to possess him
+with a great longing. His owner--a worthless vagabond, as it
+happened--marked my enthusiastic admiration, and a day or two
+afterwards, having lost all his money at cards, he came to me, offering
+to sell me the horse. Having obtained my father's consent, I rushed off
+to the man with all the money I possessed--about thirty or thirty-five
+shillings, I believe. After some grumbling, and finding he could get no
+more, he accepted the money. My new possession filled me with unbounded
+delight, and I spent the time caressing him and leading him about the
+grounds in search of succulent grasses and choice leaves to feed him on.
+I am sure this horse understood and loved me, for, in spite of that
+savage look, which his eyes never quite lost, he always displayed a
+singular gentleness towards me. He never attempted to upset me, though
+he promptly threw--to my great delight, I must confess--anyone else who
+ventured to mount him. Probably the secret of his conduct was that he
+hated the whip. Of this individual, if not of the species, the
+celebrated description held true:--"The horse is a docile animal, but if
+you flog him he will not do so." After he had been mine a few days, I
+rode on him one morning to witness a cattle-marking on a neighbouring
+estate. I found thirty or forty gauchos on the ground engaged in
+catching and branding the cattle. It was rough, dangerous work, but
+apparently not rough enough to satisfy the men, so after branding an
+animal and releasing him from their lassos, several of the mounted
+gauchos would, purely for sport, endeavour to knock it down as it rushed
+away, by charging furiously on to it. As I sat there enjoying the fun,
+my horse stood very quietly under me, also eagerly watching the sport.
+At length a bull was released, and, smarting from the fiery torture,
+lowered his horns and rushed away towards the open plain. Three horsemen
+in succession shot out from the crowd, and charged the bull at full
+speed; one by one, by suddenly swerving his body round, he avoided them,
+and was escaping scot-free. At this moment my horse--possibly
+interpreting a casual touch of my hand on his neck, or some movement of
+my body, as a wish to join in the sport--suddenly sprang forward and
+charged on the flying bull like a thunderbolt, striking him full in the
+middle of his body, and hurling him with a tremendous shock to earth.
+The stricken beast rolled violently over, while my horse stood still as
+a stone watching him. Strange to say, I was not unseated, but,
+turning-round, galloped back, greeted by a shout of applause from the
+spectators--the only sound of that description I have ever had the
+privilege of listening to. They little knew that my horse had
+accomplished the perilous feat without his rider's guidance. No doubt he
+had been accustomed to do such things, and, perhaps, for the moment, had
+forgotten that he had passed into the hands of a new owner--one of
+tender years. He never voluntarily attempted an adventure of that kind
+again; he knew, I suppose, that he no longer carried on his back a
+reckless dare-devil, who valued not life. Poor Picáso! he was mine till
+he died. I have had scores of horses since, but never one I loved so
+well.
+
+With the gauchos the union between man and horse is not of so intimate a
+nature as with the Indians of the pampas. Horses are too cheap, where a
+man without shoes to his feet may possess a herd of them, for the
+closest kind of friendship to ripen. The Indian has also less
+individuality of character. The immutable nature of the conditions he is
+placed in, and his savage life, which is a perpetual chase, bring him
+nearer to the level of the beast he rides. And probably the acquired
+sagacity of the horse in the long co-partnership of centuries has become
+hereditary, and of the nature of an instinct. The Indian horse is more
+docile, he understands his master better; the slightest touch of the
+hand on his neck, which seems to have developed a marvellous
+sensitiveness, is sufficient to guide him. The gaucho labours to give
+his horse "a silken mouth," as he aptly calls it; the Indian's horse has
+it from birth. Occasionally the gaucho sleeps in the saddle; the Indian
+can die on his horse. During frontier warfare one hears at times of a
+dead warrior being found and removed with difficulty from the horse that
+carried him out of the fight, and about whose neck his rigid fingers
+were clasped in death. Even in the gaucho country, however, where, I
+grieve to confess, the horse is not deservedly esteemed, there are very
+remarkable instances of equine attachment and fidelity to man, and of a
+fellowship between horse and rider of the closest kind. One only I will
+relate.
+
+When Rosas, that man of "blood and iron," was Dictator of the Argentine
+country--a position which he held for a quarter of a century--desertors
+from the army were inexorably shot when caught, as they generally were.
+But where my boyhood was spent there was a deserter, a man named Santa
+Anna, who for seven years, without ever leaving the neighbourhood of his
+home, succeeded in eluding his pursuers by means of the marvellous
+sagacity and watchful care exercised by his horse. When taking his rest
+on the plain--for he seldom slept under a roof--his faithful horse kept
+guard. At the first sight of mounted men on the horizon he would fly to
+his master, and, seizing his cloak between his teeth, rouse him with a
+vigorous shake. The hunted man would start up, and in a moment man and
+horse would vanish into one of the dense reed-beds abounding in the
+place, and where no man could follow. I have not space to tell more
+about this horse; but at last, in the fulness of time, when the figs
+were ripe--literally as well as figuratively, for it happened in the
+autumn of the year--the long tyrannous rule ended, and Santa Anna came
+out of the reed-beds, where he had lived his wild-animal life, to mix
+with his fellows. I knew him some years later. He was a rather
+heavy-looking man, with little to say, and his reputation for honesty
+was not good in the place; but I dare say there was something good in
+him.
+
+Students of nature are familiar with the modifying effects of new
+conditions on man and brute. Take, for example, the gaucho: he must
+every day traverse vast distances, see quickly, judge rapidly, be ready
+at all times to encounter hunger and fatigue, violent changes of
+temperature, great and sudden perils. These conditions have made him
+differ widely from the peasant of the Peninsula; he has the endurance
+and keen sight of a wolf, is fertile in expedients, quick in action,
+values human life not at all, and is in pain or defeat a Stoic.
+Unquestionably the horse he rides has also suffered a great change. He
+differs as much from the English hunter, for instance, as one animal can
+well differ from another of the same species. He never pounds the earth
+and wastes his energies in vain parade. He has not the dauntless courage
+that performs such brilliant feats in the field, and that often as not
+attempts the impossible. In the chase he husbands all his strength,
+carrying his head low, and almost grazing the ground with his hoofs, so
+that he is not a showy animal. Constant use, or the slow cumulative
+process of natural selection, has served to develop a keenness of sense
+almost preternatural. The vulture's eye, with all the advantage derived
+from the vulture's vast elevation above the scene surveyed, is not so
+far-reaching as the sense of smell in the pampa horse. A common
+phenomenon on the pampas is a sudden migration of the horses of a
+district to some distant place. This occurs in seasons of drought, when
+grass or water fails. The horses migrate to some district where, from
+showers having fallen or other circumstances, there is a better supply
+of food and drink. A slight breeze blowing from the more favoured
+region, which may be forty or fifty miles away, or even much further, is
+enough to start them off. Yet, during the scorching days of midsummer,
+very little moisture or smell of grass can possibly reach them from such
+a distance.
+
+Another phenomenon, even more striking, is familiar to every
+frontiersman. For some reason, the gaucho horse manifests the greatest
+terror at an Indian invasion. No doubt his fear is, in part at any rate,
+an associate feeling, the coming of the Indians being always a time of
+excitement and com-motion, sweeping like a great wave over the country;
+houses are in flames, families flying, cattle being driven at frantic
+speed to places of greater safety. Be this as it may, long before the
+marauders reach the settlement (often when they are still a whole day's
+journey from it) the horses take the alarm and come wildly flying in:
+the contagion quickly spreads to the horned cattle, and a general
+stampede ensues. The gauchos maintain that the horses _smell_ the
+Indians. I believe they are right, for when passing a distant Indian
+camp, from which the wind blew, the horses driven before me have
+suddenly taken fright and run away, leading me a chase of many miles.
+The explanation that ostriches, deer, and other fleet animals driven in
+before the invaders might be the cause of the stampede cannot be
+accepted, since the horses are familiar with the sight of these animals
+flying from their gaucho hunters.
+
+There is a pretty fable of a cat and dog lying in a dark room, aptly
+illustrating the fine senses of these two species. "Listen! I heard a
+feather drop!" said the dog. "Oh, no!" said the cat, "it was a needle;
+I saw it." The horse is not commonly believed to have senses keen as
+that, and a dog tracing his master's steps over the city pavement is
+supposed to be a feat no other animal can equal. No doubt the artificial
+life a horse lives in England, giving so little play to many of his most
+important faculties, has served to blunt them. He is a splendid
+creature; but the noble bearing, the dash and reckless courage that
+distinguish him from the modest horse of the desert, have not been
+acquired without a corresponding loss in other things. When ridden by
+night the Indian horse--and sometimes the same habit is found in the
+gaucho's animal--drops his head lower and lower as the darkness
+increases, with the danger arising from the presence of innumerable
+kennels concealed in the grass, until his nose sweeps the surface like a
+foxhound's. That this action is dictated by a powerful instinct of
+self-preservation is plain; for, when I have attempted to forcibly drag
+the animal's head up, he has answered such an experiment by taking the
+bit in his teeth, and violently pulling the reins out of my hand. His
+miraculous sense of smell measures the exact position of every hidden
+kennel, every treacherous spot, and enables him to pass swiftly and
+securely over it.
+
+On the desert pampa the gaucho, for a reason that he knows, calls the
+puma the "friend of man." The Arab gives this designation to his horse;
+but in Europe, where we do not associate closely with the horse, the dog
+naturally takes the foremost place in our affections. The very highest
+praise yet given to this animal is probably to be found in Bacon's essay
+on Atheism. "For take an example of a dog," he says, "and mark what a
+generosity and courage he will put on when he finds himself maintained
+by a man, who is to him in place of a god, or _melior natura,_ which
+courage is manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a
+better nature than its own, could never attain!" Can we not say as much
+of the horse? The very horses that fly terror-stricken from the smell of
+an Indian will, when "maintained by a man," readily charge into a whole
+host of yelling savages.
+
+I once had a horse at home, born and bred on the place, so docile that
+whenever I required him I could go to him where the horses were at
+pasture, and, though they all galloped off at my approach, he would
+calmly wait to be caught. Springing on to his back, I would go after the
+other horses, or gallop home with only my hand on his neck to guide him.
+I did not often ride him, as he was slow and lazy, but with timid women
+and children he was a favourite; he was also frequently used for farm
+work, in or out of harness, and I could shoot from his back. In the
+peach season he would roam about the plantation, getting the fruit, of
+which he was very fond, by tugging at the lower branches of the trees
+and shaking it down in showers. One intensely dark night I was riding
+home on this horse. I came through a road with a wire fence on each
+side, two miles in length, and when I had got nearly to the end of this
+road my horse suddenly stopped short, uttering a succession of loud
+terrified snorts. I could see nothing but the intense blackness of the
+night before me and tried to encourage him to go on. Touching him on
+the neck, I found his hair wet with the sudden profuse sweat of extreme
+fear. The whip made no impression on him. He continued to back away, his
+eyes apparently fixed on some object of horror just before him, while he
+trembled to such a degree that I was shaken in the saddle. He attempted
+several times to wheel round and run away, but I was determined not to
+yield to him, and continued the contest. Suddenly, when I was beginning
+to despair of getting home by that road, he sprang forward, and
+regularly charged the (to me) invisible object before him, and in
+another moment, when he had apparently passed it, taking the bit between
+his teeth he almost flew over the ground, never pausing till he brought
+me to my own door. When I dismounted his terror seemed gone, but he hung
+his head in a dejected manner, like a horse that has been under the
+saddle all day. I have never witnessed another such instance of almost
+maddening fear. His terror and apprehension were like what we can
+imagine a man experiencing at sight of a ghost in some dark solitary
+place.
+
+Yet he did not forcibly carry me away from it, as he might so easily
+have done; but, finding himself maintained by a "nature superior to his
+own," he preferred to face it. I have never met in the dog a more
+striking example of this noblest kind of brute courage. The incident did
+not impress me very much at the moment, but when I came to reflect that
+my sight was mere blindness compared with that of my horse, and that it
+was not likely his imagination clothed any familiar natural object with
+fantastic terrors, it certainly did impress me very deeply.
+
+I am loth to finish with, my subject, in which, to express myself in the
+manner of the gauchos, I have passed over many matters, like good grass
+and fragrant herbs the galloping horse sniffs at but cannot stay to
+taste; and especially loth to conclude with this last incident, which
+has in it an element of gloom. I would rather first go back for a few
+moments to my original theme--the pleasures of riding, for the sake of
+mentioning a species of pleasure my English reader has probably never
+tasted or even heard of. When riding by night on the pampas, I used to
+enjoy lying back on my horse till my head and shoulders rested well on
+his back, my feet also being raised till they pressed against his neck;
+and in this position, which practice can make both safe and comfortable,
+gaze up into the starry sky. To enjoy this method of riding thoroughly,
+a sure-footed unshod horse with perfect confidence in his rider is
+necessary; and he must be made to go at a swift and smooth pace over
+level grassy ground. With these conditions the sensation is positively
+delightful. Nothing of earth is visible, only the vast circle of the
+heavens glittering with innumerable stars; the muffled sound of the
+hoofs on the soft sward becomes in fancy only the rushing of the wings
+of our Pegasus, while the enchanting illusion that we are soaring
+through space possesses the mind. Unfortunately, however, this method of
+riding is impracticable in England. And, even if people with enthusiasm
+enough could be found to put it in practice by importing swift
+light-footed Arabian or pampa horses, and careering about level parks on
+dark starry nights, probably a shout of derision would be raised against
+so undignified a pastime.
+
+_Apropos_ of dignity, I will relate, in conclusion, an incident in my
+London life which may possibly interest psychologists. Some time ago in
+Oxford Street I got on top of an omnibus travelling west. My mind was
+preoccupied, I was anxious to get home, and, in an absent kind of way, I
+became irritated at the painfully slow rate of progress. It was all an
+old familiar experience, the deep thought, lessening pace, and
+consequent irritation. The indolent brute I imagined myself riding was,
+as usual, taking advantage of his rider's abstraction; but I would soon
+"feelingly persuade" him that I was not so far gone as to lose sight of
+the difference between a swinging gallop and a walk. So, elevating my
+umbrella, I dealt the side of the omnibus a sounding blow, very much to
+the astonishment of my fellow-passengers. So overgrown are we with
+usages, habits, tricks of thought and action springing from the soil we
+inhabit; and when we have broken away and removed ourselves far from it,
+so long do the dead tendrils still cling to us!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV,
+
+SEEN AND LOST,
+
+
+We can imagine what the feelings of a lapidary would be--an enthusiast
+whose life is given to the study of precious stones, and whose sole
+delight is in the contemplation of their manifold beauty--if a stranger
+should come in to him, and, opening his hand, exhibit a new unknown gem,
+splendid as ruby or as sapphire, yet manifestly no mere variety of any
+familiar stone, but differing as widely from all others as diamond from
+opal or cat's-eye; and then, just when he is beginning to rejoice in
+that strange exquisite loveliness, the hand should close and the
+stranger, with a mocking smile on his lips, go forth and disappear from
+sight in the crowd. A feeling such as that would be is not unfrequently
+experienced by the field naturalist whose favoured lot it is to live in
+a country not yet "thoroughly worked out," with its every wild
+inhabitant scientifically named, accurately described, and skilfully
+figured in some colossal monograph. One swift glance of the practised
+eye, ever eagerly searching for some new-thing, and he knows that here
+at length is a form never previously seen by him; but his joy is perhaps
+only for a few moments, and the prize is snatched from sight for ever.
+The lapidary might have some doubts; he might think that the stranger
+had, after all, only mocked him with the sight of a wonderful artificial
+gem, and that a close examination would have proved its worthlessness;
+but the naturalist can have no doubts: if he is an enthusiast, well
+acquainted with the fauna of his district, and has good eyesight, he
+knows that there is no mistake; for there it is, the new strange form,
+photographed by instantaneous process on his mind, and there it will
+remain, a tantalizing image, its sharp lines and fresh colouring
+unblurred by time.
+
+Walking in some open forest glade, he may look up just in time to see a
+great strange butterfly--a blue Morpho, let us say, wandering in some
+far country where this angel insect is unknown--passing athwart his
+vision with careless, buoyant flight, the most sylph-like thing in
+nature, and all blue and pure like its aerial home, but with a more
+delicate and wonderful brilliance in its cerulean colour, giving such
+unimaginable glory to its broad airy wings; and then, almost before his
+soul has had time to feel its joy, it may soar away unloitering over the
+tall trees, to be seen no more.
+
+But the admiration, the delight, and the desire are equally great, and
+the loss just as keenly felt, whether the strange species seen happens
+to be one surpassingly beautiful or not. Its newness is to the
+naturalist its greatest attraction. How beautiful beyond all others
+seems a certain small unnamed brown bird to my mind! So many years have
+passed and its image has not yet grown dim; yet I saw it only for a few
+moments, when it hopped out from, the thick foliage and perched within
+two or three yards of me, not afraid, but only curious; and after
+peering at me first with one eye and then the other, and wiping its
+small dagger on a twig, it flew away and was seen no more. For many days
+I sought for it, and for years waited its reappearance, and it was more
+to me than ninety and nine birds which I had always known; yet it was
+very modest, dressed in a brown suit, very pale on the breast and white
+on the throat, and for distinction a straw-coloured stripe over the
+eye--that ribbon which Queen Nature bestows on so many of her feathered
+subjects, in recognition, I suppose, of some small and common kind of
+merit. If I should meet with it in a collection I should know it again;
+only, in that case it would look plain and homely to me--this little
+bird that for a time made all others seem unbeautiful.
+
+Even a richer prize may come in sight for a brief period--one of the
+nobler mammalians, which are fewer in number, and bound to earth like
+ourselves, and therefore so much better known than the wandering
+children of air. In. some secluded spot, resting amidst luxuriant
+herbage or forest undergrowth, a slight rustling makes us start, and,
+lo! looking at us from the clustering leaves, a strange face; the
+leaf-like ears erect, the dark eyes round with astonishment, and the
+sharp black nose twitching and sniffing audibly, to take in the
+unfamiliar flavour of a human presence from the air, like the pursed-up
+and smacking lips of a wine-drinker tasting a new vintage. No sooner
+seen than gone, like a dream, a phantom, the quaint furry face to be
+thereafter only an image in memory.
+
+Sometimes the prize may be a very rich one, and actually within reach of
+the hand--challenging the hand, as it were, to grasp it, and yet
+presently slip away to be seen no more, although it maybe sought for day
+after day, with a hungry longing comparable to that of some poor tramp
+who finds a gold doubloon in the forest, and just when he is beginning
+to realize all that it means to him drops it in the grass and cannot
+find it again. There is not the faintest motion in the foliage, no
+rustle of any dry leaf, and yet we know that something has
+moved--something has come or has gone; and, gazing fixedly at one spot,
+we suddenly see that it is still there, close to us, the pointed
+ophidian head and long neck, not drawn back and threatening, but sloping
+forward, dark and polished as the green and purple weed-stems springing
+from marshy soil, and with an irregular chain of spots extending down
+the side. Motionless, too, as the stems it is; but presently the tongue,
+crimson and glistening, darts out and flickers, like a small jet of
+smoke and flame, and is withdrawn; then the smooth serpent head drops
+down, and the thing is gone.
+
+How I saw and lost the noble wrestling frog has been recounted in
+Chapter IV.: other tantalizing experiences of the same kind remain to be
+told in the present chapter, which is not intended for the severe
+naturalist, but rather for such readers as may like to hear something
+about the pains and pleasures of the seeker as well as the result of the
+seeking.
+
+One of my earliest experiences of seeing and losing relates to a
+humming-bird--a veritable "jewel of ornithology." I was only a boy at
+the time, but already pretty well acquainted with the birds of the
+district I lived in, near La Plata River, and among them were three
+species of the hummingbird. One spring day I saw a fourth--a wonderful
+little thing, only half as big as the smallest of the other three--the
+well-known Phaithornis splendens--and scarcely larger than a bumble-bee.
+I was within three feet of it as it sucked at the flowers, suspended
+motionless in the air, the wings appearing formless and mist-like from
+their rapid vibratory motion, but the rest of the upper plumage was seen
+distinctly as anything can be seen. The head and neck and upper part of
+the back were emerald green, with the metallic glitter usually seen in
+the burnished scale-like feathers of these small birds; the lower half
+of the back was velvet-black; the tail and tail-coverts white as snow.
+On two other occasions, at intervals of a few days, I saw this brilliant
+little stranger, always very near, and tried without success to capture
+it, after which, it disappeared from the plantation. Four years later I
+saw it once again not far from the same place. It was late in summer,
+and I was out walking on the level plain where the ground was carpeted
+with short grass, and nothing else grew there except a solitary stunted
+cardoou thistle-bush with one flower on its central stem above the
+grey-green artichoke-like leaves. The disc of the great thorny blossom
+was as broad as that of a sunflower, purple in colour, delicately
+frosted with white; on this flat disc several insects were
+feeding--flies, fireflies, and small wasps--and I paused for a few
+minutes in my walk to watch them. Suddenly a small misty object flew
+swiftly downwards past my face, and paused motionless in the air an inch
+or two above the rim of the flower. Once more my lost humming-bird,
+which I remembered so well! The exquisitely graceful form, half circled
+by the misty moth-like wings, the glittering green and velvet-black
+mantle, and snow-white tail spread open like a fan--there it hung like a
+beautiful bird-shaped gem suspended by an invisible gossamer thread.
+One--two--three moments passed, while I gazed, trembling with rapturous
+excitement, and then, before I had time to collect my faculties and make
+a forlorn attempt to capture it with my hat, away it flew, gliding so
+swiftly on the air that form and colour were instantly lost, and in
+appearance it was only an obscure grey line traced rapidly along the
+low sky and fading quickly out ol sight. And that was the last I ever
+saw of it.
+
+The case of this small "winged gem," still wandering nameless in the
+wilds, reminds me of yet another bird seen and lost, also remarkable for
+its diminutive size. For years I looked for it, and when the wished-for
+opportunity came, and it was in my power to secure it, I refrained; and
+Fate punished me by never permitting me to see it again. On several
+occasions while riding on the pampas I had caught glimpses of this
+minute bird flitting up mothlike, with uncertain tremulous flight, and
+again dipping into the weeds, tall grass, or thistles. Its plumage was
+yellowish in hue, like sere dead herbage, and its extremely slender body
+looked longer and slimmer than it was, owing to the great length of its
+tail, or of the two middle tail-feathers. I knew that it was a
+Synallaxis--a genus of small birds of the Woodhewer family. Now, as I
+have said in a former chapter, these are wise little birds, more
+interesting--I had almost said more beautiful--in their wisdom, or
+wisdom-simulating instincts, than the quatzel in its resplendent green,
+or the cock-of-the-rock in its vivid scarlet and orange mantle. Wrens
+and mocking-birds have melody for their chief attraction, and the name
+of each kind is, to our minds, also the name of a certain kind of sweet
+music; we think of swifts and swallows in connection with the mysterious
+migratory instinct; and humming-birds have a glittering mantle, and the
+miraculous motions necessary to display its ever-changing iridescent
+beauty. In like manner, the homely Dendrocolaptidae possess the genius
+for building, and an account of one of these small birds without its
+nest would be like a biography of Sir Christopher Wren that made no
+mention of his works. It was not strange then that when I saw this small
+bird the question rose to my mind, what kind of nest does it build?
+
+One morning in the month of October, the great breeding-time for birds
+in the Southern Hemisphere, while cautiously picking my way through a
+bed of eardoon bushes, the mysterious little creature flitted up and
+perched among the clustering leaves quite near to me. It uttered a
+feeble grasshopper-like chirp; and then a second individual, smaller,
+paler-coloured, and if possible shyer than the first, showed itself for
+two or three seconds, after which both birds dived once more into
+concealment. How glad I was to see them! for here they were, male and
+female, in a suitable spot in my own fields, where they evidently meant
+to breed. Every day after that I paid them one cautious visit, and by
+waiting from five to fifteen minutes, standing motionless among the
+thistles, I always succeeded in getting them to show themselves for a
+few moments. I could easily have secured them then, but my wish was to
+discover their nesting habits; and after watching for some days, I was
+rewarded by finding their nest; then for three days more I watched it
+slowly progressing towards completion, and each time I approached it one
+of the small birds would flit out to vanish into the herbage. The
+structure was about six inches long, and not more than two inches in
+diameter, and was placed horizontally on a broad stiff eardoon leaf,
+sheltered by other leaves above. It was made of the finest dry grass
+loosely woven, and formed a simple perfectly straight tube, open at both
+ends. The aperture was so small that I could only insert my little
+finger, and the bird could not, of course, have turned round in so
+narrow a passage, and so always went in at one end and left by the
+other. On visiting the spot on the fourth day I found, to my intense
+chagrin, that the delicate fabric had been broken and thrown down by
+some animal; also, that the birds had utterly vanished--for I sought
+them in vain, both there and in every weedy and thistly spot in the
+neighbourhood. The bird without the nest had seemed a useless thing to
+possess; now, for all my pains, I had only a wisp of fine dry grass in
+my hand, and no bird. The shy, modest little creature, dwelling
+violet-like amidst clustering leaves, and even when showing itself still
+"half-hidden from the eye," was thereafter to be only a tantalizing
+image in memory. Still, my case was not so hopeless as that of the
+imagined lapidary; for however rare a species may be, and near to its
+final extinction, there must always be many individuals existing, and I
+was cheered by the thought that I might yet meet with one at some future
+time. And, even if this particular species was not to gladden my sight
+again, there were others, scores and hundreds more, and at any moment I
+might expect to see one shining, a living gem, on Nature's open extended
+palm.
+
+Sometimes it has happened that an animal would have been overlooked or
+passed by with scant notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for some
+singular action or habit which has instantly given it a strange
+importance, and made its possession desirable.
+
+I was once engaged in the arduous and monotonous task of driving a large
+number of sheep a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, in
+excessively hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to travelling.
+Five or six gauchos were with me, and we were on the southern pampas of
+Buenos Ayres, near to a long precipitous stony sierra which rose to a
+height of five or six hundred feet above the plain. Who that has
+travelled for eighteen days on a dead level in a broiling sun can resist
+a hill? That sierra was more sublime to us than Conon-dagua, than
+Illimani.
+
+Leaving the sheep, I rode to it with three of the men; aad after
+securing our horses on the lower slope, we began our laborious ascent.
+Now the gaucho when taken from his horse, on which he lives like a kind
+of parasite, is a very slow-moving creature, and I soon left my friends
+far behind. Coming to a place where ferns and flowering herbage grew
+thick, I began to hear all about me sounds of a character utterly unlike
+any natural sound I was acquainted with--innumerable low clear voices
+tinkling or pealing like minute sweet-toned, resonant bells--for the
+sounds were purely metallic and perfectly bell-like. I was completely
+ringed round with the mysterious music, and as I walked it rose and sank
+rhythmically, keeping time to my steps. I stood still, and immediately
+the sounds ceased. I took a step forwards, and again the fairy-bells
+were set ringing, as if at each step my foot touched a central meeting
+point of a thousand radiating threads, each thread attached to a peal of
+little bells hanging concealed among the herbage. I waited for my
+companions, and called their attention to the phenomenon, and to them
+also it was a thing strange and perplexing. "It is the bell-snake!"
+cried one excitedly. This is the rattle-snake; but although at that time
+I had no experience of this reptile, I knew that he was wrong. Yet how
+natural the mistake! The Spanish name of "bell-snake" had made him
+imagine that the whirring sound of the vibrating rattles, resembling
+muffled cicada music, is really bell-like in character. Eventually we
+discovered that the sound was made by grasshoppers; but they were seen
+only to be lost, for I could not capture one, so excessively shy and
+cunning had the perpetual ringing of their own little tocsins made them.
+And presently I had to return to my muttons; and afterwards there was no
+opportunity of revisiting the spot to observe so singular a habit again
+and collect specimens. It was a very slender grasshopper, about an inch
+and a half long, of a uniform, tawny, protective colour--the colour of
+an old dead leaf. It also possessed a protective habit common to most
+grasshoppers, of embracing a slender vertical stem with its four fine
+front legs, and moving cunningly round so as to keep the stem always in
+front of it to screen itself from sight. Only other grasshoppers are
+silent when alarmed, and the silence and masking action are related, and
+together prevent the insect from being detected. But this particular
+species, or race, or colony, living on the sides of the isolated sierra,
+had acquired a contrary habit, resembling a habit of gregarious birds
+and mammals. For this informing sound (unless it mimicked some
+_warning-sound,_ as of a rattlesnake, which it didn't) could not
+possibly be beneficial to individuals living alone, as grasshoppers
+generally do, but, on the contrary, only detrimental; and such a habit
+was therefore purely for the public good, and could only have arisen in
+a species that always lived in communities.
+
+On another occasion, in the middle of the hot season, I was travelling
+alone across-country in a locality which was new to me, a few leagues
+east of La Plata River, in its widest part. About eleven o'clock in the
+morning I came to a low-lying level plain where the close-cropped grass
+was vivid green, although elsewhere all over the country the vegetation
+was scorched and dead, and dry as ashes. The ground being so favourable,
+I crossed this low plain at a swinging gallop, and in about thirty
+minutes' time. In that half-hour I saw a vast number of snakes, all of
+one kind, and a species new to me; but my anxiety to reach my
+destination before the oppressive heat of the afternoon made me hurry
+on. So numerous were the snakes in that green place that frequently I
+had as many as a dozen in sight at one time. It looked to me like a
+coronelia--harmless colubrine snakes--but was more than twice as large
+as either of the two species of that genus I was already familiar with.
+In size they varied greatly, ranging from two to fully five feet in
+length, and the colour was dull yellow or tan, slightly lined and
+mottled with shades of brown. Among dead or partially withered grass and
+herbage they would have been undistinguishable at even a very short
+distance, but on the vivid green turf they were strangely conspicuous,
+some being plainly visible forty or fifty yards away; and not one was
+seen coiled up. They were all lying motionless, stretched out full
+length, and looking like dark yellow or tan-coloured ribbons, thrown on
+to the grass. It was most unusual to see so many snakes together,
+although not surprising in the circumstances. The December heats had
+dried up all the watercourses and killed the vegetation, and made the
+earth hard and harsh as burnt bricks; and at such times snakes,
+especially the more active non-venomous kinds, will travel long
+distances, in their slow way, in search of water. Those I saw during my
+ride had probably been attracted by the moisture from a large area of
+country; and although there was no water, the soft fresh grass must have
+been grateful to them. Snakes are seen coiled up when they are at home;
+when travelling and far afield, they lie as a rule extended full length,
+even when resting--and they are generally resting. Pausing at length,
+before quitting this green plain, to give my horse a minute's rest, I
+got off and approached a large snake; but when I was quite twelve yards
+from it, it lifted its head, and, turning deliberately round, came
+rather swiftly at me. I retreated, and it followed, until, springing on
+to my horse, I left it, greatly surprised at its action, and beginning
+to think that it must be venomous. As I rode on the feeling of surprise
+increased, conquering haste; and in the end, seeing more snakes, I
+dismounted and approached the largest, when exactly the same thing
+occurred again, the snake rousing itself and coming angrily at me when I
+was still (considering the dull lethargic character of the deadliest
+kinds) at an absurd distance from it. Again and again I repeated the
+experiment, with the same result. And at length I stunned one with a
+blow of my whip to examine its mouth, but found no poison-fangs in it.
+
+I then resumed my journey, expecting to meet with more snakes of the
+same kind at my destination; but there were none, and very soon business
+called me to a distant place, and I never met with this species
+afterwards. But when I rode away from that green spot, and was once more
+on the higher, desolate, wind-swept plain surrounding it--a rustling sea
+of giant thistles, still erect, although dead, and red as rust, and
+filling the hot blue sky with silvery down--it was with a very strange
+feeling. The change from the green and living to the dead and dry and
+dusty was so great! There seemed to be something mysterious,
+extra-natural, in that low level plain, so green and fresh and snaky,
+where my horse's hoofs had made no sound--a place where no man dwelt,
+and no cattle pastured, and no wild bird folded its wing. And the
+serpents there were not like others--the mechanical coiled-up thing we
+know, a mere bone-and-muscle man-trap, set by the elements, to spring
+and strike when trodden on: but these had a high intelligence, a lofty
+spirit, and were filled with a noble rage and astonishment that any
+other kind of creature, even a man, should venture there to disturb
+their sacred peace. It was a fancy, born of that sense of mystery which
+the unknown and the unusual in nature wakes in us--an obsolescent
+feeling that still links us to the savage. But the simple fact was
+wonderful enough, and that has been set down simply and apart from all
+fancies. If the reader happens not to be a naturalist, it is right to
+tell him that a naturalist cannot exaggerate consciously; and if he be
+capable of unconscious exaggeration, then ho is no naturalist. He
+should hasten "to join the innumerable caravan that moves" to the
+fantastic realms of romance. Looking at the simple fact scientifically,
+it was a case of mimicry--the harmless snake mimicking the fierce
+threatening gestures and actions proper to some deadly kind. Only with
+this difference: the venomous snake, of all deadly things in nature, is
+the slowest to resentment, the most reluctant to enter into a quarrel;
+whereas in this species angry demonstrations were made when the intruder
+was yet far off, and before he had shown any hostile intentions.
+
+My last case--the last, that is, of the few I have selected--relates to
+a singular variation in the human species. On this occasion I was again
+travelling alone in a strange district on the southern frontier of
+Buenos Ayres. On a bitterly cold midwinter day, shortly before noon, I
+arrived, stiff and tired, at one of those pilgrims' rests on the
+pampas--a wayside _pulperia,_ or public house, where the traveller can
+procure anything he may require or desire, from a tumbler of Brazilian
+rum to make glad his heart, to a poncho, or cloak of blue cloth with
+fluffy scarlet lining, to keep him warm o' nights; and, to speed him on
+his way, a pair of cast-iron spurs weighing six pounds avoirdupois, with
+rowels eight inches in diameter, manufactured in this island for the use
+of barbarous men beyond the sea. The wretched mud-and-grass building was
+surrounded by a foss crossed by a plank drawbridge; outside of the
+enclosure twelve or fourteen saddled horses were standing, and from the
+loud noise of talk and laughter in the bar I conjectured that a goodly
+company of rough frontiersmen were already making merry at that early
+hour. It was necessary for me to go in among them to see the proprietor
+of the place and ask permission to visit his kitchen in order to make
+myself a "tin of coffee," that being the refreshment I felt inclined
+for. When I went in and made my salutation, one man wheeled round square
+before me, stared straight into my oyes, and in an exceedingly
+high-pitched reedy or screechy voice and a sing-song tone returned my
+"good morning," and bade me call for the liquid I loved best at his
+expense. I declined with thanks, and in accordance with gaucho etiquette
+added that I was prepared to pay for his liquor. It was then for him to
+say that he had already been served and so let the matter drop, but he
+did not do so: he screamed out in his wild animal voice that he would
+take gin. I paid for his drink, and would, I think, have felt greatly
+surprised at his strange insolent behaviour, so unlike that of the
+usually courteous gaucho, but this thing affected me not at all, so
+profoundly had his singular appearance and voice impressed me; and for
+the rest of the time I remained in the place I continued to watch him
+narrowly. Professor Huxley has somewhere said, "A variation frequently
+occurs, but those who notice it take no care about noting down the
+particulars." That is not a failing of mine, and this is what I noted
+down while the man's appearance was still fresh in memory. He was about
+five feet eleven inches in height--very tall for a gaucho--straight and
+athletic, with exceedingly broad shoulders, which made his round head
+look small; long arms and huge hands. The round flat face, coarse black
+hair, swarthy reddish colour, and smooth hairless cheeks seemed to show
+that he had more Indian than Spanish blood in him, while his round black
+eyes were even more like those of a rapacious animal in expression than
+in the pure-blooded Indian. He also had the Indian or half-breed's
+moustache, when that natural ornament is permitted to grow, and which is
+composed of thick bristles standing out like a cat's whiskers. The mouth
+was the marvellous feature, for it was twice the size of an average
+mouth, and the two lips were alike in thickness. This mouth did not
+smile, but snarled, both when he spoke and when he should have smiled;
+and when he snarled the wliolo of his teeth and a part of the gums were
+displayed. The teeth were not as in other human beings--incisors,
+canines, and molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, each
+tooth a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched its
+companion teeth, and with a point sharp as the sharpest-pointed dagger.
+They were like the teeth of a shark or crocodile. I noticed that when he
+showed them, which was very often, they were not set together as in
+dogs, weasels, and other savage snarling animals, but apart, showing the
+whole terrible serration in the huge red mouth.
+
+After getting his gin he joined in the boisterous conversation with the
+others, and this gave me an opportunity of studying his face for several
+minutes, all the time with a curious feeling that I had put myself into
+a cage with a savage animal of horrible aspect, whose instincts were
+utterly unknown to me, and were probably not very pleasant. It was
+interesting to note that whenever one of the others addressed him
+directly, or turned to him when speaking, it was with a curious
+expression, not of fear, but partly amusement and partly something else
+which I could not fathom. Now, one might think that this was natural
+enough purely on account of the man's extraordinary appearance. I do not
+think that a sufficient explanation; for however strange a man's
+appearance may be, his intimate friends and associates soon lose all
+sense of wonder at his strangeness, and even forget that he is unlike
+others. My belief is that this curiosity, or whatever it was they showed
+in their faces, was due to something in his character--a mental
+strangeness, showing itself at unexpected times, and which might flash,
+out at any moment to amuse or astonish them. There was certainly a
+correspondence between the snarling action of the mouth and the
+dangerous form of the teeth, perfect as that in any snarling animal; and
+such animals, it should be remembered, snarl not only when angry and
+threatening, but in their playful moods as well. Other and more
+important correspondences or correlations might have existed; and the
+voice was certainly unlike any human voice I have ever heard, whether in
+white, red, or black man. But the time I had for observation was short,
+the conversation revealed nothing further, and by-and-by I went away in
+search of the odorous kitchen, where there would be hot water for
+coffee, or at all events cold water and a kettle, and materials for
+making a fire--to wit, bones of dead cattle, "buffalo chips," and rancid
+fat.
+
+I have never been worried with the wish, or ambition to be a head-hunter
+in the Dyak sense, but on this one occasion I did wish that it had been
+possible, without violating any law, or doing anything to a
+fellow-creature which I should not like done to myself, to have obtained
+possession of this man's head, with its set of unique and terrible
+teeth. For how, in the name of Evolution, did he come by them, and by
+other physical peculiarities--the snarling habit and that high-pitched
+animal voice, for instance--which made him a being different from
+others--one separate and far apart? Was he, so admirably formed, so
+complete and well-balanced, merely a freak of nature, to use an
+old-fashioned phrase--a sport, or spontaneous individual variation--an
+experiment for a new human type, imagined by Nature in some past period,
+inconceivably long ago, but which she had only now, too late, found time
+to carry out? Or rather was he like that little hairy maiden exhibited
+not long ago in London, a reproduction of the past, the mystery called
+reversion--a something in the life of a species like memory in the life
+of an individual, the memory which suddenly brings back to the old man's
+mind the image of his childhood? For no dream-monster in human form ever
+appeared to me with so strange and terrible a face; and this was no
+dream but sober fact, for I saw and spoke with this man; and unless cold
+steel has given him his quietus, or his own horse has crushed him, or a
+mad bull sored him--all natural forms of death in that wild land--he is
+probably still living and in the prime of life, and perhaps at this very
+moment drinking gin at some astonished traveller's expense at that very
+bar where I met him. The old Palaeolithic man, judging from the few
+remains we have of him, must have had an unspeakably savage and, to our
+way of thinking, repulsive and horrible aspect, with his villainous low
+receding forehead, broad nose, great projecting upper jaw, and
+retreating chin; to meet such a man face to face in Piccadilly would
+frighten a nervous person of the present time. But his teeth were not
+unlike our own, only very much larger and more powerful, and well
+adapted to their work of masticating the flesh, underdone and possibly
+raw, of mammoth and rhinoceros. If, then, this living man recalls a type
+of the past, it is of a remoter past, a more primitive man, the volume
+of whose history is missing from the geological record. To speculate on
+such a subject seems idle and useless; and when I coveted possession of
+that head it was not because I thought that it might lead to any fresh
+discovery. A lower motive inspired the feeling. I wished for it only
+that I might bring it over the sea, to drop it like a new apple of
+discord, suited to the spirit of the times, among the anthropologists
+and evolutionists generally of this old and learned world. Inscribed, of
+course, "To the most learned," but giving no locality and no
+particulars. I wished to do that for the pleasure--not a very noble kind
+of pleasure, I allow--of witnessing from some safe hiding-place the
+stupendous strife that would have ensued--a battle more furious, lasting
+and fatal to many a brave knight of biology, than was ever yet fought
+over any bone or bony fragment or fabric ever picked up, including the
+celebrated cranium of the Neanderthal.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX.
+
+THE PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The following passage occurs in an article on "The Naturalist in La
+Plata," by the late Professor Piomanes, which appeared in the
+_Nineteenth Century,_ May, 1893. After quoting the account of the puma's
+habits and character given in the book, the writer says:--"I have
+received corroboration touching all these points from a gentleman who,
+when walking alone and unarmed on the skirts of a forest, was greatly
+alarmed by a large puma coming out to meet him. Deeming it best not to
+stand, he advanced to meet the animal, which thereupon began to gambol
+around his feet and rub against his legs, after the manner of an
+affectionate cat. At first he thought these movements must have been
+preliminary to some peculiar mode of attack, and therefore he did not
+respond, but walked quietly on, until the puma suddenly desisted and
+re-entered the forest. This gentleman says that, until the publication
+of Mr. Hudson's book, he had always remained under the impression that
+that particular puma must have been insane."
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+I have found among my papers the following mislaid note on the subject
+of sportive displays of mammalians, which should have been used on page
+281, where the subject is briefly treated:--Most mammalians are
+comparatively silent and live on the ground, and not having the power to
+escape easily, which birds have, and being more persecuted by man, they
+do not often disport themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it is
+difficult to watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence being
+known or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as we
+might imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which I was,
+or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting themselves in a
+manner that took me completely by surprise. While out tinamou shooting
+one day in autumn, near my own home in La Plata, I spied a troop of
+about a dozen weasels racing madly about over a vizcacha village--the
+mound and group of pit-like burrows inhabited by a community of
+vizcachas. These weasels were of the large common species, Galictis
+barbara, about the size of a cat; and were engaged in a pastime
+resembling a complicated dance, and so absorbed were they on that
+occasion that they took no notice of me when I walked up to within nine
+or ten yards of them, and stood still to watch the performance. They
+were all swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doubling
+quickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and although
+apparently carried away with excitement, and crossing each other's
+tracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with so many changes of
+direction that I became confused when trying to keep any one animal in
+view, they never collided nor even came near enough to touch one
+another. The whole performance resembled, on a greatly magnified scale
+and without its beautiful smoothness and lightning swiftness, the
+fantastic dance of small black water-beetles, frequently seen on the
+surface of a pool or stream, during which the insects glide about in a
+limited area with such celerity as to appear like black curving lines
+traced by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross and
+intersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After watching
+the weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the mound, whereupon
+the animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell into the burrows, but
+only to reappear in a few seconds, thrusting up their long ebony-black
+necks and flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaring
+with fierce, beady eyes.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+In November and December, 1893, a short correspondence appeared in the
+_Field_ on the curious subject of "Dogs burying their dead." It arose
+through a letter from a Mr. Gould, of Albany, Western Australia,
+relating the following incident:--
+
+A settler shot a bitch from a neighbouring estate that had formed the
+habit of coming on to his land to visit and play with his dog. The dog,
+finding his companion dead, was observed to dig a large hole in the
+ground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not cover it with
+earth. The writer wished to know if any reader of the _Field_ had met
+with a similar case. Some notes, which I contributed in reply to this
+letter, bear on one of the subjects treated in the chapter on "strange
+instincts," namely, the instinct of social animals to protect and shield
+their fellows; and for this reason I have thought it best to reproduce
+them in this place.
+
+I remember on one occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, a
+large and very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitch
+that had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but he
+never left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the body
+away, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not succeeding in these
+attempts, he settled down by its side again, although it was evident
+that he was suffering greatly from thirst and heat. It was at last only
+with the greatest trouble that the people of the house succeeded in
+getting the body away and burying it out of his sight.
+
+Another instance, more to the point, occurred at my own house on the
+pampas, and I was one of several persons who witnessed it. A small, red,
+long-haired bitch--a variety of the common native cur--gave birth to
+four or five pups. A peon was told to destroy them, and, waiting until
+the bitch was out of sight, he carried them off to the end of the
+orchard, some 400 or 500 yards from the house, and threw them into a
+pool of water which was only two to three feet deep. The bitch passed
+the rest of the day in rushing frantically about, searching for her
+young, and in the evening, a little after dark, actually succeeded in
+finding them, although they were lying at the bottom of the pool. She
+got them all out, and carried them, one by one, to another part of the
+grounds, where she passed the night with them, uttering at intervals the
+most piercing cries. In the morning she carried them to still another
+spot, where there was a soft mould, and then dug a hole large and deep
+enough to bury them all, covering them over with the loose earth. Her
+task done, she returned to the house to sleep all day, but when night
+came again the whole piteous performance was repeated: the pups were dug
+up, and she passed the long, piercingly cold night--for it was in the
+depth of winter--trying to keep them warm, and uttering, as before,
+distressing cries. Yet a third time the whole thing was repeated; but
+after the third night, when the dog came home to sleep, the dead pups
+were taken out of the ground and buried at a distance.
+
+Such an action as this strikes one with astonishment only because we
+have the custom of burying our dead, and are too ready at all times to
+regard the dog as human-like. But the explanation of the action in this
+case is to be found in the familiar fact that very many animals,
+including the dog, have the habit or instinct of burying or concealing
+the thing they wish to leave in safety. Thus, the dog buries the bone it
+does not want to eat, and when hungry digs it up again. When a dog
+buries or hides the dead body of the she dog it was attached to, or the
+she dog buries her dead young, it is with the same motive--namely, to
+conceal the animal that cannot be roused, and that it would not be safe
+to leave exposed.
+
+It is plain to all who observe their actions that the lower animals have
+no comprehension of death. In the case of two animals that are
+accustomed to play or to be much together, if one dies, or is killed,
+and its body left, the other will come to sniff at, touch, and at last
+try to rouse it; but finding all attempts vain, it will at length go
+away to seek companionship elsewhere. In cases where the attachment is
+much stronger, the dead body may be watched over for an indefinite
+period. A brother of mine once related to me a very pathetic incident
+which occurred at an estancia on the pampas where he was staying. A
+large portion of the land was a low, level, marshy plain, partly
+overgrown with reeds and rushes; and one day, in this wilderness, a
+little boy of eight or nine, from the estancia, lost himself. A small
+dog, his invariable attendant, had gone out with him, but did not
+return. Seven days later the poor boy was found, at a great distance
+from the house, lying on the grass, where he had died of exhaustion. The
+dog was lying coiled up at his side, and appeared to be sleeping; but,
+when spoken to, he did not stir, and was presently found to be dead too.
+The dog could have gone back at any moment to the estancia, but his
+instinct of attachment overcame all others; he kept guard over his
+little master, who slept so soundly and so long, until he, too, slept in
+the same way.
+
+A still more remarkable case of this kind was given in one of my books,
+of a gaucho, accompanied by his dog, who was chased and overtaken by a
+troop of soldiers during one of the civil wars in Uruguay. Suspecting
+him of being a spy, or, at all events, an enemy, his captors cut his
+throat, then rode away, calling to the dog to follow them; but the
+animal refused to leave his dead master's side. Returning to the spot a
+few days later, they saw the body of the man they had killed surrounded
+by a large number of vultures, which the dog, in a frenzy of excitement,
+was occupied in keeping at a respectable distance. It was observed that
+the dog, after making one of his sallies, driving the birds away with
+furious barkings, would set out at a run to a small stream not far from
+the spot; but when half way to it he would look back, and, seeing the
+vultures advancing once more to the corpse, would rush back to protect
+it. The soldiers watched him for some time with great interest, and once
+more they tried in vain to get him to follow them. Two days afterwards
+they revisited the spot, to find the dog lying dead by the side of his
+dead master. I had this story from the lips of one of the witnesses.
+
+In all such cases, whether the dog watches over, conceals, or buries a
+dead body, he is doubtless moved by the same instinct which leads him to
+safeguard the animal he is attached to--another dog or his human master.
+But, as the dead animal is past help, it is, of course, a blunder of the
+instinct; and the blunder must be of very much less frequent occurrence
+among wild than among domestic animals. In a state of nature, when a
+gregarious animal dies, he dies, as a rule, alone; his body is not seen
+by his former companions, and he is not missed. When he dies by
+violence--which is the common fate--the body is carried off or devoured
+by the killer. This being the usual order, there is no instinct, except
+in a very few species, relating to the disposal of the dead among
+mammals and other vertebrates, such as is found in ants and other social
+insects. There are a few mammalians that live together in small
+communities, in a habitation made to last for many generations, in which
+such an instinct would appear necessary, and it accordingly exists, but
+is very imperfect. This is the case with the vizcacha, the large rodent
+of the pampas, which lives with its fellows, to the number of twenty or
+thirty, in a cluster of huge burrows. When a vizcacha dies in a burrow,
+the body is dragged out and thrown on to the mound among the mass of
+rubbish collected on it--but not until he has been dead a long time, and
+there is nothing left of him but the dry bones held together by the
+skin. In that condition the other members of the community probably
+cease to look on him as one of their companions who has fallen into a
+long sleep; he is no more than so much rubbish, which must be cleared
+out of an old disused burrow. Probably the beaver possesses some rude
+instinct similar to that of the vizcacha.
+
+_Apropos_ of animals burying their treasures (or connections) for
+safety, it is worth mentioning that the skunk of the pampas occasionally
+buries her young in the kennel, when hunger compels her to go out
+foraging. I had often heard of this habit of the female skunk from the
+gauchos, and one day had the rare good fortune to witness an animal
+engaged in obliterating her own kennel. The senses of the skunk are so
+defective that one is able at times to approach very near to without
+alarming them. In this instance I sat on my horse at a distance of
+twenty yards, and watched the animal at work, drawing in the loose earth
+with her fore feet until the entrance to the kennel was filled up to
+within three inches of the surface; then, dropping into the shallow
+cavity, she pressed the loose mould down with her nose. Her task
+finished, she trotted away, and the hollow in the soil, when I examined
+it closely, looked only like the mouth of an ancient choked-up burrow.
+The young inhabit a circular chamber, lined with fine dry grass, at the
+end of a narrow passage from 3 ft. to 5 ft. long, and no doubt have air
+enough to serve them until their parent returns; but I believe the skunk
+only buries her young when they are very small.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Naturalist in La Plata
+
+Author: W. H. Hudson
+
+Posting Date: April 12, 2014 [EBook #7446]
+Release Date: February, 2005
+First Posted: May 1, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Eric Eldred
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<img src="images/h1-1.jpg" alt="h1-1.jpg" class="c1">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">Pampas grass: Indians
+on the look-out for strayed horses</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<h1>THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA</h1>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font12">BY</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<h2>W. H. HUDSON, C.M.Z.S.</h2>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font10">JOINT AUTHOR OF
+"ARGENTINE ORNITHOLOGY"</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-2.jpg" alt="h1-2.jpg" class="c2">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font12">WHITE-BANDED
+MOCKING-BIRD</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font1"><b>WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
+J. SMIT</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font13"><i>THIRD
+EDITION.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font14">NEW YORK</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">D. APPLETON AND
+COMPANY</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">1895</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<h2>PREFACE.</h2>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">THE plan I have
+followed in this work has been to sift and arrange the facts I
+have gathered concerning the habits of the animals best known to
+me, preserving those only, which, in my judgment, appeared worth
+recording. In some instances a variety of subjects have linked
+themselves together in my mind, and have been grouped under one
+heading; consequently the scope of the book is not indicated by
+the list of contents: this want is, however, made good by an
+index at the end.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is seldom an easy
+matter to give a suitable name to a book of this description. I
+am conscious that the one I have made choice of displays a lack
+of originality; also, that this kind of title has been used
+hitherto for works constructed more or less on the plan of the
+famous <i>Naturalist on the Amazons.</i> After I have made this
+apology the reader, on his part, will readily admit that, in
+treating of the Natural History of a district so well known, and
+often described as the southern portion of La Plata, which has a
+temperate climate, and where nature is neither exuberant nor
+grand, a personal narrative would have seemed
+superfluous.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The greater portion
+of the matter contained in</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font1"><b>VI</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font22"><i>Preface.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">this volume has
+already seen the light in the form of papers contributed to the
+<i>Field,</i> with other journals that treat of Natural History;
+and to the monthly magazines :--<i>Longmans', The Nineteenth
+Century, The Gentleman's Magazine,</i> and others : I am indebted
+to the Editors and Proprietors of these periodicals for kindly
+allowing me to make use of this material.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Of all animals,
+birds have perhaps afforded me most pleasure; but most of the
+fresh knowledge I have collected in this department is contained
+in a larger work <i>(Argentine Ornithology),</i> of which Dr. P.
+L. Sclater is part author. As I have not gone over any of the
+subjects dealt with in that work, bird-life has not received more
+than a fair share of attention in the present volume.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<h2>CONTENTS.</h2>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER I. THE DESERT
+PAMPAS ....... 1</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER II. CUB PUMA,
+OR LION OF AMERICA 31</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c4">CHAPTER III. WAVE OF
+LIFE ........ 59</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER IV. SOME
+CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS ..... 69</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c5">CHAPTER V. FEAR IN
+BIRDS ........ 83</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c5">CHAPTER VI. PARENTAL
+AND EARLY INSTINCTS ..... 101</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c4">CHAPTER VII. THE
+MEPHITIC SKUNK . 116</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER VIII. MIMICRY
+AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS . 124</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c4">CHAPTER IX.
+DRAGON-FLY STORMS ....... 130</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">viii
+<i>Contents.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c6">CHAPTER X.
+MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS .... 135</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XI. HUMBLE-BEES
+AND OTHER MATTERS . . . .154</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XII. A NOBLE
+WASP . ,. . . . . . . . 162</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c7">CHAPTER XIII.
+NATURE'S NIGHT-LIGHTS ....... 168</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XIV. FACTS AND
+THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS . 178</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XV. THE
+DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT . . . 200</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XVI.
+HUMMING-BIRDS . . . . . . , . . 205</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XVII. THE
+CRESTED SCREAMER . . . . . . . . 221</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c8">CHAPTER XVIII. THE
+WOODHEWER FAMILY 235</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XIX. MUSIC AND
+DANCING IN NATURE ..... 261</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c7">CHAPTER XX.
+BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA ...... 289</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c6">CHAPTER XXI. THE
+DYING HUANACO ....... 314</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font10"><b>PAGE</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">CHAPTER XXII. THE
+STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE ... 329</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c10">CHAPTER XXIII.
+HORSE AND MAN ........ 348</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c11">CHAPTER XXIV. SEEN
+AND LOST ..,,. 363</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">APPENDIX ......
+384</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19">INDEX ........-
+391</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18">Pampas Grass : Indians
+on the look-out for strayed</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Horses .......
+<i>Frontispiece</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Coyp&uacute;
+.......... 12</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Puma killed by Cow
+....... 39</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Puma attacking
+Jaguar ..... <i>To face</i> 48</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Armadillo killing
+Snake ....... 72</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Wrestler Frog . . .
+. . . . . .77</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Ceratrophrys ornata
+........ 80</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Didelphys azaree
+and young . . . . . . 102</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Pampa Sheep
+......... 109</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Skunk and Dog . . .
+. . . . .123</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Storm, of
+Dragon-flies ..... <i>To face,</i> 132</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Ixodes; before and
+after a blood diet . . . .142</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Fire-wood gatherer
+and Bird-fly .. . . . .147</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">A Bee's Kevengo . .
+. . . . . .165</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Mygale fusca,
+threatening ....... 191</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Loddigesia
+Mirabilis . . . . . . . .215</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Crested Screamer .
+. . . . . . . 224</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Some Woodhewers'
+beaks . . . . . . .239</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Dance of Ypecaha
+Rails ....... 267</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Wing-display of
+Jacanas ....... 268</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Dance of
+Spur-winged Lapwings ..... 270</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">White-banded
+Mocking-bird ...... 277</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Vizcachas .........
+290</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">The Dying Huanaco
+...... To <i>face</i> 318</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Gaucho . . . . . .
+, , . . 350</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">A lost Humming-bird
+....... 367</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c12">Small Spine-tail
+and Nest ,...,. 371</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<h2>THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA,</h2>
+
+<h3>CHAPTER I.</h3>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">THE DESERT
+PAMPAS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">DURING recent years
+we have heard much about the great and rapid changes now going on
+in the plants and animals of all the temperate regions of the
+globe colonized by Europeans. These changes, if taken merely as
+evidence of material progress, must be a matter of rejoicing to
+those who are satisfied, and more than satisfied, with our system
+of civilization, or method of outwitting Nature by the removal of
+all checks on the undue increase of our own species. To one who
+finds a charm in things as they exist in the unconquered
+provinces of Nature's dominions, and who, not being over-anxious
+to reach the end of his journey, is content to perform it on
+horseback, or in a waggon drawn by bullocks, it is permissible to
+lament the altered aspect of the earth's surface, together with
+the disappearance of numberless noble and beautiful forms, both
+of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. For he cannot find it in
+his heart to love the forms by which they are replaced; these are
+cultivated and domesticated, and have only become useful to man
+at the cost of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">B</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">2 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">that grace and
+spirit which freedom and wildness give. In numbers they are
+many--twenty-five millions of sheep in this district, fifty
+millions in that, a hundred millions in a third--but how few are
+the species in place of those destroyed? and when the owner of
+many sheep and much wheat desires variety--for he possesses this
+instinctive desire, albeit in conflict with and overborne by the
+perverted instinct of destruction--what is there left to him,
+beyond his very own, except the weeds that spring up in his
+fields under all skies, ringing him round with old-world
+monotonous forms, as tenacious of their undesired union with him
+as the rats and cockroaches that inhabit his house?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">We hear most
+frequently of North America, New Zealand, and Australia in this
+connection; but nowhere on the globe has civilization "written
+strange defeatures" more markedly than on that great area of
+level country called by English writers <i>the pampas</i>, but by
+the Spanish more appropriately <i>La Pampa</i>--from the Quichua
+word signifying open space or country--since it forms in most
+part one continuous plain, extending on its eastern border from
+the river Parana, in latitude 32 degrees, to the Patagonian
+formation on the river Colorado, and comprising about two hundred
+thousand square miles of humid, grassy country.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">This district has
+been colonized by Europeans since the middle of the sixteenth
+century; but down to within a very few years ago immigration was
+on too limited a scale to make any very great change; and,
+speaking only of the pampean country, the conquered territory was
+a long, thinly-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">3 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">settled strip,
+purely pastoral, and the Indians, with their primitive mode of
+warfare, were able to keep back the invaders from the greater
+portion of their ancestral hunting-grounds. Not twenty years ago
+a ride of two hundred miles, starting from the capital city,
+Buenos Ayres, was enough to place one well beyond the furthest
+south-western frontier outpost. In 1879 the Argentine Government
+determined to rid the country of the aborigines, or, at all
+events, to break their hostile and predatory spirit once for all;
+with the result that the entire area of the grassy pampas, with a
+great portion of the sterile pampas and Patagonia, has been made
+available to the emigrant. There is no longer anything to deter
+the starvelings of the Old World from possessing themselves of
+this new land of promise, flowing, like Australia, with milk and
+tallow, if not with honey; any emasculated migrant from a Genoese
+or Neapolitan slum is now competent to "fight the wilderness" out
+there, with his eight-shilling fowling-piece and the implements
+of his trade. The barbarians no longer exist to frighten his soul
+with dreadful war cries; they have moved away to another more
+remote and shadowy region, called in their own language
+<i>Alhuemapu</i>, and not known to geographers. For the results
+so long and ardently wished for have swiftly followed on General
+Roca's military expedition; and the changes witnessed during the
+last decade on the pampas exceed in magnitude those which had
+been previously effected by three centuries of
+occupation.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In view of this
+wave of change now rapidly sweeping away the old order, with
+whatever beauty</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">4 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">and grace it
+possessed, it might not seem inopportune at the present moment to
+give a rapid sketch, from the field naturalist's point of view,
+of the great plain, as it existed before the agencies introduced
+by European colonists had done their work, and as it still exists
+in its remoter parts.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The humid, grassy,
+pampean country extends, roughly speaking, half-way from the
+Atlantic Ocean and the Plata and Paran&aacute; rivers to the
+Andes, and passes gradually into the "Monte Formation," or
+<i>sterile pampa--</i>a sandy, more or less barren district,
+producing a dry, harsh, ligneous vegetation, principally thorny
+bushes and low trees, of which the cha&ntilde;ar (Gurliaca
+decorticans) is the most common; hence the name of
+"Cha&ntilde;ar-steppe" used by some writers: and this formation
+extends southwards down into Patagonia. Scientists have not yet
+been able to explain why the pampas, with a humid climate, and a
+soil exceedingly rich, have produced nothing but grass, while the
+dry, sterile territories on their north, west, and south borders
+have an arborescent vegetation. Darwin's conjecture that the
+extreme violence of the <i>pampero,</i> or south-west wind,
+prevented trees from growing, is now proved to have been
+ill-founded since the introduction of the Eucalyptus globulus;
+for this noble tree attains to an extraordinary height on the
+pampas, and exhibits there a luxuriance of foliage never seen in
+Australia.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">To this level
+area--my "parish of Selborne," or, at all events, a goodly
+portion of it--with the sea on one hand, and on the other the
+practically infinite expanse of grassy desert--another sea,
+not</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> 5</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">"in vast
+fluctuations fixed," but in comparative calm--I should like to
+conduct the reader in imagination: a country all the easier to be
+imagined on account of the absence of mountains, woods, lakes,
+and rivers. There is, indeed, little to be imagined--not even a
+sense of vastness; and Darwin, touching on this point, in the
+<i>Journal of a Naturalist,</i> aptly says:--"At sea, a person's
+eye being six feet above the surface of the water, his horizon is
+two miles and four-fifths distant. In like manner, the more level
+the plain, the more nearly does the horizon approach within these
+narrow limits; and this, in my opinion, entirely destroys the
+grandeur which one would have imagined that a vast plain would
+have possessed."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I remember my first
+experience of a hill, after having been always shut within "these
+narrow limits." It was one of the range of sierras near Cape
+Corrientes, and not above eight hundred feet high; yet, when I
+had gained the summit, I was amazed at the vastness of the earth,
+as it appeared to me from that modest elevation. Persons born and
+bred on the pampas, when they first visit a mountainous district,
+frequently experience a sensation as of "a ball in the throat"
+which seems to prevent free respiration.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In most places the
+rich, dry soil is occupied by a coarse grass, three or four feet
+high, growing in large tussocks, and all the year round of a deep
+green; a few slender herbs and trefoils, with long, twining
+stems, maintain a frail existence among the tussocks; but the
+strong grass crowds out most plants, and scarcely a flower
+relieves its</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">6 A <i>Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">uniform everlasting
+verdure. There are patches, sometimes large areas, where it does
+not grow, and these are carpeted by small creeping herbs of a
+livelier green, and are gay in spring with flowers, chiefly of
+the composite and papilionaceous kinds; and verbenas, scarlet,
+purple, rose, and white. On moist or marshy grounds there are
+also several lilies, yellow, white, and red, two or three flags,
+and various other small flowers; but altogether the flora of the
+pampas is the poorest in species of any fertile district on the
+globe. On moist clayey ground flourishes the stately pampa grass,
+Gynerium argenteum, the spears of which often attain a height of
+eight or nine feet. I have ridden through many leagues of this
+grass with the feathery spikes high as my head, and often higher.
+It would be impossible for me to give anything like an adequate
+idea of the exquisite loveliness, at certain times and seasons,
+of this queen of grasses, the chief glory of the solitary pampa.
+Everyone is familiar with it in cultivation; but the garden-plant
+has a sadly decaying, draggled look at all times, and to my mind,
+is often positively ugly with its dense withering mass of coarse
+leaves, drooping on the ground, and bundle of spikes, always of
+the same dead white or dirty cream-colour. Now colour--the
+various ethereal tints that give a blush to its cloud-like
+purity--is one of the chief beauties of this grass on its native
+soil; and travellers who have galloped across the pampas at a
+season of the year when the spikes are dead, and white as paper
+or parchment, have certainly missed its greatest charm. The plant
+is social, and in some places where</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas,</i> 7</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">scarcely any other
+kind exists it covers large areas with a sea of fleecy-white
+plumes; in late summer, and in autumn, the tints are seen,
+varying from the most delicate rose, tender and illusive as the
+blush on the white under-plumage of some gulls, to purple and
+violaceous. At no time does it look so perfect as in the evening,
+before and after sunset, when the softened light imparts a
+mistiness to the crowding plumes, and the traveller cannot help
+fancying that the tints, which then seem richest, are caught from
+the level rays of the sun, or reflected from the coloured vapours
+of the afterglow.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The last occasion on
+which I saw the pampa grass in its full beauty was at the close
+of a bright day in March, ending in one of those perfect sunsets
+seen only in the wilderness, where no lines of house or hedge mar
+the enchanting disorder of nature, and the earth and sky tints
+are in harmony. I had been travelling all day with one companion,
+and for two hours we had ridden through the matchless grass,
+which spread away for miles on every side, the myriads of white
+spears, touched with varied colour, blending in the distance and
+appearing almost like the surface of a cloud. Hearing a swishing
+sound behind us, we turned sharply round, and saw, not forty
+yards away in our rear, a party of five mounted Indians, coming
+swiftly towards us: but at the very moment we saw them their
+animals came to a dead halt, and at the same instant the five
+riders leaped up, and stood erect on their horses' backs.
+Satisfied that they had no intention of attacking us, and were
+only looking out for strayed horses, we continued watching them
+for</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font7">8</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">some time, as they
+stood gazing away over the plain in different directions,
+motionless and silent, like bronze men on strange horse-shaped
+pedestals of dark stone; so dark in their copper skins and long
+black hair, against the far-off ethereal sky, flushed with amber
+light; and at their feet, and all around, the cloud of white and
+faintly-blushing plumes. That farewell scene was printed very
+vividly on my memory, but cannot be shown to another, nor could
+it be even if a Ruskin's pen or a Turner's pencil were mine; for
+the flight of the sea-mew is not more impossible to us than the
+power to picture forth the image of Nature in our souls, when she
+reveals herself in one of those "special moments" which have
+"special grace" in situations where her wild beauty has never
+been spoiled by man.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">At other hours and
+seasons the general aspect of the plain is monotonous, and in
+spite of the unobstructed view, and the unfailing verdure and
+sunshine, somewhat melancholy, although never sombre: and
+doubtless the depressed and melancholy feeling the pampa inspires
+in those who are unfamiliar with it is due in a great measure to
+the paucity of life, and to the profound silence. The wind, as
+may well be imagined on that extensive level area, is seldom at
+rest; there, as in the forest, it is a "bard of many breathings,"
+and the strings it breathes upon give out an endless variety of
+sorrowful sounds, from the sharp fitful sibilations of the dry
+wiry grasses on the barren places, to the long mysterious moans
+that swell and die in the tall polished rushes of the marsh. It
+is also curious to note that with a few exceptions the resident
+birds</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas,</i> 9</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">are comparatively
+very silent, even those belonging to groups which elsewhere are
+highly loquacious. The reason of this is not far to seek. In
+woods and thickets, where birds abound most, they are continually
+losing sight of each other, and are only prevented from
+scattering by calling often; while the muffling effect on sound
+of the close foliage, to' which may be added a spirit of
+emulation where many voices are heard, incites most species,
+especially those that are social, to exert their voices to the
+utmost pitch in singing, calling, and screaming. On the open
+pampas, birds, which are not compelled to live concealed on the
+surface, can see each other at long distances, and perpetual
+calling is not needful: moreover, in that still atmosphere sound
+travels far. As a rule their voices are strangely subdued;
+nature's silence has infected them, and they have become silent
+by habit. This is not the case with aquatic species, which are
+nearly all migrants from noisier regions, and mass themselves in
+lagoons and marshes, where they are all loquacious together. It
+is also noteworthy that the subdued bird-voices, some of which
+are exceedingly sweet and expressive, and the notes of many of
+the insects and batrachians have a great resemblance, and seem to
+be in accord with the aeolian tones of the wind in reeds and
+grasses: a stranger to the pampas, even a naturalist accustomed
+to a different fauna, will often find it hard to distinguish
+between bird, frog, and insect voices.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The mammalia is poor
+in species, and with the single exception of the well-known
+vizcacha (Lagostomus trichodactylus), there is not one
+of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16"><b>10</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">which it can truly
+be said that it is in any special way the product of the pampas,
+or, in other words, that its instincts are better suited to the
+conditions of the pampas than to those of other districts. As a
+fact, this large rodent inhabits a vast extent of country, north,
+west, and south of the true pampas, but nowhere is he so
+thoroughly on his native heath as on the great grassy plain.
+There, to some extent, he even makes his own conditions, like the
+beaver. He lives in a small community of twenty or thirty
+members, in a village of deep-chambered burrows, all with their
+pit-like entrances closely grouped together; and as the village
+endures for ever, or for an indefinite time, the earth constantly
+being brought up forms a mound thirty or forty feet in diameter;
+and this protects the habitation from floods on low or level
+ground. Again, he is not swift of foot, and all rapacious beasts
+are his enemies; he also loves to feed on tender succulent herbs
+and grasses, to seek for which he would have to go far afield
+among the giant grass, where his watchful foes are lying in wait
+to seize him; he saves himself from this danger by making a
+clearing all round his abode, on which a smooth turf is formed;
+and here the animals feed and have their evening pastimes in
+comparative security: for when an enemy approaches, he is easily
+seen; the note of alarm is sounded, and the whole company
+scuttles away to their refuge. In districts having a different
+soil and vegetation, as in Patagonia, the vizcachas' curious,
+unique instincts are of no special advantage, which makes it seem
+probable that they have been formed on the pampas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert Pampas.
+11</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">How marvellous a
+thing it seems that the two species of mammalians--the beaver and
+the vizcacha--that most nearly simulate men's intelligent actions
+in their social organizing instincts, and their habitations,
+which are made to endure, should belong to an order so low down
+as the Rodents! And in the case of the latter species, it adds to
+the marvel when we find that the vizcacha, according to
+Water-house, is the lowest of the order in its marsupial
+affinities.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The vizcacha is the
+most common rodent on the pampas, and the Rodent order is
+represented by the largest number of species. The finest is the
+so-called Patagonian hare--Dolichotis patagonica--a beautiful
+animal twice as large as a hare, with ears shorter and more
+rounded, and legs relatively much longer. The fur is grey and
+chestnut brown. It is diurnal in its habits, lives in kennels,
+and is usually met with in pairs, or small flocks. It is better
+suited to a sterile country like Patagonia than to the grassy
+humid plain; nevertheless it was found throughout the whole of
+the pampas; but in a country where the wisdom of a Sir William
+Harcourt was never needed to slip the leash, this king of the
+Rodentia is now nearly extinct.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">A common rodent is
+the coyp&uacute;--Myiopotamus coyp&uacute;--yellowish in colour
+with bright red incisors; a rat in shape, and as large as an
+otter. It is aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where
+there are no banks it makes a platform nest among the rushes. Of
+an evening they are all out swimming and playing in the water,
+conversing together in their strange tones, which sound like the
+moans and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15"><b>12</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">cries of wounded
+and suffering men; and among them the mother-coyp&uacute; is seen
+with her progeny, numbering eight or nine, with as many on her
+back as she can accommodate, while the others swim after her,
+crying for a ride.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">With reference to
+this animal, which, as we have seen, is prolific, a strange thing
+once happened in Buenos Ayres. The coyp&uacute; was much more
+abundant fifty years ago than now, and its skin, which</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-3.jpg" alt="h1-3.jpg" class="c14">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font15">Coyp&uacute;.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">has a fine fur
+under the long coarse hair, was largely exported to Europe. About
+that time the Dictator Rosas issued a decree prohibiting the
+hunting of the coyp&uacute;. The result was that the animals
+increased and multiplied exceedingly, and, abandoning their
+aquatic habits, they became terrestrial and migratory, and
+swarmed everywhere in search of food. Suddenly a mysterious
+malady fell on them, from which they quickly perished, and became
+almost extinct.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> 13</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">What a blessed
+thing it would be for poor rabbit-worried Australia if a similar
+plague should visit that country, and fall on the right animal!
+On the other hand, what a calamity if the infection, wide-spread,
+incurable, and swift as the wind in its course, should attack the
+too-numerous sheep! And who knows what mysterious, unheard-of
+retributions that revengeful deity Nature may not be meditating
+in her secret heart for the loss of her wild four-footed children
+slain by settlers, and the spoiling of her ancient beautiful
+order!</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">A small pampa
+rodent worthy of notice is the Cavia australis, called
+<i>cu&iacute;</i> in the vernacular from its voice: a timid,
+social, mouse-coloured little creature, with a low gurgling
+language, like running babbling waters; in habits resembling its
+domestic pied relation the guinea pig. It loves to run on clean
+ground, and on the pampas makes little rat-roads all about its
+hiding-place, which little roads tell a story to the fox, and
+such like; therefore the little cavy's habits, and the habits of
+all cav&iacute;es, I fancy, are not so well suited to the humid
+grassy region as to other districts, with sterile ground to run
+and play upon, and thickets in which to hide.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">A more interesting
+animal is the Ctenomys magellanica, a little less than the rat in
+size, with a shorter tail, pale grey fur, and red incisors. It is
+called <i>tuco-tuco</i> from its voice, and <i>oculto</i> from
+its habits; for it is a dweller underground, and requires a
+loose, sandy soil in which, like the mole, it may <i>swim</i>
+beneath the surface. Consequently the pampa, with its heavy,
+moist mould, is not the tuco's proper place; nevertheless,
+wherever there</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><b>14</b> <i>The
+Naturalist in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">is a stretch of
+sandy soil, or a range of dunes, there it is found living; not
+seen, but heard; for all day long and all night sounds its voice,
+resonant and loud, like a succession of blows from a hammer; as
+if a company of gnomes were toiling far down underfoot, beating
+on their anvils, first with strong measured strokes, then with
+lighter and faster, and with a swing and rhythm as if the little
+men were beating in time to some rude chant unheard above the
+surface. How came these isolated colonies of a species so
+subterranean in habits, and requiring a sandy soil to move in, so
+far from their proper district--that sterile country from which
+they are separated by wide, unsuitable areas? They cannot perform
+long overland journeys like the rat. Perhaps the dunes have
+travelled, carrying their little cattle with them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Greatest among the
+carnivores are the two cat-monarchs of South America, the jaguar
+and puma. Whatever may be their relative positions elsewhere, on
+the pampas the puma is mightiest, being much more abundant and
+better able to thrive than its spotted rival. Versatile in its
+preying habits, its presence on the pampa is not surprising; but
+probably only an extreme abundance of large mammalian prey, which
+has not existed in recent times, could have, tempted an animal of
+the river and forest-loving habits of the jaguar to colonize this
+cold, treeless, and comparatively waterless desert. There are two
+other important cats. The grass-cat, not unlike Felis catus in
+its robust form and dark colour, but a larger, more powerful
+animal, inexpressibly savage in disposition. The second, Felis
+geoffroyi,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> <b>15</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">is a larger and
+more beautiful animal, coloured like a leopard; it is called
+wood-cat, and, as the name would seem to indicate, is an intruder
+from wooded districts north of the pampas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">There are two
+canines: one is Azara's beautiful grey fox-like dog, purely a fox
+in habits, and common everywhere. The other is far more
+interesting and extremely rare; it is called
+<i>aguar&aacute;,</i> its nearest ally being the
+<i>aguar&aacute;-guaz&uacute;,</i> the Canis jubatus or maned
+wolf of naturalists, found north of the pampean district. The
+aguar&aacute; is smaller and has no mane; it is like the dingo in
+size, but slimmer and with a sharper nose, and lias a much
+brighter red colour. At night when camping out I have heard its
+dismal screams, but the screamer was sought in vain; while from
+the gauchos of the frontier I could only learn that it is a
+harmless, shy, solitary animal, that ever flies to remoter wilds
+from its destroyer, man. They offered me a skin--what more could
+I want? Simple souls! it was no more to me than the skin of a
+dead dog, with long, bright red hair. Those who love dead animals
+may have them in any number by digging with a. spade in that vast
+sepulchre of the pampas, where perished the hosts of antiquity. I
+love the living that are above the earth; and how small a remnant
+they are in South America we know, and now yearly becoming more
+precious as it dwindles away.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The pestiferous
+skunk is universal; and there are two quaint-looking weasels,
+intensely black in colour, and grey on the back and flat crown.
+One, the Galictis barbara, is a large bold animal that</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">16</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">hunts in companies;
+and when these long-bodied creatures sit up erect, glaring with
+beady eyes, grinning and chattering at the passer-by, they look
+like little friars in black robes and grey cowls; but the
+expression on their round faces is malignant and bloodthirsty
+beyond anything in nature, and it would perhaps be more decent to
+liken them to devils rather than to humans.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">On the pampas there
+is, strictly speaking, only one ruminant, the Cervus campestris,
+which is common. The most curious thing about this animal is that
+the male emits a rank, musky odour, so powerful that when the
+wind blows from it the effluvium comes in nauseating gusts to the
+nostrils from a distance exceeding two miles. It is really
+astonishing that only one small ruminant should be found on this
+immense grassy area, so admirably suited to herbivorous
+quadrupeds, a portion of which at the present moment affords
+sufficient pasture to eighty millions of sheep, cattle, and
+horses. In La Plata the author of <i>The Mammoth and the
+Flood</i> will find few to quarrel with his doctrine.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">Of Edentates there
+are four. The giant armadillo does not range so far, and the
+delicate little pink fairy armadillo, the truncated
+Chlamydophorus, is a dweller in the sand-dunes of Mendoza, and
+has never colonized the grassy pampas. The Tatusia hybrida,
+called "little mule" from the length of its ears, and the Dasypus
+tricinctus, which, when disturbed, rolls itself into a ball, the
+wedge-shaped head and wedge-shaped tail admirably fitting into
+the deep-cut shell side by side; and the <i>quirquincho</i>
+(Dasypus minutus), all inhabit the pampa, are</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> 7</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">diurnal, and feed
+exclusively on insects, chiefly ants. Wherever the country
+becomes settled, these three disappear, owing to the dulness of
+their senses, especially that of sight, and to the diurnal habit,
+which was an advantage to them, and enabled them to survive when
+rapacious animals, which are mostly nocturnal, were their only
+enemies. The fourth, and most important, is the hairy armadillo,
+with habits which are in strange contrast to those of its
+perishing congeners, and which seem to mock many hard-and-fast
+rules concerning animal life. It is omnivorous, and will thrive
+on anything from grass to flesh, found dead and in all stages of
+decay, or captured by means of its own strategy. Furthermore, its
+habits change to suit its conditions: thus, where nocturnal
+carnivores are its enemies, it is diurnal; but where man appears
+as a chief persecutor, it becomes nocturnal. It is much hunted
+for its flesh, dogs being trained for the purpose; yet
+it</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">actually becomes
+more abundant as population increases in any district; and, if
+versatility in habits or adaptiveness can be taken as a measure
+of intelligence, this poor armadillo, a survival of the past, so
+old on the earth as to have existed contemporaneously with the
+giant glyptodon, is the superior of the large-brained cats and
+canines.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">To finish with the
+mammalia, there are two interesting opossums, both of the genus
+Didelphys, but in habits as wide apart as cat from otter. One of
+these marsupials appears so much at home on the plains that I
+almost regret having said that the vizcacha alone gives us the
+idea of being in its habits the <i>product</i> of the pampas.
+This animal--</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">18</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Didelphys
+crassicaudata--has a long slender, wedge-, shaped head and body,
+admirably adapted for pushing through the thick grass and rushes;
+for it is both terrestrial and aquatic, therefore well suited to
+inhabit low, level plains liable to be flooded. On dry land its
+habits are similar to those of a weasel; in lagoons, where it
+dives and swims with great ease, it constructs a globular nest
+suspended from the rushes. The fur is soft, of a rich yellow,
+reddish above, and on the sides and under surfaces varying in
+some parts to orange, in others exhibiting beautiful copper and
+terra-cotta tints. These lovely tints and the metallic lustre
+soon fade from the fur, otherwise this animal would be much
+sought after in the interests of those who love to decorate
+themselves with the spoils of beautiful dead animals--beast and
+bird. The other opossum is the black and white Didelphys azarae;
+and it is indeed strange to find this animal on the pampas,
+although its presence there is not so mysterious as that of the
+tuco-tuco. It shuffles along slowly and awkwardly on the ground,
+but is a great traveller nevertheless. Tschudi met it
+mountaineering on the Andes at an enormous altitude, and, true to
+its lawless nature, it confronted me in Patagonia, where the
+books say no marsupial dwells. In every way it is adapted to an
+arboreal life, yet it is everywhere found on the level country,
+far removed from the conditions which one would imagine to be
+necessary to its existence. For how many thousands of years has
+this marsupial been a dweller on the plain, all its best
+faculties unexercised, its beautiful grasping hands pressed to
+the ground, and its prehensile tail</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Desert Pampas.
+19</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">dragged like an
+idle rope behind it! Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will
+take to it as readily as a duck to water, or an armadillo to
+earth, climbing up the trunk and about the branches with a
+monkey-like agility. How reluctant Nature seems in some cases to
+undo her own work! How long she will allow a specialized organ,
+with the correlated instinct, to rest without use, yet ready to
+flash forth on the instant, bright and keen-edged, as in the
+ancient days of strife, ages past, before peace came to dwell on
+earth!</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The avi-fauna is
+relatively much richer than the mammalia, owing to the large
+number of aquatic species, most of which are migratory with their
+"breeding" or "subsistence-areas" on the pampas. In more senses
+than one they constitute a "floating population," and their
+habits have in no way been modified by the conditions of the
+country. The order, including storks, ibises, herons, spoonbills,
+and flamingoes, counts about eighteen species; and the most
+noteworthy birds in it are two great ibises nearly as large as
+turkeys, with mighty resonant voices. The duck order is very
+rich, numbering at least twenty species, including two beautiful
+upland geese, winter visitors from Magellanic lands, and two
+swans, the lovely black-necked, and the pure white with rosy
+bill. Of rails, or ralline birds, there are ten or twelve,
+ranging from a small spotted creature no bigger than a thrush to
+some large majestic birds. One is the courlan, called "crazy
+widow" from its mourning plumage and long melancholy screams,
+which on still evenings may be heard a league away. Another is
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">20 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">graceful variegated
+<i>ypicaha,</i> fond of social gatherings, where the birds
+perform a dance and make the desolate marshes resound with their
+insane humanlike voices. A smaller kind, Porphyriops melanops,
+has a night-cry like a burst of shrill hysterical laughter, which
+has won for it the name of "witch;" while another, Rallus
+rythyrhynchus, is called "little donkey" from its braying cries.
+Strange eerie voices have all these birds. Of the remaining
+aquatic species, the most important is the spur-winged crested
+screamer; a noble bird as large as a swan, yet its favourite
+pastime is to soar upwards until it loses itself to sight in the
+blue ether, whenca it pours forth its resounding choral notes,
+which reach the distant earth clarified, and with a rhythmic
+swell and fall as of chiming bells. It also sings by night,
+"counting the hours," the gauchos say, and where they have
+congregated together in tens of thousands the mighty roar of
+their combined voices produces an astonishingly grand
+effect.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The largest aquatic
+order is that of the Limicolse--snipes, plover, and their
+allies--which has about twenty-five species. The vociferous
+spur-winged lapwing; the beautiful black and white stilt; a true
+snipe, and a painted snipe, are, strictly speaking, the only
+residents; and it is astonishing to find, that, of the
+five-and-twenty species, at least thirteen are visitors from
+North America, several of them having their breeding-places quite
+away in the Arctic regions. This is one of those facts concerning
+the annual migration of birds which almost stagger belief; for
+among them are species with widely different habits, upland,
+marsh and sea-shore</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> <b>21</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">birds, and in their
+great biannual journey they pass through a variety of climates,
+visiting many countries where the conditions seem suited to their
+requirements. Nevertheless, in September, and even as early as
+August, they begin to arrive on the pampas, the golden plover
+often still wearing his black nuptial dress; singly and in pairs,
+in small flocks, and in clouds they come--curlew, godwit, plover,
+tatler, tringa--piping the wild notes to which the Greenlander
+listened in June, now to the gaucho herdsman on the green plains
+of La Plata, then to the wild Indian in his remote village; and
+soon, further south, to the houseless huanaco-hunter in the grey
+wilderness of Patagonia.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">Here is a puzzle for
+ornithologists. In summer on the pampas we have a godwit--Limosa
+hudsonica; in March it goes north to breed; later in the season
+flocks of the same species arrive from the south to winter on the
+pampas. And besides this godwit, there are several other North
+American species, which have colonies in the southern hemi-spere,
+with a reversed migration and breeding season. Why do these
+southern birds winter so far south? Do they really breed in
+Patagonia? If so, their migration is an extremely limited one
+compared with that of the northern birds--seven or eight hundred
+miles, on the outside, in one case, against almost as many
+thousands of miles in the other. Considering that some species
+which migrate as far south as Patagonia breed in the Arctic
+regions as far north as latitude 82 degrees, and probably higher
+still, it would be strange indeed if none of the birds which
+winter in Patagonia and on the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">22 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">pampas were summer
+visitors to that great austral continent, which has an estimated
+area twice as large as that of Europe, and a climate milder than
+the arctic one. The migrants would have about six hundred miles
+of sea to cross from Tierra del Fuego; but we know that the
+golden plover and other species, which sometimes touch at the
+Bermudas when travelling, fly much further than that without
+resting. The fact that a common Argentine titlark, a non-migrant
+and a weak flyer, has been met with at the South Shetland
+Islands, close to the antarctic continent, shows that the journey
+may be easily accomplished by birds with strong flight; and that
+even the winter climate of that unknown land is not too severe to
+allow an accidental colonist, like this small delicate bird, to
+survive. The godwit, already mentioned, has been observed in
+flocks at the Falkland Islands in May, that is, three months
+after the same species had taken its autumal departure from the
+neighbouring mainland. Can it be believed that these late
+visitors to the Falklands were breeders in Patagonia, and had
+migrated east to winter in so bleak a region? It is far more
+probable that they came from the south. Officers of sailing ships
+beating round Cape Horn might be able to settle this question
+definitely by looking out, and listening at night, for flights of
+birds, travelling north from about the first week in January to
+the end of February; and in September and October travelling
+south. Probably not fewer than a dozen species of the plover
+order are breeders on the great austral continent; also other
+aquatic birds--ducks and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> 23</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">geese; and many
+Passerine birds, chiefly of the Tyrant family.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Should the long
+projected Australasian expedition to the South Polar regions ever
+be carried to a successful issue, there will probably be
+important results for ornithology, in spite of the astounding
+theory which has found a recent advocate in Canon Tristram, that
+all life originated at the North Pole, whence it spread over the
+globe, but never succeeded in crossing the deep sea surrounding
+the antarctic continent, which has consequently remained till now
+desolate, "a giant ash (and ice) of death." Nor is it unlikely
+that animals of a higher class than birds exist there; and the
+discovery of new mammalians, differing in type from those we
+know, would certainly be glad tidings to most students of
+nature.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Land birds on the
+pampas are few in species and in numbers. This may be accounted
+for by the absence of trees and other elevations on which birds
+prefer to roost and nest; and by the scarcity of food. Insects
+are few in dry situations; and the large perennial grasses, which
+occupy most of the ground, yield a miserable yearly harvest of a
+few minute seeds; so that this district is a poor one both for
+soft and hard billed birds. Hawks of several genera, in moderate
+numbers, are there, but generally keep to the marshes. Eagles and
+vultures are somewhat unworthily represented by carrion-hawks
+(Polyborinae); the lordly carancho, almost eagle-like in size,
+black and crested, with a very large, pale blue, hooked beak--his
+battle axe: and his humble follower and jackal, the brown
+and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">24 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">harrier-like
+chimango. These nest on the ground, are versatile in their
+habits, carrion-eaters, also killers on their own account, and,
+like wild dogs, sometimes hunt in bands, which gives them an
+advantage. They are the unfailing attendants of all
+flesh-hunters, human or feline; and also furiously pursue and
+persecute all eagles and true vultures that venture on that great
+sea of grass, to wander thereafter, for ever lost and harried,
+"the Hagars and Ishmaels of their kind."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The owls are few and
+all of wide-ranging species. The most common is the
+burrowing-owl, found in both Americas. Not a retiring owl this,
+but all day long, in cold and in heat, it stands exposed at the
+mouth of its kennel, or on the vizcacha's mound, staring at the
+passer-by with an expression of grave surprise and reprehension
+in its round yellow eyes; male and female invariably together,
+standing stiff and erect, almost touching--of all birds that pair
+for life the most Darby and Joan like.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Of the remaining
+land birds, numbering about forty species, a few that are most
+attractive on account of their beauty, engaging habits, or large
+size, may be mentioned here. On the southern portion of the
+pampas the military starling (Sturnella) is found, and looks like
+the European starling, with the added beauty of a scarlet breast:
+among resident pampas birds the only one with a touch of
+brilliant colouring. It has a pleasing, careless song, uttered on
+the wing, and in winter congregates in great flocks, to travel
+slowly northwards over the plains. When thus travelling the birds
+observe a kind of order, and the flock feeding along
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> 25</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ground shows a very
+extended front--a representation in bird-life of the "thin red
+line"--and advances by the hindmost birds constantly flying over
+the others and alighting in the front ranks.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Among the
+tyrant-birds are several species of the beautiful wing-banded
+genus, snow-white in colour, with black on the wings and tail:
+these are extremely graceful birds, and strong flyers, and in
+desert places, where man seldom intrudes, they gather to follow
+the traveller, calling to each other with low whistling notes,
+and in the distance look like white flowers as they perch on the
+topmost stems of the tall bending grasses.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The most
+characteristic pampean birds are the tinamous--called partridges
+in the vernacular--large as a fowl, and the spotted tinamou,
+which is about the size of the English partridge. Their habits
+are identical: both lay eggs of a beautiful wine-purple colour,
+and in both species the young acquire the adult plumage and power
+of flight when very small, and fly better than the adults. They
+have small heads, slender curved beaks, unfeathered legs and
+feet, and are tailless; the plumage is deep yellowish, marked
+with black and brown above. They live concealed, skulking like
+rails through the tall grass, fly reluctantly, and when driven
+up, their flight is exceedingly noisy and violent, the bird soon
+exhausting itself. They are solitary, but many live in proximity,
+frequently calling to each other with soft plaintive voices. The
+evening call-notes of the larger bird are flute-like in
+character, and singularly sweet and expressive.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">26 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The last figure to
+be introduced into this sketch--which is not a catalogue--is that
+of the Rhea. Glyptodon, Toxodon, Mylodon, Megatherium, have
+passed away, leaving no descendants, and only pigmy
+representatives if any; but among the feathered inhabitants of
+the pampa the grand archaic ostrich of America survives from a
+time when there were also giants among the avians. Vain as such
+efforts usually are, one cannot help trying to imagine something
+of the past history of this majestic bird, before man came to
+lead the long chase now about to end so mournfully. Its
+fleetness, great staying powers, and beautiful strategy when
+hunted, make it seem probable that it was not without pursuers,
+other than the felines, among its ancient enemies, long-winded
+and tenacious of their quarry; and these were perhaps of a type
+still represented by the wolf or hound-like aguar&aacute; and
+aguara-guaz&uacute;. It might be supposed that when almost all
+the larger forms, both mammal and bird, were overtaken by
+destruction, and when the existing rhea was on the verge of
+extinction, these long-legged swift canines changed their habits
+and lost their bold spirit, degenerating at last into hunters of
+small birds and mammals, on which they are said to
+live.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The rhea possesses
+a unique habit, which is a puzzle to us, although it probably
+once had some significance--namely, that of running, when hunted,
+with one wing raised vertically, like a great sail--a veritable
+"ship of the wilderness." In every way it is adapted to the
+conditions of the pampas in a far greater degree than other
+pampean birds, only excepting the rufous and spotted tinamous.
+Its</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> 27</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c13">commanding stature
+gives it a wide horizon; and its dim, pale, bluish-grey colour
+assimilates to that of the haze, and renders it invisible at even
+a moderate distance. Its large form fades out of sight
+mysteriously, and the hunter strains his eyes in vain to
+distinguish it on the blue expanse. Its figure and carriage have
+a quaint majestic grace, somewhat unavian in character, and
+peculiar to itself. There are few more strangely fascinating
+sights in nature than that of the old black-necked cock bird,
+standing with raised agitated wings among the tall plumed
+grasses, and calling together his scattered hens with hollow
+boomings and long mysterious suspira-tions, as if a wind blowing
+high up in the void sky had found a voice. Rhea-hunting with the
+bolas, on a horse possessing both speed and endurance, and
+trained to follow the bird in all his quick doublings, is
+unquestionably one of the most fascinating forms of sport ever
+invented, by man. The quarry has even more than that fair chance
+of escape, without which all sport degenerates into mere
+butchery, unworthy of rational beings; moreover, in this unique
+method of hunting the ostrich the capture depends on a
+preparedness for all the shifts and sudden changes of course
+practised by the bird when closely followed, which is like
+instinct or intuition; and, finally, in a dexterity in casting
+the bolas at the right moment, with a certain aim, which no
+amount of practice can give to those who are not to the manner
+born.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c13">This 'wild mirth of
+the desert,' which the gaucho has known for the last three
+centuries, is now passing away, for the rhea's fleetness can no
+longer</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">28 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">avail him. He may
+scorn the horse and his rider, what time he lifts himself up, but
+the cowardly murderous methods of science, and a systematic war
+of extermination, have left him no chance. And with the rhea go
+the flamingo, antique and splendid; and the swans in their bridal
+plumage; and the rufous tinamou--sweet and mournful melodist of
+the eventide; and the noble crested screamer, that clarion-voiced
+watch-bird of the night in the wilderness. Those, and the other
+large avians, together with the finest of the mammalians, will
+shortly be lost to the pampas utterly as the great bustard is to
+England, and as the wild turkey and bison and many other species
+will shortly be lost to North America. What a wail there would be
+in the world if a sudden destruction were to fall on the
+accumulated art-treasures of the National Gallery, and the
+marbles in the British Museum, and the contents of the King's
+Library--the old prints and' mediaeval illuminations! And these
+are only the work of human hands and brains--impressions of
+individual genius on perishable material, immortal only in the
+sense that the silken cocoon of the dead moth is so, because they
+continue to exist and shine when the artist's hands and brain are
+dust:--and man has the long day of life before him in which to do
+again things like these, and better than these, if there is any
+truth in evolution. But the forms of life in the two higher
+vertebrate classes are Nature's most perfect work; and the life
+of even a single species is of incalculably greater value to
+mankind, for what it teaches and would continue to teach, than
+all the chiselled marbles and painted canvases</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Desert
+Pampas.</i> <b>29</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the world contains;
+though doubtless there are many persons who are devoted to art,
+but blind to some things greater than art, who will set me down
+as a Philistine for saying so. And, above all others, we should
+protect and hold sacred those types, Nature's masterpieces, which
+are first singled out for destruction on account of their size,
+or splendour, or rarity, and that false detestable glory which is
+accorded to their most successful slayers. <b>In</b> ancient
+times the spirit of life shone brightest in these; and when
+others that shared the earth with them were taken by death they
+were left, being more worthy of perpetuation. Like immortal
+flowers they have drifted down to us on the ocean of time, and
+their strangeness and beauty bring to our imaginations a dream
+and a picture of that unknown world, immeasurably far removed,
+where man was not: and when they perish, something of gladness
+goes out from nature, and the sunshine loses something of its
+brightness. Nor does their loss affect us and our times only. The
+species now being exterminated, not only in South America but
+everywhere on the globe, are, so far as we know, untouched by
+decadence. They are links in a chain, and branches on the tree of
+life, with their roots in a past inconceivably remote; and but
+for our action they would continue to flourish, reaching outward
+to an equally distant future, blossoming into higher and more
+beautiful forms, and gladdening innumerable generations of our
+descendants. But we think nothing of all this: we must give full
+scope to our passion for taking life, though by so doing we "ruin
+the great work of time;" not in the sense in which</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">30 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">the poet used those
+words, but in one truer, and wider, and infinitely sadder. Only
+when this sporting rage has spent itself, when there are no
+longer any animals of the larger kinds remaining, the loss we are
+now inflicting on this our heritage, in which we have a
+life-interest only, will be rightly appreciated. It is hardly to
+be supposed or hoped that posterity will feel satisfied with our
+monographs of extinct species, and the few crumbling bones and
+faded feathers, which may possibly survive half a dozen centuries
+in some happily-placed museum. On the contrary, such dreary
+mementoes will only serve to remind them of their loss; and if
+they remember us at all, it will only be to hate our memory, and
+our age--this enlightened, scientific, humanitarian age, which
+should have for a motto "Let us slay all noble and beautiful
+things, for tomorrow we die."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER II.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">THE PUMA, OB LION OF
+AMERICA.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">THE Puma has been
+singularly unfortunate in its biographers. Formerly it often
+happened that writers were led away by isolated and highly
+exaggerated incidents to attribute very shining qualities to
+their favourite animals; the lion of the Old World thus came to
+be regarded as brave and I magnanimous above all beasts of the
+field--the Bayard of the four-footed kind, a reputation which
+these prosaic and sceptical times have not suffered it to keep.
+Precisely the contrary has happened with the puma of literature;
+for, although to those personally acquainted with the habits of
+this lesser lion of the New World it is known to possess a
+marvellous courage and daring, it is nevertheless</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">always spoken of in
+books of natural history as the most pusillanimous of the larger
+carnivores. It does not attack man, and Azara is perfectly
+correct when he affirms that it never hurts, or threatens to
+hurt, man or child, even when it finds them sleeping. This,
+however, is not a full statement of the facts; the puma will not
+even defend itself against man. How natural, then, to conclude
+that it is too timid to attack a human being, or to defend
+itself, but scarcely philosophical; for even the most cowardly
+carnivores we know--dogs and hyaenas,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">32 <i>Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">for instance--will
+readily attack a disabled or sleeping man when pressed by hunger;
+and when driven to desperation no animal is too small or too
+feeble to make a show of resistance. In such a case "even the
+armadillo defends itself," as the gaucho proverb says. Besides,
+the conclusion is in contradiction to many other well-known
+facts. Putting-aside the puma's passivity in the presence of man,
+it is a bold hunter that invariably prefers large to small game;
+in desert places killing peccary, tapir, ostrich, deer, huanaco,
+&amp;c., all powerful, well-armed, or swift animals. Huanaco
+skeletons seen in Patagonia almost invariably have the neck
+dislocated, showing that the puma was the executioner. Those only
+who have hunted the huanaco on the sterile plains and mountains
+it inhabits know how wary, keen-scented, and fleet of foot it is.
+I once spent several weeks with a surveying party in a district
+where pumas were very abundant, and saw not less than half a
+dozen deer every day, freshly killed in most cases, and all with
+dislocated necks. Where prey is scarce and difficult to capture,
+the puma, after satisfying its hunger, invariably conceals the
+animal it has killed, covering it over carefully with grass and
+brushwood; these deer, however, had all been left exposed to the
+caracaras and foxes after a portion of the breast had been eaten,
+and in many cases the flesh had not been touched, the captor
+having satisfied itself with sucking the blood. It struck me very
+forcibly that the puma of the desert pampas is, among mammals,
+like the peregrine falcon of the same district among birds; for
+there this wide-ranging raptor only</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 33</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">attacks
+comparatively large birds, and, after fastidiously picking a meal
+from the flesh of the head and neck, abandons the untouched body
+to the polybori and other hawks of the more ignoble
+sort.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In pastoral
+districts the puma is very destructive to the larger domestic
+animals, and has an extraordinary fondness for horseflesh. This
+was first noticed by Molina, whose <i>Natural History of
+Chili</i> was written a century and a half ago. In Patagonia I
+heard on all sides that it was extremely difficult to breed
+horses, as the colts were mostly killed by the pumas. A native
+told me that on one occasion, while driving his horses home
+through the thicket, a puma sprang out of the bushes on to a colt
+following behind the troop, killing it before his eyes and not
+more than six yards from his horse's head. In this instance, my
+informant said, the puma alighted directly on the colt's back,
+with one fore foot grasping its bosom, while with the other it
+seized the head, and, giving it a violent wrench, dislocated the
+neck. The colt fell to the earth as if shot, and he affirmed that
+it was dead before it touched the ground.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Naturalists have
+thought it strange that the horse, once common throughout
+America, should have become extinct over a continent apparently
+so well suited to it and where it now multiplies so greatly. As a
+fact wherever pumas abound the wild horse of the present time,
+introduced from Europe, can hardly maintain its existence.
+Formerly in many places horses ran wild and multiplied to an
+amazing extent, but this happened, I believe, only in districts
+where the puma was scarce or had</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">D</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font5">34</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">already been driven
+out by man. My own experience is that on the desert pampas wild
+horses are exceedingly scarce, and from all accounts it is the
+same throughout Patagonia.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Next to horseflesh,
+sheep is preferred, and where the puma can come at a flock, he
+will not trouble himself to attack horned cattle. In Patagonia
+especially I found this to be the case. I resided for some time
+at an estancia close to the town of El Carmen, on the Rio Negro,
+which during my stay was infested by a very bold and cunning
+puma. To protect the sheep from his attacks an enclosure was made
+of upright willow-poles fifteen feet long, while the gate, by
+which he would have to enter, was close to the house and nearly
+six feet high. In spite of the difficulties thus put in the way,
+and of the presence of several large dogs, also of the watch we
+kept in the hope of shooting him, every cloudy night he came, and
+after killing one or more sheep got safely away. One dark night
+he killed four sheep; I detected him in the act, and going up to
+the gate, was trying to make out his invisible form in the gloom
+as he flitted about knocking the sheep over, when suddenly he
+leaped clear over my head and made his escape, the bullets I sent
+after him in the dark failing to hit him. Yet at this place
+twelve or fourteen calves, belonging to the milch cows, were
+every night shut into a small brushwood pen, at a distance from
+the house where the enemy could easily have destroyed every one
+of them. When I expressed surprise at this arrangement, the owner
+said that the puma was not fond of calves' flesh, and came only
+for the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 35</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">sheep. Frequently
+after his nocturnal visits we found, by tracing his footprints in
+the loose sand, that he had actually used the calves' pen as a
+place of concealment while waiting to make his attack on the
+sheep.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The puma often kills
+full-grown cows and horses, but exhibits a still greater daring
+when attacking the jaguar, the largest of American carnivores,
+although, compared with its swift, agile enemy, as heavy as a
+rhinoceros. Azara states that it is generally believed in La
+Plata and Paraguay that the puma attacks and conquers the jaguar;
+but he did not credit what he heard, which was not strange, since
+he had already set the puma down as a cowardly animal, because it
+does not attempt to harm man or child. Nevertheless, it is well
+known that where the two species inhabit the same district they
+are at enmity, the puma being the persistent persecutor of the
+jaguar, following and harassing it as a tyrant-bird harasses an
+eagle or hawk, moving about it with such rapidity as to confuse
+it, and, when an opportunity occurs, springing upon its back and
+inflicting terrible wounds with teeth and claws. Jaguars with
+scarred backs are frequently killed, and others, not long escaped
+from their tormentors, have been found so greatly lacerated that
+they were easily overcome by the hunters.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In Kingsley's
+American <i>Standard Natural History</i>, it is stated that the
+puma in North California has a feud with the grizzly bear similar
+to that of the southern animal with the jaguar. In its encounter
+with the grizzly it is said to be always</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">1 D 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">36 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">the victor; and
+this is borne out by the finding of the bodies of bears, which
+have evidently perished in the struggle.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">How strange that
+this most cunning, bold, and bloodthirsty of the Felidae, the
+persecutor of the jaguar and the scourge of the ruminants in the
+regions it inhabits, able to kill its prey with the celerity of a
+rifle bullet, never attacks a human being! Even the cowardly,
+carrion-feeding dog will attack a man when it can do so with
+impunity; but in places where the puma is the only large beast of
+prey, it is notorious that it is there perfectly safe for even a
+small child to go out and sleep on the plain. At the same time it
+will not fly from man (though the contrary is always stated in
+books of Natural History) except in places where it is
+continually persecuted. Nor is this all: it will not, as a rule,
+even defend itself against man, although in some rare instances
+it has been known to do so.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The mysterious,
+gentle instinct of this ungentle species, which causes the
+gauchos of the pampas to name it man's friend--"amigo del
+cristiano"--has been persistently ignored by all travellers and
+naturalists who have mentioned the puma. They have thus made it a
+very incongruous creature, strong enough to kill a horse, yet so
+cowardly withal that it invariably flies from a human being--even
+from a sleeping child! Possibly its real reputation was known to
+some of those who havo spoken about it; if so, they attributed
+what they heard to the love of the marvellous and the romantic,
+natural to the non-scientific mind; or else</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 37</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">preferred not to
+import into their writings matter which has so great a likeness
+to fable, and might have the effect of imperilling their
+reputation for sober-mindedness.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is, however,
+possible that the singular instinct of tho southern puma, which
+is unique among animals in a state of nature, is not possessed by
+the entire species, ranging as it does over a hundred degrees of
+latitude, from British North America to Tierra del Fuego. The
+widely different conditions of life in the various regions it
+inhabits must necessarily have caused some divergence. Concerning
+its habits in the dense forests of the Amazonian region, where it
+must have developed special instincts suited to its semi-arboreal
+life, scarcely anything has been recorded. Everyone is, however,
+familiar with the dreaded cougar, catamount, or
+panther--sometimes called "painter"--of North American
+literature, thrilling descriptions of encounters with this
+imaginary man-eating monster being freely scattered through the
+backwoods or border romances, many of them written by authors who
+have the reputation of being true to nature. It may be true that
+this cougar of a cold climate did occasionally attack man, or, as
+it is often stated, follow him in the forest with the intention
+of springing on him unawares; but on this point nothing definite
+will ever be known, as the pioneers hunters of the past were only
+anxious to shoot cougar and not to study its instinct and
+disposition. It is now many years since Audubon and Bachman
+wrote, "This animal, which has excited so much terror in the
+minds of the ignorant</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">38 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">and timid, has been
+nearly exterminated in all the Atlantic States, and we do not
+recollect a single well-authenticated instance where any hunter's
+life fell a sacrifice in a cougar hunt." It might be added, I
+believe, that no authentic instance has been recorded of the puma
+making an unprovoked attack on any human being. In South America
+also the traveller in the wilderness is sometimes followed by a
+puma; but he would certainly be very much surprised if told that
+it follows with the intention of springing on him unawares and
+devouring his flesh.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have spoken of the
+comparative ease with which the puma overcomes even large
+animals, comparing it in this respect with the peregrine falcon;
+but all predacious species are liable to frequent failures,
+sometimes to fatal mishaps, and even the cunning, swift-killing
+puma is no exception. Its attacks are successfully resisted by
+the ass, which does not, like the horse, lose his presence of
+mind, but when assaulted thrusts his head well down between its
+fore-legs and kicks violently until the enemy is thrown or driven
+off. Pigs, when in large herds, also safely defy the puma,
+massing themselves together for defence in their well-known
+manner, and presenting a serried line of tusks to the aggressor.
+During my stay in Patagonia a puma met its fate in a manner so
+singular that the incident caused considerable sensation among
+the settlers on the Rio Negro at the time. A man named Linares,
+the chief of the tame Indians settled in the neighbourhood of El
+Carmen, while riding near the river had his curiosity aroused by
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">39</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">appearance and
+behaviour of a young cow standing alone in the grass, her head,
+armed with long and exceedingly sharp horns, much raised, and
+watching his approach in a manner which betokened a state of
+dangerous excitement. She had recently dropped her calf, and he
+at once conjectured that it had been attacked, and perhaps
+killed, by some animal of prey. To satisfy himself on this point
+he began to search for it, and while thus engaged the
+cow</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-4.jpg" alt="h1-4.jpg" class="c15">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15">Puma killed by
+Cow.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">repeatedly charged
+him with the greatest fury. Presently he discovered the calf
+lying dead among the long grass; and by its side lay a full-grown
+puma, also dead, and with a large wound in its side, just behind
+the shoulder. The calf had been killed by the puma, for its
+throat showed the wounds of large teeth, and the puma had been
+killed by the cow. When he saw it he could, he affirmed, scarcely
+believe the evidence of his own senses, for was an unheard-of
+thing that a puma should be</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">4O <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">injured by any other
+animal. His opinion was that it had come down from the hills in a
+starving condition, and having sprung upon the calf, the taste of
+blood had made it for a moment careless of its own safety, and
+during that moment the infuriated cow had charged, and driving
+one of her long sharp horns into some vital part, killed it
+instantly.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The puma is, with
+the exception of some monkeys, the most playful animal in
+existence. The young of all the Felidae spend a large portion of
+their time in characteristic gambols; the adults, however,
+acquire a grave and dignified demeanour, only the female playing
+on occasions with her offspring; but this she always does with a
+certain formality of manner, as if the relaxation were indulged
+in not spontaneously, but for the sake of the young and as being
+a necessary part of their education. Some writer has described
+the lion's assumption of gaiety as more grim than its most
+serious moods. The puma at heart is always a kitten, taking
+unmeasured delight in its frolics, and when, as often happens,
+one lives alone in the desert, it will amuse itself by the hour
+fighting mock battles or playing at hide-and-seek with imaginary
+companions, and lying in wait and putting all its wonderful
+strategy in practice to capture a passing butterfly. Azara kept a
+young male for four months, which spent its whole time playing
+with the slaves. This animal, he says, would not refuse any food
+offered to it; but when not hungry it would bury the meat in the
+sand, and when inclined to eat dig it up, and, taking it to the
+water-trough, wash it clean. I have only known one puma kept as a
+pet, and this animal, in seven</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> <b>41</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">or eight years had
+never shown a trace of ill-temper. When approached, he would lie
+down, purring loudly, and twist himself about a person's legs,
+begging to be caressed. A string or handkerchief drawn about was
+sufficient to keep him in a happy state of excitement for an
+hour; and when one person was tired of playing with him he was
+ready for a game with the next comer.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I was told by a
+person who had spent most of his life on the pampas that on one
+occasion, when travelling in the neighbourhood of Cape
+Corrientes, his horse died under him, and he was compelled to
+continue his journey on foot, burdened with his heavy native
+horse-gear. At night he made his bed under the shelter of a rock,
+on the slope of a stony sierra; a bright moon was shining, and
+about nine o'clock in the evening four pumas appeared, two adults
+with their two half-grown young. Not feeling the least alarm at
+their presence, he did not stir; and after a while they began to
+gambol together close to him, concealing themselves from each
+other among the rocks, just as kittens do, and frequently while
+pursuing one another leaping over him. He continued watching them
+until past midnight, then fell asleep, and did not wake until
+morning, when they had left him.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">This man was an
+Englishman by birth, but having gone very young to South America
+he had taken kindly to the semi-barbarous life of the gauchos,
+and had imbibed all their peculiar notions, one of which is that
+human life is not worth very much. "What does it matter?" they
+often say,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">42 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">and shrug their
+shoulders, when told of a comrade's death; "so many beautiful
+horses die!" I asked him if he had ever killed a puma, and he
+replied that he had killed only one and had sworn never to kill
+another. He said that while out one day with another gaucho
+looking for cattle a puma was found. It sat up with its back
+against a stone, and did not move even when his companion threw
+the noose of his lasso over its neck. My informant then
+dismounted, and, drawing his knife, advanced to kill it: still
+the puma made no attempt to free itself from the lasso, but it
+seemed to know, he said, what was coming, for it began to
+tremble, the tears ran from its eyes, and it whined in the most
+pitiful manner. He killed it as it sat there unresisting before
+him, but after accomplishing the deed felt that he had committed
+a murder. It was the only thing ho had ever done in his life, he
+added, which filled him with remorse when he remembered it. This
+I thought a rather startling declaration, as I knew that he had
+killed several individuals of his own species in duels, fought
+with knives, in the fashion of the gauchos.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">All who have killed
+or witnessed the killing of the puma--and I have questioned
+scores of hunters on this point--agree that it resigns itself in
+this unresisting, pathetic manner to death at the hands of man.
+Claudio Gay, in his <i>Natural History of Chili,</i> says, "When
+attacked by man its energy and daring at once forsake it, and it
+becomes a weak, inoffensive animal, and trembling, and uttering
+piteous moans, and shedding abundant tears, it seems to implore
+compassion from a generous</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 43</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">enemy." The enemy is
+not often generous; but many gauchos have assured me, when
+speaking on this subject, that although they kill the puma
+readily to protect their domestic animals, they consider it an
+evil thing to take its life in desert places, where it is man's
+only friend among the wild animals.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">When the hunter is
+accompanied by dogs, then the puma, instead of drooping and
+shedding tears, is roused to a sublime rage: its hair stands
+erect; its eyes shine like balls of green flame; it spits and
+snarls like a furious torn cat. The hunter's presence seems at
+such times to be ignored altogether, its whole attention being
+given to the dogs and its rage directed against them. In
+Patagonia a sheep-farming Scotchman, with whom I spent some days,
+showed me the skulls of five pumas which he had shot in the
+vicinity of his ranche. One was of an exceptionally large
+individual, and I here relate what he told me of his encounter
+with this animal, as it shows just how the puma almost invariably
+behaves when attacked by man and dogs. He was out on foot with
+his flock, when the dogs discovered the animal concealed among
+the bushes. He had left his gun at home, and having no weapon,
+and finding that the dogs dared not attack it where it sat in a
+defiant attitude with its back against a thorny bush, he looked
+about and found a large dry stick, and going boldly up to it
+tried to stun it with a violent blow on the head. But though it
+never looked at him, its fiery eyes gazing steadily at the dogs
+all the time, he could not hit it, for with a quick side movement
+it avoided every blow. The small heed the puma paid him, and the
+apparent</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">44 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ease with which it
+avoided his best-aimed blows, only served to rouse his spirit,
+and at length striking with increased force his stick came to the
+ground and was broken to pieces. For some moments he now stood
+within two yards of the animal perfectly defenceless and not
+knowing what to do. Suddenly it sprang past him, actually
+brushing against his arm with its side, and began pursuing the
+dogs round and round among the bushes. In the end my informant's
+partner appeared on the scene with his rifle, and the puma was
+shot.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In encounters of
+this kind the most curious thing is that the puma steadfastly
+refuses to recognize an enemy in man, although it finds him
+acting in concert with its hated canine foe, about whose hostile
+intentions it has no such delusion.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Several years ago a
+paragraph, which reached me in South America, appeared in the
+English papers relating an incident characteristic of the puma in
+a wild beast show in this country. The animal was taken out of
+its cage and led about the grounds by its keeper, followed by a
+large number of spectators. Suddenly it was struck motionless by
+some object in the crowd, at which it gazed steadily with a look
+of intense excitement; then springing violently away it dragged
+the chain from the keeper's hand and dashed in among the people,
+who immediately fled screaming in all directions. Their fears
+were, however, idle, the object of the puma's rage being a dog
+which it had spied among the crowd.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is said that when
+taken adult pumas invariably pine away and die; when brought up
+in captivity</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 45</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">they invariably make
+playful, affectionate pets, and are gentle towards all human
+beings, but very seldom overcome their instinctive animosity
+towards the dog.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">One of the very few
+authentic instances I have met with of this animal defending
+itself against a human being was related to me at a place on the
+pampas called Saladillo. At the time of my visit there jaguars
+and pumas were very abundant and extremely destructive to the
+cattle and horses. Sheep it had not yet been considered worth
+while to introduce, but immense herds of pigs were kept at every
+estancia, these animals being able to protect themselves. One
+gaucho had so repeatedly distinguished himself by his boldness
+and dexterity in killing jaguars that he was by general consent
+made the leader of every tiger-hunt. One day the comandante of
+the district got twelve or fourteen men together, the
+tiger-slayer among them, and started in search of a jaguar which
+had been seen that morning in the neighbourhood of his estancia.
+The animal was eventually found and surrounded, and as it was
+crouching among some clumps of tall pampas grass, where throwing
+a lasso over its neck would be a somewhat difficult and dangerous
+operation, all gave way to the famous hunter, who at once
+uncoiled his lasso and proceeded in a leisurely manner to form
+the loop. While thus engaged he made the mistake of allowing his
+horse, which had grown restive, to turn aside from the hunted
+animal. The jaguar, instantly taking advantage of the oversight,
+burst from its cover and sprang first on to the haunches of the
+horse, then seizing the hunter by</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">46 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">his poncho dragged
+him to the earth, and would no doubt have quickly despatched him
+if a lasso, thrown by one of the other men, had not closed round
+its neck at this critical moment. It was quickly dragged off, and
+eventually killed. But the discomfited hunter did not stay to
+assist at the finish. He arose from the ground unharmed, but in a
+violent passion and blaspheming horribly, for he knew that his
+reputation, which he priced above everything, had suffered a
+great blow, and that he would be mercilessly ridiculed by his
+associates. Getting on his horse he rode away by himself from the
+scene of his misadventure. Of what happened to him on his
+homeward ride there were no witnesses; but his own account was as
+follows, and inasmuch as it told against his own prowess it was
+readily believed: Before riding a league, and while his bosom was
+still burning with rage, a puma started up from the long grass in
+his path, but made no attempt to run away; it merely sat up, he
+said, and looked at him in a provokingly fearless manner. To slay
+this animal with his knife, and so revenge himself on it for the
+defeat he had just suffered, was his first thought. He alighted
+and secured his horse by tying its fore feet together, then,
+drawing his long, heavy knife, rushed at the puma. Still it did
+not stir. Raising his weapon he struck with a force which would
+have split the animal's skull open if the blow had fallen where
+it was intended to fall, but with a quick movement the puma
+avoided it, and at the same time lifted a foot and with lightning
+rapidity dealt the aggressor a blow on the face, its unsheathed
+claws literally dragging down the flesh</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 47</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">from his cheek,
+laying the bone bare. After inflicting this terrible punishment
+and eyeing its fallen foe for a few seconds it trotted quietly
+away. The wounded man succeeded in getting on to his horse and
+reaching his home. The hanging flesh was restored to its place
+and the ghastly rents sewn up, and in the end he recovered: but
+he was disfigured for life; his temper also completely changed;
+he became morose and morbidly sensitive to the ridicule of his
+neighbours, and he never again ventured to join them in their
+hunting expeditions. I inquired of the comandante, and of others,
+whether any case had come to their knowledge in that district in
+which the puma had shown anything beyond a mere passive
+friendliness towards man; in reply they related the following
+incident, which had occurred at the Saladillo a few years before
+my visit: The men all went out one day beyond the frontier to
+form a <i>cerco,</i> as it is called, to hunt ostriches and other
+game. The hunters, numbering about thirty, spread themselves
+round in a vast ring and, advancing towards the centre, drove the
+animals before them. During the excitement of the chase which
+followed, while they were all engaged in preventing the
+ostriches, deer, &amp;c., from doubling back and escaping, it was
+not noticed that one of the hunters had disappeared; his horse,
+however, returned to its home during the evening, and on the next
+morning a fresh hunt for the lost man was organized. He was
+eventually found lying on the ground with a broken leg, where he
+had been thrown at the beginning of the hunt. He related that
+about an hour after it had become dark a puma</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">48 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">appeared and sat
+near him, but did not seem to notice him. After a while it became
+restless, frequently going away and returning, and finally it
+kept away so long, that he thought it had left him for good.
+About midnight he heard the deep roar of a jaguar, and gave
+himself up for lost. By raising himself on his elbow he was able
+to see the outline of the beast crouching near him, but its face
+was turned from him, and it appeared to be intently watching some
+object on which it was about to spring. Presently it crept out of
+sight, then he heard snarlings and growlings and the sharp yell
+of a puma, and he knew that the two beasts were fighting. Before
+morning he saw the jaguar several times, but the puma renewed the
+contest with it again and again until morning appeared, after
+which he saw and heard no more of them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Extraordinary as
+this story sounds, it did not seem so to me when I heard it, for
+I had already met with many anecdotes of a similar nature in
+various parts of the country, some of them vastly more
+interesting than the one I have just narrated; only I did not get
+them at first hand, and am consequently not able to vouch for
+their accuracy; but in this case it seemed to me that there was
+really no room for doubt. All that I had previously heard had
+compelled me to believe that the puma really does possess a
+unique instinct of friendliness for man, the origin of which,
+like that of many other well-known instincts of animals, must
+remain a mystery. The fact that the puma never makes an
+unprovoked attack on a human being, or eats human flesh, and that
+it refuses, except in some very rare cases, even</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<img src="images/h1-5.jpg" alt="h1-5.jpg" class="c16">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font11">PUMA ATTACKING
+JAGUAR.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font11">[Page 48.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 49</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">to defend itself,
+does not seem really less wonderful in an animal of its bold and
+sanguinary temper thau that it should follow the traveller in the
+wilderness, or come near him when he lies sleeping or disabled,
+and even occasionally defend him from its enemy the jaguar. We
+know that certain sounds, colours, or smells, which are not
+particularly noticed by most animals, produce an extraordinary
+effect on some species; and it is possible to believe, I think,
+that the human form or countenance, or the odour of the human
+body, may also have the effect on the puma of suspending its
+predatory instincts and inspiring it with a gentleness towards
+man, which we are only accustomed to see in our domesticated
+carnivores or in feral animals towards those of their own
+species. Wolves, when pressed with hunger, will sometimes devour
+a fellow wolf; as a rule, however, rapacious animals will starve
+to death rather than prey on one of their own kind, nor is it a
+common thing for them to attack other species possessing
+instincts similar to their own. The puma, we have seen, violently
+attacks other large carnivores, not to feed on them, but merely
+to satisfy its animosity; and, while respecting man, it is,
+within the tropics, a great hunter and eater of monkeys, which of
+all animals most resemble men. We can only conclude with Humboldt
+that there is something mysterious in the hatreds and affections
+of animals.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The view here taken
+of the puma's character imparts, I think, a fresh interest to
+some things concerning the species, which have appeared
+in</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">50 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">historical and
+other works, and which I propose to discuss briefly in this
+place.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">There is a
+remarkable passage in Byron's <i>Narrative of the loss of the
+Wager,</i> which was quoted by Admiral Fitzroy in his <i>Voyage
+of the Beagle,</i> to prove that tho puma inhabits Tierra del
+Fuego and the adjacent islands; no other large beast of prey
+being known in that part of America. "I heard," he says, "a
+growling close by me, which made me think it advisable to retire
+as soon as possible: the woods were, so gloomy I could see
+nothing; but, as I retired, this noise followed me close till I
+got out of them. Some of our men did assure me that they had seen
+a very large beast in the woods. . . I proposed to four of the
+people to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from
+the bell tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam,
+which I had discovered in a walk that way on our first landing.
+This we covered to windward with seaweed; and, lighting a fire,
+laid ourselves down in hopes of finding a remedy for our hunger
+in sleep; but we had not long composed ourselves before one of
+our company was disturbed by the blowing of some animal at his
+face; and, upon opening his eyes, was not a little astonished to
+see by the glimmering of the fire, a large beast standing over
+him. He had presence of mind enough to snatch a brand from the
+fire, which was now very low, and thrust it at the nose of tho
+animal, which thereupon made off. . . . In the morning we were
+not a little anxious to know how our companions had fared; and
+this anxiety was increased upon our tracing the footsteps of
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 51</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">beast in the sand,
+in a direction towards the bell tent. The impression was deep and
+plain, of a large round foot well furnished with claws. Upon
+acquainting the people in the tent with the circumstances of our
+story, we found that they had been visited by the same unwelcome
+guest."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Mr. Andrew Murray,
+in his work on the Geographical Distribution of Mammals, gives
+the Straits of Magellan as the extreme southern limit of the
+puma's range, and in discussing the above passage from Byron he
+writes: "This reference, however, gives no support to the notion
+of the animal alluded to having been a puma. . . . The
+description of the footprints clearly shows that the animal could
+not have been a puma. None of the cat tribe leave any trace of a
+claw in their footprints. . . .The dogs, on the other hand, leave
+a very well-defined claw-mark. . . . Commodore Byron and his
+party had therefore suffered a false alarm. The creature which
+had disturbed them was, doubtless, one of the harmless domestic
+dogs of the natives."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The assurance that
+the bold hardy adventurer and his men suffered a false alarm, and
+were thrown into a great state of excitement at the appearance of
+one of the wretched domestic dogs of the Fuegians, with which
+they were familiar, comes charmingly, it must be said, from a
+closet naturalist, who surveys the world of savage beasts from
+his London study. He apparently forgets that Commodore Byron
+lived in a time when the painful accuracy and excessive
+minuteness we are accustomed to was not expected from a writer,
+whenever he happened to touch on any matters connected with
+zoology.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">52 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">This kind of
+criticism, which seizes on a slight inaccuracy in one passage,
+and totally ignores an important statement in another--as, for
+instance, that of the "great beast" seen in the woods--might be
+extended to other portions of the book, and Byron's entire
+narrative made to appear as purely a work of the imagination as
+Peter Wilkin's adventures in those same antarctic
+seas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Mr. J. W. Boddam
+Whetham, in his work <i>Across Central America</i> (1877), gives
+an anecdote of the puma, which he heard at Sacluk, in Guatemala,
+and which strangely resembles some of the stories I have heard on
+the pampas. He writes: "The following event, most extraordinary
+if true, is said to have occurred in this forest to a
+mahogany-cutter, who had been out marking trees. As he was
+returning to his hut, he suddenly felt a soft body pressing
+against him, and on looking down saw a cougar, which, with tail
+erect, and purring like a cat, twisted itself in and out of his
+legs, and glided round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if with
+laughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on,
+and the terrible animal still circled about, now rolling over,
+and now touching him with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse.
+At last the suspense became too great, and with a loud shout he
+struck desperately at the creature with his axe. It bounded on
+one side and crouched snarling and showing its teeth. Just as it
+was about to spring, the man's companion, who had heard his call,
+appeared in the distance, and with a growl the beast vanished
+into the thick bushes."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Now, after allowing
+for exaggeration, if there is</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 53</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">no foundation for
+stories of this character, it is really a very wonderful
+coincidence that they should be met with in countries so widely
+separated as Patagonia and Central America. Pumas, doubtless, are
+scarce in Guatemala; and, as in other places where they have met
+with nothing but persecution from man, they are shy of him; but
+had this adventure occurred on the pampas, where they are better
+known, the person concerned in it would not have said that the
+puma played with him as a cat with a mouse, but rather as a tame
+cat plays with a child; nor, probably, would he have been
+terrified into imagining that the animal, even after its caresses
+had met with so rough a return, was about to spring on
+him.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In Clavigero's
+<i>History of Lower California,</i> it is related that a very
+extraordinary state of things was discovered to exist in that
+country by the first missionaries who settled there at the end of
+the seventeenth century, and which was actually owing to the
+pumas. The author says that there were no bears or tigers
+(jaguars); these had most probably been driven out by their old
+enemies; but the pumas had increased to a prodigious extent, so
+that the whole peninsula was overrun by them; and this was owing
+to the superstitious regard in which they were held by the
+natives, who not only did not kill them, but never ventured to
+disturb them in any way. The Indians were actually to some extent
+dependent on the puma's success in hunting for their subsistence;
+they watched the movements of the vultures in order to discover
+the spot in which the remains of any animal it had captured had
+been</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">54 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">left by the puma,
+and whenever the birds were seen circling about persistently over
+one place, they hastened to take possession of the carcass,
+discovered in this way. The domestic animals, imported by the
+missionaries, were quickly destroyed by the virtual masters of
+the country, and against these enemies the Jesuits preached a
+crusade in vain: for although the Indians readily embraced
+Christianity and were baptized, they were not to be shaken in
+their notions concerning the sacred <i>Chimbic&aacute;,</i> as
+the puma was called. The missions languished in consequence; the
+priests existed in a state of semi-starvation, depending on
+provisions sent to them at long intervals from the distant
+Mexican settlements; and for many years all their efforts to
+raise the savages from their miserable condition were thrown
+away. At length, in 1701, the mission of Loreto was taken charge
+of by one Padre Ugarte, described by Clavigero as a person of
+indomitable energy, and great physical strength and courage, a
+true muscular Christian, who occasionally varied his method of
+instruction by administering corporal chastisements to his
+hearers when they laughed at his doctrines, or at the mistakes he
+made in their language, while preaching to them. Ugarte, like his
+predecessors, could not move the Indians to hunt the puma, but he
+was a man of action, with a wholesome belief in the efficacy of
+example, and his opportunity came at last.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">One day, while
+riding in the wood, he saw at a distance a puma walking
+deliberately towards him. Alighting from his mule, he took up a
+large stone and advanced to meet the animal, and when</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America.</i> 55</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">sufficiently near
+hurled the missile with such precision and force that he knocked
+ifc down senseless. After killing it, he found that the heaviest
+part of his task remained, as it was necessary for the success of
+his project to carry the beast, still warm and bleeding, to the
+Indian village; but mow his mule steadfastly refused to approach
+it. Father Ugarte was not, however, to be defeated, and partly by
+stratagem, partly by force, he finally succeeded in getting the
+puma on to the mule's back, after which he rode in triumph to the
+settlement. The Indians at first thought it all a trick of their
+priest, who was so anxious to involve them in a conflict with the
+pumas, and standing at a distance they began jeering at him, and
+exclaiming that he had found the animal dead! But when they were
+induced to approach, and saw that it was still warm and bleeding,
+they were astonished beyond measure, and began to watch the
+priest narrowly, thinking that he would presently drop down and
+die in sight of them all. It was their belief that death would
+quickly overtake the slayer of a puma. As this did not happen,
+the priest gained a great influence over them, and in the end
+they were persuaded to turn their weapons against the
+Chimbic&aacute;.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Clavigero has
+nothing to say concerning the origin of this Californian
+superstition; but with some knowledge of the puma's character, it
+is not difficult to imagine what it may have been. No doubt these
+savages had been very well acquainted from ancient times with the
+animal's instinct of friendliness toward man, and its extreme
+hatred of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">56 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">other carnivores,
+which prey on the human species; and finding it ranged on their
+side, as it were, in the hard struggle of life in the desert,
+they were induced to spare it, and even to regard it as a friend;
+and such a feeling, among primitive men, might in the course of
+time degenerate into such a superstition as that of the
+Californians.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I shall, in
+conclusion, relate here the story of Maldonada, which is not
+generally known, although familiar to Buenos Ayreans as the story
+of Lady Godiva's ride through Coventry is to the people of that
+town. The case of Maldonada is circumstantially narrated by Rui
+Diaz de Guzman, in his history of the colonization of the Plata:
+he was a person high in authority in the young colonies, and is
+regarded by students of South American history as an accurate and
+sober-minded chronicler of the events of his own times. He
+relates that in the year 1536 the settlers at Buenos Ayres,
+having exhausted their provisions, and being compelled by hostile
+Indians to keep within their pallisades, were reduced to the
+verge of starvation. The Governor Mendoza went off to seek help
+from the other colonies up the river, deputing his authority to
+one Captain Ruiz, who, according to all accounts, displayed an
+excessively tyrannous and truculent disposition while in power.
+The people were finally reduced to a ration of sis ounces of
+flour per day for each person; but as the flour was putrid and
+only made them ill, they were forced to live on any small animals
+they could capture, including snakes, frogs and toads. Some
+horrible details are given by Rui Diaz, and other writers; one,
+Del Barco</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Puma, or Lion of
+America</i> 57</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Centenera, affirms
+that of two thousand persons in the town eighteen hundred
+perished of hunger. During this unhappy time, beasts of prey in
+large numbers were attracted to the settlement by the effluvium
+of the corpses, buried just outside the pallisades; and this made
+the condition of the survivors more miserable still, since they
+could venture into the neighbouring woods only at the risk of a
+violent death. Nevertheless, many did so venture, and among these
+was the young woman Maldonada, who, losing herself in the forest,
+strayed to a distance, and was eventually found by a party of
+Indians, and carried by them to their village.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Some months later,
+Captain Ruiz discovered her whereabouts, and persuaded the
+savages to bring her to the settlement; then, accusing her of
+having gone to the Indian village in order to betray the colony,
+he condemned her to be devoured by wild beasts. She was taken to
+a wood at a distance of a league from the town, and left there,
+tied to a tree, for the space of two nights and a day. A party of
+soldiers then went to the spot, expecting to find her bones
+picked clean by the beasts, but were greatly astonished to find
+Maldonada still alive, without hurt or scratch. She told them
+that a puma had come to her aid, and had kept at her side,
+defending her life against all the other beasts that approached
+her. She was instantly released, and taken back to the town, her
+deliverance through the action of the puma probably being looked
+on as direct interposition of Providence to save her.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Rui Diaz concludes
+with the following paragraph, in which he affirms that he knew
+the woman Mal-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">58 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">donada, which may be
+taken as proof that she was among the few that survived the first
+disastrous settlement and lived on to more fortunate times: his
+pious pun on her name would be lost in a translation:--"De esta
+manera qued&oacute; libre la que ofrecieron a las fieras: la cual
+mujer yo la conoc&iacute;, y la llamaban la Maldonada, que mas
+bien se le pod&iacute;a llamar la BIENDONADA; pues por este
+suceso se ha de ver no haber merecido el castigo &aacute; que la
+ofrecieron."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">If such a thing were
+to happen now, in any portion of southern South America, where
+the puma's disposition is best known, it would not be looked on
+as a miracle, as it was, and that unavoidably, in the case of
+Maldonada.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER III.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">A WAVE OF
+LIFE,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">FOR many years,
+while living in my own home on the pampas, I kept a journal, in
+which all my daily observations on the habits of animals and
+kindred matters were carefully noted. Turning back to 1872-3, I
+find my jottings for that season contain a history of one of
+those waves of life--for I can think of no better name for the
+phenomenon in question--that are of such frequent occurrence in
+thinly-settled regions, though in countries like England, seen
+very rarely, and on a very limited scale. An exceptionally
+bounteous season, the accidental mitigation of a check, or other
+favourable circumstance, often causes an increase so sudden and
+inordinate of small prolific species, that when we actually
+witness it we are no longer surprised at the notion prevalent
+amongst the common people that mice, frogs, crickets, &amp;c.,
+are occasionally rained down from the clouds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the summer of
+1872-3 we had plenty of sunshine, with frequent showers; so that
+the hot months brought no dearth of wild flowers, as in most
+years. The abundance of flowers resulted in a wonderful increase
+of humble bees. I have never known them so plentiful before; in
+and about the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">6o <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">plantation
+adjoining my house I found, during the season, no fewer than
+seventeen nests.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The season was also
+favourable for mice; that is, of course, favourable for the time
+being, unfavourable in the long run, since the short-lived, undue
+preponderance of a species is invariably followed by a long
+period of undue depression. These prolific little creatures were
+soon so abundant that the dogs subsisted almost exclusively on
+them; the fowls also, from incessantly pursuing and killing them,
+became quite rapacious in their manner; whilst the sulphur
+tyrant-birds (Pitangus) and the Guira cuckoos preyed on nothing
+but mice.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The domestic cats,
+as they invariably do in such plentiful seasons, absented
+themselves from the house, assuming all the habits of their wild
+congeners, and slinking from the sight of man--even of a former
+fireside companion--with a shy secrecy in their motions, an
+apparent affectation of fear, almost ludicrous to see. Foxes,
+weasels, and opossums fared sumptuously. Even for the common
+armadillo (Dasypus villosus) it was a season of affluence, for
+this creature is very adroit in capturing mice. This fact might
+seem surprising to anyone who marks the uncouth figure, toothless
+gums, and the motions --anything but light and graceful--of the
+armadillo and perhaps fancying that, to be a dexterous mouser, an
+animal should bear some resemblance in habits and structure to
+the felidas. But animals, like men, are compelled to adapt
+themselves to their surroundings; new habits are acquired, and
+the exact co-relation between habit and structure is seldom
+maintained.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>A Wave of Life,</i>
+61 '</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I kept an armadillo
+at this time, and good cheer and the sedentary life he led in
+captivity made him excessively fat; but the mousing exploits of
+even this individual were most interesting. Occasionally I took
+him into the fields to give him a taste of liberty, though at
+such times I always took the precaution to keep hold of a cord
+fastened to one of his hind legs; for as often as he came to a
+kennel of one of his wild fellows, he would attempt to escape
+into it. He invariably travelled with an ungainly trotting gait,
+carrying his nose, beagle-like, close to the ground. His sense of
+smell was exceedingly acute, and when near his prey he became
+agitated, and quickened his motions, pausing frequently to sniff
+the earth, till, discovering the exact spot where the mouse
+lurked, he would stop and creep cautiously to it; then, after
+slowly raising himself to a sitting posture, spring suddenly
+forwards, throwing his body like a trap over the mouse, or nest
+of mice, concealed beneath the grass.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">A curious instance
+of intelligence in a cat was brought to my notice at this time by
+one of my neighbours, a native. His children had made the
+discovery that some excitement and fun was to be had by placing a
+long hollow stalk of the giant thistle with a mouse in it--and
+every hollow stalk at this time had one for a tenant--before a
+cat, and then watching her movements. Smelling her prey, she
+would spring at one end of the stalk--the end towards which the
+mouse would be moving at the same time, but would catch nothing,
+for the mouse, instead of running out, would turn back to run to
+the other end; whereupon the cat, all excitement,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">62 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">would jump there to
+seize it; and so the contest would continue for a long time, an
+exhibition of the cleverness and the stupidity of instinct, both
+of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several cats at the
+house, and all acted in the same way except one. When a stalk was
+placed before this cat, instead of becoming excited like the
+others, it went quickly to one end and smelt' at the opening,
+then, satisfied that its prey was inside, it deliberately bit a
+long piece out of the stalk with its teeth, then another strip,
+and so on progressively, until the entire stick had been opened
+up to within six or eight inches of the further end, when the
+mouse came out and was caught. Every stalk placed before this cat
+was demolished in the same businesslike way; but the other cats,
+though they were made to look on while the stick was being broken
+up by their fellow, could never learn the trick.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In the autumn of
+the year countless numbers of storks (Ciconia maguari) and of
+short-eared owls (Otus brachyotus) made their appearance. They
+had also come to assist at the general feast.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Remembering the
+opinion of Mr. E. Newman, quoted by Darwin, that two-thirds of
+the humble bees in England are annually destroyed by mice, I
+determined to continue observing these insects, in order to
+ascertain whether the same thing occurred on the pampas. I
+carefully revisited all the nests I had found, and was amazed at
+the rapid disappearance of all the bees. I was quite convinced
+that the mice had devoured or driven them out, for the weather
+was still warm, and flowers and fruit on which humble bees feed
+were very abundant.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>A Wave of Life.</i>
+63</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">After cold weather
+set in the storks went away, probably on account of the scarcity
+of water, for the owls remained. So numerous were they during the
+winter, that any evening after sunset I could count forty or
+fifty individuals hovering over the trees about my house.
+Unfortunately they did not confine their attentions to the mice,
+but became destructive to the birds as well. I frequently watched
+them at dusk, beating about the trees and bushes in a systematic
+manner, often a dozen or more of them wheeling together about one
+tree, like so many moths about a candle, and one occasionally
+dashing through the branches until a pigeon--usually the Zenaida
+maculata--or other bird was scared from its perch. The instant
+the bird left the tree they would all give chase, disappearing in
+the darkness. I could not endure to see the havoc they were
+making amongst the ovenbirds (Furnarius rufus--a species for
+which I have a regard and affection almost superstitious), so I
+began to shoot the marauders. Very soon, however, I found it was
+impossible to protect my little favourites. Night after night the
+owls mustered in their usual numbers, so rapidly were the gaps I
+made in their ranks refilled. I grew sick of the cruel war in
+which I had so hopelessly joined, and resolved, not without pain,
+to let things take their course. A singular circumstance was that
+the owls began to breed in the middle of winter. The
+field-labourers and boys found many nests with eggs and young
+birds in the neighbourhood. I saw one nest in July, our coldest
+month, with three half-grown young birds in it. They were
+excessively fat, and, though it</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">64 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata*</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">was noon-day, had
+their crops full. There were three mice and two young
+cav&iacute;es (Cavia australis) lying untouched in the
+nest.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The short-eared owl
+is of a wandering disposition, ard performs long journeys at all
+seasons of the year in search of districts where food is
+abundant; and perhaps these winter-breeders came from a region
+where scarcity of prey, or some such cause, had prevented them
+from nesting at their usual time in summer.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The gradual
+increase or decrease continually going on in many species about
+us is little remarked; but the sudden infrequent appearance in
+vast numbers of large and comparatively rare species is regarded
+by most people as a very wonderful phenomenon, not easily
+explained. On the pampas, whenever grasshoppers, mice, frogs or
+crickets become excessively abundant we confidently look for the
+appearance of multitudes of the birds that prey on them. However
+obvious may be the cause of the first phenomenon--the sudden
+inordinate increase during a favourable year of a species always
+prolific--the attendant one always creates astonishment: For how,
+it is asked, do these largo birds, seldom seen at other times,
+receive information in the distant regions they inhabit of an
+abundance of food in any particular locality? Years have perhaps
+passed during which, scarcely an individual of these kinds has
+been seen: all at once armies of the majestic white storks are
+seen conspicuously marching about the plain in all directions;
+while the night air resounds with the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>A Wave of Life.</i>
+65</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">solemn hootings of
+innumerable owls. It is plain that these birds have been drawn
+from over an immense area to one spot; and the question is how
+have they been drawn?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Many large birds
+possessing great powers of flight are, when not occupied with the
+business of propagation, incessantly wandering from place to
+place in search of food. They are not, as a rule, regular
+migrants, for their wanderings begin and end irrespective of
+seasons, and where they find abundance they remain the whole
+year. They fly at a very great height, and traverse immense
+distances. When the favourite food of any one of these species is
+plentiful in any particular region all the individuals that
+discover it remain, and attract to them all of their kind passing
+overhead. This happens on the pampas with the stork, the
+short-eared owl, the hooded gull and the dominican or
+black-backed gull--the leading species among the feathered
+nomads: a few first appear like harbingers; these are presently
+joined by new comers in considerable numbers, and before long
+they are in myriads. Inconceivable numbers of birds are,
+doubtless, in these regions, continually passing over us unseen.
+It was once a subject of very great wonder to me that flocks of
+black-necked swans should almost always appear flying by
+immediately after a shower of rain, even when none had been
+visible for a long time before, and when they must have come from
+a very great distance. When the reason at length occurred to me,
+I felt very much disgusted with myself for being puzzled over so
+very simple a matter. After rain a flying swan</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">P</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">66</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">may be visible to
+the eye at a vastly greater distance than during fair weather;
+the sun shining on its intense white plumage against the dark
+background of a rain-cloud making it exceedingly conspicuous. The
+fact that swans are almost always seen after rain shows only that
+they are almost always passing.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Whenever we are
+visited by a dust-storm on the pampas myriads of hooded
+gulls--Larus macnlipen-nis--appear flying before the dark
+dust-cloud, even when not a gull has been seen for months.
+Dust-storms are of rare occurrence, and come only after a long
+drought, and, the water-courses being all dry, the gulls cannot
+have been living in the region over which the storm passes. Yet
+in seasons of drought gulls must be continually passing by at a
+great height, seeing but not seen, except when driven together
+and forced towards the earth by the fury of the storm.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">By August (1873)
+the owls had vanished, and they had, indeed, good cause for
+leaving. The winter had been one of continued drought; the dry
+grass and herbage of the preceding year had been consumed by the
+cattle and wild animals, or had turned to dust, and with the
+disappearance of their food and cover the mice had ceased to be.
+The famine-stricken cats sneaked back to the house. It was
+pitiful to see the little burrowing owls; for these birds, not
+having the powerful wings and prescient instincts of the vagrant
+Otus brachyotus, are compelled to face the poverty from which the
+others escape. Just as abundance had before made</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>A Wave of Life.</i>
+67</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">the domestic cats
+wild, scarcity now made the burrowing owls tame and fearless of
+man. They were so reduced as scarcely to be able to fly, and hung
+about the houses all day long on the look-out for some stray
+morsel of food. I have frequently seen one alight and advance
+within two or three yards of the door-step, probably attracted by
+the smell of roasted meat. The weather continued dry until late
+in spring, so reducing the sheep and cattle that incredible
+numbers perished during a month of cold and rainy weather that
+followed the drought.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">How clearly we can
+see in all this that the tendency to multiply rapidly, so
+advantageous in normal seasons, becomes almost fatal to a species
+in seasons of exceptional abundance. Cover and food without limit
+enabled the mice to increase at such an amazing rate that the
+lesser checks interposed by predatory species were for a while
+inappreciable. But as the mice increased, so did their enemies.
+Insectivorous and other species acquired the habits of owls and
+weasels, preying exclusively on them; while to this innumerable
+army of residents was shortly added multitudes of wandering birds
+coming from distant regions. No sooner had the herbage perished,
+depriving the little victims of cover and food, than the effects
+of the war became apparent. In autumn the earth so teemed with
+them that one could scarcely walk anywhere without treading on
+mice; while out of every hollow weed-stalk lying on the ground
+dozens could be shaken; but so rapidly had they devoured, by the
+trained army of persecutors, p 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font25">68</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">that in spring it
+was hard to find a survivor, even in the barns and houses. The
+fact that species tend to increase in a geometrical ratio makes
+these great and sudden changes frequent in many regions of the
+earth; but it is not often they present themselves so vividly as
+in the foregoing instance, for here, scene after scene in one of
+Nature's silent passionless tragedies opens before us, countless
+myriads of highly organized beings rising into existence only to
+perish almost immediately, scarcely a hard-pressed remnant
+remaining after the great reaction to continue the
+species.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER IV.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL
+WEAPONS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">STRICTLY speaking,
+the only weapons of vertebrates are teeth, claws, horns, and
+spurs. Horns belong only to the ruminants, and the spur is a rare
+weapon. There are also many animals in which teeth and claws are
+not suited to inflict injury, or in which the proper instincts
+and courage to use and develop them are wanted; and these would
+seem, to be in a very defenceless condition. Defenceless they are
+in one sense, but as a fact they are no worse off than the
+well-armed species, having either a protective colouring or a
+greater swiftness or cunning to assist them in escaping from
+their enemies. And there are also many of these practically
+toothless and clawless species which have yet been provided with
+other organs and means of offence and defence out of Nature's
+curious armoury, and concerning a few of these species I propose
+to speak in this place.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Probably such
+distinctive weapons as horns, spurs, tusks and spines would be
+much more common in nature if the conditions of life always
+remained the same. But these things are long in fashioning;
+meanwhile, conditions are changing; climate, soil, vegetation
+vary; foes and rivals</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">70 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">diminish or
+increase; the old go, and others with different weapons and a new
+strategy take their place; and just as a skilful man "fighting
+the wilderness" fashions a plough from a hunting-knife, turns his
+implements into weapons of war, and for everything he possesses
+discovers a use never contemplated by its maker, so does Nature
+--only with an ingenuity exceeding that of man--use the means she
+has to meet all contingencies, and enable her creatures,
+seemingly so ill-provided, to maintain their fight for life.
+Natural selection, like an angry man, can make a weapon of
+anything; and, using the word in this wide sense, the mucous
+secretions the huanaco discharges into the face of an adversary,
+and the pestilential drops "distilled" by the skunk, are weapons,
+and may be as effectual in defensive warfare as spines, fangs and
+tushes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I do not know of a
+more striking instance in the animal kingdom of adaptation of
+structure to habit than is afforded by the hairy
+armadillo--Dasypus villosus. He appears to us, roughly speaking,
+to resemble an ant-eater saddled with a dish cover; yet this
+creature, with the cunning Avhich Nature has given it to
+supplement all deficiencies, has discovered in its bony
+encumbrance a highly efficient weapon of offence. Most other
+edentates are diurnal and almost exclusively insectivorous, some
+feeding only on ants; they have unchangeable habits, very limited
+intelligence, and vanish before civilization. The hairy armadillo
+alone has struck out a line for itself. Like its fast
+disappearing congeners, it is an insect-eater still,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Some curious Annual
+Weapons. 71</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">but does not like
+them seek its food on the surface and in the ant-hill only; all
+kinds of insects are preyed on, and by means of its keen scent it
+discovers worms and larvae several inches beneath the surface.
+Its method of taking worms and grubs resembles that of probing
+birds, for it throws up no earth, but forces its sharp snout and
+wedge-shaped head down to the required depth; and probably while
+working it moves round in a circle, for the hole is conical,
+though the head of the animal is flat. Where it has found a rich
+hunting-ground, the earth is seen pitted with hundreds of these
+neat symmetrical bores. It is also an enemy to ground-nesting
+birds, being fond of eggs and fledglings; and when unable to
+capture prey it will feed on carrion as readily as a wild dog or
+vulture, returning night after night to the carcase of a horse or
+cow as long as the flesh lasts. Failing animal food, it subsists
+on vegetable diet; and I have frequently found their stomachs
+stuffed with clover, and, stranger still, with the large, hard
+grains of the maize, swallowed entire.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is not,
+therefore, strange that at all seasons, and even when other
+animals are starving, the hairy armadillo is always fat and
+vigorous. In the desert it is diurnal; but where man appears it
+becomes more and more nocturnal, and in populous districts does
+not go abroad until long after dark. Yet when a district becomes
+thickly settled it increases in numbers; so readily does it adapt
+itself to new conditions. It is not to be wondered at that the
+gauchos, keen observers of nature as they are, should make this
+species the hero of many of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">72 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">their fables of the
+"Uncle Remus" type, representing it as a versatile creature,
+exceedingly fertile in expedients, and duping its sworn friend
+the fox in various ways, just as "Brer Rabbit" serves the fox in
+the North American fables.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The hairy armadillo
+will, doubtless, long survive all the other armadillos, and on
+this account alone it will have an ever-increasing interest for
+the naturalist. I have elsewhere described how it</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-6.jpg" alt="h1-6.jpg" class="c17">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Armadillo killing
+Snake.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">captures mice; when
+preying on snakes it proceeds in another manner. A friend of
+mine, a careful observer, who was engaged in cattle-breeding
+amongst the stony sierras near Cape Corrientes, described to me
+an encounter he witnessed between an armadillo and a poisonous
+snake. While seated on the hillside one day he observed a snake,
+about twenty inches in length, lying coiled up on a stoue five or
+six yards beneath him. By-and-by, a hairy</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Some curious Animal
+Weapons.</i> 73</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">armadillo appeared
+trotting directly towards it. Apparently the snake perceived and
+feared its approach, for it quickly uncoiled itself and began
+gliding away. Instantly the armadillo rushed on to it, and,
+squatting close down, began swaying its body backward and forward
+with a regular sawing motion, thus lacerating its victim with the
+sharp, deep-cut edges of its bony covering. The snake struggled
+to free itself, biting savagely at its aggressor, for its head
+and neck were disengaged. Its bites made no impression, and very
+soon it dropped its head, and when its enemy drew off, it was
+dead and very much mangled. The armadillo at once began its meal,
+taking the tail in its mouth and slowly progressing towards the
+head; but when about a third of the snake still remained it
+seemed satisfied, and, leaving that portion, trotted
+away.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Altogether, in its
+rapacious and varied habits this armadillo appears to have some
+points of resemblance with the hedgehog; and possibly, like the
+little European mammal it resembles, it is not harmed by the bite
+of venomous snakes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I once had a cat
+that killed every snake it found, purely for sport, since it
+never ate them. It would jump nimbly round and across its victim,
+occasionally dealing it a blow with its cruel claws. The enemies
+of the snake are legion. Burrowing owls feed largely on them; so
+do herons and storks, killing them with a blow of their javelin
+beaks, and swallowing them entire. The sulphur tyrant-bird picks
+up the young snake by the tail, and, flying to a branch or stone,
+uses it like a flail till its life is battered out. The bird is
+highly com-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font5">74</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">mended in
+consequence, reminding one of very ancient words: "Happy shall he
+be that taketh thy little ones and dasheth them against the
+stones." In arraying such a variety of enemies against the snake,
+nature has made ample amends for having endowed it with deadly
+weapons. Besides, the power possessed by venomous snakes only
+seems to us disproportionate; it is not really so, except in
+occasional individual encounters. Venomous snakes are always
+greatly outnumbered by non-venomous ones in the same district; at
+any rate this is the case on the pampas. The greater activity of
+the latter counts for more in the result than the deadly weapons
+of the former.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The large teguexin
+lizard of the pampas, called iguana by the country people, is a
+notable snake-killer. Snakes have in fact, no more formidable
+enemy, for he is quick to see, and swift to overtake them. He is
+practically invulnerable, and deals them sudden death with his
+powerful tail. The gauchos say that dogs attacking the iguana are
+sometimes known to have their legs broken, and I do not doubt it.
+A friend of mine was out riding one day after his cattle, and
+having attached one end of his lasso to the saddle, He let it
+trail on the ground. He noticed a large iguana lying apparently
+asleep in the sun, and though he rode by it very closely, it did
+not stir; but no sooner had he passed it, than it raised its
+head, and fixed its attention on the forty feet of lasso slowly
+trailing by. Suddenly it rushed after the rope, and dealt it a
+succession of violent blows with its tail. When the whole of the
+lasso, several yards of which had been pounded in vain, had
+been</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Sonic curious Animal
+Weapons.</i> 75</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">dragged by, the
+lizard, with uplifted head, continued gazing after it with the
+greatest astonishment. Never had such a wonderful snake crossed
+its path before!</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Molina, in his
+<i>Natural History of Chill,</i> says the vizcacha uses its tail
+as a weapon; but then Molina is not always reliable. I have
+observed vizcachas all my life, and never detected them making
+use of any weapon except their chisel teeth. The tail is
+certainly very curious, being straight at the base, then curving
+up outwardly, and slightly down again at the tip, resembling the
+spout of a china teapot. The under surface of the straight
+portion of the base is padded with a thick, naked, corneous skin;
+and, when the animal performs the curious sportive antics in
+which it occasionally indulges, it gives rapid loud-sounding
+blows on the ground with this part of the tail. The peculiar form
+of the tail also makes it a capital support, enabling the
+vizcacha to sit erect, with ease and security.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The frog is a most
+timid, inoffensive creature, saving itself, when pursued, by a
+series of saltatory feats unparalleled amongst vertebrates.
+Consequently, when I find a frog, I have no hesitation in placing
+my hands upon it, and the cold sensation it gives one is the
+worse result I fear. It came to pass, however, that I once
+encountered a frog that was not like other frogs, for it
+possessed an instinct and weapons of offence which greatly
+astonished me. I was out snipe shooting one day when, peering
+into an old disused burrow, two or three feet deep, I perceived a
+burly-looking frog sitting it. It was larger and stouter-looking
+than</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><b>76</b> <i>The
+Naturalist in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">our common Rana,
+though like it in colour, and I at once dropped on to my knees
+and set about its capture. Though it watched me attentively, the
+frog remained perfectly motionless, and this greatly surprised
+me. Before I was sufficiently near to make a grab, it sprang
+straight at my hand, and, catching two of my fingers round with
+its fore legs, administered a hug so sudden and violent as to
+cause an acute sensation of pain; then, at the very instant I
+experienced this feeling, which made me start back quickly, it
+released its hold and bounded out and away. I flew after it, and
+barely managed to overtake it before it could gain the water.
+Holding it firmly pressed behind the shoulders, it was powerless
+to attack me, and I then noticed the enormous development of the
+muscles of the fore legs, usually small in frogs, bulging out in
+this individual, like a second pair of thighs, and giving-it a
+strangely bold and formidable appearance. On holding my gun
+within its reach, it clasped the barrel with such energy as to
+bruise the skin of its breast and legs. After allowing it to
+partially exhaust itself in these fruitless huggings, I
+experimented by letting it seize my hand again, and I noticed
+that invariably after each squeeze it made a quick, violent
+attempt to free itself. Believing that I had discovered a frog
+differing in structure from all known species, and possessing a
+strange unique instinct of self-preservation, I carried my
+captive home, intending to show it to Dr. Burmeister, the
+director of the National Museum at Buenos Ayres-Unfortunately,
+after I had kept it some days, it effected its escape by pushing
+up the glass cover of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>Some curious Animal
+Weapons.</i> 77</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">its box, and I have
+never since met with another individual like it. That this
+singular frog has it in its power to seriously injure an opponent
+is, of course, out of the question; but its unexpected attack
+must be of great advantage. The effect of the sudden opening of
+an umbrella in the face of an angry bull gives, I think, only a
+faint idea of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-7.jpg" alt="h1-7.jpg" class="c18">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Wrestler
+Frog.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">the astonishment
+and confusion it must cause an adversary by its leap, quick as
+lightning, and the violent hug it administers; and in the
+confusion it finds time to escape. I cannot for a moment believe
+that an instinct so admirable, correlated as it is with the
+structure of the fore legs, can be merely an individual
+variation; and I confidently expect</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">78 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">that all I have
+said about my lost frog will some day be confirmed by others.
+Rana luctator would be a good name for this species.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The toad is a
+slow-moving creature that puts itself in the way of persecution;
+yet, strange to say, the acrid juice it exudes when irritated is
+a surer protection to it than venomous fangs are to the deadliest
+snake. Toads are, in fact, with a very few exceptions, only
+attacked and devoured by snakes, by lizards, and by their own
+venomous relative, Ceratophrys ornata. Possibly the cold sluggish
+natures of all these creatures protects them against the toad's
+secretion, which would be poison to most warm-blooded animals,
+but I am not so sure that all fish enjoy a like immunity. I one
+day noticed a good-sized fish (bagras) floating, belly upmost, on
+the water. It had apparently just died, and had such a glossy,
+well-nourished look about it, and appeared so full, I was curious
+to know the cause of its death. On opening it I found its stomach
+quite filled with a very large toad it had swallowed. The toad
+looked perfectly fresh, not even a faint discoloration of the
+skin showing that the gastric juices had begun to take effect;
+the fish, in fact, must have died immediately after swallowing
+the toad. The country people in South America believe that the
+milky secretion exuded by the toad possesses wonderful curative
+properties; it is their invariable specific for shingles--a
+painful, dangerous malady common amongst them, and to cure it
+living toads are applied to the inflamed parb. I dare say learned
+physicians would laugh at this cure, but then, if I mistake not,
+the learned have in past</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Some curious Animal
+Weapons.</i> 79</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">times laughed at
+other specifics used by the vulgar, but which now have honourable
+places in the pharmacopoeia--pepsine, for example. More than two
+centuries ago (very ancient times for South America) the gauchos
+were accustomed to take the lining of the rhea's stomach, dried
+and powdered, for ailments caused by impaired digestion; and the
+remedy is popular still. Science has gone over to them, and the
+ostrich-hunter now makes a double profit, one from the feathers,
+and the other from the dried stomachs which he supplies to the
+chemists of Buenos Ayres. Yet he was formerly told that to take
+the stomach of the ostrich to improve his digestion was as wild
+an idea as it would be to swallow birds' feathers in order to
+fly.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I just now called
+Ceratophrys ornata venomous, though its teeth are not formed to
+inject poison into the veins, like serpents' teeth. It is a
+singular creature, known as <i>escuerzo</i> in the vernacular,
+and though beautiful in colour, is in form hideous beyond
+description. The skin is of a rich brilliant green, with
+chocolate-coloured patches, oval in form, and symmetrically
+disposed. The lips are bright yellow, the cavernous mouth pale
+flesh colour, the throat and under-surface dull white. The body
+is lumpy, and about the size of a large man's fist. The eyes,
+placed on the summit of a disproportionately large head, are
+embedded in horn-like protuberances, capable of being elevated or
+depressed at pleasure. When the creature is undisturbed, the
+eyes, which are of a pale gold colour, look out <b>as</b> from a
+couple of watch towers, but when touched on the head or menaced,
+the prominences sink down</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font5">8o</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">to a level with the
+head, closing the eyes completely, and giving the creature the
+appearance of being eyeless. The upper jaw is armed with minute
+teeth, and there are two teeth in the centre of the lower jaw,
+the remaining portions of the jaw being armed with two
+exceedingly sharp-edged bony plates. In place of a tongue, it has
+a round</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-8.jpg" alt="h1-8.jpg" class="c19">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Ceratophrys
+ornata.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">muscular process
+with a rough flat disc the size of a halfpenny.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is common all
+over the pampas, ranging as far south as the Rio Colorado in
+Patagonia. In the breeding season it congregates in pools, and
+one is then struck by their extraordinary vocal powers, which
+they exercise by night. The performance in no way resembles the
+series of percussive sounds uttered by most batrachians. The
+notes it utters</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Some curious Animal
+Weapons.</i> Si</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">are long, as of a
+wind instrument, not unmelodious, and so powerful as to make
+themselves heard distinctly a mile off on still evenings. After
+the amorous period these toads retire to moist places and sit
+inactive, buried just deep enough to leave the broad green back
+on a level with the surface, and it is then very difficult to
+detect them. In this position they wait for their prey--frogs,
+toads, birds, and small mammals. Often they capture and attempt
+to swallow things too large for them, a mistake often made by
+snakes. In very wet springs they sometimes come about houses and
+lie in wait for chickens and ducklings. In disposition they are
+most truculent, savagely biting at anything that comes near them;
+and when they bite they hang on with the tenacity of a bulldog,
+poisoning the blood with their glandular secretions. When teased,
+the creature swells itself out to such an extent one almost
+expects to see him burst; he follows his tormentors about with
+slow awkward leaps, his vast mouth wide open, and uttering an
+incessant harsh croaking sound. A gaucho I knew was once bitten
+by one. He sat down on the grass, and, dropping his hand at his
+side, had it seized, and only freed himself by using his hunting
+knife to force the creature's mouth open. He washed and bandaged
+the wound, and no bad result followed; but when the toad cannot
+be shaken off, then the result is different. One summer two
+horses were found dead on the plain near my home. One, while
+lying down, had been seized by a fold in the skin near the belly;
+the other had been grasped by the nose while cropping grass. In
+both instances the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">82 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24 c20">vicious toad was
+found dead, with jaws tightly closed, still</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24 c20">hanging to the dead
+horse. Perhaps they are sometimes</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24 c20">incapable of
+letting go at will, and like honey bees, destroy themselves in
+these savage attacks.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER V.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15">FEAR IN
+BIRDS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">THE statement that
+birds instinctively fear man is frequently met with in zoological
+works written since the <i>Origin of Species</i> appeared; but
+almost the only reason--absolutely the only plausible reason, all
+the rest being mere supposition--given in support of such a
+notion is that birds in desert islands show at first no fear of
+man, but afterwards, finding him a dangerous neighbour, they
+become wild; and their young also grow up wild. It is thus
+assumed that the habit acquired by the former has become
+hereditary in the latter--or, at all events, that in time it
+becomes hereditary. Instincts, which are few in number in any
+species, and practically endure for ever, are not, presumably,
+acquired with such extraordinary facility.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Birds become shy
+where persecuted, and the young, even when not disturbed, learn a
+shy habit from the parents, and from other adults they associate
+with. I have found small birds shyer in desert places, where the
+human form was altogether strange to them, than in
+thickly-settled districts. Large birds are actually shyer than
+the small ones, although, to the civilized or shooting man they
+seem astonishingly tame where they have never been</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">G 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">84 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">fired at. I have
+frequently walked quite openly to within twenty-five or thirty
+yards of a flock of flamingoes without alarming them. This,
+however, was when they were in the water, or on the opposite side
+of a stream. Having no experience of guns, they fancied
+themselves secure as long as a strip of water separated them from
+the approaching object. When standing on dry land they would not
+allow so near an approach. Sparrows in England aro very much
+tamer than the sparrows I have observed in desert places, where
+they seldom see a human being. Nevertheless young sparrows in
+England are very much tamer than old birds, as anyone may see for
+himself. During the past summer, while living near Kew Gardens, I
+watched the sparrows a great deal, and fed forty or fifty of them
+every day from a back window. The bread and seed was thrown on to
+a low roof just outside the window, and I noticed that the young
+birds when first able to fly were always brought by the parents
+to this feeding place, and that after two or three visits they
+would begin to come of their own accord. At such times they would
+venture quite close to me, showing as little suspicion as young
+chickens. The adults, however, although so much less shy than
+birds of other species, were extremely suspicious, snatching up
+the bread and flying away; or, if they remained, hopping about in
+a startled manner, craning their necks to view me, and making so
+many gestures and motions, and little chirps of alarm, that
+presently the young would become infected with fear. The lesson
+was taught them in a surprisingly short time; their suspicion was
+seen to increase day by</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Fear in Birds.</i>
+85</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">day, and about a
+week later they were scarcely to be distinguished, in behaviour
+from the adults. It is plain that, with these little birds, fear
+of man is an associate feeling, and that, unless it had been
+taught them, his presence would trouble them as little as does
+that of horse, sheep, or cow. But how about the larger species,
+used as food, and which have had a longer and sadder experience
+of man's destructive power?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The rhea, or South
+American ostrich, philosophers tell us, is a very ancient bird on
+the earth; and from its great size and inability to escape by
+flight, and its excellence as food, especially to savages, who
+prefer fat rank-flavoured flesh, it must have been systematically
+persecuted by man as long as, or longer than, any bird now
+existing on the globe. If fear of man ever becomes hereditary in
+birds, we ought certainly to find some trace of such an instinct
+in this species. I have been unable to detect any, though I have
+observed scores of young rheas in captivity, taken before the
+parent bird had taught them what to fear. I also once kept a
+brood myself, captured just after they had hatched out. With
+regard to food they were almost, or perhaps quite, independent,
+spending most of the time catching flies, grasshoppers, and other
+insects with surprising dexterity; but of the dangers
+encompassing the young rhea they knew absolutely frothing. They
+would follow me about as if they took me for their parent; and,
+whenever I imitated the loud snorting or rasping warning-call
+emitted the old bird in moments of danger, they would to me in
+the greatest terror, though no animal</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">86 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">was in sight, and,
+squatting at my feet, endeavour to conceal themselves by
+thrusting their heads and long necks up my trousers. If I had
+caused a person to dress in white or yellow clothes for several
+consecutive days, and had then uttered the warning cry each time
+he showed himself to the birds, I have no doubt that they would
+soon have acquired a habit of running in terror from him, even
+without the warning cry, and that the fear of a person in white
+or yellow would have continued all their lives. Up to within
+about twenty years ago, rheas were seldom or never shot in La
+Plata and Patagonia, but were always hunted on horseback and
+caught with the bolas. The sight of a mounted man would set them
+off at once, while a person on foot could walk quite openly to
+within easy shooting distance of them; yet their fear of a
+horseman dates only two hundred years back--a very short time,
+when we consider that, before the Indian borrowed the horse from
+the invader, he must have systematically pursued the rhea on foot
+for centuries. The rhea changed its habits when the hunter
+changed his, and now, if an <i>estanciero</i> puts down ostrich
+hunting on his estate, in a very few years the birds, although
+wild birds still, become as fearless and familiar as domestic
+animals. I have known old and ill-tempered males to become a
+perfect nuisance on some estancias, running after and attacking
+every person, whether on foot or on horseback, that ventured near
+them. An old instinct of a whole race could not be thus readily
+lost here and there on isolated estates wherever a proprietor
+chose to protect his birds for half a dozen years.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>Fear in Birds,</i>
+87</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I suppose the
+Talegallus--the best-known brush-turkey--must be looked on as an
+exception to all other birds with regard to the point I am
+considering; for this abnormal form buries its eggs in the huge
+mound made by the male, and troubles herself no more about them.
+When the young is fully developed it simply kicks the coffin to
+pieces in which its mother interred it, and, burrowing its way up
+to the sunshine, enters on the pleasures and pains of an
+independent existence from earliest infancy--that is, if a
+species born into the world in full possession of all the wisdom
+of the ancients, can be said ever to know infancy. At all events,
+from Mr. Bartlett's observations on the young hatched in the
+Zoological Gardens, it appears that they took no notice of the
+old birds, but lived quite independently from the moment they
+came out of the ground, even flying up into a tree and roosting
+separately at night. I am not sure, however, that these
+observations are quite conclusive; for it is certain that
+captivity plays strange pranks with the instincts of some
+species, and it is just possible that in a state of nature the
+old birds exercise at first some slight parental supervision,
+and, like all other species, have a peculiar cry to warn the
+young of the dangers to be avoided. If this is not so, then the
+young Talegallus must fly or hide with instinctive tear from
+every living thing that approaches it. I, at any rate, find it
+hard to believe that it has a knowledge, independent of
+experience, of the different habits of man and kangaroo, and
+dis-criminates at first sight between animals that are dangerous
+to it and those that are not. This</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">88 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">interesting point
+will probably never be determined, as, most unhappily, the
+Australians are just now zealously engaged in exterminating their
+most wonderful bird for the sake of its miserable flesh; and with
+less excuse than the Maories could plead with regard to the moa,
+since they cannot deny that they have mutton and rabbit enough to
+satisfy hunger.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Whether birds fear
+or have instinctive knowledge of any of their enemies is a much
+larger question. Species that run freely on the ground from the
+time of quitting the shell know their proper food, and avoid
+whatever is injurious. Have all young birds a similarly
+discriminating instinct with regard to their enemies? Darwin
+says, "Fear of any particular enemy is certainly an instinctive
+quality, as may be seen in nestling birds." Here, even man seems
+to be included among the enemies feared instinctively; and in
+another passage he says, "Young chickens have lost, wholly from
+habit, that fear of the dog and cat which, no doubt, was
+originally instinctive in them." My own observations point to a
+contrary conclusion; and I may say that I have had unrivalled
+opportunities for studying the habits of young birds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Animals of all
+classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear from any
+strange object approaching them. A piece of newspaper carried
+accidentally by the wind is as great an object of terror to an
+inexperienced young bird as a buzzard sweeping down with death in
+its talons. Among birds not yet able to fly there are, however,
+some curious exceptions; thus the young of most owls
+and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Fear in Birds.</i>
+89</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">pigeons are excited
+to anger rather than fear, and, puffing themselves up, snap and
+strike at an intruder with their beaks. Other fledglings simply
+shrink down in the nest or squat 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 approaches 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 corning swiftly towards them, is the "wildness<i>"</i>
+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, &amp;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 wild 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, &amp;c.--are
+actually much tamer than our newly-hatched chickens and
+ducklings.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">To return to what
+may be seen in nestling birds, n very young, and before their
+education has begun, if quietly approached and touched, they open
+their bills and take food as readily from a man</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>90 The Naturalist in
+La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">as from the parent
+bird. But if while being thus fed the parent returns and emits
+the warning note, they instantly cease their hunger-cries, close
+their gaping mouths, and crouch down frightened in the nest. This
+fear caused by the parent bird's warning note begins to manifest
+itself even before the young are hatched--and my observations on
+this point refer to several species in three widely separated
+orders. When the little prisoner is hammering at its shell, and
+uttering its feeble <i>peep,</i> as if begging to be let out, if
+the warning note is uttered, even at a considerable distance, the
+strokes and complaining instantly cease, and the chick will then
+remain quiescent in the shell for a long time, or until the
+parent, by a changed note, conveys to it an intimation that the
+danger is over. Another proof that the nestling has absolutely no
+instinctive knowledge of particular enemies, but is taught to
+fear them by the parents, is to be found in the striking contrast
+between the habits of parasitical and genuine young in the nest,
+and after they have left it, while still unable to find their own
+food. I have had no opportunities of observing the habits of the
+young cuckoo in England with regard to this point, and do not
+know whether other observers have paid any attention to the
+matter or not, but I am very familiar with the manners of the
+parasitical starling or cow-bird of South America. The warning
+cries of the foster parent have no effect on the young cow-bird
+at any time. Until they are able to fly they will readily devour
+worms from the hand of a man, even when the old birds are
+hovering close by and screaming their danger notes,
+and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Fear in Birds'.</i>
+91</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">while their own
+young, if the parasite has allowed any to survive in the nest,
+are crouching down in the greatest fear. After the cow-bird has
+left the nest it is still stupidly tame, and more than once I
+have seen one carried off from its elevated perch by a milvago
+hawk, when, if it had understood the warning cry of the foster
+parent, it would have dropped down into the bush or grass and
+escaped. But as soon as the young cow-birds are able to shift for
+themselves, and begin to associate with their own kind, their
+habits change, and they become suspicious and wild like other
+birds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">On this point--the
+later period at which the parasitical young bird acquires fear of
+man--and also bearing on the whole subject under discussion, I
+shall add here some observations I once made on a dove hatched
+and reared by a pigeon at my home on the pampas. A very large
+omb&uacute; tree grew not far from the dove-cote, and some of the
+pigeons used to make their nests on the lower horizontal
+branches. One summer a dove of the most common species, Zenaida
+maculata, in size a third less than the domestic pigeon, chanced
+to drop an egg in one of these nests, and a young dove was
+hatched and reared; and, in due time, when able to fly, it was
+brought to the dove-cote. I watched it a great deal, and it was
+evident that this foster-young, though' with the pigeons, was not
+nor ever would be of them, for it could not take kiudly to their
+flippant flirty ways. Whenever a male approached it, and with
+guttural noises and strange gestures made a pompous declaration
+of amorous feelings, the dove would strike vigorously at its
+undesirable lover,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">92 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">and drive him off,
+big as he was; and, as a rule, it would sit apart, afoot or so,
+from the others. The dove was also a male; but its male
+companions, with instinct tainted by domestication, were ignorant
+alike of its sex and different species. Now, it chanced that my
+pigeons, never being fed and always finding their own living on
+the plain like wild birds, were, although still domestic, not
+nearly so tame as pigeons usually are in England. They would not
+allow a person to approach within two or three yards of them
+without flying, and if grain was thrown to them they would come
+to it very suspiciously, or not at all. And, of course, the young
+pigeons always acquired the exact degree of suspicion shown by
+the adults as soon as they were able to fly and consort with the
+others. But the foundling Zenaida did not know what their
+startled gestures and notes of fear meant when a person
+approached too near, and as he saw none of his own kind, he did
+not acquire their suspicious habit. On the contrary, he was
+perfectly tame, although by parentage a wild bird, and showed no
+more fear of a man than of a horse. Throughout the winter it
+remained with the pigeons, going afield every day with them, and
+returning to the dove-cote; but as spring approached the slight
+tie which united him to them began to be loosened; their company
+grew less and less congenial, and he began to lead a solitary
+life. But he did not go to the trees yet. He came to the house,
+and his favourite perch was on the low overhanging roof of a
+vine-covered porch, just over the main entrance. Here he would
+pass several hours every day, taking no notice of the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>Fear in Birds.</i>
+93</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">people passing in
+and out at all times; and when the weather grew warm he would
+swell out his breast and coo mournfully by the hour for our
+pleasure.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">We can, no doubt,
+learn best by observing the behaviour of nestlings and young
+birds; nevertheless, I find much even in the confirmed habits of
+adults to strengthen me in the belief that fear of particular
+enemies is in nearly all cases--for I will not say all--the
+result of experience and tradition.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Hawks are the most
+open, violent, and persistent enemies birds have; and it is
+really wonderful to see how well the persecuted kinds appear to
+know the power for mischief possessed by different raptorial
+species, and how exactly the amount of alarm exhibited is in
+proportion to the extent of the danger to be apprehended. Some
+raptors never attack birds, others only occasionally; still
+others prey only on the young and feeble; and, speaking of La
+Plata district, where I have observed hawks, from the milvago
+chimango--chiefly a carrion-eater--to the destructive peregrine
+falcon, there is a very great variety of predatory habits, and
+all degrees of courage to be found; yet all these raptors are
+treated differently by species liable to be preyed on, and have
+just as much respect paid them as their strength and daring
+entitles them to, and no more, So much discrimination must seem
+almost incredible to those who are not very familiar with the
+manners of wild birds; I do not think it could exist if the fear
+shown resulted from instinct or inherited habit. There would be
+no end to the blunders of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">94 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">such an instinct as
+that; and in regions where hawks are extremely abundant most of
+the birds would be in a constant state of trepidation. On the
+pampas the appearance of the comparatively harmless chimango
+excites not the least alarm among small birds, yet at a distance
+it closely resembles a henharrier, and it also readily attacks
+young, sick, and wounded birds; all others know how little they
+have to fear from it. When it appears unexpectedly, sweeping over
+a hedge or grove with a rapid flight, it is sometimes mistaken
+for a more dangerous species; there is then a little flutter of
+alarm, some birds springing into the air, but in two or three
+seconds of time they discover their mistake, and settle down
+quietly again, taking no further notice of the despised
+carrion-eater. On the other hand, I have frequently mistaken a
+harrier (Circus cinereus, in the brown state of plumage) for a
+chimango, and have only discovered my mistake by seeing the
+commotion among the small birds. The harrier I have mentioned,
+also the C. macropterus, feed partly on small birds, which they
+flush from the ground and strike down with their claws. When the
+harrier appears moving along with a loitering flight near the
+surface, it is everywhere attended by a little whirlwind of
+alarm, small birds screaming or chirping excitedly and diving
+into the grass or bushes; but the alarm does not spread far, and
+subsides as soon as the hawk has passed on its way. Buzzards
+(Buteo and Urubitinga) are much more feared, and create a more
+widespread alarm, and they ars certainly more destructive to
+birds than harriers. Another curious instance is that of the
+sociable</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Fear in Birds.</i>
+95</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">hawk (Rostrhanrus
+sociabilis). This bird spends the summer and breeds in marshes in
+La Plata, and birds pay no attention to it, for it feeds
+exclusively on water-snails (Ampullaria). But when it visits
+woods and plantations to roost, during migration, its appearance
+creates as much alarm as that of a true buzzard, which it closely
+resembles. Wood-birds, unaccustomed to see it, do not know its
+peculiar preying habits, and how little they need fear its
+presence. I may also mention that the birds of La Plata seem to
+fear the kite-like Elanus less than other hawks, and I believe
+that its singular resemblance to the common gull of the district
+in its size, snowy-white plumage and manner of flight, has a
+deceptive effect on most species, and makes them so little
+suspicious of it.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The wide-ranging
+peregrine falcon is a common species in La Plata, although, oddly
+enough, not included in any notice of the avifauna of that region
+before 1888. The consternation caused among birds by its
+appearance is vastly greater than that produced by any of the
+raptors I have mentioned: and it is unquestionably very much more
+destructive to birds, since it preys exclusively on them, and, as
+a rule, merely picks the flesh from the head and neck, and leaves
+the untouched body to its jackal, the carrion-hawk. When the
+peregrine appears speeding through the air in a straight line at
+a great height, the feathered world, as far as one able to see,
+is thrown into the greatest commo-tion, all birds, from the
+smallest up to species large as duck, ibis, and curlew, rushing
+about in the air as if distracted. When the falcon has
+disappeared</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">96 <i>The Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">in the sky, and the
+wave of terror attending its progress subsides behind it, the
+birds still continue wild and excited for some time, showing how
+deeply they have been moved; for, as a rule, fear is exceedingly
+transitory in its effects on animals.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I must, before
+concluding this part of my subject, mention another raptor, also
+a true falcon, but differing from the peregrine in being
+exclusively a marsh-hawk. In size it is nearly a third less than
+the male peregrine, which it resembles in its sharp wings and
+manner of flight, but its flight is much more rapid. The whole
+plumage, is uniformly of a dark grey colour. Unfortunately,
+though I have observed it not fewer than a hundred times, I have
+never been able to procure a specimen, nor do I find that it is
+like any American falcon already described; so that for the
+present it must remain nameless. Judging solely from the effect
+produced by the appearance of this hawk, it must be even more
+daring and destructive than its larger relation, the peregrine.
+It flies at a great height, and sometimes descends vertically and
+with extraordinary velocity, the wings producing a sound like a
+deep-toned horn. The sound is doubtless produced at will, and is
+certainly less advantageous to the hawk than to the birds it
+pursues. No doubt it can afford to despise the wing-power of its
+quarry; and I have sometimes thought that it takes a tyrannous
+delight in witnessing the consternation caused by its hollow
+trumpeting sound. This may be only a fancy, but some hawks do
+certainly take pleasure in pursuing and striking birds when not
+seeking prey. The</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Fear in Birds.</i>
+97</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">peregrine has been
+observed, Baird says, capturing birds, only to kill and drop
+them. Many of the Felidae, we know, evince a similar habit; only
+these prolong their pleasure by practising a more refined and
+deliberate cruelty.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The sudden
+appearance overhead of this hawk produces an effect wonderful to
+witness. I have frequently seen all the inhabitants of a marsh
+struck with panic, acting as if demented, and suddenly grown
+careless to all other dangers; and on such occasions I have
+looked up confident of seeing the sharp-winged death, suspended
+above them in the sky. All birds that happen to be on the wing
+drop down as if shot into the reeds or water; ducks away from the
+margin stretch out their necks horizontally and drag their
+bodies, as if wounded, into closer cover; not one bird is found
+bold enough to rise up and wheel about the marauder--a usual
+proceeding in the case of other hawks; while, at every sudden
+stoop the falcon makes, threatening to dash down on his prey, a
+low cry of terror rises from the birds beneath; a sound
+expressive of an emotion so contagious that it quickly runs like
+a murmur all over the marsh, as if a gust of wind had swept
+moaning through, the rushes. As long as the falcon hangs
+overhead, always at a height of about forty yards, threatening at
+intervals to dash down, this murmuring sound, made up of many
+hundreds of individual cries, is heard swelling and dying away,
+and occasionally, when he drops lower than usual, rising to a
+sharp scream of terror.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Sometimes when I
+have been riding over marshy</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">H</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">ground, one of
+these hawks has placed himself directly over my head, within
+fifteen or twenty yards of me; and it has perhaps acquired the
+habit of following a horseman in this way in order to strike at
+any birds driven up. On one occasion my horse almost trod on a
+couple of snipe squatting terrified in the short grass. The
+instant they rose the hawk struck at one, the end of his wing
+violently smiting my cheek as he stooped, and striking at the
+snipe on a level with the knees of my horse. The snipe escaped by
+diving under the bridle, and immediately dropped down on the
+other side of me, and the hawk, rising up, flew away.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">To return. I think
+I am justified in believing that fear of hawks, like fear of men,
+is, in very nearly all cases, the result of experience and
+tradition. Nevertheless, I think it probable that in some species
+which have always lived in the open, continually exposed to
+attack, and which are preferred as food by raptors, such as duck,
+snipe, and plover, the fear of the falcon may be an inherited
+habit. Among passerine birds I am also inclined to think that
+swallows show inherited fear of hawks. Swallows and humming-birds
+have least to fear from raptors; yet, while humming-birds readily
+pursue and tease hawks, thinking as little of them as of pigeons
+or herons, swallows everywhere manifest the greatest terror at
+the approach of a true falcon; and they also fear other birds of
+prey, though in a much less degree. It has been said that the
+European hobby occasionally catches swal-lows on the wing, but
+this seems a rare and exceptional habit, and in South America I
+have</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Fear in Birds.</i>
+99</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">never seen any bird
+of prey attempt the pursuit of a swallow. The question then
+arises, how did this unnecessary fear, so universal in swallows,
+originate? Can it be a survival of a far past--a time when some
+wide-ranging small falcon, aerial in habits as the swallow
+itself, preyed by preference on hirundines only?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">[NOTE.-Herbert
+Spencer, who accepts Darwin's inference, explains how the fear of
+man, acquired by experience, becomes instinctive in birds, in the
+following passage: "It is well known that in newly-discovered
+lands not inhabited by man, birds are so devoid o<b>f</b> fear as
+to allow themselves to be knocked over with sticks; but that, in
+the course of generations, they acquire such a dread o<b>f</b>
+man as to fly on his approach: and that this dread is manifested
+by young as well as by old. Now unless this change be</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">ascribed to the
+killing-off of the least fearful, and the preservation and
+multiplication of the most fearful which, considering the
+comparatively small number killed by man, is an inadequate cause,
+it must be ascribed to accumulated experience; and each
+experience must be held to have a share in producing it.
+We</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">must conclude that
+in each bird that escapes with injuries inflicted by man, or is
+alarmed by the outcries of other members of the flock (gregarious
+creatures of any intelligence being necessarily more or less
+sympathetic), there is established an association of ideas
+between the human aspect and the pains, direct and in-direct,
+suffered from human agency. And we must further con-clude, that
+the state of consciousness which compels the bird to take flight,
+is at first nothing more than an ideal reproduction of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">those painful
+impressions which before followed man's approach; that such ideal
+reproduction becomes more vivid and more massive as the painful
+experiences, direct or sympathetic, increase<i>;</i> and that
+thus the emotion, in its incipient state, is nothing else
+than</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">an aggregation of
+the revived pains before experience.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">"As, in the course
+of generations, the young birds of this race begin to display a
+fear of man before yet they have been injured by him, it is an
+unavoidable inference that the nervous system of the race has
+been organically modified by these experiences, we have no choice
+but to conclude, that when a young bird is led</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">100</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">to fly, it is
+because the impression produced in its senses by the approaching
+man entails, through an incipiently reflex action, a partial
+excitement of all those nerves which in its ancestors had been
+excited under the like conditions; that this partial excitement
+has its accompanying painful consciousness, and that the vague
+painful consciousness thus arising constitutes emotion
+proper--<i>emotion undecomposable into specific experiences, and,
+therefore, seemingly homogeneous"</i> (Essays, vol. i. p.
+320.)</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">It is comforting to
+know that the "unavoidable inference" is, after all, erroneous,
+and that the nervous system in birds has not yet been organically
+altered as a result of man's persecution; for in that case it
+would take long to undo the mischief, and we should be indeed far
+from that "better friendship" with the children of the air which
+many of us would like to see.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER VI.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">PARENTAL AND EARLY
+INSTINCTS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">UNDER this heading I
+have put together several notes from my journals on subjects
+which have no connection with each other, except that they relate
+chiefly to the parental instincts of some animals I have
+observed, and to the instincts of the young at a very early
+period of life.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">While taking bats
+one day in December, I captured a female of our common Buenos
+Ayrean species (Molossus bonariensis), with her two young
+attached to her, so large that it seemed incredible she should be
+able to fly and take insects with such a weight to drag her down.
+The young were about a third less in size than the mother, so
+that she had to carry a weight greatly exceeding that of her own
+body. They were fastened to her breast and belly, one on each
+side, as when first born; and, possibly, the young bat does not
+change its position, or move, like the young developed opossum,
+to other parts of the body, until mature enough to begin an
+independent life. On forcibly separating them from their parent,
+I found that they were not yet able to fly, but when set free
+fluttered feebly to the ground. This bat certainly appeared more
+burdened with its young</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15"><b>102</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">than any animal I
+had ever observed. I have seen an old female opossum (Didelphys
+azarae) with eleven young, large as old rats--the mother being
+less than a cat in size--all clinging to various parts of her
+body; yet able to climb swiftly and with the greatest agility in
+the higher branches of a tree. The actual weight was in this case
+rela-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-9.jpg" alt="h1-9.jpg" class="c22">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Didelphys azarae and
+young.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">tively much greater
+than in that of the female bat: but then the opossum never
+quitted its hold on the tree, and it also supplemented its
+hand-like feet, furnished with crooked claws, with its teeth and
+long prehensile tail. The poor bat had to seek its living in the
+empty air, pursuing its prey with the swiftness of a swallow, and
+it seemed</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts.</i> 103</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">wonderful to me that
+she should have been able to carry about that great burden with
+her one pair of wings, and withal to be active enough to supply
+herself and her young with food.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the end I
+released her, and saw her fly away and disappear among the trees,
+after which I put back the two young bats in the place I had
+taken them from, among the thick-clustering foliage of a small
+acacia tree. When set free they began to work their way upwards
+through the leaves and slender twigs in the most adroit manner,
+catching a twig with their teeth, then embracing a whole cluster
+of leaves with their wings, just as a person would take up a
+quantity of loose clothes and hold them tight by pressing them
+against the chest. The body would then emerge above the clasped
+leaves, and a higher twig would be caught by the teeth; and so on
+successively, until they had got as high as they wished, when
+they proceeded to hook themselves to a twig and assume the
+inverted position side by side; after which, one drew in its head
+and went to sleep, while the other began licking the end of its
+wing, where my finger and thumb had pressed the delicate
+membrane. Later in the day I attempted to feed them with small
+insects, but they rejected my friendly attentions in the most
+unmistakable manner, snapping viciously at me every time I
+approached them. In the evening, I stationed myself close to the
+tree, and presently had the satisfaction of seeing the mother
+return, flying straight to the spot where I had taken her, and in
+a few moments she was away again and over the trees with her
+twins.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">104 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Assuming that these
+two young bats had, before I found them, existed like parasites
+clinging to the parent, their adroit actions when liberated, and
+their angry demonstrations at my approach, were very astonishing;
+for in all other mammals born in a perfectly helpless state, like
+rodents, weasels, edentates, and even marsupials, the instincts
+of self-preservation are gradually developed after the period of
+activity begins, when the mother leads them out, and they play
+with her and Avith each other. In the bat the instincts must
+ripen to perfection without exercise or training, and while the
+animal exists as passively as a fruit on its stem.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I have observed
+that the helpless young of some of the mammals I have just
+mentioned seem at first to have no instinctive understanding of
+the language of alarm and fear in the parent, as all young-birds
+have, even before their eyes are open. Nor is it necessary that
+they should have such an instinct, since, in most cases, they are
+well concealed in kennels or other safe places; but when, through
+some accident, they are exposed, the want of such an instinct
+makes the task of protecting them doubly hard for the parent. I
+once surprised a weasel (Galictis barbara) in the act of removing
+her young, or conducting them, rather; and when she was forced to
+quit them, although still keeping close by, and uttering the most
+piercing cries of anger and solicitude, the young continued
+piteously crying out in their shrill voices and moving about in
+circles, without making the slightest attempt to escape, or to
+conceal themselves, as young birds do.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts.</i> 105</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Some field mice
+breed on the surface of the ground in ill-constructed nests, and
+their young are certainly the most helpless things in nature. It
+is possible that where this dangerous habit exists, the parent
+has some admirable complex instincts to safeguard her young, in
+addition to the ordinary instincts of most animals of this kind.
+This idea was suggested to me by the action of a female mouse
+which I witnessed by chance. While walking in a field of stubble
+one day in autumn, near Buenos Ayres, I suddenly heard, issuing
+from near my feet, a chorus of shrill squealing voices--the
+familiar excessively sharp little needles of sound emitted by
+young, blind and naked mice, when they are disturbed or in pain.
+Looking down, I saw close to my foot a nest of them--there were
+nine in all, wriggling about and squealing; for the parent,
+frightened at my step, had just sprung from them, overturning in
+her hurry to escape the slight loosely-felted dome of fine grass
+and thistledown which had covered them. I saw her running away,
+but after going six or seven yards she stopped, and, turning
+partly round so as to watch me, waited in fear and trembling. I
+remained perfectly motionless--a sure way to allay fear and
+suspicion in any wild creature,--and in a few moments she
+returned, but with the utmost caution, frequently pausing to
+start and tremble, and masking her approach with corn stumps and
+little inequalities in the surface of the ground, until, reaching
+the nest, she took one of the young in her mouth, and ran rapidly
+away to a distance of eight or nine yards and concealed it in a
+tuft of dry grass.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">106 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Leaving it, she
+returned a second time, in the same cautious manner, and taking
+another, ran with it to the same spot, and concealed it along
+with the first. It was curious that the first young mouse had
+continued squealing after being hidden by the mother, for I could
+hear it distinctly, the air being very still, but when the second
+mouse had been placed with it, the squealing ceased. A third time
+the old mouse came, and then instead of going to the same spot,
+as I had expected, she ran off in an opposite direction and
+disappeared among the dry weeds; a fourth was carried to the same
+place as the third; and in this way they were all removed to a
+distance of some yards from the nest, and placed in couples,
+until the last and odd one remained. In due time she came for it,
+and ran away with it in a new direction, and was soon out of
+sight; and although I waited fully ten minutes, she did not
+return; nor could I afterwards find any of the young mice when I
+looked for them, or even hear them squeal.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have frequently
+observed newly-born lambs on the pampas, and have never failed to
+be surprised at the extreme imbecility they display in their
+actions; although this may be due partly to inherited degeneracy
+caused by domestication. This imbecile condition continues for
+two, sometimes for three days, during which time the lamb
+apparently acts purely from instincts, which are far from
+perfect; but after that, experience and its dam teach it a better
+way. When born its first impulse is to struggle up on to its
+feet; its second</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts*</i> 107</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">to suck, but here it
+does not discriminate like the newly-hatched bird that picks up
+its proper food, or it does not know what to suck. It will take
+into its mouth whatever comes near, in most cases a tuft of wool
+on its dam's neck; and at this it will continue sucking for an
+indefinite time. It is highly probable that the strong-smelling
+secretion of the sheep's udder attracts the lamb at length to
+that part; and that without something of the kind to guide it, in
+many cases it would actually starve without finding the teats. I
+have often seen lambs many hours after birth still confining
+their attention to the most accessible locks of wool on the neck
+or fore legs of the dams, and believe that in such cases the long
+time it took them to find the source of nourishment arose from a
+defective sense of smell. Its next important instinct, which
+comes into play from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels
+it to follow after any object receding from it, and, on the other
+hand, to run from anything approaching it. If the dam turns round
+and approaches it from even a very short distance, it will start
+back and run from her in fear, and will not understand her voice
+when she bleats to it: at the same time it will confidently
+follow after a man, dog, horse, or any other animal moving from
+it. A very common experience on the pampas, in the sheep-country,
+is to see a lamb start up from sleep and follow the rider,
+running along close to the heels of the horse. This is
+distressing to a merciful man, tor he cannot shake the little
+simpleton off, and if he rides on, no matter how fast, it will
+keep up him, or keep him in sight, for half a mile or
+a</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">l08 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">mile, and never
+recover its dam. The gaucho, who is not merciful, frequently
+saves himself all trouble and delay by knocking it senseless with
+a blow of his whip-handle, and without checking his horse. I have
+seen a lamb, about two days old, start up from sleep, and
+immediately start off in pursuit of a puff ball about as big as a
+man's head, carried past it over the smooth turf by the wind, and
+chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until the dry ball
+was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse grass. This blundering
+instiuct is quickly laid aside when the lamb has learned to
+distinguish its dam from other objects, and its dam's voice from
+other sounds. When four or five days old it will start from
+sleep, but instead of rushing blindly away after any receding
+object, it first looks about it, and will then recognize and run
+to its dam.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I have often been
+struck with the superiority of the pampa or creolla--the old
+native breed of sheep--in the greater vigour of the young when
+born over the improved European varieties. The pampa descends to
+us from the first sheep introduced into La Plata about three
+centuries ago, and is a tall, gaunt bony animal, with lean dry
+flesh, like venison, and long straight wool, like goats' hair. In
+their struggle for existence in a country subject to sudden great
+changes of temperature, to drought, and failure of grass, they
+have in a great measure lost the qualities which make the sheep
+valuable to man as a food and wool-producing animal; but on the
+other hand they have to some extent recovered the vigour of a
+wild animal, being hardy enough to exist without any shelter, and
+requiring from their</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">109</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">master man only
+protection from the larger carnivores. They are keen-scented,
+swift of foot and Wonderfully active, and thrive where other
+breeds would quickly starve. I have often seen a lamb dropped on
+the frosty ground in bitterly cold windy weather in midwinter,
+and in less than five seconds struggle to its feet, and seem as
+vigorous as any day-old lamb of other breeds. The dam,
+impatient</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-10.jpg" alt="h1-10.jpg" class="c23">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font14"><b>Pampa
+sheep.</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">at the short delay,
+and not waiting to give it suck, has then started off at a brisk
+trot after the flock, scattered and galloping before the wind
+like huanacos rather than sheep, with the lamb, scarcely a minute
+in the world, running freely at her side. Notwithstanding its
+great vigour it has been proved that the pampa sheep has not so
+far outgrown the domestic taint as to be able to maintain its own
+existence when left entirely to itself. During the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font14"><b>110</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">first half of this
+century, when cattle-breeding began to be profitable, and wool
+was not worth the trouble of shearing, and the gaucho workman
+would not eat mutton when beef was to be had, some of the
+estancieros on the southern pampas determined to get rid of their
+sheep, which were of no value to them; and many flocks were
+driven a distance out and lost in the wilds. Out of many
+thousands thus turned loose to shift for themselves, not one pair
+survived to propagate a new race of feral sheep; in a short time
+pumas, wild dogs, and other beasts of prey, had destroyed them
+all. The sterling qualities of the pampa sheep had their value in
+other times; at present the improved kinds are alone considered
+worth having, and the original sheep of the country is now
+rapidly disappearing, though still found in remote and poor
+districts, especially in the province of Cordova; and probably
+before long it will become extinct, together with the curious
+pug-nosed cow of the pampas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have had frequent
+opportunities of observing the young, from one to three days old,
+of the Cervus campestris--the common deer of the pampas, and the
+perfection of its instincts at that tender age seem very
+wonderful in a ruminant. When the doe with, fawn is approached by
+a horseman, even when accompanied with dogs, she stands perfectly
+motionless, gazing fixedly at the enemy, the fawn motionless at
+her side; and suddenly, as if at a preconcerted signal, the fawn
+rushes directly away from her at its utmost speed; and going to a
+distance of six hundred to a thousand yards conceals</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">111</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">itself in a hollow
+in the ground or among the long grass, lying down very close with
+neck stretched out horizontally, and will thus remain until
+sought by the dam. When very young if found in its hiding-place
+it will allow itself to be taken, making no further effort to
+escape. After the fawn has run away the doe still maintains her
+statuesque attitude, as if resolved to await the onset, and only
+when the dogs are close to her she also rushes away, but
+invariably in a direction as nearly opposite to that taken by the
+fawn as possible. At first she runs slowly, with a limping gait,
+and frequently pausing, as if to entice her enemies on, like a
+partridge, duck or plover when driven from its young; but as they
+begin to press her more closely her speed increases, becoming
+greater the further she succeeds in leading them from the
+starting-point.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The alarm-cry of
+this deer is a peculiar whistling bark, a low but far-reaching
+sound; but when approaching a doe with young I have never been
+able to hear it, nor have I seen any movement on the part of the
+doe. Yet it is clear that in some mysterious way she inspires the
+fawn with sudden violent fear; while the fawn, on its side,
+instead of being affected like the young in other mammals, and
+sticking closer to its mother, acts in a contrary way, and runs
+from her.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Of the birds I am
+acquainted with, the beautiful jacana (Parra jacana) appears to
+come into the world with its faculties and powers in the most
+advanced state. It is, in fact, ready to begin active</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">112 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">life from the very
+moment of leaving the shell, as I once accidentally observed. I
+found a nest on a small mound of earth in a shallow lagoon,
+containing four eggs, with the shells already chipped by the
+birds in them. Two yards from the small nest mound there was a
+second mound covered with coarse grass. I got off my horse to
+examine the nest, and the old birds, excited beyond measure,
+fluttered round me close by pouring out their shrill
+rapidly-reiterated cries in an unbroken stream, sounding very
+much like a policeman's rattle. While I was looking closely at
+one of the eggs lying on the palm of my hand, all at once the
+cracked shell parted, and at the same moment the young bird
+leaped from my hand and fell into the water. I am quite sure that
+the young bird's sudden escape from the shell and my hand was the
+result of a violent effort on its part to free itself; and it was
+doubtless inspired to make the effort by the loud persistent
+screaming of the parent birds, which it heard while in the shell.
+Stooping to pick it up to save it from perishing, I soon saw that
+my assistance was not required, for immediately on dropping into
+the water, it put out its neck, and with the body nearly
+submerged, like a wounded duck trying to escape observation, it
+swam rapidly to the second small mound I have mentioned, and,
+escaping from the water, concealed itself in the grass, lying
+close and perfectly motionless like a young plover.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the case of the
+pampa or creolla sheep, I have shown that during its long, rough
+life in La Plata, this variety has in some measure recovered the
+natural vigour and ability to maintain existence in</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts.</i> 113</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">adverse
+circumstances of its wild ancestors. As much can be said of the
+creolla fowl of the pampas; and some observations of mine on the
+habits of this variety will perhaps serve to throw light on a
+vexed question of Natural History--namely, the cackling of the
+hen after laying, an instinct which has been described as
+"useless" and "disadvantageous." In fowls that live unconfined,
+and which are allowed to lay where they like, the instinct, as we
+know it, is certainly detrimental, since egg-eating dogs and pigs
+soon learn the cause of the outcry, and acquire a habit of
+rushing off to find the egg when they hear it. The question then
+arises: Does the wild jungle fowl possess the same pernicious
+instinct?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">The creolla is no doubt
+the descendant of the fowl originally introduced about three
+centuries ago by the first colonists in La Plata, and has
+probably not only been uncrossed with any other improved variety,
+such as are now fast taking its place, and has lived a much freer
+life than is usual with the fowl in Europe. It is a rather small,
+lean, extremely active bird, lays about a dozen eggs, and hatches
+them all, and is of a yellowish red colour--a hue which is
+common, I believe, in the old barn-door fowl of England. The
+creolla fowl is strong on the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">wing, and much more
+carnivorous and rapacious in habits than other breeds; mice,
+frogs, and small snakes are eagerly hunted and devoured by it. At
+my home on the pampas a number of these fowls were kept, and were
+allowed to range freely about the plantation, which was large,
+and the adjacent grounds, where there were thickets of giant
+cardoon thistle, red-weed, thorn apple, &amp;c. They
+always</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">114 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">nested at a distance
+from the house, and it was almost impossible ever to find their
+eggs, on account of the extreme circumspection they observed in
+going to and from their nests; and when they succeeded in
+escaping foxes, skunks, weasels, and opossums, which, strange to
+say, they often did, they would rear their chickens away out of
+sight and hearing of the house, and only bring them home when
+winter deprived them of their leafy covering and made food
+scarce. During the summer, in. my rambles about the plantation, T
+would occasionally surprise one of these half-wild hens with her
+brood; her distracted screams and motions would then cause her
+chicks to scatter and vanish in all directions, and, until the
+supposed danger was past, they would lie as close and
+well-concealed as young partridges. These fowls in summer always
+lived in small parties, each party composed of one cock and as
+many hens as he could collect--usually three or four. Each family
+occupied its own feeding ground, where it would pass a greater
+portion of each day. The hen would nest at a considerable
+distance from the feeding ground, sometimes as far as four or
+five hundred yards away. After laying an egg she would quit the
+nest, not walking from it as other fowls do, but flying, the
+flight extending to a distance of from fifteen to about fifty
+yards; after which, still keeping silence, she would walk or run,
+until, arrived at the feeding ground, she would begin to cackle.
+At once the cock, if within hearing, would utter a responsive
+cackle, whereupon she would run to him and cackle no more.
+Frequently the cackling call-note would not be uttered more than
+two or three times, some-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Parental and Early
+Instincts.</i> i 15</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">times only once,
+and in a much lower tone than in fowls of other
+breeds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">If we may assume
+that these fowls, in their long, semi-independent existence in La
+Plata, have reverted to the original instincts of the wild Gallus
+bankiva, we can see here how advantageous the cackling instinct
+must be in enabling the hen in dense tropical jungles to rejoin
+the flock after laying an egg. If there are egg-eating animals in
+the jungle intelligent enough to discover the meaning of such a
+short, subdued cackling call, they would still be unable to find
+the nest by going back on the bird's scent, since she flies from
+the nest in the first place; and the wild bird probably flies
+further than the creolla hen of La Plata. The clamorous cackling
+of our fowls would appear then to be nothing more than a
+perversion of a very useful instinct.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font26">12</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER VII</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">THE MEPHITIC
+SKUNK.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">IT might possibly
+give the reader some faint conception of the odious character of
+this creature (for adjectives are weak to describo it) when I say
+that, in talking to strangers from abroad, I have never thought
+it necessary to speak of sunstroke, jaguars, or the assassin's
+knife, but have never omitted to warn them of the skunk, minutely
+describing its habits and personal appearance.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I knew an Englishman
+who, on taking a first gallop across the pampas, saw one, and,
+quickly dismounting, hurled himself bodily on to it to effect its
+capture. Poor man! he did not know that the little animal is
+never unwilling to be caught. Men have been blinded for ever by a
+discharge of the fiery liquid full in their faces. On a mucous
+membrane it burns like sulphuric acid, say the unfortunates who
+have had the experience. How does nature protect the skunk itself
+from the injurious effects of its potent fluid? I have not
+unfrequently found individuals stone-blind, sometimes moving so
+briskly about that the blindness must have been of long
+standing--very possibly in some cases an accidental drop
+discharged by the animal itself has caused the loss of sight.
+When coming to close</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Mephitic Skunk,
+11</i>7</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">quarters with a
+skunk, by covering up the face, one's clothes only are ruined.
+But this is not all one has to fear from an encounter; the worst
+is that effluvium, after which crushed garlic is lavender, which
+tortures the olfactory nerves, and appears to pervade the whole
+system like a pestilent ether, nauseating one until sea-sickness
+seems almost a pleasant sensation in comparison.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">To those who know
+the skunk only from reputation, my words might seem too strong;
+many, however, who have come to close quarters with the little
+animal will think them ridiculously weak. And consider what must
+the feelings be of one who has had the following experience--not
+an uncommon experience on the pampas. There is to be a dance at a
+neighbouring house a few miles away; he has been looking forward
+to it, and, dressing himself with due care, mounts his horse and
+sets out full of joyous anticipations. It is a dark windy
+evening, but there is a convenient bridle-path through the dense
+thicket of giant thistles, and striking it he puts his horse into
+a swinging gallop. Unhappily the path is already occupied by a
+skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, in obedience to the
+promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get out of it,
+until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kicked
+football into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as
+high as his knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider,
+after coming out into the open, dismounts and walks away twenty
+yards from his animal, and literally <i>smells</i> himself all
+over, and with a feeling of profound relief pronounces himself
+Not the minutest drop of the diabolical spray</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">118 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">has touched his
+dancing shoes! Springing into the saddle he proceeds to his
+journey's end, is warmly welcomed by his host, and speedily
+forgetting his slight misadventure, mingles with a happy crowd of
+friends. In a little while people begin exchanging whispers and
+significant glances; men are seen smiling at nothing in
+particular; the hostess wears a clouded face; the ladies cough
+and put their scented handkerchiefs to their noses, and presently
+they begin to feel faint and retire from the room. Our hero
+begins to notice that there is something wrong, and presently
+discovers its cause; he, unhappily, has been the last person in
+the room to remark that familiar but most abominable odour,
+rising like a deadly exhalation from the floor, conquering all
+other odours, and every moment becoming more powerful. A drop
+<i>has</i> touched his shoe after all; and fearing to be found
+out, and edging towards the door, he makes his escape, and is
+speedily riding home again; knowing full well that his sudden and
+early departure from the scene will be quickly discovered and set
+down to the right cause.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In that not always
+trustworthy book <i>The Natural History of Chili,</i> Molina
+tells us how they deal with the animal in the trans-Andine
+regions. "When one appears," he says, "some of the company begiu
+by caressing it, until an opportunity offers for one of them to
+seize it by the tail. In this position the muscles become
+contracted, the animal is unable to eject its fluid, and is
+quickly despatched." One might just as well talk of caressing a
+cobra de capello; yet this laughable fiction finds
+believers</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Mephitic
+Skunk.</i> 119</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">all over South and
+North America. Professor Baird gravely introduces it into his
+great work on the mammalia. I was once talking about animals in a
+rancho, when a person present (an Argentine officer) told that,
+while visiting an Indian encampment, he had asked the savages how
+they contrived to kill skunks without making even a life in the
+desert intolerable. A grave old Cacique informed him that the
+secret was to go boldly up to the animal, take it by the tail,
+and despatch it; for, he said, when you fear it not at all, then
+it respects your courage and dies like a lamb--sweetly. The
+officer, continuing his story, said that on quitting the Indian
+camp he started a skunk, and, glad of an opportunity to test the
+truth of what he had heard, dismounted and proceeded to put the
+Indian plan in practice. Here the story abruptly ended, and when
+I eagerly demanded to hear the sequel, the amateur hunter of furs
+lit a cigarette and vacantly watched the ascending smoke. The
+Indians aro grave jokers, they seldom smile; and this old
+traditional skunk-joke, which has run the length of a continent,
+finding its way into many wise books, is their revenge on a
+superior race.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have shot a great
+many eagles, and occasionally a carancho (Polyborus tharus), with
+the plumage smelling strongly of skunk, which shows that these
+birds, pressed by hunger, often commit the fearful mistake of
+attacking the animal. My friend Mr. Ernest Gibson, of Buenos
+Ayres, in a communication to the <i>Ibis,</i> describes an
+encounter he actually witnessed between a carancho and a skunk.
+Riding home one afternoon, he spied a skunk "shuffling</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">120 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">along in the erratic
+manner usual to that odoriferous quadruped;" following it at a
+very short distance was an eagle-vulture, evidently bent on
+mischief. Every time the bird came near the bushy tail rose
+menacingly; then the carancho would fall behind, and, after a few
+moments' hesitation, follow on again. At length, growing bolder,
+it sprung forward, seizing the threatening tail with its claw,
+but immediately after "began staggering about with dishevelled
+plumage, tearful eyes, and a profoundly woe-begone expression on
+its vulture face. The skunk, after turning and regarding its
+victim with an I-told-you-so look for a few moments, trotted
+unconcernedly off."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I was told in
+Patagonia by a man named Molinos, who was frequently employed by
+the Government as guide to expeditions in the desert, that
+everywhere throughout that country the skunk is abundant. Some
+years ago he was sent with two other men to find and treat with
+an Indian chief whose whereabouts were not known. Far in the
+interior Molinos was overtaken by a severe winter, his horses
+died of thirst and fatigue, and during the three bitterest months
+of the year he kept himself and his followers alive by eating the
+flesh of skunks, the only wild animal that never failed them. No
+doubt, on those vast sterile plains where the skunk abounds, and
+goes about by day and by night careless of enemies, the terrible
+nature of its defensive weapon is the first lesson experience
+teaches to every young eagle, fox, wild cat, and puma.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Dogs kill skunks
+when made to do so, but it is not a sport they delight in. One
+moonlight night,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Mephitic
+Skunk.</i> 121</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">at home, I went out
+to where the dogs, twelve in number, were sleeping: while I stood
+there a skunk appeared and deliberately came towards me, passing
+through the dogs where they lay, and one by one as he passed them
+they rose up, and, with their tails between their legs, skulked
+off. When made to kill skunks often they become seasoned; but
+always perform the loathsome task expeditiously, then rush away
+with frothing mouths to rub their faces in the wet clay and rid
+themselves of the fiery sensation. At one time I possessed only
+one dog that could be made to face a skunk, and as the little
+robbers were very plentiful, and continually coining about the
+house in their usual open, bold way, it was rather hard for the
+poor brute. This dog detested them quite as strongly as the
+others, only he was more obedient, faithful, and brave. Whenever
+I bade him attack one of them he would come close up to me and
+look up into my face with piteous pleading eyes, then, finding
+that he was not to be let off from the repulsive task, he would
+charge upon the doomed animal with a blind fury wonderful to see.
+Seizing it between his teeth, he would shake it madly, crushing
+its bones, then hurl it several feet from him, only to rush again
+and again upon it to repeat the operation, doubtless with a
+Caligula-like wish in his frantic breast that all the skunks on
+the globe had but one backbone.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I was once on a
+visit to a sheep-farming brother, far away on the southern
+frontier of Buenos Ayres, and amongst the dogs I found there was
+one most interesting creature, He was a great,
+lumbering,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">122 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">stupid,
+good-tempered brute, so greedy that when you offered him a piece
+of meat he would swallow half your arm, and so obedient that at a
+word he would dash himself against the horns of a bull, and face
+death and danger in any shape. But, my brother told me, he would
+not face a skunk--he would die first. One day I took him out and
+found a skunk, and for upwards of half an hour I sat on my horse
+vainly cheering on my cowardly follower, and urging him to
+battle. The very sight of the enemy gave him a fit of the
+shivers; and when the irascible little enemy began to advance
+against us, going through the performance by means of which he
+generally puts his foes to flight without resorting to malodorous
+measures--stamping his little feet in rage, jumping up,
+spluttering and hissing and flourishing his brush like a warlike
+banner above his head--then hardly could I restrain my dog from
+turning tail and flying home in abject terror. My cruel
+persistence was rewarded at last. Continued shouts, cheers, and
+hand-clappings began to stir the brute to a kind of frenzy. Torn
+by conflicting emotions, he began to revolve about the skunk at a
+lumbering gallop, barking, howling, and bristling up his hair;
+and at last, shutting his eyes, and with a yell of desperation,
+he charged. I fully expected to see the enemy torn to pieces in a
+few seconds, but when the dog was still four or five feet from
+him the fatal discharge came, and he dropped down as if shot
+dead. For some time he lay on the earth perfectly motionless,
+watched and gently bedewed by the victorious skunk; then he got
+up and crept whining away. Gradually he quickened his
+pace,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Mephitic
+Skunk,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><b>123</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">finally breaking
+into a frantic run. In vain I followed him, shouting at the top
+of my lungs; he stayed not to listen, and very speedily vanished
+from sight--a white speck on the vast level plain. At noon on the
+following day he made his appearance, gaunt and befouled with
+mud, staggering forward like a galvanized skeleton. Too worn
+out</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-11.jpg" alt="h1-11.jpg" class="c24">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font14"><b>Skunk and
+dog.</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">even to eat, he
+flung himself down, and for hours lay like a dead thing, sleeping
+off the effects of those few drops of perfume.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Dogs, I concluded,
+like men, have their idiosyncrasies; but I had gained my point,
+and proved once more--if any proof were needed--the truth of that
+noble panegyric of Bacon's on our faithful servant and
+companion.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER
+VIII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">MIMICRY AND WARNING
+COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">THERE is in La Plata
+a large handsome grasshopper (Zoniopoda tarsata), the habits of
+which in its larva and imago stages are in strange contrast, like
+those in certain lepidoptera, in which the caterpillars form
+societies and act in concert. The adult has a greenish protective
+colouring, brown and green banded thighs, bright red hind wings,
+seen only during flight. It is solitary and excessively shy in
+its habits, living always in concealment among the dense foliage
+near the surface of the ground. The yonng are intensely black,
+like grasshoppers cut out of jet or ebony, and gregarious in
+habit, living in bands of forty or fifty to three or four
+hundred; and so little shy, that they may sometimes be taken up
+by handfuls before they begin to scatter in alarm. Their
+gregarious habits and blackness--of all hues in nature the most
+obvious to the sight--would alone be enough to make them the most
+conspicuous of insects; but they have still other habits which
+appear as if specially designed to bring them more prominently
+into notice. Thus, they all keep so close together at all times
+as to have their bodies actually touching, and when</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mimicry and Warning
+Colours in Grasshoppers.</i> 25</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">travelling, move so
+slowly that the laziest snail might easily overtake and pass one
+of their bands, and even disappear beyond their limited horizon
+in a very short time.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">They often select an
+exposed weed to feed on, clustering together on its summit above
+the surrounding verdure, an exceedingly conspicuous object to
+every eye in the neighbourhood. They also frequently change their
+feeding-ground; at such times they deliberately cross wide roads
+and other open spaces, barren of grass, where, moving so slowly
+that they scarcely seem to move at all, they look at a distance
+like a piece of black velvet lying on the ground. Thus in every
+imaginable way they expose themselves and invite attack; yet, in
+spite of it all, I have never detected birds preying on them, and
+I have sometimes kept one of these black societies under
+observation near my house for several days, watching them at
+intervals, in places where the trees overhead were the resort of
+Icterine and tyrant birds, Guira cuckoos, and other species, all
+great hunters after grasshoppers. A young grasshopper is,
+moreover, a morsel that seldom comes amiss to any bird, whether
+insect or seed eater; and, as a rule, it is extremely shy,
+nimble, and inconspicuous. It seems clear that, although the
+young Zoniopoda does not mimic in its form any black protected
+insect, it nevertheless owes its safety to its blackness,
+together with the habit it possesses of exposing itself in so
+open and bold a manner. Blackness is so common in large protected
+insects, as, for instance, in the un-palatable leaf-cutting ants,
+scorpions, mygale</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">126 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">spiders, wasps, and
+other dangerous kinds, that it is manifestly a "warning colour,"
+the most universal and best known in nature; and the grasshopper,
+I believe, furthermore mimics the fearless demeanour of the
+protected or venomous species, which birds and other
+insect-eaters know and respect. It might be supposed that the
+young Zoniopoda is itself unpalatable; but this is scarcely
+probable, for when the deceptive black mask is once dropped, the
+excessive shyness, love of concealment, and protective colouring
+of the insect show that it is much sought after by
+birds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">While setting this
+down as an undoubted case of "mimicry," although it differs in
+some respects from all other cases I have seen reported, I cannot
+help remarking that this most useful word appears to be in some
+danger of losing the meaning originally attached to it in
+zoology. There are now very few cases of an accidental
+resemblance found between two species in nature which are not set
+down by someone to "mimicry," some in which even the wildest
+imagination might well fail to see any possible benefit to the
+supposed mimic. In cases where the outward resemblance of some
+feeble animal to a widely different and well-protected species,
+or to some object like a leaf or stick, and where such
+resemblance is manifestly advantageous and has reacted on and
+modified the life habits, it is conceivable that slight
+spontaneous variations in the structure and colouring of the
+unprotected species have been taken advantage of by the principle
+of natural selection, and a case of "mimicry" set up, to become
+more and more</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mimicry and Warning
+Colours in Grasshoppers.</i> 127</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">perfect in time, as
+successive casual variations in the same direction increased the
+resemblance.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The stick-insect is
+perhaps the most perfect example where resemblance to an
+inanimate object has been the result aimed at, so to speak, by
+nature; the resemblance of the volucella fly to the humble-bee,
+on which it is parasitical, is the most familiar example of one
+species growing like another to its own advantage, since only by
+means of its deceptive likeness to the humble-bee is it able to
+penetrate into the nest with impunity. These two cases, with
+others of a similar character, were first called cases of
+"mimicry" by Kirby and Spence, in their ever-delightful
+<i>Introduction to Entomology--</i>an old book, but, curiously
+enough in these days of popular treatises on all matters of the
+kind, still the only general work on insects in the English
+language which one who is not an entomologist can read with
+pleasure.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">A second case of
+mimicry not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen in another
+grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa of
+Thun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and
+thorax chocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen
+steel-blue or purple, a colour I have not seen in any other
+insects of this family. The fore wings have a protective
+colouring; the hind wings are bright red. When at rest, with the
+red and purple tints concealed, it is only a very pretty
+grasshopper, but the instant it takes wing it becomes the
+fac-simile of a very common wasp of the genus Pepris. These wasps
+vary greatly in size, some being as large as the
+hornet;</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">128 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">they are solitary,
+and feed on the honey of flowers and on fruit, and, besides being
+furnished with stings like other wasps--though their sting is nok
+so venomous as in other genera--they also, when angry, emit a
+most abominable odour, and are thus doubly protected against
+their enemies. Their excessive tameness, slow flight, and
+indolent motions serve to show that they are not accustomed to be
+interfered with. All these strong-smelling wasps have steel-blue
+or purple bodies, and bright red wings. So exactly does the
+Rhomalea grasshopper mimic the Pepris when flying, that I have
+been deceived scores of times. I have even seen it on the leaves,
+and, after it has flown and settled once more, I have gone to
+look at it again, to make sure that my eyes had not deceived me.
+It is curious to see how this resemblance has reacted on and
+modified the habits of the grasshopper. It is a great flyer, and
+far more aerial in its habits than any other insect I am
+acquainted with in this family, living always in trees, instead
+of on or near the surface of the ground. It is abundant in
+orchards and plantations round Buenos Ayres, where its long and
+peculiarly soft, breezy note may be heard all summer. If the
+ancient Athenians possessed so charming an insect as this, their
+great regard for the grasshopper was not strange: I only wish
+that the "Athenians of South America," as my fellow-townsmen
+sometimes call themselves in moments of exaltation, had a feeling
+of the samo kind--the regard which does <i>not</i> impale its
+object on a pin--for the pretty light-hearted songster of their
+groves and gardens.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mimicry and Warning
+Colours in Grasshoppers.</i> 129</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">When taken in the
+hand, it has the habit, common to most grasshoppers, of pouring
+out an inky fluid from its mouth; only the discharge is unusually
+copious in this species. It has another habit in defending itself
+which is very curious. When captured it instantly curls its body
+round, as a wasp does to sting. The suddenness of this action has
+more than once caused me to drop an insect I had taken, actually
+thinking for the moment that I had taken hold of a wasp. Whether
+birds would be deceived and made to drop it or not is a question
+it would not be easy to settle; but the instinct certainly looks
+like 'one of a series of small adaptations, all tending to make
+the resemblance to a wasp more complete and effective.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font2">K</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER IX.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">DRAGON-FLY
+STORMS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ONE of the most
+curious things I have encountered in my observations on animal
+life relates to a habit of the larger species of dragon-flies
+inhabiting the Pampas and Patagonia. Dragon-flies are abundant
+throughout the country wherever there is water. There are several
+species, all more or less brilliantly coloured. The kinds that
+excited my wonder, from their habits, are twice as large as the
+common widely distributed insects, being three inches to four
+inches in length, and as a rule they are sober-coloured, although
+there is one species--the largest among them--entirely of a
+brilliant scarlet. This kind is, however, exceedingly rare. All
+the different kinds (of the large dragon-flies) when travelling
+associate together, and occasionally, in a flight composed of
+countless thousands, one of these brilliant-hued individuals will
+catch the eye, appearing as conspicuous among the others as a
+poppy or scarlet geranium growing alone in an otherwise
+flowerless field. The most common species--and in some cases the
+entire flight seems to be composed of this kind only--is the
+Aeschna bonariensis Raml, the prevailing colour of which is pale
+blue. But the really wonderful thing about them all alike
+is,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Dragon-Fly
+Storms.</i> 131</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">that they appear
+only when flying before the southwest wind, called
+<i>pampero--</i>the wind that blows from the interior of the
+pampas. The pampero is a dry, cold wind, exceedingly violent. It
+bursts on the plains very suddenly, and usually lasts only a
+short time, sometimes not more than ten minutes; it comes
+irregularly, and at all seasons of the year, but is most frequent
+in the hot season, and after exceptionally sultry weather. It is
+in summer and autumn that the large dragon-flies appear; not
+<i>with</i> the wind, but--and this is the most curious part of
+the matter--in advance of it; and inasmuch as these insects are
+not seen in the country at other times, and frequently appear in
+seasons of prolonged drought, when all the marshes and
+water-courses for many hundreds of miles are dry, they must of
+course traverse immense distances, flying before the wind at a
+speed of seventy or eighty miles an hour. On some occasions they
+appear almost simultaneously with the wind, going by like a
+flash, and instantly disappearing from sight. You have scarcely
+time to see them before the wind strikes you. As a rule, however,
+they make their appearance from five to fifteen minutes before
+the wind strikes; and when they are in great numbers the air, to
+a height of ten or twelve feet above the surface of the ground,
+is all at once seen to be full of them, rushing past with
+extraordinary velocity in a north-easterly direction. In very
+oppressive weather, and when the swiftly advancing pampero brings
+no moving mountains of mingled cloud and dust, and is
+consequently not expected, the sudden apparition of the
+dragon-fly is a most welcome one,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">K 2 .</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">132 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">for then an
+immediate burst of cold wind is confidently looked for. In the
+expressive vernacular of the gauchos the large dragon-fly is
+called <i>hijo del pampero--</i>son of the south-west
+wind.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is clear that
+these great and frequent dragonfly movements are not explicable
+on any current hypothesis regarding the annual migrations of
+birds, the occasional migrations of butterflies, or the
+migrations of some mammals, like the reindeer and buffalo of
+Arctic America, which, according to Rae and other observers,
+perform long journeys north and south at regular seasons, "from a
+sense of polarity." Neither this hypothetical sense in animals,
+nor "historical memory" will account for the dragon-fly storms,
+as the phenomenon of the pampas might be called, since the
+insects do not pass and repass between "breeding and subsistence
+areas," but all journey in a north-easterly direction; and of the
+countless millions flying like thistledown before the great
+pampero wind, not one solitary traveller ever returns.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The cause of the
+flight is probably dynamical, affecting the insects with a sudden
+panic, and compelling them to rush away before the approaching
+tempest. The mystery is that they should fly from the wind before
+it reaches them, and yet travel in the same direction with it.
+When they pass over the level, treeless country, not one insect
+lags behind, or permits the wind to overtake it; but, on arriving
+at a wood or large plantation they swarm into it, as if seeking
+shelter from some swift-pursuing enemy, and on such occasions
+they sometimes remain clinging to the trees while the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<img src="images/h1-12.jpg" alt="h1-12.jpg" class="c25">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font12">STORM OF DRAGON
+FLIES.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font12">[Page 132.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Dragon-Fly
+Storms.</i> 133</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">wind spends its
+force. This is particularly the case when the wind blows up at a
+late hour of the day; then, on the following morning, the
+dragon-flies are seen clustering to the foliage in such numbers
+that many trees are covered with them, a large tree often
+appearing as if hung with curtains of some brown glistening
+material, too thick to show the green leaves beneath.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In Patagonia, where
+the phenomenon of dragon-fly storms is also known, an Englishman
+residing at the Rio Negro related to me the following occurrence
+which he witnessed there. A race meeting was being held near the
+town of El Carmen, on a high exposed piece of ground, when,
+shortly before sunset, a violent pampero wind came up, laden with
+dense dust-clouds. A few moments before the storm broke, the air
+all at once became obscured with a prodigious cloud of
+dragon-flies. About a hundred men, most of them on horseback,
+were congregated on the course at the time, and the insects,
+instead of rushing by in their usual way, settled on the people
+in such quantities that men and horses were quickly covered with
+clinging masses of them. My informant said--and this agrees with
+my own observation--that he was greatly impressed by the
+appearance of terror shown by the insects; they clung to him as
+if for dear life, so that he had the greatest difficulty in
+ridding himself of them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Weissenborn, in
+London's <i>Magazine of Natural History</i> (N. S. vol. iii.)
+describes a great migration of dragon-flies which he witnessed in
+Germany in 1839, and also mentions a similar
+phenomenon</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">134</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">occurring in 1816,
+and extending over a large portion of Europe. But in these cases
+the movement took place at the end of May, and the insects
+travelled due south; their migrations were therefore similar to
+those of birds and butterflies, and were probably due to the same
+cause. I have been unable to find any mention of a phenomenon
+resembling the one with which we are so familiar on the pampas,
+and which, strangely enough, has not been recorded by any
+European naturalists who have travelled there.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER X.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE
+PROBLEMS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">THERE cannot be a
+doubt that some animals possess an instinctive knowledge of their
+enemies--or, at all events, of some of their enemies--though I do
+not believe that this faculty is so common as many naturalists
+imagine. The most striking example I am acquainted with is seen
+in gnats or mosquitoes, and in the minute South American
+sandflies (Simulia), when a dragon-fly appears in a place where
+they are holding their aerial pastimes. The sudden appearance of
+a ghost among human revellers could not produce a greater panic.
+I have spoken in the last chapter of periodical storms or waves
+of dragon-flies in the Plata region, and mentioned incidentally
+that the appearance of these insects is most welcome in
+oppressively hot weather, since they are known to come just in
+advance of a rush of cool wind. In La Plata we also look for the
+dragon-fly, and rejoice at its coming, for another reason. We
+know that the presence of this noble insect will cause the clouds
+of stinging gnats and flies, which make life a burden, to vanish
+like smoke.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">When a flight of
+dragon-flies passes over the country many remain along the route,
+as I have</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">136 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">said, sheltering
+themselves wherever trees occur; and, after the storm blows over,
+these strangers and stragglers remain for some days hawking for
+prey in the neighbourhood. It is curious to note that they do not
+show any disposition to seek for watercourses. It may be that
+they feel lost in a strange region, or that the panic they have
+suffered, in their long flight before the wind, has unsettled
+their instincts; for it is certain that they do not, like the
+dragon-fly in Mrs. Browning's poem, "return to dream upon the
+river." They lead instead a kind of vagabond existence, hanging
+about the plantations, and roaming over the surrounding plains.
+It is then remarked that gnats and sand-flies apparently cease to
+exist, even in places where they have been most abundant. They
+have not been devoured by the dragon-flies, which are perhaps
+very few in number; they have simply got out of the way, and will
+remain in close concealment until their enemies take their
+departure, or have all been devoured by martins, tyrant birds,
+and the big robber-flies or devil's dykes--no name is bad enough
+for them--of the family Asilidaa. During these peaceful gnatless
+days, if a person thrusts himself into the bushes or herbage in
+some dark sheltered place, he will soon begin to hear the thin
+familiar sounds, as of "horns of elf-land faintly blowing"; and
+presently, from the ground and the under surface of every leaf,
+the ghost-like withered little starvelings will appear in scores
+and in hundreds to settle on him, fear not having blunted their
+keen appetites.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">When riding over
+the pampas on a hot still day,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems.</i> 137</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">with a pertinacious
+cloud of gnats or sandflies hovering just above my head and
+keeping me company for miles, I have always devoutly wished for a
+stray dragon-fly to show himself. Frequently the wish has been
+fulfilled, the dragon-fly, apparently "sagacious of his quarry
+from afar," sweeping straight at his prey, and instantly, as if
+by miracle, the stinging rain has ceased and the noxious cloud
+vanished from overhead, to be re-formed no more. This has always
+seemed very extraordinary to me; for in other matters gnats do
+not appear to possess even that proverbial small dose of
+intellect for which we give most insects credit. Before the
+advent of the dragon-fly it has perhaps happened that I have been
+vigorously striking at them, making it very unpleasant for them,
+and also killing and disabling many hundreds--a larger number
+than the most voracious dragon-fly could devour in the course of
+a whole day; and yet, after brushing and beating them off until
+my arms have ached with the exertion, they have continued to rush
+blindly on their fate, exhibiting not the faintest symptom of
+fear. I suppose that for centuries mosquitoes have, in this way,
+been brushed and beaten away with hands and with tails, without
+learning caution. It is not in their knowledge that there are
+hands and tails. A large animal is simply a field on which they
+confidently settle to feed, sounding shrill flourishes on their
+little trumpets to show how fearless they are. But the dragon-fly
+is very ancient on the earth, and if, during the Devonian epoch,
+when it existed, it preyed on some blood-sucking insect from
+which or Culicidae have come, then these stupid little</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">138 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">insects have
+certainly had ample time in which to learn well at least one
+lesson.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">There is not in all
+organic nature, to my mind, any instance of wasted energy
+comparable in magnitude with the mosquito's thirst for blood, and
+the instincts and elaborate blood-pumping apparatus with which it
+is related. The amount of pollen given off by some
+wind-fertilized trees--so great in some places that it covers
+hundreds of square miles of earth and water with a film of yellow
+dust---strikes us as an amazing waste of material on the part of
+nature; but in these cases we readily see that this excessive
+prodigality is necessary to continue the species, and that a
+sufficient number of flowers would not be impregnated unless the
+entire trees were bathed for days in the fertilizing cloud, in
+which only one out of many millions of floating particles can
+ever hit the mark. The mosquito is able to procreate without ever
+satisfying its ravenous appetite for blood. To swell its grey
+thread-like abdomen to a coral bead is a delight to the insect,
+but not necessary to its existence, like food and water to ours;
+it is the great prize in the lottery of life, which few can ever
+succeed in drawing. In a hot summer, when one has ridden perhaps
+for half a day over a low-lying or wet district, through an
+atmosphere literally obscured with a fog of mosquitoes, this fact
+strikes the mind very forcibly, for in such places it frequently
+is the case that mammals do not exist, or are exceedingly rare.
+In Europe it is different. There, as Reaumur said, possibly one
+gnat in every hundred may be able to</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems.</i> 139</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">gratify its appetite
+for blood; but of the gnats in many districts in South America it
+would be nearer the mark to say that only one in a hundred
+millions can ever do so.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Curt&iacute;s
+discovered that only the female mosquito bites or sucks blood,
+the male being without tongue or mandibles; and he asks, What,
+then, does the male feed on? He conjectures that it feeds on
+flowers; but, had he visited some swampy places in hot countries,
+where flowers are few and the insects more numerous than the
+sands on the seashore, he would most probably have said that the
+males subsist on decaying vegetable matter and moisture of slime.
+It is, however, more important to know what the female subsists
+on. We know that she thirsts for warm mammalian blood, that she
+seeks it with avidity, and is provided with an admirable organ
+for its extraction--only, unfortunately for her, she does not get
+it, or, at all events, the few happy individuals that do get it
+are swamped in the infinite multitude of those that are doomed by
+nature to total abstinence.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I should like to
+know whether this belief of Curt&iacute;s, shared by Westwood and
+other distinguished entomologists, but originally put forward
+merely as a conjecture, has ever been tested by careful
+observation and experiment. If not, then it is strange that it
+should have crept into many important works, where it is stated
+not as a mere guess, but as an established fact. Thus, Van
+Beneden, in his work on parasites, while classing female
+mosquitoes with his "miserable wretches," yet says, "If blood
+fails them, they live, like the males, on the juices
+of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">140 <i>The Natziralist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">flowers." If this
+be so, it is quite certain that the juices fail to satisfy them;
+and that, like Dr. Tanner, who was ravenously hungry during his
+forty days' fast, in spite of his frequent sips of water, the
+mosquito still craves for something better than a cool vegetarian
+diet. I cannot help thinking, though the idea may seem fanciful,
+that mosquitoes feed on nothing. We know that the ephemerae take
+no refreshment in the imago state, the mouth being aborted or
+atrophied in these short-lived creatures; but we also know that
+they belong to an exceedingly ancient tribe, and possibly, after
+the earth had ceased to produce their proper nourishment there
+came in their history a long hungry period, which did not kill
+them, but lasted until their feeding instincts became obsolete,
+the mouth lost its use, and their life in its perfect state
+dwindled to its present length.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In any case, how
+unsatisfactory is the mosquitoes' existence, and what a curious
+position they occupy in nature! Let us suppose that, owing to
+some great change in the conditions of the earth, rapacious birds
+were no longer able to capture prey, and that, by a corresponding
+change in their organizations, they were able to subsist on the
+air they breathed, with perhaps an occasional green leaf and a
+sip of water, and yet retained the old craving for solid food,
+and the old predatory instincts and powers undiminished; they
+would be in the position of mosquitoes in the imago state. And if
+then fifty or a hundred individuals were to succeed every year in
+capturing something and making one hearty meal, these few
+fortunate diners would bear about</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems.</i> 141</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">the same proportion
+to all the raptors on the globe as the mosquitoes that succeed in
+sucking blood to their unsuccessful fellows. In the case of the
+hawks, the effect of the few meals on the entire rapacious family
+or order would certainly be <i>nil;</i> and it is impossible to
+believe for a moment that the comparatively infinitesimal amount
+of blood sucked by mosquitoes can. serve to invigorate the
+species. The wonder is that the machinery, which accomplishes
+nothing, should continue in such perfect working
+order.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">When we consider
+the insect's delicate organ, so admirably fitted for the purpose
+to which it is applied, it becomes difficult to believe that it
+could have been so perfected except in a condition of things
+utterly unlike the present. There must have been a time when
+mosquitoes found their proper nourishment, and when warm
+mammalian blood was as necessary to their existence as honey is
+to that of the bee, or insect food to the dragon-fly.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">This applies to
+many blood-sucking insects besides mosquitoes, and with special
+force to the tick tribes (Ixodes), which swarm throughout Central
+and South America; for in these degraded spiders the whole body
+has been manifestly modified to fit it for a parasitical life;
+while the habits of the insect during its blind, helpless,
+waiting existence on trees, and its sudden great development when
+it succeeds in attaching itself to an animal body, also point
+irresistibly to the same conclusion. In the sunny uplands they
+act (writes Captain Burton) like the mosquitoes of the hot, humid
+Beiramar. "The nuisance is general; it seems to be in the air;
+every</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15"><b>142</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-13.jpg" alt="h1-13.jpg" class="c26">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">blade of grass has
+its colony; clusters of hundreds adhere to the twigs; myriads are
+found in the bush clumps. Lean and flat when growing to the
+leaves, the tick catches man or beast brushing by, fattens
+rapidly, and, at the end-of a week's good living, drops off,
+<i>plena cruoris."</i> When on trees, Belt says, they
+instinctively place themselves on the extreme tips of leaves and
+shoots, with their hind legs stretching out, each foot armed with
+two hooks or claws, with which to lay hold of any animal brushing
+by. During this wretched, incom-plete existence (from which, in
+most cases, it is never destined to emerge), its greatest length
+is about one-fourth of an inch; but where it fastens itself to an
+animal the abdomen increases to a globe as big as a medium-sized
+Barcelona nut. Being silvery-grey or white in colour, it becomes,
+when thus distended, very conspicuous on any dark surface. I have
+frequently seen black, smooth-haired dogs with their coats,
+turned into a perfect garden of these white spider-flowers or
+mushrooms. The white globe is leathery, and nothing can injure
+it; and the poor beast cannot rub, bite, or scratch it off, as it
+is anchored to his flesh by eight sets of hooks and a triangle of
+teeth.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The ticks inhabiting
+regions rich in bird and insect life, but with few mammals, are
+in the same condition as mosquitoes, as far as the supply of
+blood goes; and, like the mosquitoes, they are compelled and able
+to exist without the nourishment</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15 c27">Ixodes;. before and
+after a blood diet.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems.</i> 43</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">best suited to
+them. They are nature's miserable castaways, parasitical tribes
+lost in a great dry wilderness where no blood is; and every
+marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hunger gnawing its vitals, and
+every forest tick, blindly feeling with its grappling-irons for
+the beast that never brushes by, seems to tell us of a world
+peopled with gigantic forms, mammalian and reptilian, which once
+afforded abundant pasture to the parasite, and which the parasite
+perhaps assisted to overthrow.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is almost
+necessary to transport oneself to the vast tick-infested
+wilderness of the New World to appreciate the full significance
+of a passage in Belt's <i>Naturalist in Nicaragua,</i> in which
+it is suggested that man's hairless condition was perhaps brought
+about by natural selection in tropical regions, where he was
+greatly troubled with parasites of this kind. It is certain that
+if in such a country as Brazil he possessed a hairy coat,
+affording cover to the tick and enabling it to get a footing on
+the body, his condition would be a very sad one. Savages abhor
+hairs on the body, and even pluck them off their faces. This
+seems like a survival of an ancient habit acquired when the whole
+body was clothed with hair; and if primitive man ever possessed
+such a habit, nature only followed his lead in giving him a
+hairless offspring.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">Is it not also probable
+that the small amount of mammalian life in South America, and the
+aquatic habits of nearly all the large animals in the warmer
+districts, is due to the persecutions of the tick?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The only way in
+which a large animal can rid itself of the pest is by going into
+the water or wallowing</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">144 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">in the mud; and
+this perhaps accounts for the more or less aquatic habits of the
+jaguar, aguar&aacute;-guaz&uacute;, the large Cervus paluclosus,
+tapir, capybara, and peccary. Monkeys, which are most abundant,
+are a notable exception; but these animals have the habit of
+attending to each other's skins, and spend a great deal of their
+time in picking off the parasites. But how do birds escape the
+ticks, since these parasites do not confine their attacks to any
+one class of aninials, but attach themselves impartially to any
+living thing coming within reach of their hooks, from snake to
+man? My own observations bearing on this point refer less to the
+Ixodes than to the minute b&eacute;te-rouge, which is excessively
+abundant in the Plata district, where it is known as <i>bicho
+colorado,</i> and in size and habits resembles the English Leptus
+autumnalis. It is so small that, notwithstanding its bright
+scarlet colour, it can only be discerned by bringing the eye
+close to it; and being, moreover, exceedingly active and abundant
+in all shady places in summer--making life a misery to careless
+human beings--it must be very much more dangerous to birds than
+the larger sedentary Ixodes. The b&eacute;te-rouge invariably
+lodges beneath the wings of birds, where the loose scanty plumage
+affords easy access to the skin. Domestic birds suffer a great
+deal from its persecutions, and their young, if allowed to run
+about in shady places, die of the irritation. Wild birds,
+however, seem to be very little troubled, and most of those I
+have examined have been almost entirely free from parasites.
+Probably they are much more sensitive than the domestic birds,
+and able to feel and pick off the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">insects with their
+beaks before they have penetrated into the skin. I believe they
+are also able to protect themselves in another way, namely, by
+preventing the parasites from reaching their bodies at all. I was
+out under the trees one day with a pet oven-bird (Furnarius
+rufus), which had full liberty to range about at will, and
+noticed that at short intervals it went through the motions of
+picking something from its toes or legs, though I could see
+nothing on them. At length I approached my eyes to within a few
+inches of the bird's feet, and discovered that the large dry
+branch on which it stood was covered with a multitude of
+parasites, all running rapidly about like foraging ants, and
+whenever one came to the bird's feet it at once ran up the leg.
+Every time this happened, so far as I could see, the bird felt
+it. and quickly and deftly picked it off with the point of its
+bill. It seemed very astonishing that the horny covering of the
+toes and legs should be so exquisitely sensitive, for the insects
+are so small and light that they cannot be felt on the hand, even
+when a score of them are running over it; but the fact is as I
+have stated, and it is highly probable, I think, that most wild
+birds keep themselves free from these little torments in the same
+way.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Some observations
+of mine on a species of Orni-thomyia--a fly parasitical on
+birds--might possibly be of use in considering the question of
+the anomalous position in nature of insects possessing the
+instincts and aptitudes of parasites, and organs manifestly
+modified to suit a parasitical mode of life, yet compelled and
+able to exist free, feeding, perhaps, on</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c13">L</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">146</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>TIic Naturalist in
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">vegetable juices,
+or, like the ephemerae, on nothing at all. For it must be borne
+in mind that I do not assert that these "occasional" or
+"accidental" parasites, as some one calls them, explaining
+nothing, do not feed on such juices. I do not know what they feed
+on. I only know that the joyful alacrity with which gnats and
+stinging flies of all kinds abandon the leaves, supposed to
+afford them pasture, to attack a warm-blooded animal, serves to
+show how strong the impulse is, and how ineradicable the
+instinct, which must have had an origin. Perhaps the habits of
+the bird-fly I have mentioned will serve to show how, in some
+cases, the free life of some blood-sucking flies and other
+insects might have originated.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">Kirby and Spence, in
+their <i>Introduction,</i> mention that one or two species of
+Ornithomyia have been observed flying about and alighting on men;
+and in one case the fly extracted blood and was caught, the
+species being thus placed beyond doubt. This circumstance led the
+authors to believe that the insect, when the bird it is
+parasitical on dies, takes to flight and migrates from body to
+body, occasionally tasting blood until, coming to the right
+body--to wit, that of a bird, or of a particular species of
+bird--it once more establishes itself permanently in the plumage.
+I fancy that the insect sometimes leads a freer life and ranges
+much more than the authors imagined; and I refer to Kirby and
+Spence, with apologies to those who regard the
+<i>Introduction</i> as out of date, only because I am not aware
+that we have any later observations on the subject.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">There is in La Plata
+a small very common</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems.</i> 147</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Dendrocolaptine
+bird--Anumbius acuticaudatus--much infested by an Ornithomyia, a
+pretty, pale insect, half the size of a house-fly, and elegantly
+striped with green. It is a very large parasite for so small a
+bird, yet so cunning and alert is it, and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-14.jpg" alt="h1-14.jpg" class="c28">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15">Firewood-gatherer and
+Bird-fly.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">so swiftly is it
+able to swim through the plumage, that the bird is unable to rid
+itself of so undesirable a companion. The bird lives with its
+mate all the year round, much of the time with its grown-up
+young, in its nest--a large structure, in L 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">148 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">which so much
+building-material is used that the bird is called in the
+vernacular Le&ntilde;atero, or Firewood-gatherer. On warm bright
+days without wind, during the absence of the birds, I have
+frequently seen a company of from half a dozen to a dozen or
+fifteen of the parasitical fly wheeling about in the air above
+the nest, hovering and gambolling together, just like house-flies
+in a room in summer; but always on the appearance of the birds,
+returning from their feeding-ground, they would instantly drop
+down and disappear into the nest. How curious this instinct
+seems! The fly regards the bird, which affords it the warmth and
+food essential to life, as its only deadly enemy; and with an
+inherited wisdom, like that of the mosquito with regard to the
+dragon-fly, or of the horse-fly with regard to the Monedula wasp,
+vanishes like smoke from its presence, and only approaches the
+bird secretly from a place of concealment.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The parasitical
+habit tends inevitably to degrade the species acquiring it,
+dulling its senses and faculties, especially those of sight and
+locomotion; but the Ornithomyia seems an exception, its dependent
+life having had a contrary effect; the extreme sensitiveness,
+keenness of sight, and quickness of the bird having reacted on
+the insect, giving it a subtlety in its habits and motions almost
+without a parallel even among free insects. A man with a
+blood-sucking flat-bodied flying squirrel, concealing itself
+among his clothing and gliding and dodging all over his body with
+so much artifice and rapidity as to defeat all efforts made to
+capturo</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems. 149</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">it or knock it off,
+would be a case parallel to that of the bird-fly on the small
+bird. It might be supposed that the Firewood-gatherer, like some
+ants that keep domestic pets, makes a pet of the fly; for it is a
+very pretty insect, barred with green, and with rainbow
+reflections on its wings--and birds are believed by some
+theorists to possess aesthetic tastes; but the discomfort of
+having such a vampire on the body would, I imagine, be too great
+to allow a kindly instinct of that nature to grow up. Moreover, I
+have on several occasions seen the bird making frantic efforts to
+capture one of the flies, which had incautiously flown up from
+the nest at the wrong moment. Bird and fly seem to know each
+other wonderfully well.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Here, then, we have
+a parasitical insect specialized in the highest degree, yet
+retaining all its pristine faculties unimpaired, its love of
+liberty, and of associating in numbers together for sportive
+exercises, and well able to take care of itself during its free
+intervals. And probably when thrown on the world, as when nests
+are blown down, or the birds get killed, or change their
+quarters, as they often do, it is able to exist for some time
+without avian blood. Let us then imagine some of these orphaned
+colonies, unable to find birds, but through a slight change in
+habits or organization able to exist in the imago state without
+sucking blood until they laid their eggs; and succeeding
+generations, still better able to stand the altered conditions of
+life until they become practically independent (like gnats),
+multiplying greatly, and disporting themselves in clouds over
+forests, yet still retaining the old hunger</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">150 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">for blood and the
+power to draw it, and ready at any moment to return to the
+ancestral habit. It might be said that if such a result were
+possible it would have occurred, but that we find no insect like
+the Ornithomyia existing independently. With the bird-fly it has
+not occurred, as far as we know; but in the past history of some
+independent parasites it is possible that something similar to
+the imaginary case I have sketched may have taken place. The
+bush-tick is a more highly specialized, certainly a more
+degraded, creature than the bird-fly, and the very fact of its
+existence seems to show that it is possible for even the lowest
+of the fallen race of parasites to start afresh in life under new
+conditions, and to reascend in the scale of being, although still
+bearing about it the marks of former degeneracy.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The connection
+between the flea and the mammal it feeds on is even less close
+than that which exists between the Ornithomyia and bird. The fact
+that fleas are so common and universal--for in all lands we have
+them, like the poor, always with us; and that they are found on
+all mammals, from the king of beasts to the small modest
+mouse--seems to show a great amount of variability and
+adaptiveness, as well as a very high antiquity. It has often been
+reported that fleas have been found hopping on the ground in
+desert places, where they could not have been dropped by man or
+beast; and it has been assumed that these "independent" fleas
+must, like gnats and ticks, subsist on vegetable juices. There is
+no doubt that they are able to exist and propagate</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems,</i> 151</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">for one or two years
+after being deprived of their proper aliment; houses shut up for
+a year or longer are sometimes found infested with them; possibly
+in the absence of "vegetable juices" they flourish on dust. I
+have never detected them hopping on the ground in uninhabited
+places, although I once found them in Patagonia, in a hamlet
+which had been attacked and depopulated by the Indians about
+twenty months before my visit. On entering one of the deserted
+huts I found the floor literally swarming with fleas, and in less
+than ten seconds my legs, to the height of my knees, were almost
+black with their numbers. This proves that they are able
+toincrease greatly for a period without blood; but I doubt that
+they can go on existing and increasing for an indefinite time;
+perhaps their true position, with regard to the parasitical
+habit, is midway between that of the strict parasite which never
+leaves the body, and that of independent parasites like the Culex
+and the Ixodes, and all those which are able to exist free for
+ever, and are parasitical only when the opportunity
+offers.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Entomologists regard
+the flea as a degraded fly. Certainly it is very much more
+degraded than the bird-borne Ornithomyia, with its subtle motions
+and instinct, its power of flight and social pastimes. The poor
+pulex has lost every trace of wings; nevertheless, in its fallen
+condition it has developed some remarkable qualities and
+saltatory powers, which give it a lower kind of glory; and,
+compared with another parasite with which it shares the human
+species, it is almost a noble insect. Darwin has some remarks
+about the smallness of the brain</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15"><b>152</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">of an ant, assuming
+that this insect possesses a very high intelligence, but I doubt
+very much that the ant, which moves in a groove, is mentally the
+superior of the unsocial flea. The last is certainly the most
+teachable; and if fleas were generally domesticated and made pets
+of, probably there would be as many stories about their
+marvellous intelligence and fidelity to man as we now hear about
+our over-praised "friend" the dog.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">With regard to size,
+the flea probably started on its downward course as a
+comparatively large insect, probably larger than the Ornithomyia.
+That insect has been able to maintain its existence, without
+dwindling like the Leptus into a mere speck, through the great
+modification in organs and instinct, which adapt it so
+beautifully to the feathery element in which it moves. The
+bush-tick, wingless from the beginning, and diverging in another
+direction, has probably been greatly increased in size by its
+parasitical habit; this seems proven by the fact, that as long as
+it is parasitical on nothing it remains small, but when able to
+fasten itself to an animal it rapidly developes to a great size.
+Again, the big globe of its abdomen is coriaceous and elastic,
+and is probably as devoid of sensation as a ball of india-rubber.
+The insect, being made fast by hooks and teeth to its victim, all
+efforts to remove it only increase the pain it causes; and
+animals that know it well do not attempt to rub, scratch, or bite
+it off, therefore the great size and the conspicuous colour of
+the tick are positive advantages to it. The flea, without the
+subtlety and highly-specialized organs of the Ornithomyia, or the
+stick-fast powers and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Mosquitoes and
+Parasite Problems,</i> 153</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">leathery body of
+the Ixodes, can only escape its vigilant enemies by making itself
+invisible; hence every variation, i.e. increase in jumping-power
+and diminished bulk, tending towards this result, has been taken
+advantage of by natural selection.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XI</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER
+MATTERS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Two humble-bees,
+Bombus thoracicus and B. viola-ceus, are found on the pampas; the
+first, with a primrose yellow thorax, and the extremity of the
+abdomen bright rufous, slightly resembles the English B.
+terrestris; the rarer species, which is a trifle smaller than the
+first, is of a uniform intense black, the body having the
+appearance of velvet, the wings being of a deep violaceous
+blue.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">A census of the
+humble-bees in any garden or field always shows that the yellow
+bees outnumber the black in the proportion of about seven to one;
+and I have also found their nests for many years in the same
+proportion; about seven nests of the yellow to one nest of the
+black species. In habits they are almost identical, and when two
+species so closely allied are found inhabiting the same locality,
+it is only reasonable to infer that one possesses some advantage
+over the other, and that the least favoured species will
+eventually disappear. In this case, where one so greatly
+outnumbers the other, it might be thought that the rarer species
+is dying out, or that, on the contrary, it is a new-comer
+destined to supplant the older more numerous species. Yet, during
+the twenty years I have ob-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Humble-Bees and
+other Matters.</i> 155</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">served them, there
+has occurred no change in their relative positions; though both
+have greatly increased in numbers during that time, owing to the
+spread of cultivation. And yet it would scarcely be too much to
+expect some marked change in a period so long as that, even
+through the slow-working agency of natural selection; for it is
+not as if there had been an exact balance of power between them.
+In the same period of time I have seen several species, once
+common, almost or quite disappear, while others, very low down as
+to numbers, have been exalted to the first rank. In insect life
+especially, these changes have been numerous, rapid, and
+widespread.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the district
+where, as a boy, I chased and caught tinamous, and also chased
+ostriches, but failed to catch them, the continued presence of
+our two humble-bees, sucking the same flowers and making their
+nests in the same situations, has remained a puzzle to my
+mind.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The site of the nest
+is usually a slight depression in the soil in the shelter of a
+cardoon bush. The bees deepen the hollow by burrowing in the
+earth; and when the spring foliage sheltering it withers up, they
+construct a dome-shaped covering of small sticks, thorns, and
+leaves bitten into extremely minute pieces. They sometimes take
+possession of a small hole or cavity in the ground, and save
+themselves the labour of excavation.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Their architecture
+closely resembles that of B. terrestris. They make rudely-shaped
+oval honey-cells, varying from half an inch to an inch and a half
+in length, the smaller ones being the first</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">156</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">made; later in the
+season the old cocoons are utilized for storing honey. The wax is
+chocolate-coloured, and almost the only difference I can find in
+the economy of the two species is that the black bee uses a large
+quantity of wax in plastering the interior of its nest. The
+egg-cell of the yellow bee always contains from twelve to sixteen
+eggs; that of the black bee from ten to fourteen; and the eggs of
+this species are the largest though the bee is smallest. At the
+entrance on the edge of the mound one bee is usually stationed,
+and, when approached, it hums a shrill challenge, and throws
+itself into a menacing attitude. The sting is exceedingly
+painful.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">One summer I was so
+fortunate as to discover two nests of the two kinds within twelve
+yards of each other, and I resolved to watch them very carefully,
+in order to see whether the two species ever came into collision,
+as sometimes happens with ants of different species living close
+together. Several times I saw a yellow bee leave its own nest and
+hover round or settle on the neighbouring one, upon which the
+sentinel black bee would attack and drive it off. One day, while
+watching, I was delighted to see a yellow bee actually enter its
+neighbour's nest, the sentinel being off duty. In about five
+minutes' time it came out again and flew away unmolested. I
+concluded from this that humble-bees, like their relations of the
+hive, occasionally plunder each other's sweets. On another
+occasion I found a black bee dead at the entrance of the yellow
+bees' nest; doubtless this individual had been caught in the act
+of stealing honey, and, after</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humble-Bees and
+other Matters,</i> 157</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">it had been stung
+to death, it had been dragged out and left there as a warning to
+others with like felonious intentions.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">There is one
+striking difference between the two species. The yellow bee is
+inodorous; the black bee, when angry and attacking, emits an
+exceedingly powerful odour: curiously enough, this smell is
+identical in character with that made when angry by all the wasps
+of the South American genus Pepris--dark blue wasps with red
+wings. This odour at first produces a stinging sensation on the
+nerve of smell, but when inhaled in large measure becomes very
+nauseating. On one occasion, while I was opening a nest, several
+of the bees buzzing round my head and thrusting their stings
+through the veil I wore for protection, gave out so pungent a
+smell that I found it unendurable, and was compelled to
+retreat.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It seems strange
+that a species armed with a venomous sting and possessing the
+fierce courage of the humble-bee should also have this repulsive
+odour for a protection. It is, in fact, as incongruous as it
+would be were our soldiers provided with guns and swords first,
+and after with phials of assafoatida to be uncorked in the face
+of an enemy.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Why, or how, animals
+came to be possessed of the power of emitting pestiferous odours
+is a mystery; we only see that natural selection has, in some
+mstances, chiefly among insects, taken advantage of it to furnish
+some of the weaker, more unprotected species with a means of
+escape from their enemies. The most stinking example I know is
+that</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">158 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">of a large hairy
+caterpillar I have found on dry wood in Patagonia, and which,
+when touched, emits an intensely nauseous effluvium. Happily it
+is very volatile, but while it lasts it is even more detestable
+than that of the skunk.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The skunk itself
+offers perhaps the one instance amongst the higher vertebrates of
+an animal in which all the original instincts of
+self-preservation have died out, giving place to this lower kind
+of protection. All the other members of the family it belongs to
+are cunning, swift of foot, and, when overtaken, fierce-tempered
+and well able to defend themselves with their powerful well-armed
+jaws.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">For some occult
+reason they are provided with a gland charged with a malodorous
+secretion; and out of this mysterious liquor Nature has
+elaborated the skunk's inglorious weapon. The skunk alone when
+attacked makes no attempt to escape or to defend itself by
+biting; but, thrown by its agitation into a violent convulsion,
+involuntarily discharges its foetid liquor into the face of an
+opponent. When this animal had once ceased to use so good a
+weapon as its teeth in defending itself, degenerating at the same
+time into a slow-moving creature, without fear and without
+cunning, the strength and vileness of its odour would be
+continually increased by the cumulative process of natural
+selection: and how effective the protection has become is shown
+by the abundance of the species throughout the whole American
+continent. It is lucky for mankind--especially for naturalists
+and sportsmen--that other species have not been improved in the
+same direction.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humble-Bees and
+other Matters.</i> 59</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">But what can we say
+of the common deer of the pampas (Cervus campestris), the male of
+which gives out an effluvium quite as far-reaching although not
+so abominable in character as that of the Mephitis? It comes in
+disagreeable whiffs to the human nostril when the perfumer of the
+wilderness is not even in sight. Yet it is not a protection; on
+the contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling white
+plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a direct disadvantage,
+informing all enemies for leagues around of its whereabouts. It
+is not, therefore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer
+are never very abundant; the only wonder is that, like the
+ancient horse of America, they have not become
+extinct.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The gauchos of the
+pampas, however, give <i>a reason</i> for the powerful smell of
+the male deer; and, after some hesitation, I have determined to
+set it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, as he
+thinks proper. I neither believe nor disbelieve it; for although
+I do not put great faith in gaucho natural history, my own
+observations have not infrequently confirmed statements of
+theirs, which a sceptical person would have regarded as wild
+indeed. To give one instance: I heard a gaucho relate that while
+out riding he had been pursued for a considerable distance by a
+large spider; his hearers laughed at him for a romancer; but as I
+myself had been attacked and pursued, both when on foot and on
+horseback, by a large wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I did
+not join in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of C.
+campestris is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">16o <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">as pyrethrum powder
+is to most insects, and even go so far as to describe its effect
+as fatal to them; according to this, the smell is therefore a
+protection to the deer. In places where venomous snakes are
+extremely abundant, as in the Sierra district on the southern
+pampas of Buenos Ayres, the gaucho frequently ties a strip of the
+male deer's skin, which retains its powerful odour for an
+indefinite time, round the neck of a valuable horse as a
+protection. It is certain that domestic animals are frequently
+lost here through snake-bites. The most common poisonous
+species--the Craspedo-cephalus alternatus, called <i>Vivora de la
+Cruz</i> in the vernacular--has neither bright colour nor warning
+rattle to keep off heavy hoofs, and is moreover of so sluggish a
+temperament that it will allow itself to be trodden on before
+stirring, with the result that its fangs are not infrequently
+struck into the nose or foot of browsing beast. Considering,
+then, the conditions in which C. campestris is placed--and it
+might also be supposed that venomous snakes have in past times
+been much more numerous than they are now--it is not impossible
+to believe that the powerful smell it emits has been made
+protective, especially when we see in other species how repulsive
+odours have been turned to account by the principle of natural
+selection.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">After all, perhaps
+the wild naturalist of the pampas knows what he is about when he
+ties a strip of deer-skin to the neck of his steed and turns him
+loose to graze among the snakes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The gaucho also
+affirms that the deer cherishes a wonderful animosity against
+snakes; that it be-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humble-Bees and
+other Matters.</i> 161</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">comes greatly
+excited when it sees one, and proceeds at once to destroy it;
+<i>they say,</i> by running round and round it in a circle,
+emitting its violent smell in larger measure, until the snake
+dies of suffocation. It is hard to believe that the effect can be
+so great; but that the deer is a snake hater and killer is
+certainly true: in North America, Ceylon, and other districts
+deer have been observed excitedly leaping on serpents, and
+killing them with their sharp cutting hoofs.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">A NOBLE
+WASP.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>(Monedula
+punctata.)</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">NATURALISTS, like
+kings and emperors, have their favourites, and as my zoological
+sympathies, which are wider than my knowledge, embrace all
+classes of beings, there are of course several insects for which
+I have a special regard; a few in each of the principal orders.
+My chief favourite among the hymenopteras is the one
+representative of the curious genus Monedula known in La Plata.
+It is handsome and has original habits, but it is specially
+interesting to me for another reason: I can remember the time
+when it was extremely rare on the pampas, so rare that in boyhood
+the sight of one used to be a great event to me; and I have
+watched its rapid increase year by year till it has come to be
+one of our commonest species. Its singular habits and
+intelligence give it a still better claim to notice. It is a big,
+showy, loud-buzzing insect, with pink head and legs, wings with
+brown reflections, and body encircled with alternate bands of
+black and pale gold, and has a preference for large composite
+flowers, on the honey of which it feeds. Its young is, however,
+an insect-eater; but the Monedula does not, like other burrowing
+or</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>A noble Wasp.</i>
+163</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">sand wasps, put
+away a store of insects or spiders, partially paralyzed, as a
+provision for the grub till it reaches the pupa state; it
+actually supplies the grub with fresh-caught insects as long as
+food is required, killing the prey it captures outright, and
+bringing it in to its young; so that its habits, in this
+particular, are more bird- than wasp-like.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The wasp lays its
+solitary egg at the extremity of a hole it excavates for itself
+on a bare hard piece of ground, and many holes are usually found
+close together. When the grub--for I have never been able to find
+more than one in a hole--has come out from the egg, the parent
+begins to bring in insects, carefully filling up the mouth of the
+hole with loose earth after every visit. Without this precaution,
+which entails a vast amount of labour, I do not believe one grub
+out of every fifty would survive, so overrun are these barren
+spots of ground used as breeding-places with hunting spiders,
+ants, and tiger-beetles. The grub is a voracious eater, but the
+diligent mother brings in as much as it can devour. I have often
+found as many as six or seven insects, apparently fresh killed,
+and not yet touched by the pampered little glutton, coiled up in
+the midst of them waiting for an appetite.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The Monedula is an
+adroit fly-catcher, for though it kills numbers of fire-flies and
+other insects, flies are always preferred, possibly because they
+are so little encumbered with wings, and are also more easily
+devoured. It occasionally captures insects on the wing, but the
+more usual method is to pounce down on its prey when it is at
+rest. At one time, before I had learnt their habits, I
+used</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">164 <i>The Nauiralist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">frequently to be
+startled by two or three or more of these wasps rushing towards
+my face, and continuing hovering before it, loudly buzzing,
+attending me in my walks about the fields. The reason of this
+curious proceeding is that the Monedula preys largely on stinging
+flies, having learnt from experience that the stinging fly will
+generally neglect its own safety when it has once fastened on a
+good spot to draw blood from. When a man or horse stands
+perfectly motionless the wasps take no notice, but the moment any
+movement is made of hand, tail, or stamping hoof, they rush to
+the rescue, expecting to find a stinging fly. On the other hand,
+the horse has learnt to know and value this fly-scourge, and will
+stand very quietly with half a dozen loud Avasps hovering in an
+alarming manner close to his head, well knowing that every fly
+that settles on him will be instantly snatched away, and that the
+boisterous Monedula is a better protection even than the
+tail--which, by the way, the horse wears very long in Buenos
+Ayres.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have, in
+conclusion, to relate an incident I onco witnessed, and which
+does not show the Monedula in a very amiable light. I was leaning
+over a gate watching one of these wasps feeding on a sunflower. A
+small leaf-cutting bee was hurrying about with its shrill busy
+hum in the vicinity, and in due time came to the sunflower and
+settled on it. The Monedula became irritated, possibly at the
+shrill voice and bustling manner of its neighbour, and, after
+watching it for a few moments on the flower, deliberately rushed
+at and drove it off. The leaf-cutter quickly returned,
+however--for bees</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>A noble Wasp.</i>
+165</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c8">are always extremely
+averse to leaving a flower unexplored--but was again driven away
+with threats and demonstrations on the part of the Monedula. The
+little thing went off and sunned itself on a leaf for a time,
+then returned to the flower, only to be instantly ejected again.
+Other attempts were made,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-15.jpg" alt="h1-15.jpg" class="c29">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">A Bee's
+Eevenge.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">but the big wasp now
+kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, and would not
+allow it to come within several inches of the flower without
+throwing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee
+retired to sun itself once more, apparently determined to wait
+for the big tyrant to go away; but the other seemed to know what
+was</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">166 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">wanted, and
+spitefully made up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter
+then gave up the contest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it
+hovered, hawk-like, above the Monedula for a moment, then pounced
+down on its back, and clung there, furiously biting, until its
+animosity was thoroughly appeased; then it flew off, leaving the
+other master of the field certainly, but greatly discomposed, and
+perhaps seriously injured about the base of the wings. I was
+rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for a
+leaf-cutting bee can use its teeth as deftly as a tailor can his
+shears.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Doubtless to bees,
+as to men, revenge is sweeter than honey. But, in the face of
+mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale of
+organization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything so
+intelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "which
+implies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the
+person (or bee) offended?" According to Bain <i>(Mental and Moral
+Science)</i> only the highest animals--stags and bulls he
+mentions-can be credited with the developed form of anger, which,
+he describes as an excitement caused by pain, reaching the
+centres of activity, and containing an impulse knowingly to
+inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if man only is
+meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel of
+gunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the
+breast of nearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high
+according to Bain, though I myself should place him nearly on a
+level mentally</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>A noble Wasp.</i>
+167</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">with the majority
+of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable of a
+wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag
+can manifestly have no associations, personal or political, for
+the bull, shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another
+instance of misdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar
+as that of the bull and red rag, is used as an illustration by
+one of the prophets: "My heritage is unto me as a speckled bird;
+the birds round, about are against it." I have frequently seen
+the birds of a thicket gather round some singularly marked
+accidental visitor, and finally drive him with great anger from
+the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in a little here,
+since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured or marked,
+might be looked on as a bird of prey.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The flesh-fly
+laying its eggs on the carrion-flower is only a striking instance
+of the mistakes all instincts are liable to, never more markedly
+than in the inherited tendency to fits of frenzied excitement:
+the feeling is frequently excited by the wrong object, and
+explodes at inopportune moments.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER
+XIII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c30">NATURE'S NIGHT
+LIGHTS. <i>(Remarks about Fireflies and other
+matters.)</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">IT was formerly
+supposed that the light of the firefly (in any family possessing
+the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks of other
+insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirby
+and Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all
+the attention it would receive from modern entomologists: just at
+present any observer who lived in the pre-Darwin days is regarded
+as one of the ancients. The reasons given for the notion or
+theory in the celebrated <i>Introduction to Entomology</i> were
+not conclusive; nevertheless it was not an improbable supposition
+of the authors'; while the theory which has taken its place in
+recent zoological writings seems in every way even less
+satisfactory.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Let us first examine
+the antiquated theory, as it must now be called. By bringing a
+raptorial insect and a firefly together, we find that the
+flashing light of the latter does actually scare away the former,
+and is therefore, for the moment, a protection as effectual as
+the camp-fire the traveller lights in a district abounding with
+beasts of prey. Notwith-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Nature's Night
+Lights.</i> 169</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">standing this fact,
+and assuming that we have here the whole reason of the existence
+of the light-emitting power, a study of the firefly's habits
+compels us to believe that the insect would be just as well off
+without the power as with it. Probably it experiences some
+pleasure in emitting flashes of light during its evening
+pastimes, but this could scarcely be considered an advantage in
+its struggle for existence, and it certainly does not account for
+the possession of the faculty.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">About the habits of
+Pyrophorus, the large tropical firefly which has the seat of its
+luminosity on the upper surface of the thorax, nothing definite
+appears to be known; but it has been said that this instinct is
+altogether nocturnal. The Pyrophorus is only found in the
+sub-tropical portion of the Argentine country, and I have never
+met with it. With the widely-separated Cratomorphus, and the
+tortoise-shaped Aspisoma, which emit the light from the abdomen,
+I am familiar; one species of Cratomorphus--a long slender insect
+with yellow wing-cases marked with two parallel black lines--is
+"the firefly" known to every one and excessively abundant in the
+southern countries of La Plata. This insect is strictly diurnal
+in its habits--as much so, in fact, as diurnal butterflies. They
+are seen flying about, wooing their mates, and feeding on
+composite and umbelliferous flowers at all hours of the day, and
+are as active as wasps during the full glare of noon. Birds do
+not feed on them, owing to the disagreeable odour, resembling
+that of phosphorus, they emit, and probably because they are to
+be uneatable; but their insect enemies are</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">170 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">not so squeamish,
+and devour them readily, just as they also do the blister-fly,
+which one would imagine a morsel fitted to disagree with any
+stomach. One of their enemies is the Monedula wasp; another, a
+fly, of the rapacious Asilidas family; and this fly is also a
+wasp in appearance, having a purple body and bright red wings,
+like a Pepris, and this mimetic resemblance doubtless serves it
+as a protection against birds. A majority of raptorial insects
+are, however, nocturnal, and from all these enemies that go about
+under cover of night, the firefly, as Kirby and Spence rightly
+conjectured, protects itself, or rather is involuntarily
+protected, by means of its frequent flashing light. We are thus
+forced to the conclusion that, while the common house fly and
+many other diurnal insects spend a considerable portion of the
+daylight in purely sportive exercises, the firefly, possessing in
+its light a protection from nocturnal enemies, puts off its
+pastimes until the evening; then, when its carnival of two or
+three hours' duration is over, retires also to rest, putting out
+its candle, and so exposing itself to the dangers which surround
+other diurnal species during the hours of darkness. I have spoken
+of the firefly's pastimes advisedly, for I have really never been
+able to detect it doing anything in the evening beyond flitting
+aimlessly about, like house flies in a room, hovering and
+revolving in company by the hour, apparently for amusement. Thus,
+the more closely we look at the facts, the more unsatisfactory
+does the explanation seem. That the firefly should have become
+possessed of so elaborate a machinery, producing incidentally
+such splendid results, merely as</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Nature's Night
+Lights.</i> <b>171</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">a protection
+against one set of enemies for a portion only of the period
+during which they are active, is altogether
+incredible.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The current theory,
+which we owe to Belt, is a prettier one. Certain insects (also
+certain Batrachians, reptiles, &amp;c.) are unpalatable to the
+rapacious kinds; it is therefore a direct advantage to these
+unpalatable species to be distinguishable from all the
+persecuted, and the more conspicuous and well-known they are, the
+less likely are they to be mistaken by birds, insectivorous
+mammals, &amp;c., for eatable kinds and caught or injured. Hence
+we find that many such species have acquired for their protection
+very brilliant or strongly-contrasted colours--warning
+colours--which insect-eaters come to know.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The firefly, a
+soft-bodied, slow-flying insect, is easily caught and injured,
+but it is not fit for food, and, therefore, says the theory, lest
+it should be injured or killed by mistake, it has a fiery spark
+to warn enemies---birds, bats, and rapacious insects--that it is
+uneatable.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The theory of
+warning colours is an excellent one, but it has been pushed too
+far. We have seen that one of the most common fireflies is
+diurnal in habits, or, at any rate, that it performs all the
+important business of its life by day, when it has neither bright
+colour nor light to warn its bird enemies; and out of every
+hundred species of insect-eating birds at least ninety-nine are
+diurnal. Raptorial insects, as I have said, feed freely on
+fireflies, so that the supposed warning is not for them, and it
+would be hard to believe that the magnificent</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">172 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">display made by
+luminous insects is useful only in preventing accidental injuries
+to them from a few crepuscular bats and goatsuckers. And to
+believe even this we should first have to assume that bats and
+goatsuckers are differently constituted from all other creatures;
+for in other animals--insects, birds, and mammalians--the
+appearance of fire by night seems to confuse and frighten, but it
+certainly cannot be said to <i>warn,</i> in the sense in which
+that word is used when we speak of the brilliant colours of some
+butterflies, or even of the gestures of some venomous snakes, and
+of the sounds they emit.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Thus we can see
+that, while the old theory of Kirby and Spence had some facts to
+support it, the one now in vogue is purely fanciful. Until some
+better suggestion is made, it would perhaps be as well to
+consider the luminous organ as having "no very close and direct
+relation to present habits of life." About their present habits,
+however, especially their crepuscular habits, there is yet much
+to learn. One thing I have observed in them has always seemed
+very strange to me. Occasionally an individual insect is seen
+shining with a very large and steady light, or with a light which
+very gradually decreases and increases in power, and at such
+times it is less active than at others, remaining for long
+intervals motionless on the leaves, or moving with a very slow
+flight. In South America a firefly displaying this abnormal
+splendour is said to be dying, and it is easy to imagine how such
+a notion originated. The belief is, however, erroneous, for
+sometimes, on very rare occasions, all the insects in
+one</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Nature's Night
+Lights.</i> 173</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">place are
+simultaneously affected in the same way, and at such times they
+mass themselves together in myriads, as if for migration, or for
+some other great purpose. Mr. Bigg-Wither, in South Brazil, and
+D'Albertis, in New Guinea, noticed these firefly gatherings; I
+also once had the rare good fortune to witness a phenomenon of
+the kind on a very grand scale. Riding on the pampas one dark
+evening an hour after sunset, and passing from high ground
+overgrown with giant thistles to a low plain covered with long
+grass, bordering a stream of water, I found it all ablaze with
+myriads of fireflies. I noticed that all the insects gave out an
+exceptionally large, brilliant light, which shone almost
+steadily. The long grass was thickly studded with them, while
+they literally swarmed in the air, all moving up the valley with
+a singularly slow and languid flight. When I galloped down into
+this river of phosphorescent fire, my horse plunged and snorted
+with alarm. I succeeded at length in quieting him, and then rode
+slowly through, compelled to keep my mouth and eyes closed, so
+thickly did the insects rain on to my face. The air was laden
+with the sickening phosphorous smell they emit, but when I had
+once got free of the broad fiery zone, stretching away on either
+hand for miles along the moist valley, I stood still and gazed
+back for some time on a scene the most wonderful and enchanting I
+have ever witnessed.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c31">The fascinating and
+confusing effect which the appearance of fire at night has on
+animals is a most</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">174 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">interesting subject;
+and although it is not probable that anything very fresh remains
+to be said about it, I am tempted to add here the results of my
+own experience.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">When travelling by
+night, I have frequently been struck with the behaviour of my
+horse at the sight of natural fire, or appearance of fire, always
+so different from that caused by the sight of fire artificially
+created. The steady gleam from the open window or door of a
+distant house, or even the unsteady wind-tossed flame of some
+lonely camp-fire, has only served to rouse a fresh spirit in him
+and the desire to reach it; whereas those infrequent displays of
+fire which nature exhibits, such as lightning, or the ignis
+fatuus, or even a cloud of fireflies, has always produced a
+disquieting effect. Experience has evidently taught the domestic
+horse to distinguish a light kindled by man from all others; and,
+knowing its character, he is just as well able as his rider to go
+towards it without experiencing that confusion of mind caused by
+a glare in the darkness, the origin and nature of which is a
+mystery. The artificially-lighted fire is to the horse only the
+possible goal of the journey, and is associated with the thought
+of rest and food. Wild animals, as a rule, at any rate in
+thinly-settled districts, do not know the meaning of any fire; it
+only excites curiosity and fear in them; and they are most
+disturbed at the sight of fires made by man, which are brighter
+and steadier than most natural fires. We can understand this
+sensation in animals, since we ourselves experience a similar one
+(although in a less degree and not associated</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Nature's Night
+Lights.</i> 175</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">with fear) in the
+effect which mere brightness has on us, both by day and
+night.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">On riding across
+the monotonous grey Patagonian uplands, where often for hours one
+sees not the faintest tinge of bright colour, the intense glowing
+crimson of a cactus-fruit, or the broad shining white bosom of
+the Patagonian eagle-buzzard (Buteo erythronotus), perched on the
+summit of a distant bush, has had a strangely fascinating effect
+on me, so that I have been unable to take my eyes off it as long
+as it continued before me. Or in passing through extensive
+desolate marshes, the dazzling white plumage of a stationary
+egret has exercised the same attraction. At night we experience
+the sensation in a greater degree, when the silver sheen of the
+moon makes a broad path on the water; or when a meteor leaves a
+glowing track across the sky; while a still more familiar
+instance is seen in the powerful attraction on the sight of
+glowing embers in a darkened room. The mere brightness, or
+vividness of the contrast, fascinates the mind; but the effect on
+man is comparatively weak, owing to his fiery education and to
+his familiarity with brilliant dyes artificially obtained from
+nature. How strong this attraction of mere brightness, even where
+there is no mystery about it, is to wild animals is shown by
+birds of prey almost invariably singling out white or
+bright-plumaged birds for attack where bright and sober-coloured
+kinds are mingled together. By night the attraction is
+immeasurably greater than by day, and the light of a fire
+steadily gazed at quickly confuses the mind. The fires which,
+travellers make</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">176 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">for their protection
+actually serve to attract the beasts of prey, but the confusion
+and fear caused by the bright glare makes it safe for the
+traveller to lie down and sleep in the light. Mammals do not lose
+their heads altogether, because they are walking on firm ground
+where muscular exertion and an exercise of judgment are necessary
+at every step; whereas birds floating buoyantly and with little
+effort through the air are quickly bewildered. Incredible numbers
+of migratory birds kill them-selves by dashing against the
+windows of lighthouses; on bright moonlight nights the voyagers
+are comparatively safe; but during dark cloudy weather the
+slaughter is very great; over six hundred birds were killed by
+striking a lighthouse in Central America in a single night. On
+insects the effect is the same as on the higher animals: on the
+ground they are attracted by the light, but keep, like wolves and
+tigers, at a safe distance from it; when rushing through the air
+and unable to keep their eyes from it they fly into it, or else
+revolve about it, until, coming too close, their wings are
+singed.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I find that when I
+am on horseback, going at a swinging gallop, a bright light
+affects me far more powerfully than when I am trudging along on
+foot. A person mounted on a bicycle and speeding over a level
+plain on a dark night, with nothing to guide him except the idea
+of the direction in his mind, would be to some extent in the
+position of the migratory bird. An exceptionally brilliant ignis
+fatuus flying before him would affect him as the gleam of a lamp
+placed high above the surface</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Natures Night
+Lights.</i> 177</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">affects the
+migrants: he would not be able to keep his eyes from it, but
+would quickly lose the sense of direction, and probably end his
+career much as the bird does, by breaking his machine and perhaps
+his bones against some unseen obstruction in the way.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">N</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XIV.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">FACTS AND THOUGHTS
+ABOUT SPIDERS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">SOME time ago, while
+turning over a quantity of rubbish in a little-used room, I
+disturbed a large black spider. Rushing forth, just in time to
+save itself from destruction through the capsizing of a pile of
+books, it paused for one moment, took a swift comprehensive
+glance at the position, then scuttled away across the floor, and
+was lost in an obscure corner of the room. This incident served
+to remind me of a fact I was nearly forgetting, that England is
+not a spiderless country. A foreigner, however intelligent,
+coming from warmer regions, might very easily make that mistake.
+In Buenos Ayres, the land of my nativity, earth teems with these
+interesting little creatures. They abound in and on the water,
+they swarm in the grass and herbage, which everywhere glistens
+with the silvery veil they spin over it. Indeed it is scarcely an
+exaggeration to say that there is an atmosphere of spiders, for
+they are always floating about invisible in the air; their filmy
+threads are unfelt when they fly against you; and often enough
+you are not even aware of the little arrested aeronaut hurrying
+over your face with feet lighter than the lightest
+thistledown.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+aboitt Spiders.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is somewhat
+strange that although, where other tribes of living creatures are
+concerned, I am something of a naturalist, spiders I have always
+observed and admired in a non-scientific spirit, and this must be
+my excuse for mentioning the habits of some spiders without
+giving their specific names--an omission always vexing to the
+severely-technical naturalist. They have ministered to the love
+of the beautiful, the grotesque, and the marvellous in me; but I
+have never <i>collected</i> a spider, and if I wished to preserve
+one should not know how to do it. I have been "familiar with the
+face" of these monsters so long that I have even learnt to love
+them; and I believe that if Emerson rightly predicts that spiders
+are amongst the things to be expelled from earth by the perfected
+man of the future, then a great charm and element of interest
+will be lost to nature. Though loving them, I cannot, of course,
+feel the same degree of affection towards all the members of so
+various a family. The fairy gossamer, scarce seen, a creature of
+wind and sunshine; the gem-like Epeira in the centre of its
+Starry web; even the terrestrial Salticus, with its puma-like
+strategy, certainly appeal more to our aesthetic feelings than
+does the slow heavy Mygale, looking at a distance of twenty yards
+away, as he approaches you, like a gigantic cockroach mounted on
+stilts. The rash fury with which the female wolf-spider defends
+her young is very admirable; but the admiration she excites is
+mingled with other feelings when we remember that the brave
+mother proves to her consort a cruel and cannibal
+spouse.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Possibly my
+affection for spiders is due in a great</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c3">N 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">180 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">measure to the
+compassion I have always felt for them. Pity, 'tis said, is akin
+to love; and who can help experiencing that tender emotion that
+considers the heavy affliction nature has laid on the spiders in
+compensation for the paltry drop of venom with which she,
+unasked, endowed them! And here, of course, I am alluding to the
+wasps. These insects, with a refinement of cruelty, prefer not to
+kill their victims outright, but merely maim them, then house
+them in cells where the grubs can vivisect them at leisure. This
+is one of those revolting facts the fastidious soul cannot escape
+from in warm climates; for in and out of open windows and doors,
+all day long, all the summer through, comes the busy beautiful
+mason-wasp. A long body, wonderfully slim at the waist, bright
+yellow legs and thorax, and a dark crimson abdomen,--what object
+can be prettier to look at? But in her life this wasp is not
+beautiful. At home in summer they were the pests of my life, for
+nothing would serve to keep them out. One day, while we were
+seated at dinner, a clay nest, which a wasp had succeeded in
+completing unobserved, detached itself from the ceiling and fell
+with a crash on to the table, where it was shattered to pieces,
+scattering a shower of green half-living spiders round it. I
+shall never forget the feeling of intense repugnance I
+experienced at the sight, coupled with detestation of the pretty
+but cruel little architect. There is, amongst our wasps, even a
+more accomplished spider-scourge than the mason-wasp, and I will
+here give a brief account of its habits. On the grassy pampas,
+dry bare spots of soil are resorted to by a class of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Thoughts about
+Spiders.</i> 181</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">spiders that either
+make or take little holes in the ground to reside in, and from
+which they rush forth to seize their prey. They also frequently
+sit inside their dens and patiently wait there for the intrusion
+of some bungling insect. Now, in summer, to a dry spot of ground
+like this, comes a small wasp, scarcely longer than a blue-bottle
+fly, body and wings of a deep shining purplish blue colour, with
+only a white mark like a collar on the thorax. It flirts its blue
+wings, hurrying about here and there, and is extremely active,
+and of a slender graceful figure--the type of an assassin. It
+visits and explores every crack and hole in the ground, and, if
+you watch it attentively, you will at length see it, on arriving
+at a hole, give a little start backwards. It knows that a spider
+lies concealed within. Presently, having apparently matured a
+plan of attack, it disappears into the hole and remains there for
+some time. Then, just when you are beginning to think that the
+little blue explorer has been trapped, out it rushes, flying in
+terror, apparently, from the spider who issues close behind in
+hot pursuit; but, before they are three inches away from the
+hole, quick as lightning the wasp turns on its follower, and the
+two become locked together in a deadly embrace. Looking like one
+insect, they spin rapidly round for a few moments, then up
+springs the wasp--victorious. The wretched victim is not dead;
+its legs move a little, but its soft body is paralyzed, and lies
+collapsed, flabby, and powerless as a stranded jellyfish. And
+this is the invariable result of every such conflict. In other
+classes of beings, even the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><b>182</b> <i>The
+Naturalist in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">weakest hunted thing
+occasionally succeeds in inflicting pain on its persecutor, and
+the small trembling mouse, unable to save itself, can sometimes
+make the cat shriek with paiu; but there is no weak spot in the
+wasp's armour, no fatal error of judgment, not even an accident,
+ever to save the wretched victim from its fate. And now comes the
+most iniquitous part of the proceeding. When the wasp has
+sufficiently rested after the struggle, it deliberately drags the
+disabled spider back into its own hole, and, having packed it
+away at the extremity, lays an egg alongside of it, then, coming
+out again, gathers dust and rubbish with which it fills up and
+obliterates the hole; and, having thus concluded its
+Machiavellian task, it flies cheerfully off in quest of another
+victim.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The extensive Epeira
+family supply the mason-wasps and other spider-killers with the
+majority of their victims. These spiders have soft, plump,
+succulent bodies like pats of butter; they inhabit trees and
+bushes chiefly, where their geometric webs-betray their
+whereabouts; they ar&eacute; timid, comparatively innocuous, and
+reluctant to quit the shelter of their green bower, made of a
+rolled-up leaf; so that there are many reasons why they should be
+persecuted. They exhibit a great variety of curious forms; many
+are also very richly coloured; but even their brightest
+hues--orange, silver, scarlet --have not been given without
+regard to the colouring of their surroundings. Green-leafed
+bushes arc frequented by vividly green Epeiras, but the imitative
+resemblance does not quite end here. The green spider's method of
+escape, when the bush is</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 183</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">roughly shaken, is
+to drop itself down on the earth, where it lies simulating death.
+In falling, it drops just as a green leaf would drop, that is,
+not quite so rapidly as a round, solid body like a beetle or
+spider. Now in the bushes there is another Epeira, in size and
+form like the last, but differing in colour; for instead of a
+vivid green, it is of a faded yellowish white--the exact hue of a
+dead, dried-up leaf. This spider, when it lets itself drop--for
+it has the same protective habit as the other--falls not so
+rapidly as a green freshly broken off leaf or as the green spider
+would fall, but with a slower motion, precisely like a leaf
+withered up till it has become almost light as a feather. It is
+not difficult to imagine how this comes about: either a thicker
+line, or a greater stiffness or tenacity of the viscid fluid
+composing the web and attached to the point the spider drops
+from, causes one to fall slower than the other. But how many
+tentative variations in the stiffness of the web material must
+there have been before the precise degree was attained enabling
+the two distinct species, differing in colour, to complete their
+resemblance to falling leaves--a fresh green leaf in one case and
+a dead, withered leaf in the other!</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The Tetragnatha--a
+genus of the Epeira family, and known also in England--are small
+spiders found on the margin of streams. Their bodies are slender,
+oblong, and resembling a canoe in shape; and when they sit
+lengthwise on a stem or blade of grass, their long, hair-like
+legs arranged straight before and behind them, it is difficult to
+detect them, so closely do they resemble a discoloured stripe on
+the herbage. A species of Tetragnatha</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">184 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">with a curious
+modification of structure abounds on the pampas. The long leg of
+this spider is no thicker than a bristle from a pig's back, but
+at the extremity it is flattened and broad, giving it a striking
+resemblance to an oar. These spiders are only found in herbage
+overhanging the borders of streams: they are very numerous, and,
+having a pugnacious temper, are incessantly quarrelling; and it
+frequently happens that in these encounters, or where they are
+pursuing each other through the leaves, they drop into the water
+below. I believe, in fact, that they often drop themselves
+purposely into it as the readiest means of escape when hard
+pressed. When this happens, the advantage of the modified
+structure of the legs is seen. The fallen spider, sitting
+boat-like on the surface, throws out its long legs, and, dipping
+the broad ends into the water, literally rows itself rapidly to
+land.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The
+gossamer-spider, most spiritual of living things, of which there
+are numerous species, some extremely beautiful in colouring and
+markings, is the most numerous of our spiders. Only when the
+declining sun flings a broad track of shiny silver light on the
+plain does one get some faint conception of the unnumbered
+millions of these buoyant little creatures busy weaving their
+gauzy veil over the earth and floating unseen, like an ethereal
+vital dust, in the atmosphere.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">This spider carries
+within its diminutive abdomen a secret which will possibly serve
+to vex subtle intellects for a long time to come; for it is hard
+to believe that merely by mechanical force, even aided by
+currents of air, a creature half as big as a barley</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 185</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">grain can
+instantaneously snoot out filaments twenty or thirty inches long,
+and by means of which it floats itself in the air.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Naturalists are now
+giving a great deal of attention to the migrations of birds in
+different parts of the world: might not insect and spider
+migrations be included with advantage to science in their
+observations? The common notion is that the gossamer makes use of
+its unique method of locomotion, only to shift its quarters,
+impelled by want of food or unfavourable conditions--perhaps only
+by a roving disposition. I believe that besides these incessant
+flittings about from place to place throughout the summer the
+gossamer-spiders have great periodical migrations which are, as a
+rule, in-visible, since a single floating web cannot be remarked,
+and each individual rises and floats away by itself from its own
+locality when influenced by the instinct. When great numbers of
+spiders rise up simultaneously over a large area, then,
+sometimes, the movement forces itself on our attention; for at
+such times the whole sky may be filled with visible masses of
+floating web. All the great movements of gossamers I have
+observed have occurred in the autumn, or, at any rate, several
+weeks after the summer solstice; and, like the migrations of
+birds at the same season of the year, have been in a northerly
+direction. I do not assert or believe that the migratory instinct
+in the gossamer is universal. In a moist island, like England,
+for instance, where the condition of the atmosphere is seldom
+favourable, and where the little voyagers would often be blown by
+adverse winds to perish</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">186 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">far out at sea, it
+is difficult to believe that such migrations take place. But
+where they inhabit a vast area of land, as in South America,
+extending without interruption from the equator to the cold
+Magellanic regions, and where there is a long autumn of dry, hot
+weather, then such an instinct as migration might have been
+developed. For this is not a faculty merely of a few birds: the
+impulse to migrate at certain seasons affects birds, insects, and
+even mammals. In a few birds only is it highly developed, but the
+elementary feeling, out of which the wonderful habit of the
+swallow has grown, exists widely throughout animated nature. On
+the continent of Europe it also seems probable that a great
+autumnal movement of these spiders takes place; although, I must
+confess, I have no grounds for this statement, except that the
+floating gossamer is called in Germany "Der fliegender
+Summer"--the flying or departing summer.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I have stated that
+all migrations of gossamers I have witnessed have been in the
+autumn; excepting in one instance, these flights occurred when
+the weather was still hot and dry. The exceptionally late
+migration was on March 22--a full month after the departure of
+martins, humming-birds, flycatchers, and most other true
+bird-migrants. It struck me as being so remarkable, and seems to
+lend so much force to the idea I have suggested, that I wish to
+give here an exact copy of the entries made at the time and on
+the spot in my notebook.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">"March 22. This
+afternoon, while I was out shooting, the gossamer-spiders
+presented an appearance quite new to me. Walking along a
+stream</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 187</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">(the Conchitas, near
+Buenos Ayres), I noticed a broad white line skirting the low wet
+ground. This I found was caused by gossamer web lying in such
+quantities over the earth as almost to hide the grass ad thistles
+under it. The white zone was about twenty yards wide, and outside
+it only a few scattered webs were visible on the grass; its exact
+length I did not ascertain, but followed it for about two miles
+without finding the end. The spiders were so numerous that they
+continually baulked one another in their efforts to rise in the
+air. As soon as one threw out its lines they would become
+entangled with those of another spider, lanced out at the same
+moment; both spiders would immediately seem to know the cause of
+the trouble, for as soon as their lines fouled they would rush
+angrily towards each other, each trying to drive the other from
+the elevation. Notwithstanding these difficulties, numbers were
+continually floating off on the breeze which blew from the
+south.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">"I noticed three
+distinct species: one with a round scarlet body; another, velvet
+black, with large square cephalothorax and small pointed abdomen;
+the third and most abundant kind were of different shades of
+olive green, and varied greatly in size, the largest being fully
+a quarter of an inch in length. Apparently these spiders had been
+driven up from the low ground along the stream where it was wet,
+and had congregated along the borders of the dry ground in
+readiness to migrate.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">"25th. Went again to
+visit the spiders, scarcely expecting to find them, as, since
+first seeing them, we have had much wind and rain. To my
+surprise</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">188 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I found them in
+greatly increased numbers: on the tops of cardoons, posts, and
+other elevated situations they were literally lying together in
+heaps. Most of them were large and of the olive-coloured species;
+their size had probably prevented them from getting away earlier,
+but they were now floating off in great numbers, the weather
+being calm and tolerably dry. To-day I noticed a new species with
+a grey body, elegantly striped with black, and pink legs--a very
+pretty spider.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">"26th. Went again
+to-day and found that the whole vast army of gossamers, with the
+exception of a few stragglers sitting on posts and dry stalks,
+had vanished. They had taken advantage of the short spell of fine
+weather we are now having, after an unusually wet and boisterous
+autumn, to make their escape."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Here it seemed to me
+that a conjunction of circumstances--first, the unfavourable
+season preventing migration at the proper time, and secondly, the
+strip of valley out of which the spiders had been driven to the
+higher ground till they were massed together--only served to make
+visible and evident that a vast annual migration takes place
+which we have only to look closely for to discover.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">One of the most
+original spiders in Buenos Ayres--mentally original, I mean--is a
+species of Pholcus; a quiet, inoffensive creature found in
+houses, and so abundant that they literally swarm where they are
+not frequently swept away from ceilings and obscure corners.
+Certainly it seems a poor spider after the dynamical and
+migratory gossamer; but it happens, curiously enough, that
+a</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders,</i> 189</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">study of the habits
+of this dusty domestic creature leads us incidentally into the
+realms of fable and romance. It is remarkable for the extreme
+length of its legs, and resembles in colour and general
+appearance a crane fly, but is double the size of that insect. It
+has a singular method of protecting itself: when attacked or
+approached even, gathering its feet together and fastening them
+to the centre of its web, it swings itself round and round with
+the velocity of a whirligig, so that it appears like a mist on
+the web, offering no point for an enemy to strike at. When a fly
+is captured the spider approaches it cautiously and spins a web
+round it, continually narrowing the circle it describes, until
+the victim is inclosed in a cocoon-like covering. This is a
+common method with spiders; but the intelligence--for I can call
+it by no other word--of the Pholcus has supplemented this
+instinctive procedure with a very curious and unique habit. The
+Pholcus, in spite of its size, is a weak creature, possessing
+little venom to despatch its prey with, so that it makes a long
+and laborious task of killing a fly. A fly when caught in a web
+is a noisy creature, and it thus happens that when the
+Daddylonglegs--as Anglo-Argentines have dubbed this
+species--succeeds in snaring a captive the shrill outrageous
+cries of the victim are heard for a long time--often for ten or
+twelve minutes. This noise greatly excites other spiders in the
+vicinity, and presently they are seen quitting their webs and
+flurrying to the scene of conflict. Sometimes the captor is
+driven off, and then the strongest or most daring spider carries
+away the fly. But where a</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">190 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">large colony are
+allowed to continue for a long time in undisturbed possession of
+a ceiling, when one has caught a fly he proceeds rapidly to throw
+a covering of web over it, then, cutting it away, drops it down
+and lets it hang suspended by a line at a distance of two or
+three feet from the ceiling. The other spiders arrive on the
+scene, and after a short investigation retreat to their own webs,
+and when the coast is clear our spider proceeds to draw up the
+captive fly, which is by this time exhausted with its
+struggles.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Now, I have
+repeatedly remarked that all spiders, when the shrill humming of
+an insect caught in a web is heard near them, become agitated,
+like the Pholcus, and will, in the same way, quit their own webs
+and hurry to the point the sound proceeds from. This fact
+convinced me many years ago that spiders are attracted by the
+sound of musical instruments, such as violins, concertinas,
+guitars, &amp;c., simply because the sound produces the same
+effect on them as the shrill buzzing of a captive fly. I have
+frequently seen spiders come down walls or from ceilings,
+attracted by the sound of a guitar, softly played; and by gently
+touching metal strings, stretched on a piece of wood, I have
+succeeded in attracting spiders on to the strings, within two or
+three inches of my fingers; and I always noticed that the spiders
+seemed to be eagerly searching for something which they evidently
+expected to find there, moving about in an excited manner and
+looking very hungry and fierce. I have no doubt that Pelisson's
+historical spider in the Bastille came down in a mood and with a
+manner just as ferocious</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 191</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">when the prisoner
+called it with musical sounds to be fed.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The spiders I have
+spoken of up till now are timid, inoffensive creatures, chiefly
+of the Epeira family; but there are many others exceedingly
+high-spirited and, like some of the most touchy hymenopteras.
+always prepared to "greatly quarrel" over matters of little
+moment. The Mygales, of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-16.jpg" alt="h1-16.jpg" class="c32">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Mygale fueoa,
+threatening.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">which we have
+several species, are not to be treated with contempt. One is
+extremely abundant on the pampas, the Mygale fusca, a veritable
+monster, covered with dark brown hair, and called in the
+vernacular <i>aranea peluda--</i>hairy spider. In the hot month
+of December these spiders take to roaming about on the open
+plain, and are then everywhere seen travelling in a straight line
+with a slow</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">192 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">even pace. They are
+very great in attitudes, and when one is approached it
+immediately throws itself back, like a pugilist preparing for an
+encounter, and stands up so erect on its four hind feet that the
+under surface of its body is displayed. Humble-bees are commonly
+supposed to carry the palm in attitudinizing; and it is wonderful
+to see the grotesque motions of these irascible insects when
+their nest is approached, elevating their abdomens and two or
+three legs at a time, so that they resemble a troupe of acrobats
+balancing themselves on their heads or hands, and kicking their
+legs about in the air. And to impress the intruder with the
+dangerous significance of this display they hum a shrill warning
+or challenge, and stab at the air with their naked stings, from
+which limpid drops of venom are seen to exude. These threatening
+gestures probably have an effect. In the case of the hairy
+spider, I do not think any creature, however stupid, could
+mistake its meaning when it stands suddenly up, a figure horribly
+grotesque; then, dropping down on all eights, charges violently
+forwards. Their long, shiny black, sickle-shaped falces are
+dangerous weapons. I knew a native woman who had been bitten on
+the leg, and who, after fourteen years, still suffered at
+intervals acute pains in the limb.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The king of the
+spiders on the pampas is, however, not a Mygale, but a Lycosa of
+extraordinary size, light grey in colour, with a black ring round
+its middle. It is active and swift, and irritable to such a
+degree that one can scarcely help thinking that in this species
+nature has overshot her mark.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 193</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">When a person passes
+near one--say, within three or four yards of its
+lurking-place--it starts up and gives chase, and will often
+follow for a distance of thirty or forty yards. I came once very
+nearly being bitten by one of these savage creatures Riding at an
+easy trot over the dry grass, I suddenly observed a spider
+pursuing me, leaping swiftly along and keeping up with my beast.
+I aimed a blow with my whip, and the point of the lash struck the
+ground close to it, when it instantly leaped upon and ran up the
+lash, and was actually within three or four inches of my hand
+when I flung the whip from me.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">The gauchos have a
+very quaint ballad which tells that the city of Cordova was once
+invaded by an army of monstrous spiders, and that the townspeople
+went out with beating drums and flags flying to repel the
+invasion, and that after firing several volleys they were forced
+to turn and fly for their lives. I have no doubt that a sudden
+great increase of the man-chasing spiders, in a year
+exceptionally favourable to them, suggested this fable to some
+rhyming satirist of the town.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">In conclusion of
+this part of my subject, I will describe a single combat of a
+very terrible nature I once witnessed between two little spiders
+belong-ing to the same species. One had a small web against a
+wall, and of this web the other coveted possession. After vainly
+trying by a series of strategic movements to drive out the lawful
+owner, it rushed on to the web, and the two envenomed httle
+duellists closed in mortal combat. They did nothing so vulgar and
+natural as to make use of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c3">0</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">194 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">their falces, and
+never once actually touched each other, but the fight was none
+the less deadly. Rapidly revolving about, or leaping over, or
+passing under, each other, each endeavoured to impede or entangle
+his adversary, and the dexterity with which each avoided the
+cunningly thrown snare, trying at the same time to entangle its
+opponent, was wonderful to see. At length, after this equal
+battle had raged for some time, one of the combatants made some
+fatal mistake, and for a moment there occurred a break in his
+motions; instantly the other perceived his advantage, and began
+leaping backwards and forwards across his struggling adversary
+with such rapidity as to confuse the sight, producing the
+appearance of two spiders attacking a third one lying between
+them. He then changed his tactics, and began revolving round and
+round his prisoner, and very soon the poor vanquished wretch--the
+aggressor, let us hope, in the interests of justice--was closely
+wrapped in a silvery cocoon, which, unlike the cocoon the
+caterpillar weaves for itself, was also its
+winding-sheet.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the foregoing
+pages I have thrown together some of the most salient facts I
+have noted; but the spider-world still remains to me a wonderland
+of which I know comparatively nothing. Nor is any very intimate
+knowledge of spiders to be got from books, though numberless
+lists of new species are constantly being printed; for they have
+not yet had, like the social bees and ants, many loving and
+patient chroniclers of their ways. The Hubens and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">rs</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 195</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Lubbocks have been
+many; the Moggridges few. But even a very slight study of these
+most versatile and accomplished of nature's children gives rise
+to some interesting reflections. One fact that strikes the mind
+very forcibly is the world-wide distribution of groups of species
+possessing highly developed instincts. One is the zebra-striped
+Salticus, with its unique strategy--that is to say, unique
+amongst spiders. It is said that the Australian savage approaches
+a kangaroo in the open by getting up in sight of its prey and
+standing perfectly motionless till he is regarded as an inanimate
+object, and every time the animal's attention wanders advancing a
+step or two until sufficiently near to hurl his spear. The
+Salticus approaches a fly in the same manner, till near enough to
+make its spring. Another is the Trapdoor spider. Another the
+Dolomedes, that runs over the surface of the water in pursuit of
+its prey, and dives down to escape from its enemies; and,
+strangest of all, the Argyroneta, that has its luminous dwelling
+at the bottom of streams; and just as a mason carries bricks and
+mortar to its building, so does this spider carry down bubbles of
+air from the surface to enlarge its mysterious house, in which it
+lays its eggs and rears its young. Community of descent must be
+supposed of species having such curious and complex instincts;
+but how came these feeble creatures, unable to transport
+themselves over seas and continents like the aerial gossamer, to
+be so widely distributed, and inhabiting regions with such
+different conditions? This can only be attributed to the enormous
+antiquity of the species, and of this antiquity the earliness in
+which</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font3 c3">o 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">196 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the instinct
+manifests itself in the young spiders is taken as
+evidence.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">A more important
+matter, the intelligence of spiders, has not yet received the
+attention it deserves. The question of insect
+intelligence--naturalists are agreed that insects do possess
+intelligence--is an extremely difficult one; probably some of our
+conclusions on this matter will have to be reconsidered. For
+instance, we regard the Order Hymenoptera as the most intelligent
+because most of the social insects are included in it; but it has
+not yet been proved, probably never will be proved, that the
+social instincts resulted from intelligence which has "lapsed."
+Whether ants and bees were more intelligent than other insects
+during the early stages of their organic societies or not, it
+will hardly be disputed by any naturalist who has observed
+insects for long that many solitary species display more
+intelligence in their actions than those that live in
+communities.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The nature of the
+spider's food and the difficulties in the way of providing for
+their wants impose on them a life of solitude: hunger, perpetual
+watchfulness, and the sense of danger have given them a character
+of mixed ferocity and timidity. But these very conditions, which
+have made it impossible for them to form societies like some
+insects and progress to a state of things resembling civilization
+in men, have served to develop the mind that is in a spider,
+making of him a very clever barbarian-The spider's only weapon of
+defence---his falces--are as poor a protection against the
+assaults of his insect foes as are teeth and finger-nails in
+man</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 197</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">employed against
+wolves, bears, and tigers. And the spider is here even worse off
+than man, since his enemies are winged and able to sweep down
+instantly on him from above; they are also protected with an
+invulnerable shield, and are armedwith deadly stings. Like man,
+also, the spider has a soft, unprotected body, while his muscular
+strength, compared with that of the insects he has to contend
+with, is almost <i>nil.</i> His position in nature then, with
+relation to his enemies, is like that of man; only the spider has
+this disadvantage, that he cannot combine with others for
+protection. That he does protect himself and maintains his place
+in nature is due, not to special instincts, which are utterly
+insufficient, but to the intelligence which supplements them. At
+the same time this superior cunning is closely related with, and
+probably results indirectly from, the web he is provided with,
+and which is almost of the nature of an artificial aid. Let us
+take the imaginary case of a man-like monkey, or of an arboreal
+man, born with a cord of great length attached to his waist,
+which could be either dragged after him or carried in a coil.
+After many accidents, experience would eventually teach him to
+put it to some use; practice would make him more and more skilful
+in handling it, and, indirectly, it would be the means of
+developing his latent mental faculties. He would begin by using
+it, as the monkey does its prehensile tail, to swing himself from
+branch to branch, and finally, to escape from an enemy or in
+pursuit of his prey, he would be able by means of his cord to
+drop himself with safety from the tallest trees, or fly down the
+steepest precipices. He would</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">198 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">coil up his cord to
+make a bed to lie on, and also use it for binding branches
+together when building himself a refuge. In a close fight, he
+would endeavour to entangle an adversary, and at last he would
+learn to make a snare with it to capture his prey. To all these,
+and to a hundred other uses, the spider has put his web. And when
+we see him spread his beautiful geometric snare, held by lines
+fixed to widely separated points, while he sits concealed in his
+web-lined retreat amongst the leaves where every touch on the
+far-reaching structure is telegraphed to him by the communicating
+line faithfully as if a nerve had been touched, we must admire
+the wonderful perfection to which he has attained in the use of
+his cord. By these means he is able to conquer creatures too
+swift and strong for him, and make them his prey. When we see him
+repairing damages, weighting his light fabric in windy weather
+with pebbles or sticks, as a fisher weights his net, and cutting
+loose a captive whose great strength threatens the destruction of
+the web, then we begin to suspect that he has, above his special
+instinct, a reason that guides, modifies, and in many ways
+supplements it. It is not, however, only on these great
+occasions, when the end is sought by unusual means, that spiders
+show their intelligence; for even these things might be
+considered by some as merely parts of one great complex instinct;
+but at all times, in all things, the observer who watches them
+closely cannot fail to be convinced that they possess a guiding
+principle which is not mere instinct. What the stick or stone was
+to primitive man, when he had made the dis-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Facts and Thoughts
+about Spiders.</i> 199</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">covery that by
+holding it in his hand he greatly increased the force of his
+blow, the possession of a web has been to the spider in
+developing that spark of intellect which it possesses in common
+with all animal organisms.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XV.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">THE DEATH-FEIGNING
+INSTINCT.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">MOST people are
+familiar with the phenomenon of "death-feigning," commonly seen
+in coleopterous insects, and in many spiders. This highly curious
+instinct is also possessed by some vertebrates. In insects it is
+probably due to temporary paralysis occasioned by sudden
+concussion, for when beetles alight abruptly, though voluntarily,
+they assume that appearance of death, which lasts for a few
+moments. Some species, indeed, are so highly sensitive that the
+slightest touch, or even a sudden menace, will instantly throw
+them into this motionless, death-simulating condition. Curiously
+enough, the same causes which produce this trance in slow-moving
+species, like those of Scarabseus for example, have a precisely
+contrary effect on species endowed with great activity. Rapacious
+beetles, when disturbed, scuttle quickly out of sight, and some
+water-beetles spin about the surface, in circles or zigzag lines,
+so rapidly as to confuse the eye. Our common long-legged spiders
+(Pholcus) when approached draw their feet together in the middle
+of the web, and spin the body round with such velocity as to
+resemble a whirligig.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Certain mammals and
+birds also possess the death-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Death-feigning
+Instinct.</i> 201</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">simulating instinct,
+though it is hardly possible to believe that the action springs
+from the same immediate cause in vertebrates and in insects. In
+the latter it appears to be a purely physical instinct, the
+direct result of an extraneous cause, and resembling the motions
+of a plant. In mammals and birds it is evident that violent
+emotion, and not the rough handling experienced, is the final
+cause of the swoon.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Passing over
+venomous snakes, skunks, and a few other species in which the
+presence of danger excites only anger, fear has a powerful, and
+in some cases a disabling, effect on animals; and it is this
+paralyzing effect of fear on which the death-feigning instinct,
+found only in a few widely-separated species, has probably been
+built up by the slow cumulative process of natural
+selection.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have met with some
+curious instances of the paralyzing effect of fear. I was told by
+some hunters in an outlying district of the pampas of its effect
+on a jaguar they started, and which took refuge in a dense clump
+of dry reeds. Though they could see it, it was impossible to
+throw the lasso over its head, and, after vainly trying to
+dislodge it, they at length set fire to the reeds. Still it
+refused to stir, but lay with head erect, fiercely glaring at
+them through the flames. Finally it disappeared from sight in the
+black smoke; and when the fire had burnt itself out, it was
+found, dead and charred, in the same spot.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">On the pampas the
+gauchos frequently take the black-necked swan by frightening it.
+When the birds are feeding or resting on the grass, two or three
+men or boys on horseback go quietly to lee-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">2O2 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ward of the flock,
+and when opposite to it suddenly wheel and charge it at full
+speed, uttering loud shouts, by which the birds are thrown into
+such terror that they are incapable of flying, and are quickly
+despatched.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have also seen
+gaucho boys catch the Silver-bill (Lichenops perspicillata) by
+hurling a stick or stone at the bird, then rushing at it, when it
+sits perfectly still, disabled by fear, and allows itself to be
+taken. I myself once succeeded in taking a small bird of another
+species in the same way.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Amongst mammals our
+common fox (Canis azarae), and one of the opossums (Didelphys
+azarae), are strangely subject to the death-simulating swoon. For
+it does indeed seem strange that animals so powerful, fierce, and
+able to inflict such terrible injury with their teeth should also
+possess this safeguard, apparently more suited to weak inactive
+creatures that cannot resist or escape from an enemy and to
+animals very low down in the scale of being. When a fox is caught
+in a trap or run down by dogs he fights savagely at first, but
+by-and-by relaxes his efforts, drops on the ground, and
+apparently yields up the ghost. The deception is so well carried
+out, that dogs are constantly taken in by it, and no one, not
+previously acquainted with this clever trickery of nature, but
+would at once pronounce the creature dead, and worthy of some
+praise for having perished in so brave a spirit. Now, when in
+this condition of feigning death, I am quite sure that the animal
+does not altogether lose consciousness. It is exceedingly
+difficult to discover any evidence of life in the opossum; but
+when one with-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Death-feigning
+Instinct,</i> 203</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">draws a little way
+from the feigning fox, and watches him very attentively, a slight
+opening of the eye may be detected; and, finally, when left to
+himself, he does not recover and start up like an animal that has
+been stunned, but slowly and cautiously raises his head first,
+and only gets up when his foes are at a safe distance. Yet I have
+seen gauchos, who are very cruel to animals, practise the most
+barbarous experiments on a captive fox without being able to
+rouse it into exhibiting any sign of life. This has greatly
+puzzled me, since, if death-feigning is simply a cunning habit,
+the animal could not suffer itself to be mutilated without
+wincing. I can only believe that the fox, though not insensible,
+as its behaviour on being left to itself appears to prove, yet
+has its body thrown by extreme terror into that benumbed
+condition which simulates death, and during which it is unable to
+feel the tortures practised on it.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The swoon sometimes
+actually takes place before the animal has been touched, and even
+when the exciting cause is at a considerable distance. I was once
+riding with a gaucho, when we saw, on the open level ground
+before us, a fox, not yet fully grown, standing still and
+watching our approach. All at once it dropped, and when we came
+up to the spot it was lying stretched out, with eyes closed, and
+apparently dead. Before passing on my companion, who said it was
+not the first time he had seen such a thing, lashed it vigorously
+with his whip for some moments, but without producing the
+slightest effect.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The death-feigning
+instinct is possessed in a very marked degree by the spotted
+tinamou or common</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">204 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">partridge of the
+pampas (Nothura maculosa). When captured, after a few violent
+struggles to escape, it drops its head, gasps two or three times,
+and to all appearances dies. If, when you have seen this, you
+release your hold, the eyes open instantly, and, with startling
+suddenness and a noise of wings, it is up and away, and beyond
+your reach for ever. Possibly, while your grasp is on the bird it
+does actually become insensible, though its recovery from that
+condition is almost instantaneous. Birds when captured do
+sometimes die in the hand, purely from terror. The tinamou is
+excessively timid, and sometimes when birds of this species are
+chased--for gaucho boys frequently run them down on
+horseback--and when they find no burrows or thickets to escape
+into, they actually drop down dead on the plain. Probably, when
+they feign death in their captor's hand, they are in reality very
+near to death.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XVI.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font16">HUMMING-BIRDS.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">HUMMING-BIRDS are
+perhaps the very loveliest things in nature, and many celebrated
+writers have exhausted their descriptive powers in vain efforts
+to picture them to the imagination. The temptation was certainly
+great, after describing the rich setting of tropical foliage and
+flower, to speak at length of the wonderful gem contained within
+it; but they would in this case have been wise to imitate that
+modest novel-writer who introduced a blank space on the page
+where the description of his matchless heroine should have
+appeared. After all that has been written, the first sight of a
+living humming-bird, so unlike in its beauty all other beautiful
+things, comes like a revelation to the mind. To give any true
+conception of it by means of mere word-painting is not more
+impossible than it would be to bottle up a supply of the "living
+sunbeams" themselves, and convey them across the Atlantic to
+scatter them in a sparkling shower over the face of
+England.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">Doubtless many who
+have never seen them in a state of nature imagine that a
+tolerably correct idea of their appearance can be gained from
+Gould's colossal monograph. The pictures there, however, only
+represent dead humming-birds. A dead robin</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">206 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">is, for purposes of
+bird-portraiture, as good as a live robin; the same may be said
+of even many brilliant-plumaged species less aerial in their
+habits than humming-birds. In butterflies the whole beauty is
+seldom seen until the insect is dead, or, at any rate, captive.
+It was not when Wallace saw the Ornithoptera croesus flying
+about, but only when he held it in his hands, and opened its
+glorious wings, that the sight of its beauty overcame him so
+powerfully. The special kind of beauty which makes the first
+sight of a humming-bird a revelation depends on the swift
+singular motions as much as on the intense gem-like and metallic
+brilliancy of the plumage.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The minute exquisite
+form, when the bird hovers on misty wings, probing the flowers
+with its coral spear, the fan-like tail expanded, and poising
+motionless, exhibits the feathers shot with many hues; and the
+next moment vanishes, or all but vanishes, then reappears at
+another flower only to vanish again, and so on successively,
+showing its splendours not continuously, but like the intermitted
+flashes of the firefly--this forms a picture of airy grace and
+loveliness that baffles description. All this glory disappears
+when the bird is dead, and even when it alights to rest on a
+bough. Sitting still, it looks like an exceedingly attenuated
+kingfisher, without the pretty plumage of that bird, but
+retaining its stiff artificial manner. No artist has been so bold
+as to attempt to depict the bird as it actually appears, when
+balanced before a flower the swift motion of the wings
+obliterates their form, making them seem like a mist encircling
+the body;</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Humming-Birds.</i>
+207</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">yet it is precisely
+this formless cloud on which the glittering body hangs suspended,
+which contributes most to give the humming-bird its wonderful
+sprite-like or extra-natural appearance. How strange, then, to
+find bird-painters persisting in their efforts to show the
+humming-bird flying! When they draw it stiff and upright on its
+perch the picture is honest, if ugly; the more ambitious
+representation is a delusion and a mockery.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Coming to the actual
+colouring--the changeful tints that glow with such intensity on
+the scale-like feathers, it is curious to find that Gould seems
+to have thought that all difficulties here had been successfully
+overcome. The "new process" he spoke so confidently about might
+no doubt be used with advantage in reproducing the coarser
+metallic reflections on a black plumage, such as we see in the
+corvine birds; but the glittering garment of the humming-bird,
+like the silvery lace woven by the Epeira, gemmed with dew and
+touched with rainbow-coloured light, has never been and never can
+be imitated by art.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">On this subject one
+of the latest observers of humming-birds, Mr. Everard im Thurn,
+in his work on British Guiana, has the following
+passage:--"Hardly more than one point of colour is in reality
+ever visible in any one humming-bird at one and the same time,
+for each point only shows its peculiar and glittering colour when
+the light falls upon it from a particular direction. A true
+representation of one of these birds would show it in somewhat
+sombre colours, except just at the one point which, when the bird
+is in the position chosen</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">208 <i>The Naturalist
+tn La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">for representation,
+meets the light at the requisite angle, and that point alone
+should be shown in full brilliance of colour. A flowery shrub is
+sometimes seen surrounded by a cloud of humming-birds, all of one
+species, and each, of course, in a different position. If someone
+would draw such a scene as that, showing a different detail of
+colour in each bird, according to its position, then some idea of
+the actual appearance of the bird might be given to one who had
+never seen an example."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is hardly to be
+expected that anyone will carry out the above suggestion, and
+produce a monograph with pages ten or fifteen feet wide by
+eighteen feet long, each one showing a cloud of humming-birds of
+one species flitting about a flowery bush; but even in such a
+picture as that would be, the birds, suspended on unlovely
+angular projections instead of "hazy semicircles of
+indistinctness," and each with an immovable fleck of brightness
+on the otherwise sombre plumage, would be as unlike living
+humming-birds as anything in the older monographs.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Whether the
+glittering iridescent tints and singular ornaments for which this
+family is famous result from the cumulative process of conscious
+or voluntary sexual selection, as Darwin thought, or are merely
+the outcome of a superabundant vitality, as Dr. A. R.. Wallace so
+strongly maintains, is a question which science has not yet
+answered satisfactorily. The tendency to or habit of varying in
+the direction of rich colouring and beautiful or fantastic
+ornament, might, for all we know to the contrary, have descended
+to humming-birds from</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humming-Birds.</i>
+209</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">some diminutive,
+curiously-shaped, bright-tinted, flying reptile of arboreal
+habits that lived in some far-off epoch in the world's history.
+It is not, at all events, maintained by anyone that <i>all</i>
+birds sprang originally from one reptilian stock; and the true
+position of humming-birds in a natural classification has not yet
+been settled, for no intermediate forms exist connecting them
+with any other group, To the ordinary mind they appear utterly
+unlike all other feathered creatures, and as much entitled to
+stand apart as, for instance, the pigeon and ostrich families. It
+has been maintained by some writers that they are anatomically
+related to the swifts, although the differences separating the
+two families appear so great as almost to stagger belief in this
+notion. Now, however, the very latest authority on this subject,
+<b>Dr.</b> Schufeldt, has come to the conclusion that swifts are
+only greatly modified Passeres, and that the humming-birds should
+form an order by themselves.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Leaving this
+question, and regarding them simply with the ornithological eye
+that does not see far below the surface of things, when we have
+sufficiently admired the unique beauty and marvellous velocity of
+humming-birds, there is little more to be said about them. They
+are lovely to the eye--indescribably so; and it is not strange
+that Gould wrote rapturously of the time when he was at length
+"permitted to revel in the delight of seeing the humming-bird in
+a state of nature." The feeling, he wrote, which animated him
+with regard to these most wonderful works of creation it was
+impossible to describe, and could only be appreciated by
+those</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">P</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">210 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">who have made
+natural history a study, and who "pursue the investigations of
+her charming mysteries with ardour and delight." This we can
+understand; but to what an astonishing degree the feeling was
+carried in him, when, after remarking that enthusiasm and
+excitement with regard to most things in life become lessened and
+eventually deadened by time in most of us, he was able to add,
+"not so, however, I believe, with those who take up the study of
+the Family of Humming-birds!" It can only be supposed that he
+regarded natural history principally as a "science of dead
+animals--a <i>necrology,"</i> and collected humming-birds just as
+others collect Roman coins, birds' eggs, old weapons, or blue
+china, their zeal in the pursuit and faith in its importance
+increasing with the growth of their treasures, until they at last
+come to believe that though all the enthusiasms and excitements
+which give a zest to the lives of other men fade and perish with
+time, it is not so with their particular pursuit. The more
+rational kind of pleasure experienced by the ornithologist in
+studying habits and disposition no doubt results in a great
+measure from the fact that the actions of the feathered people
+have a savour of intelligence in them. Whatever his theory or
+conviction about the origin of instincts may happen to be, or
+even if he has no convictions on the subject, it must
+nevertheless seem plain to him that intelligence is, after all,
+in most cases, the guiding principle of life, supplementing and
+modifying habits to bring them into closer harmony with the
+environment, and enlivening every day with countless little acts
+which result from judgment</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humming-Birds.</i>
+211</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">and experience, and
+form no part of the inherited complex instincts. The longer he
+observes any one species or individual, the more does he find in
+it to reward his attention; this is not the case, however, with
+humming-birds, which possess the avian body but do not rank
+mentally with birds. The pleasure one takes in their beauty soon
+evaporates, and is succeeded by no fresh interest, so monotonous
+and mechanical are all their actions; and we accordingly find
+that those who are most familiar with them from personal
+observation have very little to say about them. A score of
+hummingbirds, of as many distinct species, are less to the
+student of habits than one little brown-plurnaged bird haunting
+his garden or the rush-bed of a neighbouring stream; and,
+doubtless, for a reason similar to that which makes a lovely
+human face uninformed by intellect seem less permanently
+attractive than many a homelier countenance. He grows tired of
+seeing the feathered fairies perpetually weaving their aerial
+ballet-dance about the flowers, and finds it a relief to watch
+the little finch or wren or flycatcher of shy temper and obscure
+protective colouring. Perhaps it possesses a graceful form and
+melodious voice to give it aesthetic value, but even without such
+accessories he can observe it day by day with increasing interest
+and pleasure; and it only adds piquancy to the feeling to know
+that the little bird also watches him with a certain amount of
+intelligent curiosity and a great deal of suspicion, and that it
+studiously endeavours to conceal from him all the little secrets
+its life which he is bent on discovering. p <i>2</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">212 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It has frequently
+been remarked that humming birds are more like insects than birds
+in disposition. Some species, on quitting their perch, perform
+wide bee-like circles about the tree before shooting away in a
+straight line. Their aimless attacks on other species approaching
+or passing near them, even on large birds like hawks and pigeons,
+is a habit they have in common with many solitary wood-boring
+bees. They also, like dragon-flies and other insects, attack each
+other when they come together while feeding; and in this case
+their action strangely resembles that of a couple of butterflies,
+as they revolve about each other and rise vertically to a great
+height in the air. Again, like insects, they are undisturbed at
+the presence of man while feeding, or even when engaged in
+building and incubation; and like various solitary bees, wasps,
+&amp;c., they frequently come close to a person walking or
+standing, to hover suspended in the air within a few inches of
+his face; and if then struck at they often, insect-like, return
+to circle round his head. All other birds, even those which
+display the least versatility, and in districts where man is
+seldom seen, show as much caution as curiosity in his presence;
+they recognize in the upright unfamiliar form a living being and
+a possible enemy. Mr. Whiteley, who observed humming-birds in
+Peru, says it is an amusing sight to watch the Lesbia nuna
+attempting to pass to a distant spot in a straight line during a
+high wind, which, acting on the long tail feathers, carries it
+quite away from the point aimed at. Insects presenting a large
+surface to the wind are always blown from their course in
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Humming-Birds,</i>
+213</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">same way, for even
+in the most windy districts they never appear to learn to guide
+themselves; and I have often seen a butterfly endeavouring to
+reach an isolated flower blown from it a dozen times before it
+finally succeeded or gave up the contest. Birds when shaping
+their course, unless young and inexperienced, always make
+allowance for the force of the wind. Humming-birds often fly into
+open rooms, impelled apparently by a fearless curiosity, and may
+then be chased about until they drop exhausted or are beaten down
+and caught, and, as Gould says, "if then taken into the hand,
+they almost immediately feed on any sweet, or pump up any liquid
+that may be offered to them, without betraying either fear or
+resentment at the previous treatment." Wasps and bees taken in
+the same way endeavour to sting their captor, as most people know
+from experience, nor do they cease struggling violently to free
+themselves; but the dragon-fly is like the humming-bird, and is
+no sooner caught after much ill-treatment, than it will greedily
+devour as many flies and mosquitoes as one likes to offer it.
+Only in beings very low in the scale of nature do we see the
+instinct of self-preservation in this extremely simple condition,
+unmixed with reason or feeling, and so transient in its effects.
+The same insensibility to danger is seen when humming-birds are
+captured and confined in a room, and when, before a day is over,
+they will flutter about their captor's face and even take nectar
+from his lips.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Some observers have
+thought that hummingbirds come nearest to humble-bees in their
+actions. I do not think so. Mr. Bates writes: "They do</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">214 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">not proceed in that
+methodical manner which bees follow, taking the flowers seriatim,
+but skip about from one part of a tree to another in the most
+capricious manner." I have observed humble-bees a great deal, and
+feel convinced that they arc among the most highly intelligent of
+the social hymenoptera. Humming-birds, to my mind, have a much
+closer resemblance to the solitary wood-boring bees and to
+dragon-flies. It must also be borne in mind that insects have
+very little time in which to acquire experience, and that a large
+portion of their life, in the imago state, is taken up with the
+complex business of reproduction.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The Trochilidae,
+although confined to one continent, promise to exceed all other
+families--even the cosmopolitan finches and warblers--in number
+of species. At present over five hundred are known, or as many as
+all the species of birds in Europe together; and good reasons
+exist for believing that very many more--not less perhaps than
+one or two hundred species--yet remain to be discovered. The most
+prolific region, and where humming-birds are most highly
+developed, is known to be West Brazil and the eastern slopes of
+the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. This is precisely the least
+known portion of South America; the few naturalists and
+collectors who have reached it have returned laden with spoil, to
+tell us of a region surpassing all others in the superabundance
+and beauty of its bird life. Nothing, however, which can be said
+concerning these vast unexplored areas of tropical mountain and
+forest so forcibly impresses us with the idea of the unknown
+riches</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humming-
+Birds.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">215</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">contained in them
+as the story of the Loddigesia mirabilis. This is perhaps the
+most wonderful humming-bird known, and no one who had not
+previously seen it figured could possibly form an idea of what it
+is like from a mere description. An outline sketch of it would
+probably be taken by most people as a fantastic design
+representing a</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-17.jpg" alt="h1-17.jpg" class="c33">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Loddigesia
+Mirabilis,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">bird-form in
+combination with leaves, in size and shape resembling poplar
+leaves, but on leaf-stalks of an impossible length, curving and
+crossing each other so as to form geometrical figures unlike
+anything in nature. Yet this bird (a single specimen) was
+obtained in Peru half a century ago, and for upwards of twenty
+years after its discovery</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">2i6 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Gould tried to
+obtain others, offering as much as fifty pounds for one; but no
+second specimen ever gladdened his eyes, nor was anything more
+heard of it until Stolzmann refound it in the year
+1880.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The addition of many
+new species to the long list would, however, be a matter of small
+interest, unless fresh facts concerning their habits and
+structure were at the same time brought to light; but we can
+scarcely expect that the as yet unknown species will supply any
+link connecting the Trochilidae with other existing families of
+birds. The eventual conclusion will perhaps be that this family
+has come down independently from an exceedingly remote past, and
+with scarcely any modification. While within certain very narrow
+limits humming-birds vary more than other families, outside of
+these limits they appear relatively stationary; and, conversely,
+other birds exhibit least variability in the one direction in
+which humming-birds vary excessively. On account of a trivial
+difference in habit they have sometimes been separated in two
+sub-families: the Phaethornithinae, found in shady tropical
+forests; and the Trochilinae, comprising humming-birds which
+inhabit open sunny places--and to this division they mostly
+belong. In both of these purely arbitrary groups, however, the
+aerial habits and manner of feeding poised in the air are
+identical, although the birds living in shady forests, where
+flowers are scarce, obtain their food principally from the under
+surfaces of leaves. In their procreant habits the uniformity is
+also very great. In all cases the nest is small, deep,
+cup-shaped, or conical, composed of soft felted mate-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Humming-Birds. 2
+1</i>7</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">rials, and lined
+inside with vegetable down. The eggs are white, and never exceed
+two in number. Broadly speaking, they resemble each other as
+closely in habits as in structure; the greatest differences in
+habit in the most widely separated genera being no greater than
+may be found in two wrens or sparrows of the same
+genus.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">This persistence of
+character in humming-birds, both as regards structure and habit,
+seems the more remarkable when we consider their very wide
+distribution over a continent so varied in its conditions, and
+where they range from the lowest levels to the limit of perpetual
+snow on the Andes, and from the tropics to the wintry Magellanic
+district; also that a majority of genera inhabit very
+circumscribed areas--these facts, as Dr. Wallace remarks, clearly
+pointing to a very high antiquity.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is perhaps a law
+of nature that when a species (or group) fits itself to a place
+not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to no
+opposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so
+great a perfection as to be able easily to overcome all
+opposition, the character eventually loses its original
+plasticity, or tendency to vary, since improvement in such a case
+would be superfluous, and becomes, so to speak, crystallized in
+that form which continues thereafter unaltered. It is, at any
+rate, clear that while all other birds rub together in the
+struggle for existence, the humming-bird, owing to its aerial
+life and peculiar manner of seeking its food, is absolutely
+untouched by this kind of warfare, and is accordingly as far
+removed</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">218 <i>The Naturalist
+in Li Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">from all competition
+with other birds as the solitary savage is removed from the
+struggle of life affecting and modifying men in crowded
+communities. The lower kind of competition affecting
+hummingbirds, that with insects and, within the family, of
+species with species, has probably only served to intensify their
+unique characteristics, and, perhaps, to lower their
+intelligence.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Not only are they
+removed from that indirect struggle for existence which acts so
+powerfully on other families, but they are also, by their habits
+and the unequalled velocity of their flight, placed out of reach
+of that direct war waged on all other small birds by the
+rapacious kinds--birds, mammals, and reptiles. One result of this
+immunity is that humming-birds are excessively numerous, albeit
+such slow breeders; for, as we have seen, they only lay two eggs,
+and not only so, but the second egg is often dropped so long
+after incubation has begun in the first that only one is really
+hatched. Yet Belt expressed the opinion that in Nicaragua, where
+he observed humming-birds, they out-numbered all the other birds
+together. Considering how abundant birds of all kinds are in that
+district, and that most of them have a protective colouring and
+lay several eggs, it would be impossible to accept such a
+statement unless we believed that humming-birds have,
+practically, no enemies.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Another result of
+their immunity from persecution is the splendid colouring and
+strange and beautiful feather ornaments distinguishing them above
+all other birds; and excessive variation in this direction is
+due, it seems to me, to the very</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Humming-Birds.</i>
+219</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">causes which serve
+to check variation in all other directions. In their plumage, as
+Martin long ago wrote, nature has strained at every variety of
+effect and revelled in an infinitude of modifications. How
+wonderful their garb is, with colours so varied, so intense, yet
+seemingly so evanescent!--the glittering mantle of powdered gold;
+the emerald green that changes to velvet black; ruby reds and
+luminous scarlets; dull bronze that brightens and burns like
+polished brass, and pale neutral tints that kindle to rose and
+lilac-coloured flame. And to the glory of prismatic colouring are
+added feather decorations, such as the racket-plumes and downy
+muffs of Spathura, the crest and frills of Lophornis, the
+sapphire gorget burning on the snow-white breast of
+Oreotrochilus, the fiery tail of Cometes, and, amongst grotesque
+forms, the long pointed crest-feathers, representing horns, and
+flowing-white beard adorning the piebald goat-like face of
+Oxypogon.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Excessive variation
+in this direction is checked in nearly all other birds by the
+need of a protective colouring, few kinds so greatly excelling in
+strength and activity as to be able to maintain their existence
+without it. Bright feathers constitute a double danger, for not
+only do they render their possessor conspicuous, but, just as the
+butterfly chooses the gayest flower, so do hawks deliberately
+single out from many obscure birds the one with brilliant
+plumage; but the rapacious kinds do not waste their energies in
+the vain pursuit of hummingbirds. These are in the position of
+neutrals, free to range at will amidst the combatants,
+insulting</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">220 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">all alike, and
+flaunting their splendid colours with impunity. They are nature's
+favourites, endowed with faculties bordering on the miraculous,
+and all other kinds, gentle or fierce, ask only to be left alone
+by them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER
+XVII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">THE CRESTED
+SCREAMER.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>(Chalina
+chavarria.)</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">AMONGST the
+feathered notables from all parts of the world found gathered at
+the Zoological Gardens in London is the Crested Screamer from
+South America. It is in many respects a very singular species,
+and its large size, great strength, and majestic demeanour, with
+the surprising docility and intelligence it displays when
+domesticated, give it a character amongst birds somewhat like
+that of the elephant amongst mammals. Briefly and roughly to
+describe it: in size it is like a swan, in shape like a lapwing,
+only with a powerful curved gallinaceous beak. It is adorned with
+a long pointed crest and a black neck-ring, the plumage being
+otherwise of a pale slaty blue, while the legs and the naked skin
+about the eyes are bright red. On each wing, in both sexes, there
+are two formidable spurs; the first one, on the second joint, is
+an inch and a half long, nearly straight, triangular, and
+exceedingly sharp; the second spur, on the last joint, being
+smaller, broad, and curved, and roughly resembling in shape and
+size a lion's claw. There is another stinking peculiarity. The
+skin is <i>emphy-</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">222 7726' <i>Naturalist
+in La Piafa.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font22 c3"><i>sematous</i>--that is, bloated and yielding to
+pressure. It crackles when touched, and the surface, when the
+feathers are removed, presents a swollen bubbly appearance; for
+under the skin there is a layer of air-bubbles extending over the
+whole body and even down the legs under the horny tesselated skin
+to the toes, the legs thus having a somewhat massive
+appearance.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">And now just a few
+words about the position of the screamer in systematic zoology.
+It is placed in the Family Palamedeidae, which contains only
+three species, but about the Order it belongs to there is much
+disagreement. It was formerly classed with the rails, and in
+popular books of Natural History still keeps its place with them.
+"Now the rail-tribe," says Professor Parker, speaking on this
+very matter, "has for a long time been burdened (on paper) with a
+very false army list. Everything alive that has had the
+misfortune to be possessed of large unwieldy feet has been added
+to this feeble-minded cowardly group, until it has become a mixed
+multitude with discordant voices and with manners and customs
+having no consonance or relation." He takes the screamer from the
+rail-tribe and classes it with the geese (as also does Professor
+Huxley), and concludes his study with these words:--"Amongst
+living birds there is not one possessing characters of higher
+interest, none that I am acquainted with come nearer, in some
+important points, to the lizard; and there are parts of the
+organization which make it very probable that it is one of the
+nearest living relations of the marvellous
+<i>Archaeopteryx</i>"--an intermediate form</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Crested
+Screamer.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">between birds and
+reptiles belonging to the Upper Jurassic period.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">The screamer's
+right to dwell with the geese has not been left unchallenged. The
+late Professor Garrod finds that "from considerations of
+pterylosis, visceral anatomy, myology, and osteology the screamer
+cannot be placed along with the Anserine birds." He finds that in
+some points it resembles the ostrich and rhea, and concludes: "It
+seems therefore to me that, summing these results, the screamer
+must have sprung from the primary avian stock as an independent
+offshoot at much the same time as did most of the other important
+families." This time, he further tells us, was when there
+occurred a general break-up of the ancient terrestrial bird-type,
+when the acquisition of wings brought many intruders into domains
+already occupied, calling forth a new struggle for existence, and
+bringing out many special qualities by means of natural
+selection.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c3">With this
+archaeological question I have little to do, and only quote the
+above great authorities to show that the screamer appears to be
+nearly the last descendant of an exceedingly ancient family, with
+little or no relationship to other existing families, and that
+its pedigree has been hopelessly lost in the night of an
+incalculable antiquity. I have only to speak of the bird as a
+part of the visible world and as it appears to the non-scientific
+lover of nature; for, curiously enough, while anatomists nave
+been laboriously seeking for the screamer's affinities in that
+"biological field which is as wide as the earth and deep as the
+sea," travellers and</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">224 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">ornithologists have
+told us almost nothing about its strange character and
+habits.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Though dressed with
+Quaker-like sobriety, and without the elegance of form
+distinguishing the swan or peacock, this bird yet appeals to the
+aesthetic feelings in man more than any species I am acquainted
+with. Voice is one of its strong points, as one might readily
+infer from the name: never-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-18.jpg" alt="h1-18.jpg" class="c34">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18">Crested
+Screamer.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">theless the name is
+not an appropriate one, for though the bird certainly does
+scream, and that louder than the peacock, its scream is only a
+powerful note of alarm uttered occasionally, while the notes
+uttered at intervals in the night, or in the day-time, when it
+soars upwards like the lark of some far-off imaginary epoch in
+the world's history when all tilings, larks included, were on a
+gigantic scale, are. properly speaking, singing notes and
+in</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Crested
+Screamer.</i> 225</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">quality utterly
+unlike screams. Sometimes when walking across Regent's Park I
+bear the resounding cries of the bird confined there attempting
+to sing; above the concert of cranes, the screams of eagles and
+macaws, the howling of dogs and wolves and the muffled roar of
+lions, one can hear it all over the park. But those loud notes
+only sadden me. Exile and captivity have taken all joyousness
+from the noble singer, and a moist climate has made him hoarse;
+the long clear strains are no more, and he hurries through his
+series of confused shrieks as quickly as possible, as if ashamed
+of the performance. A lark singing high up in a sunny sky and a
+lark singing in a small cage hanging against a shady wall in a
+London street produce very different effects; and the spluttering
+medley of shrill and harsh sounds from the street singer scarcely
+seems to proceed from the same kind of bird as that matchless
+melody filling the blue heavens. There is even a greater
+difference in the notes of the crested screamer when heard in
+Regent's Park and when heard on the pampas, where the bird soars
+upwards until its bulky body disappears from sight, and from that
+vast elevation pours down a perpetual rain of jubilant
+sound.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3"><i>Screamer</i>
+being a misnomer, I prefer to call the bird by its vernacular
+name of <i>chaj&aacute;,</i> or <i>chakar,</i> a more convenient
+spelling.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">With the chakar the
+sexes are faithful, even in very large flocks the birds all being
+ranged in couples. When one bird begins to sing its partner
+immediately joins, but with notes entirely different in quality.
+Both birds have some short deep notes,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">Q</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">226 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Piala.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the other notes of
+the female being long powerful notes with a trill in them; but
+over them sounds the clear piercing voice of the male, ringing
+forth at the close with great strength and purity. The song
+produces the effect of harmony, but, comparing it with human
+singing, it is less like a <i>duo</i> than a <i>terzetto</i>
+composed of bass, contralto, and soprano.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">At certain times, in
+districts favourable to them, the chakars often assemble in
+immense flocks, thousands of individuals being sometimes seen
+congregated together, and in these gatherings the birds
+frequently all sing in concert. They invariably--though without
+rising--sing at intervals during the night, "counting the hours,"
+as the gauchos say; the first song being at about nine o'clock,
+the second at midnight, and the third just before dawn, but the
+hours vary in different districts.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I was once
+travelling with a party of gauchos when, about midnight, it being
+intensely dark, a couple of chakars broke out singing right ahead
+of us, thus letting us know that we were approaching a
+watercourse, where we intended refreshing our horses. We found it
+nearly dry, and when we rode down to the rill of water meandering
+over the broad dry bed of the river, a flock of about a thousand
+chakars set up a perfect roar of alarm notes, all screaming
+together, with intervals of silence after; then they rose up with
+a mighty rush of wings. They settled down again a few hundred
+yards off, and all together burst forth in one of their grand
+midnight songs, making the plains echo for miles
+around.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">There is something
+strangely impressive in these</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Crested
+Screamer.</i> 227</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">spontaneous
+outbursts of a melody so powerful from one of these large flocks,
+and though accustomed to hear these birds from childhood, I have
+often been astonished at some new effect produced by a large
+multitude singing under certain conditions. Travelling alone one
+summer day, I carne at noon to a lake on the pampas called
+Kakel--a sheet of water narrow enough for one to see across.
+Chakars in countless numbers were gathered along its shores, but
+they were all ranged in well-defined flocks, averaging about five
+hundred birds in each flock. These flocks seemed to extend all
+round the lake, and had probably been driven by the drought from
+all the plains around to this spot. Presently one flock near me
+began singing, and continued their powerful chant for three or
+four minutes; when they ceased the next flock took up the
+strains, and after it the next, and so on until the notes of the
+flocks on the opposite shore came floating strong and clear
+across the water--then passed away, growing fainter and fainter,
+until once more the sound approached me travelling round to my
+side again. The effect was very curious, and I was astonished at
+the orderly way with which each flock waited its turn to sing,
+instead of a general outburst taking place after the first flock
+had given the signal. On another occasion I was still more
+impressed, for here the largest number of birds I have ever found
+congregated at one place all sung together. This was on the
+southern pampas, at a place called Gualicho, where I had ridden
+for an hour before sunset over a marshy plain where there was
+still much standing</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">Q 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">228 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">water in the rushy
+pools, though it was at the height of the dry season. This whole
+plain was covered with an endless flock of chakars, not in close
+order, but scattered about in pairs and small groups. In this
+desolate spot I found a small rancho inhabited by a gaucho and
+his family, and I spent the night with them. The birds were all
+about the house, apparently as tame as the domestic fowls, and
+when I went out to look for a spot for my horse to feed on, they
+would not fly away from me, but merely moved, a few steps out of
+my path About nine o'clock we were eating supper in the rancho
+when suddenly the entire multitude of birds covering the marsh
+for miles around burst forth into a tremendous evening song. It
+is impossible to describe the effect of this mighty rush of
+sound; but let the reader try to imagine half-a-million voices,
+each far more powerful than that one which makes itself heard all
+over Regent's Park, bursting forth on the silent atmosphere of
+that dark lonely plain. One peculiarity was that in this mighty
+noise, which sounded louder than the sea thundering on a rocky
+coast, I seemed to be able to distinguish hundreds, even
+thousands, of individual voices. Forgetting my supper, I sat
+motionless and overcome with astonishment, while the air, and
+even the frail rancho, seemed to be trembling in that tempest of
+sound. When it ceased my host remarked with a smile, "We are
+accustomed to this, se&ntilde;or--every evening we have this
+concert." It was a concert well worth riding a hundred miles to
+hear. But the chakar country is just now in a transitional state,
+and the precise conditions which</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Crested
+Screamer.</i> 229</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">made it possible
+for birds so large in size to form such immense congregations are
+rapidly passing away. In desert places, the bird subsists chiefly
+on leaves and seeds of aquatic plants; but when the vast level
+area of the pampas was settled by man, the ancient stiff
+grass-vegetation gave place to the soft clovers and grasses of
+Europe, and to this new food the birds took very kindly. Other
+circumstances also favoured their increase. They were never
+persecuted, for the natives do not eat them, though they are
+really very good--the flesh being something like wild goose in
+flavour. A <i>higher</i> civilization is changing all this: the
+country is becoming rapidly overrun with emigrants, especially by
+Italians, the pitiless enemies of all bird-life.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The chakars, like
+the skylark, love to soar upwards when singing, and at such times
+when they have risen till their dark bulky bodies appear like
+floating specks on the blue sky, or until they disappear from
+sight altogether, the notes become wonderfully etherealized by
+distance to a soft silvery sound, and it is then very delightful
+to listen to them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It seems strange
+that so ponderous a fowl with only six feet and a half spread of
+wings should possess a power of soaring equal to that of vultures
+and eagles. Even the vulture with its marvellous wing power soars
+chiefly from necessity, and when its crop is full finds no
+pleasure in "scaling the heavens by invisible stairs." The chakar
+leaves its grass-plot after feeding and soars purely for
+recreation, taking so much pleasure in its aerial</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">230 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">exercises that in
+bright warm weather, in winter and spring, it spends a great part
+of the day in the upper regions of the air. On the earth its air
+is grave and its motions measured and majestic, and it rises with
+immense labour, the wings producing a sound like a high wind. But
+as the bird mounts higher, sweeping round as it ascends, just as
+vultures and eagles do, it gradually appears to become more
+buoyant, describing each succeeding circle with increasing grace.
+I can only account for this magnificent flight, beginning so
+laboriously, by supposing that the bubble space under the skin
+becomes inflated with an air lighter than atmospheric air,
+enabling a body so heavy with wings disproportionately short to
+float with such ease and evident enjoyment at the vast heights to
+which the bird ascends. The heavenward flight of a large bird is
+always a magnificent spectacle; that of the chakar is peculiarly
+fascinating on account of the resounding notes it sings while
+soaring, and in which the bird seems to exult in its sublime
+power and freedom.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I was once very much
+surprised at the behaviour of a couple of chakars during a
+thunderstorm. On a still sultry day in summer I was standing
+watching masses of black cloud coming rapidly over the sky, while
+a hundred yards from me stood the two birds also apparently
+watching the approaching storm with interest. Presently the edge
+of the cloud touched the sun, and a twilight gloom fell on the
+earth. The very moment the sun disappeared the birds rose up and
+soon began singing their long' resounding notes, though it was
+loudly thundering</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Crested
+Screamer.</i> 231</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">at the time, while
+vivid flashes of lightning lit the black cloud overhead at short
+intervals. I watched their flight and listened to their notes,
+till suddenly as they made a wide sweep upwards they disappeared
+in the cloud, and at the same moment their voices became muffled,
+and seemed to come from an immense distance. The cloud continued
+emitting sharp flashes of lightning, but the birds never
+reappeared, and after six or seven minutes once more their notes
+sounded loud and clear above the muttering thunder. I suppose
+they had passed through the cloud into the clear atmosphere above
+it, but I was extremely surprised at their fearlessness; for as a
+rule when soaring birds see a storm coming they get out of its
+way, flying before it or stooping to the earth to seek shelter of
+some kind, for most living things appear to have a wholesome
+dread of thunder and lightning.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">When taken young the
+chakar becomes very tame and attached to man, showing no
+inclination to go back to a wild life. There was one kept at an
+estancia called Mangrullos, on the western frontier of Buenos
+Ayres, and the people of the house gave me a very curious account
+of it. The bird was a male, and had been reared by a soldier's
+wife at a frontier outpost called La Esperanza, about twenty-five
+miles from Mangrullos. Four years before I saw the bird the
+Indians had invaded the frontier, destroying the Esperanza
+settlement and all the estancias for some leagues around. For
+some weeks after the invasion the chakar wandered about the
+country, visiting all the ruined estancias, apparently in quest
+of human beings, and on arriving</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">232 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">at Mangrullos, which
+had not been burnt and was still inhabited, it settled down at
+ones and never afterwards showed any disposition to go away. It
+was extremely tame, associating by day with the poultry, and
+going to roost with them at night OH a high perch, probably for
+the sake of companionship, for in a wild state the bird roosts on
+the ground. It was friendly towards all the members of the
+household except one, a peon, and against this person from the
+first the bird always displayed the greatest antipathy,
+threatening him with its wings, puffing itself out, and hissing
+like an angry goose. The man had a swarthy, beardless face, and
+it was conjectured that the chakar associated him in its mind
+with the savages who had destroyed its early home.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Close to the house
+there was a lagoon, never dry, which was frequently visited by
+flocks of wild chakars. Whenever a flock appeared the tame bird
+would go out to join them; and though the chakars are
+mild-tempered birds and very rarely quarrel, albeit so well
+provided with formidable weapons, they invariably attacked the
+visitor with great fury, chasing him back to the house, and not
+ceasing their persecutions till the poultry-yard was reached.
+They appeared to regard this tame bird that dwelt with man as a
+kind of renegade, and hated him accordingly.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Before he had been
+long at the estancia it began to be noticed that he followed the
+broods of young chickens about very assiduously, apparently
+taking great interest in their welfare, and even trying to entice
+them to follow him. A few newly-hatched</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Crested
+Screamer.</i> 233</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">chickens were at
+length offered to him as an experiment, and he immediately took
+charge of them with every token of satisfaction, conducting them
+about in search of food and imitating all the actions of a hen.
+Finding him so good a nurse, large broods were given to him, and
+the more the foster-chickens were the better he seemed pleased.
+It was very curious to see this big bird with thirty or forty
+little animated balls of yellow cotton following him about, while
+he moved majestically along, setting down his feet with the
+greatest care not to tread on them, and swelling himself up with
+jealous anger at the approach of a cat or dog.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The intelligence,
+docility, and attachment to man displayed by the chakar in a
+domestic state, with perhaps other latent aptitudes only waiting
+to be developed by artificial selection, seem to make this
+species one peculiarly suited for man's protection, without which
+it must inevitably perish. It is sad to reflect that all our
+domestic animals have descended to us from those ancient times
+which we are accustomed to regard as dark or barbarous, while the
+effect of our modern so-called humane civilization has been
+purely destructive to animal life. Not one type do we rescue from
+the carnage going on at an ever-increasing rate over all the
+globe. To Australia and America, North and South, we look in vain
+for new domestic species, while even from Africa, with its
+numerous fine mammalian forms, and where England has been the
+conquering colonizing power for nearly a century, we take
+nothing. Even the sterling qualities of the elephant, the unique
+beauty of the zebra, appeal</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">234 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">to us in vain. We
+are only teaching the tribes of that vast continent to
+exterminate a hundred noble species they would not tame. With
+grief and shame, even with dismay, we call to mind that our
+country is now a stupendous manufactory of destructive engines,
+which we are rapidly placing in the hands of all the savage and
+semi-savage peoples of the earth, thus ensuring the speedy
+destruction of all the finest types in the animal
+kingdom.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c35">CHAPTER
+XVIII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c35">THE WOODHEWER
+FAMILY.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font22 c35"><i>(Dendrocolaptidae.)</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">THE South American
+Tree-creepers, or Woodhewers, as they are sometimes called,
+although confined exclusively to one continent, their range
+extending from Southern Mexico to the Magellanic islands, form
+one of the largest families of the order Passeres; no fewer than
+about two hundred and ninety species (referable to about
+forty-six genera) having been already described. As they are
+mostly small, inconspicuous, thicket-frequenting birds, shy and
+fond of concealment to excess, it is only reasonable to suppose
+that our list of this family is more incomplete than of any other
+family of birds known. Thus, in the southern Plata and north
+Pata-gonian districts, supposed to be exhausted, where my
+observations have been made, and where, owing to the open nature
+of the country, birds are more easily remarked than in the
+forests and marshes of the tropical region, I have made notes on
+the habits of five species, of which I did not preserve
+specimens, and which, as far as I know, have never been described
+and named. Probably long before the whole of South America has
+been "exhausted," there will be not less than four to five
+hundred Dendrocolaptine</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">236 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">species known. And
+yet with the exception of that dry husk of knowledge, concerning
+size, form and colouration, which classifiers and cataloguers
+obtain from specimens, very little indeed--scarcely anything, in
+fact--is known about the Tree-creepers; and it would not be too
+much to say that there are many comparatively obscure and
+uninteresting species in Europe, any one of which has a larger
+literature than the entire Tree-creeper family. No separate work
+about these birds has seen the light, even in these days of
+monographs; but the reason of this comparative neglect is not far
+to seek. In the absence of any knowledge, except of the most
+fragmentary kind, of the life-habits of exotic species, the
+monograph-makers of the Old World naturally take up only the most
+important groups--i.e. the groups which most readily attract the
+traveller's eye with their gay conspicuous colouring, and which
+have acquired a wide celebrity. We thus have a succession of
+splendid and expensive works dealing separately with such groups
+as woodpeckers, trogons, humming-birds, tanagers, king-fishers,
+and birds of paradise; for with these, even if there be nothing
+to record beyond the usual dreary details and technicalities
+concerning geographical distribution, variations in size and
+markings of different species, &amp;c., the little interest of
+the letter-press is compensated for in the accompanying plates,
+which are now produced on a scale of magnitude, and with so great
+a degree of perfection, as regards brilliant colouring, spirited
+attitudes and general fidelity to nature, that leaves little
+further improvement in this direction to be looked for. The
+Tree-creepers, being</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 237</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">without the inferior
+charm of bright colour, offer no attraction to the bird-painter,
+whose share in the work of the pictorial monograph is, of course,
+all-important. Yet even the very slight knowledge we possess of
+this family is enough to show that in many respects it is one
+richly endowed, possessing characters of greater interest to the
+student of the instincts and mental faculties of birds, than any
+of |the gaily-tinted families I have mentioned.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">There is, in the
+Dendrocolaptidae, a splendid harvest for future observers of the
+habits of South American birds: some faint idea of its richness
+may perhaps be gathered from the small collection of the most
+salient facts known to us about them I have brought together and
+put in order in this place. And I am here departing a little from
+the plan usually observed in this book, which is chiefly occupied
+with matters of personal knowledge, seasoned with a little
+speculation; but in this case I have thought it best to
+supplement my own observations with those of others who have
+collected and observed birds in South America,* so as to give as
+comprehensive a survey of the family as I could.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is strange to
+find a Passerine family, numerous as the Tree-creepers, uniformly
+of one colour, or nearly so; for, with few exceptions, these
+birds have a brown plumage, without a particle of bright colour.
+But although they possess no brilliant or metallic tints, in some
+species, as we shall see, there are tints approaching to
+brightness. Notwithstand-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21">* Azara; D'Orbigny;
+Darwin; Bridges; Frazer; Leotaud; Gaumer; Wallace; Bates;
+Cunningham; Stolzmann; Jelski; Durnford; Gibson; Burrows;
+Doering; White, &amp;c.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">238 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ing this family
+likeness in colour, any person, not an ornithologist, looking at
+a collection of specimens comprising many genera, would hear with
+surprise and almost incredulity that they all belonged to one
+family, so great is the diversity exhibited in their structure.
+In size they vary from species smaller than the golden-crested
+wren to others larger than the woodcock; but the differences in
+size are as nothing compared with those shown in the form of the
+beak. Between the minute, straight, conical, tit-like beaks of
+the Laptasthenura--a tit in appearance and habits--and the
+extravagantly long, sword-shaped bill of Nasica, or the
+excessively attenuated, sickle-shaped organ in Xiphorynchus, the
+divergence is amazing, compared with what is found in other
+families; while between these two extremes there is a
+heterogeneous assemblage of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">birds with beaks
+like creepers, nuthatches, finches, tyrant-birds, woodpeckers,
+crows, and even curlews and ibises. In legs, feet and tails,
+there are corresponding differences. There are tails of all
+lengths and all forms; soft and stiff, square, acuminated, broad
+and fan-like, narrow and spine-like, and many as in the
+woodpeckers, and used as in that bird to support the body in
+climbing. An extremely curious modification is found in
+Sittosoma: the tail-feathers in this genus are long and
+graduated, and the shafts, projecting beyond the webs at the
+ends, curve downwards and form stiff hooks. Concerning the habits
+of these birds, it has only been reported that they climb on the
+trunks of trees: probably they are able to run vertically up or
+down with equal facility, and even to suspend
+themselves</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">239</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">by their
+feather-hooks when engaged in dislodging insects. Another curious
+variation is found in Sylviothorhynchus, a small wren-like bird
+and the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-19.jpg" alt="h1-19.jpg" class="c36">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Some Woodhewers'
+beaks.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">only member known
+of the genus, with a tail resembling that of the lyre-bird, the
+extravagantly long feathers being so narrow as to appear
+almost</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font4">240</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">like shafts
+destitute of webs. This tail appears to be purely
+ornamental.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">This extreme variety
+in structure indicates a corresponding diversity in habits; and,
+assuming it to be a true doctrine that habits vary first and
+structure afterwards, anyone might infer from a study of their
+forms alone that these birds possess a singular plasticity, or
+tendency to vary, in their habits--or, in other words, that they
+are exceptionally intelligent; and that such a conclusion would
+be right I believe a study of their habits will serve to
+show.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The same species is
+often found to differ in its manner of life in different
+localities. Some species of Xenops and Magarornis, like
+woodpeckers, climb vertically on tree-trunks in search of insect
+prey, but also, like tits, explore the smaller twigs and foliage
+at the extremity of the branches; so that the whole tree, from
+its root to its topmost foliage, is hunted over by them. The
+Sclerurus, although an inhabitant of the darkest forest, and
+provided with sharply-curved claws, never seeks its food on
+trees, but exclusively on the ground, among the decaying fallen
+leaves; but, strangely enough, when alarmed it flies to the trunk
+of the nearest tree, to which it clings in a vertical position,
+and, remaining silent and motionless, escapes observation by
+means of its dark protective colour. The Drymornis, a large bird,
+with feet and tail like a woodpecker, climbs on tree-trunks to
+seek its food; but also possesses the widely-different habit of
+resorting to the open plain, especially after a shower, to feed
+on larvae and earthworms, extracting them from a depth of
+three</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodkewer
+Family.</i> 241</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">or four inches
+beneath the surface with its immense curved probing
+beak.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Again, when we
+consider a large number of species of different groups, we find
+that there is not with the Tree-creepers, as with most families,
+any special habit or manner of life linking them together; but
+that, on the contrary, different genera, and, very frequently,
+different species belonging to one genus, possess habits
+peculiarly their own. In other families, even where the
+divergence is greatest, what may be taken as the original or
+ancestral habit is seldom or never quite obsolete in any of the
+members. This we see, for instance, in the woodpeckers, some of
+which have acquired the habit of seeking their food exclusively
+on the ground in open places, and even of nesting in the banks of
+streams. Yet all these wanderers, even those which have been
+structurally modified in accordance with their altered way of
+life, retain the primitive habit of clinging vertically to the
+trunks of trees, although the habit has lost its use. With the
+tyrant birds--a family showing an extraordinary amount of
+variation--it is the same; for the most divergent kinds are
+frequently seen reverting to the family habit of perching on an
+elevation, from which to make forays after passing insects,
+returning after each capture to the same stand. The thrushes,
+ranging all over the globe, afford another striking example.
+Without speaking of their nesting habits, their relationship
+appears in their love of fruit, in their gait, flight, statuesque
+attitudes, and abrupt motions.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">With the numerous
+Dendrocolaptine groups, so</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">242 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">widely separated
+and apparently unrelated, it would be difficult indeed to say
+which, of their most striking habits is the ancestral one. Many
+of the smaller species live in trees or bushes, and in their
+habits resemble tits, warblers, wrens, and other kinds that
+subsist on small caterpillars, spiders, &amp;c., gleaned from the
+leaves and smaller twigs. The Anumbius nests on trees, but feeds
+exclusively on the ground in open places; while other
+ground-feeders seek their food among dead leaves in dense gloomy
+forests. Coryphistera resembles the lark and pipit in its habits;
+Cinclodes, the wagtail; Geobates a Saxicola; Limnornis lives in
+reed beds growing in the water; Henicornis in reed beds growing
+out of the water; and many other ground species exist concealed
+in the grass on dry plains; Homorus seeks its food by digging in
+the loose soil and dead leaves about the roots of trees; while
+Geo-sitta, Furnarius, and Upercerthia obtain a livelihood chiefly
+by probing in the soil. It would not be possible within the
+present limits to mention in detail all the different modes of
+life of those species or groups which do not possess the
+tree-creeping habit; after them comes a long array of genera in
+which this habit is ingrained, and in which the greatly modified
+feet and claws are suited to a climbing existence. As these
+genera comprise the largest half of the family, also the largest
+birds in it, we might expect to find in the tree-creeping the
+parental habit of the Dendrocolaptidae, and that from these
+tropical forest groups have sprung the widely-diverging thicket,
+ground, marsh, sea-beach, and rock-frequenting groups. It
+happens, however,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 243</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">that these birds
+resemble each other only in their climbing feet; in the form of
+their beaks they are as wide apart as are nuthatches,
+woodpeckers, crows, and curlews. They also differ markedly in the
+manner of seeking their food. Some dig like woodpeckers in
+decayed wood; others probe only in soft rotten wood; while the
+humming-bird-billed Xiphorhynchus, with a beak too long and
+slender for probing, explores the interior of deep holes in the
+trunks to draw out nocturnal insects, spiders, and centipedes
+from their concealment. Xiphoco-laptes uses its sword-like beak
+as a lever, thrusting it under and forcing up the loose bark;
+while Dendrornis, with its stout corvine beak, tears the bark
+off.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In the nesting
+habits the diversity is greatest. Some ground species excavate in
+the earth like kingfishers, only with greater skill, making
+cylindrical burrows often four to five feet deep, and terminating
+in a round chamber. Others build a massive oven-shaped structure
+of clay on a branch or other elevated site. Many of those that
+creep on trees nest in holes in the wood. The marsh-frequenting
+kinds attach spherical or oval domed nests to the reeds; and in
+some cases woven grass and clay are so ingeniously combined that
+the structure, while light as a basket, is perfectly impervious
+to the wet and practically indestructible. The most curious
+nests, however, are the large stick structures on trees and
+bushes, in the building and repairing of which the birds are in
+many cases employed more or less constantly all the year round.
+These stick nests vary greatly in form,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">244 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">size, and in other
+respects. Some have a spiral passage-way leading from the
+entrance to the nest cavity, and the cavity is in many cases only
+large enough to accommodate the bird; but in the gigantic
+structure of Homorus gutturalis it is so large that, if the upper
+half of the nest or dome were removed, a condor could comfortably
+hatch her eggs and rear her young in it. This nest is spherical.
+The allied Homorus lophotis builds a nest equally large, but with
+a small cavity for the eggs inside, and outwardly resembling a
+gigantic powder-flask, lying horizontally among the lower
+branches of a spreading tree. Pracellodomtis sibila-trix, a bird
+in size like the English house sparrow, also makes a huge nest,
+and places it on the twigs at the terminal end of a horizontal
+branch from twelve to fifteen feet above the ground; but when
+finished, the weight of the structure bears down the branch-end
+to within one or two feet of the surface. Mr. Barrows, who
+describes this nest, says: "When other branches of the same tree
+are similarly loaded, and other trees close at hand bear the same
+kind of fruit, the result is very picturesque." Synallaxis
+phryganophila makes a stick nest about a foot in depth, and from
+the top a tubular passage, formed of slender twigs interlaced,
+runs down the entire length of the nest, like a rain-pipe on the
+wall of a house, and then becoming external slopes upward, ending
+at a distance of two to three feet from the nest. Throughout
+South America there are several varieties of these fruit-and-stem
+or watering-pot shaped nests; they are not, however, all built by
+birds of one genus, while in the genus</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 245</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Synallaxis many
+species have no tubular passageways attached to their nests. One
+species--erythro thorax--in Yucatan, makes so large a nest of
+sticks, that the natives do not believe that so small a bird can
+be the builder. They say that when the <i>tzapatan</i> begins to
+sing, all the birds in the forest repair to it, each one carrying
+a stick to add to the structure; only one, a tyrant-bird, brings
+two sticks, one for itself and one for the <i>urub&uacute;</i> or
+vulture, that bird being considered too large, heavy, and
+ignorant of architecture to assist personally in the
+work.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In the southern
+part of South America, where scattered thorn trees grow on a dry
+soil, these big nests are most abundant. "There are plains," Mr.
+Barrows writes, "within two miles of the centre of this town
+(Concepcion, Argentine Republic), where I have stood and counted,
+from one point within a radius of twenty rods, over two hundred
+of these curious nests, varying in size from that of a small
+pumpkin to more than the volume of a barrel. Often a single tree
+will contain half a dozen nests or more; and, not unfrequently,
+the nests of several different species are seen crowding each
+other out of shape on the same bush or tree."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It would be a
+mistake to think that the widely different nesting habits I have
+mentioned are found in different genera. I have just spoken of
+the big stick nests, with or without passage-ways, of the
+Synallaxes, yet the nest of one member of this group is simply a
+small straight tube of woven grass, the aperture only large
+enough to admit the finger, and open at both ends, so that
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">246 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">bird can pass in
+and out without turning round. Another species scoops a circular
+hollow in the soil, and builds over it a dome of fine woven
+grass. It should be mentioned that the nesting habits of only
+about fifteen out of the sixty-five species comprised in this
+genus are known to us. In the genus Furnarius the oven-shaped
+clay structure is known to be made by three species; a fourth
+builds a nest of sticks in a tree; a fifth burrows in the side of
+a bank, like a kingfisher.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The explanation of
+the most striking features of the Dendrocolaptidae, their
+monotonous brown plumage, diversity of structure, versatile
+habits, and the marvellous development of the nest-making
+instinct which they exhibit is to be found, it appears to me, in
+the fact that they are the most defenceless of birds. They are
+timid, unresisting creatures, without strength or weapons; their
+movements arc less quick and vigorous than those of other kinds,
+and their flight is exceedingly feeble. The arboreal species flit
+at intervals from one tree to another; those that frequent
+thickets refuse to leave their chosen shelter; while those
+inhabiting grassy plains or marshes study concealment, and, when
+forced to rise, flutter away just above the surface, like
+flying-fish frightened from the water, and, when they have gone
+thirty or forty yards, dip into the grass or reeds again. Their
+life is thus one of perpetual danger in a far greater
+degree than with other passerine families, such as warblers,
+tyrants, finches, thrushes, &amp;c.; while an exclusively insect
+diet, laboriously extracted from secret places, and inability to
+change their climate, contribute to make</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 247</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">their existence a
+hard one. It has been with these birds as with human beings, bred
+in "misfortune's school," and subjected to keen competition. One
+of their most striking characteristics is a methodical, plodding,
+almost painful diligence of manner while seeking their food, so
+that when viewed side by side with other species, rejoicing in a
+gayer plumage and stronger flight, they seem like sober labourers
+that never rest among holiday people bent only on enjoyment. That
+they are able not only to maintain their existence, but to rise
+to the position of a dominant family, is due to an intelligence
+and adaptiveness exceeding that of other kinds, and which has
+been strengthened, and perhaps directly results from the hard
+conditions of their life.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">How great their
+adaptiveness and variability must be when we find that every
+portion of the South American continent is occupied by them; for
+there is really no climate, and no kind of soil or vegetation,
+which does not possess its appropriate species, modified in
+colour, form, and habits to suit the surrounding conditions. In
+the tropical region, so rich in bird life of all kinds, in
+forest, marsh, and savanna, they are everywhere abundant--food is
+plentiful there; but when we go to higher elevations avd cold
+sterile deserts, where their companion families of the tropics
+dwindle away and disappear, the creepers are still present, for
+they are evidently able to exist where other kinds would starve.
+On the stony plateaus of the Andes, and on the most barren spots
+in Patagonia, where no other bird is seen, there are small
+species of Synallaxis, which, in their obscure colour and
+motions</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">248 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">on the ground,
+resemble mice rather than birds; indeed, the Quichua name for one
+of these Synallaxes is <i>ukatchtuka,</i> or mouse-bird. How
+different is the life habit here from what we see in the tropical
+groups--the large birds with immense beaks, that run vertically
+on the trunks of the great forest trees!</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">At the extreme
+southern extremity of the South American continent we find
+several species of Cin-clodes, seeking a subsistence like
+sandpipers on the beach; they also fly out to sea, and run about
+on the floating kelp, exploring the fronds for the small marine
+animals on which they live. In the dreary forests of Tierra del
+Fuego another creeper, Uxyurus, is by far the commonest bird.
+"Whether high up or low down, in the most gloomy, wet, and
+scarcely penetrable ravines," says Darwin, "this little bird is
+to be met with;" and Dr. Cunningham also relates that in these
+wintry, savage woods he was always attended in his walks by
+parties of these little creepers, which assembled to follow him
+out of curiosity.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">To birds placed at
+so great a disadvantage, by a feeble flight and other adverse
+circumstances, in the race of life bright colours would certainly
+prove fatal. It is true that brown is not in itself a protective
+colour, and the clear, almost silky browns and bright chestnut
+tints in several species are certainly not protective; but these
+species are sufficiently protected in other ways, and can afford
+to be without a strictly adaptive colour, so long as they are not
+conspicuous. In a majority of cases, however, the colour is
+undoubtedly protective, the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodkewer
+Family. 2</i>49</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">brown hue being of a
+shade that assimilates very closely to the surroundings. There
+are pale yellowish browns, lined and mottled, in species living
+amidst a sere, scanty vegetation; earthy browns, in those
+frequenting open sterile or stony places; while the species that
+creep on trees in forests are dark brown in colour, and in many
+cases the feathers are mottled in such a manner as to make them
+curiously resemble the bark of a tree. The genera Lochmias and
+Sclerurus are the darkest, the plumage in these birds being
+nearly or quite black, washed or tinged with rhubarb yellow.
+Their black plumage would render them conspicuous in the
+sunshine, but they pass their lives in dense tropical forests,
+where the sun at noon sheds only a gloomy twilight.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">If "colour is ever
+tending to increase and to appear where it is absent," as Dr.
+Wallace believes, then we ought to find it varying in the
+direction of greater brightness in some species in a family so
+numerous and variable as the Dendrocolaptidae, however feeble and
+in need of a protective colouring these birds may be in a
+majority of pases. And this in effect we do find. In many of the
+dark-plumaged species that live in perpetual shade some parts are
+a very bright chestnut; while in a few that live in such close
+concealment as to be almost independent of protective colouring,
+the lower plumage has become pure white. A large number of
+species have a bright or nearly bright guiar spot. This is most
+remarkable in Synallaxis phryganophila, the chin being
+sulphur-yellow, beneath which is a spot of velvet-black, and on
+either side a white</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">2 5O <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">patch, the throat
+thus having three strongly contrasted colours, arranged in four
+divisions. The presence of this bright throat spot in so many
+species cannot very well be attributed to voluntary sexual
+selection, although believers in that theory are of course at
+liberty to imagine that when engaged in courtship, the male bird,
+or rather male and female both, as both sexes possess the spot,
+hold up their heads vertically to exhibit it. Perhaps it would be
+safer to look on it as a mere casual variation, which, like the
+exquisitely pencilled feathers and delicate tints on the
+concealed sides and under surfaces of the wings of many species
+possessing outwardly an obscure protective colouring, is neither
+injurious nor beneficial in any way, either to the birds or to
+the theory. It is more than probable, however, that in such small
+feeble-winged, persecuted birds, this spot of colour would prove
+highly dangerous on any conspicuous part of the body. In some of
+the more vigorous, active species, we can see a tendency towards
+a brighter colouring on large, exposed surfaces. In Auto-malus
+the tail is bright satiny rufous; in Pseudo-colaptes the entire
+under surface is rufous of a peculiar vivid tint, verging on
+orange or red; in Magarornis the bosom is black, and beautifully
+ornamented with small leaf-shaped spots of a delicate
+straw-colour. There are several other very pretty birds in this
+homely family; but the finest of all is Thripodectes flammulatus,
+the whole body being tortoise-shell colour, the wings and tail
+bright chesnut. The powerful tanager-like beak of this species
+seems also to show that it has diverged</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 251</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">from its timid
+shade-loving congeners in another direction by becoming a seed
+and fruit eater.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Probably the sober
+and generally protective colouring of the tree-creepers, even
+with the variability and adaptiveness displayed in their habits
+superadded, would be insufficient to preserve such feeble birds
+in the struggle of life without the further advantage derived
+from their wonderful nests. It has been said of domed nests that
+they are a danger rather than a protection, owing to their large
+size, which makes it easy for carnivorous species that prey on
+eggs and young birds to find them; while small open nests are
+usually well concealed. This may be the case with covered nests
+made of soft materials, loosely put together; but it cannot be
+said of the solid structure the tree-creeper bnilds, and which,
+as often as not, the bird erects in the most conspicuous place it
+can find, as if, writes Azara, it desired all the world to admire
+its work. The annual destruction of adult birds is very
+great--more than double that, I believe, which takes place in
+other passerine families. Their eggs and young are, however,
+practically safe in their great elaborate nests or deep burrows,
+and, as a rule, they lay more eggs than other kinds, the full
+complement being seldom less than five in the species I am
+acquainted with, while some lay as many as nine. Their nests are
+also made so as to keep out a greater pest than their carnivorous
+or egg-devouring enemies--namely, the parasitical starlings
+(Molo-thrus), which are found throughout South America, and are
+excessively abundant and destructive to birds' nests in some
+districts. In most cases, in the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">252 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">big, strong-domed
+nest or deep burrow, all the eggs are hatched and all the young
+reared, the thinning, out process commencing only after the brood
+has been led forth into a world beset with perils. With other
+families, on the contrary, the greatest amount of destruction
+falls on the eggs or fledglings. I have frequently kept a dozen
+or twenty pairs of different species--warblers, finches, tyrants,
+starlings, &amp;c.--under observation during the breeding season,
+and have found that in some cases no young-were reared at all; in
+other cases one or two young; while, as often as not, the young
+actually reared were only parasitical starlings after
+all.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have still to
+speak of the voice of the tree-creepers, an important point in
+the study of these birds; for, though not accounted singers, some
+species emit remarkable sounds; moreover, language in birds is
+closely related to the social instinct. They seem to be rather
+solitary than gregarious; and this seems only natural in birds so
+timid, weak-winged, and hard pressed. It would also be natural to
+conclude from what has been said concerning their habits that
+they are comparatively silent; for, as a rule, vigorous social
+birds are loquacious and loud-voiced, while shy solitary kinds
+preservo silence, except in the love season. Nevertheless the
+creepers are loquacious and have loud resonant voices; this fact,
+however, does not really contradict a well-known principle, for
+the birds possess the social disposition in an eminent degree,
+only the social habit is kept down in them by the conditions of a
+life which makes solitude necessary. Thus, a large proportion of
+species are found to pair for</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 253</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c13">life; and the only
+reasonable explanation of this habit in birds--one which is not
+very common in the mammalia--is that such species possess the
+social temper or feeling, and live in pairs only because they
+cannot afford to live in flocks. Strictly gregarious species pair
+only for the breeding season. In the creepers the attachment
+between the birds thus mated for life is very great, and, as
+Azara truly says of Anumbi&uuml;s, so fond of each other's
+society are these birds, that when one incubates the other sits
+at the entrance to the nest, and when one carries food to its
+young the other accompanies it, even if it has found nothing to
+cany. In these species that live in pairs, when the two birds are
+separated they are perpetually calling to each other, showing how
+impatient of solitude they are; while even from the more solitary
+kind, a high-pitched call-note is constantly heard in the woods,
+for these birds, debarred from associating together, satisfy
+their instinct by conversing with one another over long
+distances.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c13">The foregoing
+remarks apply to the Dendrocolap-tidae throughout the temperate
+countries of South America--the birds inhabiting extensive grassy
+plains and marshes, and districts with a scanty or scattered tree
+and bush vegetation. In the forest areas of the hotter regions it
+is different; there the birds form large gatherings or "wandering
+bands," composed of all the different species found in each
+district, associated with birds of other families--wood-peckers,
+tyrant-birds, bush shrikes, and many others. These miscellaneous
+gatherings are not of rare occurrence, but out of the breeding
+season are</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">254 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">formed daily, the
+birds beginning to assemble at about nine or ten o'clock in the
+morning, their number increasing through the day until it reaches
+its maximum between two and four o'clock in the afternoon, after
+which it begins to diminish, each bird going off to its customary
+shelter or dwelling-place. Mr. Bates, who first described these
+wandering bands, says that he could always find the particular
+band belonging to a district any day he wished, for when he
+failed to meet with it in one part of the forest he would try
+other paths, until he eventually found it. The great Amazonian
+forests, he tells us, appear strangely silent and devoid of bird
+life, and it is possible to ramble about for whole days without
+seeing or hearing birds. But now and then the surrounding trees
+and bushes appear suddenly swarming with them. "The bustling
+crowd loses no time, and, always moving in concert, each bird is
+occupied on its own account in searching bark, or leaf, or twig.
+In a few moments the host is gone, and the forest path remains
+deserted and silent as before." Stolzmann, who observed them in
+Peru, says that the sound caused by the busy crowd searching
+through the foliage, and the falling of dead leaves and twigs,
+resembles that produced by a shower of rain. The Indians of the
+Amazons, Mr. Bates writes, have a curious belief to explain these
+bird armies; they say that the Papa-uira, supposed to be a small
+grey bird, fascinates all the others, and leads them on a weary
+perpetual dance through the forest. It seems very wonderful that
+birds, at other times solitary, should thus combine daily in
+large numbers, includ-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 255</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c13">ing in their bands
+scores of widely different species, and in size ranging from
+those no larger than a wren to others as big as a magpie. It is
+certainly very advantageous to them. As Belt remarks, they play
+into each other's hands; for while the larger creepers explore
+the trunks of big trees, others run over the branches and cling
+to the lesser twigs, so that every tree in their route, from its
+roots to the topmost foliage, is thoroughly examined, and every
+spider and caterpillar taken, while the winged insects, driven
+from their lurking-places, are seized where they settle, or
+caught flying by the tyrant birds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c13">I have observed the
+wandering bands only in Patagonia, where they are on a very small
+scale compared with those of the tropical forests. In the
+Patagonia thickets the small tit-like creeper, Laptas-thenura, is
+the prime mover; and after a considerable number of these have
+gathered, creepers of other species and genera unite with them,
+and finally the band, as it moves through the thickets, draws to
+itself other kinds--flycatchers, finches, &amp;c.--many of the
+birds running or hopping on the ground to search for insects in
+the loose soil or under dead leaves, while others explore the
+thorny bushes. My observations of these small bands lead me to
+believe that everywhere in South America the Dendrocolaptidae are
+the first in combining to act in concert, and that the birds of
+other families follow their march and associate with them,
+knowing from experience that a rich harvest may be thus reaped.
+In the same way birds of various kinds follow the movements of a
+column of hunting</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">256 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">ants, to catch the
+insects flying up from the earth to escape from their enemies;
+swallows also learn to keep company with the traveller on
+horseback, and, crossing and recrossing just before the hoofs,
+they catch the small twilight moths driven up from the
+grass.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">To return to the
+subject of voice. The tree-creepers do not possess melodious, or
+at any rate mellow notes, although in so numerous a family there
+is great variety of tone, ranging from a small reedy voice like
+the faint stridulation of a grasshopper, to the resounding,
+laughter-like, screaming concerts of Homorus, which may be heard
+distinctly two miles away. As a rule, the notes are loud ringing
+calls; and in many species the cry, rapidly reiterated, resembles
+a peal of laughter. With scarcely an exception, they possess no
+set song; but in most species that live always in pairs there are
+loud, vehement, gratulatory notes uttered by the two birds in
+concert when they meet after a brief separation. This habit they
+possess in common with birds of other families, as, for instance,
+the tyrants; but, in some creepers, out of this confused outburst
+of joyous sound has been developed a musical performance very
+curious, and perhaps unique among birds. On meeting, the male and
+female, standing close together and facing each other, utter
+their clear ringing concert, one emitting loud single measured
+notes, while the notes of its fellow are rapid, rhythmical
+triplets; their voices have a joyous character, and seem to
+accord, thus producing a kind of harmony. This manner of singing
+is perhaps most perfect in the oven-bird,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 257</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Furnarias, and it
+is very curious that the young birds, when only partially
+fledged, are constantly heard in the nest or oven apparently
+practising these duets in the intervals when the parents are
+absent; single measured notes, triplets, and long concluding
+trills are all repeated with wonderful fidelity, although these
+notes are in character utterly unlike the hunger cry, which is
+like that of other fledglings. I cannot help thinking that this
+fact of the young birds beginning to sing like the adults, while
+still confined in their dark cradle, is one of very considerable
+significance, especially when we consider the singular character
+of the performance; and that it might even be found to throw some
+light on the obscure question of the comparative antiquity of the
+different and widely separated Dendrocolaptine groups. It is a
+doctrine in evolutionary science that the early maturing of
+instincts in the young indicates a high antiquity for the species
+or group; and there is no reason why this principle should not be
+extended, in the case of birds at any rate, to language. It is
+true that Daines Barrington's notion that young song-birds learn
+to sing only by imitating the adults still holds its ground; and
+Darwin gives it his approval in his <i>Descent of Man.</i> It is
+perhaps one of those doctrines which are partially true, or which
+do not contain the whole truth; and it is possible to believe
+that, while many singing birds do so learn their songs, or
+acquire a greater proficiency in them from hearing the adults, in
+other species the song comes instinctively, and is, like other
+instincts and habits, purely an "inherited memory."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">258 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The case of a
+species in another order of birds--Crypturi--strikes me as being
+similar to this of the oven-bird, and seems to lend some force to
+the suggestion I have made concerning the early development of
+voice in the young.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Birds peculiar to
+South America are said by anatomists to be less specialized,
+lower, more ancient, than the birds of the northern continents,
+and among those which are considered lowest and most ancient are
+the Tinamous (rail and partridge like in their habits), birds
+that lead a solitary, retiring life, and in most cases have sweet
+melancholy voices. Rhynchotus rufescens, a bird the size of a
+fowl, inhabiting the pampas, is perhaps the sweetest-voiced, and
+sings with great frequency. Its song or call is heard oftenest
+towards the evening, and is composed of five modulated notes,
+flute-like in character, very expressive, and uttered by many
+individuals answering each other as they sit far apart concealed
+in the grass. As we might have expected, the faculties and
+instincts of the young of this species mature at a very early
+period; when extremely small, they abandon their parents to shift
+for themselves in solitude; and when not more than one-fourth the
+size they eventually attain, they acquire the adult plumage and
+are able to fly as well as an old bird. I observed a young bird
+of this species, less than a quail in size, at a house on the
+pampas, and was told that it had been taken from the nest when
+just breaking the shell; it had, therefore, never seen or heard
+the parent birds. Yet this small chick, every day at the approach
+of evening, would retire to the darkest corner of the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Woodhewer
+Family.</i> 259</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">dining room, and,
+concealed under a piece of furniture, would continue uttering its
+evening song for an hour or longer at short intervals, and
+rendering it so perfectly that I was greatly surprised to hear
+it; for a thrush or other songster at the same period of life,
+when attempting to sing, only produces a chirping
+sound.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The early singing
+of the oven-bird fledgling is important, owing to the fact that
+the group it belongs to comprises the least specialized forms in
+the family. They are strong-legged, square-tailed, terrestrial
+birds, generally able to perch, have probing beaks, and build the
+most perfect mud or stick nests, or burrow in the ground. In the
+numerous tree-creeping groups, which, seem as unrelated to the
+oven-bird as the woodpecker is to the hoopoe, we find a score of
+wonderfully different forms of beak; but many of them retain the
+probing character, and are actually used to probe in rotten wood
+on trees, and to explore the holes and deep crevices in the
+trunk. We have also seen that some of these tree-creepers revert
+to the ancestral habit (if I may so call it) of seeking their
+food by probing in the soil. In others, like Dendrornis, in which
+the beak has lost this character, and is used to dig in the wood
+or to strip off the bark, it has not been highly specialized,
+and, compared with the woodpecker's beak, is a very imperfect
+organ, considering the purpose for which it is used. Yet, on the
+principle that "similar functional requirements frequently lead
+to the development of similar structures in animals which are
+otherwise very distinct"--as we see in the tubular tongue
+in</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">260 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">honey-eaters and
+humming birds--we might have expected to find in the
+Dendrocolaptidae a better imitation of the woodpecker in so
+variable an organ as the beak, if not in the tongue.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Probably the
+oven-birds, and their nearest relations--generalized, hardy,
+builders of strong nests, and prolific--represent the parental
+form; and when birds of this type had spread over the entire
+continent they became in different districts frequenters of
+marshes, forests, thickets and savannas. With altered life-habits
+the numerous divergent forms originated; some, like Xiphorynchus,
+retaining a probing beak in a wonderfully modified form,
+attenuated in an extreme degree, and bent like a sickle; others
+diverging more in the direction of nuthatches and
+woodpeckers.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">This sketch of the
+Dendrocolaptidae, necessarily slight and imperfect, is based on a
+knowledge of the habits of about sixty species, belonging to
+twenty-eight genera: from personal observation I am acquainted
+with less than thirty species. It is astonishing to find how
+little has been written about these most interesting birds in
+South America. One tree-creeper only, Furnarius rufus, the
+oven-bird <i>par excellence,</i> has been mentioned, on account
+of its wonderful architecture, in almost every general work of
+natural history published during the present century; yet the
+oven-bird does not surpass, or even equal in interest, many
+others in this family of nearly three hundred members.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XIX.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">MUSIC AND DANCING IN
+NATURE.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">IN reading books of
+Natural History we meet with numerous instances of birds
+possessing the habit of assembling together, in many cases always
+at the same spot, to indulge in antics and dancing performances,
+with or without the accompaniment of music, vocal or
+instrumental.; and by instrumental music is here meant all sounds
+other than vocal made habitually and during the more or less
+orderly performances; as, for instance, drumming and tapping
+noises; smiting of wings; and humming, whip-cracking,
+fan-shutting, grinding, scraping, and horn-blowing sounds,
+produced as a rule by the quills.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">There are human
+dances, in which only one person performs at a time, the rest of
+the company looking on; and some birds, in widely separated
+genera, have dances of this kind. A striking example is the
+Rupicola, or cock of-the-rock, of tropical South America. A mossy
+level spot of earth surrounded by bushes is selected for a
+dancing-place, and kept well cleared of sticks and stones; round
+this area the birds assemble, when a cock-bird, with vivid
+orange-scarlet crest and plumage, steps into it, and, with
+spreading wings and tail,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">262 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">begins a series of
+movements as if dancing a minuet; finally, carried away with
+excitement, he leaps and gyrates in the most astonishing manner,
+until, becoming exhausted, he retires, and another bird takes his
+place.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In other species
+all the birds in a company unite in the set performances, and
+seem to obey an impulse which affects them simultaneously and in
+the same degree; but sometimes one bird prompts the others and
+takes a principal part. One of the most curious instances I have
+come across in reading is contained in Mr. Bigg-Wither's
+<i>Pioneering in South Brazil.</i> He relates that one morning in
+the dense forest his attention was roused by the unwonted sound
+of a bird singing--songsters being rare in that district. His
+men, immediately they caught the sound, invited him to follow
+them, hinting that he would probably witness a very curious
+sight. Cautiously making their way through the dense undergrowth,
+they finally came in sight of a small stony spot of ground, at
+the end of a tiny glade; and on this spot, some on the stone and
+some on the shrubs, were assembled a number of little birds,
+about the size of tom-tits, with lovely blue plumage and red
+top-knots. One was perched quite still on a twig, singing
+merrily, while the others were keeping time with wings and feet
+in a kind of dance, and all twittering an accompaniment. He
+watched them for some time, and was satisfied that they were
+having a ball and concert, and thoroughly enjoying themselves;
+they then became alarmed, and the performance abruptly
+terminated, the birds all going off in different directions. The
+natives told</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 26^</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">him that these
+little creatures were known as the "dancing birds."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">This species was
+probably solitary, except when assembling for the purpose of
+display; but in a majority of cases, especially in the Passerine
+order, the solitary species performs its antics alone, or with no
+witness but its mate. Azara, describing a small finch, which he
+aptly named <i>Oscilador,</i> says that early and late in the day
+it mounts up vertically to a moderate height; then, flies off to
+a distance of twenty yards, describing a perfect curve in its
+passage; turning, it flies back over the imaginary line it has
+traced, and so on repeatedly, appearing like a pendulum swung in
+space by an invisible thread.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">Those who seek to
+know the cause and origin of this kind of display and of song in
+animals are referred to Darwin's <i>Descent of Man</i> for an
+explanation. The greater part of that work is occupied with a
+laborious argument intended to prove that the love-feeling
+inspires the animals engaged in these exhibitions, and that
+sexual selection, or the voluntary selection of mates by the
+females, is the final cause of all set musical and dancing
+performances, as well as of bright and harmonious colouring, and
+of ornaments.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">The theory, with
+regard to birds is, that in the love-season, when the males are
+excited and engage in courtship, the females do not fall to the
+strongest and most active, nor to those that are first in the
+field; but that in a large number of species they are endowed
+with a faculty corresponding to the aesthetic feeling or taste in
+man, and deliberately</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">264 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">select males for
+their superiority in some aesthetic quality, such as graceful or
+fantastic motions, melody of voice, brilliancy of colour, or
+perfection of ornaments. Doubtless all birds were originally
+plain-coloured, without ornaments and without melody, and it is
+assumed that so it would always have been in many cases but for
+the action of this principle, which, like natural selection, has
+gone on accumulating countless small variations, tending to give
+a greater lustre to the species in each case, and resulting in
+all that we most admire in the animal world--the Rupicola's
+flame-coloured mantle, the peacock's crest and starry train, the
+joyous melody of the lark, and the pretty or fantastic dancing
+performances of birds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">My experience is
+that mammals and birds, with few exceptions--probably there are
+really no exceptions--possess the habit of indulging frequently
+in more or less regular or set performances, with or without
+sound, or composed of sound exclusively; and that these
+performances, which in many animals are only discordant cries and
+choruses, and uncouth, irregular motions, in the more aerial,
+graceful, and melodious kinds take immeasurably higher, more
+complex, and more beautiful forms. Among the mammalians the
+instinct appears almost universal; but their displays are, as a
+rule, less admirable than those seen in birds. There are some
+kinds, it is true, like the squirrels and monkeys, of arboreal
+habits, almost birdlike in their restless energy, and in the
+swiftness and certitude of their motions, in which the slightest
+impulse can be instantly expressed in graceful or fantastic
+action; others, like</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 265</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">the Chinchillidae
+family, have greatly developed vocal organs, and resemble birds
+in loquacity; but mammals generally, compared with birds, are
+slow and heavy, and not so readily moved to exhibitions of the
+kind I am discussing.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The terrestrial
+dances, often very elaborate, of heavy birds, like those of the
+gallinaceous kind, are represented in the more volatile species
+by performances in the air, and these are very much more
+beautiful; while a very large number of birds--hawks, vultures,
+swifts, swallows, nightjars, storks, ibises, spoonbills, and
+gulls--circle about in the air, singly or in flocks. Sometimes,
+in serene weather, they rise to a vast altitude, and float about
+in one spot for an hour or longer at a stretch, showing a faint
+bird-cloud in the blue, that does not change its form, nor grow
+lighter and denser like a flock of starlings; but in the seeming
+confusion there is perfect order, and amidst many hundreds each
+swift- or slow-gliding figure keeps its proper distance with such
+exactitude that no two ever touch, even with the extremity of the
+long-wings, flapping or motionless:--such a multitude, and such
+miraculous precision in the endless curving motions of all the
+members of it, that the spectator can lie for an hour on his back
+without weariness watching this mystic cloud-dance in the
+empyrean.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The black-faced
+ibis of Patagonia, a bird nearly as large as a turkey, indulges
+in a curious mad performance, usually in the evening when
+feeding-time is over. The birds of a flock, while winging their
+way to the roosting-place, all at once seem possessed with
+frenzy, simultaneously dashing</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">266 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">downwards with
+amazing violence, doubling about in the most eccentric manner;
+and when close to the surface rising again to repeat the action,
+all the while making the air palpitate for miles around with
+their hard, metallic cries. Other ibises, also birds of other
+genera, have similar aerial performances.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The displays of most
+ducks known to me take the form of mock fights on the water; one
+exception is the handsome and loquacious whistling widgeon of La
+Plata, which has a pretty aerial performance. A dozen or twenty
+birds rise up until they appear like small specks in the sky, and
+sometimes disappear from sight altogether; and at that great
+altitude they continue hovering in one spot, often for an hour or
+longer, alternately closing and separating; the fine, bright,
+whistling notes and flourishes of the male curiously harmonizing
+with the grave, measured notes of the female; and every time they
+close they slap each other on the wings so smartly that the sound
+can be distinctly heard, like applauding hand-claps, even after
+the birds have ceased to be visible.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The rails, active,
+sprightly birds with powerful and varied voices, are great
+performers; but owing to the nature of the ground they inhabit
+and to their shy, suspicious character, it is not easy to observe
+their antics. The finest of the Platan rails is the ypecaha, a
+beautiful, active bird about the size of the fowl. A number of
+ypecahas have their assembling place on a small area of smooth,
+level ground, just above the water, and hemmed in by dense rush
+beds. First, one bird among the rushes emits a powerful cry,
+thrice repeated<i>;</i> and this is a</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>and Dancing in
+Nature.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><b>26?</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">note of invitation,
+quickly responded to by other birds from all sides as they
+hurriedly repair to the usual place. In a few moments they
+appear, to the number of a dozen or twenty, bursting from the
+rushes and running into the open space, and instantly beginning
+the performance. This is a tremendous screaming concert. The
+screams they utter have a certain resemblance to the
+human</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-20.jpg" alt="h1-20.jpg" class="c37">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Dance of Ypecaha
+Bails.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">voice, exerted to
+its utmost pitch and expressive of extreme terror, frenzy, and
+despair. A long, piercing shriek, astonishing for its vehemence
+and power, is succeeded by a lower note, as if in the first the
+creature had well nigh exhausted itself: this double scream is
+repeated several times, and followed by other sounds, resembling,
+as they rise and fall, half smothered cries of pains and moans of
+anguish. Suddenly the unearthly shrieks are</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">268</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">renewed in all
+their power. While screaming the birds rush from side to side, as
+if possessed with madness, the wings spread and vibrating, the
+long-beak wide open and raised vertically. This exhibition lasts
+three or four minntes, after which the assembly peacefully breaks
+up.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">The singular
+wattled, wing-spurred, and long-, toed jacana has a remarkable
+performance, which seems specially designed to bring out the
+concealed</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-21.jpg" alt="h1-21.jpg" class="c38">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Wing-display of
+Jacanas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">beauty of the
+silky, greenish-golden wing-quills-The birds go singly or in
+pairs, and a dozen or fifteen individuals may be found in a
+marshy place feeding within sight of each other. Occasionally, in
+response to a note of invitation, they all in a moment leave off
+feeding and. fly to one spot, and, forming a close cluster, and
+emitting short, excited, rapidly repeated notes, display their
+wings, like beautiful flags grouped loosely together: some
+hold</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 269</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">the wings up
+vertically and motionless; others, half open and vibrating
+rapidly, while still others wave them up and down with a slow,
+measured motion.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In the ypecaha and
+jacana displays both sexes take part. A stranger performance is
+that of the spur-winged lapwing of the same region--a species
+resembling the lapwing of Europe, but a third larger, brighter
+coloured, and armed with spurs. The lapwing display, called by
+the natives its "dance," or "serious dance"--by which they mean
+square dance--requires three birds for its performance, and is,
+so far as I know, unique in this respect. The birds are so fond
+of it that they indulge in it all the year round, and at frequent
+intervals during the day, also on moonlight nights. If a person
+watches any two birds for some time--for they live in pairs--he
+will see another lapwing, one of a neighbouring couple, rise up
+and fly to them, leaving his own mate to guard their chosen
+ground; and instead of resenting this visit as an unwarranted
+intrusion on their domain, as they would certainly resent the
+approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it with notes and
+signs of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place
+themselves behind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid
+march, uttering resonant drumming notes in time with their
+movements; the notes of the pair behind being emitted in a
+stream, like a drum-roll, while the leader utters loud single
+notes at regular intervals. The march ceases; the leader elevates
+his wings and stands erect and motionless, still uttering loud
+notes; while the other two, with</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font6">270</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">puffed-out plumage
+and standing exactly abreast stoop forward and downward until the
+tips of their beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their
+rhythmical voices to a murmur, remain for some time in this
+posture. The performance is then over and the visitor goes back
+to his own ground and mate, to receive a visitor himself later
+on.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-22.jpg" alt="h1-22.jpg" class="c39">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15">Dance of Spur-winged
+Lapwings.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the Passerine
+order, not the least remarkable displays are witnessed in birds
+that are not accounted songsters, as they do not possess the
+highly developed vocal organ confined to the suborder Oscines.
+The tyrant-birds, which represent in South America the
+fly-catchers of the Old World, all have displays of some kind; in
+a vast majority of cases these are simply joyous, excited
+duets</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 271</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">between male and
+female, composed of impetuous and more or less confused notes and
+screams, accompanied with beating of wings and other gestures. In
+some species choruses take the place of duets, while in others
+entirely different forms of display have been developed. In one
+group--Cnipolegus--the male indulges in solitary antics, while
+the silent, modest-coloured female keeps in hiding. Thus, the
+male of Cnipolegus Hudsoni, an intensely black-plumaged species
+with a concealed white wing-band, takes his stand on a dead twig
+on the summit of a bush. At intervals he leaves his perch,
+displaying the intense white on the quills, and producing, as the
+wings are thrown open and shut alternately, the effect of
+successive flashes of light. Then suddenly the bird begins
+revolving in the air about its perch, like a moth wheeling round
+and close to the flame of a candle, emitting a series of sharp
+clicks and making a loud humming with the wings. While performing
+this aerial waltz the black and white on the quills mix, the
+wings appearing like a grey mist encircling the body. The
+fantastic dance over, the bird drops suddenly on to its perch
+again; and, until moved to another display, remains as stiff and
+motionless as a bird carved out of jet.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The performance of
+the scissors-tail, another tyrant-bird, is also remarkable. This
+species is grey and white, with black head and tail and a
+crocus-yellow crest. On the wing it looks like a large swallow,
+but with the two outer tail-feathers a foot long. The
+scissors-tails always live in pairs, but at sunset several pairs
+assemble, the birds calling excitedly to each other; they then
+mount</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">272 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">upwards, like
+rockets, to a great height in the anand, after wheeling about for
+a few moments, pro-cipitate themselves downwards with amazing
+violence in a wild zigzag, opening and shutting the long
+tail-feathers like a pair of shears, and producing loud whirring
+sounds, as of clocks being wound rapidly up, with a slight pause
+after each turn of the key. This aerial dance over, they alight
+in separate couples on the tree tops, each couple joining in a
+kind of duet of rapidly repeated, castanet-like
+sounds.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The displays of the
+wood-hewers, or Dendrocolap-tidae, another extensive family,
+resemble those of the tyrant-birds in being chiefly duets, male
+and female singing excitedly in piercing or resonant voices, and
+with much action. The habit varies somewhat in the cachalote, a
+Patagonian species of the genus Homorus, about the size of the
+missel-thrush. Old and young birds live in a family together, and
+at intervals, on any fine day, they engage in a grand screaming
+contest, which may be heard distinctly at a distance of a mile
+and a half. One bird mounts on to a bush and calls, and instantly
+all the others hurry to the spot, and burst out into a chorus of
+piercing cries that sound like peals and shrieks of insane
+laughter. After the chorus, they all pursue each other wildly
+about among the bushes for some minutes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c31">In some groups the
+usual duet-like performances have developed into a kind of
+harmonious singing, which is very curious and pleasant to hear.
+This is pre-eminently the case with the oven-birds, as D'Orbigney
+first remarked. Thus, in the red oven-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature. 273</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">bird, the first
+bird, on the appearance of its mate flying to join it, begins to
+emit loud, measured notes, and sometimes a continuous trill,
+somewhat metallic in sound; but immediately on the other bird
+striking in this introductory passage is changed to triplets,
+strongly accented on the first note, in a <i>tempo vivace;</i>
+while the second bird utters loud single notes in the same time.
+While thus singing they stand facing each other, necks
+outstretched and tails expanded, the wings of the first bird
+vibrating rapidly to the rapid utterance, while those of the
+second bird beat measured time. The finale consists of three or
+four notes, uttered by the second bird alone, strong and clear,
+in an ascending scale, the last very piercing.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In the melodists
+proper the displays, in a majority of cases, are exclusively
+vocal, the singer sitting still on his perch. In the Troupials, a
+family of starling-like birds numbering about one hundred and
+forty species, there are many that accompany singing with pretty
+or grotesque antics. The male screaming cow-bird of La Plata,
+when perched, emits a hollow-sounding internal note that swells
+at the end into a sharp metallic ring, almost bell-like: this is
+uttered with wings and tail spread and depressed, the whole
+plumage being puffed out as in a strutting turkey-cock, while the
+bird hops briskly up and down on its perch as if dancing. The
+bell-like note of the male is followed by an impetuous scream
+from the female, and the dance ends. Another species, the common
+Argentine cow-bird of La Plata, when courting puffs out his
+glossy rich violet plumage, and, with wings vibrating, emits a
+succes-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">T</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">274 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">sion of deep
+internal notes, followed by a set song in clear, ringing tones;
+and then, suddenly taking wing, he flies straight away, close to
+the surface, fluttering like a moth, and at a distance of twenty
+to thirty yards turns and flies in a wide circle round the
+female, singing loudly all the time, hedging her in with melody
+as it were.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Many songsters in
+widely different families possess the habit of soaring and
+falling alternately while singing, and in some cases all the
+aerial postures and movements, the swift or slow descent,
+vertical, often, with oscillations, or in a spiral, and sometimes
+with a succession of smooth oblique lapses, seem to have an
+admirable correspondence with the changing and falling
+voice--melody and motion being united in a more intimate and
+beautiful way than in the most perfect and poetic forms of human
+dancing.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">One of the soaring
+singers is a small yellow field-finch of La Plata--Sycalis
+luteola; and this species, like some others, changes the form of
+its display with the seasons. It lives in immense flocks, and
+during the cold season it has, like most finches, only aerial
+pastimes, the birds wheeling about in a cloud, pursuing each
+other with lively chirpings. In August, when the trees begin to
+blossom, the flock betakes itself to a plantation, and, sitting
+on the branches, the birds sing in a concert of innumerable
+voices, producing a great volume of sound, as of a high wind when
+heard at a distance. Heard near, it is a great mass of melody;
+not a confused tangle of musical sounds as when a host of
+Troupials sing in concert, but the notes, although numberless,
+seem to flow smoothly and separately, producing an</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 275</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">effect on the ear
+similar to that which rain does on the sight, when the sun shines
+on and lightens up the myriads of falling drops all falling one
+way. In this manner the birds sing for hours, without
+intermission, every day. Then the passion of love infects them;
+the pleasant choir breaks up, and its ten thousand members
+scatter wide over the surrounding fields and pasture lands.
+During courtship the male has a feeble, sketchy music, but his
+singing is then accompanied with very charming love antics. His
+circlings about the hen-bird; his numberless advances and
+retreats, and little soarings above her when his voice swells
+with importunate passion; his fluttering lapses back to earth,
+where he lies prone with outspread, tremulous wings, a suppliant
+at her feet, his languishing voice meanwhile dying down to
+lispings--all these apt and graceful motions seem to express the
+very sickness of the heart. But the melody during this emotional
+period is nothing. After the business of pairing and
+nest-building is over, his musical displays take a new and finer
+form. He sits perched on a stalk above the grass, and at
+intervals soars up forty or fifty yards high; rising, he utters a
+series of long melodious notes; then he descends in a graceful
+spiral, the set of the motionless wings giving him the appearance
+of a slowly-falling parachute; the voice then also falls, the
+notes coming lower, sweeter, and more expressive until he reaches
+the surface. After alighting the song continues, the strains
+becoming longer, thinner, and clearer, until they dwindle to the
+finest threads of sound and faintest tinklings, as from a cithern
+touched by fairy fingers. The great charm of the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">276 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">song is in this
+slow gradation from the somewhat throaty notes emitted by the
+bird when ascendino-to the excessively attenuated sounds at the
+close.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In conclusion of
+this part I shall speak of one species more--the white-banded
+mocking-bird of Patagonia, which greatly excels all other
+songsters known to me in the copiousness, variety and brilliant
+character of its music. Concealed in the foliage this bird will
+sing by the half-hour, reproducing with miraculous fidelity the
+more or less melodious set songs of a score of species--a strange
+and beautiful performance; but wonderful as it seems while it
+lasts, one almost ceases to admire this mimicking bird-art when
+the mocker, as if to show by contrast his unapproachable
+superiority, bursts into his own divine song, uttered with a
+power, abandon and joyousness resembling, but greatly exceeding,
+that of the skylark "singing at heaven's gate;" the notes issuing
+in a continuous torrent; the voice so brilliant and infinitely
+varied, that if "rivalry and emulation" have as large a place in
+feathered breasts as some imagine all that hear this surpassing
+melody might well languish ever after in silent
+despair.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In a vast majority
+of the finest musical performances the same notes are uttered in
+the same order, and after an interval the song is repeated
+without any variation: and it seems impossible that we could in
+any other way have such beautiful contrasts and harmonious lights
+and shades--the whole song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly
+played in tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in
+the mocking-bird's song: the notes never come in the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancins in
+Nature.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font3">277</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">same order again
+and again, but, as if inspired, in a changed order, with
+variations and new sounds: and here again it has some resemblance
+to the skylark's song, and might be described as the lark's song
+with endless variations and brightened and spiritualized in a
+degree that cannot be imagined.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-23.jpg" alt="h1-23.jpg" class="c40">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15">White-banded
+mocking-bird.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">This mocking-bird is
+one of those species that accompany music with appropriate
+motions. And just as its song is, so to speak, inspired and an
+im-provization, unlike any song the bird has ever uttered, so its
+motions all have the same character of spontaneity, and follow no
+order, and yet have a grace and passion and a perfect harmony
+with the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">278 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">music unparalleled
+among birds possessing a similar habit. While singing he passes
+from bush to bush, sometimes delaying a few moments on and at
+others just touching the summits, and at times sinking out of
+sight in the foliage: then, in an access of rapture, soaring
+vertically to a height of a hundred feet, with measured
+wing-beats, like those of a heron: or, mounting suddenly in a
+wild, hurried zigzag, then slowly circling downwards, to sit at
+last with tail outspread fanwise, and vans, glistening white in
+the sunshine, expanded and vibrating, or waved languidly up and
+down, with, a motion like that of some broad-winged butterfly at
+rest on a flower.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I wish now to put
+this question: What relation that we can see or imagine to the
+passion of love and the business of courtship, have these dancing
+and vocal performances in nine cases out of ten? In such cases,
+for instance, as that of the scissors-tail tyrant-bird, and its
+pyrotechnic evening displays, when a number of couples leave
+their nests containing eggs and young to join in a wild aerial
+dance: the mad exhibitions of ypecahas and ibises, and the
+jacanas' beautiful exhibition of grouped wings: the triplet
+dances of the spur-winged lapwing, to perform which two birds
+already mated are compelled to call in a third bird to complete
+the set: the harmonious duets of the oven-birds, and the duets
+and choruses of nearly all the wood-hewers, and the wing-slapping
+aerial displays of the whistling widgeons--will it be seriously
+contended that the female of this species makes choice of
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 2 79</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">male able to
+administer the most vigorous and artistic slaps?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The believer in the
+theory would put all these cases lightly aside, to cite that of
+the male cow-bird practising antics before the female and drawing
+a wide circle of melody round her; or that of the jet-black,
+automaton-like, dancing tyrant-bird; and concerning this species
+he would probably say that the plain-plumaged female went about
+unseen, critically watching the dancing of different males, to
+discover the most excellent performer according to the
+traditional standard. And this was, in substance, what Darwin
+did. There are many species in which the male, singly or with
+others, practises antics or sings during the love-season before
+the female; and when all such cases, or rather those that are
+most striking and bizarre, are brought together, and when it is
+gratuitously asserted that the females <i>do</i> choose the males
+that show off in the best manner or that sing best, a case for
+sexual selection seems to be made out. How unfair the argument
+is, based on these carefully selected cases gathered from all
+regions of the globe, and often not properly reported, is seen
+when we turn from the book to nature and closely consider the
+habits and actions of all the species inhabiting any <i>one</i>
+district. We see then that such cases as those described and made
+so much of in the <i>Descent of Man,</i> and cases like those
+mentioned in this chapter, are not essentially different in
+character, but are manifestations of one instinct, which appears
+to be almost universal among the animals. The explanation I have
+to offer lies very much on the surface</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">2 So <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">and is very simple
+indeed, and, like that of Dr. Wallace1 with regard to colour and
+ornaments covers the whole of the facts. We see that the inferior
+animals, when the conditions of life are favourable, are subject
+to periodical fits of gladness affecting them powerfully and
+standing out in vivid contrast to their ordinary temper. And we
+know what this feeling is--this periodic intense elation which
+even civilized man occasionally experiences when in perfect
+health, more especially when young. There are moments when he is
+mad with joy, when he cannot keep still, when his impulse is to
+sing and shout aloud and laugh at nothing, to run and leap and
+exert himself in some extravagant way. Among the heavier
+mammalians the feeling is manifested in loud noises, bellowings
+and screamings, and in lumbering, uncouth motions--throwing up of
+heels, pretended panics, and ponderous mock battles.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In smaller and
+livelier animals, with greater celerity and certitude in their
+motions, the feeling shows itself in more regular and often in
+more complex ways. Thus, Felidae when young, and, in very agile,
+sprightly species like the Puma, throughout life, simulate all
+the actions of an animal hunting its prey--sudden, intense
+excitement of discovery, concealment, gradual advance, masked by
+interven-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c21">1 It is curious to
+find that Dr. Wallace's idea about colour has been independently
+hit upon by Ruskin. Of stones he writes in <i>Frondes
+Agrestis:--"</i>I have often had occasion to allude to the
+apparent connection of brilliancy of colour with vigour of life
+and purity of substance. This is pre-eminently the case in the
+mineral kingdom. The perfection with which the particles of any
+substance unite in crystallization, corresponds in that kingdom
+to the vital power in organic nature."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 281</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ing objects, with
+intervals of watching, when they crouch motionless, the eyes
+flashing and tail waved from side to side; finally, the rush and
+spring, when the playfellow is captured, rolled over on his back
+and worried to imaginary death. Other species of the most diverse
+kinds, in which voice is greatly developed, join in noisy
+concerts and choruses; many of the cats may be mentioned, also
+dogs and foxes, capybaras and other loquacious rodents; and in
+the howling monkeys this kind of performance rises to the sublime
+uproar of the tropical forest at eventide.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Birds are more
+subject to this universal joyous instinct than mammals, and there
+are times when some species are constantly overflowing with it;
+and as they are so much freer than mammals, more buoyant and
+graceful in action, more loquacious, and have voices so much
+finer, their gladness shows itself in a greater variety of ways,
+with more regular and beautiful motions, and with melody. But
+every species, or group of species, has its own inherited form or
+style of performance; and, however rude and irregular this may
+be, as in the case of the pretended stampedes and fights of wild
+cattle, that is the form in which the feeling will always be
+expressed. If all men, at some exceedingly remote period in their
+history, had agreed to express the common glad impulse, which
+they now express in such an infinite variety of ways or do not
+express at all, by dancing a minuet, and minuet-dancing had at
+last come to be instinctive, and taken to spontaneously by
+children at an early period, just as they take to walking "on
+their hind legs,"</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">282 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">man's case would be
+like that of the inferior animals.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I was one day
+watching a flock of plovers, quietly feeding on the ground, when,
+in a moment, all the birds were seized by a joyous madness, and
+each one, after making a vigorous peck at his nearest neighbour,
+began running wildly about, each trying in passing to peck other
+birds, while seeking by means of quick doublings to escape being
+pecked in turn. This species always expresses its glad impulse in
+the same way; but how different in form is this simple game of
+touch-who-touch-can from the triplet dances of the spur-winged
+lapwings, with their drumming music, pompous gestures, and
+military precision of movement! How different also from the
+aerial performance of another bird of the same family--the
+Brazilian stilt--in which one is pursued by the others, mounting
+upwards in a wild, eccentric flight until they are all but lost
+to view; and back to earth again, and then, skywards once more;
+the pursued bird when overtaken giving place to another
+individual, and the pursuing pack making the air ring with their
+melodious barking cries! How different again are all these from
+the aerial pastimes of the snipe, in which the bird, in its
+violent descent, is able to produce such wonderful, far-reaching
+sounds with its tail-feathers! The snipe, as a rule, is a
+solitary bird, and, like the oscillating finch mentioned early in
+this paper, is content to practise its pastimes without a
+witness. In the gregarious kinds all perform together: for this
+feeling, like fear, is eminently contagious, and the sight of one
+bird mad with joy will quickly make</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature,</i> 283</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the whole flock mad.
+There are also species that always live in pairs, like the
+scissors-tails already mentioned, that periodically assemble in
+numbers for the purpose of display. The crested screamer, a very
+large bird, may also be mentioned: male and female sing somewhat
+harmoniously together, with voices of almost unparalleled power:
+but these birds also congregate in large numbers, and a thousand
+couples, or even several thousands, may be assembled together:
+and, at intervals, both by day and night, all sing in concert,
+their combined voices producing a thunderous melody which seems
+to shake the earth. As a rule, however, birds that live always in
+pairs do not assemble for the purpose of display, but the joyous
+instinct is expressed by duet-like performances between male and
+female. Thus, in the three South American Passerine families, the
+tyrant-birds, wood-hewers, and ant-thrushes, numbering together
+between eight and nine hundred species, a very large majority
+appear to have displays of this description.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In my own
+experience, in cases where the male and female together, or
+assembled with others, take equal parts in the set displays, the
+sexes arc similar, or differ little; but where the female takes
+no part in the displays the superiority of the male in brightness
+of colour is very marked. One or two instances bearing on this
+point may be given.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">A scarlet-breasted
+troupial of La Plata perches conspicuously on a tall plant in
+afield, and at intervals soars up vertically, singing, and, at
+the highest ascending point, flight and song end in a kind of
+aerial somersault and vocal flourish at the same</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">284 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">moment. Meanwhile,
+the dull-plumaged female is not seen and not heard: for not even
+a skulking</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">crake lives in
+closer seclusion under the herbage--so widely have the sexes
+diverged in this species. Is the female, then, without an
+instinct so common r --has she no sudden fits of irrepressible
+gladness? Doubtless she has them, and manifests them down in her
+place of concealment in lively chirpings and quick motions--the
+simple, primitive form in which gladness is expressed in the
+class of birds. In the various species of the genus Cnipolegus,
+already mentioned, the difference in the sexes is just as great
+as in the case of the troupial: the solitary, intensely black,
+statuesque male has, we have seen, a set and highly fantastic
+performance; but on more than one occasion I have seen four or
+five females of one species meet together and have a little
+simple performance all to themselves--in form a kind of lively
+mock fight.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It might be objected
+that when a bird takes its stand and repeats a set finished song
+at intervals for an hour at a stretch, remaining quietly perched,
+such a performance appears to be different in character from the
+irregular and simple displays which are unmistakably caused by a
+sudden glad impulse. But we are familiar with the truth that in
+organic nature great things result from small beginnings--a
+common flower, and our own bony skulls, to say nothing of the
+matter contained within them, are proofs of it. Only a limited
+number of species sing in a highly finished manner. Looking at
+many species, we find every gradation, every shade, from the
+simple joyous chirp and cry to the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 285</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">most perfect melody.
+Even in a single branch of the true vocalists we may see it--from
+the chirping bunting, and noisy but tuneless sparrow, to linnet
+and goldfinch and canary. Not only do a large majority of species
+show the singing instinct, or form of display, in a primitive,
+undeveloped state, but in that state it continues to show itself
+in the young of many birds in which melody is most highly
+developed in the adult. And where the development has been solely
+in the male the female never rises above that early stage; in her
+lively chirpings and little mock fights and chases, and other
+simple forms which gladness takes in birds, as well as in her
+plainer plumage, and absence of ornament, she represents the
+species at some remote period. And as with song so with antics
+and all set performances aerial or terrestrial, from those of the
+whale and the elephant to those of the smallest
+insect.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">Another point
+remains to be noticed, and that is the greater frequency and
+fulness in displays of all kinds, including song, during the love
+season. And here Dr. Wallace's colour and ornament theory helps
+us to an explanation. At the season of courtship, when the
+conditions of life are most favourable vitality is at its
+maximum, and naturally it is then that the proficiency in all
+kinds of dancing-antics, aerial and terrestrial, appears
+greatest, and that melody attains its highest perfection. This
+applies chiefly to birds, but even among birds there are
+exceptions, as we have seen in the case of the field-finch,
+Sycalis luteola. The love-excitement is doubtless pleasurable to
+them, and it takes the form in which keenly pleasurable emotions
+are</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">286 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">habitually
+expressed, although not infrequently with variations due to the
+greater intensity of the feeling. In some migrants the males
+arrive before the females, and no sooner have they recovered from
+the effects of their journey than they burst out into rapturous
+singing; these are not love-strains, since the females have not
+yet arrived, and pairing-time is perhaps a mouth distant; their
+singing merely expresses their overflowing gladness. The forest
+at that season is vocal, not only with the fine melody of the
+true songsters, but with hoarse cawings, piercing cries, shrill
+duets, noisy choruses, drummings, boomings, trills,
+wood-tappings--every sound with which different species express
+the glad impulse; and birds like the parrot that only exert their
+powerful voices in screamings--because "they can do no
+other"--then scream their loudest. When courtship begins it has
+in many cases the effect of increasing the beauty of the
+performance, giving added sweetness, verve, and brilliance to the
+song, and freedom and grace to the gestures and motions. But, as
+I have said, there are exceptions. Thus, some birds that are good
+melodists at other times sing in a feeble, disjointed manner
+during courtship. In Patagonia I found that several of the birds
+with good voices--one a mocking bird--were, like the robin at
+home, autumn and winter songsters.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The argument has
+been stated very binefly: but little would be gained by the mere
+multiplication of instances, since, however many, they would be
+selected instances--from a single district, it is true, while
+those in the <i>Descent of Man</i> were brought</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Music and Dancing in
+Nature.</i> 287</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">together from an
+immeasurably wider field; but the principle is the same in both
+cases, and to what I have written it may be objected that, if,
+instead of twenty-five, I had given a hundred cases, taking them
+as they came, they might have shown a larger proportion of
+instances like that of the cow-bird, in which the male has a set
+performance practised only during the love-season and in the
+presence of the female.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is, no doubt,
+true that all collections of facts relating to animal life
+present nature to us somewhat as a "fantastic realm"--unavoidably
+so, in a measure, since the writing would be too bulky, or too
+dry, or too something inconvenient, if we did not take only the
+most prominent facts that come before us, remove them from their
+places, where alone they can be seen in their proper relations to
+numerous other less prominent facts, and rearrange them patch
+work-wise to make up our literature. But I am convinced that any
+student of the subject who will cast aside his books--supposing
+that they have not already bred a habit in his mind of seeing
+only "in accordance with verbal statement"--and go directly to
+nature to note the actions of animals for himself--actions which,
+in many cases, appear to lose all significance when set down in
+writing--the result of such independent investigation will be a
+conviction that conscious sexual selection on the part of the
+female is not the cause of music and dancing performances in
+birds, nor of the brighter colours and ornaments that distinguish
+the male. It is true that the females of some species, both in
+the vertebrate and insect kingdoms, do exercise a</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">288 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">preference; but in
+a vast majority of species the male takes the female he finds, or
+that he is able to win from other competitors; and if we go to
+the reptile class we find that in the ophidian order, which
+excels in variety and richness of colour, there is no such thing
+as preferential mating; and if we go to the insect class, we find
+that in butterflies, which surpass all creatures in their
+glorious beauty, the female gives herself up to the embrace of
+the first male that appears, or else is captured by the strongest
+male, just as she might be by a mantis or some other rapacious
+insect.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24 c9">CHAPTER
+XX.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c9">BIOGRAPHY OF THE
+VIZCACHA.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c9"><i>(Lagostomus
+Trichodactylus.)</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">THE vizcacha is
+perhaps the most characteristic of the South American
+Rodentia,<sup>1</sup> while its habits, in some respects, are
+more interesting than those of any other rodent known: it is,
+moreover, the most common mammal we have on the pampas; and all
+these considerations have induced me to write a very full account
+of its customs. It is necessary to add that since the following
+pages were written at my home on the pampas a great war of
+extermination has been waged against this animal by
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c21"><sup>1</sup>
+"According to Mr. Waterhouse, of all rodents the vizcacha is most
+nearly related to marsupials; but in the points in which it
+approaches this order its relations are general, that is, not to
+any one marsupial species more than to another. As these points
+of affinity are believed to be real and not merely adaptive, they
+must be due in accordance with our view to inheritance from a
+common progenitor. Therefore wo must suppose either that all
+rodents, including the vizcacha, branched off from some ancient
+marsupial, which will naturally have been more or less
+intermediate in character with respect to all existing
+marsupials; or, that both lodents and marsupials branched off
+from a common progenitor. ... On either view we must suppose that
+the vizcacha has retained, by inheritance, more of the characters
+of its ancient progenitor than have other rodents."--DARWIN;
+<i>Origin of Species.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">290</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">landowners, which
+has been more fortunate in its results--or unfortunate if one's
+sympathies are with the vizcacha--than the war of the Australians
+against their imported rodent--the smaller and more prolific
+rabbit.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The vizcachas on
+the pampas of Buenos Ayres live in societies, usually numbering
+twenty or thirty</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-24.jpg" alt="h1-24.jpg" class="c41">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Vizcachas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">members. The
+village, which is called Vizcachera, is composed of a dozen or
+fifteen burrows or mouths; for one entrance often serves for two
+or more distinct holes. Often, where the ground is soft, there
+are twenty or thirty or more burrows in an old vizcachera; but on
+stony, or "tosca" soil even an old one may have no more than four
+or five burrows. They are deep wide-mouthed holes, placed very
+close together, the entire village covering an area</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 291</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">of from one hundred
+to two hundred square feet of ground.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">The burrows vary
+greatly in extent; and usually in a vizcachera there are several
+that, at a distance of from four to six feet from the entrance,
+open into large circular chambers. From these chambers other
+burrows diverge in all directions, some running horizontally,
+others obliquely downwards to a maximum depth of six feet from
+the surface: some of these burrows or galleries communicate with
+those of other burrows. A vast amount of loose earth is thus
+brought up, and forms a very irregular mound, fifteen to thirty
+inches above the surrounding level.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">It will afford some
+conception of the numbers of these vizcacheras on the settled
+pampas when I say that, in some directions, a person might ride
+five hundred miles and never advance half a mile without seeing
+one or more of them. In districts where, as far as the eye can
+see, the plains are as level and smooth as a bowling-green,
+especially in winter when the grass is close-cropped, and where
+the rough giant-thistle has not sprung up, these mounds appear
+like brown or dark spots on a green surface. They are the only
+irregularities that occur to catch the eye, and consequently form
+an important feature in the scenery. In some places they are so
+near together that a person on horseback may count a hundred of
+them from one point of view.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23 c13">The sites of which
+the vizcacha invariably makes choice to work on, as well as his
+manner of burrow-ing, adapt him peculiarly to live and thrive on
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">292 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">open pampas. Other
+burrowing species seem always to fix upon some spot where there
+is a bank or a sudden depression in the soil, or where there is
+rank herbage, or a bush or tree, about the roots of which to
+begin their kennel. They are averse to commence digging on a
+clear level surface, either because it is not easy for them where
+they have nothing to rest their foreheads against while
+scratching, or because they possess a wary instinct that impels
+them to place the body in concealment whilst working on the
+surface, thus securing the concealment of the burrow after it is
+made. Certain it is that where large hedges have been planted on
+the pampas, multitudes of opossums, weasels, skunks, armadillos,
+&amp;c., come and make their burrows beneath them; and where
+there are no hedges or trees, all these species make their
+kennels under bushes of the perennial thistle, or where there is
+a shelter of some kind. The vizcacha, on the contrary, chooses an
+open level spot, the cleanest he can find to burrow on. The first
+thing that strikes the observer when viewing the vizcachera
+closely is the enormous size of the entrance of the burrows, or,
+at least, of several of the central ones in the mound; for there
+are usually several smaller outside burrows. The pit-like opening
+to some of these principal burrows is often four to six feet
+across the mouth, and sometimes deep enough for a tall man to
+stand up waist-deep in. How these large entrances can be made on
+a level surface may be seen when the first burrow or burrows of
+an incipient vizcachera are formed. It is not possible to tell
+what induces a vizcacha to be the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 293</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">founder of a new
+community; for they increase very slowly, and furthermore are
+extremely fond of each other's society; and it is invariably one
+individual that leaves his native village to found a new and
+independent one. If it were to have better pasture at hand, then
+he would certainly remove to a considerable distance; but he
+merely goes from forty to fifty or sixty yards off to begin his
+work. Thus it is that in desert places, where these animals are
+rare, a solitary vizcachera is never seen; but there are always
+several close together, though there may be no others on the
+surrounding plain for leagues. When the vizcacha has made his
+habitation, it is but a single burrow, with only himself for an
+inhabitant, perhaps for many months. Sooner or later, however,
+others join him: and these will be the parents of innumerable
+generations; for they construct no temporary lodging-place, as do
+the armadillos and other species, but their posterity continues
+in the quiet possession of the habitations bequeathed to it; how
+long, it is impossible to say. Old men who have lived all their
+lives in one district remember that many of the vizcacheras
+around them existed when they were children. It is invariably a
+male that begins a new village, and makes his burrow in the
+following manner, though he does not always observe the same
+method. He works very straight into the earth, digging a hole
+twelve or fourteen inches wide, but not so deep, at an angle of
+about 25 degrees with the surface. But after he has progressed
+inwards a few feet, the vizcacha is no longer satisfied with
+merely scattering away the loose earth he fetches</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">294 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">up, but cleans it
+away so far in a straight line from the entrance, and scratches
+so much on this line (apparently to make the slope gentler), that
+he soon forms a trench a foot or more in depth, and often three
+or four feet in length. Its use is, as I have inferred, to
+facilitate the conveying of the loose earth as far as possible
+from the entrance of the burrow. But after a while the animal is
+unwilling that it should accumulate even at the end of this long
+passage; he therefore proceeds to make two additional trenches,
+that form an acute, sometimes a right angle, converging into the
+first, so that when the whole is completed it takes the form of a
+capital Y.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">These trenches are
+continually deepened and lengthened as the burrow progresses, the
+angular segment of earth between them, scratched away, until by
+degrees it has been entirely conveyed off, and in its place is
+the one deep great unsymmetrical mouth I have already described.
+There are soils that will not admit of the animals working in
+this manner. Where there are large cakes of "tosca" near the
+surface, as in many localities on the southern pampas, the
+vizcacha makes its burrow as best he can, and without the regular
+trenches. In earths that crumble much, sand or gravel, he also
+works under great disadvantages.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The burrows are
+made best in the black and red moulds of the pampas; but even in
+such soils the entrances of many burrows are made differently. In
+some the central trench is wanting, or is so short that there
+appear but two passages converging directly into the burrow; or
+these two trenches</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 295</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">may be so curved
+inwards as to form the segment of a circle. Many other forms may
+also be noticed, but usually they appear to be only modifications
+of the most common Y-shaped system.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">As I have remarked
+that its manner of burrowing has peculiarly adapted the vizcacha
+to the pampas, it may be asked what particular advantage a
+species that makes a wide-mouthed burrow possesses over those
+that excavate in the usual way. On a declivity, or at the base of
+rocks or trees, there would be none; but on the perfectly level
+and shelterless pampas, the durability of the burrow, a
+circumstance favourable to the animal's preservation, is owing
+altogether to its being made in this way, and to several barrows
+being made together. The two outer trenches diverge so widely
+from the mouth that half the earth brought out is cast behind
+instead of before it, thus creating a mound of equal height about
+the entrance, by which it is secured from water during great
+rainfalls, while the cattle avoid treading over the great
+pit-like entrances. But the burrows of the dolichotis, armadillo,
+and other species, when made on perfectly level ground, are soon
+trod on and broken in by cattle; in summer they are choked up
+with dust and rubbish; and, the loose earth having all been
+thrown up together in a heap on one side, there is no barrier to
+the water which in every great rainfall flows in and obliterates
+the kennel, drowning or driving out the tenant.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I have been minute
+in describing the habitations of the vizcacha, as I esteem the
+subject of prime importance in considering the zoology of
+this</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">296 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">portion of America.
+The vizcacha does not benefit himself alone by his perhaps unique
+style of burrowing; but this habit has proved advantageous to
+several other species, and has been so favourable to two of our
+birds that they are among the most common species found here,
+whereas without these burrows they would have been exceedingly
+rare, since the natural banks in which they breed are scarcely
+found anywhere on the pampas. I refer to the Minera (Geositta
+cunicularia), which makes its breeding-holes in the bank-like
+sides of the vizcacha's burrow, and to the little swallow
+(Atticora cyanoleuca) which breeds in these excavations when
+forsaken by the Minera. Few old vizcacheras are seen without some
+of these little parasitical burrows in them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Birds are not the
+only beings in this way related to the vizcachas: the fox and the
+weasel of the pampas live almost altogether in them. Several
+insects also frequent these burrows that are seldom found
+anywhere else. Of these the most interesting are:--a large
+predacious nocturnal bug, shining black, with red wings; a
+nocturnal Cicindela, a beautiful insect, with dark green striated
+wing-cases and pale red legs; also several diminutive wingless
+wasps. Of the last I have counted six species, most of them
+marked with strongly contrasted colours, black, red, and white.
+There are also other wasps that prey on the spiders found on the
+vizcachera. All these and others are so numerous on the mounds
+that dozens of them might there be collected any summer day; but
+if sought for in other situations they are exceedingly rare. If
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 297</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">dry mound of soft
+earth which the vizcacha elevates amidst a waste of humid,
+close-growing grass is not absolutely necessary to the existence
+of all these species, it supplies them with at least one
+favourable condition, and without doubt thereby greatly increases
+their numbers: they, too, whether predacious or preyed on, have
+so many relations with other outside species, and these again
+with still others, that it would be no mere fancy to say that
+probably hundreds of species are either directly or indirectly
+affected in their struggle for existence by the vizcacheras so
+abundantly sprinkled over the pampas.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">In winter the
+vizcachas seldom leave their burrows till dark, but in summer
+come out before sunset; and the vizcachera is then a truly
+interesting spectacle. Usually one of the old males first
+appears, and sits on some prominent place on the mound,
+apparently in no haste to begin his evening meal. When approached
+from the front he stirs not, but eyes the intruder with a bold
+indifferent stare. If the person passes to one side, he deigns
+not to turn his head.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Other vizcachas
+soon begin to appear, each one quietly taking up his station at
+his burrow's mouth, the females, known by their greatly inferior
+size and lighter grey colour, sitting upright on their haunches,
+as if to command a better view, and indicating by divers sounds
+and gestures that fear and curiosity struggles in them for
+mastery; for they are always wilder and sprightlier in their
+motions than the males. With eyes fixed on the intruder, at
+intervals they dodge the head, emitting at the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">298 <i>The Nattiralist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">same time an
+internal note with great vehemence; and suddenly, as the danger
+comes nearer, they plunge simultaneously, with a startled cry,
+into their burrows. But in some curiosity is the strongest
+emotion; for, in spite of their fellow's contagious example, and
+already half down the entrance, again they start up to scrutinize
+the stranger, and will then often permit him to walk within five
+or six paces of them.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Standing on the
+mound there is frequently a pair of burrowing owls (Pholeoptynx
+cunicularia). These birds generally make their own burrows to
+breed in, or sometimes take possession of one of the lesser
+outside burrows of the village; but their favourite residence,
+when not engaged in tending their eggs or young, is on the
+vizcachera. Here a pair will sit all day; and I have often
+remarked a couple close together on the edge of the burrow; and
+when the vizcacha came out in the evening, though but a hand's
+breadth from them, they did not stir, nor did he notice them, so
+accustomed are these creatures to each other. Usually a couple of
+the little burrowing Geositta are also present. They are lively
+creatures, running with great rapidity about the mound and bare
+space that surrounds it, suddenly stopping and jerking their
+tails in a slow deliberate manner, and occasionally uttering
+their cry, a trill, or series of quick short clear notes,
+resembling somewhat the shrill excessive laughter of a child.
+Among the grave, stationary vizcachas, of which they take no
+heed, perhaps half a dozen or more little swallows (Atticora
+cyanoleuca) are seen, now clinging altogether to the bank-like
+entrance</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 299</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">of a burrow, now
+hovering over it in a moth-like manner, as if uncertain where to
+alight, and anon sweeping about in circles, but never ceasing
+their low and sorrowful notes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The vizcachera with
+all its incongruous inhabitants thus collected upon it is to a
+stranger one of the most novel sights the pampas
+afford.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The vizcacha
+appears to be a rather common species over all the extensive
+Argentine territory; but they are so exceedingly abundant on the
+pampas inhabited by man, and comparatively so rare in the desert
+places I have been in, that I was at first much surprised at
+finding them so unequally distributed. I have also mentioned that
+the vizcacha is a tame familiar creature. This is in the pastoral
+districts, where they are never disturbed; but in wild regions,
+where he is scarce, he is exceedingly wary, coming forth long
+after dark, and plunging into his burrow on the slightest alarm,
+so that it is a rare thing to get a sight of him. The reason is
+evident enough; in desert regions the vizcacha has several deadly
+enemies in the larger rapacious mammals. Of these the puma or
+lion (Felis concolor) is the most numerous, as it is also the
+swiftest, most subtle, and most voracious; for, as regards these
+traits, the jaguar (F. onca) is an inferior animal. To the
+insatiable bloody appetite of this creature nothing comes amiss;
+he takes the male ostrich by surprise, and slays that wariest of
+wild things on his nest; He captures little birds with the
+dexterity of a cat, and hunts for diurnal armadillos; he comes
+unawares upon the deer and huanaco, and, springing like lightning
+on them, dislocates their necks before their</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">300 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">bodies touch the
+earth. Often after he has thus slain them, he leaves their bodies
+untouched for the Polyborus and vulture to feast on, so great a
+delight does he take in destroying life. The vizcacha falls an
+easy victim to this subtle creature; and it is not to be wondered
+at that it becomes wild to excess, and rare in regions hunted
+over by such an enemy, even when all other conditions are
+favourable to its increase. But as soon as these wild regions are
+settled by man the pumas are exterminated, and the sole remaining
+foe of the vizcacha is the fox, comparatively an insignificant
+one.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The fox takes up his
+residence in a vizcachera, and succeeds, after some quarrelling
+(manifested in snarls, growls, and other subterranean warlike
+sounds), in ejecting the rightful owners of one of the burrows,
+which forthwith becomes his. Certainly the vizcachas are not much
+injured by being compelled to relinquish the use of one of their
+kennels for a season or permanently; for, if the locality suits
+him, the fox remains with them always. Soon they grow accustomed
+to the unwelcome stranger; he is quiet and unassuming in
+demeanour, and often in the evening sits on the mound in their
+company, until they regard him with the same indifference they do
+the burrowing owl. But in spring, when the young vizcachas are
+large enough to leave their cells, then the fox makes them his
+prey; and if it is a bitch fox, with a family of eight or nine
+young to provide for, she will grow so bold as to hunt her
+helpless quarry from hole to hole, and do battle with the old
+ones, and carry off the young in spite of them, so that all the
+young animals in the village are even-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 301</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">tually destroyed.
+Often when the young foxes are large enough to follow their
+mother, the whole family takes leave of the vizcachera where such
+cruel havoc has been made to settle in another, there to continue
+their depredations. But the fox has ever a relentless foe in man,
+and meets with no end of bitter persecutions; it is consequently
+much more abundant in desert or thinly settled districts than in
+such as are populous, so that in these the check the vizcachas
+receive from the foxes is not appreciable.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The abundance of
+cattle on the pampas has made it unnecessary to use the vizcacha
+as an article of food. His skin is of no value; therefore man,
+the destroyer of his enemies, has hitherto been the greatest
+benefactor of his species. Thus they have been permitted to
+multiply and spread themselves to an amazing extent, so that the
+half-domestic cattle on the pampas are not nearly so familiar
+with man, or so fearless of his presence as are the vizcachas. It
+is not that they do him no injury, but because they do it
+indirectly, that they have so long enjoyed immunity from
+persecution. It is amusing to see the sheep-farmer, the greatest
+sufferer from the vizcachas, regarding them with such
+indifference as to permit them to swarm on his "run," and burrow
+within a stone's throw of his dwelling with impunity, and yet
+going a distance from home to persecute with unreasonable
+animosity a fox, skunk, or opossum on account of the small annual
+loss it inflicts on the poultry-yard. That the vizcacha has
+comparatively no adverse conditions to war with wherever man is
+settled is evident when we consider</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">3O2 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">its very slow rate
+of increase, and yet see them in such incalculable numbers. The
+female has but one litter in the year of two young, sometimes of
+three. She becomes pregnant late in April, and brings forth in
+September; the period of gestation is, I think, rather less than
+five months.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The vizcacha is
+about two years growing. A full-sized male measures to the root
+of the tail twenty-two inches, and weighs from fourteen to
+fifteen pounds; the female is nineteen inches in length, and her
+greatest weight nine pounds. Probably it is a long-lived, and
+certainly it is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green
+substance to eat it never drinks water; but after a long summer
+drought, when for months it has subsisted on bits of dried
+thistle-stalks and old withered grass, if a shower falls it will
+come out of its burrows even at noonday and drink eagerly from
+the pools. It has been erroneously stated that vizcachas subsist
+on roots. Their food is grass and seeds; but they may also
+sometimes eat roots, as the ground is occasionally seen scratched
+up about the burrows. In March, when the stalks of the perennial
+cardoon or Castile thistle (Cynara cardunculus) are dry, the
+vizcachas fell them by gnawing about their roots, and afterwards
+tear to pieces the great dry flower-heads to get the seeds
+imbedded deeply in them, of which they seem very fond. Large
+patches of thistle are often found served thus, the ground about
+them literally white with the silvery bristles they have
+scattered. This cutting down tall plants to get the seeds at the
+top seems very like an act of pure intelligence; but the fact
+is,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 303</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the vizcachas cut
+down every tall plant they can. I have seen whole acres of maize
+destroyed by them, yet the plants cut down were left untouched.
+If posts be put into the ground within range of their nightly
+rambles they will gnaw till they have felled them, unless of a
+wood hard enough to resist their chisel-like incisors.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The strongest
+instinct of this animal is to clear the ground thoroughly about
+its burrows; and it is this destructive habit that makes it
+necessary for cultivators of the soil to destroy all the
+vizcachas in or near their fields. On the uninhabited pampas,
+where the long grasses grow, I have often admired the vizcachera;
+for it is there the centre of a clean space, often of half an
+acre in extent, on which there is an even close-shaven turf: this
+clearing is surrounded by the usual rough growth of herbs and
+giant grasses. In such situations this habit of clearing the
+ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affords them a
+comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, and
+over which they can fly to their burrows without meeting any
+obstruction, on the slightest alarm.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Of course the
+instinct continues to operate where it is no longer of any
+advantage. In summer, when the thistles are green, even when
+growing near the burrows, and the giant thistle (Carduus mariana)
+springs up most luxuriantly right on the mound, the vizcachas
+will not touch them, either disliking the strong astringent sap,
+or repelled by the thorns with which they are armed. As soon as
+they dry, and the thorns become brittle, they are levelled;
+afterwards, when the animal begins to drag</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">304 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">them about and cut
+them up, as his custom is, he accidentally discovers and feasts
+on the seed: for vizcachas are fond of exercising their teeth on
+hard substances, such as sticks and bones, just as cats are of
+"sharpening their claws" on trees.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Another remarkable
+habit of the vizcacha, that of dragging to and heaping about the
+mouth of his burrow every stalk he cuts down, and every portable
+object that by dint of great strength he can carry, has been
+mentioned by Azara, Darwin, and others. On the level plains it is
+a useful habit; for as the vizcachas are continually deepening
+and widening their burrows, the earth thrown out soon covers up
+these materials, and so assists in raising the mound. On the
+Buenos-Ayrean pampas numbers of vizcacheras would annually be
+destroyed by water in the great sudden rainfalls were the mounds
+loss high. But this is only an advantage when the animals inhabit
+a perfectly level country subject to flooding rains; for where
+the surface is unequal they invariably prefer high to low ground
+to burrow on, and are thus secured from destruction by water; yet
+the instinct is as strong in such situations as on the level
+plains. The most that can be said of a habit apparently so
+obscure in its origin and uses is, that it appears to be part of
+the instinct of clearing the ground about the village. Every tall
+stalk the vizcacha cuts down, every portable object he finds,
+must be removed to make the surface clean and smooth; but while
+encumbered with it he does not proceed further from his burrows,
+but invariably re-tires towards them, and so deposits it upon the
+mound. So well known is this habit, that whatever</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 305</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">article is lost by
+night--whip, pistol, or knife--;the loser next morning visits the
+vizcacheras in the vicinity, quite sure of finding it there.
+People also visit the vizcacheras to pick up sticks for
+firewood.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The vizcachas are
+cleanly in their habits; and the fur, though it has a strong
+earthy smell, is kept exceedingly neat. The hind leg and foot
+afford a very beautiful instance of adaptation. Propped by the
+hard curved tail, they sit up erect, and as firmly on the long
+horny disks on the undersides of the hind legs as a man stands on
+his feet. Most to be admired, on the middle toe the skin thickens
+into a round cushion, in which the curved teeth-like bristles are
+set; nicely graduated in length, so that "each particular hair"
+may come into contact with the skin when the animal scratches or
+combs itself. As to the uses of this appendage there can be no
+difference of opinion, as there is about the serrated claw in
+birds. It is quite obvious that the animal cannot scratch himself
+with his hind paw (as all mammals do) without making use of this
+natural comb. Then the entire foot is modified, so that this comb
+shall be well protected, and yet not be hindered from performing
+its office: thus the inner toe is pressed close to the middle
+one, and so depressed that it comes under the cushion of skin,
+and cannot possibly get before the bristles, or interfere their
+coming against the skin in scratching, as certainly be the case
+if this toe were free as outer one.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Again, the vizcachas
+appear to form the deep trenches before the burrows by scratching
+the earth</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">x</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">306 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">violently backwards
+with the hind claws. Now these straight, sharp, dagger-shaped
+claws, and especially the middle one, are so long that the
+vizcacha is able to perform all this rough work without the
+bristles coming into contact with the ground, and so getting worn
+by the friction. The Tehuelcho Indians in Patagonia comb their
+hair with a brush-comb very much like that on the vizcacha's toe,
+but in their case it does not properly fulfil its office, or else
+the savages make little use of it. Vizcachas have a remarkable
+way of dusting themselves: the animal suddenly throws himself on
+his back, and, bringing over his hind legs towards his head,
+depresses them till his feet touch the ground. In this strange
+posture he scratches up the earth with great1 rapidity, raising a
+little cloud of dust, then rights himself with a jerk, and, after
+an interval, repeats the dusting. Usually they scratch a hole in
+the ground to deposit their excrements in. Whilst opening one of
+the outside burrows that had no communication with the others, I
+once discovered a vast deposit of their dung (so great that it
+must have been accumulating for years) at the extremity. To
+ascertain whether this be a constant, or only a casual habit, it
+would be necessary to open up entirely a vast number of
+vizcacheras. When a vizcacha dies in his burrow the carcass is,
+after some days, dragged out and left upon the mound.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The language of the
+vizcacha is wonderful for its variety. When the male is feeding
+he frequently pauses to utter a succession of loud, percussive,
+and somewhat jarring cries; these he utters in a leisurely
+manner, and immediately after goes on feeding-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 307</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Often he utters this
+cry in a low grunting tone. One of his commonest expressions
+sounds like the violent hawking of a man clearing his throat. At
+other times he bursts into piercing tones that may be heard a
+mile off, beginning like the excited and quick-repeated squeals
+of a young pig, and growing longer, more attenuated, and
+quavering towards the end. After retiring alarmed into the
+burrows, he repeats at intervals a deep internal moan. All these,
+and many other indescribable guttural, sighing, shrill, and deep
+tones, are varied a thousand ways in strength and intonation,
+according to the age, sex, or emotions of the individual; and I
+doubt if there is in the world any other four-footed thing so
+loquacious, or with a dialect so extensive. I take great pleasure
+in going to some spot where they are abundant, and sitting
+quietly to listen to them; for they are holding a perpetual
+discussion, all night long, which the presence of a human being
+will not interrupt.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">At night, when the
+vizcachas are all out feeding, in places where they are very
+abundant (and in some districts they literally swarm) any very
+loud and sudden sound, as the report of a gun, or a clap of
+unexpected thunder, will produce a most extraordinary effect. No
+sooner has the report broken on the stillness of night than a
+perfect storm of cries bursts forth over the surrounding country.
+After eight or nine seconds there is in the storm a momentary
+hill or pause; and then it breaks forth again, apparently louder
+than before. There is so much difference in the tones of
+different animals that the cries of individuals close at hand may
+be</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">308 <i>The Natitralist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">distinguished amidst
+the roar of blended voices coming from a distance. It sounds as
+if thousands and tens of thousands of them were striving to
+express every emotion at the highest pitch of their voices; so
+that the effect is indescribable, and fills a stranger with
+astonishment. Should a gun be fired off several times, their
+cries become less each time; and after the third or fourth time
+it produces no effect. They have a peculiar, sharp, sudden,
+"far-darting" alarm-note when a dog is spied, that is repeated by
+all that hear it, and produces an instantaneous panic, sending
+every vizcacha flying to his burrow.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">But though they
+manifest such a terror of dogs when out feeding at night (for the
+slowest dog can overtake them), in the evening, when sitting upon
+their mounds, they treat them with tantalizing contempt. If the
+dog is a novice, the instant he spies the animal he rushes
+violently at it; the vizcacha waits the charge with imperturbable
+calmness till his enemy is within one or two yards, and then
+disappears into the burrow. After having been foiled in this way
+many times, the dog resorts to stratagem: he crouches down as if
+transformed for the nonce into a Felis, and steals on with
+wonderfully slow and cautious steps, his hair bristling, tail
+hanging, and eyes intent on his motionless intended victim; when
+within seven or eight yards he makes a sudden rush, but
+invariably with the same dis-appointing result. The persistence
+with which the dogs go on hoping against hope in this
+unprofitable game, in which they always act the stupid part, is
+highly amusing, and is very interesting to the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Viscacha.</i> 309</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">naturalist; for it
+shows that the native dogs on the pampas have developed a very
+remarkable instinct, and one that might be perfected by
+artificial selection; but dogs with the hunting habits of the cat
+would, I think, be of little use to man. When it is required to
+train dogs to hunt the nocturnal armadillo (Dasypus villosus),
+then this deep-rooted (and, it might be added, hereditary)
+passion for vizcachas is excessively annoying, and it is often
+necessary to administer hundreds of blows and rebukes before a
+dog is induced to track an armadillo without leaving the scent
+every few moments to make futile grabs at his old
+enemies.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The following
+instance will show how little suspicion of man the vizcachas
+have. A few years ago I went out shooting them on three
+consecutive evenings. I worked in a circle, constantly revisiting
+the same burrows, never going a greater distance from home than
+could be walked in four or five minutes. During the three
+evenings I shot sixty vizcachas dead; and probably as many more
+escaped badly wounded into their burrows; for they are hard to
+kill, and however badly wounded, if sitting near the burrow when
+struck, are almost certain to escape into it. But on the third
+evening I found them no wilder, and killed about as many as on
+the first. After this I gave up shooting them in disgust; it was
+dull sport, and to exterminate or frighten them away with a gun
+seemed an impossibility.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is a very unusual
+thing to eat the vizcacha, most people, and especially the
+gauchos, having a silly unaccountable prejudice against their
+flesh. I</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">310 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">have found it very
+good, and while engaged writing this chapter have dined on it
+served up in various ways. The young animals are rather insipid,
+the old males tough, but the mature females are excellent--the
+flesh being tender, exceedingly white, fragrant to the nostrils,
+and with a very delicate game-flavour.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Within the last ten
+years so much new land has been brought under cultivation that
+farmers have been compelled to destroy incredible numbers of
+vizcachas: many large "estancieros" (cattle-breeders) have
+followed the example set by the grain-growers, and have had them
+exterminated on their estates. Now all that Azara, on hearsay,
+tells about the vizcachas perishing in their burrows, when these
+are covered up, but that they can support life thus buried for a
+period of ten or twelve days, and that during that time animals
+will come from other villages and disinter them, unless
+frightened off with dogs, is strictly true. Country workmen are
+so well acquainted with these facts that they frequently
+undertake to destroy all the vizcacheras on an estate for so
+paltry a sum as ten-pence in English money for each one, and yet
+will make double the money at this work than they can at any
+other. By day they partly open up, then cover up the burrows with
+a great quantity of earth, and by night go round with dogs to
+drive away the vizcachas from the still open burrows that come to
+dig out their buried friends. After all the vizcacheras on an
+estate have been thus served, the workmen are usually bound by
+previous agreement to keep guard over them for a space of
+eight</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha.</i> 311</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">or ten days before
+they receive their hire: for the animals covered up are then
+supposed to be all dead. Some of these men I have talked with
+have assured me that living vizcachas have been found after
+fourteen days--a proof of their great endurance. There is nothing
+strange, I think, in the mere fact of the vizcacha being unable
+to work his way out when thus buried alive; for, for all I know
+to the contrary, other species may, when their burrows are well
+covered up, perish in the same manner; but it certainly is
+remarkable that other vizcachas should come from a distance to
+dig out those that are buried alive. In this good office they are
+exceedingly zealous; and I have frequently surprised them after
+sunrise, at a considerable distance from their own burrows,
+diligently scratching at those that had been covered up. The
+vizcachas are fond of each other's society, and live peaceably
+together; but their goodwill is not restricted to the members of
+their own little community; it extends to the whole species, so
+that as soon as night comes many animals leave their own and go
+to visit the adjacent villages. If one approaches a vizcachera at
+night, usually some of the vizcachas on it scamper off to distant
+burrows: these are neighbours merely come to pay a friendly
+visit. This intercourse is so frequent that little straight paths
+are formed from one vizcachera to another. The extreme attachment
+between members of different communities makes it appear less
+strange that they should assist each other: either the desire to
+see, as usual, their buried neighbours becomes intense enough to
+impel them to work their way to them; or cries of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">312 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">distress from the
+prisoners reach and incite them to attempt their deliverance.
+Many social species are thus powerfully affected by cries of
+distress from one of their fellows; and some will attempt a
+rescue in the face of great danger--the weasel and the peccary
+for example.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Mild and sociable as
+the vizcachas are towards each other, each one is exceedingly
+jealous of any intrusion into his particular burrow, and indeed
+always resents such a breach of discipline with the utmost fury.
+Several individuals may reside in the compartments of the same
+burrow; but beyond themselves not even their next-door neighbour
+is permitted to enter; their hospitality ends where it begins, at
+the entrance. It is difficult to compel a vizcacha to enter a
+burrow not his own; even when hotly pursued by dogs they often
+refuse to do so. When driven into one, the instant their enemies
+retire a little space they rush out of it, as if they thought the
+hiding-place but little less dangerous than the open plain. I
+have frequently seen vizcachas, chased into the wrong burrows,
+summarily ejected by those inside: and sometimes they make their
+escape only after being well bitten for their offence.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have now stated
+the most interesting facts I have collected concerning the
+vizcacha: when others rewrite its history they doubtless will,
+according to the opportunities of observation they enjoy, be able
+to make some additions to it, but probably none of great
+consequence. I have observed this species in Patagonia and Buenos
+Ayres only; and as I have found that its habits are considerably
+modified by</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Biography of the
+Vizcacha,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">313</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">circumstances in the
+different localities where I have met with it, I am sure that
+other variations will occur in the more distant regions, where
+the conditions vary.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The most remarkable
+thing to be said about the vizcacha is, that although regarded by
+Mr. Waterhouse, and others who have studied its affinities, as
+one of the lowest of the rodents, exhibiting strong Marsupial
+characters, the living animal appears to be more intelligent than
+other rodents, not of South America only, but also of those of a
+higher type in other continents. A parallel case is, perhaps, to
+be found in the hairy armadillo, an extremely versatile and
+intelligent animal, although only an edentate. And among birds
+the ypecaha--a large La Plata rail--might also be mentioned as an
+example of what ought not to be; for it is a bold and intelligent
+bird, more than a match for the fowl, both in courage and in
+cunning; and yet it is one of the family which Professor
+Parker--from the point of view of the anatomist--characterizes as
+a "feeble-minded, cowardly group."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER XXI.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">THE DYING
+HUANACO.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">LEST any one should
+misread the title to this chapter, I hasten to say that the
+huanaco, or guanaco as it is often spelt, is not a perishing
+species; nor, as things are, is it likely to perish soon, despite
+the fact that civilized men, Britons especially, are now
+enthusiastically engaged in the extermination of all the nobler
+mammalians:--a very glorious crusade, the triumphant conclusion
+of which will doubtless be witnessed by the succeeding
+generation, more favoured in this respect than ours. The huanaco,
+happily for it, exists in a barren, desolate region, in its
+greatest part waterless and uninhabitable to human beings; and
+the chapter-heading refers to a singular instinct of the dying
+animals, in very many cases allowed, by the exceptional
+conditions in which they are placed, to die naturally.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">And first, a few
+words about its place in nature and general habits. The huanaco
+is a small camel--small, that is, compared with its existing
+relation--without a hump, and, unlike the camel of the Old World,
+non-specializad; doubtless it is a very ancient animal on the
+earth, and for all we know to the contrary, may have existed
+contemporaneously with some of the earliest known representatives
+of the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> 315</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">camel type, whose
+remains occur in the lower and upper miocene
+deposits--Poebrotherium, Protolabis, Procamelus, Pliauchenia, and
+Macrauchenia. It ranges from Tierra del Fuego and the adjacent
+islands, northwards over the whole of Patagonia, and along the
+Andes into Peru and Bolivia. On the great mountain chain it is
+both a wild and a domestic animal, since the llama, the beast of
+burden of the ancient Peruvians, is no doubt only a variety: but
+as man's slave it has changed so greatly from the original form
+that some naturalists have regarded the llama as a distinct
+species, which, like the camel of the East, exists only in a
+domestic state. It has had time enough to vary, as it is more
+than probable that the tamed and useful animal was inherited by
+the children of the sun from races and nations that came before
+them: and how far back Andean civilization extends may be
+inferred from the belief expressed by the famous American
+archaeologist, Squiers, that the ruined city of Tiahuanaco, in
+the vicinity of Lake Titicaca, is as old as Thebes and the
+Pyramids.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">It is, however, with
+the wild animal, the huanaco, that I am concerned. A full-grown
+male measures seven to eight feet in length, and four feet high
+to the shoulder; it is well clothed in a coat of thick woolly
+hair, of a pale reddish colour, Longest and palest on the under
+parts. In appearance it is very unlike the camel, in spite of the
+long legs and neck; in its finely-shaped head and long ears, and
+its proud and graceful carriage, it resembles an antelope rather
+than its huge and, from an aesthetic point of view, deformed
+Asiatic relation. In habits</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">316 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">it is gregarious,
+and is usually seen in small herds, but herds numbering several
+hundreds or even a thousand are occasionally met with on the
+stony, desolate plateaus of Southern Patagonia; but the huanaco
+is able to thrive and grow fat where almost any other herbivore
+would starve. While the herd feeds one animal acts as sentinel,
+stationed on the hillside, and on the appearance of danger utters
+a shrill neigh of alarm, and instantly all take to flight. But
+although excessively shy and wary they are also very inquisitive,
+and have enough intelligence to know that a single horseman can
+do them no harm, for they will not only approach to look closely
+at him, but will sometimes follow him for miles. They are also
+excitable, and at times indulge in strange freaks. Darwin
+writes:--"On the mountains of Tierra del Fuego I have more than
+once seen a huanaco, on being approached, not only neigh and
+squeal, but prance and leap about in a most ridiculous manner,
+apparently in defiance as a challenge." And Captain King relates
+that while sailing into Port Desire he witnessed a chase of a
+huanaco after a fox, both animals evidently going at their
+greatest speed, so that they soon passed out of sight. I have
+known some tame huanacos, and in that state they make amusing
+intelligent pets, fond of being caressed, but often so frolicsome
+and mischievous as to be a nuisance to their master. It is well
+known that at the southern extremity of Patagonia the huanacos
+have a dying place, a spot to which all individuals inhabiting
+the surrounding plains repair at the approach of death to deposit
+their bones. Darwin and Fitzroy first recorded</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> <b>317</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">this strange
+instinct in their personal narratives, and their observations
+have since been fully confirmed by others. The best known of
+these dying or burial-places are on the banks of the Santa Cruz
+and Gallegos rivers, where the river valleys are covered with
+dense primeval thickets of bushes and trees of stunted growth;
+there the ground is covered with the bones of countless dead
+generations. "The animals," says Darwin, "in most cases must have
+crawled, before dying, beneath and among the bushes." A strange
+instinct in a creature so preeminently social in its habits; a
+dweller all its life long on the open, barren plateaus and
+mountain sides! What a subject for a painter! The grey wilderness
+of dwarf thorn trees, aged and grotesque and scanty-leaved,
+nourished for a thousand years on the bones that whiten the stony
+ground at their roots; the interior lit faintly with the rays of
+the departing sun, chill and grey, and silent and motionless--the
+huanacos' Golgotha. In the long centuries, stretching back into a
+dim immeasurable past, so many of this race have journeyed hither
+from the mountain and the plain to suffer the sharp pang of
+death, that, to the imagination, something of it all seems to
+have passed into that hushed and mournful nature. And now one
+more, the latest pilgrim, has come, all his little strength spent
+in his struggle to penetrate the close thicket; looking old and
+gaunt and ghostly in the twilight; with long ragged hair; staring
+into the gloom out of death-dimmed sunken eyes. England has one
+artist who might show it to us on canvas, who would be able to
+catch the feeling of such a scene--of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">318 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">that mysterious,
+passionless tragedy of nature--I refer to J. M. Swan, the painter
+of the "Prodigal Son" and the "Lioness Defending her
+Cubs."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">To his account of
+the animal's dying place and instinct, Darwin adds: "I do not at
+all understand the reason of this, but I may observe that the
+wounded huanacos at the Santa Cruz invariably walked towards the
+river."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It would, no doubt,
+be rash to affirm of any instinct that it is absolutely unique;
+but, putting aside some doubtful reports about a custom of the
+Asiatic elephant, which may have originated in the account of
+Sindbad the Sailor's discovery of an elephant's burial place, we
+have no knowledge of an instinct similar to that of the huanaco
+in any other animal. So far as we know, it stands alone and
+apart, with nothing in the actions of other species leading up,
+or suggesting any family likeness to it. But what chiefly
+attracts the mind to it is its strangeness. It looks, in fact,
+less like an instinct of one of the inferior creatures than the
+superstitious observance of human beings, who have knowledge of
+death, and believe in a continued existence after dissolution; of
+a triba that in past times had conceived the idea that the
+liberated spirit is only able to find its way to its future abode
+by starting at death from the ancient dying-place of the tribe or
+family, and thence moving westward, or skyward, or underground,
+over the well-worn immemorial track, invisible to material
+eyes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">But, although alone
+among animal instincts-in its strange and useless purpose--for it
+is as absolutely useless to the species or race as to the dying
+individual</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-25.jpg" alt="h1-25.jpg" class="c42">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font11">THE DYING
+HUANACO.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font11">[Page 3!8.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> 319</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">--it is not the
+only useless instinct we know of: there are many others, both
+simple and complex; and of such instincts we believe, with good
+reason, that they once played an important part in the life of
+the species, and were only rendered useless by changes in the
+condition of life, or in the organism, or in both. In other
+words, when the special conditions that gave them value no longer
+existed, the correlated and perfect instinct was not, in these
+cases, eradicated, but remained, in abeyance and still capable of
+being called into activity by a new and false stimulus simulating
+the old and true. Viewed in this way, the huanaco's instinct
+might be regarded as something remaining to the animal from a
+remote past, not altogether unaffected by time perhaps; and like
+some ceremonial usage among men that has long ceased to have any
+significance, or like a fragment of ancient history, or a
+tradition, which in the course of time has received some new and
+false interpretation. The false interpretation, to continue the
+metaphor, is, in this case, that the <i>purpose</i> of the animal
+in going to a certain spot, to which it has probably never
+previously resorted, is to die there. A false interpretation,
+because, in the first place, it is incredible that an instinct of
+no advantage to the species, in its struggle for existence and
+predominance should arise and become permanent; and, in the
+second place, it is equally incredible that it could ever have
+been to the advantage of the species or race to, have a dying
+place. We must, then, suppose that there is in the sensations
+preceding death, when death comes slowly, some resemblance to the
+sensations experi-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">320 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">enced by the animal
+at a period when its curious instinct first took form and
+crystallized; these would be painful sensations that threatened
+life; and freedom from them, and safety to the animal, would only
+exist in a certain well-remembered spot. Further, we might assume
+that it was at first only the memory of a few individuals that
+caused the animals to seek the place of safety; that a habit was
+thus formed; that in time this traditional habit became
+instinctive, so that the animals, old and young, made their way
+unerringly to the place of refuge whenever the old danger
+returned. And such an instinct, slowly matured and made perfect
+to enable this animal to escape extinction during periods of
+great danger to mammalian life, lasting hundreds or even
+thousands of years, and destructive of numberless other species
+less hardy and adaptive than the generalized huanaco, might well
+continue to exist, to be occasionally called into life by a false
+stimulus, for many centuries after it had ceased to be of any
+advantage.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Once we accept this
+explanation as probable--namely, that the huanaco, in withdrawing
+from the herd to drop down and die in the ancient dying ground,
+is in reality only seeking an historically remembered place of
+refuge, and not of death--the action of the animal loses much of
+its mysterious character; we come on to firm ground, and find
+that we are no longer considering an instinct absolutely unique,
+with no action or instinct in any other animal leading up or
+suggesting any family likeness to it, as I said before. We find,
+in fact, that there is at least one very important and
+very</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> 321</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">well-known instinct
+in another class of creatures, which has a strong resemblance to
+that of the huanaco, as I have interpreted it, and which may even
+serve to throw a side light on the origin of the huanaco's
+instinct. I refer to a habit of some ophidians, in temperate and
+cold countries, of returning annually to hybernate in the saine
+den.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">A typical instance
+is that of the rattlesnake in the colder parts of North America.
+On the approach of winter these reptiles go into hiding, and it
+has been observed that in some districts a very large number of
+individuals, hundreds, and even thousands, will repair from the
+surrounding country to the ancestral den. Here the serpents
+gather in a mass to remain in a wholly or semi-torpid condition
+until the return of spring brings them out again, to scatter
+abroad to their usual summer haunts. Clearly in this case the
+knowledge of the hyberna-ting den is not merely traditional--that
+is, handed down from generation to generation, through the young
+each year following the adults, and so forming the habit of
+repairing at certain seasons to a certain place; for the young
+serpent soon abandons its parent to lead an independent life; and
+on the approach of cold weather the hybernating den may be a long
+distance away, ten or twenty, or even thirty miles from the spot
+in which it was born. The annual return to the hybernating den is
+then a fixed unalterable instinct, like the autumnal migration of
+some birds to a warmer latitude. It is doubtless favourable to
+the serpents to hybernate in large numbers massed together; and
+the habit of resorting annually to the same spot once
+formed,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">322 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">we can imagine that
+the individuals--perhaps a single couple in the first
+place--frequenting some very deep, dry, and well-sheltered
+cavern, safe from enemies, would have a great advantage over
+others of their race; that they would be stronger and increase
+more, and spread during the summer months further and further
+from the cavern on all sides; and that the further afield they
+went the more would the instinct be perfected; since all the
+young serpents that did not have the instinct of returning
+unerringly to the ancestral refuge, and that, like the outsiders
+of their race, to put it in that way, merely crept into the first
+hole they found on the approach of the cold season, would be more
+liable to destruction. Probably most snakes get killed long
+before a natural decline sets in; to say that not one in a
+thousand dies of old age would probably be no exaggeration; but
+if they were as safe from enemies and accidents as some less
+prolific and more highly-organized animals, so that many would
+reach the natural term of life, and death came slowly, we can
+imagine that in such a heat-loving creature the failure of the
+vital powers would simulate the sensations caused by a falling
+temperature, and cause the old or sick serpent, even in
+midsummer, to creep instinctively away to the ancient refuge,
+where many a long life-killing frost had been safely tided over
+in the past.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The huanaco has
+never been a hybernating animal; but we must assume that, like
+the crotalus of the north, he had formed a habit of congregating
+with his fellows at certain seasons at the same spot;</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> 323</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">further, that these
+were seasons of suffering to the animal--the suffering, or
+discomfort and danger, having in the first place given rise to
+the habit. Assuming again that the habit had existed so long as
+to become, like that of the reptile, a fixed, immutable instinct,
+a hereditary knowledge, so that the young huanacos, untaught by
+the adults, would go alone and unerringly to the meeting-place
+from any distance, it is but an easy step to the belief, that
+after the conditions had changed, and the refuges were no longer
+needed, this instinctive knowledge would still exist in them, and
+that they would take the old road when stimulated by the pain of
+a wound; or the miserable sensations experienced in disease or
+during the decay of the life-energy, when the senses grow dim,
+and the breath fails, and the blood is thin and cold.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I presume that most
+persons who have observed animals a great deal have met with
+cases in which the animal has acted automatically, or
+instinctively, when the stimulus has been a false one. I will
+relate one such case, observed by myself, and which strikes me as
+being apposite to the question I am considering. It must be
+premised that this is an instance of an acquired habit; but this
+does not affect my argument, since I have all along assumed that
+the huanaco--a highly sagacious species in the highest class of
+vertebrates--first acquired a habit from experience of seeking a
+remembered refuge, and that such habit was the parent, as it
+were, or the first clay model, of the perfect and indestructible
+instinct that was to be.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is not an
+uncommon thing in the Argentino</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Y 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">324 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">pampas--I have on
+two occasions witnessed it myself--for a riding-horse to come
+home, or to the gate of his owner's house, to die. I am speaking
+of riding-horses that are never doctored, nor treated mercifully;
+that look on their master as an enemy rather than a friend;
+horses that live out in the open, and have to be hunted to the
+corral or enclosure, or roughly captured with a lasso as they
+run, when their services are required. I retain a very vivid
+recollection of the first occasion of witnessing an action of
+this kind in a horse, although I was only a boy at the time. On
+going out one summer evening I saw one of the horses of the
+establishment standing unsaddled and unbridled leaning his head
+over the gate. Going to the spot, I stroked his nose, and then,
+turning to an old native who happened to be near, asked him what
+could be the meaning of such a thing. "I think he is going to
+die," he answered; "horses often come to the house to die." And
+next morning the poor beast was found lying dead not twenty yards
+from the gate; although he had not appeared ill when I stroked
+his nose on the previous evening; but when I saw him lying there
+dead, and remembered the old native's words, it seemed to me as
+marvellous and inexplicable that a horse should act in that way,
+as if some wild creature--a rhea, a fawn, or dolichotes--had come
+to exhale his last breath at the gates of his enemy and constant
+persecutor, man.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">I now believe that
+the sensations of sickness and approaching death in the
+riding-horse of the pampas resemble or similate the pains, so
+often experienced, of hunger, thirst and fatigue
+combined,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> 325</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">together with the
+oppressive sensations caused by the ponderous native saddle, or
+recado, with its huge surcingle of raw hide drawn up so tightly
+as to hinder free respiration. The suffering animal remembers how
+at the last relief invariably came, when the twelve or fifteen
+hours' torture were over, the toil and the want, and when the
+great iron bridle and ponderous gear were removed, and he had
+freedom and food and drink and rest. At the gate or at the door
+of his master's house, the sudden relief had always come to him;
+and there does he sometimes go in his sickness, his fear
+overmastered by his suffering, to find it again.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Discussing this
+question with a friend, who has a subtle mind and great
+experience of the horse in semi-barbarous countries, and of many
+other animals, wild and tame, in many regions of the globe, he
+put forward a different explanation of the action of the horse in
+coming home to die, which he thinks simpler and more probable
+than mine. It is, that a dying or ailing animal instinctively
+withdraws itself from its fellows--an action of self-preservation
+in the individual in opposition to the well-known instincts of
+the healthy animals, which impels the whole herd to turn upon and
+persecute the sickly member, thus destroying its chances of
+recovery. The desire of the suffering animal is not only to leave
+its fellows, but to get to some solitary place where they cannot
+follow, or would never find him, to escape at once from a great
+and pressing danger. But on the pastoral pampas, where horses are
+so numerous that on that level, treeless area they are always and
+everywhere visible, no hiding-place</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">326 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">is discoverable. In
+such a case, the animal, goaded by its instinctive fear, turns to
+the one spot that horses avoid; and although that spot has
+hitherto been fearful to him, the old fear is forgotten in the
+present and far more vivid one; the vicinity of his master's
+house represents a solitary place to him, and he seeks it, just
+as the stricken deer seeks the interior of some close forest,
+oblivious for the time, in its anxiety to escape from the herd,
+of the dangers lurking in it, and which he formerly
+avoided.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have not set this
+explanation down merely because it does credit to my friend's
+ingenuity, but because it strikes me that it is the only
+alternative explanation that can be given of the animal's action
+in coming home to die. Another fact concerning the ill-tamed and
+barbarously treated horses of the pampas, which, to my mind,
+strengthens the view I have taken, remains to be mentioned. It is
+not an uncommon thing for one of these horses, after escaping,
+saddled and bridled, and wandering about for anight or night and
+day on the plains, to return of its own accord to the house. It
+is clear that in a case of this kind the animal comes home to
+seek relief. I have known one horse that always had to be hunted
+like a wild animal to be caught, and that invariably after being
+saddled tried to break loose, to return in this way to the gate
+after wandering about, saddled and bridled, for over twenty hours
+in uncomfortable freedom.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The action of the
+riding-horse returning to a master he is accustomed to fly from,
+as from an enemy, to be released of saddle and bridle, is, no
+doubt more intelligent than that of the dying horse</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Dying
+Huanaco.</i> 327</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">coming home to be
+relieved from his sufferings, but the motive is the same in both
+cases; at the gate the only pain the animal has ever experienced
+has invariably begun, and there it has ended, and when the spur
+of some new pain afflicts him--new and yet like the old--it is to
+the well-remembered hated gate that it urges him.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">To return to the
+huanaco. After tracing the dying instinct back to its
+hypothetical origin--namely, a habit acquired by the animal in
+some past period of seeking refuge from some kind of pain and
+danger at a certain spot, it is only natural to speculate a
+little further as to the nature of that danger and of the
+conditions the animal existed in.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">If the huanaco is as
+old on the earth as its antique generalized form have led
+naturalists to suppose, we can well believe that it has survived
+not only a great many lost mammalian types, but many changes in
+the conditions of its life. Let us then imagine that at some
+remote period a change took place in the climate of Patagonia,
+and that it became colder and colder, owing to some cause
+affecting only that portion of the antarctic region; such a
+cause, for instance, as a great accumulation of icebergs on the
+northern shores of the antarctic continent, extending century by
+century until a large portion of the now open sea became blocked
+up with solid ice. If the change was gradual and the snow became
+deeper each winter and lasted longer, an intelligent, gregarious,
+and exceedingly hardy and active animal like the huanaco, able to
+exist on the driest woody fibres, would stand the beat chance of
+maintaining its existence in such altered conditions,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21">328 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">and would form new
+habits to meet the new danger. One would be that at the approach
+of a period of deep snow and deadly cold, all the herds
+frequenting one place would gather together at the most
+favourable spots in the river valleys, where the vegetation is
+dense and some food could be had while the surrounding country
+continued covered with deep snow. They would, in fact, make
+choice of exactly such localities as are now used for dying
+places. There they would be sheltered from the cutting-winds, the
+twigs and bark would supply them with food, the warmth from a
+great many individuals massed together would serve to keep the
+snow partially melted under foot, and would prevent their being
+smothered, while the stiff and closely interlaced branches would
+keep a roof of snow above them, and thus protected they would
+keep alive until the return of mild weather released them. In the
+course of many generations all weakly animals, and all in which
+the habit of seeking the refuge at the proper time was weak or
+uncertain in its action would perish, but their loss would be an
+advantage to the survivors.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is worthy of
+remark that it is only at the southern extremity of Patagonia
+that the huanacos have dying places. In Northern Patagonia, and
+on the Chilian and Peruvian Andes no such instinct has been
+observed.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER
+XXII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">THE STRANGE INSTINCTS
+OF CATTLE.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">MY purpose in this
+paper is to discuss a group of curious and useless emotional
+instincts of social animals, which have not yet been properly
+explained. Excepting two of the number, placed first and last in
+the list, they are not related in their origin; consequently they
+are here grouped together arbitrarily, only for the reason that
+we are very familiar with them on account of their survival in
+our domestic animals, and because they are, as I have said,
+useless; also because they resemble each other, among the
+passions and actions of the lower animals, in their effect on our
+minds. This is in all cases unpleasant, and sometimes exceedingly
+painful, as when species that rank next to ourselves in their
+developed intelligence and organized societies, such as
+elephants, monkeys, dogs, and cattle, are seen under the
+domination of impulses, in some cases resembling insanity, and in
+others simulating the darkest passions of man.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">These instincts
+are:--</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">(1) The excitement
+caused by the smell of blood, noticeable in horses and cattle
+among our domestic animals, and varying greatly in degree, from
+an</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">330 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">emotion so slight
+as to be scarcely perceptible to the greatest extremes of rage or
+terror.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">(2) The angry
+excitement roused in some animals when a scarlet or bright-red
+cloth is shown to them. So well known is this apparently insane
+instinct in our cattle that it has given rise to a proverb and
+metaphor familiar in a variety of forms to everyone.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">(3) The persecution
+of a sick or weakly animal by its companions.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">(4) The sudden
+deadly fury that seizes on the herd or family at the sight of a
+companion in extreme distress. Herbivorous mammals at such times
+will trample and gore the distressed one to death. In the case of
+wolves, and other savage-tempered carnivorous species, the
+distressed fellow is frequently torn to pieces and devoured on
+the spot.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">To take the first
+two together. When we consider that blood is red; that the smell
+of it is, or may be, or has been, associated with that vivid hue
+in the animal's mind; that blood, seen and smelt is, or has been,
+associated with the sight of wounds and with cries of pain and
+rage or terror from the wounded or captive animal, there appears
+at first sight to be some reason for connecting these two
+instinctive passions as having the same origin--namely, terror
+and rage caused by the sight of a member of the herd struck down
+and bleeding, or struggling for life in the grasp of an enemy. I
+do not mean to say that such an image is actually present in the
+animal's mind, but that the inherited or instinctive passion is
+one in kind and in its work-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 331</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">ing with the
+passion of the animal when experience and reason were its
+guides.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">But the more I
+consider the point the more am I inclined to regard these two
+instincts as separate in their origin, although I retain the
+belief that cattle and horses and several wild animals are
+violently excited by the smell of blood for the reason just
+given--namely, their inherited memory associates the smell of
+blood with the presence among them of some powerful enemy that
+threatens their life. To this point I shall return when dealing
+with the last and most painful of the instincts I am
+considering.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The following
+incident will show how violently this blood passion sometimes
+affects cattle, when they are permitted to exist in a half-wild
+condition, as on the pampas. I was out with my gun one day, a few
+miles from home, when I came across a patch on the ground where
+the grass was pressed or trodden down and stained with blood. I
+concluded that some thievish gauchos had slaughtered a fat cow
+there on the previous night, and, to avoid detection, had somehow
+managed to carry the whole of it away on their horses. As I
+walked on, a herd of cattle, numbering about three hundred,
+appeared moving slowly on towards a small stream a mile away;
+they were travelling in a thin long line, and would pass the
+blood-stained spot at a distance of seven to eight hundred yards,
+but the wind from it would blow across their track. When the
+tainted wind struck the leaders of the herd they instantly stood
+still, raising their heads, then broke out into loud excited
+bellowings;</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">332 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">and finally turning
+they started off at a fast trot, following up the scent in a
+straight line, until they arrived at the place where one of their
+kind had met its death. The contagion spread, and before long all
+the cattle were congregated on the fatal spot, and began moving
+round in a dense mass, bellowing continually.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It may be remarked
+here that the animal has a peculiar language on occasions like
+this; it emits a succession of short bellowing cries, like
+excited exclamations, followed by a very loud cry, alternately
+sinking into a hoarse murmur, and rising to a kind of scream that
+grates harshly on the sense. Of the ordinary "cow-music" I am a
+great admirer, and take as much pleasure in it as in the cries
+and melody of birds and the sound of the wind in trees; but this
+performance of cattle excited by the smell of blood is most
+distressing to hear.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The animals that had
+forced their way into the centre of the mass to the spot where
+the blood was, pawed the earth, and dug it up with their horns,
+and trampled each other down in their frantic excitement. It was
+terrible to see and hear them. The action of those on the border
+of the living mass in perpetually moving round in a circle with
+dolorous bellowings, was like that of the women in an Indian
+village when a warrior dies, and all night they shriek and howl
+with simulated grief, going round and round the dead man's hut in
+an endless procession.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The "bull and red
+rag" instinct, as it may be called, comes next in
+order.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 333</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">It is a familiar
+fact that brightness in itself powerfully attracts most if not
+all animals. The higher mammalians are affected in the same way
+as birds and insects, although not in the same degree. This fact
+partly explains the rage of the bull. A scarlet flag fluttering
+in the wind or lying on the grass attracts his attention
+powerfully, as it does that of other animals; but though curious
+about the nature of the bright object, it does not anger him. His
+anger is excited--and this is the whole secret of the
+matter--when the colour is flaunted by a man; when it forces him
+to fix his attention on a man, i.e. an animal of another species
+that rules or drives him, and that he fears, but with only a
+slight fear, which may at any moment be overcome by his naturally
+bold aggressive disposition, Not only does the vivid colour
+compel him to fix his attention on the being that habitually
+interferes with his liberty, and is consequently regarded with
+unfriendly eyes, but it also produces the illusion on his mind
+that the man is near him, that he is approaching him in an
+aggressive manner: it is an insult, a challenge, which, being of
+so explosive a temper, he is not slow to accept.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">On the pampas I was
+once standing with some gauchos at the gate of a corral into
+which a herd of half-wild cattle had just been driven. One of the
+men, to show his courage and agility, got off his horse and
+boldly placed himself in the centre of the open gate. His action
+attracted the attention of one of the nearest cows, and lowering
+her horns she began watching him in a threatening manner. He then
+suddenly displayed the scarlet lining of his</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">334 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">poncho, and
+instantly she charged him furiously: with a quick movement to one
+side he escaped her horns, and after we had driven her back,
+resumed his former position and challenged her again in the same
+way. The experiment was repeated not less than half a dozen
+times, and always with the same result. The cattle were all in a
+savage temper, and would have instantly charged him on his
+placing himself before them on foot without the display of
+scarlet cloth, but their fear of the mounted men, standing with
+lassos in their hand on either side of him, kept them in check.
+But whenever the attention of any one individual among them was
+forcibly drawn to him by the display of vivid colour, and fixed
+on him alone, the presence of the horsemen was forgotten and fear
+was swallowed by rage. It is a fact, I think, that most animals
+that exhibit angry excitement when a scarlet rag is flourished
+aggressively at them, are easily excited to anger at all times.
+Domestic geese and turkeys may be mentioned among birds: they do
+not fly at a grown person, but they will often fly at a child
+that challenges them in this way; and it is a fact that they do
+not at any time fear a child very much and will sometimes attack
+him without being challenged. I think that the probability of the
+view I have taken is increased by another fact--namely, that the
+sudden display of scarlet colour sometimes affects timid animals
+with an extreme fear, just as, on the other hand, it excites
+those that are bold and aggressive to anger. Domestic sheep,
+forinstance, that vary greatly in disposition in different races
+or breeds, and even in different individuals, may be</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 335</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">affected in the two
+opposite ways, some exhibiting extreme terror and others only
+anger at a sudden display of scarlet colour by the shepherd or
+herder.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The persecution of a
+sick animal by its companions comes next under
+consideration.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It will have been
+remarked, with surprise by some readers, no doubt, that I have
+set down as two different instincts this persecution of a sick or
+weakly individual by its fellows, and the sudden deadly rage that
+sometimes impels the herd to turn upon and destroy a wounded or
+distressed companion. It is usual for writers on the instincts of
+animals to speak of them as one: and I presume that they regard
+this sudden deadly rage of several individuals against a
+companion as merely an extreme form of the common persecuting
+instinct or impulse. They are not really one, but are as distinct
+in origin and character as it is possible for any two instincts
+to be. The violent and fatal impulse starts simultaneously into
+life and action, and is contagious, affecting all the members of
+the herd like a sudden madness. The other is neither violent nor
+contagious: the persecution is intermittent: it is often confined
+to one or to a very few members of the herd, and seldom joined in
+by the chief member, the leader or head to whom all the others
+give way.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Concerning this head
+of the herd, or flock, or pack, it is necessary to say something
+more. Some gregarious animals, particularly birds, live together
+in the most perfect peace and amity; and here no leader is
+required, because in their long association together as a species
+in flocks, they have attained to a oneness of mind, so to speak,
+which causes them</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">336 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">to move or rest, and
+to act at all times harmoniously together, as if controlled and
+guided by an extrane-ous force. I may mention that the kindly
+instinct in animals, which is almost universal between male and
+female in the vertebrates, is most apparent in these harmoniously
+acting birds. Thus, in La Plata, I have remarked, in more than
+one species, that a lame or sick individual, unable to keop pace
+with the flock and find its food, has not only been waited for,
+but in some cases some of the flock have constantly attended it,
+keeping close to it both when flying and on the ground; and, I
+have no doubt, feeding it just as they would have fed their
+young.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Naturally among such
+kinds no one member is of more consideration than another. But
+among mammals such equality and harmony is rare. The instinct of
+one and all is to lord it over the others, with the result that
+one more powerful or domineering gets the mastery, to keep it
+thereafter as long as he can. The lower animals are, in this
+respect, very much like us; and in all kinds that are at all
+fierce-tempered the mastery of one over all, and of a few under
+him over the others, is most salutary; indeed, it is
+inconceivable that they should be able to exist together under
+any other system.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">On cattle-breeding
+establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to keep a large
+number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these animals a
+great deal, and presume that they are very much like feral dogs
+and wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but
+when a fight begins the head of the pack as a rule rushes to
+the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 337</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">spot, whereupon the
+fighters separate and march off in different directions, or else
+cast themselves down and deprecate their tyrant's wrath with
+abject gestures and whines. If the combatants are both strong and
+have worked themselves into a mad rage before their head puts in
+an appearance, it may go hard with him: they know him no longer,
+and all he can do is to join in the fray; then, if the fighters
+turn on him, he may be so injured that his power is gone, and the
+next best dog in the pack takes his place. The hottest contests
+are always between dogs that are well matched; neither will give
+place to the other, and so they fight it out; but from the
+foremost in strength and power down to the weakest there is a
+gradation of authority; each one knows just how far he can go,
+which companion he can bully when he is in a bad temper or wishes
+to assert himself, and to which he must humbly yield in his turn.
+In such a state the weakest one must always yield to all the
+others, and cast himself down, seeming to call himself a slave
+and worshipper of any other member of the pack that chooses to
+snarl at him, or command him to give up his bone with a good
+grace.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">This masterful or
+domineering temper, so common among social mammals, is the cause
+of the persecution of the sick and weakly. When an animal begins
+to ail he can no longer hold his own; he ceases to resent the
+occasional ill-natured attacks made on him; his non-combative
+condition is quickly discovered, and he at once drops down to a
+place below the lowest; it is common knowledge</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17">2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">338 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">in the herd that he
+may be buffeted with impunity by all, even by those that have
+hitherto suffered buffets but have given none. But judging from
+my own observation, this persecution, is not, as a rule, severe,
+and is seldom fatal.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It is often the case
+that a sick or injured animal withdraws and hides himself from
+the herd; the instinct of the "stricken deer" this might be
+called. But I do not think that we need assume that the ailing
+individual goes away to escape the danger of being ill-used by
+his companions. He is sick and drooping and consequently unfit to
+be with the healthy and vigorous; that is the simplest and
+probably the true explanation of his action; although in some
+cases he might be driven from them by persistent rough usage.
+However peaceably gregarious mammals may live together, and
+however fond of each other's company they may be, they do not, as
+a rule, treat each other gently. Furthermore, their games are
+exceedingly rough and require that they shall be in a vigorous
+state of health to escape injury. Horned animals have no buttons
+to the sharp weapons they prod and strike each other with in a
+sportive spirit. I have often witnessed the games of wild and
+half-wild horses with astonishment; for it seemed that broken
+bones must result from the sounding kicks they freely bestowed on
+one another. This roughness itself would be a sufficient cause
+for the action of the individual, sick and out of tune and
+untouched by the glad contagion of the others, in escaping from
+them; and to leave them would be to its advantage (and to that of
+the race) since, if not fatally injured or sick unto death,
+its</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 339</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">chances of recovery
+to perfect health would be thereby greatly increased.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It remains now to
+speak of that seemingly most cruel of instincts which stands last
+on my list. It is very common among gregarious animals that are
+at all combative in disposition, and still survives in our
+domestic cattle, although very rarely witnessed in England. My
+first experience of it was just before I had reached the age of
+five years. I was not at that early period trying to find out any
+of nature's secrets, but the scene I witnessed printed itself
+very vividly on my mind, so that I can recall it as well as if my
+years had been five-and-twenty; perhaps better. It was on a
+summer's evening, and I was out by myself at some distance from
+the house, playing about the high exposed roots of some old
+trees; on the other side of the trees the cattle, just returned
+from pasture, were gathered on the bare level ground. Hearing a
+great commotion among them, I climbed on to one of the high
+exposed roots, and, looking over, saw a cow on the ground,
+apparently unable to rise, moaning and bellowing in a distressed
+way, while a number of her companions were crowding round and
+goring her.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">What is the meaning of
+such an instinct? Darwin has but few words on the subject. "Can
+we believe," he says, in his posthumous <i>Essay on Instinct,
+"</i>when a wounded herbivorous animal returns to its own herd
+and is then attacked and gored, that this cruel and very common
+instinct is of any service to the species?" At the same time, he
+hints that such an instinct might in some circumstances be
+useful, and his hint has been developed into the current
+belief</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font4">340</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">among naturalists on
+the subject. Here it is, in Dr. Romanes' words: "We may readily
+imagine that the instinct displayed by many herbivorous animals
+of goring sick and wounded companions, is really of use in
+countries where the presence of weak members in a herd is a
+source of danger to the herd from the prevalence of wild beasts."
+Here it is assumed that the sick are set upon and killed, but
+this is not the fact; sickness and decay from age or some other
+cause are slow things, and increase imperceptibly, so that the
+sight of a drooping member grows familiar to the herd, as does
+that of a member with some malformation, or unusual shade of
+colour, or altogether white, as in the case of an
+albino.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Sick and weak
+members, as we have seen, while subject to some ill-treatment
+from their companions (only because they can be ill-treated with
+impunity), do not rouse the herd to a deadly animosity; the
+violent and fatal attack is often as not made on a member in
+perfect health and vigour and unwounded, although, owing to some
+accident, in great distress, and perhaps danger, at the
+moment.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The instinct is,
+then, not only useless but actually detrimental; and, this being
+so, the action of the herd in destroying one of its members is
+not even to be regarded as an instinct proper, but rather as an
+aberration of an instinct, a blunder, into which animals
+sometimes fall when excited to action in unusual
+circumstances.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The first thing that
+strikes us is that in these wild abnormal moments of social
+animals, they are acting in violent contradiction to the whole
+tenor of their lives; that in turning against a
+distressed</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle,</i> 341</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">fellow they oppose
+themselves to the law of their being, to the whole body of
+instincts, primary and secondary, and habits, which have made it
+possible for them to exist together in communities. It is, I
+think, by reflecting on the abnormal character of such an action
+that we are led to a true interpretation of this "dark saying of
+Nature."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Every one is
+familiar with Bacon's famous passage about the dog, and the noble
+courage which that animal puts on when "maintained by a man; who
+is to him in place of a God, or <i>melior natura;</i> which
+courage is manifestly such as that creature, without the
+confidence of a better nature than its own, could never attain."
+Not so. The dog is a social animal, and acts instinctively in
+concert with his fellows; and the courage he manifests is of the
+family, not the individual. In the domestic state the man he is
+accustomed to associate with and obey stands to him in the place
+of the controlling pack, and to his mind, which is canine and not
+human, <i>is</i> the pack. A similar "noble courage," greatly
+surpassing that exhibited on all other occasions, is displayed by
+an infinite number of mammals and birds of gregarious habits,
+when repelling the attacks of some powerful and dangerous enemy,
+or when they rush to the rescue of one of their captive fellows.
+Concerning this rage and desperate courage of social animals in
+the face of an enemy, we see (1) that it is excited by the
+distressed cries, or by the sight of a member of the herd or
+family dying from or struggling in the clutches of an enemy; (2)
+that it affects animals when a number af individuals are
+together, and is eminently con-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">342 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">tagious, like fear,
+that communicates itself, quick as lightning, from one to another
+until all are in a panic, and like the joyous emotion that impels
+the members of a herd or flock to rush simultaneously into
+play.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Now, it is a pretty
+familiar fact that animals acting instinctively, as well as men
+acting intelligently, have at times their delusions and their
+illusions, and see things falsely, and are moved to action by a
+false stimulus to their own disadvantage. When the individuals of
+a herd or family are excited to a sudden deadly rage by the
+distressed cries of one of their fellows, or by the sight of its
+bleeding wounds and the smell of its blood, or when they see it
+frantically struggling on the ground, or in the cleft of a tree
+or rock, as if in the clutches of a powerful enemy, they do not
+turn on it to kill but to rescue it.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In whatever way the
+rescuing instinct may have risen, whether simply through natural
+selection or, as is more probable, through an intelligent habit
+becoming fixed and hereditary, its effectiveness depends
+altogether on the emotion of overmastering rage excited in the
+animal--rage against a tangible visible enemy, or invisible, and
+excited by the cries or struggles of a suffering companion;
+clearly, then, it could not provide against the occasional rare
+accidents that animals meet with, which causes them to act
+precisely in the way they do when seized or struck down by an
+enemy. An illusion is the result of the emotion similar to the
+illusion produced by vivid expectation in ourselves, which has
+caused many a man to see in a friend and companion the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 343</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">adversary he looked
+to see, and to slay him in his false-seeing anger.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">An illusion just as
+great, leading to action equally violent, but ludicrous rather
+than painful to witness, may be seen in dogs, when encouraged by
+a man to the attack, and made by his cries and gestures to expect
+that some animal they are accustomed to hunt is about to be
+unearthed or overtaken; and if, when they are in this
+disposition, he cunningly exhibits and sets them on a dummy, made
+perhaps of old rags and leather and stuffed with straw, they will
+seize, worry, and tear it to pieces with the greatest fury, and
+without the faintest suspicion of its true character.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">That wild elephants
+will attack a distressed fellow seemed astonishing to Darwin,
+when he remembered the case of an elephant after escaping from a
+pit helping its fellow to escape also. But it is precisely the
+animals, high or low in the organic scale, that are social, and
+possess the instinct of helping each other, that will on
+occasions attack a fellow in misfortune--such an attack being no
+more than a blunder of the helping instinct.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Felix de Azara
+records a rather cruel experiment on the temper of some tame rats
+confined in a cage. The person who kept them caught the tail of
+one of the animals and began sharply pinching it, keeping his
+hand concealed under the cage. Its cries of pain and struggles to
+free itself greatly excited the other rats; and after rushing
+wildly round for some moments they flew at their distressed
+companion, and fixing their teeth in its throat quickly
+dispatched it. In this case if the</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">344 <i>The Naturalist m
+La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">hand that held the
+tail had been visible and in the cage, the bites would
+undoubtedly have been inflicted on it; but no enemy was visible;
+yet the fury and impulse to attack an enemy was present in the
+animals. In such circumstances, the excitement must be
+discharged--the instinct obeyed, and in the absence of any other
+object of attack the illusion is produced and it discharges
+itself on the struggling companion. It is sometimes seen in dogs,
+when three or four or five are near together, that if one
+suddenly utters a howl or cry of pain, when no man is near it and
+no cause apparent, the others run to it, and seeing nothing, turn
+round and attack each other. Here the exciting cause--the cry for
+help--is not strong enough to produce the illusion which is
+sometimes fatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly
+thinks that the others, or one of the others, inflicted the
+injury, and his impulse is to take the part of the injured
+animal. If the cry for help--caused perhaps by a sudden cramp or
+the prick of a thorn--is not very sharp or intense, the other
+dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl at each other in
+a suspicious way.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">To go back to
+Azara's anecdote. Why, it may be asked--and this question has
+been put to me in conversation--if killing a distressed companion
+is of no advantage to the race, and if something must be
+attacked--why did not these rats in this instance attack the cage
+they were shut in, and bite at the woodwork and wires? Or, in the
+case related by Mr. Andrew Lang in <i>Longman's Magazine</i> some
+time ago, in which the members of a herd of cattle in Scotland
+turned with sudden amazing fury on</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 345</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">one of the cows that
+had got wedged between two rocks and was struggling with
+distressed bellowings to free itself--why did they not attack the
+prisoning rocks instead of goring their unfortunate comrade to
+death? For it is well known that animals will, on occasions, turn
+angrily upon and attack inanimate objects that cause them injury
+or hinder their freedom of action. And we know that this mythic
+faculty--the mind's projection of itself into visible
+nature--survives in ourselves, that there are exceptional moments
+in our lives when it comes back to us; no one, for instance,
+would be astonished to hear that any man, even a philosopher, had
+angrily kicked away or imprecated a stool or other inanimate
+object against which he had accidentally barked his shins. The
+answer is, that there is no connection between these two
+things--the universal mythic faculty of the mind, and that bold
+and violent instinct of social animals of rushing to the rescue
+of a stricken or distressed companion, which has a definite, a
+narrow, purpose--namely, to fall upon an enemy endowed not merely
+with the life and intelligence common to all things, including
+rocks, trees, and waters, but with animal form and
+motion.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I had intended in
+this place to give other instances, observed in several
+widely-separated species, including monkeys; but it is not
+necessary, as I consider that all the facts, however varied, are
+covered by the theory I have suggested--even a fact I like the
+one mentioned in this chapter of cattle bellowing and madly
+digging up the ground where the blood of one of their kind had
+been spilt: also such a fact as that of wild cattle and
+other</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><b>346</b> <i>The
+Naturalist in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">animals caught in a
+trap or enclosure attacking and destroying each other in their
+frenzy; and the fact that some fierce-tempered carnivorous
+mammals will devour the companion they have killed. It is an
+instinct of animals like wolves and peccaries to devour the enemy
+they have overcome and slain: thus, when the jaguar captures a
+peccary out of a drove, and does not quickly escape with his
+prize into a tree, he is instantly attacked and slain and then
+consumed, even to the skin and boues. This is the wolf's and the
+peccary's instinct; and the devouring of one of their own
+companions is an inevitable consequence of the mistake made in
+the first place of attacking and killing it. In no other
+circumstances, not even when starving, do they prey on their own
+species.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">If the explanation I
+have offered should seem a true or highly probable one, it will,
+I feel sure, prove acceptable to many lovers of animals, who,
+regarding tins seemingly ruthless instinct, not as an aberration
+but as in some vague way advantageous to animals in their
+struggle for existence, are yet unable to think of it without
+pain and horror; indeed, I know those who refuse to think of it
+at all, who would gladly disbelieve it if they could.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">It should be a
+relief to them to be able to look on it no longer as something
+ugly and hateful, a blot on nature, but as an illusion, a
+mistake, an unconscious crime, so to speak, that has for its
+motive the noblest passion that animals know--that sublime
+courage and daring which they exhibit in defence of a distressed
+companion. This fiery spirit in animals, which makes them forget
+their own</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Strange
+Instincts of Cattle.</i> 347</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">safety, moves our
+hearts by its close resemblance to one of the most highly-prized
+human virtues; just as we are moved to intellectual admiration by
+the wonderful migratory instinct in birds that simulates some of
+the highest achievements of the mind of man. And we know that
+this beautiful instinct is also liable to mistakes--that many
+travellers leave us annually never to return. Such a mistake was
+undoubtedly the cause of the late visitation of Pallas'
+sand-grouse: owing perhaps to some unusual atmospheric or dynamic
+condition, or to some change in the nervous system of the birds,
+they deviated widely from their usual route, to scatter in
+countless thousands over the whole of Europe and perish slowly in
+climates not suited to them; while others, overpassing the cold
+strange continent, sped on over colder, stranger seas, to drop at
+last like aerolites, quenching their lives in the
+waves.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Whether because it
+is true, as Professor Freeman and some others will have it, that
+humanity is a purely modern virtue; or because the doctrine of
+Darwin, by showing that we are related to other forms of life,
+that our best feelings have their roots low down in the temper
+and instincts of the social species, has brought us nearer in
+spirit to the inferior animals, it is certain that our regard for
+them has grown, and is growing, and that new facts and fresh
+inferences that make us think more highly of them are
+increasingly welcome.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER
+XXIII.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">HORSE AND
+MAN.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">THERE is no mode of
+progression so delightful as riding on horseback. Walking,
+rowing, bicycling are pleasant exercises in their way, but the
+muscular exertion and constant exercise of judgment they call for
+occupy the mind partly to the exclusion of other things; so that
+a long walk may sometimes be only a long walk and nothing more.
+In riding we are not conscious of exertion, and as for that close
+observation and accurate discernment necessary in traversing the
+ground with speed and safety, it is left to the faithful servant
+that carries us. Pitfalls, hillocks, slippery places, the
+thousand little inequalities of the surface that have to be
+measured with infallible eye, these disturb us little. To fly or
+go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough and smooth alike,
+fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hills without
+climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearest
+approach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster
+bubbles and flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from
+the days of Montgolfier downwards have brought us no nearer to
+it. The aeronaut gasping for breath above the clouds offers only
+a sad spectacle of the imbecility of science and man's</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Horse and Man.</i>
+349</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">shattered hopes. To
+the free inhabitants of air we can only liken the mounted Arab,
+vanishing, hawklike, over the boundless desert.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">In riding there is
+always exhilarating motion; yet, if the scenery encountered be
+charming, you are apparently sitting still, while, river-like, it
+flows toward and past you, ever giving place to fresh visions of
+beauty. Above all, the mind is free, as when one lies idly on the
+grass gazing up into the sky. And, speaking of myself, there is
+even more than this immunity from any tax on the understanding
+such as we require in walking; the rhythmic motion, the sensation
+as of night, acting on the brain like a stimulus. That anyone
+should be able to think better lying, sitting, or standing, than
+when speeding along on horseback, is to me incomprehensible. This
+is doubtless due to early training and long use; for on those
+great pampas where I first saw the light and was taught at a
+tender age to ride, we come to look on man as a parasitical
+creature, fitted by nature to occupy the back of a horse, in
+which position only he has full and free use of all his
+faculties. Possibly the gaucho--the horseman of the pampas--is
+born with this idea in his brain; if so, it would only be
+reasonable to suppose that its correlative exists in a
+modification of structure. Certain it is that an intoxicated
+gaucho lifted on to the back of his horse is perfectly safe in
+his seat. The horse may do his best to rid himself of his burden;
+the rider's legs--or posterior arms as they might appropriately
+be called--retain their iron grip, notwithstanding the fuddled
+brain.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">350</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">The gaucho is more
+or less bow-legged; and, of course, the more crooked his legs
+are, the better for him in his struggle for existence. Off his
+horse his motions are awkward, like those of certain tardigrade
+mammals of arboreal habits when removed from their tree. He
+waddles in his walk;</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-26.jpg" alt="h1-26.jpg" class="c43">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font14"><b>Gancho.</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">his hands feel for
+the reins; his toes turn inwards like a duck's. And here,
+perhaps, we can see why foreign travellers, judging him from
+their own standpoint, invariably bring against him the charge of
+laziness. On horseback he is of all men most active. His patient
+endurance under privations</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Horse and Man.</i>
+351</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">that would drive
+other men to despair, his laborious days and feats of
+horsemanship, the long journeys he performs without rest or food,
+seem to simple dwellers on the surface of the earth almost like
+miracles. Deprive him of his horse, and he can do nothing but sit
+on the ground cross-legged, or <i>en cuclillas,--</i>on his
+heels. You have, to use his own figurative language, cut off his
+feet.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Darwin in his
+earlier years appears not to have possessed the power of reading
+men with that miraculous intelligence always distinguishing his
+researches concerning other and lower orders of beings. In the
+<i>Voyage of a Naturalist,</i> speaking of this supposed
+indolence of the gauchos, he tells that in one place where
+workmen were in great request, seeing a poor gaucho sitting in a
+listless attitude, he asked him why he did not work. The man's
+answer was that <i>he was too poor to work!</i> The philosopher
+was astonished and amused at the reply, but failed to understand
+it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of brief
+phrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned?
+The poor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been
+stolen--a thing of frequent occurrence in that country, or,
+perhaps, that some minion of the Government of the moment had
+seized them for the use of the State.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">To return to the
+starting point, the pleasures of riding do not flow exclusively
+from the agreeable sensations attendant on flight-like motion;
+there is also the knowledge, sweet in itself, that not a mere
+cunningly fashioned machine, like that fabled horse of brass "on
+which the Tartar king did ride,"</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">352 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">sustains us; but a
+something with life and thought, like ourselves, that feels what
+we feel, understands us, and keenly participates in our
+pleasures. Take, for example, the horse on which some quiet old
+country gentleman is accustomed to travel; how soberly and evenly
+he jogs along, picking his way over the ground. But let him fall
+into the hands of a lively youngster, and how soon he picks up a
+frisky spirit! Were horses less plastic, more the creatures of
+custom than they are, it would always be necessary, before buying
+one, to inquire into the disposition of its owner.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">When I was thirteen
+years old I was smitten with love for a horse I once saw--an
+untamable-looking brute, that rolled his eyes, turbulently, under
+a cloud of black mane tumbling over his forehead. I could not
+take my sight off this proud, beautiful creature, and I longed to
+possess him with a great longing. His owner--a worthless
+vagabond, as it happened--marked my enthusiastic admiration, and
+a day or two afterwards, having lost all his money at cards, he
+came to me, offering to sell me the horse. Having obtained my
+father's consent, I rushed off to the man with all the money I
+possessed--about thirty or thirty-five shillings, I believe.
+After some grumbling, and finding he could get no more, he
+accepted the money. My new possession filled me with unbounded
+delight, and I spent the time caressing him and leading him about
+the grounds in search of succulent grasses and choice leaves to
+feed him on. I am sure this horse understood and loved me, for,
+in spite of that savage look, which his eyes never quite
+lost,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Horse and Man,</i>
+353</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">he always displayed a
+singular gentleness towards me. He never attempted to upset me,
+though he promptly threw--to my great delight, I must
+confess--anyone else who ventured to mount him. Probably the
+secret of his conduct was that he hated the whip. Of this
+individual, if not of the species, the celebrated description
+held true:--"The horse is a docile animal, but if you flog him he
+will not do so." After he had been mine a few days, I rode on him
+one morning to witness a cattle-marking on a neighbouring estate.
+I found thirty or forty gauchos on the ground engaged in catching
+and branding the cattle. It was rough, dangerous work, but
+apparently not rough enough to satisfy the men, so after branding
+an animal and releasing him from their lassos, several of the
+mounted gauchos would, purely for sport, endeavour to knock it
+down as it rushed away, by charging furiously on to it. As I sat
+there enjoying the fun, my horse stood very quietly under me,
+also eagerly watching the sport. At length a bull was released,
+and, smarting from the fiery torture, lowered his horns and
+rushed away towards the open plain. Three horsemen in succession
+shot out from the crowd, and charged the bull at full speed; one
+by one, by suddenly swerving his body round, he avoided them, and
+was escaping scot-free. At this moment my horse--possibly
+interpreting a casual touch of my hand on his neck, or some
+movement of my body, as a wish to join in the sport--suddenly
+sprang forward and charged on the flying bull like a thunderbolt,
+striking him full in the middle of his body, and hurling him with
+a tremendous shock to</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">354 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">earth. The stricken
+beast rolled violently over, while my horse stood still as a
+stone watching him. Strange to say, I was not unseated, but,
+turning-round, galloped back, greeted by a shout of applause from
+the spectators--the only sound of that description I have ever
+had the privilege of listening to. They little knew that my horse
+had accomplished the perilous feat without his rider's guidance.
+No doubt he had been accustomed to do such things, and, perhaps,
+for the moment, had forgotten that he had passed into the hands
+of a new owner--one of tender years. He never voluntarily
+attempted an adventure of that kind again; he knew, I suppose,
+that he no longer carried on his back a reckless dare-devil, who
+valued not life. Poor Pic&aacute;so! he was mine till he died. I
+have had scores of horses since, but never one I loved so
+well.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">With the gauchos the
+union between man and horse is not of so intimate a nature as
+with the Indians of the pampas. Horses are too cheap, where a man
+without shoes to his feet may possess a herd of them, for the
+closest kind of friendship to ripen. The Indian has also less
+individuality of character. The immutable nature of the
+conditions he is placed in, and his savage life, which is a
+perpetual chase, bring him nearer to the level of the beast he
+rides. And probably the acquired sagacity of the horse in the
+long co-partnership of centuries has become hereditary, and of
+the nature of an instinct. The Indian horse is more docile, he
+understands his master better; the slightest touch of the hand on
+his neck, which seems to have</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Horse and Man.</i>
+355</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">developed a
+marvellous sensitiveness, is sufficient to guide him. The gaucho
+labours to give his horse "a silken mouth," as he aptly calls it;
+the Indian's horse has it from birth. Occasionally the gaucho
+sleeps in the saddle; the Indian can die on his horse. During
+frontier warfare one hears at times of a dead warrior being found
+and removed with difficulty from the horse that carried him out
+of the fight, and about whose neck his rigid fingers were clasped
+in death. Even in the gaucho country, however, where, I grieve to
+confess, the horse is not deservedly esteemed, there are very
+remarkable instances of equine attachment and fidelity to man,
+and of a fellowship between horse and rider of the closest kind.
+One only I will relate.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">When Rosas, that man
+of "blood and iron," was Dictator of the Argentine country--a
+position which he held for a quarter of a century--desertors from
+the army were inexorably shot when caught, as they generally
+were. But where my boyhood was spent there was a deserter, a man
+named Santa Anna, who for seven years, without ever leaving the
+neighbourhood of his home, succeeded in eluding his pursuers by
+means of the marvellous sagacity and watchful care exercised by
+his horse. When taking his rest on the plain--for he seldom slept
+under a roof--his faithful horse kept guard. At the first sight
+of mounted men on the horizon he would fly to his master, and,
+seizing his cloak between his teeth, rouse him with a vigorous
+shake. The hunted man would start up, and in a moment man and
+horse would vanish into one of the dense reed-beds</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">A a 2</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">350 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Piafa.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">abounding in the
+place, and where no man could follow. I have not space to tell
+more about this horse; but at last, in the fulness of time, when
+the figs were ripe--literally as well as figuratively, for it
+happened in the autumn of the year--the long tyrannous rule
+ended, and Santa Anna came out of the reed-beds, where he had
+lived his wild-animal life, to mix with his fellows. I knew him
+some years later. He was a rather heavy-looking man, with little
+to say, and his reputation for honesty was not good in the place;
+but I dare say there was something good in him.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">Students of nature
+are familiar with the modifying effects of new conditions on man
+and brute. Take, for example, the gaucho: he must every day
+traverse vast distances, see quickly, judge rapidly, be ready at
+all times to encounter hunger and fatigue, violent changes of
+temperature, great and sudden perils. These conditions have made
+him differ widely from the peasant of the Peninsula; he has the
+endurance and keen sight of a wolf, is fertile in expedients,
+quick in action, values human life not at all, and is in pain or
+defeat a Stoic. Unquestionably the horse he rides has also
+suffered a great change. He differs as much from the English
+hunter, for instance, as one animal can well differ from another
+of the same species. He never pounds the earth and wastes his
+energies in vain parade. He has not the dauntless courage that
+performs such brilliant feats in the field, and that often as not
+attempts the impossible. In the chase he husbands all his
+strength, carrying his head low, and almost grazing the ground
+with his hoofs, so that he is not a showy animal. Con-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Horse and Man.</i>
+357</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">stant use, or the
+slow cumulative process of natural selection, has served to
+develop a keenness of sense almost preternatural. The vulture's
+eye, with all the advantage derived from the vulture's vast
+elevation above the scene surveyed, is not so far-reaching as the
+sense of smell in the pampa horse. A common phenomenon on the
+pampas is a sudden migration of the horses of a district to some
+distant place. This occurs in seasons of drought, when grass
+or</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">water fails. The
+horses migrate to some district where, from showers having fallen
+or other circumstances, there is a better supply of food and
+drink. A slight breeze blowing from the more favoured region,
+which may be forty or fifty miles away, or even much further, is
+enough to start them off. Yet, during the scorching days of
+midsummer, very little moisture or smell of grass can possibly
+reach them from such a distance.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Another phenomenon,
+even more striking, is familiar to every frontiersman. For some
+reason, the gaucho horse manifests the greatest terror at an
+Indian invasion. No doubt his fear is, in part at any rate, an
+associate feeling, the coming of the Indians being always a time
+of excitement and com-motion, sweeping like a great wave over the
+country; houses are in flames, families flying, cattle being
+driven at frantic speed to places of greater safety. Be this as
+it may, long before the marauders reach the settlement (often
+when they are still a whole day's journey from it) the horses
+take the alarm and come wildly flying in: the contagion quickly
+spreads to the horned cattle, and a general stampede ensues. The
+gauchos maintain that the horses <i>smell</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">358 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the Indians. I
+believe they are right, for when passing a distant Indian camp,
+from which the wind blew, the horses driven before me have
+suddenly taken fright and run away, leading me a chase of many
+miles. The explanation that ostriches, deer, and other fleet
+animals driven in before the invaders might be the cause of the
+stampede cannot be accepted, since the horses are familiar with
+the sight of these animals flying from their gaucho
+hunters.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">There is a pretty
+fable of a cat and dog lying in a dark room, aptly illustrating
+the fine senses of these two species. "Listen! I heard a feather
+drop!" said the dog. "Oh, no!" said the cat, "it was a needle; I
+saw it." The horse is not commonly believed to have senses keen
+as that, and a dog tracing his master's steps over the city
+pavement is supposed to be a feat no other animal can equal. No
+doubt the artificial life a horse lives in England, giving so
+little play to many of his most important faculties, has served
+to blunt them. He is a splendid creature; but the noble bearing,
+the dash and reckless courage that distinguish him from the
+modest horse of the desert, have not been acquired without a
+corresponding loss in other things. When ridden by night the
+Indian horse--and sometimes the same habit is found in the
+gaucho's animal--drops his head lower and lower as the darkness
+increases, with the danger arising from the presence of
+innumerable kennels concealed in the grass, until his nose sweeps
+the surface like a foxhound's. That this action is dictated by a
+powerful instinct of self-preservation is plain; for, when I have
+attempted to forcibly drag the animal's head up, he has answered
+such an</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>Horse and Man.</i>
+359</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">experiment by taking
+the bit in his teeth, and violently pulling the reins out of my
+hand. His miraculous sense of smell measures the exact position
+of every hidden kennel, every treacherous spot, and enables him
+to pass swiftly and securely over it.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">On the desert pampa
+the gaucho, for a reason that he knows, calls the puma the
+"friend of man." The Arab gives this designation to his horse;
+but in Europe, where we do not associate closely with the horse,
+the dog naturally takes the foremost place in our affections. The
+very highest praise yet given to this animal is probably to be
+found in Bacon's essay on Atheism. "For take an example of a
+dog," he says, "and mark what a generosity and courage he will
+put on when he finds himself maintained by a man, who is to him
+in place of a god, or <i>melior natura,</i> which courage is
+manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a
+better nature than its own, could never attain!" Can we not say
+as much of the horse? The very horses that fly terror-stricken
+from the smell of an Indian will, when "maintained by a man,"
+readily charge into a whole host of yelling savages.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I once had a horse
+at home, born and bred on the place, so docile that whenever I
+required him I could go to him where the horses were at pasture,
+and, though they all galloped off at my approach, he would calmly
+wait to be caught. Springing on to his back, I would go after the
+other horses, or gallop home with only my hand on his neck to
+guide him. I did not often ride him, as he was slow and lazy, but
+with timid women and children he was a favourite; he was also
+fre-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">360 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">quently used for
+farm work, in or out of harness, and I could shoot from his back.
+In the peach season he would roam about the plantation, getting
+the fruit, of which he was very fond, by tugging at the lower
+branches of the trees and shaking it down in showers. One
+intensely dark night I was riding home on this horse. I came
+through a road with a wire fence on each side, two miles in
+length, and when I had got nearly to the end of this road my
+horse suddenly stopped short, uttering a succession of loud
+terrified snorts. I could see nothing but the intense blackness
+of the night before me. and tried to encourage him to go on.
+Touching him on the neck, I found his hair wet with the sudden
+profuse sweat of extreme fear. The whip made no impression on
+him. He continued to back away, his eyes apparently fixed on some
+object of horror just before him, while he trembled to such a
+degree that I was shaken in the saddle. He attempted several
+times to wheel round and run away, but I was determined not to
+yield to him, and continued the contest. Suddenly, when I was
+beginning to despair of getting home by that road, he sprang
+forward, and regularly charged the (to me) invisible object
+before him, and in another moment, when he had apparently passed
+it, taking the bit between his teeth he almost flew over the
+ground, never pausing till he brought me to my own door. When I
+dismounted his terror seemed gone, but he hung his head in a
+dejected manner, like a horse that has been under the saddle all
+day. I have never witnessed another such instance of almost
+maddening fear. His terror and apprehension were like what we can
+imagine a man experiencing at sight of a ghost in some dark
+solitary place.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Horse and Man.</i>
+<b>361</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Yet he did not
+forcibly carry me away from it, as he might so easily have done;
+but, finding himself maintained by a "nature superior to his
+own," he preferred to face it. I have never met in the dog a more
+striking example of this noblest kind of brute courage. The
+incident did not impress me very much at the moment, but when I
+came to reflect that my sight was mere blindness compared with
+that of my horse, and that it was not likely his imagination
+clothed any familiar natural object with fantastic terrors, it
+certainly did impress me very deeply.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I am loth to finish
+with, my subject, in which, to express myself in the manner of
+the gauchos, I have passed over many matters, like good grass and
+fragrant herbs the galloping horse sniffs at but cannot stay to
+taste; and especially loth to conclude with this last incident,
+which has in it an element of gloom. I would rather first go back
+for a few moments to my original theme--the pleasures of riding,
+for the sake of mentioning a species of pleasure my English
+reader has probably never tasted or even heard of. When riding by
+night on the pampas, I used to enjoy lying back on my horse till
+my head and shoulders rested well on his back, my feet also being
+raised till they pressed against his neck; and in this position,
+which practice can make both safe and comfortable, gaze up into
+the starry sky. To enjoy this method of riding thoroughly, a
+sure-footed unshod horse with perfect confidence in his rider is
+necessary; and he must be made to go at a swift and smooth pace
+over level grassy ground. With these conditions the sensation is
+positively delightful. Nothing of earth is visible, only the vast
+circle of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">362 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">the heavens
+glittering with innumerable stars; the muffled sound of the hoofs
+on the soft sward becomes in fancy only the rushing of the wings
+of our Pegasus, while the enchanting illusion that we are soaring
+through space possesses the mind. Unfortunately, however, this
+method of riding is impracticable in England. And, even if people
+with enthusiasm enough could be found to put it in practice by
+importing swift light-footed Arabian or pampa horses, and
+careering about level parks on dark starry nights, probably a
+shout of derision would be raised against so undignified a
+pastime.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3"><i>Apropos</i> of
+dignity, I will relate, in conclusion, an incident in my London
+life which may possibly interest psychologists. Some time ago in
+Oxford Street I got on top of an omnibus travelling west. My mind
+was preoccupied, I was anxious to get home, and, in an absent
+kind of way, I became irritated at the painfully slow rate of
+progress. It was all an old familiar experience, the deep
+thought, lessening pace, and consequent irritation. The indolent
+brute I imagined myself riding was, as usual, taking advantage of
+his rider's abstraction; but I would soon "feelingly persuade"
+him that I was not so far gone as to lose sight of the difference
+between a swinging gallop and a walk. So, elevating my umbrella,
+I dealt the side of the omnibus a sounding blow, very much to the
+astonishment of my fellow-passengers. So overgrown are we with
+usages, habits, tricks of thought and action springing from the
+soil we inhabit; and when we have broken away and removed
+ourselves far from it, so long do the dead tendrils still cling
+to us!</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font24">CHAPTER
+XXIV,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">SEEN AND
+LOST,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c8">WE can imagine what
+the feelings of a lapidary would be--an enthusiast whose life is
+given to the study of precious stones, and whose sole delight is
+in the contemplation of their manifold beauty--if a stranger
+should come in to him, and, opening his hand, exhibit a new
+unknown gem, splendid as ruby or as sapphire, yet manifestly no
+mere variety of any familiar stone, but differing as widely from
+all others as diamond from opal or cat's-eye; and then, just when
+he is beginning to rejoice in that strange exquisite loveliness,
+the hand should close and the stranger, with a mocking smile on
+his lips, go forth and disappear from sight in the crowd. A
+feeling such as that would be is not unfrequently experienced by
+the field naturalist whose favoured lot it is to live in a
+country not yet "thoroughly worked out," with its every wild
+inhabitant scientifically named, accurately described, and
+skilfully figured in some colossal monograph. One swift glance of
+the practised eye, ever eagerly searching for some new-thing, and
+he knows that here at length is a form never previously seen by
+him; but his joy is perhaps only for a few moments, and the prize
+is snatched from sight for ever. The lapidary might</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">364 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata,</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">have some doubts; he
+might think that the stranger had, after all, only mocked him
+with the sight of a wonderful artificial gem, and that a close
+examination would have proved its worthlessness; but the
+naturalist can have no doubts: if he is an enthusiast, well
+acquainted with the fauna of his district, and has good eyesight,
+he knows that there is no mistake; for there it is, the new
+strange form, photographed by instantaneous process on his mind,
+and there it will remain, a tantalizing image, its sharp lines
+and fresh colouring unblurred by time.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Walking in some open
+forest glade, he may look up just in time to see a great strange
+butterfly--a blue Morpho, let us say, wandering in some far
+country where this angel insect is unknown--passing athwart his
+vision with careless, buoyant flight, the most sylph-like thing
+in nature, and all blue and pure like its aerial home, but with a
+more delicate and wonderful brilliance in its cerulean colour,
+giving such unimaginable glory to its broad airy wings; and then,
+almost before his soul has had time to feel its joy, it may soar
+away unloitering over the tall trees, to be seen no
+more.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">But the admiration,
+the delight, and the desire are equally great, and the loss just
+as keenly felt, whether the strange species seen happens to be
+one surpassingly beautiful or not. Its newness is to the
+naturalist its greatest attraction. How beautiful beyond all
+others seems a certain small unnamed brown bird to my mind! So
+many years have passed and its image has not yet grown dim; yet I
+saw it only for a few moments, when it hopped out</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen, and Lost.</i>
+36 5</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">from, the thick
+foliage and perched within two or three yards of me, not afraid,
+but only curious; and after peering at me first with one eye and
+then the other, and wiping its small dagger on a twig, it flew
+away and was seen no more. For many days I sought for it, and for
+years waited its reappearance, and it was more to me than ninety
+and nine birds which I had always known; yet it was very modest,
+dressed in a brown suit, very pale on the breast and white on the
+throat, and for distinction a straw-coloured stripe over the
+eye--that ribbon which Queen Nature bestows on so many of her
+feathered subjects, in recognition, I suppose, of some small and
+common kind of merit. If I should meet with it in a collection I
+should know it again; only, in that case it would look plain and
+homely to me--this little bird that for a time made all others
+seem unbeautiful.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Even a richer prize
+may come in sight for a brief period--one of the nobler
+mammalians, which are fewer in number, and bound to earth like
+ourselves, and therefore so much better known than the wandering
+children of air. In. some secluded spot, resting amidst luxuriant
+herbage or forest undergrowth, a slight rustling makes us start,
+and, lo! looking at us from the clustering leaves, a strange
+face; the leaf-like ears erect, the dark eyes round with
+astonishment, and the sharp black nose twitching and sniffing
+audibly, to take in the unfamiliar flavour of a human presence
+from the air, like the pursed-up and smacking lips of a
+wine-drinker tasting a new vintage. No sooner seen than gone,
+like a dream, a phantom, the quaint</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><b>366</b> <i>The
+Naturalist in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">furry face to be
+thereafter only an image in memory.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Sometimes the prize
+may be a very rich one, and actually within reach of the
+hand--challenging the hand, as it were, to grasp it, and yet
+presently slip away to be seen no more, although it maybe sought
+for day after day, with a hungry longing comparable to that of
+some poor tramp who finds a gold doubloon in the forest, and just
+when he is beginning to realize all that it means to him drops it
+in the grass and cannot find it again. There is not the faintest
+motion in the foliage, no rustle of any dry leaf, and yet we know
+that something has moved--something has come or has gone; and,
+gazing fixedly at one spot, we suddenly see that it is still
+there, close to us, the pointed ophidian head and long neck, not
+drawn back and threatening, but sloping forward, dark and
+polished as the green and purple weed-stems springing from marshy
+soil, and with an irregular chain of spots extending down the
+side. Motionless, too, as the stems it is; but presently the
+tongue, crimson and glistening, darts out and flickers, like a
+small jet of smoke and flame, and is withdrawn; then the smooth
+serpent head drops down, and the thing is gone.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">How I saw and lost
+the noble wrestling frog has been recounted in Chapter IV.: other
+tantalizing experiences of the same kind remain to be told in the
+present chapter, which is not intended for the severe naturalist,
+but rather for such readers as may like to hear something about
+the pains and pleasures of the seeker as well as the result of
+the seeking.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen <b>and
+Lost.</b></i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><b>367</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">One of my earliest
+experiences of seeing and losing relates to a humming-bird--a
+veritable "jewel of ornithology." I was only a boy at the time,
+but already pretty well acquainted with the birds of the district
+I lived in, near La Plata River, and among them were three
+species of the hummingbird. One spring day I saw a fourth--a
+wonderful little thing, only half as big as the smallest of the
+other three--the well-known Phaithornis splendens--and scarcely
+larger than a bumble-bee. I was within three feet of it as it
+sucked at the flowers,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-27.jpg" alt="h1-27.jpg" class="c44">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font15">A lost
+Humming-bird.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">suspended motionless
+in the air, the wings appearing formless and mist-like from their
+rapid vibratory motion, but the rest of the upper plumage was
+seen distinctly as anything can be seen. The head and neck and
+upper part of the back were emerald green, with the metallic
+glitter usually seen in the burnished scale-like feathers of
+these small birds; the lower half of the back was velvet-black;
+the tail and tail-coverts white as snow. On two other occasions,
+at intervals of a few days, I saw this brilliant little stranger,
+always very near, and tried without success</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">368 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">to capture it, after
+which, it disappeared from the plantation. Four years later I saw
+it once again not far from the same place. It was late in summer,
+and I was out walking on the level plain where the ground was
+carpeted with short grass, and nothing else grew there except a
+solitary stunted cardoou thistle-bush with one flower on its
+central stem above the grey-green artichoke-like leaves. The disc
+of the great thorny blossom was as broad as that of a sunflower,
+purple in colour, delicately frosted with white; on this flat
+disc several insects were feeding--flies, fireflies, and small
+wasps--and I paused for a few minutes in my walk to watch them.
+Suddenly a small misty object flew swiftly downwards past my
+face, and paused motionless in the air an inch or two above the
+rim of the flower. Once more my lost humming-bird, which I
+remembered so well! The exquisitely graceful form, half circled
+by the misty moth-like wings, the glittering green and
+velvet-black mantle, and snow-white tail spread open like a
+fan--there it hung like a beautiful bird-shaped gem suspended by
+an invisible gossamer thread. One--two--three moments passed,
+while I gazed, trembling with rapturous excitement, and then,
+before I had time to collect my faculties and make a forlorn
+attempt to capture it with my hat, away it flew, gliding so
+swiftly on the air that form and colour were instantly lost, and
+in appearance it was only an obscure grey line traced rapidly
+along the low sky and fading quickly out ol sight. And that was
+the last I ever saw of it.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">The case of this
+small "winged gem," still wandering nameless in the wilds,
+reminds me of yet</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen and Lost.</i>
+369</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">another bird seen
+and lost, also remarkable for its diminutive size. For years I
+looked for it, and when the wished-for opportunity came, and it
+was in my power to secure it, I refrained; and Fate punished me
+by never permitting me to see it again. On several occasions
+while riding on the pampas I had caught glimpses of this minute
+bird flitting up mothlike, with uncertain tremulous flight, and
+again dipping into the weeds, tall grass, or thistles. Its
+plumage was yellowish in hue, like sere dead herbage, and its
+extremely slender body looked longer and slimmer than it was,
+owing to the great length of its tail, or of the two middle
+tail-feathers. I knew that it was a Synallaxis--a genus of small
+birds of the Woodhewer family. Now, as I have said in a former
+chapter, these are wise little birds, more interesting--I had
+almost said more beautiful--in their wisdom, or wisdom-simulating
+instincts, than the quatzel in its resplendent green, or the
+cock-of-the-rock in its vivid scarlet and orange mantle. Wrens
+and mocking-birds have melody for their chief attraction, and the
+name of each kind is, to our minds, also the name of a certain
+kind of sweet music; we think of swifts and swallows in
+connection with the mysterious migratory instinct; and
+humming-birds have a glittering mantle, and the miraculous
+motions necessary to display its ever-changing iridescent beauty.
+In like manner, the homely Dendrocolaptidae possess the genius
+for building, and an account of one of these small birds without
+its nest would be like a biography of Sir Christopher Wren that
+made no mention of his works. It was not strange then</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">370 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">that when I saw this
+small bird the question rose to my mind, what kind of nest does
+it build?</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">One morning in the
+month of October, the great breeding-time for birds in the
+Southern Hemisphere, while cautiously picking my way through a
+bed of eardoon bushes, the mysterious little creature flitted up
+and perched among the clustering leaves quite near to me. It
+uttered a feeble grasshopper-like chirp; and then a second
+individual, smaller, paler-coloured, and if possible shyer than
+the first, showed itself for two or three seconds, after which
+both birds dived once more into concealment. How glad I was to
+see them! for here they were, male and female, in a suitable spot
+in my own fields, where they evidently meant to breed. Every day
+after that I paid them one cautious visit, and by waiting from
+five to fifteen minutes, standing motionless among the thistles,
+I always succeeded in getting them to show themselves for a few
+moments. I could easily have secured them then, but my wish was
+to discover their nesting habits; and after watching for some
+days, I was rewarded by finding their nest; then for three days
+more I watched it slowly progressing towards completion, and each
+time I approached it one of the small birds would flit out to
+vanish into the herbage. The structure was about six inches long,
+and not more than two inches in diameter, and was placed
+horizontally on a broad stiff eardoon leaf, sheltered by other
+leaves above. It was made of the finest dry grass loosely woven,
+and formed a simple perfectly straight tube, open at both ends.
+The aperture was so small that I could only insert my little
+finger, and the bird</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen and Los
+i.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font3">371</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">could not, of
+course, have turned round in so narrow a passage, and so always
+went in at one end and left by the other. On visiting the spot on
+the fourth day I found, to my intense chagrin, that the delicate
+fabric had been broken and thrown down by some animal; also, that
+the birds had utterly</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<img src="images/h1-28.jpg" alt="h1-28.jpg" class="c45">
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Small Spine-tail
+<b>and</b> Nest.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">vanished--for I
+sought them in vain, both there and in every weedy and thistly
+spot in the neighbourhood. The bird without the nest had seemed a
+useless thing to possess; now, for all my pains, I had only a
+wisp of fine dry grass in my hand, and no bird. The shy, modest
+little creature, dwelling</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20"><i>372</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>The Naturalist in La
+Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">violet-like amidst
+clustering leaves, and even when showing itself still
+"half-hidden from the eye," was thereafter to be only a
+tantalizing image in memory. Still, my case was not so hopeless
+as that of the imagined lapidary; for however rare a species may
+be, and near to its final extinction, there must always be many
+individuals existing, and I was cheered by the thought that I
+might yet meet with one at some future time. And, even if this
+particular species was not to gladden my sight again, there were
+others, scores and hundreds more, and at any moment I might
+expect to see one shining, a living gem, on Nature's open
+extended palm.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Sometimes it has
+happened that an animal would have been overlooked or passed by
+with scant notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for some
+singular action or habit which has instantly given it a strange
+importance, and made its possession desirable.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I was once engaged
+in the arduous and monotonous task of driving a large number of
+sheep a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, in excessively
+hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to travelling. Five
+or six gauchos were with me, and we were on the southern pampas
+of Buenos Ayres, near to a long precipitous stony sierra which
+rose to a height of five or six hundred feet above the plain. Who
+that has travelled for eighteen days on a dead level in a
+broiling sun can resist a hill? That sierra was more sublime to
+us than Conon-dagua, than Illimani.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">Leaving the sheep, I
+rode to it with three of the men; aad after securing our horses
+on the lower</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen And Lost.</i>
+373</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21 c3">slope, we began our
+laborious ascent. Now the gaucho when taken from his horse, on
+which he lives like a kind of parasite, is a very slow-moving
+creature, and I soon left my friends far behind. Coming to a
+place where ferns and flowering herbage grew thick, I began to
+hear all about me sounds of a character utterly unlike any
+natural sound I was acquainted with--innumerable low clear voices
+tinkling or pealing like minute sweet-toned, resonant bells--for
+the sounds were purely metallic and perfectly bell-like. I was
+completely ringed round with the mysterious music, and as I
+walked it rose and sank rhythmically, keeping time to my steps. I
+stood still, and immediately the sounds ceased. I took a step
+forwards, and again the fairy-bells were set ringing, as if at
+each step my foot touched a central meeting point of a thousand
+radiating threads, each thread attached to a peal of little bells
+hanging concealed among the herbage. I waited for my companions,
+and called their attention to the phenomenon, and to them also it
+was a thing strange and perplexing. "It is the bell-snake!" cried
+one excitedly. This is the rattle-snake; but although at that
+time I had no experience of this reptile, I knew that he was
+wrong. Yet how natural the mistake! The Spanish name of
+"bell-snake" had made him imagine that the whirring sound of the
+vibrating rattles, resembling muffled cicada music, is really
+bell-like in character. Eventually we discovered that the sound
+was made by grasshoppers; but they were seen only to be lost, for
+I could not capture one, so excessively shy and cunning had the
+perpetual ringing of their own</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">374 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">little tocsins made
+them. And presently I had to return to my muttons; and afterwards
+there was no opportunity of revisiting the spot to observe so
+singular a habit again and collect specimens. It was a very
+slender grasshopper, about an inch and a half long, of a uniform,
+tawny, protective colour--the colour of an old dead leaf. It also
+possessed a protective habit common to most grasshoppers, of
+embracing a slender vertical stem with its four fine front legs,
+and moving cunningly round so as to keep the stem always in front
+of it to screen itself from sight. Only other grasshoppers are
+silent when alarmed, and the silence and masking action are
+related, and together prevent the insect from being detected. But
+this particular species, or race, or colony, living on the sides
+of the isolated sierra, had acquired a contrary habit, resembling
+a habit of gregarious birds and mammals. For this informing sound
+(unless it mimicked some <i>warning-sound,</i> as of a
+rattlesnake, which it didn't) could not possibly be beneficial to
+individuals living alone, as grasshoppers generally do, but, on
+the contrary, only detrimental; and such a habit was therefore
+purely for the public good, and could only have arisen in a
+species that always lived in communities.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">On another occasion,
+in the middle of the hot season, I was travelling alone
+across-country in a locality which was new to me, a few leagues
+east of La Plata River, in its widest part. About eleven o'clock
+in the morning I came to a low-lying level plain where the
+close-cropped grass was vivid green, although elsewhere all over
+the country the vegeta-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen and Lost.</i>
+375</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">tion was scorched
+and dead, and dry as ashes. The ground being so favourable, I
+crossed this low plain at a swinging gallop, and in about thirty
+minutes' time. In that half-hour I saw a vast number of snakes,
+all of one kind, and a species new to me; but my anxiety to reach
+my destination before the oppressive heat of the afternoon made
+me hurry on. So numerous were the snakes in that green place that
+frequently I had as many as a dozen in sight at one time. It
+looked to me like a coronel&iacute;a--harmless colubrine
+snakes--but was more than twice as large as either of the two
+species of that genus I was already familiar with. In size they
+varied greatly, ranging from two to fully five feet in length,
+and the colour was dull yellow or tan, slightly lined and mottled
+with shades of brown. Among dead or partially withered grass and
+herbage they would have been undistinguishable at even a very
+short distance, but on the vivid green turf they were strangely
+conspicuous, some being plainly visible forty or fifty yards
+away; and not one was seen coiled up. They were all lying
+motionless, stretched out full length, and looking like dark
+yellow or tan-coloured ribbons, thrown on to the grass. It was
+most unusual to see so many snakes together, although not
+surprising in the circumstances. The December heats had dried up
+all the water-courses and killed the vegetation, and made the
+earth hard and harsh as burnt bricks; and at such times snakes,
+especially the more active non-venomous kinds, will travel long
+distances, in their slow way, in search of water. Those I saw
+during my ride had probably been attracted by the
+mois-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">376 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">ture from a large
+area of country; and although there was no water, the soft fresh
+grass must have been grateful to them. Snakes are seen coiled up
+when they are at home; when travelling and far afield, they lie
+as a rule extended full length, even when resting--and they are
+generally resting. Pausing at length, before quitting this green
+plain, to give my horse a minute's rest, I got off and approached
+a large snake; but when I was quite twelve yards from it, it
+lifted its head, and, turning deliberately round, came rather
+swiftly at me. I retreated, and it followed, until, springing on
+to my horse, I left it, greatly surprised at its action, and
+beginning to think that it must be venomous. As I rode on the
+feeling of surprise increased, conquering haste; and in the end,
+seeing more snakes, I dismounted and approached the largest, when
+exactly the same thing occurred again, the snake rousing itself
+and coming angrily at me when I was still (considering the dull
+lethargic character of the deadliest kinds) at an absurd distance
+from it. Again and again I repeated the experiment, with the same
+result. And at length I stunned one with a blow of my whip to
+examine its mouth, but found no poison-fangs in it.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I then resumed my
+journey, expecting to meet with more snakes of the same kind at
+my destination; but there were none, and very soon business
+called me to a distant place, and I never met with this species
+afterwards. But when I rode away from that green spot, and was
+once more on the higher, desolate, wind-swept plain surrounding
+it--a rustling sea of giant thistles, still erect,
+although</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen and Lost.</i>
+377</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">dead, and red as
+rust, and filling the hot blue sky with silvery down--it was with
+a very strange feeling. The change from the green and living to
+the dead and dry and dusty was so great! There seemed to be
+something mysterious, extra-natural, in that low level plain, so
+green and fresh and snaky, where my horse's hoofs had made no
+sound--a place where no man dwelt, and no cattle pastured, and no
+wild bird folded its wing. And the serpents there were not like
+others--the mechanical coiled-up thing we know, a mere
+bone-and-muscle man-trap, set by the elements, to spring and
+strike when trodden on: but these had a high intelligence, a
+lofty spirit, and were filled with a noble rage and astonishment
+that any other kind of creature, even a man, should venture there
+to disturb their sacred peace. It was a fancy, born of that sense
+of mystery which the unknown and the unusual in nature wakes in
+us--an obsolescent feeling that still links us to the savage. But
+the simple fact was wonderful enough, and that has been set down
+simply and apart from all fancies. If the reader happens not to
+be a naturalist, it is right to tell him that a naturalist cannot
+exaggerate consciously; and if he be capable of unconscious
+exaggeration, then ho is no naturalist. He should hasten "to join
+the innumerable caravan that moves" to the fantastic realms of
+romance. Looking at the simple fact scientifically, it was a case
+of mimicry--the harmless snake mimicking the fierce threatening
+gestures and actions proper to some deadly kind. Only with this
+difference: the venomous snake, of all deadly things in nature,
+is</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">378 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the slowest to
+resentment, the most reluctant to enter into a quarrel; whereas
+in this species angry demonstrations were made when the intruder
+was yet far off, and before he had shown any hostile
+intentions.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">My last case--the
+last, that is, of the few I have selected--relates to a singular
+variation in the human species. On this occasion I was again
+travelling alone in a strange district on the southern frontier
+of Buenos Ayres. On a bitterly cold midwinter day, shortly before
+noon, I arrived, stiff and tired, at one of those pilgrims' rests
+on the pampas--a wayside <i>pulper&iacute;a,</i> or public house,
+where the traveller can procure anything he may require or
+desire, from a tumbler of Brazilian rum to make glad his heart,
+to a poncho, or cloak of blue cloth with fluffy scarlet lining,
+to keep him warm o' nights; and, to speed him on his way, a pair
+of cast-iron spurs weighing six pounds avoirdupois, with rowels
+eight inches in diameter, manufactured in this island for the use
+of barbarous men beyond the sea. The wretched mud-and-grass
+building was surrounded by a foss crossed by a plank drawbridge;
+outside of the enclosure twelve or fourteen saddled horses were
+standing, and from the loud noise of talk and laughter in the bar
+I conjectured that a goodly company of rough frontiersmen were
+already making merry at that early hour. It was necessary for me
+to go in among them to see the proprietor of the place and ask
+permission to visit his kitchen in order to make myself a "tin of
+coffee," that being the refreshment I felt inclined for. When I
+went in and made my salutation, one man</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen and Lost.</i>
+379</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">wheeled round square
+before me, stared straight into my oyes, and in an exceedingly
+high-pitched reedy or screechy voice and a sing-song tone
+returned my "good morning," and bade me call for the liquid I
+loved best at his expense. I declined with thanks, and in
+accordance with gaucho etiquette added that I was prepared to pay
+for his liquor. It was then for him to say that he had already
+been served and so let the matter drop, but he did not do so: he
+screamed out in his wild animal voice that he would take gin. I
+paid for his drink, and would, I think, have felt greatly
+surprised at his strange insolent behaviour, so unlike that of
+the usually courteous gaucho, but this thing affected me not at
+all, so profoundly had his singular appearance and voice
+impressed me; and for the rest of the time I remained in the
+place I continued to watch him narrowly. Professor Huxley has
+somewhere said, "A variation frequently occurs, but those who
+notice it take no care about noting down the particulars." That
+is not a failing of mine, and this is what I noted down while the
+man's appearance was still fresh in memory. He was about five
+feet eleven inches in height--very tall for a gaucho--straight
+and athletic, with exceedingly broad shoulders, which made his
+round head look small; long arms and huge hands. The round flat
+face, coarse black hair, swarthy reddish colour, and smooth
+hairless cheeks seemed to show that he had more Indian than
+Spanish blood in him, while his round black eyes were even more
+like those of a rapacious animal in expression than in the
+pure-blooded Indian. He also had the Indian or</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">380 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">half-breed's
+moustache, when that natural ornament is permitted to grow, and
+which is composed of thick bristles standing out like a cat's
+whiskers. The mouth was the marvellous feature, for it was twice
+the size of an average mouth, and the two lips were alike in
+thickness. This mouth did not smile, but snarled, both when he
+spoke and when he should have smiled; and when he snarled the
+wliolo of his teeth and a part of the gums were displayed. The
+teeth were not as in other human beings--incisors, canines, and
+molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, each tooth
+a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched its
+companion teeth, and with a point sharp as the sharpest-pointed
+dagger. They were like the teeth of a shark or crocodile. I
+noticed that when he showed them, which was very often, they were
+not set together as in dogs, weasels, and other savage snarling
+animals, but apart, showing the whole terrible serration in the
+huge red mouth.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">After getting his
+gin he joined in the boisterous conversation with the others, and
+this gave me an opportunity of studying his face for several
+minutes, all the time with a curious feeling that I had put
+myself into a cage with a savage animal of horrible aspect, whose
+instincts were utterly unknown to me, and were probably not very
+pleasant. It was interesting to note that whenever one of the
+others addressed him directly, or turned to him when speaking, it
+was with a curious expression, not of fear, but partly amusement
+and partly something else which I could not fathom. Now, one
+might think that this was natural enough purely on account
+of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Seen and Lost.</i>
+381</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">the man's
+extraordinary appearance. I do not think that a sufficient
+explanation; for however strange a man's appearance may be, his
+intimate friends and associates soon lose all sense of wonder at
+his strangeness, and even forget that he is unlike others. My
+belief is that this curiosity, or whatever it was they showed in
+their faces, was due to something in his character--a mental
+strangeness, showing itself at unexpected times, and which might
+flash, out at any moment to amuse or astonish them. There was
+certainly a correspondence between the snarling action of the
+mouth and the dangerous form of the teeth, perfect as that in any
+snarling animal; and such animals, it should be remembered, snarl
+not only when angry and threatening, but in their playful moods
+as well. Other and more important correspondences or correlations
+might have existed; and the voice was certainly unlike any human
+voice I have ever heard, whether in white, red, or black man. But
+the time I had for observation was short, the conversation
+revealed nothing further, and by-and-by I went away in search of
+the odorous kitchen, where there would be hot water for coffee,
+or at all events cold water and a kettle, and materials for
+making a fire--to wit, bones of dead cattle, "buffalo chips," and
+rancid fat.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c3">I have never been
+worried with the wish, or ambition to be a head-hunter in the
+Dyak sense, but on this one occasion I did wish that it had been
+possible, without violating any law, or doing anything to a
+fellow-creature which I should not like done to myself, to have
+obtained possession of this man's head, with its set of unique
+and terrible teeth. For</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">382 <i>The Naturalist
+in La Plata.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">how, in the name of
+Evolution, did he come by them, and by other physical
+peculiarities--the snarling habit and that high-pitched animal
+voice, for instance--which made him a being different from
+others--one separate and far apart? Was he, so admirably formed,
+so complete and well-balanced, merely a freak of nature, to use
+an old-fashioned phrase--a sport, or spontaneous individual
+variation--an experiment for a new human type, imagined by Nature
+in some past period, inconceivably long ago, but which she had
+only now, too late, found time to carry out? Or rather was he
+like that little hairy maiden exhibited not long ago in London, a
+reproduction of the past, the mystery called reversion--a
+something in the life of a species like memory in the life of an
+individual, the memory which suddenly brings back to the old
+man's mind the image of his childhood? For no dream-monster in
+human form ever appeared to me with so strange and terrible a
+face; and this was no dream but sober fact, for I saw and spoke
+with this man; and unless cold steel has given him his quietus,
+or his own horse has crushed him, or a mad bull sored him--all
+natural forms of death in that wild land--he is probably still
+living and in the prime of life, and perhaps at this very moment
+drinking gin. at some astonished traveller's expense at that very
+bar where I met him. The old Palaeolithic man, judging from the
+few remains we have of him, must have had an unspeakably savage
+and, to our way of thinking, repulsive and horrible aspect, with
+his villainous low receding forehead, broad nose, great
+projecting upper jaw, and retreat-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23"><i>Seen and Lost,</i>
+383</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22 c13">ing chin; to meet
+such a man face to face in Piccadilly would frighten a nervous
+person of the present time. But his teeth were not unlike our
+own, only very much larger and more powerful, and well adapted to
+their work of masticating the flesh, underdone and possibly raw,
+of mammoth and rhinoceros. If, then, this living man recalls a
+type of the past, it is of a remoter past, a more primitive man,
+the volume of whose history is missing from the geological
+record. To speculate on such a subject seems idle and useless;
+and when 1 coveted possession of that head it was not because I
+thought that it might lead to any fresh discovery. A lower motive
+inspired the feeling. I wished for it only that I might bring it
+over the sea, to drop it like a new apple of discord, suited to
+the spirit of the times, among the anthropologists and
+evolutionists generally of this old and learned world. Inscribed,
+of course, "To the most learned," but giving no locality and no
+particulars. I wished to do that for the pleasure--not a very
+noble kind of pleasure, I allow--of witnessing from some safe
+hiding-place the stupendous strife that would have ensued--a
+battle more furious, lasting and fatal to many a brave knight of
+biology, than was ever yet fought over any bone or bony fragment
+or fabric ever picked up, including the celebrated cranium of the
+Neanderthal.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font27">APPENDIX.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">THE PUMA, OR LION OF
+AMERICA.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">THE following
+passage occurs in an article on "The Naturalist in La Plata," by
+the late Professor Piomanes, which appeared in the <i>Nineteenth
+Century,</i> May, 1893. After quoting the account of the puma's
+habits and character given in the book, the writer says:--"I have
+received corroboration touching all these points from a gentleman
+who, when walking alone and unarmed on the skirts of a forest,
+was greatly alarmed by a large puma coming out to meet him.
+Deeming it best not to stand, he advanced to meet the animal,
+which thereupon began to gambol around his feet and rub against
+his legs, after the manner of an affectionate cat. At first he
+thought these movements must have been preliminary to some
+peculiar mode of attack, and therefore he did not respond, but
+walked quietly on, until the puma suddenly desisted and
+re-entered the forest. This gentleman says that, until the
+publication of Mr. Hudson's book, he had always remained under
+the impression that that particular puma must have been
+insane."</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">MUSIC AND DANCING IN
+NATURE.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">I have found among
+my papers the following mislaid note on the subject of sportive
+displays of mammalians, which should have been used on page 281,
+where the subject is briefly treated:--Most mammalians are
+comparatively silent and live on the ground, and not having the
+power to escape</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font22"><i>Appendix.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font30">385</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">easily, which birds
+have, and being more persecuted by man, they do not often disport
+themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it is difficult to
+watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence being known
+or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as we
+might imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which
+I was, or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting
+themselves in a manner that took me completely by surprise. While
+out tinamou shooting one day in autumn, near my own home in La
+Plata, I spied a troop of about a dozen weasels racing madly
+about over a vizcacha village--the mound and group of pit-like
+burrows inhabited by a community of vizcachas. These weasels were
+of the large common species, Galictis barbara, about the size of
+a cat; and were engaged in a pastime resembling a complicated
+dance, and so absorbed were they on that occasion that they took
+no notice of me when I walked up to within nine or ten yards of
+them, and stood still to watch the performance. They were all
+swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doubling
+quickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and
+although apparently carried away with excitement, and crossing
+each other's tracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with
+so many changes of direction that I became confused when trying
+to keep any one animal in view, they never collided nor even came
+near enough to touch one another. The whole performance
+resembled, on a greatly magnified scale and without its beautiful
+smoothness and lightning swiftness, the fantastic dance of small
+black water-beetles, frequently seen on the surface of a pool or
+stream, during which the insects glide about in a limited area
+with such celerity as to appear like black curving lines traced
+by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross and
+intersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After
+watching the weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the
+mound, whereupon the animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell
+into the burrows, but only to reappear in a few seconds,
+thrusting up their long ebony-</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">386
+<i>Appendix.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46">black necks and
+flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaring with
+fierce, beady eyes.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">THE STRANGE INSTINCTS
+OF CATTLE.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46">In November and
+December, 1893, a short correspondence appeared in the
+<i>Field</i> on the curious subject of "Dogs burying their dead."
+It arose through a letter from a Mr. Gould, of Albany, Western
+Australia, relating the following incident:--</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46">A settler shot a
+bitch from a neighbouring estate that had formed the habit of
+coming on to his land to visit and play with his dog. The dog,
+finding his companion dead, was observed to dig a large hole in
+the ground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not
+cover it with earth. The writer wished to know if any reader of
+the <i>Field</i> had met with a similar case. Some notes, which I
+contributed in reply to this letter, bear on one of the subjects
+treated in the chapter on "strange instincts," namely, the
+instinct of social animals to protect and shield their fellows;
+and for this reason I have thought it best to reproduce them in
+this place.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46">I remember on one
+occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, a large and
+very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitch that
+had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but he
+never left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the
+body away, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not
+succeeding in these attempts, he settled down by its side again,
+although it was evident that he was suffering greatly from thirst
+and heat. It was at last only with the greatest trouble that the
+people of the house succeeded in getting the body away and
+burying it out of his sight.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46">Another instance,
+more to the point, occurred at my own house on the pampas, and I
+was one of several persons who witnessed it. A small, red,
+long-haired bitch--a variety of</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>Appendix.</i>
+387</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">the common native
+cur--gave birth to four or five pups. A peon was told to destroy
+them, and, waiting until the bitch was out of sight, he carried
+them off to the end of the orchard, some 400 or 500 yards from
+the house, and threw them into a pool of water which was only two
+to three feet deep. The bitch passed the rest of the day in
+rushing frantically about, searching for her young, and in the
+evening, a little after dark, actually succeeded in finding them,
+although they were lying at the bottom of the pool. She got them
+all out, and carried them, one by one, to another part of the
+grounds, where she passed the night with them, uttering at
+intervals the most piercing cries. In the morning she carried
+them to still another spot, where there was a soft mould, and
+then dug a hole large and deep enough to bury them all, covering
+them over with the loose earth. Her task done, she returned to
+the house to sleep all day, but when night came again the whole
+piteous performance was repeated: the pups were dug up, and she
+passed the long, piercingly cold night--for it was in the depth
+of winter--trying to keep them warm, and uttering, as before,
+distressing cries. Yet a third time the whole thing was repeated;
+but after the third night, when the dog came home to sleep, the
+dead pups were taken out of the ground and buried at a
+distance.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">Such an action as
+this strikes one with astonishment only because we have the
+custom of burying our dead, and are too ready at all times to
+regard the dog as human-like. But the explanation of the action
+in this case is to be found in the familiar fact that very many
+animals, including the dog, have the habit or instinct of burying
+or concealing the thing they wish to leave in safety. Thus, the
+dog buries the bone it does not want to eat, and when hungry digs
+it up again. When a dog buries or hides the dead body of the she
+dog it was attached to, or the she dog buries her dead young, it
+is with the same motive--namely, to conceal the animal that
+cannot be roused, and that it would not be safe to leave
+exposed.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">388
+<i>Appendix.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">It is plain to all
+who observe their actions that the lower animals have no
+comprehension of death. In the case of two animals that are
+accustomed to play or to be much together, if one dies, or is
+killed, and its body left, the other will come to sniff at,
+touch, and at last try to rouse it; but finding all attempts
+vain, it will at length go away to seek companionship elsewhere.
+In cases where the attachment is much stronger, the dead body may
+be watched over for an indefinite period. A brother of mine once
+related to me a very pathetic incident which occurred at an
+estancia on the pampas where he was staying. A large portion of
+the land was a low, level, marshy plain, partly overgrown with
+reeds and rushes; and one day, in this wilderness, a little boy
+of eight or nine, from the estancia, lost himself. A small dog,
+his invariable attendant, had gone out with him, but did not
+return. Seven days later the poor boy was found, at a great
+distance from the house, lying on the grass, where he had died of
+exhaustion. The dog was lying coiled up at his side, and appeared
+to be sleeping; but, when spoken to, he did not stir, and was
+presently found to be dead too. The dog could have gone back at
+any moment to the estancia, but his instinct of attachment
+overcame all others; he kept guard over his little master, who
+slept so soundly and so long, until he, too, slept in the same
+way.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">A still more
+remarkable case of this kind was given in one of my books, of a
+gaucho, accompanied by his dog, who was chased and overtaken by a
+troop of soldiers during one of the civil wars in Uruguay.
+Suspecting him of being a spy, or, at all events, an enemy, his
+captors cut his throat, then rode away, calling to the dog to
+follow them; but the animal refused to leave his dead master's
+side. Returning to the spot a few days later, they saw the body
+of the man they had killed surrounded by a large number of
+vultures, which the dog, in a frenzy of excitement, was occupied
+in keeping at a respectable distance. It was observed that the
+dog, after making one of his sallies, driving the birds away with
+furious barkings, would set out at a run to a small
+stream</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font21"><i>Appendix.</i>
+389</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">not far from the
+spot; but when half way to it he would look back, and, seeing the
+vultures advancing once more to the corpse, would rush back to
+protect it. The soldiers watched him for some time with great
+interest, and once more they tried in vain to get him to follow
+them. Two days afterwards they revisited the spot, to find the
+dog lying dead by the side of his dead master. I had this story
+from the lips of one of the witnesses.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font19 c46">In all such cases,
+whether the dog watches over, conceals, or buries a dead body, he
+is doubtless moved by the same instinct which leads him to
+safeguard the animal he is attached to--another dog or his human
+master. But, as the dead animal is past help, it is, of course, a
+blunder of the instinct; and the blunder must be of very much
+less frequent occurrence among wild than among domestic animals.
+In a state of nature, when a gregarious animal dies, he dies, as
+a rule, alone; his body is not seen by his former companions, and
+he is not missed. When he dies by violence--which is the common
+fate--the body is carried off or devoured by the killer. This
+being the usual order, there is no instinct, except in a very few
+species, relating to the disposal of the dead among mammals and
+other vertebrates, such as is found in ants and other social
+insects. There are a few mammalians that live together in small
+communities, in a habitation made to last for many generations,
+in which such an instinct would appear necessary, and it
+accordingly exists, but is very imperfect. This is the case with
+the vizcacha, the large rodent of the pampas, which lives with
+its fellows, to the number of twenty or thirty, in a cluster of
+huge burrows. When a vizcacha dies in a burrow, the body is
+dragged out and thrown on to the mound among the mass of rubbish
+collected on it--but not until he has been dead a long time, and
+there is nothing left of him but the dry bones held together by
+the skin. In that condition the other members of the community
+probably cease to look on him as one of their companions who has
+fallen into a long sleep; he is no more than so much rubbish,
+which must be cleared out</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22"><i>390
+Appendix.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46">of an old disused
+burrow. Probably the beaver possesses some rude instinct similar
+to that of the vizcacha.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font20 c46"><i>Apropos</i> of
+animals burying their treasures (or connections) for safety, it
+is worth mentioning that the skunk of the pampas occasionally
+buries her young in the kennel, when hunger compels her to go out
+foraging. I had often heard of this habit of the female skunk
+from the gauchos, and one day had the rare good fortune to
+witness an animal engaged in obliterating her own kennel. The
+senses of the skunk are so defective that one is able at times to
+approach very near to without alarming them. In this instance I
+sat on my horse at a distance of twenty yards, and watched the
+animal at work, drawing in the loose earth with her fore feet
+until the entrance to the kennel was filled up to within three
+inches of the surface; then, dropping into the shallow cavity,
+she pressed the loose mould down with her nose. Her task
+finished, she trotted away, and the hollow in the soil, when I
+examined it closely, looked only like the mouth of an ancient
+choked-up burrow. The young inhabit a circular chamber, lined
+with fine dry grass, at the end of a narrow passage from 3 ft. to
+5 ft. long, and no doubt have air enough to serve them until
+their parent returns; but I believe the skunk only buries her
+young when they are very small.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font28">INDEX,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c47">AESCHNA
+BONARIENSIS, 130.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Aguar&aacute;,
+15.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font16 c47">Aguar&aacute;-guaz&uacute;, 15.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Animal weapons,
+69-82.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Anumbius
+acnticaudatus, 14-7, 253.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Argyroueta,
+195.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Armadillo, Hairy.
+<i>See</i> Dasypus villosus.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Aspisoma,
+169.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Ass defends itself
+against the puma,</span> <span class="font18 c47">38.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c47">Atticora
+cyanoleuca, 296, 298.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font18 c47">Audnbon and
+Bachmau, on the</span> <span class="font16 c47">puma,
+37.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Automalus,
+250.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c27">Azara, F&eacute;lix
+de, on the habits of Anumbius, 253; of the oscillating finch,
+263; of the puma, 31, 35, 40; of the tree-creepers, 251; of the
+vizcacha, 304, 310.----Anecdote of caged rats, 343, 344. Azara's
+dog. <i>See</i> Canis azarae.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">BACON, on the dog
+maintained by a man, 341.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bain, Dr. A., on
+anger, 166.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Baird, Dr. Spencer,
+on the peregrine falcon, 97; on the stunk, 119.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bartlett, Mr., on
+the Talegallus in the Zoological Gardens, 87.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bates, Mr., on
+wandering bands of birds, 251</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Belt, on the
+bush-tick, 142; on the fire-fly's light, 171; on man's hairless
+condition, 143; on humming-birds in Nicaragua, 218; on wandering
+hands of birds, 255</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bete-rouge,
+141.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bicho-colorado,
+144.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bigg-Wither, Mr.,
+on dancing-birds in Brazil, 262; on fire-flies in Brazil,
+173.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bird-fly.
+<i>See</i> Ornithomyia.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Birds, on the
+pampas, 19; aerial dances of, 265; fear in, 83-100; affected by
+fire-light, 176; how they escape the bush-ticks, 144; wandering
+bands of, 252.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Black-faced ibis,
+265.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c49">Boddam-Whetham, Mr.
+J. W., anecdote of puma, 52.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bombas thoracicus,
+154.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">B. violaceus, 154,
+157.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Burrowing owl, 24,
+66; a snake-killer, 73.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Burton, Captain, on
+bush-ticks in Brazil, 141.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Bush-ticks,
+141-145.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Buteo eythronotus,
+175.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Byron, Commodore,
+anecdote of a great beast in Tierra del Fuego, 50.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">CACHALOTE.
+<i>See</i> Homorus.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Canis azarae, 15;
+death-feigning instincts of, 202; preying habits, 300.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">C. jnbatus,
+15.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Carancho, 23,
+119.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Carduus mariana,
+303.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cat, anecdotes of
+the, 60, 61, 73.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cattle, strange
+instincts of, 329-347.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cavia australis,
+13, 64.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Ceratophrys ornata,
+78, 79.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cervus campestris,
+16; instincts</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">of doe and fawn,
+110; powerful</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">smell of buck,
+159.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">C. paludosus,
+aquatic habits, 144.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Chaj&aacute;.
+<i>See</i> Crested Screamer.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Chauna chavarria.
+<i>See</i> Crested Screamer.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Chimango, 23, 91,
+93, 94.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Chinchillidae,
+language of, 265.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Chlamydophorus
+truncata, 16.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Ciconia maguari,
+62.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cinclodes, 242,
+248.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Circus cinereus,
+94.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">C. macropterus,
+94.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cnipolegus hndsoni,
+antics of, 271.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cock-of-the-rock,
+dancing antics, 261.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cometes,
+219.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Coryphistera,
+242.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Courlan,
+19.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Cow-bird, Common,
+habits of the young, 90; language and antics, 273.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font23">392</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font21"><i>Index.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Cow - bird,
+Screaming, dancing antics, 273. Coyp&uacute;, 11.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Craspedocephalus
+alternatus, 160.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Cratomorphus,
+169.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Crested Screamer,
+20; habits of, 221-234.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Ctenomys
+magellanica, 13.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Cunningham, Dr., on
+habits of Oxyurus, 248.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Curtis, Dr., on the
+Mosquito, 139.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Cynara cardunculus,
+302.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c50">DAINES BARRINGTON,
+on birds' songs, 257.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">D'Albertis, on
+fire-flies in New Guinea, 173.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dancing (Music and)
+in Nature, 261-288.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Darwin, on birds
+learning their songs, 257; fear in birds, 88, 89; the gauchos,
+351; the huanacos' dying places, 316, 317; humble-bees destroyed
+by mice, 62; habits of Oxyurus, 248; the pampas, 4, 5;
+persecution of sick and wounded animals by their companions, 339,
+343; sexual selection, 208, 263, 279; habits of the vizcacha,
+289, 304.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dasypus minutus,
+16.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">D. tricinctus,
+16.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">D. villosus, 17; a
+mouse-catcher, 60; a snake-killer, 60; hunted by trained dogs,
+309.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Death-feigning
+instincts, 200-204.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dendrocolaptidae,
+habits of, 235-260.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dendrornis, 243,
+259.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Didelphys auritur,
+18.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">D. azarae, 18;
+death-feigning instincts, 202; burdened with its young,
+102.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dog, dislike of the
+skunk in, 120; domineering temper of, 336.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dolichotis
+patagonica, 11.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dolomedes,
+195.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">D'Orbigney, on
+oven-birds' singing, 272.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Drymornis,
+240.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Dragon-flies,
+instinctively feared by gnats, 135; travel before a south-west
+wind, 130-134.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c51">EDENTATES,
+16.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c51">Elanus leucurus,
+95,</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Epeira, 175; hunted
+by wasps, 182: protective resemblances in, 183.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">FEAR, in birds,
+83-100; paralyzing</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">effects of,
+201.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Felis concolor.
+<i>Seo</i> Puma.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">F. geoffroyi,
+14.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">F. onca. <i>See</i>
+Jaguar.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Fire, confusing
+effect of, at night, 173-177.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Fire-flies,
+168-173.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Firewood gatherer.
+<i>Seo</i> Anumbius.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Fitzroy, Admiral,
+on the huanaco, 316; on the puma, 50.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Fleas,
+151.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Fowl, cackling
+instinct of, 112-115. Fox. <i>See</i> Canis azara. Freeman,
+Professor, on the humane instinct, 347.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Frog, an
+undescribed species, 75-78.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c51">Furnariusrufus,
+242, 256; destroyed by owls, 63; language, 256, 260; how it
+protects itself from parasites, 145.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c51">GALICTIS BARBARA,
+15; helplessness of young, 104.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gallus bankiva, its
+cackling instinct, 115.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Garrod, Dr., on the
+Crested Screamer, 223.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gauchos, their
+treatment of horses, 354.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gay, Claudio, on
+the puma, 42.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Geobates,
+242.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Geositta
+cunicularia, 242, 296, 298</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gibson, Mr. Ernest,
+anecdote of carancho and skunk, 119.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Golden plover,
+American, migration of, 21, 22.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gossamer spider,
+184; migrations of, 185-188.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gould, Dr., on
+humming-birds, 205, 207, 209, 213.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Grass-cat,
+14.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Grasshoppers,
+curious habit of, 373; mimicry and warning colours in,
+124-129.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Guzman, Rui Diaz
+de, his story of Maldonada and the puma, 56.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Gynerium argenteum,
+6.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c50">HAWKS,
+93.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c50">Henicornis,
+242.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font21"><i>Index.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">393</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Homorus, 242, 256;
+H. gnttnralis, architecture of, 244; language and antics, 272; H.
+lophotes, 244.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Horse, 348-362;
+wild, scarcity of in Patagonia, 33; coming home to die,
+323.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Huanaco, strange
+instinct of, 314-328 Humble-bees, great increase of, 59;
+destroyed by mice, 62; habits of, 154-157; threatening attitudes
+of, 192.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Humming-birds,
+205-220.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Huxley, Professor,
+on the Crested Screamer, 222.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">INDIANS, PAMPAS,
+their horses, 354.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Instincts of
+parents and young, 101; mistakes of, 167.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Ixodes. <i>See</i>
+Bush-ticks.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">JACANA, PARRA,
+wing-displaying performance of, 268.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Jaguar, 14; how
+hunted, 45; paralyzed by fear, 201; persecuted by puma,
+35.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c48">KING, Captain,
+anecdote of huanaco, 316.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Kirby and Spence,
+on habits of the bird-fly, 146; on the fire-fly's light, 168,
+170; on mimicry, 127.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font17 c47">LAGOSTOMUS
+TRICHODACTYLUS. <i>See</i></span> <span class=
+"font16 c47">Vizcacha.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Lambs, helplessness
+of, 106.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Lang, Mr. A.,
+anecdote of cattle, 344.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Laptasthenura, 238,
+255.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Larus maculipennis,
+66.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Le&ntilde;atero.
+<i>See</i> Armmbius.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Lichenops
+perspicillata, how caught, 202.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Limnornis,
+242.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Limosa hudsouica,
+migration of, 21, 22.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Lochmias,
+249.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Loddigesia
+mirabilis, 215.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Lophornis,
+219.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Lycosa, habits of
+a, 192.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">MAGARORNIS, 240,
+250.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Martin, Mr., on
+humming-birds, 219.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Mason-wasp,
+180.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Mice, excessive
+increase of, 60, 67; parental instincts of, 105.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Military starling,
+24.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Milvago chimango.
+<i>See</i> Chimango.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Mimicry in
+grasshoppers, 124-129; in a robber-fly, 170; in a snake,
+377.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Minera. <i>See</i>
+Geositta cunicularia.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Mocking-bird,
+white-banded, melody of, 276.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Molina, on the
+puma, 33; on the skunk in Chili, 118; on the vizcacha's tail,
+75.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Molossus
+bonariensis, 101.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Molothrns,
+parasitical habits of, 251.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">M. bonariensis.
+<i>See</i> Cow-bird.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Monedula punctata,
+habits of, 162-166.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Mosquitoes,
+instinctive fear in, 135; hunger for blood, 138.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Murray, Mr. Andrew,
+on the puma, 51. Music and dancing in Nature, 261-288.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Mygale fusca, 179,
+191.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Myiopotamus coypu.
+<i>See</i> Coyp&uacute;.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">NASICA, 238.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">OCULTO ,
+13.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Oriotrochilus,
+219.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Ornithomyia, habits
+of, 145.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Ornithoptera
+croesus, 206</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Oscilador,
+263.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Otus brachyotus,
+62.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Oxypogon,
+219.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Oxyurug,
+248.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">PAMPAS, description
+of, 4--9; grass, 6; Indians, 7.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pampa sheep, 108,
+110.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Papa-uir&aacute;,
+254.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Parker, Professor,
+on rails, 222.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Parra jacana,
+wing-displaying performance of, 268; instincts of young,
+111.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pepris wasp, habits
+of, 128.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Peregrine falcon,
+32; preying habits of, 95.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Phaethornithinae,
+216.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pholcus, habits of
+a, 188, 200.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pholeoptynx
+cunicularia. <i>See</i> Burrowing Owl.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pigs defend
+themselves against puma, 38.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><br>
+</p>
+
+<hr>
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font22">394</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class=
+"font22"><i>Index.</i></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Polyborinae,
+23.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Polyborus tharus.
+<i>See</i> Carancho.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Porphyriops
+melanops, 20.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pracellodomus
+sibilatrix, architecture, 244.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pseudocolaptes,
+250.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Puma, 14; habits
+of, 31-58; playful temper, 280; destructive habits,
+299.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Pyrophorus,
+169.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">QUIRQUINCHO,
+16.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">BALLUS
+RYTHYRHYNCHTUS, 20.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Rattlesnake,
+hybernationof, 321.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Rhea americana, 26;
+hunted with bolas, 27; habits of young, 85.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Rhomalea speciosa,
+127.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Rhynohotus
+rufescens. <i>See</i> Tinamon.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Romanes, Dr., on
+persecution of the sick and wounded by animals, 340.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Rostrhamus
+sociabilis, 95.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Rupicola, dancing
+antics of, 261.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Ruskin, on colour,
+280.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">SALTICUS, 179,
+195.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Schufeldt, Dr., on
+humming-birds, 209.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Scissors-tail,
+performance of, 271</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Sclerurus, 240,
+249.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Short-eared owl,
+62, 63, 66.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Sittosoma,
+238.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Skunk, 15; habits
+of, 116-123; degeneracy of, 158.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Snakes, their
+enemies, 72--75; hybernating habits, 321; mimicry,
+374-378.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Sociable hawk,
+95.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Sparrow, common,
+84.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Spathura,
+219.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Spencer, Herbert,
+on instinctive fear of man in birds, 99, 100.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Spiders, facts and
+thoughts about, 176-199.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Spine-tail.
+<i>See</i> Synallaxis.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Spur-winged
+lapwing, 20; dances of, 269.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Stilt, Brazilian,
+aerial pastimes of, 282.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Stolzman, on
+wandering bands of birds, 254.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Sulphur tyrant, a
+snake-killer, 73.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Swan, Black-necked,
+how taken, 201.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Sycalis luteola,
+melody of, 274, 285.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Sylviothorynchns,
+239.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Synallaxis,
+architecture of, 244, 247, 369.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">S. phryganophila,
+244, 249.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">TALEGALLUS, habits
+of young, 87.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Tatusia hybrida,
+16.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Tinamou, rufous,
+25; early maturity of, 258.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">---- spotted, 25;
+death-feigning instincts of, 203.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Teguexin lizard, a
+snake-killer, 74.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Tetragnatha,
+183.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Thripodeotes
+flammulatus, 250.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Thurn, Everard im,
+on hummingbirds, 207.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Trap-door spider,
+195.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">Tree-creepers.
+<i>See</i> Dendrocolap</span><span class=
+"font11">tidae<b>.</b></span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Tristram, Canon, on
+migration, 23.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Tuco-tucc,
+13.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">UPERCERTHIA,
+242.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">VAN BENEDEN, on
+mosquitoes, 139.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Vivora de la cruz,
+160.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Vizcacha, 9;
+biography of, 289-313.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">WALLACE, Dr. A. B.,
+on antiquity of humming-birds,217; on colour, 249, 280,
+285.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Waterhouse, on
+marsupial characters in the vizcacha, 289-313.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Weissenborn, on
+migrations of dragon-flies in Europe, 133.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Widgeon, Whistling,
+antics of, 266.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c51">Woodhewers.
+<i>See</i> Dendrocolap-tidae.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">XENOPS,
+240.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Xyphocolaptes,
+243.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c47">Xyphorynchus, 238,
+243, 260.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16">YPECAHA, 20; dances of,
+266.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">ZENAIDA MACULATA,
+63; anecdote of, 91-93.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+<p class="paragraph"><span class="font16 c48">Zoniopoda tarsata,
+habits of, 124.</span><br>
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
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+</pre>
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+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Naturalist in La Plata
+
+Author: W. H. Hudson
+
+Posting Date: April 12, 2014 [EBook #7446]
+Release Date: February, 2005
+First Posted: May 1, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Eric Eldred
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA
+
+BY
+
+W. H. HUDSON, C.M.Z.S.
+
+
+JOINT AUTHOR OF "ARGENTINE ORNITHOLOGY"
+
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. SMIT
+
+THIRD EDITION.
+
+NEW YORK
+D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
+1895
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The plan I have followed in this work has been to sift and arrange the
+facts I have gathered concerning the habits of the animals best known to
+me, preserving those only, which, in my judgment, appeared worth
+recording. In some instances a variety of subjects have linked
+themselves together in my mind, and have been grouped under one heading;
+consequently the scope of the book is not indicated by the list of
+contents: this want is, however, made good by an index at the end.
+
+It is seldom an easy matter to give a suitable name to a book of this
+description. I am conscious that the one I have made choice of displays
+a lack of originality; also, that this kind of title has been used
+hitherto for works constructed more or less on the plan of the famous
+_Naturalist on the Amazons._ After I have made this apology the reader,
+on his part, will readily admit that, in treating of the Natural History
+of a district so well known, and often described as the southern portion
+of La Plata, which has a temperate climate, and where nature is neither
+exuberant nor grand, a personal narrative would have seemed superfluous.
+
+The greater portion of the matter contained in this volume has already
+seen the light in the form of papers contributed to the _Field,_ with
+other journals that treat of Natural History; and to the monthly
+magazines:--_Longmans', The Nineteenth Century, The Gentleman's
+Magazine,_ and others: I am indebted to the Editors and Proprietors of
+these periodicals for kindly allowing me to make use of this material.
+
+Of all animals, birds have perhaps afforded me most pleasure; but most
+of the fresh knowledge I have collected in this department is contained
+in a larger work _(Argentine Ornithology),_ of which Dr. P. L. Sclater
+is part author. As I have not gone over any of the subjects dealt with
+in that work, bird-life has not received more than a fair share of
+attention in the present volume.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE DESERT PAMPAS
+
+CHAPTER II. CUB PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA
+
+CHAPTER III. WAVE OF LIFE
+
+CHAPTER IV. SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS
+
+CHAPTER V. FEAR IN BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER VI. PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE MEPHITIC SKUNK
+
+CHAPTER VIII. MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS
+
+CHAPTER IX. DRAGON-FLY STORMS
+
+CHAPTER X. MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS
+
+CHAPTER XI. HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS
+
+CHAPTER XII. A NOBLE WASP
+
+CHAPTER XIII. NATURE'S NIGHT-LIGHTS
+
+CHAPTER XIV. FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS
+
+CHAPTER XV. THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT
+
+CHAPTER XVI. HUMMING-BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE CRESTED SCREAMER
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. THE WOODHEWER FAMILY
+
+CHAPTER XIX. MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE
+
+CHAPTER XX. BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE DYING HUANACO
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. HORSE AND MAN
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. SEEN AND LOST
+
+APPENDIX
+
+INDEX
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA,
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE DESERT PAMPAS.
+
+
+During recent years we have heard much about the great and rapid changes
+now going on in the plants and animals of all the temperate regions of
+the globe colonized by Europeans. These changes, if taken merely as
+evidence of material progress, must be a matter of rejoicing to those
+who are satisfied, and more than satisfied, with our system of
+civilization, or method of outwitting Nature by the removal of all
+checks on the undue increase of our own species. To one who finds a
+charm in things as they exist in the unconquered provinces of Nature's
+dominions, and who, not being over-anxious to reach the end of his
+journey, is content to perform it on horseback, or in a waggon drawn by
+bullocks, it is permissible to lament the altered aspect of the earth's
+surface, together with the disappearance of numberless noble and
+beautiful forms, both of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. For he
+cannot find it in his heart to love the forms by which they are
+replaced; these are cultivated and domesticated, and have only become
+useful to man at the cost of that grace and spirit which freedom and
+wildness give. In numbers they are many--twenty-five millions of sheep
+in this district, fifty millions in that, a hundred millions in a
+third--but how few are the species in place of those destroyed? and when
+the owner of many sheep and much wheat desires variety--for he possesses
+this instinctive desire, albeit in conflict with and overborne by the
+perverted instinct of destruction--what is there left to him, beyond his
+very own, except the weeds that spring up in his fields under all skies,
+ringing him round with old-world monotonous forms, as tenacious of their
+undesired union with him as the rats and cockroaches that inhabit his
+house?
+
+We hear most frequently of North America, New Zealand, and Australia in
+this connection; but nowhere on the globe has civilization "written
+strange defeatures" more markedly than on that great area of level
+country called by English writers _the pampas_, but by the Spanish more
+appropriately _La Pampa_--from the Quichua word signifying open space or
+country--since it forms in most part one continuous plain, extending on
+its eastern border from the river Parana, in latitude 32 degrees, to the
+Patagonian formation on the river Colorado, and comprising about two
+hundred thousand square miles of humid, grassy country.
+
+This district has been colonized by Europeans since the middle of the
+sixteenth century; but down to within a very few years ago immigration
+was on too limited a scale to make any very great change; and, speaking
+only of the pampean country, the conquered territory was a long,
+thinly-settled strip, purely pastoral, and the Indians, with their
+primitive mode of warfare, were able to keep back the invaders from the
+greater portion of their ancestral hunting-grounds. Not twenty years
+ago a ride of two hundred miles, starting from the capital city,
+Buenos Ayres, was enough to place one well beyond the furthest
+south-western frontier outpost. In 1879 the Argentine Government
+determined to rid the country of the aborigines, or, at all events, to
+break their hostile and predatory spirit once for all; with the result
+that the entire area of the grassy pampas, with a great portion of
+the sterile pampas and Patagonia, has been made available to the
+emigrant. There is no longer anything to deter the starvelings
+of the Old World from possessing themselves of this new land of
+promise, flowing, like Australia, with milk and tallow, if not with
+honey; any emasculated migrant from a Genoese or Neapolitan
+slum is now competent to "fight the wilderness" out there, with his
+eight-shilling fowling-piece and the implements of his trade. The
+barbarians no longer exist to frighten his soul with dreadful war cries;
+they have moved away to another more remote and shadowy region, called
+in their own language _Alhuemapu_, and not known to geographers. For
+the results so long and ardently wished for have swiftly followed on
+General Roca's military expedition; and the changes witnessed during the
+last decade on the pampas exceed in magnitude those which had been
+previously effected by three centuries of occupation.
+
+In view of this wave of change now rapidly sweeping away the old
+order, with whatever beauty and grace it possessed, it might not seem
+inopportune at the present moment to give a rapid sketch, from the field
+naturalist's point of view, of the great plain, as it existed before the
+agencies introduced by European colonists had done their work, and as it
+still exists in its remoter parts.
+
+The humid, grassy, pampean country extends, roughly speaking, half-way
+from the Atlantic Ocean and the Plata and Parana rivers to the Andes,
+and passes gradually into the "Monte Formation," or _sterile pampa_--a
+sandy, more or less barren district, producing a dry, harsh, ligneous
+vegetation, principally thorny bushes and low trees, of which the chanar
+(Gurliaca decorticans) is the most common; hence the name of
+"Chanar-steppe" used by some writers: and this formation extends
+southwards down into Patagonia. Scientists have not yet been able to
+explain why the pampas, with a humid climate, and a soil exceedingly
+rich, have produced nothing but grass, while the dry, sterile
+territories on their north, west, and south borders have an arborescent
+vegetation. Darwin's conjecture that the extreme violence of the
+_pampero,_ or south-west wind, prevented trees from growing, is now
+proved to have been ill-founded since the introduction of the Eucalyptus
+globulus; for this noble tree attains to an extraordinary height on the
+pampas, and exhibits there a luxuriance of foliage never seen in
+Australia.
+
+To this level area--my "parish of Selborne," or, at all events, a goodly
+portion of it--with the sea on one hand, and on the other the
+practically infinite expanse of grassy desert--another sea, not "in vast
+fluctuations fixed," but in comparative calm--I should like to conduct
+the reader in imagination: a country all the easier to be imagined on
+account of the absence of mountains, woods, lakes, and rivers. There is,
+indeed, little to be imagined--not even a sense of vastness; and Darwin,
+touching on this point, in the _Journal of a Naturalist,_ aptly
+says:--"At sea, a person's eye being six feet above the surface of the
+water, his horizon is two miles and four-fifths distant. In like manner,
+the more level the plain, the more nearly does the horizon approach
+within these narrow limits; and this, in my opinion, entirely destroys
+the grandeur which one would have imagined that a vast plain would have
+possessed."
+
+I remember my first experience of a hill, after having been always shut
+within "these narrow limits." It was one of the range of sierras near
+Cape Corrientes, and not above eight hundred feet high; yet, when I had
+gained the summit, I was amazed at the vastness of the earth, as it
+appeared to me from that modest elevation. Persons born and bred on the
+pampas, when they first visit a mountainous district, frequently
+experience a sensation as of "a ball in the throat" which seems to
+prevent free respiration.
+
+In most places the rich, dry soil is occupied by a coarse grass, three
+or four feet high, growing in large tussocks, and all the year round of
+a deep green; a few slender herbs and trefoils, with long, twining
+stems, maintain a frail existence among the tussocks; but the strong
+grass crowds out most plants, and scarcely a flower relieves its uniform
+everlasting verdure. There are patches, sometimes large areas, where it
+does not grow, and these are carpeted by small creeping herbs of a
+livelier green, and are gay in spring with flowers, chiefly of the
+composite and papilionaceous kinds; and verbenas, scarlet, purple, rose,
+and white. On moist or marshy grounds there are also several lilies,
+yellow, white, and red, two or three flags, and various other small
+flowers; but altogether the flora of the pampas is the poorest in
+species of any fertile district on the globe. On moist clayey ground
+flourishes the stately pampa grass, Gynerium argenteum, the spears of
+which often attain a height of eight or nine feet. I have ridden through
+many leagues of this grass with the feathery spikes high as my head, and
+often higher. It would be impossible for me to give anything like an
+adequate idea of the exquisite loveliness, at certain times and seasons,
+of this queen of grasses, the chief glory of the solitary pampa.
+Everyone is familiar with it in cultivation; but the garden-plant has a
+sadly decaying, draggled look at all times, and to my mind, is often
+positively ugly with its dense withering mass of coarse leaves, drooping
+on the ground, and bundle of spikes, always of the same dead white or
+dirty cream-colour. Now colour--the various ethereal tints that give a
+blush to its cloud-like purity--is one of the chief beauties of this
+grass on its native soil; and travellers who have galloped across the
+pampas at a season of the year when the spikes are dead, and white as
+paper or parchment, have certainly missed its greatest charm. The plant
+is social, and in some places where scarcely any other kind exists it
+covers large areas with a sea of fleecy-white plumes; in late summer,
+and in autumn, the tints are seen, varying from the most delicate rose,
+tender and illusive as the blush on the white under-plumage of some
+gulls, to purple and violaceous. At no time does it look so perfect as
+in the evening, before and after sunset, when the softened light imparts
+a mistiness to the crowding plumes, and the traveller cannot help
+fancying that the tints, which then seem richest, are caught from the
+level rays of the sun, or reflected from the coloured vapours of the
+afterglow.
+
+The last occasion on which I saw the pampa grass in its full beauty was
+at the close of a bright day in March, ending in one of those perfect
+sunsets seen only in the wilderness, where no lines of house or hedge
+mar the enchanting disorder of nature, and the earth and sky tints are
+in harmony. I had been travelling all day with one companion, and for
+two hours we had ridden through the matchless grass, which spread away
+for miles on every side, the myriads of white spears, touched with
+varied colour, blending in the distance and appearing almost like the
+surface of a cloud. Hearing a swishing sound behind us, we turned
+sharply round, and saw, not forty yards away in our rear, a party of
+five mounted Indians, coming swiftly towards us: but at the very moment
+we saw them their animals came to a dead halt, and at the same instant
+the five riders leaped up, and stood erect on their horses' backs.
+Satisfied that they had no intention of attacking us, and were only
+looking out for strayed horses, we continued watching them for some
+time, as they stood gazing away over the plain in different directions,
+motionless and silent, like bronze men on strange horse-shaped pedestals
+of dark stone; so dark in their copper skins and long black hair,
+against the far-off ethereal sky, flushed with amber light; and at their
+feet, and all around, the cloud of white and faintly-blushing plumes.
+That farewell scene was printed very vividly on my memory, but cannot be
+shown to another, nor could it be even if a Ruskin's pen or a Turner's
+pencil were mine; for the flight of the sea-mew is not more impossible
+to us than the power to picture forth the image of Nature in our souls,
+when she reveals herself in one of those "special moments" which have
+"special grace" in situations where her wild beauty has never been
+spoiled by man.
+
+At other hours and seasons the general aspect of the plain is
+monotonous, and in spite of the unobstructed view, and the unfailing
+verdure and sunshine, somewhat melancholy, although never sombre: and
+doubtless the depressed and melancholy feeling the pampa inspires in
+those who are unfamiliar with it is due in a great measure to the
+paucity of life, and to the profound silence. The wind, as may well be
+imagined on that extensive level area, is seldom at rest; there, as in
+the forest, it is a "bard of many breathings," and the strings it
+breathes upon give out an endless variety of sorrowful sounds, from the
+sharp fitful sibilations of the dry wiry grasses on the barren places,
+to the long mysterious moans that swell and die in the tall polished
+rushes of the marsh. It is also curious to note that with a few
+exceptions the resident birds are comparatively very silent, even those
+belonging to groups which elsewhere are highly loquacious. The reason of
+this is not far to seek. In woods and thickets, where birds abound
+most, they are continually losing sight of each other, and are only
+prevented from scattering by calling often; while the muffling effect on
+sound of the close foliage, to' which may be added a spirit of emulation
+where many voices are heard, incites most species, especially those that
+are social, to exert their voices to the utmost pitch in singing,
+calling, and screaming. On the open pampas, birds, which are not
+compelled to live concealed on the surface, can see each other at long
+distances, and perpetual calling is not needful: moreover, in that still
+atmosphere sound travels far. As a rule their voices are strangely
+subdued; nature's silence has infected them, and they have become silent
+by habit. This is not the case with aquatic species, which are nearly
+all migrants from noisier regions, and mass themselves in lagoons and
+marshes, where they are all loquacious together. It is also noteworthy
+that the subdued bird-voices, some of which are exceedingly sweet and
+expressive, and the notes of many of the insects and batrachians have a
+great resemblance, and seem to be in accord with the aeolian tones of
+the wind in reeds and grasses: a stranger to the pampas, even a
+naturalist accustomed to a different fauna, will often find it hard to
+distinguish between bird, frog, and insect voices.
+
+The mammalia is poor in species, and with the single exception of the
+well-known vizcacha (Lagostomus trichodactylus), there is not one of
+which it can truly be said that it is in any special way the product of
+the pampas, or, in other words, that its instincts are better suited to
+the conditions of the pampas than to those of other districts. As a
+fact, this large rodent inhabits a vast extent of country, north, west,
+and south of the true pampas, but nowhere is he so thoroughly on his
+native heath as on the great grassy plain. There, to some extent, he
+even makes his own conditions, like the beaver. He lives in a small
+community of twenty or thirty members, in a village of deep-chambered
+burrows, all with their pit-like entrances closely grouped together; and
+as the village endures for ever, or for an indefinite time, the earth
+constantly being brought up forms a mound thirty or forty feet in
+diameter; and this protects the habitation from floods on low or level
+ground. Again, he is not swift of foot, and all rapacious beasts are his
+enemies; he also loves to feed on tender succulent herbs and grasses, to
+seek for which he would have to go far afield among the giant grass,
+where his watchful foes are lying in wait to seize him; he saves himself
+from this danger by making a clearing all round his abode, on which a
+smooth turf is formed; and here the animals feed and have their evening
+pastimes in comparative security: for when an enemy approaches, he is
+easily seen; the note of alarm is sounded, and the whole company
+scuttles away to their refuge. In districts having a different soil and
+vegetation, as in Patagonia, the vizcachas' curious, unique instincts
+are of no special advantage, which makes it seem probable that they have
+been formed on the pampas.
+
+How marvellous a thing it seems that the two species of mammalians--the
+beaver and the vizcacha--that most nearly simulate men's intelligent
+actions in their social organizing instincts, and their habitations,
+which are made to endure, should belong to an order so low down as the
+Rodents! And in the case of the latter species, it adds to the marvel
+when we find that the vizcacha, according to Water-house, is the lowest
+of the order in its marsupial affinities.
+
+The vizcacha is the most common rodent on the pampas, and the Rodent
+order is represented by the largest number of species. The finest is the
+so-called Patagonian hare--Dolichotis patagonica--a beautiful animal
+twice as large as a hare, with ears shorter and more rounded, and legs
+relatively much longer. The fur is grey and chestnut brown. It is
+diurnal in its habits, lives in kennels, and is usually met with in
+pairs, or small flocks. It is better suited to a sterile country like
+Patagonia than to the grassy humid plain; nevertheless it was found
+throughout the whole of the pampas; but in a country where the wisdom of
+a Sir William Harcourt was never needed to slip the leash, this king of
+the Rodentia is now nearly extinct.
+
+A common rodent is the coypu--Myiopotamus coypu--yellowish in colour
+with bright red incisors; a rat in shape, and as large as an otter. It
+is aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where there are no banks it
+makes a platform nest among the rushes. Of an evening they are all out
+swimming and playing in the water, conversing together in their strange
+tones, which sound like the moans and cries of wounded and suffering
+men; and among them the mother-coypu is seen with her progeny, numbering
+eight or nine, with as many on her back as she can accommodate, while
+the others swim after her, crying for a ride.
+
+With reference to this animal, which, as we have seen, is prolific, a
+strange thing once happened in Buenos Ayres. The coypu was much more
+abundant fifty years ago than now, and its skin, which has a fine fur
+under the long coarse hair, was largely exported to Europe. About that
+time the Dictator Rosas issued a decree prohibiting the hunting of the
+coypu. The result was that the animals increased and multiplied
+exceedingly, and, abandoning their aquatic habits, they became
+terrestrial and migratory, and swarmed everywhere in search of food.
+Suddenly a mysterious malady fell on them, from which they quickly
+perished, and became almost extinct.
+
+What a blessed thing it would be for poor rabbit-worried Australia if a
+similar plague should visit that country, and fall on the right animal!
+On the other hand, what a calamity if the infection, wide-spread,
+incurable, and swift as the wind in its course, should attack the
+too-numerous sheep! And who knows what mysterious, unheard-of
+retributions that revengeful deity Nature may not be meditating in her
+secret heart for the loss of her wild four-footed children slain by
+settlers, and the spoiling of her ancient beautiful order!
+
+A small pampa rodent worthy of notice is the Cavia australis, called
+_cui_ in the vernacular from its voice: a timid, social, mouse-coloured
+little creature, with a low gurgling language, like running babbling
+waters; in habits resembling its domestic pied relation the guinea pig.
+It loves to run on clean ground, and on the pampas makes little
+rat-roads all about its hiding-place, which little roads tell a story to
+the fox, and such like; therefore the little cavy's habits, and the
+habits of all cavies, I fancy, are not so well suited to the humid
+grassy region as to other districts, with sterile ground to run and play
+upon, and thickets in which to hide.
+
+A more interesting animal is the Ctenomys magellanica, a little less
+than the rat in size, with a shorter tail, pale grey fur, and red
+incisors. It is called _tuco-tuco_ from its voice, and _oculto_ from its
+habits; for it is a dweller underground, and requires a loose, sandy
+soil in which, like the mole, it may _swim_ beneath the surface.
+Consequently the pampa, with its heavy, moist mould, is not the tuco's
+proper place; nevertheless, wherever there is a stretch of sandy soil,
+or a range of dunes, there it is found living; not seen, but heard; for
+all day long and all night sounds its voice, resonant and loud, like a
+succession of blows from a hammer; as if a company of gnomes were
+toiling far down underfoot, beating on their anvils, first with strong
+measured strokes, then with lighter and faster, and with a swing and
+rhythm as if the little men were beating in time to some rude chant
+unheard above the surface. How came these isolated colonies of a species
+so subterranean in habits, and requiring a sandy soil to move in, so far
+from their proper district--that sterile country from which they are
+separated by wide, unsuitable areas? They cannot perform long overland
+journeys like the rat. Perhaps the dunes have travelled, carrying their
+little cattle with them.
+
+Greatest among the carnivores are the two cat-monarchs of South America,
+the jaguar and puma. Whatever may be their relative positions elsewhere,
+on the pampas the puma is mightiest, being much more abundant and better
+able to thrive than its spotted rival. Versatile in its preying habits,
+its presence on the pampa is not surprising; but probably only an
+extreme abundance of large mammalian prey, which has not existed in
+recent times, could have, tempted an animal of the river and
+forest-loving habits of the jaguar to colonize this cold, treeless, and
+comparatively waterless desert. There are two other important cats. The
+grass-cat, not unlike Felis catus in its robust form and dark colour,
+but a larger, more powerful animal, inexpressibly savage in disposition.
+The second, Felis geoffroyi, is a larger and more beautiful animal,
+coloured like a leopard; it is called wood-cat, and, as the name would
+seem to indicate, is an intruder from wooded districts north of the
+pampas.
+
+There are two canines: one is Azara's beautiful grey fox-like dog,
+purely a fox in habits, and common everywhere. The other is far more
+interesting and extremely rare; it is called _aguara,_ its nearest ally
+being the _aguara-guazu,_ the Canis jubatus or maned wolf of
+naturalists, found north of the pampean district. The aguara is smaller
+and has no mane; it is like the dingo in size, but slimmer and with a
+sharper nose, and lias a much brighter red colour. At night when camping
+out I have heard its dismal screams, but the screamer was sought in
+vain; while from the gauchos of the frontier I could only learn that it
+is a harmless, shy, solitary animal, that ever flies to remoter wilds
+from its destroyer, man. They offered me a skin--what more could I want?
+Simple souls! it was no more to me than the skin of a dead dog, with
+long, bright red hair. Those who love dead animals may have them in any
+number by digging with a. spade in that vast sepulchre of the pampas,
+where perished the hosts of antiquity. I love the living that are above
+the earth; and how small a remnant they are in South America we know,
+and now yearly becoming more precious as it dwindles away.
+
+The pestiferous skunk is universal; and there are two quaint-looking
+weasels, intensely black in colour, and grey on the back and flat crown.
+One, the Galictis barbara, is a large bold animal that hunts in
+companies; and when these long-bodied creatures sit up erect, glaring
+with beady eyes, grinning and chattering at the passer-by, they look
+like little friars in black robes and grey cowls; but the expression on
+their round faces is malignant and bloodthirsty beyond anything in
+nature, and it would perhaps be more decent to liken them to devils
+rather than to humans.
+
+On the pampas there is, strictly speaking, only one ruminant, the Cervus
+campestris, which is common. The most curious thing about this animal is
+that the male emits a rank, musky odour, so powerful that when the wind
+blows from it the effluvium comes in nauseating gusts to the nostrils
+from a distance exceeding two miles. It is really astonishing that only
+one small ruminant should be found on this immense grassy area, so
+admirably suited to herbivorous quadrupeds, a portion of which at the
+present moment affords sufficient pasture to eighty millions of sheep,
+cattle, and horses. In La Plata the author of _The Mammoth and the
+Flood_ will find few to quarrel with his doctrine.
+
+Of Edentates there are four. The giant armadillo does not range so far,
+and the delicate little pink fairy armadillo, the truncated
+Chlamydophorus, is a dweller in the sand-dunes of Mendoza, and has never
+colonized the grassy pampas. The Tatusia hybrida, called "little mule"
+from the length of its ears, and the Dasypus tricinctus, which, when
+disturbed, rolls itself into a ball, the wedge-shaped head and
+wedge-shaped tail admirably fitting into the deep-cut shell side by
+side; and the _quirquincho_ (Dasypus minutus), all inhabit the pampa,
+are diurnal, and feed exclusively on insects, chiefly ants. Wherever the
+country becomes settled, these three disappear, owing to the dulness of
+their senses, especially that of sight, and to the diurnal habit, which
+was an advantage to them, and enabled them to survive when rapacious
+animals, which are mostly nocturnal, were their only enemies. The
+fourth, and most important, is the hairy armadillo, with habits which
+are in strange contrast to those of its perishing congeners, and which
+seem to mock many hard-and-fast rules concerning animal life. It is
+omnivorous, and will thrive on anything from grass to flesh, found dead
+and in all stages of decay, or captured by means of its own strategy.
+Furthermore, its habits change to suit its conditions: thus, where
+nocturnal carnivores are its enemies, it is diurnal; but where man
+appears as a chief persecutor, it becomes nocturnal. It is much hunted
+for its flesh, dogs being trained for the purpose; yet it actually
+becomes more abundant as population increases in any district; and, if
+versatility in habits or adaptiveness can be taken as a measure of
+intelligence, this poor armadillo, a survival of the past, so old on the
+earth as to have existed contemporaneously with the giant glyptodon, is
+the superior of the large-brained cats and canines.
+
+To finish with the mammalia, there are two interesting opossums, both of
+the genus Didelphys, but in habits as wide apart as cat from otter. One
+of these marsupials appears so much at home on the plains that I almost
+regret having said that the vizcacha alone gives us the idea of being in
+its habits the _product_ of the pampas. This animal--Didelphys
+crassicaudata--has a long slender, wedge-, shaped head and body,
+admirably adapted for pushing through the thick grass and rushes; for it
+is both terrestrial and aquatic, therefore well suited to inhabit low,
+level plains liable to be flooded. On dry land its habits are similar to
+those of a weasel; in lagoons, where it dives and swims with great ease,
+it constructs a globular nest suspended from the rushes. The fur is
+soft, of a rich yellow, reddish above, and on the sides and under
+surfaces varying in some parts to orange, in others exhibiting beautiful
+copper and terra-cotta tints. These lovely tints and the metallic lustre
+soon fade from the fur, otherwise this animal would be much sought after
+in the interests of those who love to decorate themselves with the
+spoils of beautiful dead animals--beast and bird. The other opossum is
+the black and white Didelphys azarae; and it is indeed strange to find
+this animal on the pampas, although its presence there is not so
+mysterious as that of the tuco-tuco. It shuffles along slowly and
+awkwardly on the ground, but is a great traveller nevertheless. Tschudi
+met it mountaineering on the Andes at an enormous altitude, and, true to
+its lawless nature, it confronted me in Patagonia, where the books say
+no marsupial dwells. In every way it is adapted to an arboreal life, yet
+it is everywhere found on the level country, far removed from the
+conditions which one would imagine to be necessary to its existence. For
+how many thousands of years has this marsupial been a dweller on the
+plain, all its best faculties unexercised, its beautiful grasping hands
+pressed to the ground, and its prehensile tail dragged like an idle rope
+behind it! Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will take to it as
+readily as a duck to water, or an armadillo to earth, climbing up the
+trunk and about the branches with a monkey-like agility. How reluctant
+Nature seems in some cases to undo her own work! How long she will
+allow a specialized organ, with the correlated instinct, to rest without
+use, yet ready to flash forth on the instant, bright and keen-edged, as
+in the ancient days of strife, ages past, before peace came to dwell on
+earth!
+
+The avi-fauna is relatively much richer than the mammalia, owing to the
+large number of aquatic species, most of which are migratory with their
+"breeding" or "subsistence-areas" on the pampas. In more senses than one
+they constitute a "floating population," and their habits have in no way
+been modified by the conditions of the country. The order, including
+storks, ibises, herons, spoonbills, and flamingoes, counts about
+eighteen species; and the most noteworthy birds in it are two great
+ibises nearly as large as turkeys, with mighty resonant voices. The duck
+order is very rich, numbering at least twenty species, including two
+beautiful upland geese, winter visitors from Magellanic lands, and two
+swans, the lovely black-necked, and the pure white with rosy bill. Of
+rails, or ralline birds, there are ten or twelve, ranging from a small
+spotted creature no bigger than a thrush to some large majestic birds.
+One is the courlan, called "crazy widow" from its mourning plumage and
+long melancholy screams, which on still evenings may be heard a league
+away. Another is the graceful variegated _ypicaha,_ fond of social
+gatherings, where the birds perform a dance and make the desolate
+marshes resound with their insane humanlike voices. A smaller kind,
+Porphyriops melanops, has a night-cry like a burst of shrill hysterical
+laughter, which has won for it the name of "witch;" while another,
+Rallus rythyrhynchus, is called "little donkey" from its braying cries.
+Strange eerie voices have all these birds. Of the remaining aquatic
+species, the most important is the spur-winged crested screamer; a noble
+bird as large as a swan, yet its favourite pastime is to soar upwards
+until it loses itself to sight in the blue ether, whenca it pours forth
+its resounding choral notes, which reach the distant earth clarified,
+and with a rhythmic swell and fall as of chiming bells. It also sings by
+night, "counting the hours," the gauchos say, and where they have
+congregated together in tens of thousands the mighty roar of their
+combined voices produces an astonishingly grand effect.
+
+The largest aquatic order is that of the Limicolse--snipes, plover, and
+their allies--which has about twenty-five species. The vociferous
+spur-winged lapwing; the beautiful black and white stilt; a true snipe,
+and a painted snipe, are, strictly speaking, the only residents; and it
+is astonishing to find, that, of the five-and-twenty species, at least
+thirteen are visitors from North America, several of them having their
+breeding-places quite away in the Arctic regions. This is one of those
+facts concerning the annual migration of birds which almost stagger
+belief; for among them are species with widely different habits, upland,
+marsh and sea-shore birds, and in their great biannual journey they pass
+through a variety of climates, visiting many countries where the
+conditions seem suited to their requirements. Nevertheless, in
+September, and even as early as August, they begin to arrive on the
+pampas, the golden plover often still wearing his black nuptial dress;
+singly and in pairs, in small flocks, and in clouds they come--curlew,
+godwit, plover, tatler, tringa--piping the wild notes to which the
+Greenlander listened in June, now to the gaucho herdsman on the green
+plains of La Plata, then to the wild Indian in his remote village; and
+soon, further south, to the houseless huanaco-hunter in the grey
+wilderness of Patagonia.
+
+Here is a puzzle for ornithologists. In summer on the pampas we have a
+godwit--Limosa hudsonica; in March it goes north to breed; later in the
+season flocks of the same species arrive from the south to winter on the
+pampas. And besides this godwit, there are several other North American
+species, which have colonies in the southern hemi-spere, with a reversed
+migration and breeding season. Why do these southern birds winter so far
+south? Do they really breed in Patagonia? If so, their migration is an
+extremely limited one compared with that of the northern birds--seven or
+eight hundred miles, on the outside, in one case, against almost as many
+thousands of miles in the other. Considering that some species which
+migrate as far south as Patagonia breed in the Arctic regions as far
+north as latitude 82 degrees, and probably higher still, it would be
+strange indeed if none of the birds which winter in Patagonia and on the
+pampas were summer visitors to that great austral continent, which has
+an estimated area twice as large as that of Europe, and a climate milder
+than the arctic one. The migrants would have about six hundred miles of
+sea to cross from Tierra del Fuego; but we know that the golden plover
+and other species, which sometimes touch at the Bermudas when
+travelling, fly much further than that without resting. The fact that a
+common Argentine titlark, a non-migrant and a weak flyer, has been met
+with at the South Shetland Islands, close to the antarctic continent,
+shows that the journey may be easily accomplished by birds with strong
+flight; and that even the winter climate of that unknown land is not too
+severe to allow an accidental colonist, like this small delicate bird,
+to survive. The godwit, already mentioned, has been observed in flocks
+at the Falkland Islands in May, that is, three months after the same
+species had taken its autumal departure from the neighbouring mainland.
+Can it be believed that these late visitors to the Falklands were
+breeders in Patagonia, and had migrated east to winter in so bleak a
+region? It is far more probable that they came from the south. Officers
+of sailing ships beating round Cape Horn might be able to settle this
+question definitely by looking out, and listening at night, for flights
+of birds, travelling north from about the first week in January to the
+end of February; and in September and October travelling south. Probably
+not fewer than a dozen species of the plover order are breeders on the
+great austral continent; also other aquatic birds--ducks and geese; and
+many Passerine birds, chiefly of the Tyrant family.
+
+Should the long projected Australasian expedition to the South Polar
+regions ever be carried to a successful issue, there will probably be
+important results for ornithology, in spite of the astounding theory
+which has found a recent advocate in Canon Tristram, that all life
+originated at the North Pole, whence it spread over the globe, but never
+succeeded in crossing the deep sea surrounding the antarctic continent,
+which has consequently remained till now desolate, "a giant ash (and
+ice) of death." Nor is it unlikely that animals of a higher class than
+birds exist there; and the discovery of new mammalians, differing in
+type from those we know, would certainly be glad tidings to most
+students of nature.
+
+Land birds on the pampas are few in species and in numbers. This may be
+accounted for by the absence of trees and other elevations on which
+birds prefer to roost and nest; and by the scarcity of food. Insects are
+few in dry situations; and the large perennial grasses, which occupy
+most of the ground, yield a miserable yearly harvest of a few minute
+seeds; so that this district is a poor one both for soft and hard billed
+birds. Hawks of several genera, in moderate numbers, are there, but
+generally keep to the marshes. Eagles and vultures are somewhat
+unworthily represented by carrion-hawks (Polyborinae); the lordly
+carancho, almost eagle-like in size, black and crested, with a very
+large, pale blue, hooked beak--his battle axe: and his humble follower
+and jackal, the brown and harrier-like chimango. These nest on the
+ground, are versatile in their habits, carrion-eaters, also killers on
+their own account, and, like wild dogs, sometimes hunt in bands, which
+gives them an advantage. They are the unfailing attendants of all
+flesh-hunters, human or feline; and also furiously pursue and persecute
+all eagles and true vultures that venture on that great sea of grass, to
+wander thereafter, for ever lost and harried, "the Hagars and Ishmaels
+of their kind."
+
+The owls are few and all of wide-ranging species. The most common is the
+burrowing-owl, found in both Americas. Not a retiring owl this, but all
+day long, in cold and in heat, it stands exposed at the mouth of its
+kennel, or on the vizcacha's mound, staring at the passer-by with an
+expression of grave surprise and reprehension in its round yellow eyes;
+male and female invariably together, standing stiff and erect, almost
+touching--of all birds that pair for life the most Darby and Joan like.
+
+Of the remaining land birds, numbering about forty species, a few that
+are most attractive on account of their beauty, engaging habits, or
+large size, may be mentioned here. On the southern portion of the pampas
+the military starling (Sturnella) is found, and looks like the European
+starling, with the added beauty of a scarlet breast: among resident
+pampas birds the only one with a touch of brilliant colouring. It has a
+pleasing, careless song, uttered on the wing, and in winter congregates
+in great flocks, to travel slowly northwards over the plains. When thus
+travelling the birds observe a kind of order, and the flock feeding
+along the ground shows a very extended front--a representation in
+bird-life of the "thin red line"--and advances by the hindmost birds
+constantly flying over the others and alighting in the front ranks.
+
+Among the tyrant-birds are several species of the beautiful wing-banded
+genus, snow-white in colour, with black on the wings and tail: these are
+extremely graceful birds, and strong flyers, and in desert places, where
+man seldom intrudes, they gather to follow the traveller, calling to
+each other with low whistling notes, and in the distance look like white
+flowers as they perch on the topmost stems of the tall bending grasses.
+
+The most characteristic pampean birds are the tinamous--called
+partridges in the vernacular--the rufous tinamou, large as a fowl, and
+the spotted tinamou, which is about the size of the English partridge.
+Their habits are identical: both lay eggs of a beautiful wine-purple
+colour, and in both species the young acquire the adult plumage and
+power of flight when very small, and fly better than the adults. They
+have small heads, slender curved beaks, unfeathered legs and feet, and
+are tailless; the plumage is deep yellowish, marked with black and brown
+above. They live concealed, skulking like rails through the tall grass,
+fly reluctantly, and when driven up, their flight is exceedingly noisy
+and violent, the bird soon exhausting itself. They are solitary, but
+many live in proximity, frequently calling to each other with soft
+plaintive voices. The evening call-notes of the larger bird are
+flute-like in character, and singularly sweet and expressive.
+
+The last figure to be introduced into this sketch--which is not a
+catalogue--is that of the Rhea. Glyptodon, Toxodon, Mylodon,
+Megatherium, have passed away, leaving no descendants, and only pigmy
+representatives if any; but among the feathered inhabitants of the pampa
+the grand archaic ostrich of America survives from a time when there
+were also giants among the avians. Vain as such efforts usually are, one
+cannot help trying to imagine something of the past history of this
+majestic bird, before man came to lead the long chase now about to end
+so mournfully. Its fleetness, great staying powers, and beautiful
+strategy when hunted, make it seem probable that it was not without
+pursuers, other than the felines, among its ancient enemies, long-winded
+and tenacious of their quarry; and these were perhaps of a type still
+represented by the wolf or hound-like aguara and aguara-guazu. It might
+be supposed that when almost all the larger forms, both mammal and bird,
+were overtaken by destruction, and when the existing rhea was on the
+verge of extinction, these long-legged swift canines changed their
+habits and lost their bold spirit, degenerating at last into hunters of
+small birds and mammals, on which they are said to live.
+
+The rhea possesses a unique habit, which is a puzzle to us, although it
+probably once had some significance--namely, that of running, when
+hunted, with one wing raised vertically, like a great sail--a veritable
+"ship of the wilderness." In every way it is adapted to the conditions
+of the pampas in a far greater degree than other pampean birds, only
+excepting the rufous and spotted tinamous. Its commanding stature gives
+it a wide horizon; and its dim, pale, bluish-grey colour assimilates to
+that of the haze, and renders it invisible at even a moderate distance.
+Its large form fades out of sight mysteriously, and the hunter strains
+his eyes in vain to distinguish it on the blue expanse. Its figure and
+carriage have a quaint majestic grace, somewhat unavian in character,
+and peculiar to itself. There are few more strangely fascinating sights
+in nature than that of the old black-necked cock bird, standing with
+raised agitated wings among the tall plumed grasses, and calling
+together his scattered hens with hollow boomings and long mysterious
+suspira-tions, as if a wind blowing high up in the void sky had found a
+voice. Rhea-hunting with the bolas, on a horse possessing both speed and
+endurance, and trained to follow the bird in all his quick doublings, is
+unquestionably one of the most fascinating forms of sport ever invented,
+by man. The quarry has even more than that fair chance of escape,
+without which all sport degenerates into mere butchery, unworthy of
+rational beings; moreover, in this unique method of hunting the ostrich
+the capture depends on a preparedness for all the shifts and sudden
+changes of course practised by the bird when closely followed, which is
+like instinct or intuition; and, finally, in a dexterity in casting the
+bolas at the right moment, with a certain aim, which no amount of
+practice can give to those who are not to the manner born.
+
+This 'wild mirth of the desert,' which the gaucho has known for the last
+three centuries, is now passing away, for the rhea's fleetness can no
+longer avail him. He may scorn the horse and his rider, what time he
+lifts himself up, but the cowardly murderous methods of science, and a
+systematic war of extermination, have left him no chance. And with the
+rhea go the flamingo, antique and splendid; and the swans in their
+bridal plumage; and the rufous tinamou--sweet and mournful melodist of
+the eventide; and the noble crested screamer, that clarion-voiced
+watch-bird of the night in the wilderness. Those, and the other large
+avians, together with the finest of the mammalians, will shortly be lost
+to the pampas utterly as the great bustard is to England, and as the
+wild turkey and bison and many other species will shortly be lost to
+North America. What a wail there would be in the world if a sudden
+destruction were to fall on the accumulated art-treasures of the
+National Gallery, and the marbles in the British Museum, and the
+contents of the King's Library--the old prints and' mediaeval
+illuminations! And these are only the work of human hands and
+brains--impressions of individual genius on perishable material,
+immortal only in the sense that the silken cocoon of the dead moth is
+so, because they continue to exist and shine when the artist's hands and
+brain are dust:--and man has the long day of life before him in which to
+do again things like these, and better than these, if there is any truth
+in evolution. But the forms of life in the two higher vertebrate classes
+are Nature's most perfect work; and the life of even a single species is
+of incalculably greater value to mankind, for what it teaches and would
+continue to teach, than all the chiselled marbles and painted canvases
+the world contains; though doubtless there are many persons who are
+devoted to art, but blind to some things greater than art, who will set
+me down as a Philistine for saying so. And, above all others, we should
+protect and hold sacred those types, Nature's masterpieces, which are
+first singled out for destruction on account of their size, or
+splendour, or rarity, and that false detestable glory which is accorded
+to their most successful slayers. In ancient times the spirit of life
+shone brightest in these; and when others that shared the earth with
+them were taken by death they were left, being more worthy of
+perpetuation. Like immortal flowers they have drifted down to us on the
+ocean of time, and their strangeness and beauty bring to our
+imaginations a dream and a picture of that unknown world, immeasurably
+far removed, where man was not: and when they perish, something of
+gladness goes out from nature, and the sunshine loses something of its
+brightness. Nor does their loss affect us and our times only. The
+species now being exterminated, not only in South America but everywhere
+on the globe, are, so far as we know, untouched by decadence. They are
+links in a chain, and branches on the tree of life, with their roots in
+a past inconceivably remote; and but for our action they would continue
+to flourish, reaching outward to an equally distant future, blossoming
+into higher and more beautiful forms, and gladdening innumerable
+generations of our descendants. But we think nothing of all this: we
+must give full scope to our passion for taking life, though by so doing
+we "ruin the great work of time;" not in the sense in which the poet
+used those words, but in one truer, and wider, and infinitely sadder.
+Only when this sporting rage has spent itself, when there are no longer
+any animals of the larger kinds remaining, the loss we are now
+inflicting on this our heritage, in which we have a life-interest only,
+will be rightly appreciated. It is hardly to be supposed or hoped that
+posterity will feel satisfied with our monographs of extinct species,
+and the few crumbling bones and faded feathers, which may possibly
+survive half a dozen centuries in some happily-placed museum. On the
+contrary, such dreary mementoes will only serve to remind them of their
+loss; and if they remember us at all, it will only be to hate our
+memory, and our age--this enlightened, scientific, humanitarian age,
+which should have for a motto "Let us slay all noble and beautiful
+things, for tomorrow we die."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE PUMA, OB LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The Puma has been singularly unfortunate in its biographers. Formerly it
+often happened that writers were led away by isolated and highly
+exaggerated incidents to attribute very shining qualities to their
+favourite animals; the lion of the Old World thus came to be regarded as
+brave and I magnanimous above all beasts of the field--the Bayard of the
+four-footed kind, a reputation which these prosaic and sceptical times
+have not suffered it to keep. Precisely the contrary has happened with
+the puma of literature; for, although to those personally acquainted
+with the habits of this lesser lion of the New World it is known to
+possess a marvellous courage and daring, it is nevertheless
+always spoken of in books of natural history as the most pusillanimous
+of the larger carnivores. It does not attack man, and Azara is perfectly
+correct when he affirms that it never hurts, or threatens to hurt, man
+or child, even when it finds them sleeping. This, however, is not a full
+statement of the facts; the puma will not even defend itself against
+man. How natural, then, to conclude that it is too timid to attack a
+human being, or to defend itself, but scarcely philosophical; for even
+the most cowardly carnivores we know--dogs and hyaenas, for
+instance--will readily attack a disabled or sleeping man when pressed by
+hunger; and when driven to desperation no animal is too small or too
+feeble to make a show of resistance. In such a case "even the armadillo
+defends itself," as the gaucho proverb says. Besides, the conclusion is
+in contradiction to many other well-known facts. Putting-aside the
+puma's passivity in the presence of man, it is a bold hunter that
+invariably prefers large to small game; in desert places killing
+peccary, tapir, ostrich, deer, huanaco, &c., all powerful, well-armed,
+or swift animals. Huanaco skeletons seen in Patagonia almost invariably
+have the neck dislocated, showing that the puma was the executioner.
+Those only who have hunted the huanaco on the sterile plains and
+mountains it inhabits know how wary, keen-scented, and fleet of foot it
+is. I once spent several weeks with a surveying party in a district
+where pumas were very abundant, and saw not less than half a dozen deer
+every day, freshly killed in most cases, and all with dislocated necks.
+Where prey is scarce and difficult to capture, the puma, after
+satisfying its hunger, invariably conceals the animal it has killed,
+covering it over carefully with grass and brushwood; these deer,
+however, had all been left exposed to the caracaras and foxes after a
+portion of the breast had been eaten, and in many cases the flesh had
+not been touched, the captor having satisfied itself with sucking the
+blood. It struck me very forcibly that the puma of the desert pampas is,
+among mammals, like the peregrine falcon of the same district among
+birds; for there this wide-ranging raptor only attacks comparatively
+large birds, and, after fastidiously picking a meal from the flesh of
+the head and neck, abandons the untouched body to the polybori and other
+hawks of the more ignoble sort.
+
+In pastoral districts the puma is very destructive to the larger
+domestic animals, and has an extraordinary fondness for horseflesh. This
+was first noticed by Molina, whose _Natural History of Chili_ was
+written a century and a half ago. In Patagonia I heard on all sides that
+it was extremely difficult to breed horses, as the colts were mostly
+killed by the pumas. A native told me that on one occasion, while
+driving his horses home through the thicket, a puma sprang out of the
+bushes on to a colt following behind the troop, killing it before his
+eyes and not more than six yards from his horse's head. In this
+instance, my informant said, the puma alighted directly on the colt's
+back, with one fore foot grasping its bosom, while with the other it
+seized the head, and, giving it a violent wrench, dislocated the neck.
+The colt fell to the earth as if shot, and he affirmed that it was dead
+before it touched the ground.
+
+Naturalists have thought it strange that the horse, once common
+throughout America, should have become extinct over a continent
+apparently so well suited to it and where it now multiplies so greatly.
+As a fact wherever pumas abound the wild horse of the present time,
+introduced from Europe, can hardly maintain its existence. Formerly in
+many places horses ran wild and multiplied to an amazing extent, but
+this happened, I believe, only in districts where the puma was scarce or
+had already been driven out by man. My own experience is that on the
+desert pampas wild horses are exceedingly scarce, and from all accounts
+it is the same throughout Patagonia.
+
+Next to horseflesh, sheep is preferred, and where the puma can come at a
+flock, he will not trouble himself to attack horned cattle. In Patagonia
+especially I found this to be the case. I resided for some time at an
+estancia close to the town of El Carmen, on the Rio Negro, which during
+my stay was infested by a very bold and cunning puma. To protect the
+sheep from his attacks an enclosure was made of upright willow-poles
+fifteen feet long, while the gate, by which he would have to enter, was
+close to the house and nearly six feet high. In spite of the
+difficulties thus put in the way, and of the presence of several large
+dogs, also of the watch we kept in the hope of shooting him, every
+cloudy night he came, and after killing one or more sheep got safely
+away. One dark night he killed four sheep; I detected him in the act,
+and going up to the gate, was trying to make out his invisible form in
+the gloom as he flitted about knocking the sheep over, when suddenly he
+leaped clear over my head and made his escape, the bullets I sent after
+him in the dark failing to hit him. Yet at this place twelve or fourteen
+calves, belonging to the milch cows, were every night shut into a small
+brushwood pen, at a distance from the house where the enemy could easily
+have destroyed every one of them. When I expressed surprise at this
+arrangement, the owner said that the puma was not fond of calves' flesh,
+and came only for the sheep. Frequently after his nocturnal visits we
+found, by tracing his footprints in the loose sand, that he had actually
+used the calves' pen as a place of concealment while waiting to make his
+attack on the sheep.
+
+The puma often kills full-grown cows and horses, but exhibits a still
+greater daring when attacking the jaguar, the largest of American
+carnivores, although, compared with its swift, agile enemy, as heavy as
+a rhinoceros. Azara states that it is generally believed in La Plata and
+Paraguay that the puma attacks and conquers the jaguar; but he did not
+credit what he heard, which was not strange, since he had already set
+the puma down as a cowardly animal, because it does not attempt to harm
+man or child. Nevertheless, it is well known that where the two species
+inhabit the same district they are at enmity, the puma being the
+persistent persecutor of the jaguar, following and harassing it as a
+tyrant-bird harasses an eagle or hawk, moving about it with such
+rapidity as to confuse it, and, when an opportunity occurs, springing
+upon its back and inflicting terrible wounds with teeth and claws.
+Jaguars with scarred backs are frequently killed, and others, not long
+escaped from their tormentors, have been found so greatly lacerated that
+they were easily overcome by the hunters.
+
+In Kingsley's American _Standard Natural History_, it is stated that the
+puma in North California has a feud with the grizzly bear similar to
+that of the southern animal with the jaguar. In its encounter with the
+grizzly it is said to be always the victor; and this is borne out by the
+finding of the bodies of bears, which have evidently perished in the
+struggle.
+
+How strange that this most cunning, bold, and bloodthirsty of the
+Felidae, the persecutor of the jaguar and the scourge of the ruminants
+in the regions it inhabits, able to kill its prey with the celerity of a
+rifle bullet, never attacks a human being! Even the cowardly,
+carrion-feeding dog will attack a man when it can do so with impunity;
+but in places where the puma is the only large beast of prey, it is
+notorious that it is there perfectly safe for even a small child to go
+out and sleep on the plain. At the same time it will not fly from man
+(though the contrary is always stated in books of Natural History)
+except in places where it is continually persecuted. Nor is this all: it
+will not, as a rule, even defend itself against man, although in some
+rare instances it has been known to do so.
+
+The mysterious, gentle instinct of this ungentle species, which causes
+the gauchos of the pampas to name it man's friend--"amigo del
+cristiano"--has been persistently ignored by all travellers and
+naturalists who have mentioned the puma. They have thus made it a very
+incongruous creature, strong enough to kill a horse, yet so cowardly
+withal that it invariably flies from a human being--even from a sleeping
+child! Possibly its real reputation was known to some of those who havo
+spoken about it; if so, they attributed what they heard to the love of
+the marvellous and the romantic, natural to the non-scientific mind; or
+else preferred not to import into their writings matter which has so
+great a likeness to fable, and might have the effect of imperilling
+their reputation for sober-mindedness.
+
+It is, however, possible that the singular instinct of tho southern
+puma, which is unique among animals in a state of nature, is not
+possessed by the entire species, ranging as it does over a hundred
+degrees of latitude, from British North America to Tierra del Fuego. The
+widely different conditions of life in the various regions it inhabits
+must necessarily have caused some divergence. Concerning its habits in
+the dense forests of the Amazonian region, where it must have developed
+special instincts suited to its semi-arboreal life, scarcely anything
+has been recorded. Everyone is, however, familiar with the dreaded
+cougar, catamount, or panther--sometimes called "painter"--of North
+American literature, thrilling descriptions of encounters with this
+imaginary man-eating monster being freely scattered through the
+backwoods or border romances, many of them written by authors who have
+the reputation of being true to nature. It may be true that this cougar
+of a cold climate did occasionally attack man, or, as it is often
+stated, follow him in the forest with the intention of springing on him
+unawares; but on this point nothing definite will ever be known, as the
+pioneers hunters of the past were only anxious to shoot cougar and not
+to study its instinct and disposition. It is now many years since
+Audubon and Bachman wrote, "This animal, which has excited so much
+terror in the minds of the ignorant and timid, has been nearly
+exterminated in all the Atlantic States, and we do not recollect a
+single well-authenticated instance where any hunter's life fell a
+sacrifice in a cougar hunt." It might be added, I believe, that no
+authentic instance has been recorded of the puma making an unprovoked
+attack on any human being. In South America also the traveller in the
+wilderness is sometimes followed by a puma; but he would certainly be
+very much surprised if told that it follows with the intention of
+springing on him unawares and devouring his flesh.
+
+I have spoken of the comparative ease with which the puma overcomes even
+large animals, comparing it in this respect with the peregrine falcon;
+but all predacious species are liable to frequent failures, sometimes to
+fatal mishaps, and even the cunning, swift-killing puma is no exception.
+Its attacks are successfully resisted by the ass, which does not, like
+the horse, lose his presence of mind, but when assaulted thrusts his
+head well down between its fore-legs and kicks violently until the enemy
+is thrown or driven off. Pigs, when in large herds, also safely defy the
+puma, massing themselves together for defence in their well-known
+manner, and presenting a serried line of tusks to the aggressor. During
+my stay in Patagonia a puma met its fate in a manner so singular that
+the incident caused considerable sensation among the settlers on the Rio
+Negro at the time. A man named Linares, the chief of the tame Indians
+settled in the neighbourhood of El Carmen, while riding near the river
+had his curiosity aroused by the appearance and behaviour of a young cow
+standing alone in the grass, her head, armed with long and exceedingly
+sharp horns, much raised, and watching his approach in a manner which
+betokened a state of dangerous excitement. She had recently dropped her
+calf, and he at once conjectured that it had been attacked, and perhaps
+killed, by some animal of prey. To satisfy himself on this point he
+began to search for it, and while thus engaged the cow repeatedly
+charged him with the greatest fury. Presently he discovered the calf
+lying dead among the long grass; and by its side lay a full-grown puma,
+also dead, and with a large wound in its side, just behind the shoulder.
+The calf had been killed by the puma, for its throat showed the wounds
+of large teeth, and the puma had been killed by the cow. When he saw it
+he could, he affirmed, scarcely believe the evidence of his own senses,
+for was an unheard-of thing that a puma should be injured by any other
+animal. His opinion was that it had come down from the hills in a
+starving condition, and having sprung upon the calf, the taste of blood
+had made it for a moment careless of its own safety, and during that
+moment the infuriated cow had charged, and driving one of her long sharp
+horns into some vital part, killed it instantly.
+
+The puma is, with the exception of some monkeys, the most playful animal
+in existence. The young of all the Felidae spend a large portion of
+their time in characteristic gambols; the adults, however, acquire a
+grave and dignified demeanour, only the female playing on occasions with
+her offspring; but this she always does with a certain formality of
+manner, as if the relaxation were indulged in not spontaneously, but for
+the sake of the young and as being a necessary part of their education.
+Some writer has described the lion's assumption of gaiety as more grim
+than its most serious moods. The puma at heart is always a kitten,
+taking unmeasured delight in its frolics, and when, as often happens,
+one lives alone in the desert, it will amuse itself by the hour fighting
+mock battles or playing at hide-and-seek with imaginary companions, and
+lying in wait and putting all its wonderful strategy in practice to
+capture a passing butterfly. Azara kept a young male for four months,
+which spent its whole time playing with the slaves. This animal, he
+says, would not refuse any food offered to it; but when not hungry it
+would bury the meat in the sand, and when inclined to eat dig it up,
+and, taking it to the water-trough, wash it clean. I have only known one
+puma kept as a pet, and this animal, in seven or eight years had never
+shown a trace of ill-temper. When approached, he would lie down, purring
+loudly, and twist himself about a person's legs, begging to be caressed.
+A string or handkerchief drawn about was sufficient to keep him in a
+happy state of excitement for an hour; and when one person was tired of
+playing with him he was ready for a game with the next comer.
+
+I was told by a person who had spent most of his life on the pampas that
+on one occasion, when travelling in the neighbourhood of Cape
+Corrientes, his horse died under him, and he was compelled to continue
+his journey on foot, burdened with his heavy native horse-gear. At night
+he made his bed under the shelter of a rock, on the slope of a stony
+sierra; a bright moon was shining, and about nine o'clock in the evening
+four pumas appeared, two adults with their two half-grown young. Not
+feeling the least alarm at their presence, he did not stir; and after a
+while they began to gambol together close to him, concealing themselves
+from each other among the rocks, just as kittens do, and frequently
+while pursuing one another leaping over him. He continued watching them
+until past midnight, then fell asleep, and did not wake until morning,
+when they had left him.
+
+This man was an Englishman by birth, but having gone very young to South
+America he had taken kindly to the semi-barbarous life of the gauchos,
+and had imbibed all their peculiar notions, one of which is that human
+life is not worth very much. "What does it matter?" they often say, and
+shrug their shoulders, when told of a comrade's death; "so many
+beautiful horses die!" I asked him if he had ever killed a puma, and he
+replied that he had killed only one and had sworn never to kill another.
+He said that while out one day with another gaucho looking for cattle a
+puma was found. It sat up with its back against a stone, and did not
+move even when his companion threw the noose of his lasso over its neck.
+My informant then dismounted, and, drawing his knife, advanced to kill
+it: still the puma made no attempt to free itself from the lasso, but it
+seemed to know, he said, what was coming, for it began to tremble, the
+tears ran from its eyes, and it whined in the most pitiful manner. He
+killed it as it sat there unresisting before him, but after
+accomplishing the deed felt that he had committed a murder. It was the
+only thing ho had ever done in his life, he added, which filled him with
+remorse when he remembered it. This I thought a rather startling
+declaration, as I knew that he had killed several individuals of his own
+species in duels, fought with knives, in the fashion of the gauchos.
+
+All who have killed or witnessed the killing of the puma--and I have
+questioned scores of hunters on this point--agree that it resigns itself
+in this unresisting, pathetic manner to death at the hands of man.
+Claudio Gay, in his _Natural History of Chili,_ says, "When attacked by
+man its energy and daring at once forsake it, and it becomes a weak,
+inoffensive animal, and trembling, and uttering piteous moans, and
+shedding abundant tears, it seems to implore compassion from a generous
+enemy." The enemy is not often generous; but many gauchos have assured
+me, when speaking on this subject, that although they kill the puma
+readily to protect their domestic animals, they consider it an evil
+thing to take its life in desert places, where it is man's only friend
+among the wild animals.
+
+When the hunter is accompanied by dogs, then the puma, instead of
+drooping and shedding tears, is roused to a sublime rage: its hair
+stands erect; its eyes shine like balls of green flame; it spits and
+snarls like a furious torn cat. The hunter's presence seems at such
+times to be ignored altogether, its whole attention being given to the
+dogs and its rage directed against them. In Patagonia a sheep-farming
+Scotchman, with whom I spent some days, showed me the skulls of five
+pumas which he had shot in the vicinity of his ranche. One was of an
+exceptionally large individual, and I here relate what he told me of his
+encounter with this animal, as it shows just how the puma almost
+invariably behaves when attacked by man and dogs. He was out on foot
+with his flock, when the dogs discovered the animal concealed among the
+bushes. He had left his gun at home, and having no weapon, and finding
+that the dogs dared not attack it where it sat in a defiant attitude
+with its back against a thorny bush, he looked about and found a large
+dry stick, and going boldly up to it tried to stun it with a violent
+blow on the head. But though it never looked at him, its fiery eyes
+gazing steadily at the dogs all the time, he could not hit it, for with
+a quick side movement it avoided every blow. The small heed the puma
+paid him, and the apparent ease with which it avoided his best-aimed
+blows, only served to rouse his spirit, and at length striking with
+increased force his stick came to the ground and was broken to pieces.
+For some moments he now stood within two yards of the animal perfectly
+defenceless and not knowing what to do. Suddenly it sprang past him,
+actually brushing against his arm with its side, and began pursuing the
+dogs round and round among the bushes. In the end my informant's partner
+appeared on the scene with his rifle, and the puma was shot.
+
+In encounters of this kind the most curious thing is that the puma
+steadfastly refuses to recognize an enemy in man, although it finds him
+acting in concert with its hated canine foe, about whose hostile
+intentions it has no such delusion.
+
+Several years ago a paragraph, which reached me in South America,
+appeared in the English papers relating an incident characteristic of
+the puma in a wild beast show in this country. The animal was taken out
+of its cage and led about the grounds by its keeper, followed by a large
+number of spectators. Suddenly it was struck motionless by some object
+in the crowd, at which it gazed steadily with a look of intense
+excitement; then springing violently away it dragged the chain from the
+keeper's hand and dashed in among the people, who immediately fled
+screaming in all directions. Their fears were, however, idle, the object
+of the puma's rage being a dog which it had spied among the crowd.
+
+It is said that when taken adult pumas invariably pine away and die;
+when brought up in captivity they invariably make playful, affectionate
+pets, and are gentle towards all human beings, but very seldom overcome
+their instinctive animosity towards the dog.
+
+One of the very few authentic instances I have met with of this animal
+defending itself against a human being was related to me at a place on
+the pampas called Saladillo. At the time of my visit there jaguars and
+pumas were very abundant and extremely destructive to the cattle and
+horses. Sheep it had not yet been considered worth while to introduce,
+but immense herds of pigs were kept at every estancia, these animals
+being able to protect themselves. One gaucho had so repeatedly
+distinguished himself by his boldness and dexterity in killing jaguars
+that he was by general consent made the leader of every tiger-hunt. One
+day the comandante of the district got twelve or fourteen men together,
+the tiger-slayer among them, and started in search of a jaguar which had
+been seen that morning in the neighbourhood of his estancia. The animal
+was eventually found and surrounded, and as it was crouching among some
+clumps of tall pampas grass, where throwing a lasso over its neck would
+be a somewhat difficult and dangerous operation, all gave way to the
+famous hunter, who at once uncoiled his lasso and proceeded in a
+leisurely manner to form the loop. While thus engaged he made the
+mistake of allowing his horse, which had grown restive, to turn aside
+from the hunted animal. The jaguar, instantly taking advantage of the
+oversight, burst from its cover and sprang first on to the haunches of
+the horse, then seizing the hunter by his poncho dragged him to the
+earth, and would no doubt have quickly despatched him if a lasso, thrown
+by one of the other men, had not closed round its neck at this critical
+moment. It was quickly dragged off, and eventually killed. But the
+discomfited hunter did not stay to assist at the finish. He arose from
+the ground unharmed, but in a violent passion and blaspheming horribly,
+for he knew that his reputation, which he priced above everything, had
+suffered a great blow, and that he would be mercilessly ridiculed by his
+associates. Getting on his horse he rode away by himself from the scene
+of his misadventure. Of what happened to him on his homeward ride there
+were no witnesses; but his own account was as follows, and inasmuch as
+it told against his own prowess it was readily believed: Before riding a
+league, and while his bosom was still burning with rage, a puma started
+up from the long grass in his path, but made no attempt to run away; it
+merely sat up, he said, and looked at him in a provokingly fearless
+manner. To slay this animal with his knife, and so revenge himself on it
+for the defeat he had just suffered, was his first thought. He alighted
+and secured his horse by tying its fore feet together, then, drawing his
+long, heavy knife, rushed at the puma. Still it did not stir. Raising
+his weapon he struck with a force which would have split the animal's
+skull open if the blow had fallen where it was intended to fall, but
+with a quick movement the puma avoided it, and at the same time lifted a
+foot and with lightning rapidity dealt the aggressor a blow on the face,
+its unsheathed claws literally dragging down the flesh from his cheek,
+laying the bone bare. After inflicting this terrible punishment and
+eyeing its fallen foe for a few seconds it trotted quietly away. The
+wounded man succeeded in getting on to his horse and reaching his home.
+The hanging flesh was restored to its place and the ghastly rents sewn
+up, and in the end he recovered: but he was disfigured for life; his
+temper also completely changed; he became morose and morbidly sensitive
+to the ridicule of his neighbours, and he never again ventured to join
+them in their hunting expeditions. I inquired of the comandante, and of
+others, whether any case had come to their knowledge in that district in
+which the puma had shown anything beyond a mere passive friendliness
+towards man; in reply they related the following incident, which had
+occurred at the Saladillo a few years before my visit: The men all went
+out one day beyond the frontier to form a _cerco,_ as it is called, to
+hunt ostriches and other game. The hunters, numbering about thirty,
+spread themselves round in a vast ring and, advancing towards the
+centre, drove the animals before them. During the excitement of the
+chase which followed, while they were all engaged in preventing the
+ostriches, deer, &c., from doubling back and escaping, it was not
+noticed that one of the hunters had disappeared; his horse, however,
+returned to its home during the evening, and on the next morning a fresh
+hunt for the lost man was organized. He was eventually found lying on
+the ground with a broken leg, where he had been thrown at the beginning
+of the hunt. He related that about an hour after it had become dark a
+puma appeared and sat near him, but did not seem to notice him. After a
+while it became restless, frequently going away and returning, and
+finally it kept away so long, that he thought it had left him for good.
+About midnight he heard the deep roar of a jaguar, and gave himself up
+for lost. By raising himself on his elbow he was able to see the outline
+of the beast crouching near him, but its face was turned from him, and
+it appeared to be intently watching some object on which it was about to
+spring. Presently it crept out of sight, then he heard snarlings and
+growlings and the sharp yell of a puma, and he knew that the two beasts
+were fighting. Before morning he saw the jaguar several times, but the
+puma renewed the contest with it again and again until morning appeared,
+after which he saw and heard no more of them.
+
+Extraordinary as this story sounds, it did not seem so to me when I
+heard it, for I had already met with many anecdotes of a similar nature
+in various parts of the country, some of them vastly more interesting
+than the one I have just narrated; only I did not get them at first
+hand, and am consequently not able to vouch for their accuracy; but in
+this case it seemed to me that there was really no room for doubt. All
+that I had previously heard had compelled me to believe that the puma
+really does possess a unique instinct of friendliness for man, the
+origin of which, like that of many other well-known instincts of
+animals, must remain a mystery. The fact that the puma never makes an
+unprovoked attack on a human being, or eats human flesh, and that it
+refuses, except in some very rare cases, even to defend itself, does not
+seem really less wonderful in an animal of its bold and sanguinary
+temper thau that it should follow the traveller in the wilderness, or
+come near him when he lies sleeping or disabled, and even occasionally
+defend him from its enemy the jaguar. We know that certain sounds,
+colours, or smells, which are not particularly noticed by most animals,
+produce an extraordinary effect on some species; and it is possible to
+believe, I think, that the human form or countenance, or the odour of
+the human body, may also have the effect on the puma of suspending its
+predatory instincts and inspiring it with a gentleness towards man,
+which we are only accustomed to see in our domesticated carnivores or in
+feral animals towards those of their own species. Wolves, when pressed
+with hunger, will sometimes devour a fellow wolf; as a rule, however,
+rapacious animals will starve to death rather than prey on one of their
+own kind, nor is it a common thing for them to attack other species
+possessing instincts similar to their own. The puma, we have seen,
+violently attacks other large carnivores, not to feed on them, but
+merely to satisfy its animosity; and, while respecting man, it is,
+within the tropics, a great hunter and eater of monkeys, which of all
+animals most resemble men. We can only conclude with Humboldt that there
+is something mysterious in the hatreds and affections of animals.
+
+The view here taken of the puma's character imparts, I think, a fresh
+interest to some things concerning the species, which have appeared in
+historical and other works, and which I propose to discuss briefly in
+this place.
+
+There is a remarkable passage in Byron's _Narrative of the loss of the
+Wager,_ which was quoted by Admiral Fitzroy in his _Voyage of the
+Beagle,_ to prove that tho puma inhabits Tierra del Fuego and the
+adjacent islands; no other large beast of prey being known in that part
+of America. "I heard," he says, "a growling close by me, which made me
+think it advisable to retire as soon as possible: the woods were, so
+gloomy I could see nothing; but, as I retired, this noise followed me
+close till I got out of them. Some of our men did assure me that they
+had seen a very large beast in the woods. . . I proposed to four of the
+people to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from the
+bell tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam, which I had
+discovered in a walk that way on our first landing. This we covered to
+windward with seaweed; and, lighting a fire, laid ourselves down in
+hopes of finding a remedy for our hunger in sleep; but we had not long
+composed ourselves before one of our company was disturbed by the
+blowing of some animal at his face; and, upon opening his eyes, was not
+a little astonished to see by the glimmering of the fire, a large beast
+standing over him. He had presence of mind enough to snatch a brand from
+the fire, which was now very low, and thrust it at the nose of tho
+animal, which thereupon made off. . . . In the morning we were not a
+little anxious to know how our companions had fared; and this anxiety
+was increased upon our tracing the footsteps of the beast in the sand,
+in a direction towards the bell tent. The impression was deep and plain,
+of a large round foot well furnished with claws. Upon acquainting the
+people in the tent with the circumstances of our story, we found that
+they had been visited by the same unwelcome guest."
+
+Mr. Andrew Murray, in his work on the Geographical Distribution of
+Mammals, gives the Straits of Magellan as the extreme southern limit of
+the puma's range, and in discussing the above passage from Byron he
+writes: "This reference, however, gives no support to the notion of the
+animal alluded to having been a puma. . . . The description of the
+footprints clearly shows that the animal could not have been a puma.
+None of the cat tribe leave any trace of a claw in their footprints. . .
+The dogs, on the other hand, leave a very well-defined claw-mark. . . .
+Commodore Byron and his party had therefore suffered a false alarm. The
+creature which had disturbed them was, doubtless, one of the harmless
+domestic dogs of the natives."
+
+The assurance that the bold hardy adventurer and his men suffered a
+false alarm, and were thrown into a great state of excitement at the
+appearance of one of the wretched domestic dogs of the Fuegians, with
+which they were familiar, comes charmingly, it must be said, from a
+closet naturalist, who surveys the world of savage beasts from his
+London study. He apparently forgets that Commodore Byron lived in a time
+when the painful accuracy and excessive minuteness we are accustomed to
+was not expected from a writer, whenever he happened to touch on any
+matters connected with zoology.
+
+This kind of criticism, which seizes on a slight inaccuracy in one
+passage, and totally ignores an important statement in another--as, for
+instance, that of the "great beast" seen in the woods--might be extended
+to other portions of the book, and Byron's entire narrative made to
+appear as purely a work of the imagination as Peter Wilkin's adventures
+in those same antarctic seas.
+
+Mr. J. W. Boddam Whetham, in his work _Across Central America_ (1877),
+gives an anecdote of the puma, which he heard at Sacluk, in Guatemala,
+and which strangely resembles some of the stories I have heard on the
+pampas. He writes: "The following event, most extraordinary if true, is
+said to have occurred in this forest to a mahogany-cutter, who had been
+out marking trees. As he was returning to his hut, he suddenly felt a
+soft body pressing against him, and on looking down saw a cougar, which,
+with tail erect, and purring like a cat, twisted itself in and out of
+his legs, and glided round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if with
+laughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on, and the
+terrible animal still circled about, now rolling over, and now touching
+him with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse. At last the suspense
+became too great, and with a loud shout he struck desperately at the
+creature with his axe. It bounded on one side and crouched snarling and
+showing its teeth. Just as it was about to spring, the man's companion,
+who had heard his call, appeared in the distance, and with a growl the
+beast vanished into the thick bushes."
+
+Now, after allowing for exaggeration, if there is no foundation for
+stories of this character, it is really a very wonderful coincidence
+that they should be met with in countries so widely separated as
+Patagonia and Central America. Pumas, doubtless, are scarce in
+Guatemala; and, as in other places where they have met with nothing but
+persecution from man, they are shy of him; but had this adventure
+occurred on the pampas, where they are better known, the person
+concerned in it would not have said that the puma played with him as a
+cat with a mouse, but rather as a tame cat plays with a child; nor,
+probably, would he have been terrified into imagining that the animal,
+even after its caresses had met with so rough a return, was about to
+spring on him.
+
+In Clavigero's _History of Lower California,_ it is related that a very
+extraordinary state of things was discovered to exist in that country by
+the first missionaries who settled there at the end of the seventeenth
+century, and which was actually owing to the pumas. The author says that
+there were no bears or tigers (jaguars); these had most probably been
+driven out by their old enemies; but the pumas had increased to a
+prodigious extent, so that the whole peninsula was overrun by them; and
+this was owing to the superstitious regard in which they were held by
+the natives, who not only did not kill them, but never ventured to
+disturb them in any way. The Indians were actually to some extent
+dependent on the puma's success in hunting for their subsistence; they
+watched the movements of the vultures in order to discover the spot in
+which the remains of any animal it had captured had been left by the
+puma, and whenever the birds were seen circling about persistently over
+one place, they hastened to take possession of the carcass, discovered
+in this way. The domestic animals, imported by the missionaries, were
+quickly destroyed by the virtual masters of the country, and against
+these enemies the Jesuits preached a crusade in vain: for although the
+Indians readily embraced Christianity and were baptized, they were not
+to be shaken in their notions concerning the sacred _Chimbica,_ as the
+puma was called. The missions languished in consequence; the priests
+existed in a state of semi-starvation, depending on provisions sent to
+them at long intervals from the distant Mexican settlements; and for
+many years all their efforts to raise the savages from their miserable
+condition were thrown away. At length, in 1701, the mission of Loreto
+was taken charge of by one Padre Ugarte, described by Clavigero as a
+person of indomitable energy, and great physical strength and courage, a
+true muscular Christian, who occasionally varied his method of
+instruction by administering corporal chastisements to his hearers when
+they laughed at his doctrines, or at the mistakes he made in their
+language, while preaching to them. Ugarte, like his predecessors, could
+not move the Indians to hunt the puma, but he was a man of action, with
+a wholesome belief in the efficacy of example, and his opportunity came
+at last.
+
+One day, while riding in the wood, he saw at a distance a puma walking
+deliberately towards him. Alighting from his mule, he took up a large
+stone and advanced to meet the animal, and when sufficiently near hurled
+the missile with such precision and force that he knocked ifc down
+senseless. After killing it, he found that the heaviest part of his task
+remained, as it was necessary for the success of his project to carry
+the beast, still warm and bleeding, to the Indian village; but mow his
+mule steadfastly refused to approach it. Father Ugarte was not,
+however, to be defeated, and partly by stratagem, partly by force, he
+finally succeeded in getting the puma on to the mule's back, after which
+he rode in triumph to the settlement. The Indians at first thought it
+all a trick of their priest, who was so anxious to involve them in a
+conflict with the pumas, and standing at a distance they began jeering
+at him, and exclaiming that he had found the animal dead! But when they
+were induced to approach, and saw that it was still warm and bleeding,
+they were astonished beyond measure, and began to watch the priest
+narrowly, thinking that he would presently drop down and die in sight of
+them all. It was their belief that death would quickly overtake the
+slayer of a puma. As this did not happen, the priest gained a great
+influence over them, and in the end they were persuaded to turn their
+weapons against the Chimbica.
+
+Clavigero has nothing to say concerning the origin of this Californian
+superstition; but with some knowledge of the puma's character, it is not
+difficult to imagine what it may have been. No doubt these savages had
+been very well acquainted from ancient times with the animal's instinct
+of friendliness toward man, and its extreme hatred of other carnivores,
+which prey on the human species; and finding it ranged on their side, as
+it were, in the hard struggle of life in the desert, they were induced
+to spare it, and even to regard it as a friend; and such a feeling,
+among primitive men, might in the course of time degenerate into such a
+superstition as that of the Californians.
+
+I shall, in conclusion, relate here the story of Maldonada, which is not
+generally known, although familiar to Buenos Ayreans as the story of
+Lady Godiva's ride through Coventry is to the people of that town. The
+case of Maldonada is circumstantially narrated by Rui Diaz de Guzman, in
+his history of the colonization of the Plata: he was a person high in
+authority in the young colonies, and is regarded by students of South
+American history as an accurate and sober-minded chronicler of the
+events of his own times. He relates that in the year 1536 the settlers
+at Buenos Ayres, having exhausted their provisions, and being compelled
+by hostile Indians to keep within their pallisades, were reduced to the
+verge of starvation. The Governor Mendoza went off to seek help from the
+other colonies up the river, deputing his authority to one Captain Ruiz,
+who, according to all accounts, displayed an excessively tyrannous and
+truculent disposition while in power. The people were finally reduced to
+a ration of sis ounces of flour per day for each person; but as the
+flour was putrid and only made them ill, they were forced to live on any
+small animals they could capture, including snakes, frogs and toads.
+Some horrible details are given by Rui Diaz, and other writers; one, Del
+Barco Centenera, affirms that of two thousand persons in the town
+eighteen hundred perished of hunger. During this unhappy time, beasts of
+prey in large numbers were attracted to the settlement by the effluvium
+of the corpses, buried just outside the pallisades; and this made the
+condition of the survivors more miserable still, since they could
+venture into the neighbouring woods only at the risk of a violent death.
+Nevertheless, many did so venture, and among these was the young woman
+Maldonada, who, losing herself in the forest, strayed to a distance, and
+was eventually found by a party of Indians, and carried by them to their
+village.
+
+Some months later, Captain Ruiz discovered her whereabouts, and
+persuaded the savages to bring her to the settlement; then, accusing her
+of having gone to the Indian village in order to betray the colony, he
+condemned her to be devoured by wild beasts. She was taken to a wood at
+a distance of a league from the town, and left there, tied to a tree,
+for the space of two nights and a day. A party of soldiers then went to
+the spot, expecting to find her bones picked clean by the beasts, but
+were greatly astonished to find Maldonada still alive, without hurt or
+scratch. She told them that a puma had come to her aid, and had kept at
+her side, defending her life against all the other beasts that
+approached her. She was instantly released, and taken back to the town,
+her deliverance through the action of the puma probably being looked on
+as direct interposition of Providence to save her.
+
+Rui Diaz concludes with the following paragraph, in which he affirms
+that he knew the woman Maldonada, which may be taken as proof that she
+was among the few that survived the first disastrous settlement and
+lived on to more fortunate times: his pious pun on her name would be
+lost in a translation:--"De esta manera quedo libre la que ofrecieron a
+las fieras: la cual mujer yo la conoci, y la llamaban la Maldonada, que
+mas bien se le podia llamar la BIENDONADA; pues por este suceso se ha de
+ver no haber merecido el castigo a que la ofrecieron."
+
+If such a thing were to happen now, in any portion of southern South
+America, where the puma's disposition is best known, it would not be
+looked on as a miracle, as it was, and that unavoidably, in the case of
+Maldonada.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A WAVE OF LIFE,
+
+
+For many years, while living in my own home on the pampas, I kept a
+journal, in which all my daily observations on the habits of animals and
+kindred matters were carefully noted. Turning back to 1872-3, I find my
+jottings for that season contain a history of one of those waves of
+life--for I can think of no better name for the phenomenon in
+question--that are of such frequent occurrence in thinly-settled
+regions, though in countries like England, seen very rarely, and on a
+very limited scale. An exceptionally bounteous season, the accidental
+mitigation of a check, or other favourable circumstance, often causes an
+increase so sudden and inordinate of small prolific species, that when
+we actually witness it we are no longer surprised at the notion
+prevalent amongst the common people that mice, frogs, crickets, &c., are
+occasionally rained down from the clouds.
+
+In the summer of 1872-3 we had plenty of sunshine, with frequent
+showers; so that the hot months brought no dearth of wild flowers, as in
+most years. The abundance of flowers resulted in a wonderful increase of
+humble bees. I have never known them so plentiful before; in and about
+the plantation adjoining my house I found, during the season, no fewer
+than seventeen nests.
+
+The season was also favourable for mice; that is, of course, favourable
+for the time being, unfavourable in the long run, since the short-lived,
+undue preponderance of a species is invariably followed by a long period
+of undue depression. These prolific little creatures were soon so
+abundant that the dogs subsisted almost exclusively on them; the fowls
+also, from incessantly pursuing and killing them, became quite rapacious
+in their manner; whilst the sulphur tyrant-birds (Pitangus) and the
+Guira cuckoos preyed on nothing but mice.
+
+The domestic cats, as they invariably do in such plentiful seasons,
+absented themselves from the house, assuming all the habits of their
+wild congeners, and slinking from the sight of man--even of a former
+fireside companion--with a shy secrecy in their motions, an apparent
+affectation of fear, almost ludicrous to see. Foxes, weasels, and
+opossums fared sumptuously. Even for the common armadillo (Dasypus
+villosus) it was a season of affluence, for this creature is very adroit
+in capturing mice. This fact might seem surprising to anyone who marks
+the uncouth figure, toothless gums, and the motions--anything but light
+and graceful--of the armadillo and perhaps fancying that, to be a
+dexterous mouser, an animal should bear some resemblance in habits and
+structure to the felidas. But animals, like men, are compelled to adapt
+themselves to their surroundings; new habits are acquired, and the exact
+co-relation between habit and structure is seldom maintained.
+
+I kept an armadillo at this time, and good cheer and the sedentary life
+he led in captivity made him excessively fat; but the mousing exploits
+of even this individual were most interesting. Occasionally I took him
+into the fields to give him a taste of liberty, though at such times I
+always took the precaution to keep hold of a cord fastened to one of his
+hind legs; for as often as he came to a kennel of one of his wild
+fellows, he would attempt to escape into it. He invariably travelled
+with an ungainly trotting gait, carrying his nose, beagle-like, close to
+the ground. His sense of smell was exceedingly acute, and when near his
+prey he became agitated, and quickened his motions, pausing frequently
+to sniff the earth, till, discovering the exact spot where the mouse
+lurked, he would stop and creep cautiously to it; then, after slowly
+raising himself to a sitting posture, spring suddenly forwards, throwing
+his body like a trap over the mouse, or nest of mice, concealed beneath
+the grass.
+
+A curious instance of intelligence in a cat was brought to my notice at
+this time by one of my neighbours, a native. His children had made the
+discovery that some excitement and fun was to be had by placing a long
+hollow stalk of the giant thistle with a mouse in it--and every hollow
+stalk at this time had one for a tenant--before a cat, and then watching
+her movements. Smelling her prey, she would spring at one end of the
+stalk--the end towards which the mouse would be moving at the same time,
+but would catch nothing, for the mouse, instead of running out, would
+turn back to run to the other end; whereupon the cat, all excitement,
+would jump there to seize it; and so the contest would continue for a
+long time, an exhibition of the cleverness and the stupidity of
+instinct, both of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several cats
+at the house, and all acted in the same way except one. When a stalk was
+placed before this cat, instead of becoming excited like the others, it
+went quickly to one end and smelt' at the opening, then, satisfied that
+its prey was inside, it deliberately bit a long piece out of the stalk
+with its teeth, then another strip, and so on progressively, until the
+entire stick had been opened up to within six or eight inches of the
+further end, when the mouse came out and was caught. Every stalk placed
+before this cat was demolished in the same businesslike way; but the
+other cats, though they were made to look on while the stick was being
+broken up by their fellow, could never learn the trick.
+
+In the autumn of the year countless numbers of storks (Ciconia maguari)
+and of short-eared owls (Otus brachyotus) made their appearance. They
+had also come to assist at the general feast.
+
+Remembering the opinion of Mr. E. Newman, quoted by Darwin, that
+two-thirds of the humble bees in England are annually destroyed by mice,
+I determined to continue observing these insects, in order to ascertain
+whether the same thing occurred on the pampas. I carefully revisited all
+the nests I had found, and was amazed at the rapid disappearance of all
+the bees. I was quite convinced that the mice had devoured or driven
+them out, for the weather was still warm, and flowers and fruit on which
+humble bees feed were very abundant.
+
+After cold weather set in the storks went away, probably on account of
+the scarcity of water, for the owls remained. So numerous were they
+during the winter, that any evening after sunset I could count forty or
+fifty individuals hovering over the trees about my house. Unfortunately
+they did not confine their attentions to the mice, but became
+destructive to the birds as well. I frequently watched them at dusk,
+beating about the trees and bushes in a systematic manner, often a dozen
+or more of them wheeling together about one tree, like so many moths
+about a candle, and one occasionally dashing through the branches until
+a pigeon--usually the Zenaida maculata--or other bird was scared from
+its perch. The instant the bird left the tree they would all give chase,
+disappearing in the darkness. I could not endure to see the havoc they
+were making amongst the ovenbirds (Furnarius rufus--a species for which
+I have a regard and affection almost superstitious), so I began to shoot
+the marauders. Very soon, however, I found it was impossible to protect
+my little favourites. Night after night the owls mustered in their usual
+numbers, so rapidly were the gaps I made in their ranks refilled. I grew
+sick of the cruel war in which I had so hopelessly joined, and resolved,
+not without pain, to let things take their course. A singular
+circumstance was that the owls began to breed in the middle of winter.
+The field-labourers and boys found many nests with eggs and young birds
+in the neighbourhood. I saw one nest in July, our coldest month, with
+three half-grown young birds in it. They were excessively fat, and,
+though it was noon-day, had their crops full. There were three mice and
+two young cavies (Cavia australis) lying untouched in the nest.
+
+The short-eared owl is of a wandering disposition, ard performs long
+journeys at all seasons of the year in search of districts where food is
+abundant; and perhaps these winter-breeders came from a region where
+scarcity of prey, or some such cause, had prevented them from nesting at
+their usual time in summer.
+
+The gradual increase or decrease continually going on in many species
+about us is little remarked; but the sudden infrequent appearance in
+vast numbers of large and comparatively rare species is regarded by most
+people as a very wonderful phenomenon, not easily explained. On the
+pampas, whenever grasshoppers, mice, frogs or crickets become
+excessively abundant we confidently look for the appearance of
+multitudes of the birds that prey on them. However obvious may be the
+cause of the first phenomenon--the sudden inordinate increase during a
+favourable year of a species always prolific--the attendant one always
+creates astonishment: For how, it is asked, do these largo birds, seldom
+seen at other times, receive information in the distant regions they
+inhabit of an abundance of food in any particular locality? Years have
+perhaps passed during which, scarcely an individual of these kinds has
+been seen: all at once armies of the majestic white storks are seen
+conspicuously marching about the plain in all directions; while the
+night air resounds with the solemn hootings of innumerable owls. It is
+plain that these birds have been drawn from over an immense area to one
+spot; and the question is how have they been drawn?
+
+Many large birds possessing great powers of flight are, when not
+occupied with the business of propagation, incessantly wandering from
+place to place in search of food. They are not, as a rule, regular
+migrants, for their wanderings begin and end irrespective of seasons,
+and where they find abundance they remain the whole year. They fly at a
+very great height, and traverse immense distances. When the favourite
+food of any one of these species is plentiful in any particular region
+all the individuals that discover it remain, and attract to them all of
+their kind passing overhead. This happens on the pampas with the stork,
+the short-eared owl, the hooded gull and the dominican or black-backed
+gull--the leading species among the feathered nomads: a few first appear
+like harbingers; these are presently joined by new comers in
+considerable numbers, and before long they are in myriads. Inconceivable
+numbers of birds are, doubtless, in these regions, continually passing
+over us unseen. It was once a subject of very great wonder to me that
+flocks of black-necked swans should almost always appear flying by
+immediately after a shower of rain, even when none had been visible for
+a long time before, and when they must have come from a very great
+distance. When the reason at length occurred to me, I felt very much
+disgusted with myself for being puzzled over so very simple a matter.
+After rain a flying swan may be visible to the eye at a vastly greater
+distance than during fair weather; the sun shining on its intense white
+plumage against the dark background of a rain-cloud making it
+exceedingly conspicuous. The fact that swans are almost always seen
+after rain shows only that they are almost always passing.
+
+Whenever we are visited by a dust-storm on the pampas myriads of hooded
+gulls--Larus macnlipen-nis--appear flying before the dark dust-cloud,
+even when not a gull has been seen for months. Dust-storms are of rare
+occurrence, and come only after a long drought, and, the water-courses
+being all dry, the gulls cannot have been living in the region over
+which the storm passes. Yet in seasons of drought gulls must be
+continually passing by at a great height, seeing but not seen, except
+when driven together and forced towards the earth by the fury of the
+storm.
+
+By August (1873) the owls had vanished, and they had, indeed, good cause
+for leaving. The winter had been one of continued drought; the dry grass
+and herbage of the preceding year had been consumed by the cattle and
+wild animals, or had turned to dust, and with the disappearance of their
+food and cover the mice had ceased to be. The famine-stricken cats
+sneaked back to the house. It was pitiful to see the little burrowing
+owls; for these birds, not having the powerful wings and prescient
+instincts of the vagrant Otus brachyotus, are compelled to face the
+poverty from which the others escape. Just as abundance had before made
+the domestic cats wild, scarcity now made the burrowing owls tame and
+fearless of man. They were so reduced as scarcely to be able to fly, and
+hung about the houses all day long on the look-out for some stray morsel
+of food. I have frequently seen one alight and advance within two or
+three yards of the door-step, probably attracted by the smell of roasted
+meat. The weather continued dry until late in spring, so reducing the
+sheep and cattle that incredible numbers perished during a month of cold
+and rainy weather that followed the drought.
+
+How clearly we can see in all this that the tendency to multiply
+rapidly, so advantageous in normal seasons, becomes almost fatal to a
+species in seasons of exceptional abundance. Cover and food without
+limit enabled the mice to increase at such an amazing rate that the
+lesser checks interposed by predatory species were for a while
+inappreciable. But as the mice increased, so did their enemies.
+Insectivorous and other species acquired the habits of owls and weasels,
+preying exclusively on them; while to this innumerable army of residents
+was shortly added multitudes of wandering birds coming from distant
+regions. No sooner had the herbage perished, depriving the little
+victims of cover and food, than the effects of the war became apparent.
+In autumn the earth so teemed with them that one could scarcely walk
+anywhere without treading on mice; while out of every hollow weed-stalk
+lying on the ground dozens could be shaken; but so rapidly had they
+devoured, by the trained army of persecutors, that in spring it was hard
+to find a survivor, even in the barns and houses. The fact that species
+tend to increase in a geometrical ratio makes these great and sudden
+changes frequent in many regions of the earth; but it is not often they
+present themselves so vividly as in the foregoing instance, for here,
+scene after scene in one of Nature's silent passionless tragedies opens
+before us, countless myriads of highly organized beings rising into
+existence only to perish almost immediately, scarcely a hard-pressed
+remnant remaining after the great reaction to continue the species.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS.
+
+
+Strictly speaking, the only weapons of vertebrates are teeth, claws,
+horns, and spurs. Horns belong only to the ruminants, and the spur is a
+rare weapon. There are also many animals in which teeth and claws are
+not suited to inflict injury, or in which the proper instincts and
+courage to use and develop them are wanted; and these would seem, to be
+in a very defenceless condition. Defenceless they are in one sense, but
+as a fact they are no worse off than the well-armed species, having
+either a protective colouring or a greater swiftness or cunning to
+assist them in escaping from their enemies. And there are also many of
+these practically toothless and clawless species which have yet been
+provided with other organs and means of offence and defence out of
+Nature's curious armoury, and concerning a few of these species I
+propose to speak in this place.
+
+Probably such distinctive weapons as horns, spurs, tusks and spines
+would be much more common in nature if the conditions of life always
+remained the same. But these things are long in fashioning; meanwhile,
+conditions are changing; climate, soil, vegetation vary; foes and rivals
+diminish or increase; the old go, and others with different weapons and
+a new strategy take their place; and just as a skilful man "fighting the
+wilderness" fashions a plough from a hunting-knife, turns his implements
+into weapons of war, and for everything he possesses discovers a use
+never contemplated by its maker, so does Nature--only with an ingenuity
+exceeding that of man--use the means she has to meet all contingencies,
+and enable her creatures, seemingly so ill-provided, to maintain their
+fight for life. Natural selection, like an angry man, can make a weapon
+of anything; and, using the word in this wide sense, the mucous
+secretions the huanaco discharges into the face of an adversary, and the
+pestilential drops "distilled" by the skunk, are weapons, and may be as
+effectual in defensive warfare as spines, fangs and tushes.
+
+I do not know of a more striking instance in the animal kingdom of
+adaptation of structure to habit than is afforded by the hairy
+armadillo--Dasypus villosus. He appears to us, roughly speaking, to
+resemble an ant-eater saddled with a dish cover; yet this creature, with
+the cunning Avhich Nature has given it to supplement all deficiencies,
+has discovered in its bony encumbrance a highly efficient weapon of
+offence. Most other edentates are diurnal and almost exclusively
+insectivorous, some feeding only on ants; they have unchangeable habits,
+very limited intelligence, and vanish before civilization. The hairy
+armadillo alone has struck out a line for itself. Like its fast
+disappearing congeners, it is an insect-eater still, but does not like
+them seek its food on the surface and in the ant-hill only; all kinds of
+insects are preyed on, and by means of its keen scent it discovers worms
+and larvae several inches beneath the surface. Its method of taking
+worms and grubs resembles that of probing birds, for it throws up no
+earth, but forces its sharp snout and wedge-shaped head down to the
+required depth; and probably while working it moves round in a circle,
+for the hole is conical, though the head of the animal is flat. Where it
+has found a rich hunting-ground, the earth is seen pitted with hundreds
+of these neat symmetrical bores. It is also an enemy to ground-nesting
+birds, being fond of eggs and fledglings; and when unable to capture
+prey it will feed on carrion as readily as a wild dog or vulture,
+returning night after night to the carcase of a horse or cow as long as
+the flesh lasts. Failing animal food, it subsists on vegetable diet; and
+I have frequently found their stomachs stuffed with clover, and,
+stranger still, with the large, hard grains of the maize, swallowed
+entire.
+
+It is not, therefore, strange that at all seasons, and even when other
+animals are starving, the hairy armadillo is always fat and vigorous. In
+the desert it is diurnal; but where man appears it becomes more and more
+nocturnal, and in populous districts does not go abroad until long after
+dark. Yet when a district becomes thickly settled it increases in
+numbers; so readily does it adapt itself to new conditions. It is not to
+be wondered at that the gauchos, keen observers of nature as they are,
+should make this species the hero of many of their fables of the "Uncle
+Remus" type, representing it as a versatile creature, exceedingly
+fertile in expedients, and duping its sworn friend the fox in various
+ways, just as "Brer Rabbit" serves the fox in the North American fables.
+
+The hairy armadillo will, doubtless, long survive all the other
+armadillos, and on this account alone it will have an ever-increasing
+interest for the naturalist. I have elsewhere described how it captures
+mice; when preying on snakes it proceeds in another manner. A friend of
+mine, a careful observer, who was engaged in cattle-breeding amongst the
+stony sierras near Cape Corrientes, described to me an encounter he
+witnessed between an armadillo and a poisonous snake. While seated on
+the hillside one day he observed a snake, about twenty inches in length,
+lying coiled up on a stoue five or six yards beneath him. By-and-by, a
+hairy armadillo appeared trotting directly towards it. Apparently the
+snake perceived and feared its approach, for it quickly uncoiled itself
+and began gliding away. Instantly the armadillo rushed on to it, and,
+squatting close down, began swaying its body backward and forward with a
+regular sawing motion, thus lacerating its victim with the sharp,
+deep-cut edges of its bony covering. The snake struggled to free itself,
+biting savagely at its aggressor, for its head and neck were disengaged.
+Its bites made no impression, and very soon it dropped its head, and
+when its enemy drew off, it was dead and very much mangled. The
+armadillo at once began its meal, taking the tail in its mouth and
+slowly progressing towards the head; but when about a third of the snake
+still remained it seemed satisfied, and, leaving that portion, trotted
+away.
+
+Altogether, in its rapacious and varied habits this armadillo appears to
+have some points of resemblance with the hedgehog; and possibly, like
+the little European mammal it resembles, it is not harmed by the bite of
+venomous snakes.
+
+I once had a cat that killed every snake it found, purely for sport,
+since it never ate them. It would jump nimbly round and across its
+victim, occasionally dealing it a blow with its cruel claws. The enemies
+of the snake are legion. Burrowing owls feed largely on them; so do
+herons and storks, killing them with a blow of their javelin beaks, and
+swallowing them entire. The sulphur tyrant-bird picks up the young snake
+by the tail, and, flying to a branch or stone, uses it like a flail till
+its life is battered out. The bird is highly commended in consequence,
+reminding one of very ancient words: "Happy shall he be that taketh thy
+little ones and dasheth them against the stones." In arraying such a
+variety of enemies against the snake, nature has made ample amends for
+having endowed it with deadly weapons. Besides, the power possessed by
+venomous snakes only seems to us disproportionate; it is not really so,
+except in occasional individual encounters. Venomous snakes are always
+greatly outnumbered by non-venomous ones in the same district; at any
+rate this is the case on the pampas. The greater activity of the latter
+counts for more in the result than the deadly weapons of the former.
+
+The large teguexin lizard of the pampas, called iguana by the country
+people, is a notable snake-killer. Snakes have in fact, no more
+formidable enemy, for he is quick to see, and swift to overtake them. He
+is practically invulnerable, and deals them sudden death with his
+powerful tail. The gauchos say that dogs attacking the iguana are
+sometimes known to have their legs broken, and I do not doubt it. A
+friend of mine was out riding one day after his cattle, and having
+attached one end of his lasso to the saddle, He let it trail on the
+ground. He noticed a large iguana lying apparently asleep in the sun,
+and though he rode by it very closely, it did not stir; but no sooner
+had he passed it, than it raised its head, and fixed its attention on
+the forty feet of lasso slowly trailing by. Suddenly it rushed after the
+rope, and dealt it a succession of violent blows with its tail. When the
+whole of the lasso, several yards of which had been pounded in vain, had
+been dragged by, the lizard, with uplifted head, continued gazing after
+it with the greatest astonishment. Never had such a wonderful snake
+crossed its path before!
+
+Molina, in his _Natural History of Chill,_ says the vizcacha uses its
+tail as a weapon; but then Molina is not always reliable. I have
+observed vizcachas all my life, and never detected them making use of
+any weapon except their chisel teeth. The tail is certainly very
+curious, being straight at the base, then curving up outwardly, and
+slightly down again at the tip, resembling the spout of a china teapot.
+The under surface of the straight portion of the base is padded with a
+thick, naked, corneous skin; and, when the animal performs the curious
+sportive antics in which it occasionally indulges, it gives rapid
+loud-sounding blows on the ground with this part of the tail. The
+peculiar form of the tail also makes it a capital support, enabling the
+vizcacha to sit erect, with ease and security.
+
+The frog is a most timid, inoffensive creature, saving itself, when
+pursued, by a series of saltatory feats unparalleled amongst
+vertebrates. Consequently, when I find a frog, I have no hesitation in
+placing my hands upon it, and the cold sensation it gives one is the
+worse result I fear. It came to pass, however, that I once encountered a
+frog that was not like other frogs, for it possessed an instinct and
+weapons of offence which greatly astonished me. I was out snipe shooting
+one day when, peering into an old disused burrow, two or three feet
+deep, I perceived a burly-looking frog sitting it. It was larger and
+stouter-looking than our common Rana, though like it in colour, and I at
+once dropped on to my knees and set about its capture. Though it watched
+me attentively, the frog remained perfectly motionless, and this greatly
+surprised me. Before I was sufficiently near to make a grab, it sprang
+straight at my hand, and, catching two of my fingers round with its fore
+legs, administered a hug so sudden and violent as to cause an acute
+sensation of pain; then, at the very instant I experienced this feeling,
+which made me start back quickly, it released its hold and bounded out
+and away. I flew after it, and barely managed to overtake it before it
+could gain the water. Holding it firmly pressed behind the shoulders, it
+was powerless to attack me, and I then noticed the enormous development
+of the muscles of the fore legs, usually small in frogs, bulging out in
+this individual, like a second pair of thighs, and giving-it a strangely
+bold and formidable appearance. On holding my gun within its reach, it
+clasped the barrel with such energy as to bruise the skin of its breast
+and legs. After allowing it to partially exhaust itself in these
+fruitless huggings, I experimented by letting it seize my hand again,
+and I noticed that invariably after each squeeze it made a quick,
+violent attempt to free itself. Believing that I had discovered a frog
+differing in structure from all known species, and possessing a strange
+unique instinct of self-preservation, I carried my captive home,
+intending to show it to Dr. Burmeister, the director of the National
+Museum at Buenos Ayres-Unfortunately, after I had kept it some days, it
+effected its escape by pushing up the glass cover of its box, and I have
+never since met with another individual like it. That this singular
+frog has it in its power to seriously injure an opponent is, of course,
+out of the question; but its unexpected attack must be of great
+advantage. The effect of the sudden opening of an umbrella in the face
+of an angry bull gives, I think, only a faint idea of the astonishment
+and confusion it must cause an adversary by its leap, quick as
+lightning, and the violent hug it administers; and in the confusion it
+finds time to escape. I cannot for a moment believe that an instinct so
+admirable, correlated as it is with the structure of the fore legs, can
+be merely an individual variation; and I confidently expect that all I
+have said about my lost frog will some day be confirmed by others. Rana
+luctator would be a good name for this species.
+
+The toad is a slow-moving creature that puts itself in the way of
+persecution; yet, strange to say, the acrid juice it exudes when
+irritated is a surer protection to it than venomous fangs are to the
+deadliest snake. Toads are, in fact, with a very few exceptions, only
+attacked and devoured by snakes, by lizards, and by their own venomous
+relative, Ceratophrys ornata. Possibly the cold sluggish natures of all
+these creatures protects them against the toad's secretion, which would
+be poison to most warm-blooded animals, but I am not so sure that all
+fish enjoy a like immunity. I one day noticed a good-sized fish (bagras)
+floating, belly upmost, on the water. It had apparently just died, and
+had such a glossy, well-nourished look about it, and appeared so full, I
+was curious to know the cause of its death. On opening it I found its
+stomach quite filled with a very large toad it had swallowed. The toad
+looked perfectly fresh, not even a faint discoloration of the skin
+showing that the gastric juices had begun to take effect; the fish, in
+fact, must have died immediately after swallowing the toad. The country
+people in South America believe that the milky secretion exuded by the
+toad possesses wonderful curative properties; it is their invariable
+specific for shingles--a painful, dangerous malady common amongst them,
+and to cure it living toads are applied to the inflamed parb. I dare say
+learned physicians would laugh at this cure, but then, if I mistake not,
+the learned have in past times laughed at other specifics used by the
+vulgar, but which now have honourable places in the
+pharmacopoeia--pepsine, for example. More than two centuries ago (very
+ancient times for South America) the gauchos were accustomed to take
+the lining of the rhea's stomach, dried and powdered, for ailments
+caused by impaired digestion; and the remedy is popular still. Science
+has gone over to them, and the ostrich-hunter now makes a double profit,
+one from the feathers, and the other from the dried stomachs which he
+supplies to the chemists of Buenos Ayres. Yet he was formerly told that
+to take the stomach of the ostrich to improve his digestion was as wild
+an idea as it would be to swallow birds' feathers in order to fly.
+
+I just now called Ceratophrys ornata venomous, though its teeth are not
+formed to inject poison into the veins, like serpents' teeth. It is a
+singular creature, known as _escuerzo_ in the vernacular, and though
+beautiful in colour, is in form hideous beyond description. The skin is
+of a rich brilliant green, with chocolate-coloured patches, oval in
+form, and symmetrically disposed. The lips are bright yellow, the
+cavernous mouth pale flesh colour, the throat and under-surface dull
+white. The body is lumpy, and about the size of a large man's fist. The
+eyes, placed on the summit of a disproportionately large head, are
+embedded in horn-like protuberances, capable of being elevated or
+depressed at pleasure. When the creature is undisturbed, the eyes, which
+are of a pale gold colour, look out as from a couple of watch towers,
+but when touched on the head or menaced, the prominences sink down to a
+level with the head, closing the eyes completely, and giving the
+creature the appearance of being eyeless. The upper jaw is armed with
+minute teeth, and there are two teeth in the centre of the lower jaw,
+the remaining portions of the jaw being armed with two exceedingly
+sharp-edged bony plates. In place of a tongue, it has a round muscular
+process with a rough flat disc the size of a halfpenny.
+
+It is common all over the pampas, ranging as far south as the Rio
+Colorado in Patagonia. In the breeding season it congregates in pools,
+and one is then struck by their extraordinary vocal powers, which they
+exercise by night. The performance in no way resembles the series of
+percussive sounds uttered by most batrachians. The notes it utters are
+long, as of a wind instrument, not unmelodious, and so powerful as to
+make themselves heard distinctly a mile off on still evenings. After the
+amorous period these toads retire to moist places and sit inactive,
+buried just deep enough to leave the broad green back on a level with
+the surface, and it is then very difficult to detect them. In this
+position they wait for their prey--frogs, toads, birds, and small
+mammals. Often they capture and attempt to swallow things too large for
+them, a mistake often made by snakes. In very wet springs they sometimes
+come about houses and lie in wait for chickens and ducklings. In
+disposition they are most truculent, savagely biting at anything that
+comes near them; and when they bite they hang on with the tenacity of a
+bulldog, poisoning the blood with their glandular secretions. When
+teased, the creature swells itself out to such an extent one almost
+expects to see him burst; he follows his tormentors about with slow
+awkward leaps, his vast mouth wide open, and uttering an incessant harsh
+croaking sound. A gaucho I knew was once bitten by one. He sat down on
+the grass, and, dropping his hand at his side, had it seized, and only
+freed himself by using his hunting knife to force the creature's mouth
+open. He washed and bandaged the wound, and no bad result followed; but
+when the toad cannot be shaken off, then the result is different. One
+summer two horses were found dead on the plain near my home. One, while
+lying down, had been seized by a fold in the skin near the belly; the
+other had been grasped by the nose while cropping grass. In both
+instances the vicious toad was found dead, with jaws tightly closed,
+still hanging to the dead horse. Perhaps they are sometimes incapable of
+letting go at will, and like honey bees, destroy themselves in these
+savage attacks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+FEAR IN BIRDS.
+
+
+The statement that birds instinctively fear man is frequently met with
+in zoological works written since the _Origin of Species_ appeared; but
+almost the only reason--absolutely the only plausible reason, all the
+rest being mere supposition--given in support of such a notion is that
+birds in desert islands show at first no fear of man, but afterwards,
+finding him a dangerous neighbour, they become wild; and their young
+also grow up wild. It is thus assumed that the habit acquired by the
+former has become hereditary in the latter--or, at all events, that in
+time it becomes hereditary. Instincts, which are few in number in any
+species, and practically endure for ever, are not, presumably, acquired
+with such extraordinary facility.
+
+Birds become shy where persecuted, and the young, even when not
+disturbed, learn a shy habit from the parents, and from other adults
+they associate with. I have found small birds shyer in desert places,
+where the human form was altogether strange to them, than in
+thickly-settled districts. Large birds are actually shyer than the small
+ones, although, to the civilized or shooting man they seem astonishingly
+tame where they have never been fired at. I have frequently walked quite
+openly to within twenty-five or thirty yards of a flock of flamingoes
+without alarming them. This, however, was when they were in the water,
+or on the opposite side of a stream. Having no experience of guns, they
+fancied themselves secure as long as a strip of water separated them
+from the approaching object. When standing on dry land they would not
+allow so near an approach. Sparrows in England aro very much tamer than
+the sparrows I have observed in desert places, where they seldom see a
+human being. Nevertheless young sparrows in England are very much tamer
+than old birds, as anyone may see for himself. During the past summer,
+while living near Kew Gardens, I watched the sparrows a great deal, and
+fed forty or fifty of them every day from a back window. The bread and
+seed was thrown on to a low roof just outside the window, and I noticed
+that the young birds when first able to fly were always brought by the
+parents to this feeding place, and that after two or three visits they
+would begin to come of their own accord. At such times they would
+venture quite close to me, showing as little suspicion as young
+chickens. The adults, however, although so much less shy than birds of
+other species, were extremely suspicious, snatching up the bread and
+flying away; or, if they remained, hopping about in a startled manner,
+craning their necks to view me, and making so many gestures and motions,
+and little chirps of alarm, that presently the young would become
+infected with fear. The lesson was taught them in a surprisingly short
+time; their suspicion was seen to increase day by day, and about a week
+later they were scarcely to be distinguished, in behaviour from the
+adults. It is plain that, with these little birds, fear of man is an
+associate feeling, and that, unless it had been taught them, his
+presence would trouble them as little as does that of horse, sheep, or
+cow. But how about the larger species, used as food, and which have had
+a longer and sadder experience of man's destructive power?
+
+The rhea, or South American ostrich, philosophers tell us, is a very
+ancient bird on the earth; and from its great size and inability to
+escape by flight, and its excellence as food, especially to savages, who
+prefer fat rank-flavoured flesh, it must have been systematically
+persecuted by man as long as, or longer than, any bird now existing on
+the globe. If fear of man ever becomes hereditary in birds, we ought
+certainly to find some trace of such an instinct in this species. I have
+been unable to detect any, though I have observed scores of young rheas
+in captivity, taken before the parent bird had taught them what to fear.
+I also once kept a brood myself, captured just after they had hatched
+out. With regard to food they were almost, or perhaps quite,
+independent, spending most of the time catching flies, grasshoppers, and
+other insects with surprising dexterity; but of the dangers encompassing
+the young rhea they knew absolutely frothing. They would follow me about
+as if they took me for their parent; and, whenever I imitated the loud
+snorting or rasping warning-call emitted the old bird in moments of
+danger, they would to me in the greatest terror, though no animal was in
+sight, and, squatting at my feet, endeavour to conceal themselves by
+thrusting their heads and long necks up my trousers. If I had caused a
+person to dress in white or yellow clothes for several consecutive days,
+and had then uttered the warning cry each time he showed himself to the
+birds, I have no doubt that they would soon have acquired a habit of
+running in terror from him, even without the warning cry, and that the
+fear of a person in white or yellow would have continued all their
+lives. Up to within about twenty years ago, rheas were seldom or never
+shot in La Plata and Patagonia, but were always hunted on horseback and
+caught with the bolas. The sight of a mounted man would set them off at
+once, while a person on foot could walk quite openly to within easy
+shooting distance of them; yet their fear of a horseman dates only two
+hundred years back--a very short time, when we consider that, before the
+Indian borrowed the horse from the invader, he must have systematically
+pursued the rhea on foot for centuries. The rhea changed its habits when
+the hunter changed his, and now, if an _estanciero_ puts down ostrich
+hunting on his estate, in a very few years the birds, although wild
+birds still, become as fearless and familiar as domestic animals. I have
+known old and ill-tempered males to become a perfect nuisance on some
+estancias, running after and attacking every person, whether on foot or
+on horseback, that ventured near them. An old instinct of a whole race
+could not be thus readily lost here and there on isolated estates
+wherever a proprietor chose to protect his birds for half a dozen years.
+
+I suppose the Talegallus--the best-known brush-turkey--must be looked on
+as an exception to all other birds with regard to the point I am
+considering; for this abnormal form buries its eggs in the huge mound
+made by the male, and troubles herself no more about them. When the
+young is fully developed it simply kicks the coffin to pieces in which
+its mother interred it, and, burrowing its way up to the sunshine,
+enters on the pleasures and pains of an independent existence from
+earliest infancy--that is, if a species born into the world in full
+possession of all the wisdom of the ancients, can be said ever to know
+infancy. At all events, from Mr. Bartlett's observations on the young
+hatched in the Zoological Gardens, it appears that they took no notice
+of the old birds, but lived quite independently from the moment they
+came out of the ground, even flying up into a tree and roosting
+separately at night. I am not sure, however, that these observations are
+quite conclusive; for it is certain that captivity plays strange pranks
+with the instincts of some species, and it is just possible that in a
+state of nature the old birds exercise at first some slight parental
+supervision, and, like all other species, have a peculiar cry to warn
+the young of the dangers to be avoided. If this is not so, then the
+young Talegallus must fly or hide with instinctive tear from every
+living thing that approaches it. I, at any rate, find it hard to believe
+that it has a knowledge, independent of experience, of the different
+habits of man and kangaroo, and dis-criminates at first sight between
+animals that are dangerous to it and those that are not. This
+interesting point will probably never be determined, as, most unhappily,
+the Australians are just now zealously engaged in exterminating their
+most wonderful bird for the sake of its miserable flesh; and with less
+excuse than the Maories could plead with regard to the moa, since they
+cannot deny that they have mutton and rabbit enough to satisfy hunger.
+
+Whether birds fear or have instinctive knowledge of any of their enemies
+is a much larger question. Species that run freely on the ground from
+the time of quitting the shell know their proper food, and avoid
+whatever is injurious. Have all young birds a similarly discriminating
+instinct with regard to their enemies? Darwin says, "Fear of any
+particular enemy is certainly an instinctive quality, as may be seen in
+nestling birds." Here, even man seems to be included among the enemies
+feared instinctively; and in another passage he says, "Young chickens
+have lost, wholly from habit, that fear of the dog and cat which, no
+doubt, was originally instinctive in them." My own observations point to
+a contrary conclusion; and I may say that I have had unrivalled
+opportunities for studying the habits of young birds.
+
+Animals of all classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear from
+any strange object approaching them. A piece of newspaper carried
+accidentally by the wind is as great an object of terror to an
+inexperienced young bird as a buzzard sweeping down with death in its
+talons. Among birds not yet able to fly there are, however, some curious
+exceptions; thus the young of most owls and pigeons are excited to anger
+rather than fear, and, puffing themselves up, snap and strike at an
+intruder with their beaks. Other fledglings simply shrink down in the
+nest or squat 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 approaches 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 corning 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 wild 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 what may be seen in nestling birds, n very young, and
+before their education has begun, if quietly approached and touched,
+they open their bills and take food as readily from a man as from the
+parent bird. But if while being thus fed the parent returns and emits
+the warning note, they instantly cease their hunger-cries, close their
+gaping mouths, and crouch down frightened in the nest. This fear caused
+by the parent bird's warning note begins to manifest itself even before
+the young are hatched--and my observations on this point refer to
+several species in three widely separated orders. When the little
+prisoner is hammering at its shell, and uttering its feeble _peep,_ as
+if begging to be let out, if the warning note is uttered, even at a
+considerable distance, the strokes and complaining instantly cease, and
+the chick will then remain quiescent in the shell for a long time, or
+until the parent, by a changed note, conveys to it an intimation that
+the danger is over. Another proof that the nestling has absolutely no
+instinctive knowledge of particular enemies, but is taught to fear them
+by the parents, is to be found in the striking contrast between the
+habits of parasitical and genuine young in the nest, and after they have
+left it, while still unable to find their own food. I have had no
+opportunities of observing the habits of the young cuckoo in England
+with regard to this point, and do not know whether other observers have
+paid any attention to the matter or not, but I am very familiar with the
+manners of the parasitical starling or cow-bird of South America. The
+warning cries of the foster parent have no effect on the young cow-bird
+at any time. Until they are able to fly they will readily devour worms
+from the hand of a man, even when the old birds are hovering close by
+and screaming their danger notes, and while their own young, if the
+parasite has allowed any to survive in the nest, are crouching down in
+the greatest fear. After the cow-bird has left the nest it is still
+stupidly tame, and more than once I have seen one carried off from its
+elevated perch by a milvago hawk, when, if it had understood the warning
+cry of the foster parent, it would have dropped down into the bush or
+grass and escaped. But as soon as the young cow-birds are able to shift
+for themselves, and begin to associate with their own kind, their habits
+change, and they become suspicious and wild like other birds.
+
+On this point--the later period at which the parasitical young bird
+acquires fear of man--and also bearing on the whole subject under
+discussion, I shall add here some observations I once made on a dove
+hatched and reared by a pigeon at my home on the pampas. A very large
+ombu tree grew not far from the dove-cote, and some of the pigeons used
+to make their nests on the lower horizontal branches. One summer a dove
+of the most common species, Zenaida maculata, in size a third less than
+the domestic pigeon, chanced to drop an egg in one of these nests, and a
+young dove was hatched and reared; and, in due time, when able to fly,
+it was brought to the dove-cote. I watched it a great deal, and it was
+evident that this foster-young, though' with the pigeons, was not nor
+ever would be of them, for it could not take kiudly to their flippant
+flirty ways. Whenever a male approached it, and with guttural noises and
+strange gestures made a pompous declaration of amorous feelings, the
+dove would strike vigorously at its undesirable lover, and drive him
+off, big as he was; and, as a rule, it would sit apart, afoot or so,
+from the others. The dove was also a male; but its male companions, with
+instinct tainted by domestication, were ignorant alike of its sex and
+different species. Now, it chanced that my pigeons, never being fed and
+always finding their own living on the plain like wild birds, were,
+although still domestic, not nearly so tame as pigeons usually are in
+England. They would not allow a person to approach within two or three
+yards of them without flying, and if grain was thrown to them they would
+come to it very suspiciously, or not at all. And, of course, the young
+pigeons always acquired the exact degree of suspicion shown by the
+adults as soon as they were able to fly and consort with the others. But
+the foundling Zenaida did not know what their startled gestures and
+notes of fear meant when a person approached too near, and as he saw
+none of his own kind, he did not acquire their suspicious habit. On the
+contrary, he was perfectly tame, although by parentage a wild bird, and
+showed no more fear of a man than of a horse. Throughout the winter it
+remained with the pigeons, going afield every day with them, and
+returning to the dove-cote; but as spring approached the slight tie
+which united him to them began to be loosened; their company grew less
+and less congenial, and he began to lead a solitary life. But he did not
+go to the trees yet. He came to the house, and his favourite perch was
+on the low overhanging roof of a vine-covered porch, just over the main
+entrance. Here he would pass several hours every day, taking no notice
+of the people passing in and out at all times; and when the weather grew
+warm he would swell out his breast and coo mournfully by the hour for
+our pleasure.
+
+We can, no doubt, learn best by observing the behaviour of nestlings and
+young birds; nevertheless, I find much even in the confirmed habits of
+adults to strengthen me in the belief that fear of particular enemies is
+in nearly all cases--for I will not say all--the result of experience
+and tradition.
+
+Hawks are the most open, violent, and persistent enemies birds have; and
+it is really wonderful to see how well the persecuted kinds appear to
+know the power for mischief possessed by different raptorial species,
+and how exactly the amount of alarm exhibited is in proportion to the
+extent of the danger to be apprehended. Some raptors never attack birds,
+others only occasionally; still others prey only on the young and
+feeble; and, speaking of La Plata district, where I have observed hawks,
+from the milvago chimango--chiefly a carrion-eater--to the destructive
+peregrine falcon, there is a very great variety of predatory habits, and
+all degrees of courage to be found; yet all these raptors are treated
+differently by species liable to be preyed on, and have just as much
+respect paid them as their strength and daring entitles them to, and no
+more, So much discrimination must seem almost incredible to those who
+are not very familiar with the manners of wild birds; I do not think it
+could exist if the fear shown resulted from instinct or inherited habit.
+There would be no end to the blunders of such an instinct as that; and
+in regions where hawks are extremely abundant most of the birds would be
+in a constant state of trepidation. On the pampas the appearance of the
+comparatively harmless chimango excites not the least alarm among small
+birds, yet at a distance it closely resembles a henharrier, and it also
+readily attacks young, sick, and wounded birds; all others know how
+little they have to fear from it. When it appears unexpectedly,
+sweeping over a hedge or grove with a rapid flight, it is sometimes
+mistaken for a more dangerous species; there is then a little flutter of
+alarm, some birds springing into the air, but in two or three seconds of
+time they discover their mistake, and settle down quietly again, taking
+no further notice of the despised carrion-eater. On the other hand, I
+have frequently mistaken a harrier (Circus cinereus, in the brown state
+of plumage) for a chimango, and have only discovered my mistake by
+seeing the commotion among the small birds. The harrier I have
+mentioned, also the C. macropterus, feed partly on small birds, which
+they flush from the ground and strike down with their claws. When the
+harrier appears moving along with a loitering flight near the surface,
+it is everywhere attended by a little whirlwind of alarm, small birds
+screaming or chirping excitedly and diving into the grass or bushes; but
+the alarm does not spread far, and subsides as soon as the hawk has
+passed on its way. Buzzards (Buteo and Urubitinga) are much more feared,
+and create a more widespread alarm, and they ars certainly more
+destructive to birds than harriers. Another curious instance is that of
+the sociable hawk (Rostrhanrus sociabilis). This bird spends the summer
+and breeds in marshes in La Plata, and birds pay no attention to it, for
+it feeds exclusively on water-snails (Ampullaria). But when it visits
+woods and plantations to roost, during migration, its appearance creates
+as much alarm as that of a true buzzard, which it closely resembles.
+Wood-birds, unaccustomed to see it, do not know its peculiar preying
+habits, and how little they need fear its presence. I may also mention
+that the birds of La Plata seem to fear the kite-like Elanus less than
+other hawks, and I believe that its singular resemblance to the common
+gull of the district in its size, snowy-white plumage and manner of
+flight, has a deceptive effect on most species, and makes them so little
+suspicious of it.
+
+The wide-ranging peregrine falcon is a common species in La Plata,
+although, oddly enough, not included in any notice of the avifauna of
+that region before 1888. The consternation caused among birds by its
+appearance is vastly greater than that produced by any of the raptors I
+have mentioned: and it is unquestionably very much more destructive to
+birds, since it preys exclusively on them, and, as a rule, merely picks
+the flesh from the head and neck, and leaves the untouched body to its
+jackal, the carrion-hawk. When the peregrine appears speeding through
+the air in a straight line at a great height, the feathered world, as
+far as one able to see, is thrown into the greatest commo-tion, all
+birds, from the smallest up to species large as duck, ibis, and curlew,
+rushing about in the air as if distracted. When the falcon has
+disappeared in the sky, and the wave of terror attending its progress
+subsides behind it, the birds still continue wild and excited for some
+time, showing how deeply they have been moved; for, as a rule, fear is
+exceedingly transitory in its effects on animals.
+
+I must, before concluding this part of my subject, mention another
+raptor, also a true falcon, but differing from the peregrine in being
+exclusively a marsh-hawk. In size it is nearly a third less than the
+male peregrine, which it resembles in its sharp wings and manner of
+flight, but its flight is much more rapid. The whole plumage, is
+uniformly of a dark grey colour. Unfortunately, though I have observed
+it not fewer than a hundred times, I have never been able to procure a
+specimen, nor do I find that it is like any American falcon already
+described; so that for the present it must remain nameless. Judging
+solely from the effect produced by the appearance of this hawk, it must
+be even more daring and destructive than its larger relation, the
+peregrine. It flies at a great height, and sometimes descends vertically
+and with extraordinary velocity, the wings producing a sound like a
+deep-toned horn. The sound is doubtless produced at will, and is
+certainly less advantageous to the hawk than to the birds it pursues. No
+doubt it can afford to despise the wing-power of its quarry; and I have
+sometimes thought that it takes a tyrannous delight in witnessing the
+consternation caused by its hollow trumpeting sound. This may be only a
+fancy, but some hawks do certainly take pleasure in pursuing and
+striking birds when not seeking prey. The peregrine has been observed,
+Baird says, capturing birds, only to kill and drop them. Many of the
+Felidae, we know, evince a similar habit; only these prolong their
+pleasure by practising a more refined and deliberate cruelty.
+
+The sudden appearance overhead of this hawk produces an effect wonderful
+to witness. I have frequently seen all the inhabitants of a marsh struck
+with panic, acting as if demented, and suddenly grown careless to all
+other dangers; and on such occasions I have looked up confident of
+seeing the sharp-winged death, suspended above them in the sky. All
+birds that happen to be on the wing drop down as if shot into the reeds
+or water; ducks away from the margin stretch out their necks
+horizontally and drag their bodies, as if wounded, into closer cover;
+not one bird is found bold enough to rise up and wheel about the
+marauder--a usual proceeding in the case of other hawks; while, at every
+sudden stoop the falcon makes, threatening to dash down on his prey, a
+low cry of terror rises from the birds beneath; a sound expressive of an
+emotion so contagious that it quickly runs like a murmur all over the
+marsh, as if a gust of wind had swept moaning through, the rushes. As
+long as the falcon hangs overhead, always at a height of about forty
+yards, threatening at intervals to dash down, this murmuring sound, made
+up of many hundreds of individual cries, is heard swelling and dying
+away, and occasionally, when he drops lower than usual, rising to a
+sharp scream of terror.
+
+Sometimes when I have been riding over marshy ground, one of these hawks
+has placed himself directly over my head, within fifteen or twenty yards
+of me; and it has perhaps acquired the habit of following a horseman in
+this way in order to strike at any birds driven up. On one occasion my
+horse almost trod on a couple of snipe squatting terrified in the short
+grass. The instant they rose the hawk struck at one, the end of his wing
+violently smiting my cheek as he stooped, and striking at the snipe on a
+level with the knees of my horse. The snipe escaped by diving under the
+bridle, and immediately dropped down on the other side of me, and the
+hawk, rising up, flew away.
+
+To return. I think I am justified in believing that fear of hawks, like
+fear of men, is, in very nearly all cases, the result of experience and
+tradition. Nevertheless, I think it probable that in some species which
+have always lived in the open, continually exposed to attack, and which
+are preferred as food by raptors, such as duck, snipe, and plover, the
+fear of the falcon may be an inherited habit. Among passerine birds I am
+also inclined to think that swallows show inherited fear of hawks.
+Swallows and humming-birds have least to fear from raptors; yet, while
+humming-birds readily pursue and tease hawks, thinking as little of them
+as of pigeons or herons, swallows everywhere manifest the greatest
+terror at the approach of a true falcon; and they also fear other birds
+of prey, though in a much less degree. It has been said that the
+European hobby occasionally catches swal-lows on the wing, but this
+seems a rare and exceptional habit, and in South America I have never
+seen any bird of prey attempt the pursuit of a swallow. The question
+then arises, how did this unnecessary fear, so universal in swallows,
+originate? Can it be a survival of a far past--a time when some
+wide-ranging small falcon, aerial in habits as the swallow itself,
+preyed by preference on hirundines only?
+
+[NOTE.-Herbert Spencer, who accepts Darwin's inference, explains how the
+fear of man, acquired by experience, becomes instinctive in birds, in
+the following passage: "It is well known that in newly-discovered lands
+not inhabited by man, birds are so devoid of fear as to allow themselves
+to be knocked over with sticks; but that, in the course of generations,
+they acquire such a dread of man as to fly on his approach: and that
+this dread is manifested by young as well as by old. Now unless this
+change be ascribed to the killing-off of the least fearful, and the
+preservation and multiplication of the most fearful which, considering
+the comparatively small number killed by man, is an inadequate cause, it
+must be ascribed to accumulated experience; and each experience must be
+held to have a share in producing it. We must conclude that in each bird
+that escapes with injuries inflicted by man, or is alarmed by the
+outcries of other members of the flock (gregarious creatures of any
+intelligence being necessarily more or less sympathetic), there is
+established an association of ideas between the human aspect and the
+pains, direct and in-direct, suffered from human agency. And we must
+further con-clude, that the state of consciousness which compels the
+bird to take flight, is at first nothing more than an ideal reproduction
+of those painful impressions which before followed man's approach; that
+such ideal reproduction becomes more vivid and more massive as the
+painful experiences, direct or sympathetic, increase; and that thus the
+emotion, in its incipient state, is nothing else than an aggregation of
+the revived pains before experience.
+
+"As, in the course of generations, the young birds of this race begin to
+display a fear of man before yet they have been injured by him, it is an
+unavoidable inference that the nervous system of the race has been
+organically modified by these experiences, we have no choice but to
+conclude, that when a young bird is led to fly, it is because the
+impression produced in its senses by the approaching man entails,
+through an incipiently reflex action, a partial excitement of all those
+nerves which in its ancestors had been excited under the like
+conditions; that this partial excitement has its accompanying painful
+consciousness, and that the vague painful consciousness thus arising
+constitutes emotion proper--_emotion undecomposable into specific
+experiences, and, therefore, seemingly homogeneous"_ (Essays, vol. i. p.
+320.)]
+
+It is comforting to know that the "unavoidable inference" is, after all,
+erroneous, and that the nervous system in birds has not yet been
+organically altered as a result of man's persecution; for in that case
+it would take long to undo the mischief, and we should be indeed far
+from that "better friendship" with the children of the air which many of
+us would like to see.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS.
+
+
+Under this heading I have put together several notes from my journals on
+subjects which have no connection with each other, except that they
+relate chiefly to the parental instincts of some animals I have
+observed, and to the instincts of the young at a very early period of
+life.
+
+While taking bats one day in December, I captured a female of our common
+Buenos Ayrean species (Molossus bonariensis), with her two young
+attached to her, so large that it seemed incredible she should be able
+to fly and take insects with such a weight to drag her down. The young
+were about a third less in size than the mother, so that she had to
+carry a weight greatly exceeding that of her own body. They were
+fastened to her breast and belly, one on each side, as when first born;
+and, possibly, the young bat does not change its position, or move, like
+the young developed opossum, to other parts of the body, until mature
+enough to begin an independent life. On forcibly separating them from
+their parent, I found that they were not yet able to fly, but when set
+free fluttered feebly to the ground. This bat certainly appeared more
+burdened with its young than any animal I had ever observed. I have seen
+an old female opossum (Didelphys azarae) with eleven young, large as old
+rats--the mother being less than a cat in size--all clinging to various
+parts of her body; yet able to climb swiftly and with the greatest
+agility in the higher branches of a tree. The actual weight was in this
+case relatively much greater than in that of the female bat: but then
+the opossum never quitted its hold on the tree, and it also supplemented
+its hand-like feet, furnished with crooked claws, with its teeth and
+long prehensile tail. The poor bat had to seek its living in the empty
+air, pursuing its prey with the swiftness of a swallow, and it seemed
+wonderful to me that she should have been able to carry about that great
+burden with her one pair of wings, and withal to be active enough to
+supply herself and her young with food.
+
+In the end I released her, and saw her fly away and disappear among the
+trees, after which I put back the two young bats in the place I had
+taken them from, among the thick-clustering foliage of a small acacia
+tree. When set free they began to work their way upwards through the
+leaves and slender twigs in the most adroit manner, catching a twig with
+their teeth, then embracing a whole cluster of leaves with their wings,
+just as a person would take up a quantity of loose clothes and hold them
+tight by pressing them against the chest. The body would then emerge
+above the clasped leaves, and a higher twig would be caught by the
+teeth; and so on successively, until they had got as high as they
+wished, when they proceeded to hook themselves to a twig and assume the
+inverted position side by side; after which, one drew in its head and
+went to sleep, while the other began licking the end of its wing, where
+my finger and thumb had pressed the delicate membrane. Later in the day
+I attempted to feed them with small insects, but they rejected my
+friendly attentions in the most unmistakable manner, snapping viciously
+at me every time I approached them. In the evening, I stationed myself
+close to the tree, and presently had the satisfaction of seeing the
+mother return, flying straight to the spot where I had taken her, and in
+a few moments she was away again and over the trees with her twins.
+
+Assuming that these two young bats had, before I found them, existed
+like parasites clinging to the parent, their adroit actions when
+liberated, and their angry demonstrations at my approach, were very
+astonishing; for in all other mammals born in a perfectly helpless
+state, like rodents, weasels, edentates, and even marsupials, the
+instincts of self-preservation are gradually developed after the period
+of activity begins, when the mother leads them out, and they play with
+her and Avith each other. In the bat the instincts must ripen to
+perfection without exercise or training, and while the animal exists as
+passively as a fruit on its stem.
+
+I have observed that the helpless young of some of the mammals I have
+just mentioned seem at first to have no instinctive understanding of the
+language of alarm and fear in the parent, as all young-birds have, even
+before their eyes are open. Nor is it necessary that they should have
+such an instinct, since, in most cases, they are well concealed in
+kennels or other safe places; but when, through some accident, they are
+exposed, the want of such an instinct makes the task of protecting them
+doubly hard for the parent. I once surprised a weasel (Galictis barbara)
+in the act of removing her young, or conducting them, rather; and when
+she was forced to quit them, although still keeping close by, and
+uttering the most piercing cries of anger and solicitude, the young
+continued piteously crying out in their shrill voices and moving about
+in circles, without making the slightest attempt to escape, or to
+conceal themselves, as young birds do.
+
+Some field mice breed on the surface of the ground in ill-constructed
+nests, and their young are certainly the most helpless things in nature.
+It is possible that where this dangerous habit exists, the parent has
+some admirable complex instincts to safeguard her young, in addition to
+the ordinary instincts of most animals of this kind. This idea was
+suggested to me by the action of a female mouse which I witnessed by
+chance. While walking in a field of stubble one day in autumn, near
+Buenos Ayres, I suddenly heard, issuing from near my feet, a chorus of
+shrill squealing voices--the familiar excessively sharp little needles
+of sound emitted by young, blind and naked mice, when they are disturbed
+or in pain. Looking down, I saw close to my foot a nest of them--there
+were nine in all, wriggling about and squealing; for the parent,
+frightened at my step, had just sprung from them, overturning in her
+hurry to escape the slight loosely-felted dome of fine grass and
+thistledown which had covered them. I saw her running away, but after
+going six or seven yards she stopped, and, turning partly round so as to
+watch me, waited in fear and trembling. I remained perfectly
+motionless--a sure way to allay fear and suspicion in any wild
+creature,--and in a few moments she returned, but with the utmost
+caution, frequently pausing to start and tremble, and masking her
+approach with corn stumps and little inequalities in the surface of the
+ground, until, reaching the nest, she took one of the young in her
+mouth, and ran rapidly away to a distance of eight or nine yards and
+concealed it in a tuft of dry grass.
+
+Leaving it, she returned a second time, in the same cautious manner, and
+taking another, ran with it to the same spot, and concealed it along
+with the first. It was curious that the first young mouse had continued
+squealing after being hidden by the mother, for I could hear it
+distinctly, the air being very still, but when the second mouse had been
+placed with it, the squealing ceased. A third time the old mouse came,
+and then instead of going to the same spot, as I had expected, she ran
+off in an opposite direction and disappeared among the dry weeds; a
+fourth was carried to the same place as the third; and in this way they
+were all removed to a distance of some yards from the nest, and placed
+in couples, until the last and odd one remained. In due time she came
+for it, and ran away with it in a new direction, and was soon out of
+sight; and although I waited fully ten minutes, she did not return; nor
+could I afterwards find any of the young mice when I looked for them, or
+even hear them squeal.
+
+I have frequently observed newly-born lambs on the pampas, and have
+never failed to be surprised at the extreme imbecility they display in
+their actions; although this may be due partly to inherited degeneracy
+caused by domestication. This imbecile condition continues for two,
+sometimes for three days, during which time the lamb apparently acts
+purely from instincts, which are far from perfect; but after that,
+experience and its dam teach it a better way. When born its first
+impulse is to struggle up on to its feet; its second to suck, but here
+it does not discriminate like the newly-hatched bird that picks up its
+proper food, or it does not know what to suck. It will take into its
+mouth whatever comes near, in most cases a tuft of wool on its dam's
+neck; and at this it will continue sucking for an indefinite time. It is
+highly probable that the strong-smelling secretion of the sheep's udder
+attracts the lamb at length to that part; and that without something of
+the kind to guide it, in many cases it would actually starve without
+finding the teats. I have often seen lambs many hours after birth still
+confining their attention to the most accessible locks of wool on the
+neck or fore legs of the dams, and believe that in such cases the long
+time it took them to find the source of nourishment arose from a
+defective sense of smell. Its next important instinct, which comes into
+play from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels it to follow after
+any object receding from it, and, on the other hand, to run from
+anything approaching it. If the dam turns round and approaches it from
+even a very short distance, it will start back and run from her in fear,
+and will not understand her voice when she bleats to it: at the same
+time it will confidently follow after a man, dog, horse, or any other
+animal moving from it. A very common experience on the pampas, in the
+sheep-country, is to see a lamb start up from sleep and follow the
+rider, running along close to the heels of the horse. This is
+distressing to a merciful man, tor he cannot shake the little simpleton
+off, and if he rides on, no matter how fast, it will keep up him, or
+keep him in sight, for half a mile or a mile, and never recover its dam.
+The gaucho, who is not merciful, frequently saves himself all trouble
+and delay by knocking it senseless with a blow of his whip-handle, and
+without checking his horse. I have seen a lamb, about two days old,
+start up from sleep, and immediately start off in pursuit of a puff ball
+about as big as a man's head, carried past it over the smooth turf by
+the wind, and chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until the
+dry ball was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse grass. This
+blundering instiuct is quickly laid aside when the lamb has learned to
+distinguish its dam from other objects, and its dam's voice from other
+sounds. When four or five days old it will start from sleep, but instead
+of rushing blindly away after any receding object, it first looks about
+it, and will then recognize and run to its dam.
+
+I have often been struck with the superiority of the pampa or
+creolla--the old native breed of sheep--in the greater vigour of the
+young when born over the improved European varieties. The pampa descends
+to us from the first sheep introduced into La Plata about three
+centuries ago, and is a tall, gaunt bony animal, with lean dry flesh,
+like venison, and long straight wool, like goats' hair. In their
+struggle for existence in a country subject to sudden great changes of
+temperature, to drought, and failure of grass, they have in a great
+measure lost the qualities which make the sheep valuable to man as a
+food and wool-producing animal; but on the other hand they have to some
+extent recovered the vigour of a wild animal, being hardy enough to
+exist without any shelter, and requiring from their master man only
+protection from the larger carnivores. They are keen-scented, swift of
+foot and Wonderfully active, and thrive where other breeds would quickly
+starve. I have often seen a lamb dropped on the frosty ground in
+bitterly cold windy weather in midwinter, and in less than five seconds
+struggle to its feet, and seem as vigorous as any day-old lamb of other
+breeds. The dam, impatient at the short delay, and not waiting to give
+it suck, has then started off at a brisk trot after the flock, scattered
+and galloping before the wind like huanacos rather than sheep, with the
+lamb, scarcely a minute in the world, running freely at her side.
+Notwithstanding its great vigour it has been proved that the pampa sheep
+has not so far outgrown the domestic taint as to be able to maintain its
+own existence when left entirely to itself. During the first half of
+this century, when cattle-breeding began to be profitable, and wool was
+not worth the trouble of shearing, and the gaucho workman would not eat
+mutton when beef was to be had, some of the estancieros on the southern
+pampas determined to get rid of their sheep, which were of no value to
+them; and many flocks were driven a distance out and lost in the wilds.
+Out of many thousands thus turned loose to shift for themselves, not one
+pair survived to propagate a new race of feral sheep; in a short time
+pumas, wild dogs, and other beasts of prey, had destroyed them all. The
+sterling qualities of the pampa sheep had their value in other times; at
+present the improved kinds are alone considered worth having, and the
+original sheep of the country is now rapidly disappearing, though still
+found in remote and poor districts, especially in the province of
+Cordova; and probably before long it will become extinct, together with
+the curious pug-nosed cow of the pampas.
+
+I have had frequent opportunities of observing the young, from one to
+three days old, of the Cervus campestris--the common deer of the pampas,
+and the perfection of its instincts at that tender age seem very
+wonderful in a ruminant. When the doe with, fawn is approached by a
+horseman, even when accompanied with dogs, she stands perfectly
+motionless, gazing fixedly at the enemy, the fawn motionless at her
+side; and suddenly, as if at a preconcerted signal, the fawn rushes
+directly away from her at its utmost speed; and going to a distance of
+six hundred to a thousand yards conceals itself in a hollow in the
+ground or among the long grass, lying down very close with neck
+stretched out horizontally, and will thus remain until sought by the
+dam. When very young if found in its hiding-place it will allow itself
+to be taken, making no further effort to escape. After the fawn has run
+away the doe still maintains her statuesque attitude, as if resolved to
+await the onset, and only when the dogs are close to her she also rushes
+away, but invariably in a direction as nearly opposite to that taken by
+the fawn as possible. At first she runs slowly, with a limping gait, and
+frequently pausing, as if to entice her enemies on, like a partridge,
+duck or plover when driven from its young; but as they begin to press
+her more closely her speed increases, becoming greater the further she
+succeeds in leading them from the starting-point.
+
+The alarm-cry of this deer is a peculiar whistling bark, a low but
+far-reaching sound; but when approaching a doe with young I have never
+been able to hear it, nor have I seen any movement on the part of the
+doe. Yet it is clear that in some mysterious way she inspires the fawn
+with sudden violent fear; while the fawn, on its side, instead of being
+affected like the young in other mammals, and sticking closer to its
+mother, acts in a contrary way, and runs from her.
+
+Of the birds I am acquainted with, the beautiful jacana (Parra jacana)
+appears to come into the world with its faculties and powers in the most
+advanced state. It is, in fact, ready to begin active life from the very
+moment of leaving the shell, as I once accidentally observed. I found a
+nest on a small mound of earth in a shallow lagoon, containing four
+eggs, with the shells already chipped by the birds in them. Two yards
+from the small nest mound there was a second mound covered with coarse
+grass. I got off my horse to examine the nest, and the old birds,
+excited beyond measure, fluttered round me close by pouring out their
+shrill rapidly-reiterated cries in an unbroken stream, sounding very
+much like a policeman's rattle. While I was looking closely at one of
+the eggs lying on the palm of my hand, all at once the cracked shell
+parted, and at the same moment the young bird leaped from my hand and
+fell into the water. I am quite sure that the young bird's sudden escape
+from the shell and my hand was the result of a violent effort on its
+part to free itself; and it was doubtless inspired to make the effort by
+the loud persistent screaming of the parent birds, which it heard while
+in the shell. Stooping to pick it up to save it from perishing, I soon
+saw that my assistance was not required, for immediately on dropping
+into the water, it put out its neck, and with the body nearly submerged,
+like a wounded duck trying to escape observation, it swam rapidly to the
+second small mound I have mentioned, and, escaping from the water,
+concealed itself in the grass, lying close and perfectly motionless like
+a young plover.
+
+In the case of the pampa or creolla sheep, I have shown that during its
+long, rough life in La Plata, this variety has in some measure recovered
+the natural vigour and ability to maintain existence in adverse
+circumstances of its wild ancestors. As much can be said of the creolla
+fowl of the pampas; and some observations of mine on the habits of this
+variety will perhaps serve to throw light on a vexed question of Natural
+History--namely, the cackling of the hen after laying, an instinct which
+has been described as "useless" and "disadvantageous." In fowls that
+live unconfined, and which are allowed to lay where they like, the
+instinct, as we know it, is certainly detrimental, since egg-eating dogs
+and pigs soon learn the cause of the outcry, and acquire a habit of
+rushing off to find the egg when they hear it. The question then arises:
+Does the wild jungle fowl possess the same pernicious instinct?
+
+The creolla is no doubt the descendant of the fowl originally introduced
+about three centuries ago by the first colonists in La Plata, and has
+probably not only been uncrossed with any other improved variety, such
+as are now fast taking its place, and has lived a much freer life than
+is usual with the fowl in Europe. It is a rather small, lean, extremely
+active bird, lays about a dozen eggs, and hatches them all, and is of a
+yellowish red colour--a hue which is common, I believe, in the old
+barn-door fowl of England. The creolla fowl is strong on the wing, and
+much more carnivorous and rapacious in habits than other breeds; mice,
+frogs, and small snakes are eagerly hunted and devoured by it. At my
+home on the pampas a number of these fowls were kept, and were allowed
+to range freely about the plantation, which was large, and the adjacent
+grounds, where there were thickets of giant cardoon thistle, red-weed,
+thorn apple, &c. They always nested at a distance from the house, and it
+was almost impossible ever to find their eggs, on account of the extreme
+circumspection they observed in going to and from their nests; and when
+they succeeded in escaping foxes, skunks, weasels, and opossums, which,
+strange to say, they often did, they would rear their chickens away out
+of sight and hearing of the house, and only bring them home when winter
+deprived them of their leafy covering and made food scarce. During the
+summer, in my rambles about the plantation, T would occasionally
+surprise one of these half-wild hens with her brood; her distracted
+screams and motions would then cause her chicks to scatter and vanish in
+all directions, and, until the supposed danger was past, they would lie
+as close and well-concealed as young partridges. These fowls in summer
+always lived in small parties, each party composed of one cock and as
+many hens as he could collect--usually three or four. Each family
+occupied its own feeding ground, where it would pass a greater portion
+of each day. The hen would nest at a considerable distance from the
+feeding ground, sometimes as far as four or five hundred yards away.
+After laying an egg she would quit the nest, not walking from it as
+other fowls do, but flying, the flight extending to a distance of from
+fifteen to about fifty yards; after which, still keeping silence, she
+would walk or run, until, arrived at the feeding ground, she would begin
+to cackle. At once the cock, if within hearing, would utter a responsive
+cackle, whereupon she would run to him and cackle no more. Frequently
+the cackling call-note would not be uttered more than two or three
+times, sometimes only once, and in a much lower tone than in fowls of
+other breeds.
+
+If we may assume that these fowls, in their long, semi-independent
+existence in La Plata, have reverted to the original instincts of the
+wild Gallus bankiva, we can see here how advantageous the cackling
+instinct must be in enabling the hen in dense tropical jungles to rejoin
+the flock after laying an egg. If there are egg-eating animals in the
+jungle intelligent enough to discover the meaning of such a short,
+subdued cackling call, they would still be unable to find the nest by
+going back on the bird's scent, since she flies from the nest in the
+first place; and the wild bird probably flies further than the creolla
+hen of La Plata. The clamorous cackling of our fowls would appear then
+to be nothing more than a perversion of a very useful instinct.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE MEPHITIC SKUNK.
+
+
+It might possibly give the reader some faint conception of the odious
+character of this creature (for adjectives are weak to describo it) when
+I say that, in talking to strangers from abroad, I have never thought it
+necessary to speak of sunstroke, jaguars, or the assassin's knife, but
+have never omitted to warn them of the skunk, minutely describing its
+habits and personal appearance.
+
+I knew an Englishman who, on taking a first gallop across the pampas,
+saw one, and, quickly dismounting, hurled himself bodily on to it to
+effect its capture. Poor man! he did not know that the little animal is
+never unwilling to be caught. Men have been blinded for ever by a
+discharge of the fiery liquid full in their faces. On a mucous membrane
+it burns like sulphuric acid, say the unfortunates who have had the
+experience. How does nature protect the skunk itself from the injurious
+effects of its potent fluid? I have not unfrequently found individuals
+stone-blind, sometimes moving so briskly about that the blindness must
+have been of long standing--very possibly in some cases an accidental
+drop discharged by the animal itself has caused the loss of sight. When
+coming to close quarters with a skunk, by covering up the face, one's
+clothes only are ruined. But this is not all one has to fear from an
+encounter; the worst is that effluvium, after which crushed garlic is
+lavender, which tortures the olfactory nerves, and appears to pervade
+the whole system like a pestilent ether, nauseating one until
+sea-sickness seems almost a pleasant sensation in comparison.
+
+To those who know the skunk only from reputation, my words might seem
+too strong; many, however, who have come to close quarters with the
+little animal will think them ridiculously weak. And consider what must
+the feelings be of one who has had the following experience--not an
+uncommon experience on the pampas. There is to be a dance at a
+neighbouring house a few miles away; he has been looking forward to it,
+and, dressing himself with due care, mounts his horse and sets out full
+of joyous anticipations. It is a dark windy evening, but there is a
+convenient bridle-path through the dense thicket of giant thistles, and
+striking it he puts his horse into a swinging gallop. Unhappily the path
+is already occupied by a skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, in
+obedience to the promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get out
+of it, until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kicked
+football into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as high as
+his knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider, after coming out
+into the open, dismounts and walks away twenty yards from his animal,
+and literally _smells_ himself all over, and with a feeling of profound
+relief pronounces himself Not the minutest drop of the diabolical spray
+has touched his dancing shoes! Springing into the saddle he proceeds to
+his journey's end, is warmly welcomed by his host, and speedily
+forgetting his slight misadventure, mingles with a happy crowd of
+friends. In a little while people begin exchanging whispers and
+significant glances; men are seen smiling at nothing in particular; the
+hostess wears a clouded face; the ladies cough and put their scented
+handkerchiefs to their noses, and presently they begin to feel faint and
+retire from the room. Our hero begins to notice that there is something
+wrong, and presently discovers its cause; he, unhappily, has been the
+last person in the room to remark that familiar but most abominable
+odour, rising like a deadly exhalation from the floor, conquering all
+other odours, and every moment becoming more powerful. A drop _has_
+touched his shoe after all; and fearing to be found out, and edging
+towards the door, he makes his escape, and is speedily riding home
+again; knowing full well that his sudden and early departure from the
+scene will be quickly discovered and set down to the right cause.
+
+In that not always trustworthy book _The Natural History of Chili,_
+Molina tells us how they deal with the animal in the trans-Andine
+regions. "When one appears," he says, "some of the company begiu by
+caressing it, until an opportunity offers for one of them to seize it by
+the tail. In this position the muscles become contracted, the animal is
+unable to eject its fluid, and is quickly despatched." One might just as
+well talk of caressing a cobra de capello; yet this laughable fiction
+finds believers all over South and North America. Professor Baird
+gravely introduces it into his great work on the mammalia. I was once
+talking about animals in a rancho, when a person present (an Argentine
+officer) told that, while visiting an Indian encampment, he had asked
+the savages how they contrived to kill skunks without making even a life
+in the desert intolerable. A grave old Cacique informed him that the
+secret was to go boldly up to the animal, take it by the tail, and
+despatch it; for, he said, when you fear it not at all, then it respects
+your courage and dies like a lamb--sweetly. The officer, continuing his
+story, said that on quitting the Indian camp he started a skunk, and,
+glad of an opportunity to test the truth of what he had heard,
+dismounted and proceeded to put the Indian plan in practice. Here the
+story abruptly ended, and when I eagerly demanded to hear the sequel,
+the amateur hunter of furs lit a cigarette and vacantly watched the
+ascending smoke. The Indians aro grave jokers, they seldom smile; and
+this old traditional skunk-joke, which has run the length of a
+continent, finding its way into many wise books, is their revenge on a
+superior race.
+
+I have shot a great many eagles, and occasionally a carancho (Polyborus
+tharus), with the plumage smelling strongly of skunk, which shows that
+these birds, pressed by hunger, often commit the fearful mistake of
+attacking the animal. My friend Mr. Ernest Gibson, of Buenos Ayres, in a
+communication to the _Ibis,_ describes an encounter he actually
+witnessed between a carancho and a skunk. Riding home one afternoon, he
+spied a skunk "shuffling along in the erratic manner usual to that
+odoriferous quadruped;" following it at a very short distance was an
+eagle-vulture, evidently bent on mischief. Every time the bird came near
+the bushy tail rose menacingly; then the carancho would fall behind,
+and, after a few moments' hesitation, follow on again. At length,
+growing bolder, it sprung forward, seizing the threatening tail with its
+claw, but immediately after "began staggering about with dishevelled
+plumage, tearful eyes, and a profoundly woe-begone expression on its
+vulture face. The skunk, after turning and regarding its victim with an
+I-told-you-so look for a few moments, trotted unconcernedly off."
+
+I was told in Patagonia by a man named Molinos, who was frequently
+employed by the Government as guide to expeditions in the desert, that
+everywhere throughout that country the skunk is abundant. Some years ago
+he was sent with two other men to find and treat with an Indian chief
+whose whereabouts were not known. Far in the interior Molinos was
+overtaken by a severe winter, his horses died of thirst and fatigue, and
+during the three bitterest months of the year he kept himself and his
+followers alive by eating the flesh of skunks, the only wild animal that
+never failed them. No doubt, on those vast sterile plains where the
+skunk abounds, and goes about by day and by night careless of enemies,
+the terrible nature of its defensive weapon is the first lesson
+experience teaches to every young eagle, fox, wild cat, and puma.
+
+Dogs kill skunks when made to do so, but it is not a sport they delight
+in. One moonlight night, at home, I went out to where the dogs, twelve
+in number, were sleeping: while I stood there a skunk appeared and
+deliberately came towards me, passing through the dogs where they lay,
+and one by one as he passed them they rose up, and, with their tails
+between their legs, skulked off. When made to kill skunks often they
+become seasoned; but always perform the loathsome task expeditiously,
+then rush away with frothing mouths to rub their faces in the wet clay
+and rid themselves of the fiery sensation. At one time I possessed only
+one dog that could be made to face a skunk, and as the little robbers
+were very plentiful, and continually coining about the house in their
+usual open, bold way, it was rather hard for the poor brute. This dog
+detested them quite as strongly as the others, only he was more
+obedient, faithful, and brave. Whenever I bade him attack one of them
+he would come close up to me and look up into my face with piteous
+pleading eyes, then, finding that he was not to be let off from the
+repulsive task, he would charge upon the doomed animal with a blind fury
+wonderful to see. Seizing it between his teeth, he would shake it madly,
+crushing its bones, then hurl it several feet from him, only to rush
+again and again upon it to repeat the operation, doubtless with a
+Caligula-like wish in his frantic breast that all the skunks on the
+globe had but one backbone.
+
+I was once on a visit to a sheep-farming brother, far away on the
+southern frontier of Buenos Ayres, and amongst the dogs I found there
+was one most interesting creature, He was a great, lumbering, stupid,
+good-tempered brute, so greedy that when you offered him a piece of meat
+he would swallow half your arm, and so obedient that at a word he would
+dash himself against the horns of a bull, and face death and danger in
+any shape. But, my brother told me, he would not face a skunk--he would
+die first. One day I took him out and found a skunk, and for upwards of
+half an hour I sat on my horse vainly cheering on my cowardly follower,
+and urging him to battle. The very sight of the enemy gave him a fit of
+the shivers; and when the irascible little enemy began to advance
+against us, going through the performance by means of which he generally
+puts his foes to flight without resorting to malodorous
+measures--stamping his little feet in rage, jumping up, spluttering and
+hissing and flourishing his brush like a warlike banner above his
+head--then hardly could I restrain my dog from turning tail and flying
+home in abject terror. My cruel persistence was rewarded at last.
+Continued shouts, cheers, and hand-clappings began to stir the brute to
+a kind of frenzy. Torn by conflicting emotions, he began to revolve
+about the skunk at a lumbering gallop, barking, howling, and bristling
+up his hair; and at last, shutting his eyes, and with a yell of
+desperation, he charged. I fully expected to see the enemy torn to
+pieces in a few seconds, but when the dog was still four or five feet
+from him the fatal discharge came, and he dropped down as if shot dead.
+For some time he lay on the earth perfectly motionless, watched and
+gently bedewed by the victorious skunk; then he got up and crept whining
+away. Gradually he quickened his pace, finally breaking into a frantic
+run. In vain I followed him, shouting at the top of my lungs; he stayed
+not to listen, and very speedily vanished from sight--a white speck on
+the vast level plain. At noon on the following day he made his
+appearance, gaunt and befouled with mud, staggering forward like a
+galvanized skeleton. Too worn out even to eat, he flung himself down,
+and for hours lay like a dead thing, sleeping off the effects of those
+few drops of perfume.
+
+Dogs, I concluded, like men, have their idiosyncrasies; but I had gained
+my point, and proved once more--if any proof were needed--the truth of
+that noble panegyric of Bacon's on our faithful servant and companion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS.
+
+
+There is in La Plata a large handsome grasshopper (Zoniopoda tarsata),
+the habits of which in its larva and imago stages are in strange
+contrast, like those in certain lepidoptera, in which the caterpillars
+form societies and act in concert. The adult has a greenish protective
+colouring, brown and green banded thighs, bright red hind wings, seen
+only during flight. It is solitary and excessively shy in its habits,
+living always in concealment among the dense foliage near the surface of
+the ground. The yonng are intensely black, like grasshoppers cut out of
+jet or ebony, and gregarious in habit, living in bands of forty or fifty
+to three or four hundred; and so little shy, that they may sometimes be
+taken up by handfuls before they begin to scatter in alarm. Their
+gregarious habits and blackness--of all hues in nature the most obvious
+to the sight--would alone be enough to make them the most conspicuous of
+insects; but they have still other habits which appear as if specially
+designed to bring them more prominently into notice. Thus, they all keep
+so close together at all times as to have their bodies actually
+touching, and when travelling, move so slowly that the laziest snail
+might easily overtake and pass one of their bands, and even disappear
+beyond their limited horizon in a very short time.
+
+They often select an exposed weed to feed on, clustering together on its
+summit above the surrounding verdure, an exceedingly conspicuous object
+to every eye in the neighbourhood. They also frequently change their
+feeding-ground; at such times they deliberately cross wide roads and
+other open spaces, barren of grass, where, moving so slowly that they
+scarcely seem to move at all, they look at a distance like a piece of
+black velvet lying on the ground. Thus in every imaginable way they
+expose themselves and invite attack; yet, in spite of it all, I have
+never detected birds preying on them, and I have sometimes kept one of
+these black societies under observation near my house for several days,
+watching them at intervals, in places where the trees overhead were the
+resort of Icterine and tyrant birds, Guira cuckoos, and other species,
+all great hunters after grasshoppers. A young grasshopper is, moreover,
+a morsel that seldom comes amiss to any bird, whether insect or seed
+eater; and, as a rule, it is extremely shy, nimble, and inconspicuous.
+It seems clear that, although the young Zoniopoda does not mimic in its
+form any black protected insect, it nevertheless owes its safety to its
+blackness, together with the habit it possesses of exposing itself in so
+open and bold a manner. Blackness is so common in large protected
+insects, as, for instance, in the un-palatable leaf-cutting ants,
+scorpions, mygale spiders, wasps, and other dangerous kinds, that it is
+manifestly a "warning colour," the most universal and best known in
+nature; and the grasshopper, I believe, furthermore mimics the fearless
+demeanour of the protected or venomous species, which birds and other
+insect-eaters know and respect. It might be supposed that the young
+Zoniopoda is itself unpalatable; but this is scarcely probable, for when
+the deceptive black mask is once dropped, the excessive shyness, love of
+concealment, and protective colouring of the insect show that it is much
+sought after by birds.
+
+While setting this down as an undoubted case of "mimicry," although it
+differs in some respects from all other cases I have seen reported, I
+cannot help remarking that this most useful word appears to be in some
+danger of losing the meaning originally attached to it in zoology. There
+are now very few cases of an accidental resemblance found between two
+species in nature which are not set down by someone to "mimicry," some
+in which even the wildest imagination might well fail to see any
+possible benefit to the supposed mimic. In cases where the outward
+resemblance of some feeble animal to a widely different and
+well-protected species, or to some object like a leaf or stick, and
+where such resemblance is manifestly advantageous and has reacted on and
+modified the life habits, it is conceivable that slight spontaneous
+variations in the structure and colouring of the unprotected species
+have been taken advantage of by the principle of natural selection, and
+a case of "mimicry" set up, to become more and more perfect in time, as
+successive casual variations in the same direction increased the
+resemblance.
+
+The stick-insect is perhaps the most perfect example where resemblance
+to an inanimate object has been the result aimed at, so to speak, by
+nature; the resemblance of the volucella fly to the humble-bee, on which
+it is parasitical, is the most familiar example of one species growing
+like another to its own advantage, since only by means of its deceptive
+likeness to the humble-bee is it able to penetrate into the nest with
+impunity. These two cases, with others of a similar character, were
+first called cases of "mimicry" by Kirby and Spence, in their
+ever-delightful _Introduction to Entomology--_an old book, but,
+curiously enough in these days of popular treatises on all matters of
+the kind, still the only general work on insects in the English language
+which one who is not an entomologist can read with pleasure.
+
+A second case of mimicry not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen in
+another grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa of
+Thun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and thorax
+chocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen steel-blue or
+purple, a colour I have not seen in any other insects of this family.
+The fore wings have a protective colouring; the hind wings are bright
+red. When at rest, with the red and purple tints concealed, it is only a
+very pretty grasshopper, but the instant it takes wing it becomes the
+fac-simile of a very common wasp of the genus Pepris. These wasps vary
+greatly in size, some being as large as the hornet; they are solitary,
+and feed on the honey of flowers and on fruit, and, besides being
+furnished with stings like other wasps--though their sting is nok so
+venomous as in other genera--they also, when angry, emit a most
+abominable odour, and are thus doubly protected against their enemies.
+Their excessive tameness, slow flight, and indolent motions serve to
+show that they are not accustomed to be interfered with. All these
+strong-smelling wasps have steel-blue or purple bodies, and bright red
+wings. So exactly does the Rhomalea grasshopper mimic the Pepris when
+flying, that I have been deceived scores of times. I have even seen it
+on the leaves, and, after it has flown and settled once more, I have
+gone to look at it again, to make sure that my eyes had not deceived me.
+It is curious to see how this resemblance has reacted on and modified
+the habits of the grasshopper. It is a great flyer, and far more aerial
+in its habits than any other insect I am acquainted with in this family,
+living always in trees, instead of on or near the surface of the ground.
+It is abundant in orchards and plantations round Buenos Ayres, where its
+long and peculiarly soft, breezy note may be heard all summer. If the
+ancient Athenians possessed so charming an insect as this, their great
+regard for the grasshopper was not strange: I only wish that the
+"Athenians of South America," as my fellow-townsmen sometimes call
+themselves in moments of exaltation, had a feeling of the samo kind--the
+regard which does _not_ impale its object on a pin--for the pretty
+light-hearted songster of their groves and gardens.
+
+When taken in the hand, it has the habit, common to most grasshoppers,
+of pouring out an inky fluid from its mouth; only the discharge is
+unusually copious in this species. It has another habit in defending
+itself which is very curious. When captured it instantly curls its body
+round, as a wasp does to sting. The suddenness of this action has more
+than once caused me to drop an insect I had taken, actually thinking for
+the moment that I had taken hold of a wasp. Whether birds would be
+deceived and made to drop it or not is a question it would not be easy
+to settle; but the instinct certainly looks like 'one of a series of
+small adaptations, all tending to make the resemblance to a wasp more
+complete and effective.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+DRAGON-FLY STORMS.
+
+
+One of the most curious things I have encountered in my observations on
+animal life relates to a habit of the larger species of dragon-flies
+inhabiting the Pampas and Patagonia. Dragon-flies are abundant
+throughout the country wherever there is water. There are several
+species, all more or less brilliantly coloured. The kinds that excited
+my wonder, from their habits, are twice as large as the common widely
+distributed insects, being three inches to four inches in length, and as
+a rule they are sober-coloured, although there is one species--the
+largest among them--entirely of a brilliant scarlet. This kind is,
+however, exceedingly rare. All the different kinds (of the large
+dragon-flies) when travelling associate together, and occasionally, in a
+flight composed of countless thousands, one of these brilliant-hued
+individuals will catch the eye, appearing as conspicuous among the
+others as a poppy or scarlet geranium growing alone in an otherwise
+flowerless field. The most common species--and in some cases the entire
+flight seems to be composed of this kind only--is the Aeschna
+bonariensis Raml, the prevailing colour of which is pale blue. But the
+really wonderful thing about them all alike is, that they appear only
+when flying before the southwest wind, called _pampero_--the wind that
+blows from the interior of the pampas. The pampero is a dry, cold wind,
+exceedingly violent. It bursts on the plains very suddenly, and usually
+lasts only a short time, sometimes not more than ten minutes; it comes
+irregularly, and at all seasons of the year, but is most frequent in the
+hot season, and after exceptionally sultry weather. It is in summer and
+autumn that the large dragon-flies appear; not _with_ the wind, but--and
+this is the most curious part of the matter--in advance of it; and
+inasmuch as these insects are not seen in the country at other times,
+and frequently appear in seasons of prolonged drought, when all the
+marshes and watercourses for many hundreds of miles are dry, they must
+of course traverse immense distances, flying before the wind at a speed
+of seventy or eighty miles an hour. On some occasions they appear almost
+simultaneously with the wind, going by like a flash, and instantly
+disappearing from sight. You have scarcely time to see them before the
+wind strikes you. As a rule, however, they make their appearance from
+five to fifteen minutes before the wind strikes; and when they are in
+great numbers the air, to a height of ten or twelve feet above the
+surface of the ground, is all at once seen to be full of them, rushing
+past with extraordinary velocity in a north-easterly direction. In very
+oppressive weather, and when the swiftly advancing pampero brings no
+moving mountains of mingled cloud and dust, and is consequently not
+expected, the sudden apparition of the dragon-fly is a most welcome one,
+for then an immediate burst of cold wind is confidently looked for. In
+the expressive vernacular of the gauchos the large dragon-fly is called
+_hijo del pampero_--son of the south-west wind.
+
+It is clear that these great and frequent dragonfly movements are not
+explicable on any current hypothesis regarding the annual migrations of
+birds, the occasional migrations of butterflies, or the migrations of
+some mammals, like the reindeer and buffalo of Arctic America, which,
+according to Rae and other observers, perform long journeys north and
+south at regular seasons, "from a sense of polarity." Neither this
+hypothetical sense in animals, nor "historical memory" will account for
+the dragon-fly storms, as the phenomenon of the pampas might be called,
+since the insects do not pass and repass between "breeding and
+subsistence areas," but all journey in a north-easterly direction; and
+of the countless millions flying like thistledown before the great
+pampero wind, not one solitary traveller ever returns.
+
+The cause of the flight is probably dynamical, affecting the insects
+with a sudden panic, and compelling them to rush away before the
+approaching tempest. The mystery is that they should fly from the wind
+before it reaches them, and yet travel in the same direction with it.
+When they pass over the level, treeless country, not one insect lags
+behind, or permits the wind to overtake it; but, on arriving at a wood
+or large plantation they swarm into it, as if seeking shelter from some
+swift-pursuing enemy, and on such occasions they sometimes remain
+clinging to the trees while the wind spends its force. This is
+particularly the case when the wind blows up at a late hour of the day;
+then, on the following morning, the dragon-flies are seen clustering to
+the foliage in such numbers that many trees are covered with them, a
+large tree often appearing as if hung with curtains of some brown
+glistening material, too thick to show the green leaves beneath.
+
+In Patagonia, where the phenomenon of dragon-fly storms is also known,
+an Englishman residing at the Rio Negro related to me the following
+occurrence which he witnessed there. A race meeting was being held near
+the town of El Carmen, on a high exposed piece of ground, when, shortly
+before sunset, a violent pampero wind came up, laden with dense
+dust-clouds. A few moments before the storm broke, the air all at once
+became obscured with a prodigious cloud of dragon-flies. About a hundred
+men, most of them on horseback, were congregated on the course at the
+time, and the insects, instead of rushing by in their usual way, settled
+on the people in such quantities that men and horses were quickly
+covered with clinging masses of them. My informant said--and this agrees
+with my own observation--that he was greatly impressed by the appearance
+of terror shown by the insects; they clung to him as if for dear life,
+so that he had the greatest difficulty in ridding himself of them.
+
+Weissenborn, in London's _Magazine of Natural History_ (N. S. vol. iii.)
+describes a great migration of dragon-flies which he witnessed in
+Germany in 1839, and also mentions a similar phenomenon occurring in
+1816, and extending over a large portion of Europe. But in these cases
+the movement took place at the end of May, and the insects travelled due
+south; their migrations were therefore similar to those of birds and
+butterflies, and were probably due to the same cause. I have been unable
+to find any mention of a phenomenon resembling the one with which we are
+so familiar on the pampas, and which, strangely enough, has not been
+recorded by any European naturalists who have travelled there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS.
+
+
+There cannot be a doubt that some animals possess an instinctive
+knowledge of their enemies--or, at all events, of some of their
+enemies--though I do not believe that this faculty is so common as many
+naturalists imagine. The most striking example I am acquainted with is
+seen in gnats or mosquitoes, and in the minute South American sandflies
+(Simulia), when a dragon-fly appears in a place where they are holding
+their aerial pastimes. The sudden appearance of a ghost among human
+revellers could not produce a greater panic. I have spoken in the last
+chapter of periodical storms or waves of dragon-flies in the Plata
+region, and mentioned incidentally that the appearance of these insects
+is most welcome in oppressively hot weather, since they are known to
+come just in advance of a rush of cool wind. In La Plata we also look
+for the dragon-fly, and rejoice at its coming, for another reason. We
+know that the presence of this noble insect will cause the clouds of
+stinging gnats and flies, which make life a burden, to vanish like
+smoke.
+
+When a flight of dragon-flies passes over the country many remain along
+the route, as I have said, sheltering themselves wherever trees occur;
+and, after the storm blows over, these strangers and stragglers remain
+for some days hawking for prey in the neighbourhood. It is curious to
+note that they do not show any disposition to seek for watercourses. It
+may be that they feel lost in a strange region, or that the panic they
+have suffered, in their long flight before the wind, has unsettled their
+instincts; for it is certain that they do not, like the dragon-fly in
+Mrs. Browning's poem, "return to dream upon the river." They lead
+instead a kind of vagabond existence, hanging about the plantations, and
+roaming over the surrounding plains. It is then remarked that gnats and
+sand-flies apparently cease to exist, even in places where they have
+been most abundant. They have not been devoured by the dragon-flies,
+which are perhaps very few in number; they have simply got out of the
+way, and will remain in close concealment until their enemies take their
+departure, or have all been devoured by martins, tyrant birds, and the
+big robber-flies or devil's dykes--no name is bad enough for them--of
+the family Asilidaa. During these peaceful gnatless days, if a person
+thrusts himself into the bushes or herbage in some dark sheltered place,
+he will soon begin to hear the thin familiar sounds, as of "horns of
+elf-land faintly blowing"; and presently, from the ground and the under
+surface of every leaf, the ghost-like withered little starvelings will
+appear in scores and in hundreds to settle on him, fear not having
+blunted their keen appetites.
+
+When riding over the pampas on a hot still day, with a pertinacious
+cloud of gnats or sandflies hovering just above my head and keeping me
+company for miles, I have always devoutly wished for a stray dragon-fly
+to show himself. Frequently the wish has been fulfilled, the dragon-fly,
+apparently "sagacious of his quarry from afar," sweeping straight at his
+prey, and instantly, as if by miracle, the stinging rain has ceased and
+the noxious cloud vanished from overhead, to be re-formed no more. This
+has always seemed very extraordinary to me; for in other matters gnats
+do not appear to possess even that proverbial small dose of intellect
+for which we give most insects credit. Before the advent of the
+dragon-fly it has perhaps happened that I have been vigorously striking
+at them, making it very unpleasant for them, and also killing and
+disabling many hundreds--a larger number than the most voracious
+dragon-fly could devour in the course of a whole day; and yet, after
+brushing and beating them off until my arms have ached with the
+exertion, they have continued to rush blindly on their fate, exhibiting
+not the faintest symptom of fear. I suppose that for centuries
+mosquitoes have, in this way, been brushed and beaten away with hands
+and with tails, without learning caution. It is not in their knowledge
+that there are hands and tails. A large animal is simply a field on
+which they confidently settle to feed, sounding shrill flourishes on
+their little trumpets to show how fearless they are. But the dragon-fly
+is very ancient on the earth, and if, during the Devonian epoch, when it
+existed, it preyed on some blood-sucking insect from which or Culicidae
+have come, then these stupid little insects have certainly had ample
+time in which to learn well at least one lesson.
+
+There is not in all organic nature, to my mind, any instance of wasted
+energy comparable in magnitude with the mosquito's thirst for blood, and
+the instincts and elaborate blood-pumping apparatus with which it is
+related. The amount of pollen given off by some wind-fertilized
+trees--so great in some places that it covers hundreds of square miles
+of earth and water with a film of yellow dust---strikes us as an amazing
+waste of material on the part of nature; but in these cases we readily
+see that this excessive prodigality is necessary to continue the
+species, and that a sufficient number of flowers would not be
+impregnated unless the entire trees were bathed for days in the
+fertilizing cloud, in which only one out of many millions of floating
+particles can ever hit the mark. The mosquito is able to procreate
+without ever satisfying its ravenous appetite for blood. To swell its
+grey thread-like abdomen to a coral bead is a delight to the insect, but
+not necessary to its existence, like food and water to ours; it is the
+great prize in the lottery of life, which few can ever succeed in
+drawing. In a hot summer, when one has ridden perhaps for half a day
+over a low-lying or wet district, through an atmosphere literally
+obscured with a fog of mosquitoes, this fact strikes the mind very
+forcibly, for in such places it frequently is the case that mammals do
+not exist, or are exceedingly rare. In Europe it is different. There, as
+Reaumur said, possibly one gnat in every hundred may be able to gratify
+its appetite for blood; but of the gnats in many districts in South
+America it would be nearer the mark to say that only one in a hundred
+millions can ever do so.
+
+Curtis discovered that only the female mosquito bites or sucks blood,
+the male being without tongue or mandibles; and he asks, What, then,
+does the male feed on? He conjectures that it feeds on flowers; but, had
+he visited some swampy places in hot countries, where flowers are few
+and the insects more numerous than the sands on the seashore, he would
+most probably have said that the males subsist on decaying vegetable
+matter and moisture of slime. It is, however, more important to know
+what the female subsists on. We know that she thirsts for warm mammalian
+blood, that she seeks it with avidity, and is provided with an admirable
+organ for its extraction--only, unfortunately for her, she does not get
+it, or, at all events, the few happy individuals that do get it are
+swamped in the infinite multitude of those that are doomed by nature to
+total abstinence.
+
+I should like to know whether this belief of Curtis, shared by Westwood
+and other distinguished entomologists, but originally put forward merely
+as a conjecture, has ever been tested by careful observation and
+experiment. If not, then it is strange that it should have crept into
+many important works, where it is stated not as a mere guess, but as an
+established fact. Thus, Van Beneden, in his work on parasites, while
+classing female mosquitoes with his "miserable wretches," yet says, "If
+blood fails them, they live, like the males, on the juices of flowers."
+If this be so, it is quite certain that the juices fail to satisfy them;
+and that, like Dr. Tanner, who was ravenously hungry during his forty
+days' fast, in spite of his frequent sips of water, the mosquito still
+craves for something better than a cool vegetarian diet. I cannot help
+thinking, though the idea may seem fanciful, that mosquitoes feed on
+nothing. We know that the ephemerae take no refreshment in the imago
+state, the mouth being aborted or atrophied in these short-lived
+creatures; but we also know that they belong to an exceedingly ancient
+tribe, and possibly, after the earth had ceased to produce their proper
+nourishment there came in their history a long hungry period, which did
+not kill them, but lasted until their feeding instincts became obsolete,
+the mouth lost its use, and their life in its perfect state dwindled to
+its present length.
+
+In any case, how unsatisfactory is the mosquitoes' existence, and what a
+curious position they occupy in nature! Let us suppose that, owing to
+some great change in the conditions of the earth, rapacious birds were
+no longer able to capture prey, and that, by a corresponding change in
+their organizations, they were able to subsist on the air they breathed,
+with perhaps an occasional green leaf and a sip of water, and yet
+retained the old craving for solid food, and the old predatory instincts
+and powers undiminished; they would be in the position of mosquitoes in
+the imago state. And if then fifty or a hundred individuals were to
+succeed every year in capturing something and making one hearty meal,
+these few fortunate diners would bear about the same proportion to all
+the raptors on the globe as the mosquitoes that succeed in sucking blood
+to their unsuccessful fellows. In the case of the hawks, the effect of
+the few meals on the entire rapacious family or order would certainly be
+_nil;_ and it is impossible to believe for a moment that the
+comparatively infinitesimal amount of blood sucked by mosquitoes can.
+serve to invigorate the species. The wonder is that the machinery, which
+accomplishes nothing, should continue in such perfect working order.
+
+When we consider the insect's delicate organ, so admirably fitted for
+the purpose to which it is applied, it becomes difficult to believe that
+it could have been so perfected except in a condition of things utterly
+unlike the present. There must have been a time when mosquitoes found
+their proper nourishment, and when warm mammalian blood was as necessary
+to their existence as honey is to that of the bee, or insect food to the
+dragon-fly.
+
+This applies to many blood-sucking insects besides mosquitoes, and with
+special force to the tick tribes (Ixodes), which swarm throughout
+Central and South America; for in these degraded spiders the whole body
+has been manifestly modified to fit it for a parasitical life; while the
+habits of the insect during its blind, helpless, waiting existence on
+trees, and its sudden great development when it succeeds in attaching
+itself to an animal body, also point irresistibly to the same
+conclusion. In the sunny uplands they act (writes Captain Burton) like
+the mosquitoes of the hot, humid Beiramar. "The nuisance is general; it
+seems to be in the air; every blade of grass has its colony; clusters of
+hundreds adhere to the twigs; myriads are found in the bush clumps. Lean
+and flat when growing to the leaves, the tick catches man or beast
+brushing by, fattens rapidly, and, at the end-of a week's good living,
+drops off, _plena cruoris."_ When on trees, Belt says, they
+instinctively place themselves on the extreme tips of leaves and shoots,
+with their hind legs stretching out, each foot armed with two hooks or
+claws, with which to lay hold of any animal brushing by. During this
+wretched, incom-plete existence (from which, in most cases, it is never
+destined to emerge), its greatest length is about one-fourth of an inch;
+but where it fastens itself to an animal the abdomen increases to a
+globe as big as a medium-sized Barcelona nut. Being silvery-grey or
+white in colour, it becomes, when thus distended, very conspicuous on
+any dark surface. I have frequently seen black, smooth-haired dogs with
+their coats, turned into a perfect garden of these white spider-flowers
+or mushrooms. The white globe is leathery, and nothing can injure it;
+and the poor beast cannot rub, bite, or scratch it off, as it is
+anchored to his flesh by eight sets of hooks and a triangle of teeth.
+
+The ticks inhabiting regions rich in bird and insect life, but with few
+mammals, are in the same condition as mosquitoes, as far as the supply
+of blood goes; and, like the mosquitoes, they are compelled and able to
+exist without the nourishment best suited to them. They are nature's
+miserable castaways, parasitical tribes lost in a great dry wilderness
+where no blood is; and every marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hunger
+gnawing its vitals, and every forest tick, blindly feeling with its
+grappling-irons for the beast that never brushes by, seems to tell us of
+a world peopled with gigantic forms, mammalian and reptilian, which once
+afforded abundant pasture to the parasite, and which the parasite
+perhaps assisted to overthrow.
+
+It is almost necessary to transport oneself to the vast tick-infested
+wilderness of the New World to appreciate the full significance of a
+passage in Belt's _Naturalist in Nicaragua,_ in which it is suggested
+that man's hairless condition was perhaps brought about by natural
+selection in tropical regions, where he was greatly troubled with
+parasites of this kind. It is certain that if in such a country as
+Brazil he possessed a hairy coat, affording cover to the tick and
+enabling it to get a footing on the body, his condition would be a very
+sad one. Savages abhor hairs on the body, and even pluck them off their
+faces. This seems like a survival of an ancient habit acquired when the
+whole body was clothed with hair; and if primitive man ever possessed
+such a habit, nature only followed his lead in giving him a hairless
+offspring.
+
+Is it not also probable that the small amount of mammalian life in South
+America, and the aquatic habits of nearly all the large animals in the
+warmer districts, is due to the persecutions of the tick?
+
+The only way in which a large animal can rid itself of the pest is by
+going into the water or wallowing in the mud; and this perhaps accounts
+for the more or less aquatic habits of the jaguar, aguara-guazu, the
+large Cervus paluclosus, tapir, capybara, and peccary. Monkeys, which
+are most abundant, are a notable exception; but these animals have the
+habit of attending to each other's skins, and spend a great deal of
+their time in picking off the parasites. But how do birds escape the
+ticks, since these parasites do not confine their attacks to any one
+class of aninials, but attach themselves impartially to any living thing
+coming within reach of their hooks, from snake to man? My own
+observations bearing on this point refer less to the Ixodes than to the
+minute bete-rouge, which is excessively abundant in the Plata district,
+where it is known as _bicho colorado,_ and in size and habits resembles
+the English Leptus autumnalis. It is so small that, notwithstanding its
+bright scarlet colour, it can only be discerned by bringing the eye
+close to it; and being, moreover, exceedingly active and abundant in all
+shady places in summer--making life a misery to careless human
+beings--it must be very much more dangerous to birds than the larger
+sedentary Ixodes. The bete-rouge invariably lodges beneath the wings of
+birds, where the loose scanty plumage affords easy access to the skin.
+Domestic birds suffer a great deal from its persecutions, and their
+young, if allowed to run about in shady places, die of the irritation.
+Wild birds, however, seem to be very little troubled, and most of those
+I have examined have been almost entirely free from parasites. Probably
+they are much more sensitive than the domestic birds, and able to feel
+and pick off the insects with their beaks before they have penetrated
+into the skin. I believe they are also able to protect themselves in
+another way, namely, by preventing the parasites from reaching their
+bodies at all. I was out under the trees one day with a pet oven-bird
+(Furnarius rufus), which had full liberty to range about at will, and
+noticed that at short intervals it went through the motions of picking
+something from its toes or legs, though I could see nothing on them. At
+length I approached my eyes to within a few inches of the bird's feet,
+and discovered that the large dry branch on which it stood was covered
+with a multitude of parasites, all running rapidly about like foraging
+ants, and whenever one came to the bird's feet it at once ran up the
+leg. Every time this happened, so far as I could see, the bird felt it.
+and quickly and deftly picked it off with the point of its bill. It
+seemed very astonishing that the horny covering of the toes and legs
+should be so exquisitely sensitive, for the insects are so small and
+light that they cannot be felt on the hand, even when a score of them
+are running over it; but the fact is as I have stated, and it is highly
+probable, I think, that most wild birds keep themselves free from these
+little torments in the same way.
+
+Some observations of mine on a species of Orni-thomyia--a fly
+parasitical on birds--might possibly be of use in considering the
+question of the anomalous position in nature of insects possessing the
+instincts and aptitudes of parasites, and organs manifestly modified to
+suit a parasitical mode of life, yet compelled and able to exist free,
+feeding, perhaps, on vegetable juices, or, like the ephemerae, on
+nothing at all. For it must be borne in mind that I do not assert that
+these "occasional" or "accidental" parasites, as some one calls them,
+explaining nothing, do not feed on such juices. I do not know what they
+feed on. I only know that the joyful alacrity with which gnats and
+stinging flies of all kinds abandon the leaves, supposed to afford them
+pasture, to attack a warm-blooded animal, serves to show how strong the
+impulse is, and how ineradicable the instinct, which must have had an
+origin. Perhaps the habits of the bird-fly I have mentioned will serve
+to show how, in some cases, the free life of some blood-sucking flies
+and other insects might have originated.
+
+Kirby and Spence, in their _Introduction,_ mention that one or two
+species of Ornithomyia have been observed flying about and alighting on
+men; and in one case the fly extracted blood and was caught, the species
+being thus placed beyond doubt. This circumstance led the authors to
+believe that the insect, when the bird it is parasitical on dies,
+takes to flight and migrates from body to body, occasionally tasting
+blood until, coming to the right body--to wit, that of a bird, or of a
+particular species of bird--it once more establishes itself permanently
+in the plumage. I fancy that the insect sometimes leads a freer life and
+ranges much more than the authors imagined; and I refer to Kirby and
+Spence, with apologies to those who regard the _Introduction_ as out of
+date, only because I am not aware that we have any later observations on
+the subject.
+
+There is in La Plata a small very common Dendrocolaptine bird--Anumbius
+acuticaudatus--much infested by an Ornithomyia, a pretty, pale insect,
+half the size of a house-fly, and elegantly striped with green. It is a
+very large parasite for so small a bird, yet so cunning and alert is it,
+and so swiftly is it able to swim through the plumage, that the bird is
+unable to rid itself of so undesirable a companion. The bird lives with
+its mate all the year round, much of the time with its grown-up young,
+in its nest--a large structure, in which so much building-material is
+used that the bird is called in the vernacular Lenatero, or
+Firewood-gatherer. On warm bright days without wind, during the absence
+of the birds, I have frequently seen a company of from half a dozen to a
+dozen or fifteen of the parasitical fly wheeling about in the air above
+the nest, hovering and gambolling together, just like house-flies in a
+room in summer; but always on the appearance of the birds, returning
+from their feeding-ground, they would instantly drop down and disappear
+into the nest. How curious this instinct seems! The fly regards the
+bird, which affords it the warmth and food essential to life, as its
+only deadly enemy; and with an inherited wisdom, like that of the
+mosquito with regard to the dragon-fly, or of the horse-fly with regard
+to the Monedula wasp, vanishes like smoke from its presence, and only
+approaches the bird secretly from a place of concealment.
+
+The parasitical habit tends inevitably to degrade the species acquiring
+it, dulling its senses and faculties, especially those of sight and
+locomotion; but the Ornithomyia seems an exception, its dependent life
+having had a contrary effect; the extreme sensitiveness, keenness of
+sight, and quickness of the bird having reacted on the insect, giving it
+a subtlety in its habits and motions almost without a parallel even
+among free insects. A man with a blood-sucking flat-bodied flying
+squirrel, concealing itself among his clothing and gliding and dodging
+all over his body with so much artifice and rapidity as to defeat all
+efforts made to capturo it or knock it off, would be a case parallel to
+that of the bird-fly on the small bird. It might be supposed that the
+Firewood-gatherer, like some ants that keep domestic pets, makes a pet
+of the fly; for it is a very pretty insect, barred with green, and with
+rainbow reflections on its wings--and birds are believed by some
+theorists to possess aesthetic tastes; but the discomfort of having such
+a vampire on the body would, I imagine, be too great to allow a kindly
+instinct of that nature to grow up. Moreover, I have on several
+occasions seen the bird making frantic efforts to capture one of the
+flies, which had incautiously flown up from the nest at the wrong
+moment. Bird and fly seem to know each other wonderfully well.
+
+Here, then, we have a parasitical insect specialized in the highest
+degree, yet retaining all its pristine faculties unimpaired, its love of
+liberty, and of associating in numbers together for sportive exercises,
+and well able to take care of itself during its free intervals. And
+probably when thrown on the world, as when nests are blown down, or the
+birds get killed, or change their quarters, as they often do, it is able
+to exist for some time without avian blood. Let us then imagine some of
+these orphaned colonies, unable to find birds, but through a slight
+change in habits or organization able to exist in the imago state
+without sucking blood until they laid their eggs; and succeeding
+generations, still better able to stand the altered conditions of life
+until they become practically independent (like gnats), multiplying
+greatly, and disporting themselves in clouds over forests, yet still
+retaining the old hunger for blood and the power to draw it, and ready
+at any moment to return to the ancestral habit. It might be said that if
+such a result were possible it would have occurred, but that we find no
+insect like the Ornithomyia existing independently. With the bird-fly it
+has not occurred, as far as we know; but in the past history of some
+independent parasites it is possible that something similar to the
+imaginary case I have sketched may have taken place. The bush-tick is a
+more highly specialized, certainly a more degraded, creature than the
+bird-fly, and the very fact of its existence seems to show that it is
+possible for even the lowest of the fallen race of parasites to start
+afresh in life under new conditions, and to reascend in the scale of
+being, although still bearing about it the marks of former degeneracy.
+
+The connection between the flea and the mammal it feeds on is even less
+close than that which exists between the Ornithomyia and bird. The fact
+that fleas are so common and universal--for in all lands we have them,
+like the poor, always with us; and that they are found on all mammals,
+from the king of beasts to the small modest mouse--seems to show a great
+amount of variability and adaptiveness, as well as a very high
+antiquity. It has often been reported that fleas have been found hopping
+on the ground in desert places, where they could not have been dropped
+by man or beast; and it has been assumed that these "independent" fleas
+must, like gnats and ticks, subsist on vegetable juices. There is no
+doubt that they are able to exist and propagate for one or two years
+after being deprived of their proper aliment; houses shut up for a year
+or longer are sometimes found infested with them; possibly in the
+absence of "vegetable juices" they flourish on dust. I have never
+detected them hopping on the ground in uninhabited places, although I
+once found them in Patagonia, in a hamlet which had been attacked and
+depopulated by the Indians about twenty months before my visit. On
+entering one of the deserted huts I found the floor literally swarming
+with fleas, and in less than ten seconds my legs, to the height of my
+knees, were almost black with their numbers. This proves that they are
+able toincrease greatly for a period without blood; but I doubt that
+they can go on existing and increasing for an indefinite time; perhaps
+their true position, with regard to the parasitical habit, is midway
+between that of the strict parasite which never leaves the body, and
+that of independent parasites like the Culex and the Ixodes, and all
+those which are able to exist free for ever, and are parasitical only
+when the opportunity offers.
+
+Entomologists regard the flea as a degraded fly. Certainly it is very
+much more degraded than the bird-borne Ornithomyia, with its subtle
+motions and instinct, its power of flight and social pastimes. The poor
+pulex has lost every trace of wings; nevertheless, in its fallen
+condition it has developed some remarkable qualities and saltatory
+powers, which give it a lower kind of glory; and, compared with another
+parasite with which it shares the human species, it is almost a noble
+insect. Darwin has some remarks about the smallness of the brain of an
+ant, assuming that this insect possesses a very high intelligence, but I
+doubt very much that the ant, which moves in a groove, is mentally the
+superior of the unsocial flea. The last is certainly the most teachable;
+and if fleas were generally domesticated and made pets of, probably
+there would be as many stories about their marvellous intelligence and
+fidelity to man as we now hear about our over-praised "friend" the dog.
+
+With regard to size, the flea probably started on its downward course as
+a comparatively large insect, probably larger than the Ornithomyia. That
+insect has been able to maintain its existence, without dwindling like
+the Leptus into a mere speck, through the great modification in organs
+and instinct, which adapt it so beautifully to the feathery element in
+which it moves. The bush-tick, wingless from the beginning, and
+diverging in another direction, has probably been greatly increased in
+size by its parasitical habit; this seems proven by the fact, that as
+long as it is parasitical on nothing it remains small, but when able to
+fasten itself to an animal it rapidly developes to a great size. Again,
+the big globe of its abdomen is coriaceous and elastic, and is probably
+as devoid of sensation as a ball of india-rubber. The insect, being made
+fast by hooks and teeth to its victim, all efforts to remove it only
+increase the pain it causes; and animals that know it well do not
+attempt to rub, scratch, or bite it off, therefore the great size and
+the conspicuous colour of the tick are positive advantages to it. The
+flea, without the subtlety and highly-specialized organs of the
+Ornithomyia, or the stick-fast powers and leathery body of the Ixodes,
+can only escape its vigilant enemies by making itself invisible; hence
+every variation, i.e. increase in jumping-power and diminished bulk,
+tending towards this result, has been taken advantage of by natural
+selection.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS.
+
+
+Two humble-bees, Bombus thoracicus and B. violaceus, are found on the
+pampas; the first, with a primrose yellow thorax, and the extremity of
+the abdomen bright rufous, slightly resembles the English B. terrestris;
+the rarer species, which is a trifle smaller than the first, is of a
+uniform intense black, the body having the appearance of velvet, the
+wings being of a deep violaceous blue.
+
+A census of the humble-bees in any garden or field always shows that the
+yellow bees outnumber the black in the proportion of about seven to one;
+and I have also found their nests for many years in the same proportion;
+about seven nests of the yellow to one nest of the black species. In
+habits they are almost identical, and when two species so closely allied
+are found inhabiting the same locality, it is only reasonable to infer
+that one possesses some advantage over the other, and that the least
+favoured species will eventually disappear. In this case, where one so
+greatly outnumbers the other, it might be thought that the rarer species
+is dying out, or that, on the contrary, it is a new-comer destined to
+supplant the older more numerous species. Yet, during the twenty years I
+have observed them, there has occurred no change in their relative
+positions; though both have greatly increased in numbers during that
+time, owing to the spread of cultivation. And yet it would scarcely be
+too much to expect some marked change in a period so long as that, even
+through the slow-working agency of natural selection; for it is not as
+if there had been an exact balance of power between them. In the same
+period of time I have seen several species, once common, almost or quite
+disappear, while others, very low down as to numbers, have been exalted
+to the first rank. In insect life especially, these changes have been
+numerous, rapid, and widespread.
+
+In the district where, as a boy, I chased and caught tinamous, and also
+chased ostriches, but failed to catch them, the continued presence of
+our two humble-bees, sucking the same flowers and making their nests in
+the same situations, has remained a puzzle to my mind.
+
+The site of the nest is usually a slight depression in the soil in the
+shelter of a cardoon bush. The bees deepen the hollow by burrowing in
+the earth; and when the spring foliage sheltering it withers up, they
+construct a dome-shaped covering of small sticks, thorns, and leaves
+bitten into extremely minute pieces. They sometimes take possession of a
+small hole or cavity in the ground, and save themselves the labour of
+excavation.
+
+Their architecture closely resembles that of B. terrestris. They make
+rudely-shaped oval honey-cells, varying from half an inch to an inch and
+a half in length, the smaller ones being the first made; later in the
+season the old cocoons are utilized for storing honey. The wax is
+chocolate-coloured, and almost the only difference I can find in the
+economy of the two species is that the black bee uses a large quantity
+of wax in plastering the interior of its nest. The egg-cell of the
+yellow bee always contains from twelve to sixteen eggs; that of the
+black bee from ten to fourteen; and the eggs of this species are the
+largest though the bee is smallest. At the entrance on the edge of the
+mound one bee is usually stationed, and, when approached, it hums a
+shrill challenge, and throws itself into a menacing attitude. The sting
+is exceedingly painful.
+
+One summer I was so fortunate as to discover two nests of the two kinds
+within twelve yards of each other, and I resolved to watch them very
+carefully, in order to see whether the two species ever came into
+collision, as sometimes happens with ants of different species living
+close together. Several times I saw a yellow bee leave its own nest and
+hover round or settle on the neighbouring one, upon which the sentinel
+black bee would attack and drive it off. One day, while watching, I was
+delighted to see a yellow bee actually enter its neighbour's nest, the
+sentinel being off duty. In about five minutes' time it came out again
+and flew away unmolested. I concluded from this that humble-bees, like
+their relations of the hive, occasionally plunder each other's sweets.
+On another occasion I found a black bee dead at the entrance of the
+yellow bees' nest; doubtless this individual had been caught in the act
+of stealing honey, and, after it had been stung to death, it had been
+dragged out and left there as a warning to others with like felonious
+intentions.
+
+There is one striking difference between the two species. The yellow bee
+is inodorous; the black bee, when angry and attacking, emits an
+exceedingly powerful odour: curiously enough, this smell is identical in
+character with that made when angry by all the wasps of the South
+American genus Pepris--dark blue wasps with red wings. This odour at
+first produces a stinging sensation on the nerve of smell, but when
+inhaled in large measure becomes very nauseating. On one occasion, while
+I was opening a nest, several of the bees buzzing round my head and
+thrusting their stings through the veil I wore for protection, gave out
+so pungent a smell that I found it unendurable, and was compelled to
+retreat.
+
+It seems strange that a species armed with a venomous sting and
+possessing the fierce courage of the humble-bee should also have this
+repulsive odour for a protection. It is, in fact, as incongruous as it
+would be were our soldiers provided with guns and swords first, and
+after with phials of assafoatida to be uncorked in the face of an enemy.
+
+Why, or how, animals came to be possessed of the power of emitting
+pestiferous odours is a mystery; we only see that natural selection has,
+in some mstances, chiefly among insects, taken advantage of it to
+furnish some of the weaker, more unprotected species with a means of
+escape from their enemies. The most stinking example I know is that of a
+large hairy caterpillar I have found on dry wood in Patagonia, and
+which, when touched, emits an intensely nauseous effluvium. Happily it
+is very volatile, but while it lasts it is even more detestable than
+that of the skunk.
+
+The skunk itself offers perhaps the one instance amongst the higher
+vertebrates of an animal in which all the original instincts of
+self-preservation have died out, giving place to this lower kind of
+protection. All the other members of the family it belongs to are
+cunning, swift of foot, and, when overtaken, fierce-tempered and well
+able to defend themselves with their powerful well-armed jaws.
+
+For some occult reason they are provided with a gland charged with a
+malodorous secretion; and out of this mysterious liquor Nature has
+elaborated the skunk's inglorious weapon. The skunk alone when attacked
+makes no attempt to escape or to defend itself by biting; but, thrown by
+its agitation into a violent convulsion, involuntarily discharges its
+foetid liquor into the face of an opponent. When this animal had once
+ceased to use so good a weapon as its teeth in defending itself,
+degenerating at the same time into a slow-moving creature, without fear
+and without cunning, the strength and vileness of its odour would be
+continually increased by the cumulative process of natural selection:
+and how effective the protection has become is shown by the abundance of
+the species throughout the whole American continent. It is lucky for
+mankind--especially for naturalists and sportsmen--that other species
+have not been improved in the same direction.
+
+But what can we say of the common deer of the pampas (Cervus
+campestris), the male of which gives out an effluvium quite as
+far-reaching although not so abominable in character as that of the
+Mephitis? It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human nostril when the
+perfumer of the wilderness is not even in sight. Yet it is not a
+protection; on the contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling
+white plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a direct disadvantage,
+informing all enemies for leagues around of its whereabouts. It is not,
+therefore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer are never very
+abundant; the only wonder is that, like the ancient horse of America,
+they have not become extinct.
+
+The gauchos of the pampas, however, give _a reason_ for the powerful
+smell of the male deer; and, after some hesitation, I have determined to
+set it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, as he thinks
+proper. I neither believe nor disbelieve it; for although I do not put
+great faith in gaucho natural history, my own observations have not
+infrequently confirmed statements of theirs, which a sceptical person
+would have regarded as wild indeed. To give one instance: I heard a
+gaucho relate that while out riding he had been pursued for a
+considerable distance by a large spider; his hearers laughed at him for
+a romancer; but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, both when on
+foot and on horseback, by a large wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I
+did not join in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of C. campestris
+is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just as pyrethrum powder is to most
+insects, and even go so far as to describe its effect as fatal to them;
+according to this, the smell is therefore a protection to the deer. In
+places where venomous snakes are extremely abundant, as in the Sierra
+district on the southern pampas of Buenos Ayres, the gaucho frequently
+ties a strip of the male deer's skin, which retains its powerful odour
+for an indefinite time, round the neck of a valuable horse as a
+protection. It is certain that domestic animals are frequently lost here
+through snake-bites. The most common poisonous species--the
+Craspedo-cephalus alternatus, called _Vivora de la Cruz_ in the
+vernacular--has neither bright colour nor warning rattle to keep off
+heavy hoofs, and is moreover of so sluggish a temperament that it will
+allow itself to be trodden on before stirring, with the result that its
+fangs are not infrequently struck into the nose or foot of browsing
+beast. Considering, then, the conditions in which C. campestris is
+placed--and it might also be supposed that venomous snakes have in past
+times been much more numerous than they are now--it is not impossible to
+believe that the powerful smell it emits has been made protective,
+especially when we see in other species how repulsive odours have been
+turned to account by the principle of natural selection.
+
+After all, perhaps the wild naturalist of the pampas knows what he is
+about when he ties a strip of deer-skin to the neck of his steed and
+turns him loose to graze among the snakes.
+
+The gaucho also affirms that the deer cherishes a wonderful animosity
+against snakes; that it becomes greatly excited when it sees one, and
+proceeds at once to destroy it; _they say,_ by running round and round
+it in a circle, emitting its violent smell in larger measure, until the
+snake dies of suffocation. It is hard to believe that the effect can be
+so great; but that the deer is a snake hater and killer is certainly
+true: in North America, Ceylon, and other districts deer have been
+observed excitedly leaping on serpents, and killing them with their
+sharp cutting hoofs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+A NOBLE WASP.
+
+_(Monedula punctata.)_
+
+
+Naturalists, like kings and emperors, have their favourites, and as my
+zoological sympathies, which are wider than my knowledge, embrace all
+classes of beings, there are of course several insects for which I have
+a special regard; a few in each of the principal orders. My chief
+favourite among the hymenopteras is the one representative of the
+curious genus Monedula known in La Plata. It is handsome and has
+original habits, but it is specially interesting to me for another
+reason: I can remember the time when it was extremely rare on the
+pampas, so rare that in boyhood the sight of one used to be a great
+event to me; and I have watched its rapid increase year by year till it
+has come to be one of our commonest species. Its singular habits and
+intelligence give it a still better claim to notice. It is a big, showy,
+loud-buzzing insect, with pink head and legs, wings with brown
+reflections, and body encircled with alternate bands of black and pale
+gold, and has a preference for large composite flowers, on the honey of
+which it feeds. Its young is, however, an insect-eater; but the Monedula
+does not, like other burrowing or sand wasps, put away a store of
+insects or spiders, partially paralyzed, as a provision for the grub
+till it reaches the pupa state; it actually supplies the grub with
+fresh-caught insects as long as food is required, killing the prey it
+captures outright, and bringing it in to its young; so that its habits,
+in this particular, are more bird- than wasp-like.
+
+The wasp lays its solitary egg at the extremity of a hole it excavates
+for itself on a bare hard piece of ground, and many holes are usually
+found close together. When the grub--for I have never been able to find
+more than one in a hole--has come out from the egg, the parent begins to
+bring in insects, carefully filling up the mouth of the hole with loose
+earth after every visit. Without this precaution, which entails a vast
+amount of labour, I do not believe one grub out of every fifty would
+survive, so overrun are these barren spots of ground used as
+breeding-places with hunting spiders, ants, and tiger-beetles. The grub
+is a voracious eater, but the diligent mother brings in as much as it
+can devour. I have often found as many as six or seven insects,
+apparently fresh killed, and not yet touched by the pampered little
+glutton, coiled up in the midst of them waiting for an appetite.
+
+The Monedula is an adroit fly-catcher, for though it kills numbers of
+fire-flies and other insects, flies are always preferred, possibly
+because they are so little encumbered with wings, and are also more
+easily devoured. It occasionally captures insects on the wing, but the
+more usual method is to pounce down on its prey when it is at rest. At
+one time, before I had learnt their habits, I used frequently to be
+startled by two or three or more of these wasps rushing towards my face,
+and continuing hovering before it, loudly buzzing, attending me in my
+walks about the fields. The reason of this curious proceeding is that
+the Monedula preys largely on stinging flies, having learnt from
+experience that the stinging fly will generally neglect its own safety
+when it has once fastened on a good spot to draw blood from. When a man
+or horse stands perfectly motionless the wasps take no notice, but the
+moment any movement is made of hand, tail, or stamping hoof, they rush
+to the rescue, expecting to find a stinging fly. On the other hand, the
+horse has learnt to know and value this fly-scourge, and will stand very
+quietly with half a dozen loud Avasps hovering in an alarming manner
+close to his head, well knowing that every fly that settles on him will
+be instantly snatched away, and that the boisterous Monedula is a better
+protection even than the tail--which, by the way, the horse wears very
+long in Buenos Ayres.
+
+I have, in conclusion, to relate an incident I onco witnessed, and which
+does not show the Monedula in a very amiable light. I was leaning over a
+gate watching one of these wasps feeding on a sunflower. A small
+leaf-cutting bee was hurrying about with its shrill busy hum in the
+vicinity, and in due time came to the sunflower and settled on it. The
+Monedula became irritated, possibly at the shrill voice and bustling
+manner of its neighbour, and, after watching it for a few moments on the
+flower, deliberately rushed at and drove it off. The leaf-cutter quickly
+returned, however--for bees are always extremely averse to leaving a
+flower unexplored--but was again driven away with threats and
+demonstrations on the part of the Monedula. The little thing went off
+and sunned itself on a leaf for a time, then returned to the flower,
+only to be instantly ejected again. Other attempts were made, but the
+big wasp now kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, and
+would not allow it to come within several inches of the flower without
+throwing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee retired to
+sun itself once more, apparently determined to wait for the big tyrant
+to go away; but the other seemed to know what was wanted, and spitefully
+made up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter then gave up the
+contest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it hovered, hawk-like, above
+the Monedula for a moment, then pounced down on its back, and clung
+there, furiously biting, until its animosity was thoroughly appeased;
+then it flew off, leaving the other master of the field certainly, but
+greatly discomposed, and perhaps seriously injured about the base of the
+wings. I was rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for a
+leaf-cutting bee can use its teeth as deftly as a tailor can his shears.
+
+Doubtless to bees, as to men, revenge is sweeter than honey. But, in the
+face of mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale of
+organization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything so
+intelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "which
+implies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the person
+(or bee) offended?" According to Bain _(Mental and Moral Science)_ only
+the highest animals--stags and bulls he mentions-can be credited with
+the developed form of anger, which, he describes as an excitement caused
+by pain, reaching the centres of activity, and containing an impulse
+knowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if man
+only is meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel of
+gunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the breast of
+nearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high according to Bain,
+though I myself should place him nearly on a level mentally with the
+majority of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable of
+a wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag can
+manifestly have no associations, personal or political, for the bull,
+shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another instance of
+misdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar as that of the bull
+and red rag, is used as an illustration by one of the prophets: "My
+heritage is unto me as a speckled bird; the birds round, about are
+against it." I have frequently seen the birds of a thicket gather round
+some singularly marked accidental visitor, and finally drive him with
+great anger from the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in a
+little here, since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured or
+marked, might be looked on as a bird of prey.
+
+The flesh-fly laying its eggs on the carrion-flower is only a striking
+instance of the mistakes all instincts are liable to, never more
+markedly than in the inherited tendency to fits of frenzied excitement:
+the feeling is frequently excited by the wrong object, and explodes at
+inopportune moments.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+NATURE'S NIGHT LIGHTS.
+
+_(Remarks about Fireflies and other matters.)_
+
+
+It was formerly supposed that the light of the firefly (in any family
+possessing the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks of
+other insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirby
+and Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all the
+attention it would receive from modern entomologists: just at present
+any observer who lived in the pre-Darwin days is regarded as one of the
+ancients. The reasons given for the notion or theory in the celebrated
+_Introduction to Entomology_ were not conclusive; nevertheless it was
+not an improbable supposition of the authors'; while the theory which
+has taken its place in recent zoological writings seems in every way
+even less satisfactory.
+
+Let us first examine the antiquated theory, as it must now be called. By
+bringing a raptorial insect and a firefly together, we find that the
+flashing light of the latter does actually scare away the former, and is
+therefore, for the moment, a protection as effectual as the camp-fire
+the traveller lights in a district abounding with beasts of prey.
+Notwithstanding this fact, and assuming that we have here the whole
+reason of the existence of the light-emitting power, a study of the
+firefly's habits compels us to believe that the insect would be just as
+well off without the power as with it. Probably it experiences some
+pleasure in emitting flashes of light during its evening pastimes, but
+this could scarcely be considered an advantage in its struggle for
+existence, and it certainly does not account for the possession of the
+faculty.
+
+About the habits of Pyrophorus, the large tropical firefly which has the
+seat of its luminosity on the upper surface of the thorax, nothing
+definite appears to be known; but it has been said that this instinct is
+altogether nocturnal. The Pyrophorus is only found in the sub-tropical
+portion of the Argentine country, and I have never met with it. With the
+widely-separated Cratomorphus, and the tortoise-shaped Aspisoma, which
+emit the light from the abdomen, I am familiar; one species of
+Cratomorphus--a long slender insect with yellow wing-cases marked with
+two parallel black lines--is "the firefly" known to every one and
+excessively abundant in the southern countries of La Plata. This insect
+is strictly diurnal in its habits--as much so, in fact, as diurnal
+butterflies. They are seen flying about, wooing their mates, and feeding
+on composite and umbelliferous flowers at all hours of the day, and are
+as active as wasps during the full glare of noon. Birds do not feed on
+them, owing to the disagreeable odour, resembling that of phosphorus,
+they emit, and probably because they are to be uneatable; but their
+insect enemies are not so squeamish, and devour them readily, just as
+they also do the blister-fly, which one would imagine a morsel fitted to
+disagree with any stomach. One of their enemies is the Monedula wasp;
+another, a fly, of the rapacious Asilidas family; and this fly is also a
+wasp in appearance, having a purple body and bright red wings, like a
+Pepris, and this mimetic resemblance doubtless serves it as a protection
+against birds. A majority of raptorial insects are, however, nocturnal,
+and from all these enemies that go about under cover of night, the
+firefly, as Kirby and Spence rightly conjectured, protects itself, or
+rather is involuntarily protected, by means of its frequent flashing
+light. We are thus forced to the conclusion that, while the common house
+fly and many other diurnal insects spend a considerable portion of the
+daylight in purely sportive exercises, the firefly, possessing in its
+light a protection from nocturnal enemies, puts off its pastimes until
+the evening; then, when its carnival of two or three hours' duration is
+over, retires also to rest, putting out its candle, and so exposing
+itself to the dangers which surround other diurnal species during the
+hours of darkness. I have spoken of the firefly's pastimes advisedly,
+for I have really never been able to detect it doing anything in the
+evening beyond flitting aimlessly about, like house flies in a room,
+hovering and revolving in company by the hour, apparently for amusement.
+Thus, the more closely we look at the facts, the more unsatisfactory
+does the explanation seem. That the firefly should have become possessed
+of so elaborate a machinery, producing incidentally such splendid
+results, merely as a protection against one set of enemies for a portion
+only of the period during which they are active, is altogether
+incredible.
+
+The current theory, which we owe to Belt, is a prettier one. Certain
+insects (also certain Batrachians, reptiles, &c.) are unpalatable to the
+rapacious kinds; it is therefore a direct advantage to these unpalatable
+species to be distinguishable from all the persecuted, and the more
+conspicuous and well-known they are, the less likely are they to be
+mistaken by birds, insectivorous mammals, &c., for eatable kinds and
+caught or injured. Hence we find that many such species have acquired
+for their protection very brilliant or strongly-contrasted
+colours--warning colours--which insect-eaters come to know.
+
+The firefly, a soft-bodied, slow-flying insect, is easily caught and
+injured, but it is not fit for food, and, therefore, says the theory,
+lest it should be injured or killed by mistake, it has a fiery spark to
+warn enemies---birds, bats, and rapacious insects--that it is uneatable.
+
+The theory of warning colours is an excellent one, but it has been
+pushed too far. We have seen that one of the most common fireflies is
+diurnal in habits, or, at any rate, that it performs all the important
+business of its life by day, when it has neither bright colour nor light
+to warn its bird enemies; and out of every hundred species of
+insect-eating birds at least ninety-nine are diurnal. Raptorial insects,
+as I have said, feed freely on fireflies, so that the supposed warning
+is not for them, and it would be hard to believe that the magnificent
+display made by luminous insects is useful only in preventing accidental
+injuries to them from a few crepuscular bats and goatsuckers. And to
+believe even this we should first have to assume that bats and
+goatsuckers are differently constituted from all other creatures; for in
+other animals--insects, birds, and mammalians--the appearance of fire by
+night seems to confuse and frighten, but it certainly cannot be said to
+_warn,_ in the sense in which that word is used when we speak of the
+brilliant colours of some butterflies, or even of the gestures of some
+venomous snakes, and of the sounds they emit.
+
+Thus we can see that, while the old theory of Kirby and Spence had some
+facts to support it, the one now in vogue is purely fanciful. Until some
+better suggestion is made, it would perhaps be as well to consider the
+luminous organ as having "no very close and direct relation to present
+habits of life." About their present habits, however, especially their
+crepuscular habits, there is yet much to learn. One thing I have
+observed in them has always seemed very strange to me. Occasionally an
+individual insect is seen shining with a very large and steady light, or
+with a light which very gradually decreases and increases in power, and
+at such times it is less active than at others, remaining for long
+intervals motionless on the leaves, or moving with a very slow flight.
+In South America a firefly displaying this abnormal splendour is said to
+be dying, and it is easy to imagine how such a notion originated. The
+belief is, however, erroneous, for sometimes, on very rare occasions,
+all the insects in one place are simultaneously affected in the same
+way, and at such times they mass themselves together in myriads, as if
+for migration, or for some other great purpose. Mr. Bigg-Wither, in
+South Brazil, and D'Albertis, in New Guinea, noticed these firefly
+gatherings; I also once had the rare good fortune to witness a
+phenomenon of the kind on a very grand scale. Riding on the pampas one
+dark evening an hour after sunset, and passing from high ground
+overgrown with giant thistles to a low plain covered with long grass,
+bordering a stream of water, I found it all ablaze with myriads of
+fireflies. I noticed that all the insects gave out an exceptionally
+large, brilliant light, which shone almost steadily. The long grass was
+thickly studded with them, while they literally swarmed in the air, all
+moving up the valley with a singularly slow and languid flight. When I
+galloped down into this river of phosphorescent fire, my horse plunged
+and snorted with alarm. I succeeded at length in quieting him, and then
+rode slowly through, compelled to keep my mouth and eyes closed, so
+thickly did the insects rain on to my face. The air was laden with the
+sickening phosphorous smell they emit, but when I had once got free of
+the broad fiery zone, stretching away on either hand for miles along the
+moist valley, I stood still and gazed back for some time on a scene the
+most wonderful and enchanting I have ever witnessed.
+
+The fascinating and confusing effect which the appearance of fire at
+night has on animals is a most interesting subject; and although it is
+not probable that anything very fresh remains to be said about it, I am
+tempted to add here the results of my own experience.
+
+When travelling by night, I have frequently been struck with the
+behaviour of my horse at the sight of natural fire, or appearance of
+fire, always so different from that caused by the sight of fire
+artificially created. The steady gleam from the open window or door of a
+distant house, or even the unsteady wind-tossed flame of some lonely
+camp-fire, has only served to rouse a fresh spirit in him and the desire
+to reach it; whereas those infrequent displays of fire which nature
+exhibits, such as lightning, or the ignis fatuus, or even a cloud of
+fireflies, has always produced a disquieting effect. Experience has
+evidently taught the domestic horse to distinguish a light kindled by
+man from all others; and, knowing its character, he is just as well able
+as his rider to go towards it without experiencing that confusion of
+mind caused by a glare in the darkness, the origin and nature of which
+is a mystery. The artificially-lighted fire is to the horse only the
+possible goal of the journey, and is associated with the thought of rest
+and food. Wild animals, as a rule, at any rate in thinly-settled
+districts, do not know the meaning of any fire; it only excites
+curiosity and fear in them; and they are most disturbed at the sight of
+fires made by man, which are brighter and steadier than most natural
+fires. We can understand this sensation in animals, since we ourselves
+experience a similar one (although in a less degree and not associated
+with fear) in the effect which mere brightness has on us, both by day
+and night.
+
+On riding across the monotonous grey Patagonian uplands, where often for
+hours one sees not the faintest tinge of bright colour, the intense
+glowing crimson of a cactus-fruit, or the broad shining white bosom of
+the Patagonian eagle-buzzard (Buteo erythronotus), perched on the summit
+of a distant bush, has had a strangely fascinating effect on me, so that
+I have been unable to take my eyes off it as long as it continued before
+me. Or in passing through extensive desolate marshes, the dazzling white
+plumage of a stationary egret has exercised the same attraction. At
+night we experience the sensation in a greater degree, when the silver
+sheen of the moon makes a broad path on the water; or when a meteor
+leaves a glowing track across the sky; while a still more familiar
+instance is seen in the powerful attraction on the sight of glowing
+embers in a darkened room. The mere brightness, or vividness of the
+contrast, fascinates the mind; but the effect on man is comparatively
+weak, owing to his fiery education and to his familiarity with brilliant
+dyes artificially obtained from nature. How strong this attraction of
+mere brightness, even where there is no mystery about it, is to wild
+animals is shown by birds of prey almost invariably singling out white
+or bright-plumaged birds for attack where bright and sober-coloured
+kinds are mingled together. By night the attraction is immeasurably
+greater than by day, and the light of a fire steadily gazed at quickly
+confuses the mind. The fires which, travellers make for their protection
+actually serve to attract the beasts of prey, but the confusion and fear
+caused by the bright glare makes it safe for the traveller to lie down
+and sleep in the light. Mammals do not lose their heads altogether,
+because they are walking on firm ground where muscular exertion and an
+exercise of judgment are necessary at every step; whereas birds floating
+buoyantly and with little effort through the air are quickly bewildered.
+Incredible numbers of migratory birds kill them-selves by dashing
+against the windows of lighthouses; on bright moonlight nights the
+voyagers are comparatively safe; but during dark cloudy weather the
+slaughter is very great; over six hundred birds were killed by striking
+a lighthouse in Central America in a single night. On insects the effect
+is the same as on the higher animals: on the ground they are attracted
+by the light, but keep, like wolves and tigers, at a safe distance from
+it; when rushing through the air and unable to keep their eyes from it
+they fly into it, or else revolve about it, until, coming too close,
+their wings are singed.
+
+I find that when I am on horseback, going at a swinging gallop, a bright
+light affects me far more powerfully than when I am trudging along on
+foot. A person mounted on a bicycle and speeding over a level plain on a
+dark night, with nothing to guide him except the idea of the direction
+in his mind, would be to some extent in the position of the migratory
+bird. An exceptionally brilliant ignis fatuus flying before him would
+affect him as the gleam of a lamp placed high above the surface affects
+the migrants: he would not be able to keep his eyes from it, but would
+quickly lose the sense of direction, and probably end his career much as
+the bird does, by breaking his machine and perhaps his bones against
+some unseen obstruction in the way.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS.
+
+
+Some time ago, while turning over a quantity of rubbish in a little-used
+room, I disturbed a large black spider. Rushing forth, just in time to
+save itself from destruction through the capsizing of a pile of books,
+it paused for one moment, took a swift comprehensive glance at the
+position, then scuttled away across the floor, and was lost in an
+obscure corner of the room. This incident served to remind me of a fact
+I was nearly forgetting, that England is not a spiderless country. A
+foreigner, however intelligent, coming from warmer regions, might very
+easily make that mistake. In Buenos Ayres, the land of my nativity,
+earth teems with these interesting little creatures. They abound in and
+on the water, they swarm in the grass and herbage, which everywhere
+glistens with the silvery veil they spin over it. Indeed it is scarcely
+an exaggeration to say that there is an atmosphere of spiders, for they
+are always floating about invisible in the air; their filmy threads are
+unfelt when they fly against you; and often enough you are not even
+aware of the little arrested aeronaut hurrying over your face with feet
+lighter than the lightest thistledown.
+
+It is somewhat strange that although, where other tribes of living
+creatures are concerned, I am something of a naturalist, spiders I have
+always observed and admired in a non-scientific spirit, and this must be
+my excuse for mentioning the habits of some spiders without giving their
+specific names--an omission always vexing to the severely-technical
+naturalist. They have ministered to the love of the beautiful, the
+grotesque, and the marvellous in me; but I have never _collected_ a
+spider, and if I wished to preserve one should not know how to do it. I
+have been "familiar with the face" of these monsters so long that I have
+even learnt to love them; and I believe that if Emerson rightly predicts
+that spiders are amongst the things to be expelled from earth by the
+perfected man of the future, then a great charm and element of interest
+will be lost to nature. Though loving them, I cannot, of course, feel
+the same degree of affection towards all the members of so various a
+family. The fairy gossamer, scarce seen, a creature of wind and
+sunshine; the gem-like Epeira in the centre of its Starry web; even the
+terrestrial Salticus, with its puma-like strategy, certainly appeal more
+to our aesthetic feelings than does the slow heavy Mygale, looking at a
+distance of twenty yards away, as he approaches you, like a gigantic
+cockroach mounted on stilts. The rash fury with which the female
+wolf-spider defends her young is very admirable; but the admiration she
+excites is mingled with other feelings when we remember that the brave
+mother proves to her consort a cruel and cannibal spouse.
+
+Possibly my affection for spiders is due in a great measure to the
+compassion I have always felt for them. Pity, 'tis said, is akin to
+love; and who can help experiencing that tender emotion that considers
+the heavy affliction nature has laid on the spiders in compensation for
+the paltry drop of venom with which she, unasked, endowed them! And
+here, of course, I am alluding to the wasps. These insects, with a
+refinement of cruelty, prefer not to kill their victims outright, but
+merely maim them, then house them in cells where the grubs can vivisect
+them at leisure. This is one of those revolting facts the fastidious
+soul cannot escape from in warm climates; for in and out of open windows
+and doors, all day long, all the summer through, comes the busy
+beautiful mason-wasp. A long body, wonderfully slim at the waist, bright
+yellow legs and thorax, and a dark crimson abdomen,--what object can be
+prettier to look at? But in her life this wasp is not beautiful. At
+home in summer they were the pests of my life, for nothing would serve
+to keep them out. One day, while we were seated at dinner, a clay nest,
+which a wasp had succeeded in completing unobserved, detached itself
+from the ceiling and fell with a crash on to the table, where it was
+shattered to pieces, scattering a shower of green half-living spiders
+round it. I shall never forget the feeling of intense repugnance I
+experienced at the sight, coupled with detestation of the pretty but
+cruel little architect. There is, amongst our wasps, even a more
+accomplished spider-scourge than the mason-wasp, and I will here give a
+brief account of its habits. On the grassy pampas, dry bare spots of
+soil are resorted to by a class of spiders that either make or take
+little holes in the ground to reside in, and from which they rush forth
+to seize their prey. They also frequently sit inside their dens and
+patiently wait there for the intrusion of some bungling insect. Now, in
+summer, to a dry spot of ground like this, comes a small wasp, scarcely
+longer than a blue-bottle fly, body and wings of a deep shining purplish
+blue colour, with only a white mark like a collar on the thorax. It
+flirts its blue wings, hurrying about here and there, and is extremely
+active, and of a slender graceful figure--the type of an assassin. It
+visits and explores every crack and hole in the ground, and, if you
+watch it attentively, you will at length see it, on arriving at a hole,
+give a little start backwards. It knows that a spider lies concealed
+within. Presently, having apparently matured a plan of attack, it
+disappears into the hole and remains there for some time. Then, just
+when you are beginning to think that the little blue explorer has been
+trapped, out it rushes, flying in terror, apparently, from the spider
+who issues close behind in hot pursuit; but, before they are three
+inches away from the hole, quick as lightning the wasp turns on its
+follower, and the two become locked together in a deadly embrace.
+Looking like one insect, they spin rapidly round for a few moments, then
+up springs the wasp--victorious. The wretched victim is not dead; its
+legs move a little, but its soft body is paralyzed, and lies collapsed,
+flabby, and powerless as a stranded jellyfish. And this is the
+invariable result of every such conflict. In other classes of beings,
+even the weakest hunted thing occasionally succeeds in inflicting pain
+on its persecutor, and the small trembling mouse, unable to save itself,
+can sometimes make the cat shriek with paiu; but there is no weak spot
+in the wasp's armour, no fatal error of judgment, not even an accident,
+ever to save the wretched victim from its fate. And now comes the most
+iniquitous part of the proceeding. When the wasp has sufficiently rested
+after the struggle, it deliberately drags the disabled spider back into
+its own hole, and, having packed it away at the extremity, lays an egg
+alongside of it, then, coming out again, gathers dust and rubbish with
+which it fills up and obliterates the hole; and, having thus concluded
+its Machiavellian task, it flies cheerfully off in quest of another
+victim.
+
+The extensive Epeira family supply the mason-wasps and other
+spider-killers with the majority of their victims. These spiders have
+soft, plump, succulent bodies like pats of butter; they inhabit trees
+and bushes chiefly, where their geometric webs-betray their whereabouts;
+they are timid, comparatively innocuous, and reluctant to quit the
+shelter of their green bower, made of a rolled-up leaf; so that there
+are many reasons why they should be persecuted. They exhibit a great
+variety of curious forms; many are also very richly coloured; but even
+their brightest hues--orange, silver, scarlet--have not been given
+without regard to the colouring of their surroundings. Green-leafed
+bushes arc frequented by vividly green Epeiras, but the imitative
+resemblance does not quite end here. The green spider's method of
+escape, when the bush is roughly shaken, is to drop itself down on the
+earth, where it lies simulating death. In falling, it drops just as a
+green leaf would drop, that is, not quite so rapidly as a round, solid
+body like a beetle or spider. Now in the bushes there is another Epeira,
+in size and form like the last, but differing in colour; for instead of
+a vivid green, it is of a faded yellowish white--the exact hue of a
+dead, dried-up leaf. This spider, when it lets itself drop--for it has
+the same protective habit as the other--falls not so rapidly as a green
+freshly broken off leaf or as the green spider would fall, but with a
+slower motion, precisely like a leaf withered up till it has become
+almost light as a feather. It is not difficult to imagine how this comes
+about: either a thicker line, or a greater stiffness or tenacity of the
+viscid fluid composing the web and attached to the point the spider
+drops from, causes one to fall slower than the other. But how many
+tentative variations in the stiffness of the web material must there
+have been before the precise degree was attained enabling the two
+distinct species, differing in colour, to complete their resemblance to
+falling leaves--a fresh green leaf in one case and a dead, withered leaf
+in the other!
+
+The Tetragnatha--a genus of the Epeira family, and known also in
+England--are small spiders found on the margin of streams. Their bodies
+are slender, oblong, and resembling a canoe in shape; and when they sit
+lengthwise on a stem or blade of grass, their long, hair-like legs
+arranged straight before and behind them, it is difficult to detect
+them, so closely do they resemble a discoloured stripe on the herbage. A
+species of Tetragnatha with a curious modification of structure abounds
+on the pampas. The long leg of this spider is no thicker than a bristle
+from a pig's back, but at the extremity it is flattened and broad,
+giving it a striking resemblance to an oar. These spiders are only found
+in herbage overhanging the borders of streams: they are very numerous,
+and, having a pugnacious temper, are incessantly quarrelling; and it
+frequently happens that in these encounters, or where they are pursuing
+each other through the leaves, they drop into the water below. I
+believe, in fact, that they often drop themselves purposely into it as
+the readiest means of escape when hard pressed. When this happens, the
+advantage of the modified structure of the legs is seen. The fallen
+spider, sitting boat-like on the surface, throws out its long legs, and,
+dipping the broad ends into the water, literally rows itself rapidly to
+land.
+
+The gossamer-spider, most spiritual of living things, of which there are
+numerous species, some extremely beautiful in colouring and markings, is
+the most numerous of our spiders. Only when the declining sun flings a
+broad track of shiny silver light on the plain does one get some faint
+conception of the unnumbered millions of these buoyant little creatures
+busy weaving their gauzy veil over the earth and floating unseen, like
+an ethereal vital dust, in the atmosphere.
+
+This spider carries within its diminutive abdomen a secret which will
+possibly serve to vex subtle intellects for a long time to come; for it
+is hard to believe that merely by mechanical force, even aided by
+currents of air, a creature half as big as a barley grain can
+instantaneously snoot out filaments twenty or thirty inches long, and by
+means of which it floats itself in the air.
+
+Naturalists are now giving a great deal of attention to the migrations
+of birds in different parts of the world: might not insect and spider
+migrations be included with advantage to science in their observations?
+The common notion is that the gossamer makes use of its unique method of
+locomotion, only to shift its quarters, impelled by want of food or
+unfavourable conditions--perhaps only by a roving disposition. I believe
+that besides these incessant flittings about from place to place
+throughout the summer the gossamer-spiders have great periodical
+migrations which are, as a rule, in-visible, since a single floating web
+cannot be remarked, and each individual rises and floats away by itself
+from its own locality when influenced by the instinct. When great
+numbers of spiders rise up simultaneously over a large area, then,
+sometimes, the movement forces itself on our attention; for at such
+times the whole sky may be filled with visible masses of floating web.
+All the great movements of gossamers I have observed have occurred in
+the autumn, or, at any rate, several weeks after the summer solstice;
+and, like the migrations of birds at the same season of the year, have
+been in a northerly direction. I do not assert or believe that the
+migratory instinct in the gossamer is universal. In a moist island, like
+England, for instance, where the condition of the atmosphere is seldom
+favourable, and where the little voyagers would often be blown by
+adverse winds to perish far out at sea, it is difficult to believe that
+such migrations take place. But where they inhabit a vast area of land,
+as in South America, extending without interruption from the equator to
+the cold Magellanic regions, and where there is a long autumn of dry,
+hot weather, then such an instinct as migration might have been
+developed. For this is not a faculty merely of a few birds: the impulse
+to migrate at certain seasons affects birds, insects, and even mammals.
+In a few birds only is it highly developed, but the elementary feeling,
+out of which the wonderful habit of the swallow has grown, exists widely
+throughout animated nature. On the continent of Europe it also seems
+probable that a great autumnal movement of these spiders takes place;
+although, I must confess, I have no grounds for this statement, except
+that the floating gossamer is called in Germany "Der fliegender
+Summer"--the flying or departing summer.
+
+I have stated that all migrations of gossamers I have witnessed have
+been in the autumn; excepting in one instance, these flights occurred
+when the weather was still hot and dry. The exceptionally late migration
+was on March 22--a full month after the departure of martins,
+humming-birds, flycatchers, and most other true bird-migrants. It struck
+me as being so remarkable, and seems to lend so much force to the idea I
+have suggested, that I wish to give here an exact copy of the entries
+made at the time and on the spot in my notebook.
+
+"March 22. This afternoon, while I was out shooting, the
+gossamer-spiders presented an appearance quite new to me. Walking along
+a stream (the Conchitas, near Buenos Ayres), I noticed a broad white
+line skirting the low wet ground. This I found was caused by gossamer
+web lying in such quantities over the earth as almost to hide the grass
+ad thistles under it. The white zone was about twenty yards wide, and
+outside it only a few scattered webs were visible on the grass; its
+exact length I did not ascertain, but followed it for about two miles
+without finding the end. The spiders were so numerous that they
+continually baulked one another in their efforts to rise in the air. As
+soon as one threw out its lines they would become entangled with those
+of another spider, lanced out at the same moment; both spiders would
+immediately seem to know the cause of the trouble, for as soon as their
+lines fouled they would rush angrily towards each other, each trying to
+drive the other from the elevation. Notwithstanding these difficulties,
+numbers were continually floating off on the breeze which blew from the
+south.
+
+"I noticed three distinct species: one with a round scarlet body;
+another, velvet black, with large square cephalothorax and small pointed
+abdomen; the third and most abundant kind were of different shades of
+olive green, and varied greatly in size, the largest being fully a
+quarter of an inch in length. Apparently these spiders had been driven
+up from the low ground along the stream where it was wet, and had
+congregated along the borders of the dry ground in readiness to migrate.
+
+"25th. Went again to visit the spiders, scarcely expecting to find them,
+as, since first seeing them, we have had much wind and rain. To my
+surprise I found them in greatly increased numbers: on the tops of
+cardoons, posts, and other elevated situations they were literally lying
+together in heaps. Most of them were large and of the olive-coloured
+species; their size had probably prevented them from getting away
+earlier, but they were now floating off in great numbers, the weather
+being calm and tolerably dry. To-day I noticed a new species with a grey
+body, elegantly striped with black, and pink legs--a very pretty spider.
+
+"26th. Went again to-day and found that the whole vast army of
+gossamers, with the exception of a few stragglers sitting on posts and
+dry stalks, had vanished. They had taken advantage of the short spell of
+fine weather we are now having, after an unusually wet and boisterous
+autumn, to make their escape."
+
+Here it seemed to me that a conjunction of circumstances--first, the
+unfavourable season preventing migration at the proper time, and
+secondly, the strip of valley out of which the spiders had been driven
+to the higher ground till they were massed together--only served to make
+visible and evident that a vast annual migration takes place which we
+have only to look closely for to discover.
+
+One of the most original spiders in Buenos Ayres--mentally original, I
+mean--is a species of Pholcus; a quiet, inoffensive creature found in
+houses, and so abundant that they literally swarm where they are not
+frequently swept away from ceilings and obscure corners. Certainly it
+seems a poor spider after the dynamical and migratory gossamer; but it
+happens, curiously enough, that a study of the habits of this dusty
+domestic creature leads us incidentally into the realms of fable and
+romance. It is remarkable for the extreme length of its legs, and
+resembles in colour and general appearance a crane fly, but is double
+the size of that insect. It has a singular method of protecting itself:
+when attacked or approached even, gathering its feet together and
+fastening them to the centre of its web, it swings itself round and
+round with the velocity of a whirligig, so that it appears like a mist
+on the web, offering no point for an enemy to strike at. "When a fly is
+captured the spider approaches it cautiously and spins a web round it,
+continually narrowing the circle it describes, until the victim is
+inclosed in a cocoon-like covering. This is a common method with
+spiders; but the intelligence--for I can call it by no other word--of
+the Pholcus has supplemented this instinctive procedure with a very
+curious and unique habit. The Pholcus, in spite of its size, is a weak
+creature, possessing little venom to despatch its prey with, so that it
+makes a long and laborious task of killing a fly. A fly when caught in
+a web is a noisy creature, and it thus happens that when the
+Daddylonglegs--as Anglo-Argentines have dubbed this species--succeeds in
+snaring a captive the shrill outrageous cries of the victim are heard
+for a long time--often for ten or twelve minutes. This noise greatly
+excites other spiders in the vicinity, and presently they are seen
+quitting their webs and flurrying to the scene of conflict. Sometimes
+the captor is driven off, and then the strongest or most daring spider
+carries away the fly. But where a large colony are allowed to continue
+for a long time in undisturbed possession of a ceiling, when one has
+caught a fly he proceeds rapidly to throw a covering of web over it,
+then, cutting it away, drops it down and lets it hang suspended by a
+line at a distance of two or three feet from the ceiling. The other
+spiders arrive on the scene, and after a short investigation retreat to
+their own webs, and when the coast is clear our spider proceeds to draw
+up the captive fly, which is by this time exhausted with its struggles."
+
+Now, I have repeatedly remarked that all spiders, when the shrill
+humming of an insect caught in a web is heard near them, become
+agitated, like the Pholcus, and will, in the same way, quit their own
+webs and hurry to the point the sound proceeds from. This fact convinced
+me many years ago that spiders are attracted by the sound of musical
+instruments, such as violins, concertinas, guitars, &c., simply because
+the sound produces the same effect on them as the shrill buzzing of a
+captive fly. I have frequently seen spiders come down walls or from
+ceilings, attracted by the sound of a guitar, softly played; and by
+gently touching metal strings, stretched on a piece of wood, I have
+succeeded in attracting spiders on to the strings, within two or three
+inches of my fingers; and I always noticed that the spiders seemed to be
+eagerly searching for something which they evidently expected to find
+there, moving about in an excited manner and looking very hungry and
+fierce. I have no doubt that Pelisson's historical spider in the
+Bastille came down in a mood and with a manner just as ferocious when
+the prisoner called it with musical sounds to be fed.
+
+The spiders I have spoken of up till now are timid, inoffensive
+creatures, chiefly of the Epeira family; but there are many others
+exceedingly high-spirited and, like some of the most touchy
+hymenopteras, always prepared to "greatly quarrel" over matters of
+little moment. The Mygales, of which we have several species, are not to
+be treated with contempt. One is extremely abundant on the pampas, the
+Mygale fusca, a veritable monster, covered with dark brown hair, and
+called in the vernacular _aranea peluda_--hairy spider. In the hot
+month of December these spiders take to roaming about on the open plain,
+and are then everywhere seen travelling in a straight line with a slow
+even pace. They are very great in attitudes, and when one is approached
+it immediately throws itself back, like a pugilist preparing for an
+encounter, and stands up so erect on its four hind feet that the under
+surface of its body is displayed. Humble-bees are commonly supposed to
+carry the palm in attitudinizing; and it is wonderful to see the
+grotesque motions of these irascible insects when their nest is
+approached, elevating their abdomens and two or three legs at a time, so
+that they resemble a troupe of acrobats balancing themselves on their
+heads or hands, and kicking their legs about in the air. And to impress
+the intruder with the dangerous significance of this display they hum a
+shrill warning or challenge, and stab at the air with their naked
+stings, from which limpid drops of venom are seen to exude. These
+threatening gestures probably have an effect. In the case of the hairy
+spider, I do not think any creature, however stupid, could mistake its
+meaning when it stands suddenly up, a figure horribly grotesque; then,
+dropping down on all eights, charges violently forwards. Their long,
+shiny black, sickle-shaped falces are dangerous weapons. I knew a native
+woman who had been bitten on the leg, and who, after fourteen years,
+still suffered at intervals acute pains in the limb.
+
+The king of the spiders on the pampas is, however, not a Mygale, but a
+Lycosa of extraordinary size, light grey in colour, with a black ring
+round its middle. It is active and swift, and irritable to such a degree
+that one can scarcely help thinking that in this species nature has
+overshot her mark.
+
+When a person passes near one--say, within three or four yards of its
+lurking-place--it starts up and gives chase, and will often follow for a
+distance of thirty or forty yards. I came once very nearly being bitten
+by one of these savage creatures Riding at an easy trot over the dry
+grass, I suddenly observed a spider pursuing me, leaping swiftly along
+and keeping up with my beast. I aimed a blow with my whip, and the point
+of the lash struck the ground close to it, when it instantly leaped upon
+and ran up the lash, and was actually within three or four inches of my
+hand when I flung the whip from me.
+
+The gauchos have a very quaint ballad which tells that the city of
+Cordova was once invaded by an army of monstrous spiders, and that the
+townspeople went out with beating drums and flags flying to repel the
+invasion, and that after firing several volleys they were forced to turn
+and fly for their lives. I have no doubt that a sudden great increase of
+the man-chasing spiders, in a year exceptionally favourable to them,
+suggested this fable to some rhyming satirist of the town.
+
+In conclusion of this part of my subject, I will describe a single
+combat of a very terrible nature I once witnessed between two little
+spiders belong-ing to the same species. One had a small web against a
+wall, and of this web the other coveted possession. After vainly trying
+by a series of strategic movements to drive out the lawful owner, it
+rushed on to the web, and the two envenomed httle duellists closed in
+mortal combat. They did nothing so vulgar and natural as to make use of
+their falces, and never once actually touched each other, but the fight
+was none the less deadly. Rapidly revolving about, or leaping over, or
+passing under, each other, each endeavoured to impede or entangle his
+adversary, and the dexterity with which each avoided the cunningly
+thrown snare, trying at the same time to entangle its opponent, was
+wonderful to see. At length, after this equal battle had raged for some
+time, one of the combatants made some fatal mistake, and for a moment
+there occurred a break in his motions; instantly the other perceived his
+advantage, and began leaping backwards and forwards across his
+struggling adversary with such rapidity as to confuse the sight,
+producing the appearance of two spiders attacking a third one lying
+between them. He then changed his tactics, and began revolving round and
+round his prisoner, and very soon the poor vanquished wretch--the
+aggressor, let us hope, in the interests of justice--was closely wrapped
+in a silvery cocoon, which, unlike the cocoon the caterpillar weaves for
+itself, was also its winding-sheet.
+
+In the foregoing pages I have thrown together some of the most salient
+facts I have noted; but the spider-world still remains to me a
+wonderland of which I know comparatively nothing. Nor is any very
+intimate knowledge of spiders to be got from books, though numberless
+lists of new species are constantly being printed; for they have not yet
+had, like the social bees and ants, many loving and patient chroniclers
+of their ways. The Hubens and Lubbocks have been many; the Moggridges
+few. But even a very slight study of these most versatile and
+accomplished of nature's children gives rise to some interesting
+reflections. One fact that strikes the mind very forcibly is the
+world-wide distribution of groups of species possessing highly developed
+instincts. One is the zebra-striped Salticus, with its unique
+strategy--that is to say, unique amongst spiders. It is said that the
+Australian savage approaches a kangaroo in the open by getting up in
+sight of its prey and standing perfectly motionless till he is regarded
+as an inanimate object, and every time the animal's attention wanders
+advancing a step or two until sufficiently near to hurl his spear. The
+Salticus approaches a fly in the same manner, till near enough to make
+its spring. Another is the Trapdoor spider. Another the Dolomedes, that
+runs over the surface of the water in pursuit of its prey, and dives
+down to escape from its enemies; and, strangest of all, the Argyroneta,
+that has its luminous dwelling at the bottom of streams; and just as a
+mason carries bricks and mortar to its building, so does this spider
+carry down bubbles of air from the surface to enlarge its mysterious
+house, in which it lays its eggs and rears its young. Community of
+descent must be supposed of species having such curious and complex
+instincts; but how came these feeble creatures, unable to transport
+themselves over seas and continents like the aerial gossamer, to be so
+widely distributed, and inhabiting regions with such different
+conditions? This can only be attributed to the enormous antiquity of the
+species, and of this antiquity the earliness in which the instinct
+manifests itself in the young spiders is taken as evidence.
+
+A more important matter, the intelligence of spiders, has not yet
+received the attention it deserves. The question of insect
+intelligence--naturalists are agreed that insects do possess
+intelligence--is an extremely difficult one; probably some of our
+conclusions on this matter will have to be reconsidered. For instance,
+we regard the Order Hymenoptera as the most intelligent because most of
+the social insects are included in it; but it has not yet been proved,
+probably never will be proved, that the social instincts resulted from
+intelligence which has "lapsed." Whether ants and bees were more
+intelligent than other insects during the early stages of their organic
+societies or not, it will hardly be disputed by any naturalist who has
+observed insects for long that many solitary species display more
+intelligence in their actions than those that live in communities.
+
+The nature of the spider's food and the difficulties in the way of
+providing for their wants impose on them a life of solitude: hunger,
+perpetual watchfulness, and the sense of danger have given them a
+character of mixed ferocity and timidity. But these very conditions,
+which have made it impossible for them to form societies like some
+insects and progress to a state of things resembling civilization in
+men, have served to develop the mind that is in a spider, making of him
+a very clever barbarian-The spider's only weapon of defence---his
+falces--are as poor a protection against the assaults of his insect foes
+as are teeth and finger-nails in man employed against wolves, bears, and
+tigers. And the spider is here even worse off than man, since his
+enemies are winged and able to sweep down instantly on him from above;
+they are also protected with an invulnerable shield, and are armedwith
+deadly stings. Like man, also, the spider has a soft, unprotected body,
+while his muscular strength, compared with that of the insects he has to
+contend with, is almost _nil._ His position in nature then, with
+relation to his enemies, is like that of man; only the spider has this
+disadvantage, that he cannot combine with others for protection. That he
+does protect himself and maintains his place in nature is due, not to
+special instincts, which are utterly insufficient, but to the
+intelligence which supplements them. At the same time this superior
+cunning is closely related with, and probably results indirectly from,
+the web he is provided with, and which is almost of the nature of an
+artificial aid. Let us take the imaginary case of a man-like monkey, or
+of an arboreal man, born with a cord of great length attached to his
+waist, which could be either dragged after him or carried in a coil.
+After many accidents, experience would eventually teach him to put it to
+some use; practice would make him more and more skilful in handling it,
+and, indirectly, it would be the means of developing his latent mental
+faculties. He would begin by using it, as the monkey does its prehensile
+tail, to swing himself from branch to branch, and finally, to escape
+from an enemy or in pursuit of his prey, he would be able by means of
+his cord to drop himself with safety from the tallest trees, or fly down
+the steepest precipices. He would coil up his cord to make a bed to lie
+on, and also use it for binding branches together when building himself
+a refuge. In a close fight, he would endeavour to entangle an adversary,
+and at last he would learn to make a snare with it to capture his prey.
+To all these, and to a hundred other uses, the spider has put his web.
+And when we see him spread his beautiful geometric snare, held by lines
+fixed to widely separated points, while he sits concealed in his
+web-lined retreat amongst the leaves where every touch on the
+far-reaching structure is telegraphed to him by the communicating line
+faithfully as if a nerve had been touched, we must admire the wonderful
+perfection to which he has attained in the use of his cord. By these
+means he is able to conquer creatures too swift and strong for him, and
+make them his prey. When we see him repairing damages, weighting his
+light fabric in windy weather with pebbles or sticks, as a fisher
+weights his net, and cutting loose a captive whose great strength
+threatens the destruction of the web, then we begin to suspect that he
+has, above his special instinct, a reason that guides, modifies, and in
+many ways supplements it. It is not, however, only on these great
+occasions, when the end is sought by unusual means, that spiders show
+their intelligence; for even these things might be considered by some as
+merely parts of one great complex instinct; but at all times, in all
+things, the observer who watches them closely cannot fail to be
+convinced that they possess a guiding principle which is not mere
+instinct. What the stick or stone was to primitive man, when he had made
+the discovery that by holding it in his hand he greatly increased the
+force of his blow, the possession of a web has been to the spider in
+developing that spark of intellect which it possesses in common with all
+animal organisms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT.
+
+
+Most people are familiar with the phenomenon of "death-feigning,"
+commonly seen in coleopterous insects, and in many spiders. This highly
+curious instinct is also possessed by some vertebrates. In insects it is
+probably due to temporary paralysis occasioned by sudden concussion, for
+when beetles alight abruptly, though voluntarily, they assume that
+appearance of death, which lasts for a few moments. Some species,
+indeed, are so highly sensitive that the slightest touch, or even a
+sudden menace, will instantly throw them into this motionless,
+death-simulating condition. Curiously enough, the same causes which
+produce this trance in slow-moving species, like those of Scarabseus for
+example, have a precisely contrary effect on species endowed with great
+activity. Rapacious beetles, when disturbed, scuttle quickly out of
+sight, and some water-beetles spin about the surface, in circles or
+zigzag lines, so rapidly as to confuse the eye. Our common long-legged
+spiders (Pholcus) when approached draw their feet together in the middle
+of the web, and spin the body round with such velocity as to resemble a
+whirligig.
+
+Certain mammals and birds also possess the death-simulating instinct,
+though it is hardly possible to believe that the action springs from the
+same immediate cause in vertebrates and in insects. In the latter it
+appears to be a purely physical instinct, the direct result of an
+extraneous cause, and resembling the motions of a plant. In mammals and
+birds it is evident that violent emotion, and not the rough handling
+experienced, is the final cause of the swoon.
+
+Passing over venomous snakes, skunks, and a few other species in which
+the presence of danger excites only anger, fear has a powerful, and in
+some cases a disabling, effect on animals; and it is this paralyzing
+effect of fear on which the death-feigning instinct, found only in a few
+widely-separated species, has probably been built up by the slow
+cumulative process of natural selection.
+
+I have met with some curious instances of the paralyzing effect of fear.
+I was told by some hunters in an outlying district of the pampas of its
+effect on a jaguar they started, and which took refuge in a dense clump
+of dry reeds. Though they could see it, it was impossible to throw the
+lasso over its head, and, after vainly trying to dislodge it, they at
+length set fire to the reeds. Still it refused to stir, but lay with
+head erect, fiercely glaring at them through the flames. Finally it
+disappeared from sight in the black smoke; and when the fire had burnt
+itself out, it was found, dead and charred, in the same spot.
+
+On the pampas the gauchos frequently take the black-necked swan by
+frightening it. When the birds are feeding or resting on the grass, two
+or three men or boys on horseback go quietly to leeward of the flock,
+and when opposite to it suddenly wheel and charge it at full speed,
+uttering loud shouts, by which the birds are thrown into such terror
+that they are incapable of flying, and are quickly despatched.
+
+I have also seen gaucho boys catch the Silver-bill (Lichenops
+perspicillata) by hurling a stick or stone at the bird, then rushing at
+it, when it sits perfectly still, disabled by fear, and allows itself to
+be taken. I myself once succeeded in taking a small bird of another
+species in the same way.
+
+Amongst mammals our common fox (Canis azarae), and one of the opossums
+(Didelphys azarae), are strangely subject to the death-simulating swoon.
+For it does indeed seem strange that animals so powerful, fierce, and
+able to inflict such terrible injury with their teeth should also
+possess this safeguard, apparently more suited to weak inactive
+creatures that cannot resist or escape from an enemy and to animals very
+low down in the scale of being. When a fox is caught in a trap or run
+down by dogs he fights savagely at first, but by-and-by relaxes his
+efforts, drops on the ground, and apparently yields up the ghost. The
+deception is so well carried out, that dogs are constantly taken in by
+it, and no one, not previously acquainted with this clever trickery of
+nature, but would at once pronounce the creature dead, and worthy of
+some praise for having perished in so brave a spirit. Now, when in this
+condition of feigning death, I am quite sure that the animal does not
+altogether lose consciousness. It is exceedingly difficult to discover
+any evidence of life in the opossum; but when one withdraws a little way
+from the feigning fox, and watches him very attentively, a slight
+opening of the eye may be detected; and, finally, when left to himself,
+he does not recover and start up like an animal that has been stunned,
+but slowly and cautiously raises his head first, and only gets up when
+his foes are at a safe distance. Yet I have seen gauchos, who are very
+cruel to animals, practise the most barbarous experiments on a captive
+fox without being able to rouse it into exhibiting any sign of life.
+This has greatly puzzled me, since, if death-feigning is simply a
+cunning habit, the animal could not suffer itself to be mutilated
+without wincing. I can only believe that the fox, though not insensible,
+as its behaviour on being left to itself appears to prove, yet has its
+body thrown by extreme terror into that benumbed condition which
+simulates death, and during which it is unable to feel the tortures
+practised on it.
+
+The swoon sometimes actually takes place before the animal has been
+touched, and even when the exciting cause is at a considerable distance.
+I was once riding with a gaucho, when we saw, on the open level ground
+before us, a fox, not yet fully grown, standing still and watching our
+approach. All at once it dropped, and when we came up to the spot it was
+lying stretched out, with eyes closed, and apparently dead. Before
+passing on my companion, who said it was not the first time he had seen
+such a thing, lashed it vigorously with his whip for some moments, but
+without producing the slightest effect.
+
+The death-feigning instinct is possessed in a very marked degree by the
+spotted tinamou or common partridge of the pampas (Nothura maculosa).
+When captured, after a few violent struggles to escape, it drops its
+head, gasps two or three times, and to all appearances dies. If, when
+you have seen this, you release your hold, the eyes open instantly, and,
+with startling suddenness and a noise of wings, it is up and away, and
+beyond your reach for ever. Possibly, while your grasp is on the bird it
+does actually become insensible, though its recovery from that condition
+is almost instantaneous. Birds when captured do sometimes die in the
+hand, purely from terror. The tinamou is excessively timid, and
+sometimes when birds of this species are chased--for gaucho boys
+frequently run them down on horseback--and when they find no burrows or
+thickets to escape into, they actually drop down dead on the plain.
+Probably, when they feign death in their captor's hand, they are in
+reality very near to death.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+HUMMING-BIRDS.
+
+
+Humming-birds are perhaps the very loveliest things in nature, and many
+celebrated writers have exhausted their descriptive powers in vain
+efforts to picture them to the imagination. The temptation was certainly
+great, after describing the rich setting of tropical foliage and flower,
+to speak at length of the wonderful gem contained within it; but they
+would in this case have been wise to imitate that modest novel-writer
+who introduced a blank space on the page where the description of his
+matchless heroine should have appeared. After all that has been written,
+the first sight of a living humming-bird, so unlike in its beauty all
+other beautiful things, comes like a revelation to the mind. To give any
+true conception of it by means of mere word-painting is not more
+impossible than it would be to bottle up a supply of the "living
+sunbeams" themselves, and convey them across the Atlantic to scatter
+them in a sparkling shower over the face of England.
+
+Doubtless many who have never seen them in a state of nature imagine
+that a tolerably correct idea of their appearance can be gained from
+Gould's colossal monograph. The pictures there, however, only represent
+dead humming-birds. A dead robin is, for purposes of bird-portraiture,
+as good as a live robin; the same may be said of even many
+brilliant-plumaged species less aerial in their habits than
+humming-birds. In butterflies the whole beauty is seldom seen until the
+insect is dead, or, at any rate, captive. It was not when Wallace saw
+the Ornithoptera croesus flying about, but only when he held it in his
+hands, and opened its glorious wings, that the sight of its beauty
+overcame him so powerfully. The special kind of beauty which makes the
+first sight of a humming-bird a revelation depends on the swift singular
+motions as much as on the intense gem-like and metallic brilliancy of
+the plumage.
+
+The minute exquisite form, when the bird hovers on misty wings, probing
+the flowers with its coral spear, the fan-like tail expanded, and
+poising motionless, exhibits the feathers shot with many hues; and the
+next moment vanishes, or all but vanishes, then reappears at another
+flower only to vanish again, and so on successively, showing its
+splendours not continuously, but like the intermitted flashes of the
+firefly--this forms a picture of airy grace and loveliness that baffles
+description. All this glory disappears when the bird is dead, and even
+when it alights to rest on a bough. Sitting still, it looks like an
+exceedingly attenuated kingfisher, without the pretty plumage of that
+bird, but retaining its stiff artificial manner. No artist has been so
+bold as to attempt to depict the bird as it actually appears, when
+balanced before a flower the swift motion of the wings obliterates their
+form, making them seem like a mist encircling the body; yet it is
+precisely this formless cloud on which the glittering body hangs
+suspended, which contributes most to give the humming-bird its wonderful
+sprite-like or extra-natural appearance. How strange, then, to find
+bird-painters persisting in their efforts to show the humming-bird
+flying! When they draw it stiff and upright on its perch the picture is
+honest, if ugly; the more ambitious representation is a delusion and a
+mockery.
+
+Coming to the actual colouring--the changeful tints that glow with such
+intensity on the scale-like feathers, it is curious to find that Gould
+seems to have thought that all difficulties here had been successfully
+overcome. The "new process" he spoke so confidently about might no doubt
+be used with advantage in reproducing the coarser metallic reflections
+on a black plumage, such as we see in the corvine birds; but the
+glittering garment of the humming-bird, like the silvery lace woven by
+the Epeira, gemmed with dew and touched with rainbow-coloured light, has
+never been and never can be imitated by art.
+
+On this subject one of the latest observers of humming-birds, Mr.
+Everard im Thurn, in his work on British Guiana, has the following
+passage:--"Hardly more than one point of colour is in reality ever
+visible in any one humming-bird at one and the same time, for each point
+only shows its peculiar and glittering colour when the light falls upon
+it from a particular direction. A true representation of one of these
+birds would show it in somewhat sombre colours, except just at the one
+point which, when the bird is in the position chosen for representation,
+meets the light at the requisite angle, and that point alone should be
+shown in full brilliance of colour. A flowery shrub is sometimes seen
+surrounded by a cloud of humming-birds, all of one species, and each, of
+course, in a different position. If someone would draw such a scene as
+that, showing a different detail of colour in each bird, according to
+its position, then some idea of the actual appearance of the bird might
+be given to one who had never seen an example."
+
+It is hardly to be expected that anyone will carry out the above
+suggestion, and produce a monograph with pages ten or fifteen feet wide
+by eighteen feet long, each one showing a cloud of humming-birds of one
+species flitting about a flowery bush; but even in such a picture as
+that would be, the birds, suspended on unlovely angular projections
+instead of "hazy semicircles of indistinctness," and each with an
+immovable fleck of brightness on the otherwise sombre plumage, would be
+as unlike living humming-birds as anything in the older monographs.
+
+Whether the glittering iridescent tints and singular ornaments for which
+this family is famous result from the cumulative process of conscious or
+voluntary sexual selection, as Darwin thought, or are merely the outcome
+of a superabundant vitality, as Dr. A. R.. Wallace so strongly
+maintains, is a question which science has not yet answered
+satisfactorily. The tendency to or habit of varying in the direction of
+rich colouring and beautiful or fantastic ornament, might, for all we
+know to the contrary, have descended to humming-birds from some
+diminutive, curiously-shaped, bright-tinted, flying reptile of arboreal
+habits that lived in some far-off epoch in the world's history. It is
+not, at all events, maintained by anyone that _all_ birds sprang
+originally from one reptilian stock; and the true position of
+humming-birds in a natural classification has not yet been settled, for
+no intermediate forms exist connecting them with any other group, To the
+ordinary mind they appear utterly unlike all other feathered creatures,
+and as much entitled to stand apart as, for instance, the pigeon and
+ostrich families. It has been maintained by some writers that they are
+anatomically related to the swifts, although the differences separating
+the two families appear so great as almost to stagger belief in this
+notion. Now, however, the very latest authority on this subject, Dr.
+Schufeldt, has come to the conclusion that swifts are only greatly
+modified Passeres, and that the humming-birds should form an order by
+themselves.
+
+Leaving this question, and regarding them simply with the ornithological
+eye that does not see far below the surface of things, when we have
+sufficiently admired the unique beauty and marvellous velocity of
+humming-birds, there is little more to be said about them. They are
+lovely to the eye--indescribably so; and it is not strange that Gould
+wrote rapturously of the time when he was at length "permitted to revel
+in the delight of seeing the humming-bird in a state of nature." The
+feeling, he wrote, which animated him with regard to these most
+wonderful works of creation it was impossible to describe, and could
+only be appreciated by those who have made natural history a study, and
+who "pursue the investigations of her charming mysteries with ardour and
+delight." This we can understand; but to what an astonishing degree the
+feeling was carried in him, when, after remarking that enthusiasm and
+excitement with regard to most things in life become lessened and
+eventually deadened by time in most of us, he was able to add, "not
+so, however, I believe, with those who take up the study of the Family
+of Humming-birds!" It can only be supposed that he regarded natural
+history principally as a "science of dead animals--a _necrology_," and
+collected humming-birds just as others collect Roman coins, birds' eggs,
+old weapons, or blue china, their zeal in the pursuit and faith in its
+importance increasing with the growth of their treasures, until they at
+last come to believe that though all the enthusiasms and excitements
+which give a zest to the lives of other men fade and perish with time,
+it is not so with their particular pursuit. The more rational kind of
+pleasure experienced by the ornithologist in studying habits and
+disposition no doubt results in a great measure from the fact that the
+actions of the feathered people have a savour of intelligence in them.
+Whatever his theory or conviction about the origin of instincts may
+happen to be, or even if he has no convictions on the subject, it must
+nevertheless seem plain to him that intelligence is, after all, in most
+cases, the guiding principle of life, supplementing and modifying habits
+to bring them into closer harmony with the environment, and enlivening
+every day with countless little acts which result from judgment and
+experience, and form no part of the inherited complex instincts. The
+longer he observes any one species or individual, the more does he find
+in it to reward his attention; this is not the case, however, with
+humming-birds, which possess the avian body but do not rank mentally
+with birds. The pleasure one takes in their beauty soon evaporates, and
+is succeeded by no fresh interest, so monotonous and mechanical are all
+their actions; and we accordingly find that those who are most familiar
+with them from personal observation have very little to say about them.
+A score of hummingbirds, of as many distinct species, are less to the
+student of habits than one little brown-plurnaged bird haunting his
+garden or the rush-bed of a neighbouring stream; and, doubtless, for a
+reason similar to that which makes a lovely human face uninformed by
+intellect seem less permanently attractive than many a homelier
+countenance. He grows tired of seeing the feathered fairies perpetually
+weaving their aerial ballet-dance about the flowers, and finds it a
+relief to watch the little finch or wren or flycatcher of shy temper and
+obscure protective colouring. Perhaps it possesses a graceful form and
+melodious voice to give it aesthetic value, but even without such
+accessories he can observe it day by day with increasing interest and
+pleasure; and it only adds piquancy to the feeling to know that the
+little bird also watches him with a certain amount of intelligent
+curiosity and a great deal of suspicion, and that it studiously
+endeavours to conceal from him all the little secrets its life which he
+is bent on discovering.
+
+It has frequently been remarked that humming birds are more like insects
+than birds in disposition. Some species, on quitting their perch,
+perform wide bee-like circles about the tree before shooting away in a
+straight line. Their aimless attacks on other species approaching or
+passing near them, even on large birds like hawks and pigeons, is a
+habit they have in common with many solitary wood-boring bees. They
+also, like dragon-flies and other insects, attack each other when they
+come together while feeding; and in this case their action strangely
+resembles that of a couple of butterflies, as they revolve about each
+other and rise vertically to a great height in the air. Again, like
+insects, they are undisturbed at the presence of man while feeding, or
+even when engaged in building and incubation; and like various solitary
+bees, wasps, &c., they frequently come close to a person walking or
+standing, to hover suspended in the air within a few inches of his face;
+and if then struck at they often, insect-like, return to circle round
+his head. All other birds, even those which display the least
+versatility, and in districts where man is seldom seen, show as much
+caution as curiosity in his presence; they recognize in the upright
+unfamiliar form a living being and a possible enemy. Mr. Whiteley, who
+observed humming-birds in Peru, says it is an amusing sight to watch the
+Lesbia nuna attempting to pass to a distant spot in a straight line
+during a high wind, which, acting on the long tail feathers, carries it
+quite away from the point aimed at. Insects presenting a large surface
+to the wind are always blown from their course in the same way, for even
+in the most windy districts they never appear to learn to guide
+themselves; and I have often seen a butterfly endeavouring to reach an
+isolated flower blown from it a dozen times before it finally succeeded
+or gave up the contest. Birds when shaping their course, unless young
+and inexperienced, always make allowance for the force of the wind.
+Humming-birds often fly into open rooms, impelled apparently by a
+fearless curiosity, and may then be chased about until they drop
+exhausted or are beaten down and caught, and, as Gould says, "if then
+taken into the hand, they almost immediately feed on any sweet, or pump
+up any liquid that may be offered to them, without betraying either fear
+or resentment at the previous treatment." Wasps and bees taken in the
+same way endeavour to sting their captor, as most people know from
+experience, nor do they cease struggling violently to free themselves;
+but the dragon-fly is like the humming-bird, and is no sooner caught
+after much ill-treatment, than it will greedily devour as many flies and
+mosquitoes as one likes to offer it. Only in beings very low in the
+scale of nature do we see the instinct of self-preservation in this
+extremely simple condition, unmixed with reason or feeling, and so
+transient in its effects. The same insensibility to danger is seen when
+humming-birds are captured and confined in a room, and when, before a
+day is over, they will flutter about their captor's face and even take
+nectar from his lips.
+
+Some observers have thought that hummingbirds come nearest to
+humble-bees in their actions. I do not think so. Mr. Bates writes: "They
+do not proceed in that methodical manner which bees follow, taking the
+flowers seriatim, but skip about from one part of a tree to another in
+the most capricious manner." I have observed humble-bees a great deal,
+and feel convinced that they arc among the most highly intelligent of
+the social hymenoptera. Humming-birds, to my mind, have a much closer
+resemblance to the solitary wood-boring bees and to dragon-flies. It
+must also be borne in mind that insects have very little time in which
+to acquire experience, and that a large portion of their life, in the
+imago state, is taken up with the complex business of reproduction.
+
+The Trochilidae, although confined to one continent, promise to exceed
+all other families--even the cosmopolitan finches and warblers--in
+number of species. At present over five hundred are known, or as many as
+all the species of birds in Europe together; and good reasons exist for
+believing that very many more--not less perhaps than one or two hundred
+species--yet remain to be discovered. The most prolific region, and
+where humming-birds are most highly developed, is known to be West
+Brazil and the eastern slopes of the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. This
+is precisely the least known portion of South America; the few
+naturalists and collectors who have reached it have returned laden with
+spoil, to tell us of a region surpassing all others in the
+superabundance and beauty of its bird life. Nothing, however, which can
+be said concerning these vast unexplored areas of tropical mountain and
+forest so forcibly impresses us with the idea of the unknown riches
+contained in them as the story of the Loddigesia mirabilis. This is
+perhaps the most wonderful humming-bird known, and no one who had not
+previously seen it figured could possibly form an idea of what it is
+like from a mere description. An outline sketch of it would probably be
+taken by most people as a fantastic design representing a bird-form in
+combination with leaves, in size and shape resembling poplar leaves, but
+on leaf-stalks of an impossible length, curving and crossing each other
+so as to form geometrical figures unlike anything in nature. Yet this
+bird (a single specimen) was obtained in Peru half a century ago, and
+for upwards of twenty years after its discovery Gould tried to obtain
+others, offering as much as fifty pounds for one; but no second specimen
+ever gladdened his eyes, nor was anything more heard of it until
+Stolzmann refound it in the year 1880.
+
+The addition of many new species to the long list would, however, be a
+matter of small interest, unless fresh facts concerning their habits and
+structure were at the same time brought to light; but we can scarcely
+expect that the as yet unknown species will supply any link connecting
+the Trochilidae with other existing families of birds. The eventual
+conclusion will perhaps be that this family has come down independently
+from an exceedingly remote past, and with scarcely any modification.
+While within certain very narrow limits humming-birds vary more than
+other families, outside of these limits they appear relatively
+stationary; and, conversely, other birds exhibit least variability in
+the one direction in which humming-birds vary excessively. On account of
+a trivial difference in habit they have sometimes been separated in two
+sub-families: the Phaethornithinae, found in shady tropical forests; and
+the Trochilinae, comprising humming-birds which inhabit open sunny
+places--and to this division they mostly belong. In both of these purely
+arbitrary groups, however, the aerial habits and manner of feeding
+poised in the air are identical, although the birds living in shady
+forests, where flowers are scarce, obtain their food principally from
+the under surfaces of leaves. In their procreant habits the uniformity
+is also very great. In all cases the nest is small, deep, cup-shaped, or
+conical, composed of soft felted materials, and lined inside with
+vegetable down. The eggs are white, and never exceed two in number.
+Broadly speaking, they resemble each other as closely in habits as in
+structure; the greatest differences in habit in the most widely
+separated genera being no greater than may be found in two wrens or
+sparrows of the same genus.
+
+This persistence of character in humming-birds, both as regards
+structure and habit, seems the more remarkable when we consider their
+very wide distribution over a continent so varied in its conditions, and
+where they range from the lowest levels to the limit of perpetual snow
+on the Andes, and from the tropics to the wintry Magellanic district;
+also that a majority of genera inhabit very circumscribed areas--these
+facts, as Dr. Wallace remarks, clearly pointing to a very high
+antiquity.
+
+It is perhaps a law of nature that when a species (or group) fits itself
+to a place not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to no
+opposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so great a
+perfection as to be able easily to overcome all opposition, the
+character eventually loses its original plasticity, or tendency to vary,
+since improvement in such a case would be superfluous, and becomes, so
+to speak, crystallized in that form which continues thereafter
+unaltered. It is, at any rate, clear that while all other birds rub
+together in the struggle for existence, the humming-bird, owing to its
+aerial life and peculiar manner of seeking its food, is absolutely
+untouched by this kind of warfare, and is accordingly as far removed
+from all competition with other birds as the solitary savage is removed
+from the struggle of life affecting and modifying men in crowded
+communities. The lower kind of competition affecting hummingbirds, that
+with insects and, within the family, of species with species, has
+probably only served to intensify their unique characteristics, and,
+perhaps, to lower their intelligence.
+
+Not only are they removed from that indirect struggle for existence
+which acts so powerfully on other families, but they are also, by their
+habits and the unequalled velocity of their flight, placed out of reach
+of that direct war waged on all other small birds by the rapacious
+kinds--birds, mammals, and reptiles. One result of this immunity is that
+humming-birds are excessively numerous, albeit such slow breeders; for,
+as we have seen, they only lay two eggs, and not only so, but the second
+egg is often dropped so long after incubation has begun in the first
+that only one is really hatched. Yet Belt expressed the opinion that in
+Nicaragua, where he observed humming-birds, they out-numbered all the
+other birds together. Considering how abundant birds of all kinds are in
+that district, and that most of them have a protective colouring and lay
+several eggs, it would be impossible to accept such a statement unless
+we believed that humming-birds have, practically, no enemies.
+
+Another result of their immunity from persecution is the splendid
+colouring and strange and beautiful feather ornaments distinguishing
+them above all other birds; and excessive variation in this direction is
+due, it seems to me, to the very causes which serve to check variation
+in all other directions. In their plumage, as Martin long ago wrote,
+nature has strained at every variety of effect and revelled in an
+infinitude of modifications. How wonderful their garb is, with colours
+so varied, so intense, yet seemingly so evanescent!--the glittering
+mantle of powdered gold; the emerald green that changes to velvet black;
+ruby reds and luminous scarlets; dull bronze that brightens and burns
+like polished brass, and pale neutral tints that kindle to rose and
+lilac-coloured flame. And to the glory of prismatic colouring are added
+feather decorations, such as the racket-plumes and downy muffs of
+Spathura, the crest and frills of Lophornis, the sapphire gorget burning
+on the snow-white breast of Oreotrochilus, the fiery tail of Cometes,
+and, amongst grotesque forms, the long pointed crest-feathers,
+representing horns, and flowing-white beard adorning the piebald
+goat-like face of Oxypogon.
+
+Excessive variation in this direction is checked in nearly all other
+birds by the need of a protective colouring, few kinds so greatly
+excelling in strength and activity as to be able to maintain their
+existence without it. Bright feathers constitute a double danger, for
+not only do they render their possessor conspicuous, but, just as the
+butterfly chooses the gayest flower, so do hawks deliberately single out
+from many obscure birds the one with brilliant plumage; but the
+rapacious kinds do not waste their energies in the vain pursuit of
+hummingbirds. These are in the position of neutrals, free to range at
+will amidst the combatants, insulting all alike, and flaunting their
+splendid colours with impunity. They are nature's favourites, endowed
+with faculties bordering on the miraculous, and all other kinds, gentle
+or fierce, ask only to be left alone by them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE CRESTED SCREAMER.
+
+_(Chalina chavarria.)_
+
+
+Amongst the feathered notables from all parts of the world found
+gathered at the Zoological Gardens in London is the Crested Screamer
+from South America. It is in many respects a very singular species, and
+its large size, great strength, and majestic demeanour, with the
+surprising docility and intelligence it displays when domesticated, give
+it a character amongst birds somewhat like that of the elephant amongst
+mammals. Briefly and roughly to describe it: in size it is like a swan,
+in shape like a lapwing, only with a powerful curved gallinaceous beak.
+It is adorned with a long pointed crest and a black neck-ring, the
+plumage being otherwise of a pale slaty blue, while the legs and the
+naked skin about the eyes are bright red. On each wing, in both sexes,
+there are two formidable spurs; the first one, on the second joint, is
+an inch and a half long, nearly straight, triangular, and exceedingly
+sharp; the second spur, on the last joint, being smaller, broad, and
+curved, and roughly resembling in shape and size a lion's claw. There is
+another stinking peculiarity. The skin is _emphysematous_--that is,
+bloated and yielding to pressure. It crackles when touched, and the
+surface, when the feathers are removed, presents a swollen bubbly
+appearance; for under the skin there is a layer of air-bubbles extending
+over the whole body and even down the legs under the horny tesselated
+skin to the toes, the legs thus having a somewhat massive appearance.
+
+And now just a few words about the position of the screamer in
+systematic zoology. It is placed in the Family Palamedeidae, which
+contains only three species, but about the Order it belongs to there is
+much disagreement. It was formerly classed with the rails, and in
+popular books of Natural History still keeps its place with them. "Now
+the rail-tribe," says Professor Parker, speaking on this very matter,
+"has for a long time been burdened (on paper) with a very false army
+list. Everything alive that has had the misfortune to be possessed of
+large unwieldy feet has been added to this feeble-minded cowardly group,
+until it has become a mixed multitude with discordant voices and with
+manners and customs having no consonance or relation." He takes the
+screamer from the rail-tribe and classes it with the geese (as also does
+Professor Huxley), and concludes his study with these words:--"Amongst
+living birds there is not one possessing characters of higher interest,
+none that I am acquainted with come nearer, in some important points, to
+the lizard; and there are parts of the organization which make it very
+probable that it is one of the nearest living relations of the
+marvellous _Archaeopteryx_"--an intermediate form between birds and
+reptiles belonging to the Upper Jurassic period.
+
+The screamer's right to dwell with the geese has not been left
+unchallenged. The late Professor Garrod finds that "from considerations
+of pterylosis, visceral anatomy, myology, and osteology the screamer
+cannot be placed along with the Anserine birds." He finds that in some
+points it resembles the ostrich and rhea, and concludes: "It seems
+therefore to me that, summing these results, the screamer must have
+sprung from the primary avian stock as an independent offshoot at much
+the same time as did most of the other important families." This time,
+he further tells us, was when there occurred a general break-up of the
+ancient terrestrial bird-type, when the acquisition of wings brought
+many intruders into domains already occupied, calling forth a new
+struggle for existence, and bringing out many special qualities by means
+of natural selection.
+
+With this archaeological question I have little to do, and only quote
+the above great authorities to show that the screamer appears to be
+nearly the last descendant of an exceedingly ancient family, with little
+or no relationship to other existing families, and that its pedigree has
+been hopelessly lost in the night of an incalculable antiquity. I have
+only to speak of the bird as a part of the visible world and as it
+appears to the non-scientific lover of nature; for, curiously enough,
+while anatomists nave been laboriously seeking for the screamer's
+affinities in that "biological field which is as wide as the earth and
+deep as the sea," travellers and ornithologists have told us almost
+nothing about its strange character and habits.
+
+Though dressed with Quaker-like sobriety, and without the elegance of
+form distinguishing the swan or peacock, this bird yet appeals to the
+aesthetic feelings in man more than any species I am acquainted with.
+Voice is one of its strong points, as one might readily infer from the
+name: nevertheless the name is not an appropriate one, for though the
+bird certainly does scream, and that louder than the peacock, its scream
+is only a powerful note of alarm uttered occasionally, while the notes
+uttered at intervals in the night, or in the day-time, when it soars
+upwards like the lark of some far-off imaginary epoch in the world's
+history when all tilings, larks included, were on a gigantic scale, are.
+properly speaking, singing notes and in quality utterly unlike screams.
+Sometimes when walking across Regent's Park I bear the resounding cries
+of the bird confined there attempting to sing; above the concert of
+cranes, the screams of eagles and macaws, the howling of dogs and wolves
+and the muffled roar of lions, one can hear it all over the park. But
+those loud notes only sadden me. Exile and captivity have taken all
+joyousness from the noble singer, and a moist climate has made him
+hoarse; the long clear strains are no more, and he hurries through his
+series of confused shrieks as quickly as possible, as if ashamed of the
+performance. A lark singing high up in a sunny sky and a lark singing in
+a small cage hanging against a shady wall in a London street produce
+very different effects; and the spluttering medley of shrill and harsh
+sounds from the street singer scarcely seems to proceed from the same
+kind of bird as that matchless melody filling the blue heavens. There is
+even a greater difference in the notes of the crested screamer when
+heard in Regent's Park and when heard on the pampas, where the bird
+soars upwards until its bulky body disappears from sight, and from that
+vast elevation pours down a perpetual rain of jubilant sound.
+
+_Screamer_ being a misnomer, I prefer to call the bird by its vernacular
+name of _chaja,_ or _chakar_, a more convenient spelling.
+
+With the chakar the sexes are faithful, even in very large flocks the
+birds all being ranged in couples. When one bird begins to sing its
+partner immediately joins, but with notes entirely different in quality.
+Both birds have some short deep notes, the other notes of the female
+being long powerful notes with a trill in them; but over them sounds the
+clear piercing voice of the male, ringing forth at the close with great
+strength and purity. The song produces the effect of harmony, but,
+comparing it with human singing, it is less like a _duo_ than a
+_terzetto_ composed of bass, contralto, and soprano.
+
+At certain times, in districts favourable to them, the chakars often
+assemble in immense flocks, thousands of individuals being sometimes
+seen congregated together, and in these gatherings the birds frequently
+all sing in concert. They invariably--though without rising--sing at
+intervals during the night, "counting the hours," as the gauchos say;
+the first song being at about nine o'clock, the second at midnight, and
+the third just before dawn, but the hours vary in different districts.
+
+I was once travelling with a party of gauchos when, about midnight, it
+being intensely dark, a couple of chakars broke out singing right ahead
+of us, thus letting us know that we were approaching a watercourse,
+where we intended refreshing our horses. We found it nearly dry, and
+when we rode down to the rill of water meandering over the broad dry bed
+of the river, a flock of about a thousand chakars set up a perfect roar
+of alarm notes, all screaming together, with intervals of silence after;
+then they rose up with a mighty rush of wings. They settled down again a
+few hundred yards off, and all together burst forth in one of their
+grand midnight songs, making the plains echo for miles around.
+
+There is something strangely impressive in these spontaneous outbursts
+of a melody so powerful from one of these large flocks, and though
+accustomed to hear these birds from childhood, I have often been
+astonished at some new effect produced by a large multitude singing
+under certain conditions. Travelling alone one summer day, I carne at
+noon to a lake on the pampas called Kakel--a sheet of water narrow
+enough for one to see across. Chakars in countless numbers were gathered
+along its shores, but they were all ranged in well-defined flocks,
+averaging about five hundred birds in each flock. These flocks seemed to
+extend all round the lake, and had probably been driven by the drought
+from all the plains around to this spot. Presently one flock near me
+began singing, and continued their powerful chant for three or four
+minutes; when they ceased the next flock took up the strains, and after
+it the next, and so on until the notes of the flocks on the opposite
+shore came floating strong and clear across the water--then passed away,
+growing fainter and fainter, until once more the sound approached me
+travelling round to my side again. The effect was very curious, and I
+was astonished at the orderly way with which each flock waited its turn
+to sing, instead of a general outburst taking place after the first
+flock had given the signal. On another occasion I was still more
+impressed, for here the largest number of birds I have ever found
+congregated at one place all sung together. This was on the southern
+pampas, at a place called Gualicho, where I had ridden for an hour
+before sunset over a marshy plain where there was still much standing
+water in the rushy pools, though it was at the height of the dry season.
+This whole plain was covered with an endless flock of chakars, not in
+close order, but scattered about in pairs and small groups. In this
+desolate spot I found a small rancho inhabited by a gaucho and his
+family, and I spent the night with them. The birds were all about the
+house, apparently as tame as the domestic fowls, and when I went out to
+look for a spot for my horse to feed on, they would not fly away from
+me, but merely moved, a few steps out of my path About nine o'clock we
+were eating supper in the rancho when suddenly the entire multitude of
+birds covering the marsh for miles around burst forth into a tremendous
+evening song. It is impossible to describe the effect of this mighty
+rush of sound; but let the reader try to imagine half-a-million voices,
+each far more powerful than that one which makes itself heard all over
+Regent's Park, bursting forth on the silent atmosphere of that dark
+lonely plain. One peculiarity was that in this mighty noise, which
+sounded louder than the sea thundering on a rocky coast, I seemed to be
+able to distinguish hundreds, even thousands, of individual voices.
+Forgetting my supper, I sat motionless and overcome with astonishment,
+while the air, and even the frail rancho, seemed to be trembling in that
+tempest of sound. When it ceased my host remarked with a smile, "We are
+accustomed to this, senor--every evening we have this concert." It was a
+concert well worth riding a hundred miles to hear. But the chakar
+country is just now in a transitional state, and the precise conditions
+which made it possible for birds so large in size to form such immense
+congregations are rapidly passing away. In desert places, the bird
+subsists chiefly on leaves and seeds of aquatic plants; but when the
+vast level area of the pampas was settled by man, the ancient stiff
+grass-vegetation gave place to the soft clovers and grasses of Europe,
+and to this new food the birds took very kindly. Other circumstances
+also favoured their increase. They were never persecuted, for the
+natives do not eat them, though they are really very good--the flesh
+being something like wild goose in flavour. A _higher_ civilization is
+changing all this: the country is becoming rapidly overrun with
+emigrants, especially by Italians, the pitiless enemies of all
+bird-life.
+
+The chakars, like the skylark, love to soar upwards when singing, and at
+such times when they have risen till their dark bulky bodies appear like
+floating specks on the blue sky, or until they disappear from sight
+altogether, the notes become wonderfully etherealized by distance to a
+soft silvery sound, and it is then very delightful to listen to them.
+
+It seems strange that so ponderous a fowl with only six feet and a half
+spread of wings should possess a power of soaring equal to that of
+vultures and eagles. Even the vulture with its marvellous wing power
+soars chiefly from necessity, and when its crop is full finds no
+pleasure in "scaling the heavens by invisible stairs." The chakar leaves
+its grass-plot after feeding and soars purely for recreation, taking so
+much pleasure in its aerial exercises that in bright warm weather, in
+winter and spring, it spends a great part of the day in the upper
+regions of the air. On the earth its air is grave and its motions
+measured and majestic, and it rises with immense labour, the wings
+producing a sound like a high wind. But as the bird mounts higher,
+sweeping round as it ascends, just as vultures and eagles do, it
+gradually appears to become more buoyant, describing each succeeding
+circle with increasing grace. I can only account for this magnificent
+flight, beginning so laboriously, by supposing that the bubble space
+under the skin becomes inflated with an air lighter than atmospheric
+air, enabling a body so heavy with wings disproportionately short to
+float with such ease and evident enjoyment at the vast heights to which
+the bird ascends. The heavenward flight of a large bird is always a
+magnificent spectacle; that of the chakar is peculiarly fascinating on
+account of the resounding notes it sings while soaring, and in which the
+bird seems to exult in its sublime power and freedom.
+
+I was once very much surprised at the behaviour of a couple of chakars
+during a thunderstorm. On a still sultry day in summer I was standing
+watching masses of black cloud coming rapidly over the sky, while a
+hundred yards from me stood the two birds also apparently watching the
+approaching storm with interest. Presently the edge of the cloud touched
+the sun, and a twilight gloom fell on the earth. The very moment the sun
+disappeared the birds rose up and soon began singing their long'
+resounding notes, though it was loudly thundering at the time, while
+vivid flashes of lightning lit the black cloud overhead at short
+intervals. I watched their flight and listened to their notes, till
+suddenly as they made a wide sweep upwards they disappeared in the
+cloud, and at the same moment their voices became muffled, and seemed to
+come from an immense distance. The cloud continued emitting sharp
+flashes of lightning, but the birds never reappeared, and after six or
+seven minutes once more their notes sounded loud and clear above the
+muttering thunder. I suppose they had passed through the cloud into the
+clear atmosphere above it, but I was extremely surprised at their
+fearlessness; for as a rule when soaring birds see a storm coming they
+get out of its way, flying before it or stooping to the earth to seek
+shelter of some kind, for most living things appear to have a wholesome
+dread of thunder and lightning.
+
+When taken young the chakar becomes very tame and attached to man,
+showing no inclination to go back to a wild life. There was one kept at
+an estancia called Mangrullos, on the western frontier of Buenos Ayres,
+and the people of the house gave me a very curious account of it. The
+bird was a male, and had been reared by a soldier's wife at a frontier
+outpost called La Esperanza, about twenty-five miles from Mangrullos.
+Four years before I saw the bird the Indians had invaded the frontier,
+destroying the Esperanza settlement and all the estancias for some
+leagues around. For some weeks after the invasion the chakar wandered
+about the country, visiting all the ruined estancias, apparently in
+quest of human beings, and on arriving at Mangrullos, which had not been
+burnt and was still inhabited, it settled down at ones and never
+afterwards showed any disposition to go away. It was extremely tame,
+associating by day with the poultry, and going to roost with them at
+night OH a high perch, probably for the sake of companionship, for in a
+wild state the bird roosts on the ground. It was friendly towards all
+the members of the household except one, a peon, and against this person
+from the first the bird always displayed the greatest antipathy,
+threatening him with its wings, puffing itself out, and hissing like an
+angry goose. The man had a swarthy, beardless face, and it was
+conjectured that the chakar associated him in its mind with the savages
+who had destroyed its early home.
+
+Close to the house there was a lagoon, never dry, which was frequently
+visited by flocks of wild chakars. Whenever a flock appeared the tame
+bird would go out to join them; and though the chakars are mild-tempered
+birds and very rarely quarrel, albeit so well provided with formidable
+weapons, they invariably attacked the visitor with great fury, chasing
+him back to the house, and not ceasing their persecutions till the
+poultry-yard was reached. They appeared to regard this tame bird that
+dwelt with man as a kind of renegade, and hated him accordingly.
+
+Before he had been long at the estancia it began to be noticed that he
+followed the broods of young chickens about very assiduously, apparently
+taking great interest in their welfare, and even trying to entice them
+to follow him. A few newly-hatched chickens were at length offered to
+him as an experiment, and he immediately took charge of them with every
+token of satisfaction, conducting them about in search of food and
+imitating all the actions of a hen. Finding him so good a nurse, large
+broods were given to him, and the more the foster-chickens were the
+better he seemed pleased. It was very curious to see this big bird with
+thirty or forty little animated balls of yellow cotton following him
+about, while he moved majestically along, setting down his feet with the
+greatest care not to tread on them, and swelling himself up with jealous
+anger at the approach of a cat or dog.
+
+The intelligence, docility, and attachment to man displayed by the
+chakar in a domestic state, with perhaps other latent aptitudes only
+waiting to be developed by artificial selection, seem to make this
+species one peculiarly suited for man's protection, without which it
+must inevitably perish. It is sad to reflect that all our domestic
+animals have descended to us from those ancient times which we are
+accustomed to regard as dark or barbarous, while the effect of our
+modern so-called humane civilization has been purely destructive to
+animal life. Not one type do we rescue from the carnage going on at an
+ever-increasing rate over all the globe. To Australia and America, North
+and South, we look in vain for new domestic species, while even from
+Africa, with its numerous fine mammalian forms, and where England has
+been the conquering colonizing power for nearly a century, we take
+nothing. Even the sterling qualities of the elephant, the unique beauty
+of the zebra, appeal to us in vain. We are only teaching the tribes of
+that vast continent to exterminate a hundred noble species they would
+not tame. With grief and shame, even with dismay, we call to mind that
+our country is now a stupendous manufactory of destructive engines,
+which we are rapidly placing in the hands of all the savage and
+semi-savage peoples of the earth, thus ensuring the speedy destruction
+of all the finest types in the animal kingdom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE WOODHEWER FAMILY.
+
+_(Dendrocolaptidae.)_
+
+
+The South American Tree-creepers, or Woodhewers, as they are sometimes
+called, although confined exclusively to one continent, their range
+extending from Southern Mexico to the Magellanic islands, form one of
+the largest families of the order Passeres; no fewer than about two
+hundred and ninety species (referable to about forty-six genera) having
+been already described. As they are mostly small, inconspicuous,
+thicket-frequenting birds, shy and fond of concealment to excess, it is
+only reasonable to suppose that our list of this family is more
+incomplete than of any other family of birds known. Thus, in the
+southern Plata and north Pata-gonian districts, supposed to be
+exhausted, where my observations have been made, and where, owing to the
+open nature of the country, birds are more easily remarked than in the
+forests and marshes of the tropical region, I have made notes on the
+habits of five species, of which I did not preserve specimens, and
+which, as far as I know, have never been described and named. Probably
+long before the whole of South America has been "exhausted," there will
+be not less than four to five hundred Dendrocolaptine species known. And
+yet with the exception of that dry husk of knowledge, concerning size,
+form and colouration, which classifiers and cataloguers obtain from
+specimens, very little indeed--scarcely anything, in fact--is known
+about the Tree-creepers; and it would not be too much to say that there
+are many comparatively obscure and uninteresting species in Europe, any
+one of which has a larger literature than the entire Tree-creeper
+family. No separate work about these birds has seen the light, even in
+these days of monographs; but the reason of this comparative neglect is
+not far to seek. In the absence of any knowledge, except of the most
+fragmentary kind, of the life-habits of exotic species, the
+monograph-makers of the Old World naturally take up only the most
+important groups--i.e. the groups which most readily attract the
+traveller's eye with their gay conspicuous colouring, and which have
+acquired a wide celebrity. We thus have a succession of splendid and
+expensive works dealing separately with such groups as woodpeckers,
+trogons, humming-birds, tanagers, king-fishers, and birds of paradise;
+for with these, even if there be nothing to record beyond the usual
+dreary details and technicalities concerning geographical distribution,
+variations in size and markings of different species, &c., the little
+interest of the letter-press is compensated for in the accompanying
+plates, which are now produced on a scale of magnitude, and with so
+great a degree of perfection, as regards brilliant colouring, spirited
+attitudes and general fidelity to nature, that leaves little further
+improvement in this direction to be looked for. The Tree-creepers, being
+without the inferior charm of bright colour, offer no attraction to the
+bird-painter, whose share in the work of the pictorial monograph is, of
+course, all-important. Yet even the very slight knowledge we possess of
+this family is enough to show that in many respects it is one richly
+endowed, possessing characters of greater interest to the student of the
+instincts and mental faculties of birds, than any of |the gaily-tinted
+families I have mentioned.
+
+There is, in the Dendrocolaptidae, a splendid harvest for future
+observers of the habits of South American birds: some faint idea of its
+richness may perhaps be gathered from the small collection of the most
+salient facts known to us about them I have brought together and put in
+order in this place. And I am here departing a little from the plan
+usually observed in this book, which is chiefly occupied with matters of
+personal knowledge, seasoned with a little speculation; but in this case
+I have thought it best to supplement my own observations with those of
+others [Footnote: Azara; D'Orbigny; Darwin; Bridges; Frazer; Leotaud;
+Gaumer; Wallace; Bates; Cunningham; Stolzmann; Jelski; Durnford; Gibson;
+Burrows; Doering; White, &c.] who have collected and observed birds in
+South America, so as to give as comprehensive a survey of the family as
+I could.
+
+It is strange to find a Passerine family, numerous as the Tree-creepers,
+uniformly of one colour, or nearly so; for, with few exceptions, these
+birds have a brown plumage, without a particle of bright colour. But
+although they possess no brilliant or metallic tints, in some species,
+as we shall see, there are tints approaching to brightness.
+Notwithstanding this family likeness in colour, any person, not an
+ornithologist, looking at a collection of specimens comprising many
+genera, would hear with surprise and almost incredulity that they all
+belonged to one family, so great is the diversity exhibited in their
+structure. In size they vary from species smaller than the
+golden-crested wren to others larger than the woodcock; but the
+differences in size are as nothing compared with those shown in the form
+of the beak. Between the minute, straight, conical, tit-like beaks of
+the Laptasthenura--a tit in appearance and habits--and the extravagantly
+long, sword-shaped bill of Nasica, or the excessively attenuated,
+sickle-shaped organ in Xiphorynchus, the divergence is amazing, compared
+with what is found in other families; while between these two extremes
+there is a heterogeneous assemblage of birds with beaks like creepers,
+nuthatches, finches, tyrant-birds, woodpeckers, crows, and even curlews
+and ibises. In legs, feet and tails, there are corresponding
+differences. There are tails of all lengths and all forms; soft and
+stiff, square, acuminated, broad and fan-like, narrow and spine-like,
+and many as in the woodpeckers, and used as in that bird to support the
+body in climbing. An extremely curious modification is found in
+Sittosoma: the tail-feathers in this genus are long and graduated, and
+the shafts, projecting beyond the webs at the ends, curve downwards and
+form stiff hooks. Concerning the habits of these birds, it has only been
+reported that they climb on the trunks of trees: probably they are able
+to run vertically up or down with equal facility, and even to suspend
+themselves by their feather-hooks when engaged in dislodging insects.
+Another curious variation is found in Sylviothorhynchus, a small
+wren-like bird and the only member known of the genus, with a tail
+resembling that of the lyre-bird, the extravagantly long feathers being
+so narrow as to appear almost like shafts destitute of webs. This tail
+appears to be purely ornamental.
+
+This extreme variety in structure indicates a corresponding diversity in
+habits; and, assuming it to be a true doctrine that habits vary first
+and structure afterwards, anyone might infer from a study of their forms
+alone that these birds possess a singular plasticity, or tendency to
+vary, in their habits--or, in other words, that they are exceptionally
+intelligent; and that such a conclusion would be right I believe a study
+of their habits will serve to show.
+
+The same species is often found to differ in its manner of life in
+different localities. Some species of Xenops and Magarornis, like
+woodpeckers, climb vertically on tree-trunks in search of insect prey,
+but also, like tits, explore the smaller twigs and foliage at the
+extremity of the branches; so that the whole tree, from its root to its
+topmost foliage, is hunted over by them. The Sclerurus, although an
+inhabitant of the darkest forest, and provided with sharply-curved
+claws, never seeks its food on trees, but exclusively on the ground,
+among the decaying fallen leaves; but, strangely enough, when alarmed it
+flies to the trunk of the nearest tree, to which it clings in a vertical
+position, and, remaining silent and motionless, escapes observation by
+means of its dark protective colour. The Drymornis, a large bird, with
+feet and tail like a woodpecker, climbs on tree-trunks to seek its food;
+but also possesses the widely-different habit of resorting to the open
+plain, especially after a shower, to feed on larvae and earthworms,
+extracting them from a depth of three or four inches beneath the surface
+with its immense curved probing beak.
+
+Again, when we consider a large number of species of different groups,
+we find that there is not with the Tree-creepers, as with most families,
+any special habit or manner of life linking them together; but that, on
+the contrary, different genera, and, very frequently, different species
+belonging to one genus, possess habits peculiarly their own. In other
+families, even where the divergence is greatest, what may be taken as
+the original or ancestral habit is seldom or never quite obsolete in any
+of the members. This we see, for instance, in the woodpeckers, some of
+which have acquired the habit of seeking their food exclusively on the
+ground in open places, and even of nesting in the banks of streams. Yet
+all these wanderers, even those which have been structurally modified in
+accordance with their altered way of life, retain the primitive habit of
+clinging vertically to the trunks of trees, although the habit has lost
+its use. With the tyrant birds--a family showing an extraordinary amount
+of variation--it is the same; for the most divergent kinds are
+frequently seen reverting to the family habit of perching on an
+elevation, from which to make forays after passing insects, returning
+after each capture to the same stand. The thrushes, ranging all over the
+globe, afford another striking example. Without speaking of their
+nesting habits, their relationship appears in their love of fruit, in
+their gait, flight, statuesque attitudes, and abrupt motions.
+
+With the numerous Dendrocolaptine groups, so widely separated and
+apparently unrelated, it would be difficult indeed to say which, of
+their most striking habits is the ancestral one. Many of the smaller
+species live in trees or bushes, and in their habits resemble tits,
+warblers, wrens, and other kinds that subsist on small caterpillars,
+spiders, &c., gleaned from the leaves and smaller twigs. The Anumbius
+nests on trees, but feeds exclusively on the ground in open places;
+while other ground-feeders seek their food among dead leaves in dense
+gloomy forests. Coryphistera resembles the lark and pipit in its habits;
+Cinclodes, the wagtail; Geobates a Saxicola; Limnornis lives in reed
+beds growing in the water; Henicornis in reed beds growing out of the
+water; and many other ground species exist concealed in the grass on dry
+plains; Homorus seeks its food by digging in the loose soil and dead
+leaves about the roots of trees; while Geo-sitta, Furnarius, and
+Upercerthia obtain a livelihood chiefly by probing in the soil. It would
+not be possible within the present limits to mention in detail all the
+different modes of life of those species or groups which do not possess
+the tree-creeping habit; after them comes a long array of genera in
+which this habit is ingrained, and in which the greatly modified feet
+and claws are suited to a climbing existence. As these genera comprise
+the largest half of the family, also the largest birds in it, we might
+expect to find in the tree-creeping the parental habit of the
+Dendrocolaptidae, and that from these tropical forest groups have sprung
+the widely-diverging thicket, ground, marsh, sea-beach, and
+rock-frequenting groups. It happens, however, that these birds resemble
+each other only in their climbing feet; in the form of their beaks they
+are as wide apart as are nuthatches, woodpeckers, crows, and curlews.
+They also differ markedly in the manner of seeking their food. Some dig
+like woodpeckers in decayed wood; others probe only in soft rotten wood;
+while the humming-bird-billed Xiphorhynchus, with a beak too long and
+slender for probing, explores the interior of deep holes in the trunks
+to draw out nocturnal insects, spiders, and centipedes from their
+concealment. Xiphoco-laptes uses its sword-like beak as a lever,
+thrusting it under and forcing up the loose bark; while Dendrornis, with
+its stout corvine beak, tears the bark off.
+
+In the nesting habits the diversity is greatest. Some ground species
+excavate in the earth like kingfishers, only with greater skill, making
+cylindrical burrows often four to five feet deep, and terminating in a
+round chamber. Others build a massive oven-shaped structure of clay on a
+branch or other elevated site. Many of those that creep on trees nest in
+holes in the wood. The marsh-frequenting kinds attach spherical or oval
+domed nests to the reeds; and in some cases woven grass and clay are so
+ingeniously combined that the structure, while light as a basket, is
+perfectly impervious to the wet and practically indestructible. The most
+curious nests, however, are the large stick structures on trees and
+bushes, in the building and repairing of which the birds are in many
+cases employed more or less constantly all the year round. These stick
+nests vary greatly in form, size, and in other respects. Some have a
+spiral passage-way leading from the entrance to the nest cavity, and the
+cavity is in many cases only large enough to accommodate the bird; but
+in the gigantic structure of Homorus gutturalis it is so large that, if
+the upper half of the nest or dome were removed, a condor could
+comfortably hatch her eggs and rear her young in it. This nest is
+spherical. The allied Homorus lophotis builds a nest equally large, but
+with a small cavity for the eggs inside, and outwardly resembling a
+gigantic powder-flask, lying horizontally among the lower branches of a
+spreading tree. Pracellodomtis sibila-trix, a bird in size like the
+English house sparrow, also makes a huge nest, and places it on the
+twigs at the terminal end of a horizontal branch from twelve to fifteen
+feet above the ground; but when finished, the weight of the structure
+bears down the branch-end to within one or two feet of the surface. Mr.
+Barrows, who describes this nest, says: "When other branches of the same
+tree are similarly loaded, and other trees close at hand bear the same
+kind of fruit, the result is very picturesque." Synallaxis phryganophila
+makes a stick nest about a foot in depth, and from the top a tubular
+passage, formed of slender twigs interlaced, runs down the entire length
+of the nest, like a rain-pipe on the wall of a house, and then becoming
+external slopes upward, ending at a distance of two to three feet from
+the nest. Throughout South America there are several varieties of these
+fruit-and-stem or watering-pot shaped nests; they are not, however, all
+built by birds of one genus, while in the genus Synallaxis many species
+have no tubular passageways attached to their nests. One species--erythro
+thorax--in Yucatan, makes so large a nest of sticks, that the
+natives do not believe that so small a bird can be the builder. They say
+that when the _tzapatan_ begins to sing, all the birds in the forest
+repair to it, each one carrying a stick to add to the structure; only
+one, a tyrant-bird, brings two sticks, one for itself and one for the
+_urubu_ or vulture, that bird being considered too large, heavy, and
+ignorant of architecture to assist personally in the work.
+
+In the southern part of South America, where scattered thorn trees grow
+on a dry soil, these big nests are most abundant. "There are plains,"
+Mr. Barrows writes, "within two miles of the centre of this town
+(Concepcion, Argentine Republic), where I have stood and counted, from
+one point within a radius of twenty rods, over two hundred of these
+curious nests, varying in size from that of a small pumpkin to more than
+the volume of a barrel. Often a single tree will contain half a dozen
+nests or more; and, not unfrequently, the nests of several different
+species are seen crowding each other out of shape on the same bush or
+tree."
+
+It would be a mistake to think that the widely different nesting habits
+I have mentioned are found in different genera. I have just spoken of
+the big stick nests, with or without passage-ways, of the Synallaxes,
+yet the nest of one member of this group is simply a small straight tube
+of woven grass, the aperture only large enough to admit the finger, and
+open at both ends, so that the bird can pass in and out without turning
+round. Another species scoops a circular hollow in the soil, and builds
+over it a dome of fine woven grass. It should be mentioned that the
+nesting habits of only about fifteen out of the sixty-five species
+comprised in this genus are known to us. In the genus Furnarius the
+oven-shaped clay structure is known to be made by three species; a
+fourth builds a nest of sticks in a tree; a fifth burrows in the side of
+a bank, like a kingfisher.
+
+The explanation of the most striking features of the Dendrocolaptidae,
+their monotonous brown plumage, diversity of structure, versatile
+habits, and the marvellous development of the nest-making instinct which
+they exhibit is to be found, it appears to me, in the fact that they are
+the most defenceless of birds. They are timid, unresisting creatures,
+without strength or weapons; their movements arc less quick and vigorous
+than those of other kinds, and their flight is exceedingly feeble. The
+arboreal species flit at intervals from one tree to another; those that
+frequent thickets refuse to leave their chosen shelter; while those
+inhabiting grassy plains or marshes study concealment, and, when forced
+to rise, flutter away just above the surface, like flying-fish
+frightened from the water, and, when they have gone thirty or forty
+yards, dip into the grass or reeds again. Their life is thus one of
+perpetual danger in a far greater degree than with other passerine
+families, such as warblers, tyrants, finches, thrushes, &c.; while an
+exclusively insect diet, laboriously extracted from secret places, and
+inability to change their climate, contribute to make their existence a
+hard one. It has been with these birds as with human beings, bred in
+"misfortune's school," and subjected to keen competition. One of their
+most striking characteristics is a methodical, plodding, almost painful
+diligence of manner while seeking their food, so that when viewed side
+by side with other species, rejoicing in a gayer plumage and stronger
+flight, they seem like sober labourers that never rest among holiday
+people bent only on enjoyment. That they are able not only to maintain
+their existence, but to rise to the position of a dominant family, is
+due to an intelligence and adaptiveness exceeding that of other kinds,
+and which has been strengthened, and perhaps directly results from the
+hard conditions of their life.
+
+How great their adaptiveness and variability must be when we find that
+every portion of the South American continent is occupied by them; for
+there is really no climate, and no kind of soil or vegetation, which
+does not possess its appropriate species, modified in colour, form, and
+habits to suit the surrounding conditions. In the tropical region, so
+rich in bird life of all kinds, in forest, marsh, and savanna, they are
+everywhere abundant--food is plentiful there; but when we go to higher
+elevations avd cold sterile deserts, where their companion families of
+the tropics dwindle away and disappear, the creepers are still present,
+for they are evidently able to exist where other kinds would starve. On
+the stony plateaus of the Andes, and on the most barren spots in
+Patagonia, where no other bird is seen, there are small species of
+Synallaxis, which, in their obscure colour and motions on the ground,
+resemble mice rather than birds; indeed, the Quichua name for one of
+these Synallaxes is _ukatchtuka,_ or mouse-bird. How different is the
+life habit here from what we see in the tropical groups--the large birds
+with immense beaks, that run vertically on the trunks of the great
+forest trees!
+
+At the extreme southern extremity of the South American continent we
+find several species of Cin-clodes, seeking a subsistence like
+sandpipers on the beach; they also fly out to sea, and run about on the
+floating kelp, exploring the fronds for the small marine animals on
+which they live. In the dreary forests of Tierra del Fuego another
+creeper, Uxyurus, is by far the commonest bird. "Whether high up or low
+down, in the most gloomy, wet, and scarcely penetrable ravines," says
+Darwin, "this little bird is to be met with;" and Dr. Cunningham also
+relates that in these wintry, savage woods he was always attended in his
+walks by parties of these little creepers, which assembled to follow him
+out of curiosity.
+
+To birds placed at so great a disadvantage, by a feeble flight and other
+adverse circumstances, in the race of life bright colours would
+certainly prove fatal. It is true that brown is not in itself a
+protective colour, and the clear, almost silky browns and bright
+chestnut tints in several species are certainly not protective; but
+these species are sufficiently protected in other ways, and can afford
+to be without a strictly adaptive colour, so long as they are not
+conspicuous. In a majority of cases, however, the colour is undoubtedly
+protective, the brown hue being of a shade that assimilates very closely
+to the surroundings. There are pale yellowish browns, lined and mottled,
+in species living amidst a sere, scanty vegetation; earthy browns, in
+those frequenting open sterile or stony places; while the species that
+creep on trees in forests are dark brown in colour, and in many cases
+the feathers are mottled in such a manner as to make them curiously
+resemble the bark of a tree. The genera Lochmias and Sclerurus are the
+darkest, the plumage in these birds being nearly or quite black, washed
+or tinged with rhubarb yellow. Their black plumage would render them
+conspicuous in the sunshine, but they pass their lives in dense tropical
+forests, where the sun at noon sheds only a gloomy twilight.
+
+If "colour is ever tending to increase and to appear where it is
+absent," as Dr. Wallace believes, then we ought to find it varying in
+the direction of greater brightness in some species in a family so
+numerous and variable as the Dendrocolaptidae, however feeble and in
+need of a protective colouring these birds may be in a majority of
+pases. And this in effect we do find. In many of the dark-plumaged
+species that live in perpetual shade some parts are a very bright
+chestnut; while in a few that live in such close concealment as to be
+almost independent of protective colouring, the lower plumage has become
+pure white. A large number of species have a bright or nearly bright
+guiar spot. This is most remarkable in Synallaxis phryganophila, the
+chin being sulphur-yellow, beneath which is a spot of velvet-black, and
+on either side a white patch, the throat thus having three strongly
+contrasted colours, arranged in four divisions. The presence of this
+bright throat spot in so many species cannot very well be attributed to
+voluntary sexual selection, although believers in that theory are of
+course at liberty to imagine that when engaged in courtship, the male
+bird, or rather male and female both, as both sexes possess the spot,
+hold up their heads vertically to exhibit it. Perhaps it would be safer
+to look on it as a mere casual variation, which, like the exquisitely
+pencilled feathers and delicate tints on the concealed sides and under
+surfaces of the wings of many species possessing outwardly an obscure
+protective colouring, is neither injurious nor beneficial in any way,
+either to the birds or to the theory. It is more than probable, however,
+that in such small feeble-winged, persecuted birds, this spot of colour
+would prove highly dangerous on any conspicuous part of the body. In
+some of the more vigorous, active species, we can see a tendency towards
+a brighter colouring on large, exposed surfaces. In Auto-malus the tail
+is bright satiny rufous; in Pseudo-colaptes the entire under surface is
+rufous of a peculiar vivid tint, verging on orange or red; in Magarornis
+the bosom is black, and beautifully ornamented with small leaf-shaped
+spots of a delicate straw-colour. There are several other very pretty
+birds in this homely family; but the finest of all is Thripodectes
+flammulatus, the whole body being tortoise-shell colour, the wings and
+tail bright chesnut. The powerful tanager-like beak of this species
+seems also to show that it has diverged from its timid shade-loving
+congeners in another direction by becoming a seed and fruit eater.
+
+Probably the sober and generally protective colouring of the
+tree-creepers, even with the variability and adaptiveness displayed in
+their habits superadded, would be insufficient to preserve such feeble
+birds in the struggle of life without the further advantage derived from
+their wonderful nests. It has been said of domed nests that they are a
+danger rather than a protection, owing to their large size, which makes
+it easy for carnivorous species that prey on eggs and young birds to
+find them; while small open nests are usually well concealed. This may
+be the case with covered nests made of soft materials, loosely put
+together; but it cannot be said of the solid structure the tree-creeper
+bnilds, and which, as often as not, the bird erects in the most
+conspicuous place it can find, as if, writes Azara, it desired all the
+world to admire its work. The annual destruction of adult birds is very
+great--more than double that, I believe, which takes place in other
+passerine families. Their eggs and young are, however, practically safe
+in their great elaborate nests or deep burrows, and, as a rule, they lay
+more eggs than other kinds, the full complement being seldom less than
+five in the species I am acquainted with, while some lay as many as
+nine. Their nests are also made so as to keep out a greater pest than
+their carnivorous or egg-devouring enemies--namely, the parasitical
+starlings (Molo-thrus), which are found throughout South America, and
+are excessively abundant and destructive to birds' nests in some
+districts. In most cases, in the big, strong-domed nest or deep burrow,
+all the eggs are hatched and all the young reared, the thinning, out
+process commencing only after the brood has been led forth into a world
+beset with perils. With other families, on the contrary, the greatest
+amount of destruction falls on the eggs or fledglings. I have frequently
+kept a dozen or twenty pairs of different species--warblers, finches,
+tyrants, starlings, &c.--under observation during the breeding season,
+and have found that in some cases no young-were reared at all; in other
+cases one or two young; while, as often as not, the young actually
+reared were only parasitical starlings after all.
+
+I have still to speak of the voice of the tree-creepers, an important
+point in the study of these birds; for, though not accounted singers,
+some species emit remarkable sounds; moreover, language in birds is
+closely related to the social instinct. They seem to be rather solitary
+than gregarious; and this seems only natural in birds so timid,
+weak-winged, and hard pressed. It would also be natural to conclude from
+what has been said concerning their habits that they are comparatively
+silent; for, as a rule, vigorous social birds are loquacious and
+loud-voiced, while shy solitary kinds preservo silence, except in the
+love season. Nevertheless the creepers are loquacious and have loud
+resonant voices; this fact, however, does not really contradict a
+well-known principle, for the birds possess the social disposition in an
+eminent degree, only the social habit is kept down in them by the
+conditions of a life which makes solitude necessary. Thus, a large
+proportion of species are found to pair for life; and the only
+reasonable explanation of this habit in birds--one which is not very
+common in the mammalia--is that such species possess the social temper
+or feeling, and live in pairs only because they cannot afford to live in
+flocks. Strictly gregarious species pair only for the breeding season.
+In the creepers the attachment between the birds thus mated for life is
+very great, and, as Azara truly says of Anumbius, so fond of each
+other's society are these birds, that when one incubates the other sits
+at the entrance to the nest, and when one carries food to its young the
+other accompanies it, even if it has found nothing to cany. In these
+species that live in pairs, when the two birds are separated they are
+perpetually calling to each other, showing how impatient of solitude
+they are; while even from the more solitary kind, a high-pitched
+call-note is constantly heard in the woods, for these birds, debarred
+from associating together, satisfy their instinct by conversing with one
+another over long distances.
+
+The foregoing remarks apply to the Dendrocolap-tidae throughout the
+temperate countries of South America--the birds inhabiting extensive
+grassy plains and marshes, and districts with a scanty or scattered tree
+and bush vegetation. In the forest areas of the hotter regions it is
+different; there the birds form large gatherings or "wandering bands,"
+composed of all the different species found in each district, associated
+with birds of other families--wood-peckers, tyrant-birds, bush shrikes,
+and many others. These miscellaneous gatherings are not of rare
+occurrence, but out of the breeding season are formed daily, the birds
+beginning to assemble at about nine or ten o'clock in the morning,
+their number increasing through the day until it reaches its maximum
+between two and four o'clock in the afternoon, after which it begins to
+diminish, each bird going off to its customary shelter or
+dwelling-place. Mr. Bates, who first described these wandering bands,
+says that he could always find the particular band belonging to a
+district any day he wished, for when he failed to meet with it in one
+part of the forest he would try other paths, until he eventually found
+it. The great Amazonian forests, he tells us, appear strangely silent
+and devoid of bird life, and it is possible to ramble about for whole
+days without seeing or hearing birds. But now and then the surrounding
+trees and bushes appear suddenly swarming with them. "The bustling
+crowd loses no time, and, always moving in concert, each bird is
+occupied on its own account in searching bark, or leaf, or twig. In a
+few moments the host is gone, and the forest path remains deserted and
+silent as before." Stolzmann, who observed them in Peru, says that the
+sound caused by the busy crowd searching through the foliage, and the
+falling of dead leaves and twigs, resembles that produced by a shower of
+rain. The Indians of the Amazons, Mr. Bates writes, have a curious
+belief to explain these bird armies; they say that the Papa-uira,
+supposed to be a small grey bird, fascinates all the others, and leads
+them on a weary perpetual dance through the forest. It seems very
+wonderful that birds, at other times solitary, should thus combine daily
+in large numbers, including in their bands scores of widely different
+species, and in size ranging from those no larger than a wren to others
+as big as a magpie. It is certainly very advantageous to them. As Belt
+remarks, they play into each other's hands; for while the larger
+creepers explore the trunks of big trees, others run over the branches
+and cling to the lesser twigs, so that every tree in their route, from
+its roots to the topmost foliage, is thoroughly examined, and every
+spider and caterpillar taken, while the winged insects, driven from
+their lurking-places, are seized where they settle, or caught flying by
+the tyrant birds.
+
+I have observed the wandering bands only in Patagonia, where they are on
+a very small scale compared with those of the tropical forests. In the
+Patagonia thickets the small tit-like creeper, Laptas-thenura, is the
+prime mover; and after a considerable number of these have gathered,
+creepers of other species and genera unite with them, and finally the
+band, as it moves through the thickets, draws to itself other
+kinds--flycatchers, finches, &c.--many of the birds running or hopping
+on the ground to search for insects in the loose soil or under dead
+leaves, while others explore the thorny bushes. My observations of these
+small bands lead me to believe that everywhere in South America the
+Dendrocolaptidae are the first in combining to act in concert, and that
+the birds of other families follow their march and associate with them,
+knowing from experience that a rich harvest may be thus reaped. In the
+same way birds of various kinds follow the movements of a column of
+hunting ants, to catch the insects flying up from the earth to escape
+from their enemies; swallows also learn to keep company with the
+traveller on horseback, and, crossing and recrossing just before the
+hoofs, they catch the small twilight moths driven up from the grass.
+
+To return to the subject of voice. The tree-creepers do not possess
+melodious, or at any rate mellow notes, although in so numerous a family
+there is great variety of tone, ranging from a small reedy voice like
+the faint stridulation of a grasshopper, to the resounding,
+laughter-like, screaming concerts of Homorus, which may be heard
+distinctly two miles away. As a rule, the notes are loud ringing calls;
+and in many species the cry, rapidly reiterated, resembles a peal of
+laughter. With scarcely an exception, they possess no set song; but in
+most species that live always in pairs there are loud, vehement,
+gratulatory notes uttered by the two birds in concert when they meet
+after a brief separation. This habit they possess in common with birds
+of other families, as, for instance, the tyrants; but, in some creepers,
+out of this confused outburst of joyous sound has been developed a.
+musical performance very curious, and perhaps unique among birds. On
+meeting, the male and female, standing close together and facing each
+other, utter their clear ringing concert, one emitting loud single
+measured notes, while the notes of its fellow are rapid, rhythmical
+triplets; their voices have a joyous character, and seem to accord, thus
+producing a kind of harmony. This manner of singing is perhaps most
+perfect in the oven-bird, Furnarias, and it is very curious that the
+young birds, when only partially fledged, are constantly heard in the
+nest or oven apparently practising these duets in the intervals when the
+parents are absent; single measured notes, triplets, and long concluding
+trills are all repeated with wonderful fidelity, although these notes
+are in character utterly unlike the hunger cry, which is like that of
+other fledglings. I cannot help thinking that this fact of the young
+birds beginning to sing like the adults, while still confined in their
+dark cradle, is one of very considerable significance, especially when
+we consider the singular character of the performance; and that it might
+even be found to throw some light on the obscure question of the
+comparative antiquity of the different and widely separated
+Dendrocolaptine groups. It is a doctrine in evolutionary science that
+the early maturing of instincts in the young indicates a high antiquity
+for the species or group; and there is no reason why this principle
+should not be extended, in the case of birds at any rate, to language.
+It is true that Daines Barrington's notion that young song-birds learn
+to sing only by imitating the adults still holds its ground; and Darwin
+gives it his approval in his _Descent of Man._ It is perhaps one of
+those doctrines which are partially true, or which do not contain the
+whole truth; and it is possible to believe that, while many singing
+birds do so learn their songs, or acquire a greater proficiency in them
+from hearing the adults, in other species the song comes instinctively,
+and is, like other instincts and habits, purely an "inherited memory."
+
+The case of a species in another order of birds--Crypturi--strikes me as
+being similar to this of the oven-bird, and seems to lend some force to
+the suggestion I have made concerning the early development of voice in
+the young.
+
+Birds peculiar to South America are said by anatomists to be less
+specialized, lower, more ancient, than the birds of the northern
+continents, and among those which are considered lowest and most ancient
+are the Tinamous (rail and partridge like in their habits), birds that
+lead a solitary, retiring life, and in most cases have sweet melancholy
+voices. Rhynchotus rufescens, a bird the size of a fowl, inhabiting the
+pampas, is perhaps the sweetest-voiced, and sings with great frequency.
+Its song or call is heard oftenest towards the evening, and is composed
+of five modulated notes, flute-like in character, very expressive, and
+uttered by many individuals answering each other as they sit far apart
+concealed in the grass. As we might have expected, the faculties and
+instincts of the young of this species mature at a very early period;
+when extremely small, they abandon their parents to shift for themselves
+in solitude; and when not more than one-fourth the size they eventually
+attain, they acquire the adult plumage and are able to fly as well as an
+old bird. I observed a young bird of this species, less than a quail in
+size, at a house on the pampas, and was told that it had been taken from
+the nest when just breaking the shell; it had, therefore, never seen or
+heard the parent birds. Yet this small chick, every day at the approach
+of evening, would retire to the darkest corner of the dining room, and,
+concealed under a piece of furniture, would continue uttering its
+evening song for an hour or longer at short intervals, and rendering it
+so perfectly that I was greatly surprised to hear it; for a thrush or
+other songster at the same period of life, when attempting to sing, only
+produces a chirping sound.
+
+The early singing of the oven-bird fledgling is important, owing to the
+fact that the group it belongs to comprises the least specialized forms
+in the family. They are strong-legged, square-tailed, terrestrial birds,
+generally able to perch, have probing beaks, and build the most perfect
+mud or stick nests, or burrow in the ground. In the numerous
+tree-creeping groups, which, seem as unrelated to the oven-bird as the
+woodpecker is to the hoopoe, we find a score of wonderfully different
+forms of beak; but many of them retain the probing character, and are
+actually used to probe in rotten wood on trees, and to explore the holes
+and deep crevices in the trunk. We have also seen that some of these
+tree-creepers revert to the ancestral habit (if I may so call it) of
+seeking their food by probing in the soil. In others, like Dendrornis,
+in which the beak has lost this character, and is used to dig in the
+wood or to strip off the bark, it has not been highly specialized, and,
+compared with the woodpecker's beak, is a very imperfect organ,
+considering the purpose for which it is used. Yet, on the principle that
+"similar functional requirements frequently lead to the development of
+similar structures in animals which are otherwise very distinct"--as we
+see in the tubular tongue in honey-eaters and humming birds--we might
+have expected to find in the Dendrocolaptidae a better imitation of the
+woodpecker in so variable an organ as the beak, if not in the tongue.
+
+Probably the oven-birds, and their nearest relations--generalized,
+hardy, builders of strong nests, and prolific--represent the parental
+form; and when birds of this type had spread over the entire continent
+they became in different districts frequenters of marshes, forests,
+thickets and savannas. With altered life-habits the numerous divergent
+forms originated; some, like Xiphorynchus, retaining a probing beak in a
+wonderfully modified form, attenuated in an extreme degree, and bent
+like a sickle; others diverging more in the direction of nuthatches and
+woodpeckers.
+
+This sketch of the Dendrocolaptidae, necessarily slight and imperfect,
+is based on a knowledge of the habits of about sixty species, belonging
+to twenty-eight genera: from personal observation I am acquainted with
+less than thirty species. It is astonishing to find how little has been
+written about these most interesting birds in South America. One
+tree-creeper only, Furnarius rufus, the oven-bird _par excellence,_ has
+been mentioned, on account of its wonderful architecture, in almost
+every general work of natural history published during the present
+century; yet the oven-bird does not surpass, or even equal in interest,
+many others in this family of nearly three hundred members.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+
+In reading books of Natural History we meet with numerous instances of
+birds possessing the habit of assembling together, in many cases always
+at the same spot, to indulge in antics and dancing performances, with or
+without the accompaniment of music, vocal or instrumental; and by
+instrumental music is here meant all sounds other than vocal made
+habitually and during the more or less orderly performances; as, for
+instance, drumming and tapping noises; smiting of wings; and humming,
+whip-cracking, fan-shutting, grinding, scraping, and horn-blowing
+sounds, produced as a rule by the quills.
+
+There are human dances, in which only one person performs at a time, the
+rest of the company looking on; and some birds, in widely separated
+genera, have dances of this kind. A striking example is the Rupicola, or
+cock of-the-rock, of tropical South America. A mossy level spot of earth
+surrounded by bushes is selected for a dancing-place, and kept well
+cleared of sticks and stones; round this area the birds assemble, when a
+cock-bird, with vivid orange-scarlet crest and plumage, steps into it,
+and, with spreading wings and tail, begins a series of movements as if
+dancing a minuet; finally, carried away with excitement, he leaps and
+gyrates in the most astonishing manner, until, becoming exhausted, he
+retires, and another bird takes his place.
+
+In other species all the birds in a company unite in the set
+performances, and seem to obey an impulse which affects them
+simultaneously and in the same degree; but sometimes one bird prompts
+the others and takes a principal part. One of the most curious instances
+I have come across in reading is contained in Mr. Bigg-Wither's
+_Pioneering in South Brazil._ He relates that one morning in the dense
+forest his attention was roused by the unwonted sound of a bird
+singing--songsters being rare in that district. His men, immediately
+they caught the sound, invited him to follow them, hinting that he would
+probably witness a very curious sight. Cautiously making their way
+through the dense undergrowth, they finally came in sight of a small
+stony spot of ground, at the end of a tiny glade; and on this spot, some
+on the stone and some on the shrubs, were assembled a number of little
+birds, about the size of tom-tits, with lovely blue plumage and red
+top-knots. One was perched quite still on a twig, singing merrily, while
+the others were keeping time with wings and feet in a kind of dance, and
+all twittering an accompaniment. He watched them for some time, and was
+satisfied that they were having a ball and concert, and thoroughly
+enjoying themselves; they then became alarmed, and the performance
+abruptly terminated, the birds all going off in different directions.
+The natives told him that these little creatures were known as the
+"dancing birds."
+
+This species was probably solitary, except when assembling for the
+purpose of display; but in a majority of cases, especially in the
+Passerine order, the solitary species performs its antics alone, or with
+no witness but its mate. Azara, describing a small finch, which he aptly
+named _Oscilador,_ says that early and late in the day it mounts up
+vertically to a moderate height; then, flies off to a distance of
+twenty yards, describing a perfect curve in its passage; turning, it
+flies back over the imaginary line it has traced, and so on repeatedly,
+appearing like a pendulum swung in space by an invisible thread.
+
+Those who seek to know the cause and origin of this kind of display and
+of song in animals are referred to Darwin's _Descent of Man_ for an
+explanation. The greater part of that work is occupied with a laborious
+argument intended to prove that the love-feeling inspires the animals
+engaged in these exhibitions, and that sexual selection, or the
+voluntary selection of mates by the females, is the final cause of all
+set musical and dancing performances, as well as of bright and
+harmonious colouring, and of ornaments.
+
+The theory, with regard to birds is, that in the love-season, when the
+males are excited and engage in courtship, the females do not fall to
+the strongest and most active, nor to those that are first in the field;
+but that in a large number of species they are endowed with a faculty
+corresponding to the aesthetic feeling or taste in man, and deliberately
+select males for their superiority in some aesthetic quality, such as
+graceful or fantastic motions, melody of voice, brilliancy of colour, or
+perfection of ornaments. Doubtless all birds were originally
+plain-coloured, without ornaments and without melody, and it is assumed
+that so it would always have been in many cases but for the action of
+this principle, which, like natural selection, has gone on accumulating
+countless small variations, tending to give a greater lustre to the
+species in each case, and resulting in all that we most admire in the
+animal world--the Rupicola's flame-coloured mantle, the peacock's crest
+and starry train, the joyous melody of the lark, and the pretty or
+fantastic dancing performances of birds.
+
+My experience is that mammals and birds, with few exceptions--probably
+there are really no exceptions--possess the habit of indulging
+frequently in more or less regular or set performances, with or without
+sound, or composed of sound exclusively; and that these performances,
+which in many animals are only discordant cries and choruses,
+and uncouth, irregular motions, in the more aerial, graceful, and
+melodious kinds take immeasurably higher, more complex, and more
+beautiful forms. Among the mammalians the instinct appears
+almost universal; but their displays are, as a rule, less admirable than
+those seen in birds. There are some kinds, it is true, like the
+squirrels and monkeys, of arboreal habits, almost birdlike in their
+restless energy, and in the swiftness and certitude of their motions, in
+which the slightest impulse can be instantly expressed in graceful or
+fantastic action; others, like the Chinchillidae family, have greatly
+developed vocal organs, and resemble birds in loquacity; but mammals
+generally, compared with birds, are slow and heavy, and not so readily
+moved to exhibitions of the kind I am discussing.
+
+The terrestrial dances, often very elaborate, of heavy birds, like those
+of the gallinaceous kind, are represented in the more volatile species
+by performances in the air, and these are very much more beautiful;
+while a very large number of birds--hawks, vultures, swifts, swallows,
+nightjars, storks, ibises, spoonbills, and gulls--circle about in the
+air, singly or in flocks. Sometimes, in serene weather, they rise to a
+vast altitude, and float about in one spot for an hour or longer at a
+stretch, showing a faint bird-cloud in the blue, that does not change
+its form, nor grow lighter and denser like a flock of starlings; but in
+the seeming confusion there is perfect order, and amidst many hundreds
+each swift- or slow-gliding figure keeps its proper distance with such
+exactitude that no two ever touch, even with the extremity of the
+long-wings, flapping or motionless:--such a multitude, and such
+miraculous precision in the endless curving motions of all the members
+of it, that the spectator can lie for an hour on his back without
+weariness watching this mystic cloud-dance in the empyrean.
+
+The black-faced ibis of Patagonia, a bird nearly as large as a turkey,
+indulges in a curious mad performance, usually in the evening when
+feeding-time is over. The birds of a flock, while winging their way to
+the roosting-place, all at once seem possessed with frenzy,
+simultaneously dashing downwards with amazing violence, doubling about
+in the most eccentric manner; and when close to the surface rising again
+to repeat the action, all the while making the air palpitate for miles
+around with their hard, metallic cries. Other ibises, also birds of
+other genera, have similar aerial performances.
+
+The displays of most ducks known to me take the form of mock fights on
+the water; one exception is the handsome and loquacious whistling
+widgeon of La Plata, which has a pretty aerial performance. A dozen or
+twenty birds rise up until they appear like small specks in the sky, and
+sometimes disappear from sight altogether; and at that great altitude
+they continue hovering in one spot, often for an hour or longer,
+alternately closing and separating; the fine, bright, whistling notes
+and flourishes of the male curiously harmonizing with the grave,
+measured notes of the female; and every time they close they slap each
+other on the wings so smartly that the sound can be distinctly heard,
+like applauding hand-claps, even after the birds have ceased to be
+visible.
+
+The rails, active, sprightly birds with powerful and varied voices, are
+great performers; but owing to the nature of the ground they inhabit and
+to their shy, suspicious character, it is not easy to observe their
+antics. The finest of the Platan rails is the ypecaha, a beautiful,
+active bird about the size of the fowl. A number of ypecahas have their
+assembling place on a small area of smooth, level ground, just above the
+water, and hemmed in by dense rush beds. First, one bird among the
+rushes emits a powerful cry, thrice repeated; and this is a note of
+invitation, quickly responded to by other birds from all sides as they
+hurriedly repair to the usual place. In a few moments they appear, to
+the number of a dozen or twenty, bursting from the rushes and running
+into the open space, and instantly beginning the performance. This is a
+tremendous screaming concert. The screams they utter have a certain
+resemblance to the human voice, exerted to its utmost pitch and
+expressive of extreme terror, frenzy, and despair. A long, piercing
+shriek, astonishing for its vehemence and power, is succeeded by a lower
+note, as if in the first the creature had well nigh exhausted itself:
+this double scream is repeated several times, and followed by other
+sounds, resembling, as they rise and fall, half smothered cries of pains
+and moans of anguish. Suddenly the unearthly shrieks are renewed in all
+their power. While screaming the birds rush from side to side, as if
+possessed with madness, the wings spread and vibrating, the long-beak
+wide open and raised vertically. This exhibition lasts three or four
+minntes, after which the assembly peacefully breaks up.
+
+The singular wattled, wing-spurred, and long-, toed jacana has a
+remarkable performance, which seems specially designed to bring out the
+concealed beauty of the silky, greenish-golden wing-quills-The birds go
+singly or in pairs, and a dozen or fifteen individuals may be found in a
+marshy place feeding within sight of each other. Occasionally, in
+response to a note of invitation, they all in a moment leave off feeding
+and fly to one spot, and, forming a close cluster, and emitting short,
+excited, rapidly repeated notes, display their wings, like beautiful
+flags grouped loosely together: some hold the wings up vertically and
+motionless; others, half open and vibrating rapidly, while still others
+wave them up and down with a slow, measured motion.
+
+In the ypecaha and jacana displays both sexes take part. A stranger
+performance is that of the spur-winged lapwing of the same region--a
+species resembling the lapwing of Europe, but a third larger, brighter
+coloured, and armed with spurs. The lapwing display, called by the
+natives its "dance," or "serious dance"--by which they mean square
+dance--requires three birds for its performance, and is, so far as I
+know, unique in this respect. The birds are so fond of it that they
+indulge in it all the year round, and at frequent intervals during the
+day, also on moonlight nights. If a person watches any two birds for
+some time--for they live in pairs--he will see another lapwing, one of a
+neighbouring couple, rise up and fly to them, leaving his own mate to
+guard their chosen ground; and instead of resenting this visit as an
+unwarranted intrusion on their domain, as they would certainly resent
+the approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it with notes and
+signs of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place themselves
+behind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid march, uttering
+resonant drumming notes in time with their movements; the notes of the
+pair behind being emitted in a stream, like a drum-roll, while the
+leader utters loud single notes at regular intervals. The march ceases;
+the leader elevates his wings and stands erect and motionless, still
+uttering loud notes; while the other two, with puffed-out plumage and
+standing exactly abreast stoop forward and downward until the tips of
+their beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their rhythmical voices to a
+murmur, remain for some time in this posture. The performance is then
+over and the visitor goes back to his own ground and mate, to receive a
+visitor himself later on.
+
+In the Passerine order, not the least remarkable displays are witnessed
+in birds that are not accounted songsters, as they do not possess the
+highly developed vocal organ confined to the suborder Oscines. The
+tyrant-birds, which represent in South America the fly-catchers of the
+Old World, all have displays of some kind; in a vast majority of cases
+these are simply joyous, excited duets between male and female, composed
+of impetuous and more or less confused notes and screams, accompanied
+with beating of wings and other gestures. In some species choruses take
+the place of duets, while in others entirely different forms of display
+have been developed. In one group--Cnipolegus--the male indulges in
+solitary antics, while the silent, modest-coloured female keeps in
+hiding. Thus, the male of Cnipolegus Hudsoni, an intensely
+black-plumaged species with a concealed white wing-band, takes his stand
+on a dead twig on the summit of a bush. At intervals he leaves his
+perch, displaying the intense white on the quills, and producing, as the
+wings are thrown open and shut alternately, the effect of successive
+flashes of light. Then suddenly the bird begins revolving in the air
+about its perch, like a moth wheeling round and close to the flame of a
+candle, emitting a series of sharp clicks and making a loud humming with
+the wings. While performing this aerial waltz the black and white on the
+quills mix, the wings appearing like a grey mist encircling the body.
+The fantastic dance over, the bird drops suddenly on to its perch again;
+and, until moved to another display, remains as stiff and motionless as
+a bird carved out of jet.
+
+The performance of the scissors-tail, another tyrant-bird, is also
+remarkable. This species is grey and white, with black head and tail and
+a crocus-yellow crest. On the wing it looks like a large swallow, but
+with the two outer tail-feathers a foot long. The scissors-tails always
+live in pairs, but at sunset several pairs assemble, the birds calling
+excitedly to each other; they then mount upwards, like rockets, to a
+great height in the anand, after wheeling about for a few moments,
+pro-cipitate themselves downwards with amazing violence in a wild
+zigzag, opening and shutting the long tail-feathers like a pair of
+shears, and producing loud whirring sounds, as of clocks being wound
+rapidly up, with a slight pause after each turn of the key. This aerial
+dance over, they alight in separate couples on the tree tops, each
+couple joining in a kind of duet of rapidly repeated, castanet-like
+sounds.
+
+The displays of the wood-hewers, or Dendrocolap-tidae, another extensive
+family, resemble those of the tyrant-birds in being chiefly duets, male
+and female singing excitedly in piercing or resonant voices, and with
+much action. The habit varies somewhat in the cachalote, a Patagonian
+species of the genus Homorus, about the size of the missel-thrush. Old
+and young birds live in a family together, and at intervals, on any fine
+day, they engage in a grand screaming contest, which may be heard
+distinctly at a distance of a mile and a half. One bird mounts on to a
+bush and calls, and instantly all the others hurry to the spot, and
+burst out into a chorus of piercing cries that sound like peals and
+shrieks of insane laughter. After the chorus, they all pursue each other
+wildly about among the bushes for some minutes.
+
+In some groups the usual duet-like performances have developed into a
+kind of harmonious singing, which is very curious and pleasant to hear.
+This is pre-eminently the case with the oven-birds, as D'Orbigney first
+remarked. Thus, in the red oven-bird, the first bird, on the appearance
+of its mate flying to join it, begins to emit loud, measured notes, and
+sometimes a continuous trill, somewhat metallic in sound; but
+immediately on the other bird striking in this introductory passage is
+changed to triplets, strongly accented on the first note, in a _tempo
+vivace;_ while the second bird utters loud single notes in the same
+time. While thus singing they stand facing each other, necks
+outstretched and tails expanded, the wings of the first bird vibrating
+rapidly to the rapid utterance, while those of the second bird beat
+measured time. The finale consists of three or four notes, uttered by
+the second bird alone, strong and clear, in an ascending scale, the last
+very piercing.
+
+In the melodists proper the displays, in a majority of cases, are
+exclusively vocal, the singer sitting still on his perch. In the
+Troupials, a family of starling-like birds numbering about one hundred
+and forty species, there are many that accompany singing with pretty or
+grotesque antics. The male screaming cow-bird of La Plata, when perched,
+emits a hollow-sounding internal note that swells at the end into a
+sharp metallic ring, almost bell-like: this is uttered with wings and
+tail spread and depressed, the whole plumage being puffed out as in a
+strutting turkey-cock, while the bird hops briskly up and down on its
+perch as if dancing. The bell-like note of the male is followed by an
+impetuous scream from the female, and the dance ends. Another species,
+the common Argentine cow-bird of La Plata, when courting puffs out his
+glossy rich violet plumage, and, with wings vibrating, emits a
+succession of deep internal notes, followed by a set song in clear,
+ringing tones; and then, suddenly taking wing, he flies straight away,
+close to the surface, fluttering like a moth, and at a distance of
+twenty to thirty yards turns and flies in a wide circle round the
+female, singing loudly all the time, hedging her in with melody as it
+were.
+
+Many songsters in widely different families possess the habit of soaring
+and falling alternately while singing, and in some cases all the aerial
+postures and movements, the swift or slow descent, vertical, often, with
+oscillations, or in a spiral, and sometimes with a succession of smooth
+oblique lapses, seem to have an admirable correspondence with the
+changing and falling voice--melody and motion being united in a more
+intimate and beautiful way than in the most perfect and poetic forms of
+human dancing.
+
+One of the soaring singers is a small yellow field-finch of La
+Plata--Sycalis luteola; and this species, like some others, changes the
+form of its display with the seasons. It lives in immense flocks, and
+during the cold season it has, like most finches, only aerial pastimes,
+the birds wheeling about in a cloud, pursuing each other with lively
+chirpings. In August, when the trees begin to blossom, the flock betakes
+itself to a plantation, and, sitting on the branches, the birds sing in
+a concert of innumerable voices, producing a great volume of sound, as
+of a high wind when heard at a distance. Heard near, it is a great mass
+of melody; not a confused tangle of musical sounds as when a host of
+Troupials sing in concert, but the notes, although numberless, seem to
+flow smoothly and separately, producing an effect on the ear similar to
+that which rain does on the sight, when the sun shines on and lightens
+up the myriads of falling drops all falling one way. In this manner the
+birds sing for hours, without intermission, every day. Then the passion
+of love infects them; the pleasant choir breaks up, and its ten thousand
+members scatter wide over the surrounding fields and pasture lands.
+During courtship the male has a feeble, sketchy music, but his singing
+is then accompanied with very charming love antics. His circlings about
+the hen-bird; his numberless advances and retreats, and little soarings
+above her when his voice swells with importunate passion; his fluttering
+lapses back to earth, where he lies prone with outspread, tremulous
+wings, a suppliant at her feet, his languishing voice meanwhile dying
+down to lispings--all these apt and graceful motions seem to express the
+very sickness of the heart. But the melody during this emotional period
+is nothing. After the business of pairing and nest-building is over, his
+musical displays take a new and finer form. He sits perched on a stalk
+above the grass, and at intervals soars up forty or fifty yards high;
+rising, he utters a series of long melodious notes; then he descends in
+a graceful spiral, the set of the motionless wings giving him the
+appearance of a slowly-falling parachute; the voice then also falls, the
+notes coming lower, sweeter, and more expressive until he reaches the
+surface. After alighting the song continues, the strains becoming
+longer, thinner, and clearer, until they dwindle to the finest threads
+of sound and faintest tinklings, as from a cithern touched by fairy
+fingers. The great charm of the song is in this slow gradation from the
+somewhat throaty notes emitted by the bird when ascendino-to the
+excessively attenuated sounds at the close.
+
+In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one species more--the
+white-banded mocking-bird of Patagonia, which greatly excels all other
+songsters known to me in the copiousness, variety and brilliant
+character of its music. Concealed in the foliage this bird will sing by
+the half-hour, reproducing with miraculous fidelity the more or less
+melodious set songs of a score of species--a strange and beautiful
+performance; but wonderful as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceases
+to admire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, as if to show by
+contrast his unapproachable superiority, bursts into his own divine
+song, uttered with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, but
+greatly exceeding, that of the skylark "singing at heaven's gate;" the
+notes issuing in a continuous torrent; the voice so brilliant and
+infinitely varied, that if "rivalry and emulation" have as large a place
+in feathered breasts as some imagine all that hear this surpassing
+melody might well languish ever after in silent despair.
+
+In a vast majority of the finest musical performances the same notes are
+uttered in the same order, and after an interval the song is repeated
+without any variation: and it seems impossible that we could in any
+other way have such beautiful contrasts and harmonious lights and
+shades--the whole song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played in
+tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in the mocking-bird's
+song: the notes never come in the same order again and again, but, as if
+inspired, in a changed order, with variations and new sounds: and here
+again it has some resemblance to the skylark's song, and might be
+described as the lark's song with endless variations and brightened and
+spiritualized in a degree that cannot be imagined.
+
+This mocking-bird is one of those species that accompany music with
+appropriate motions. And just as its song is, so to speak, inspired and
+an im-provization, unlike any song the bird has ever uttered, so its
+motions all have the same character of spontaneity, and follow no order,
+and yet have a grace and passion and a perfect harmony with the music
+unparalleled among birds possessing a similar habit. While singing he
+passes from bush to bush, sometimes delaying a few moments on and at
+others just touching the summits, and at times sinking out of sight in
+the foliage: then, in an access of rapture, soaring vertically to a
+height of a hundred feet, with measured wing-beats, like those of a
+heron: or, mounting suddenly in a wild, hurried zigzag, then slowly
+circling downwards, to sit at last with tail outspread fanwise, and
+vans, glistening white in the sunshine, expanded and vibrating, or waved
+languidly up and down, with, a motion like that of some broad-winged
+butterfly at rest on a flower.
+
+I wish now to put this question: What relation that we can see or
+imagine to the passion of love and the business of courtship, have these
+dancing and vocal performances in nine cases out of ten? In such cases,
+for instance, as that of the scissors-tail tyrant-bird, and its
+pyrotechnic evening displays, when a number of couples leave their nests
+containing eggs and young to join in a wild aerial dance: the mad
+exhibitions of ypecahas and ibises, and the jacanas' beautiful
+exhibition of grouped wings: the triplet dances of the spur-winged
+lapwing, to perform which two birds already mated are compelled to call
+in a third bird to complete the set: the harmonious duets of the
+oven-birds, and the duets and choruses of nearly all the wood-hewers,
+and the wing-slapping aerial displays of the whistling widgeons--will it
+be seriously contended that the female of this species makes choice of
+the male able to administer the most vigorous and artistic slaps?
+
+The believer in the theory would put all these cases lightly aside, to
+cite that of the male cow-bird practising antics before the female and
+drawing a wide circle of melody round her; or that of the jet-black,
+automaton-like, dancing tyrant-bird; and concerning this species he
+would probably say that the plain-plumaged female went about unseen,
+critically watching the dancing of different males, to discover the most
+excellent performer according to the traditional standard. And this was,
+in substance, what Darwin did. There are many species in which the male,
+singly or with others, practises antics or sings during the love-season
+before the female; and when all such cases, or rather those that are
+most striking and bizarre, are brought together, and when it is
+gratuitously asserted that the females _do_ choose the males that show
+off in the best manner or that sing best, a case for sexual selection
+seems to be made out. How unfair the argument is, based on these
+carefully selected cases gathered from all regions of the globe, and
+often not properly reported, is seen when we turn from the book to
+nature and closely consider the habits and actions of all the species
+inhabiting any _one_ district. We see then that such cases as those
+described and made so much of in the _Descent of Man,_ and cases like
+those mentioned in this chapter, are not essentially different in
+character, but are manifestations of one instinct, which appears to be
+almost universal among the animals. The explanation I have to offer lies
+very much on the surface and is very simple indeed, and, like that of
+Dr. Wallace with regard [Footnote: It is curious to find that Dr.
+Wallace's idea about colour has been independently hit upon by Ruskin.
+Of stones he writes in _Frondes Agrestis_:--"I have often had occasion
+to allude to the apparent connection of brilliancy of colour with vigour
+of life and purity of substance. This is pre-eminently the case in the
+mineral kingdom. The perfection with which the particles of any
+substance unite in crystallization, corresponds in that kingdom to the
+vital power in organic nature."] to colour and ornaments covers the
+whole of the facts. We see that the inferior animals, when the
+conditions of life are favourable, are subject to periodical fits of
+gladness affecting them powerfully and standing out in vivid contrast to
+their ordinary temper. And we know what this feeling is--this periodic
+intense elation which even civilized man occasionally experiences when
+in perfect health, more especially when young. There are moments when
+he is mad with joy, when he cannot keep still, when his impulse is to
+sing and shout aloud and laugh at nothing, to run and leap and exert
+himself in some extravagant way. Among the heavier mammalians the
+feeling is manifested in loud noises, bellowings and screamings, and in
+lumbering, uncouth motions--throwing up of heels, pretended panics, and
+ponderous mock battles.
+
+In smaller and livelier animals, with greater celerity and certitude in
+their motions, the feeling shows itself in more regular and often in
+more complex ways. Thus, Felidae when young, and, in very agile,
+sprightly species like the Puma, throughout life, simulate all the
+actions of an animal hunting its prey--sudden, intense excitement of
+discovery, concealment, gradual advance, masked by intervening objects,
+with intervals of watching, when they crouch motionless, the eyes
+flashing and tail waved from side to side; finally, the rush and spring,
+when the playfellow is captured, rolled over on his back and worried to
+imaginary death. Other species of the most diverse kinds, in which voice
+is greatly developed, join in noisy concerts and choruses; many of the
+cats may be mentioned, also dogs and foxes, capybaras and other
+loquacious rodents; and in the howling monkeys this kind of performance
+rises to the sublime uproar of the tropical forest at eventide.
+
+Birds are more subject to this universal joyous instinct than mammals,
+and there are times when some species are constantly overflowing with
+it; and as they are so much freer than mammals, more buoyant and
+graceful in action, more loquacious, and have voices so much finer,
+their gladness shows itself in a greater variety of ways, with more
+regular and beautiful motions, and with melody. But every species, or
+group of species, has its own inherited form or style of performance;
+and, however rude and irregular this may be, as in the case of the
+pretended stampedes and fights of wild cattle, that is the form in which
+the feeling will always be expressed. If all men, at some exceedingly
+remote period in their history, had agreed to express the common glad
+impulse, which they now express in such an infinite variety of ways or
+do not express at all, by dancing a minuet, and minuet-dancing had at
+last come to be instinctive, and taken to spontaneously by children at
+an early period, just as they take to walking "on their hind legs,"
+man's case would be like that of the inferior animals.
+
+I was one day watching a flock of plovers, quietly feeding on the
+ground, when, in a moment, all the birds were seized by a joyous
+madness, and each one, after making a vigorous peck at his nearest
+neighbour, began running wildly about, each trying in passing to peck
+other birds, while seeking by means of quick doublings to escape being
+pecked in turn. This species always expresses its glad impulse in the
+same way; but how different in form is this simple game of
+touch-who-touch-can from the triplet dances of the spur-winged lapwings,
+with their drumming music, pompous gestures, and military precision of
+movement! How different also from the aerial performance of another bird
+of the same family--the Brazilian stilt--in which one is pursued by the
+others, mounting upwards in a wild, eccentric flight until they are all
+but lost to view; and back to earth again, and then, skywards once more;
+the pursued bird when overtaken giving place to another individual, and
+the pursuing pack making the air ring with their melodious barking
+cries! How different again are all these from the aerial pastimes of the
+snipe, in which the bird, in its violent descent, is able to produce
+such wonderful, far-reaching sounds with its tail-feathers! The snipe,
+as a rule, is a solitary bird, and, like the oscillating finch mentioned
+early in this paper, is content to practise its pastimes without a
+witness. In the gregarious kinds all perform together: for this feeling,
+like fear, is eminently contagious, and the sight of one bird mad with
+joy will quickly make the whole flock mad. There are also species that
+always live in pairs, like the scissors-tails already mentioned, that
+periodically assemble in numbers for the purpose of display. The crested
+screamer, a very large bird, may also be mentioned: male and female sing
+somewhat harmoniously together, with voices of almost unparalleled
+power: but these birds also congregate in large numbers, and a thousand
+couples, or even several thousands, may be assembled together: and, at
+intervals, both by day and night, all sing in concert, their combined
+voices producing a thunderous melody which seems to shake the earth. As
+a rule, however, birds that live always in pairs do not assemble for the
+purpose of display, but the joyous instinct is expressed by duet-like
+performances between male and female. Thus, in the three South American
+Passerine families, the tyrant-birds, wood-hewers, and ant-thrushes,
+numbering together between eight and nine hundred species, a very large
+majority appear to have displays of this description.
+
+In my own experience, in cases where the male and female together, or
+assembled with others, take equal parts in the set displays, the sexes
+arc similar, or differ little; but where the female takes no part in the
+displays the superiority of the male in brightness of colour is very
+marked. One or two instances bearing on this point may be given.
+
+A scarlet-breasted troupial of La Plata perches conspicuously on a tall
+plant in afield, and at intervals soars up vertically, singing, and, at
+the highest ascending point, flight and song end in a kind of aerial
+somersault and vocal flourish at the same moment. Meanwhile, the
+dull-plumaged female is not seen and not heard: for not even a skulking
+crake lives in closer seclusion under the herbage--so widely have the
+sexes diverged in this species. Is the female, then, without an instinct
+so common r--has she no sudden fits of irrepressible gladness?
+Doubtless she has them, and manifests them down in her place of
+concealment in lively chirpings and quick motions--the simple, primitive
+form in which gladness is expressed in the class of birds. In the
+various species of the genus Cnipolegus, already mentioned, the
+difference in the sexes is just as great as in the case of the troupial:
+the solitary, intensely black, statuesque male has, we have seen, a set
+and highly fantastic performance; but on more than one occasion I have
+seen four or five females of one species meet together and have a little
+simple performance all to themselves--in form a kind of lively mock
+fight.
+
+It might be objected that when a bird takes its stand and repeats a set
+finished song at intervals for an hour at a stretch, remaining quietly
+perched, such a performance appears to be different in character from
+the irregular and simple displays which are unmistakably caused by a
+sudden glad impulse. But we are familiar with the truth that in organic
+nature great things result from small beginnings--a common flower, and
+our own bony skulls, to say nothing of the matter contained within them,
+are proofs of it. Only a limited number of species sing in a highly
+finished manner. Looking at many species, we find every gradation, every
+shade, from the simple joyous chirp and cry to the most perfect melody.
+Even in a single branch of the true vocalists we may see it--from the
+chirping bunting, and noisy but tuneless sparrow, to linnet and
+goldfinch and canary. Not only do a large majority of species show the
+singing instinct, or form of display, in a primitive, undeveloped state,
+but in that state it continues to show itself in the young of many birds
+in which melody is most highly developed in the adult. And where the
+development has been solely in the male the female never rises above
+that early stage; in her lively chirpings and little mock fights and
+chases, and other simple forms which gladness takes in birds, as well as
+in her plainer plumage, and absence of ornament, she represents the
+species at some remote period. And as with song so with antics and all
+set performances aerial or terrestrial, from those of the whale and the
+elephant to those of the smallest insect.
+
+Another point remains to be noticed, and that is the greater frequency
+and fulness in displays of all kinds, including song, during the love
+season. And here Dr. Wallace's colour and ornament theory helps us to an
+explanation. At the season of courtship, when the conditions of life are
+most favourable vitality is at its maximum, and naturally it is then
+that the proficiency in all kinds of dancing-antics, aerial and
+terrestrial, appears greatest, and that melody attains its highest
+perfection. This applies chiefly to birds, but even among birds there
+are exceptions, as we have seen in the case of the field-finch, Sycalis
+luteola. The love-excitement is doubtless pleasurable to them, and it
+takes the form in which keenly pleasurable emotions are habitually
+expressed, although not infrequently with variations due to the greater
+intensity of the feeling. In some migrants the males arrive before the
+females, and no sooner have they recovered from the effects of their
+journey than they burst out into rapturous singing; these are not
+love-strains, since the females have not yet arrived, and pairing-time
+is perhaps a mouth distant; their singing merely expresses their
+overflowing gladness. The forest at that season is vocal, not only with
+the fine melody of the true songsters, but with hoarse cawings, piercing
+cries, shrill duets, noisy choruses, drummings, boomings, trills,
+wood-tappings--every sound with which different species express the glad
+impulse; and birds like the parrot that only exert their powerful voices
+in screamings--because "they can do no other"--then scream their
+loudest. When courtship begins it has in many cases the effect of
+increasing the beauty of the performance, giving added sweetness, verve,
+and brilliance to the song, and freedom and grace to the gestures and
+motions. But, as I have said, there are exceptions. Thus, some birds
+that are good melodists at other times sing in a feeble, disjointed
+manner during courtship. In Patagonia I found that several of the birds
+with good voices--one a mocking bird--were, like the robin at home,
+autumn and winter songsters.
+
+The argument has been stated very binefly: but little would be gained by
+the mere multiplication of instances, since, however many, they would bo
+selected instances--from a single district, it is true, while those in
+the _Descent of Man_ were brought together from an immeasurably wider
+field; but the principle is the same in both cases, and to what I have
+written it may be objected that, if, instead of twenty-five, I had given
+a hundred cases, taking them as they came, they might have shown a
+larger proportion of instances like that of the cow-bird, in which the
+male has a set performance practised only during the love-season and in
+the presence of the female.
+
+It is, no doubt, true that all collections of facts relating to animal
+life present nature to us somewhat as a "fantastic realm"--unavoidably
+so, in a measure, since the writing would be too bulky, or too dry, or
+too something inconvenient, if we did not take only the most prominent
+facts that come before us, remove them from their places, where alone
+they can be seen in their proper relations to numerous other less
+prominent facts, and rearrange them patch work-wise to make up our
+literature. But I am convinced that any student of the subject who will
+cast aside his books--supposing that they have not already bred a habit
+in his mind of seeing only "in accordance with verbal statement"--and go
+directly to nature to note the actions of animals for himself--actions
+which, in many cases, appear to lose all significance when set down in
+writing--the result of such independent investigation will be a
+conviction that conscious sexual selection on the part of the female is
+not the cause of music and dancing performances in birds, nor of the
+brighter colours and ornaments that distinguish the male. It is true
+that the females of some species, both in the vertebrate and insect
+kingdoms, do exercise a preference; but in a vast majority of species
+the male takes the female he finds, or that he is able to win from other
+competitors; and if we go to the reptile class we find that in the
+ophidian order, which excels in variety and richness of colour, there is
+no such thing as preferential mating; and if we go to the insect class,
+we find that in butterflies, which surpass all creatures in their
+glorious beauty, the female gives herself up to the embrace of the first
+male that appears, or else is captured by the strongest male, just as
+she might be by a mantis or some other rapacious insect.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA.
+
+_(Lagostomus Trichodactylus.)_
+
+
+The vizcacha is perhaps the most characteristic of the South American
+Rodentia, [Footnote: "According to Mr. Waterhouse, of all rodents the
+vizcacha is most nearly related to marsupials; but in the points in
+which it approaches this order its relations are general, that is, not
+to any one marsupial species more than to another. As these points of
+affinity are believed to be real and not merely adaptive, they must be
+due in accordance with our view to inheritance from a common progenitor.
+Therefore wo must suppose either that all rodents, including the
+vizcacha, branched off from some ancient marsupial, which will naturally
+have been more or less intermediate in character with respect to all
+existing marsupials; or, that both lodents and marsupials branched off
+from a common progenitor. ... On either view we must suppose that the
+vizcacha has retained, by inheritance, more of the characters of its
+ancient progenitor than have other rodents."--DARWIN; _Origin of
+Species._] while its habits, in some respects, are more interesting than
+those of any other rodent known: it is, moreover, the most common mammal
+we have on the pampas; and all these considerations have induced me to
+write a very full account of its customs. It is necessary to add that
+since the following pages were written at my home on the pampas a great
+war of extermination has been waged against this animal by the
+landowners, which has been more fortunate in its results--or unfortunate
+if one's sympathies are with the vizcacha--than the war of the
+Australians against their imported rodent--the smaller and more prolific
+rabbit.
+
+The vizcachas on the pampas of Buenos Ayres live in societies, usually
+numbering twenty or thirty members. The village, which is called
+Vizcachera, is composed of a dozen or fifteen burrows or mouths; for one
+entrance often serves for two or more distinct holes. Often, where the
+ground is soft, there are twenty or thirty or more burrows in an old
+vizcachera; but on stony, or "tosca" soil even an old one may have no
+more than four or five burrows. They are deep wide-mouthed holes, placed
+very close together, the entire village covering an area of from one
+hundred to two hundred square feet of ground.
+
+The burrows vary greatly in extent; and usually in a vizcachera there
+are several that, at a distance of from four to six feet from the
+entrance, open into large circular chambers. From these chambers other
+burrows diverge in all directions, some running horizontally, others
+obliquely downwards to a maximum depth of six feet from the surface:
+some of these burrows or galleries communicate with those of other
+burrows. A vast amount of loose earth is thus brought up, and forms a
+very irregular mound, fifteen to thirty inches above the surrounding
+level.
+
+It will afford some conception of the numbers of these vizcacheras on
+the settled pampas when I say that, in some directions, a person might
+ride five hundred miles and never advance half a mile without seeing one
+or more of them. In districts where, as far as the eye can see, the
+plains are as level and smooth as a bowling-green, especially in winter
+when the grass is close-cropped, and where the rough giant-thistle has
+not sprung up, these mounds appear like brown or dark spots on a green
+surface. They are the only irregularities that occur to catch the eye,
+and consequently form an important feature in the scenery. In some
+places they are so near together that a person on horseback may count a
+hundred of them from one point of view.
+
+The sites of which the vizcacha invariably makes choice to work on, as
+well as his manner of burrow-ing, adapt him peculiarly to live and
+thrive on the open pampas. Other burrowing species seem always to fix
+upon some spot where there is a bank or a sudden depression in the soil,
+or where there is rank herbage, or a bush or tree, about the roots of
+which to begin their kennel. They are averse to commence digging on a
+clear level surface, either because it is not easy for them where they
+have nothing to rest their foreheads against while scratching, or
+because they possess a wary instinct that impels them to place the body
+in concealment whilst working on the surface, thus securing the
+concealment of the burrow after it is made. Certain it is that where
+large hedges have been planted on the pampas, multitudes of opossums,
+weasels, skunks, armadillos, &c., come and make their burrows beneath
+them; and where there are no hedges or trees, all these species make
+their kennels under bushes of the perennial thistle, or where there is a
+shelter of some kind. The vizcacha, on the contrary, chooses an open
+level spot, the cleanest he can find to burrow on. The first thing that
+strikes the observer when viewing the vizcachera closely is the enormous
+size of the entrance of the burrows, or, at least, of several of the
+central ones in the mound; for there are usually several smaller outside
+burrows. The pit-like opening to some of these principal burrows is
+often four to six feet across the mouth, and sometimes deep enough for a
+tall man to stand up waist-deep in. How these large entrances can be
+made on a level surface may be seen when the first burrow or burrows of
+an incipient vizcachera are formed. It is not possible to tell what
+induces a vizcacha to be the founder of a new community; for they
+increase very slowly, and furthermore are extremely fond of each other's
+society; and it is invariably one individual that leaves his native
+village to found a new and independent one. If it were to have better
+pasture at hand, then he would certainly remove to a considerable
+distance; but he merely goes from forty to fifty or sixty yards off to
+begin his work. Thus it is that in desert places, where these animals
+are rare, a solitary vizcachera is never seen; but there are always
+several close together, though there may be no others on the surrounding
+plain for leagues. When the vizcacha has made his habitation, it is but
+a single burrow, with only himself for an inhabitant, perhaps for many
+months. Sooner or later, however, others join him: and these will be the
+parents of innumerable generations; for they construct no temporary
+lodging-place, as do the armadillos and other species, but their
+posterity continues in the quiet possession of the habitations
+bequeathed to it; how long, it is impossible to say. Old men who have
+lived all their lives in one district remember that many of the
+vizcacheras around them existed when they were children. It is
+invariably a male that begins a new village, and makes his burrow in the
+following manner, though he does not always observe the same method. He
+works very straight into the earth, digging a hole twelve or fourteen
+inches wide, but not so deep, at an angle of about 25 degrees with the
+surface. But after he has progressed inwards a few feet, the vizcacha is
+no longer satisfied with merely scattering away the loose earth he
+fetches up, but cleans it away so far in a straight line from the
+entrance, and scratches so much on this line (apparently to make the
+slope gentler), that he soon forms a trench a foot or more in depth, and
+often three or four feet in length. Its use is, as I have inferred, to
+facilitate the conveying of the loose earth as far as possible from the
+entrance of the burrow. But after a while the animal is unwilling that
+it should accumulate even at the end of this long passage; he therefore
+proceeds to make two additional trenches, that form an acute, sometimes
+a right angle, converging into the first, so that when the whole is
+completed it takes the form of a capital Y.
+
+These trenches are continually deepened and lengthened as the burrow
+progresses, the angular segment of earth between them, scratched away,
+until by degrees it has been entirely conveyed off, and in its place is
+the one deep great unsymmetrical mouth I have already described. There
+are soils that will not admit of the animals working in this manner.
+Where there are large cakes of "tosca" near the surface, as in many
+localities on the southern pampas, the vizcacha makes its burrow as best
+he can, and without the regular trenches. In earths that crumble much,
+sand or gravel, he also works under great disadvantages.
+
+The burrows are made best in the black and red moulds of the pampas; but
+even in such soils the entrances of many burrows are made differently.
+In some the central trench is wanting, or is so short that there appear
+but two passages converging directly into the burrow; or these two
+trenches may be so curved inwards as to form the segment of a circle.
+Many other forms may also be noticed, but usually they appear to be only
+modifications of the most common Y-shaped system.
+
+As I have remarked that its manner of burrowing has peculiarly adapted
+the vizcacha to the pampas, it may be asked what particular advantage a
+species that makes a wide-mouthed burrow possesses over those that
+excavate in the usual way. On a declivity, or at the base of rocks or
+trees, there would be none; but on the perfectly level and shelterless
+pampas, the durability of the burrow, a circumstance favourable to the
+animal's preservation, is owing altogether to its being made in this
+way, and to several barrows being made together. The two outer trenches
+diverge so widely from the mouth that half the earth brought out is cast
+behind instead of before it, thus creating a mound of equal height about
+the entrance, by which it is secured from water during great rainfalls,
+while the cattle avoid treading over the great pit-like entrances. But
+the burrows of the dolichotis, armadillo, and other species, when made
+on perfectly level ground, are soon trod on and broken in by cattle; in
+summer they are choked up with dust and rubbish; and, the loose earth
+having all been thrown up together in a heap on one side, there is no
+barrier to the water which in every great rainfall flows in and
+obliterates the kennel, drowning or driving out the tenant.
+
+I have been minute in describing the habitations of the vizcacha, as I
+esteem the subject of prime importance in considering the zoology of
+this portion of America. The vizcacha does not benefit himself alone by
+his perhaps unique style of burrowing; but this habit has proved
+advantageous to several other species, and has been so favourable to two
+of our birds that they are among the most common species found here,
+whereas without these burrows they would have been exceedingly rare,
+since the natural banks in which they breed are scarcely found anywhere
+on the pampas. I refer to the Minera (Geositta cunicularia), which makes
+its breeding-holes in the bank-like sides of the vizcacha's burrow, and
+to the little swallow (Atticora cyanoleuca) which breeds in these
+excavations when forsaken by the Minera. Few old vizcacheras are seen
+without some of these little parasitical burrows in them.
+
+Birds are not the only beings in this way related to the vizcachas: the
+fox and the weasel of the pampas live almost altogether in them. Several
+insects also frequent these burrows that are seldom found anywhere else.
+Of these the most interesting are:--a large predacious nocturnal bug,
+shining black, with red wings; a nocturnal Cicindela, a beautiful
+insect, with dark green striated wing-cases and pale red legs; also
+several diminutive wingless wasps. Of the last I have counted six
+species, most of them marked with strongly contrasted colours, black,
+red, and white. There are also other wasps that prey on the spiders
+found on the vizcachera. All these and others are so numerous on the
+mounds that dozens of them might there be collected any summer day; but
+if sought for in other situations they are exceedingly rare. If the dry
+mound of soft earth which the vizcacha elevates amidst a waste of humid,
+close-growing grass is not absolutely necessary to the existence of all
+these species, it supplies them with at least one favourable condition,
+and without doubt thereby greatly increases their numbers: they, too,
+whether predacious or preyed on, have so many relations with other
+outside species, and these again with still others, that it would be no
+mere fancy to say that probably hundreds of species are either directly
+or indirectly affected in their struggle for existence by the
+vizcacheras so abundantly sprinkled over the pampas.
+
+In winter the vizcachas seldom leave their burrows till dark, but in
+summer come out before sunset; and the vizcachera is then a truly
+interesting spectacle. Usually one of the old males first appears, and
+sits on some prominent place on the mound, apparently in no haste to
+begin his evening meal. When approached from the front he stirs not, but
+eyes the intruder with a bold indifferent stare. If the person passes to
+one side, he deigns not to turn his head.
+
+Other vizcachas soon begin to appear, each one quietly taking up his
+station at his burrow's mouth, the females, known by their greatly
+inferior size and lighter grey colour, sitting upright on their
+haunches, as if to command a better view, and indicating by divers
+sounds and gestures that fear and curiosity struggles in them for
+mastery; for they are always wilder and sprightlier in their motions
+than the males. With eyes fixed on the intruder, at intervals they dodge
+the head, emitting at the same time an internal note with great
+vehemence; and suddenly, as the danger comes nearer, they plunge
+simultaneously, with a startled cry, into their burrows. But in some
+curiosity is the strongest emotion; for, in spite of their fellow's
+contagious example, and already half down the entrance, again they start
+up to scrutinize the stranger, and will then often permit him to walk
+within five or six paces of them.
+
+Standing on the mound there is frequently a pair of burrowing owls
+(Pholeoptynx cunicularia). These birds generally make their own burrows
+to breed in, or sometimes take possession of one of the lesser outside
+burrows of the village; but their favourite residence, when not engaged
+in tending their eggs or young, is on the vizcachera. Here a pair will
+sit all day; and I have often remarked a couple close together on the
+edge of the burrow; and when the vizcacha came out in the evening,
+though but a hand's breadth from them, they did not stir, nor did he
+notice them, so accustomed are these creatures to each other. Usually a
+couple of the little burrowing Geositta are also present. They are
+lively creatures, running with great rapidity about the mound and bare
+space that surrounds it, suddenly stopping and jerking their tails in a
+slow deliberate manner, and occasionally uttering their cry, a trill, or
+series of quick short clear notes, resembling somewhat the shrill
+excessive laughter of a child. Among the grave, stationary vizcachas, of
+which they take no heed, perhaps half a dozen or more little swallows
+(Atticora cyanoleuca) are seen, now clinging altogether to the bank-like
+entrance of a burrow, now hovering over it in a moth-like manner, as if
+uncertain where to alight, and anon sweeping about in circles, but never
+ceasing their low and sorrowful notes.
+
+The vizcachera with all its incongruous inhabitants thus collected upon
+it is to a stranger one of the most novel sights the pampas afford.
+
+The vizcacha appears to be a rather common species over all the
+extensive Argentine territory; but they are so exceedingly abundant on
+the pampas inhabited by man, and comparatively so rare in the desert
+places I have been in, that I was at first much surprised at finding
+them so unequally distributed. I have also mentioned that the vizcacha
+is a tame familiar creature. This is in the pastoral districts, where
+they are never disturbed; but in wild regions, where he is scarce, he is
+exceedingly wary, coming forth long after dark, and plunging into his
+burrow on the slightest alarm, so that it is a rare thing to get a sight
+of him. The reason is evident enough; in desert regions the vizcacha has
+several deadly enemies in the larger rapacious mammals. Of these the
+puma or lion (Felis concolor) is the most numerous, as it is also the
+swiftest, most subtle, and most voracious; for, as regards these traits,
+the jaguar (F. onca) is an inferior animal. To the insatiable bloody
+appetite of this creature nothing comes amiss; he takes the male ostrich
+by surprise, and slays that wariest of wild things on his nest; He
+captures little birds with the dexterity of a cat, and hunts for diurnal
+armadillos; he comes unawares upon the deer and huanaco, and, springing
+like lightning on them, dislocates their necks before their bodies touch
+the earth. Often after he has thus slain them, he leaves their bodies
+untouched for the Polyborus and vulture to feast on, so great a delight
+does he take in destroying life. The vizcacha falls an easy victim to
+this subtle creature; and it is not to be wondered at that it becomes
+wild to excess, and rare in regions hunted over by such an enemy, even
+when all other conditions are favourable to its increase. But as soon
+as these wild regions are settled by man the pumas are exterminated, and
+the sole remaining foe of the vizcacha is the fox, comparatively an
+insignificant one.
+
+The fox takes up his residence in a vizcachera, and succeeds, after
+some quarrelling (manifested in snarls, growls, and other subterranean
+warlike sounds), in ejecting the rightful owners of one of the burrows,
+which forthwith becomes his. Certainly the vizcachas are not much
+injured by being compelled to relinquish the use of one of their kennels
+for a season or permanently; for, if the locality suits him, the fox
+remains with them always. Soon they grow accustomed to the unwelcome
+stranger; he is quiet and unassuming in demeanour, and often in the
+evening sits on the mound in their company, until they regard him with
+the same indifference they do the burrowing owl. But in spring, when the
+young vizcachas are large enough to leave their cells, then the fox
+makes them his prey; and if it is a bitch fox, with a family of eight or
+nine young to provide for, she will grow so bold as to hunt her helpless
+quarry from hole to hole, and do battle with the old ones, and carry off
+the young in spite of them, so that all the young animals in the village
+are eventually destroyed. Often when the young foxes are large enough to
+follow their mother, the whole family takes leave of the vizcachera
+where such cruel havoc has been made to settle in another, there to
+continue their depredations. But the fox has ever a relentless foe in
+man, and meets with no end of bitter persecutions; it is consequently
+much more abundant in desert or thinly settled districts than in such as
+are populous, so that in these the check the vizcachas receive from the
+foxes is not appreciable.
+
+The abundance of cattle on the pampas has made it unnecessary to use the
+vizcacha as an article of food. His skin is of no value; therefore man,
+the destroyer of his enemies, has hitherto been the greatest benefactor
+of his species. Thus they have been permitted to multiply and spread
+themselves to an amazing extent, so that the half-domestic cattle on the
+pampas are not nearly so familiar with man, or so fearless of his
+presence as are the vizcachas. It is not that they do him no injury, but
+because they do it indirectly, that they have so long enjoyed immunity
+from persecution. It is amusing to see the sheep-farmer, the greatest
+sufferer from the vizcachas, regarding them with such indifference as to
+permit them to swarm on his "run," and burrow within a stone's throw of
+his dwelling with impunity, and yet going a distance from home to
+persecute with unreasonable animosity a fox, skunk, or opossum on
+account of the small annual loss it inflicts on the poultry-yard. That
+the vizcacha has comparatively no adverse conditions to war with
+wherever man is settled is evident when we consider its very slow rate
+of increase, and yet see them in such incalculable numbers. The female
+has but one litter in the year of two young, sometimes of three. She
+becomes pregnant late in April, and brings forth in September; the
+period of gestation is, I think, rather less than five months.
+
+The vizcacha is about two years growing. A full-sized male measures to
+the root of the tail twenty-two inches, and weighs from fourteen to
+fifteen pounds; the female is nineteen inches in length, and her
+greatest weight nine pounds. Probably it is a long-lived, and certainly
+it is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green substance to eat it
+never drinks water; but after a long summer drought, when for months it
+has subsisted on bits of dried thistle-stalks and old withered grass, if
+a shower falls it will come out of its burrows even at noonday and drink
+eagerly from the pools. It has been erroneously stated that vizcachas
+subsist on roots. Their food is grass and seeds; but they may also
+sometimes eat roots, as the ground is occasionally seen scratched up
+about the burrows. In March, when the stalks of the perennial cardoon or
+Castile thistle (Cynara cardunculus) are dry, the vizcachas fell them by
+gnawing about their roots, and afterwards tear to pieces the great dry
+flower-heads to get the seeds imbedded deeply in them, of which they
+seem very fond. Large patches of thistle are often found served thus,
+the ground about them literally white with the silvery bristles they
+have scattered. This cutting down tall plants to get the seeds at the
+top seems very like an act of pure intelligence; but the fact is, the
+vizcachas cut down every tall plant they can. I have seen whole acres of
+maize destroyed by them, yet the plants cut down were left untouched. If
+posts be put into the ground within range of their nightly rambles they
+will gnaw till they have felled them, unless of a wood hard enough to
+resist their chisel-like incisors.
+
+The strongest instinct of this animal is to clear the ground thoroughly
+about its burrows; and it is this destructive habit that makes it
+necessary for cultivators of the soil to destroy all the vizcachas in or
+near their fields. On the uninhabited pampas, where the long grasses
+grow, I have often admired the vizcachera; for it is there the centre of
+a clean space, often of half an acre in extent, on which there is an
+even close-shaven turf: this clearing is surrounded by the usual rough
+growth of herbs and giant grasses. In such situations this habit of
+clearing the ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affords
+them a comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, and
+over which they can fly to their burrows without meeting any
+obstruction, on the slightest alarm.
+
+Of course the instinct continues to operate where it is no longer of any
+advantage. In summer, when the thistles are green, even when growing
+near the burrows, and the giant thistle (Carduus mariana) springs up
+most luxuriantly right on the mound, the vizcachas will not touch them,
+either disliking the strong astringent sap, or repelled by the thorns
+with which they are armed. As soon as they dry, and the thorns become
+brittle, they are levelled; afterwards, when the animal begins to drag
+them about and cut them up, as his custom is, he accidentally discovers
+and feasts on the seed: for vizcachas are fond of exercising their teeth
+on hard substances, such as sticks and bones, just as cats are of
+"sharpening their claws" on trees.
+
+Another remarkable habit of the vizcacha, that of dragging to and
+heaping about the mouth of his burrow every stalk he cuts down, and
+every portable object that by dint of great strength he can carry, has
+been mentioned by Azara, Darwin, and others. On the level plains it is a
+useful habit; for as the vizcachas are continually deepening and
+widening their burrows, the earth thrown out soon covers up these
+materials, and so assists in raising the mound. On the Buenos-Ayrean
+pampas numbers of vizcacheras would annually be destroyed by water in
+the great sudden rainfalls were the mounds loss high. But this is only
+an advantage when the animals inhabit a perfectly level country subject
+to flooding rains; for where the surface is unequal they invariably
+prefer high to low ground to burrow on, and are thus secured from
+destruction by water; yet the instinct is as strong in such situations
+as on the level plains. The most that can be said of a habit apparently
+so obscure in its origin and uses is, that it appears to be part of the
+instinct of clearing the ground about the village. Every tall stalk the
+vizcacha cuts down, every portable object he finds, must be removed to
+make the surface clean and smooth; but while encumbered with it he does
+not proceed further from his burrows, but invariably re-tires towards
+them, and so deposits it upon the mound. So well known is this habit,
+that whatever article is lost by night--whip, pistol, or knife--the
+loser next morning visits the vizcacheras in the vicinity, quite sure of
+finding it there. People also visit the vizcacheras to pick up sticks
+for firewood.
+
+The vizcachas are cleanly in their habits; and the fur, though it has a
+strong earthy smell, is kept exceedingly neat. The hind leg and foot
+afford a very beautiful instance of adaptation. Propped by the hard
+curved tail, they sit up erect, and as firmly on the long horny disks on
+the undersides of the hind legs as a man stands on his feet. Most to be
+admired, on the middle toe the skin thickens into a round cushion, in
+which the curved teeth-like bristles are set; nicely graduated in
+length, so that "each particular hair" may come into contact with the
+skin when the animal scratches or combs itself. As to the uses of this
+appendage there can be no difference of opinion, as there is about the
+serrated claw in birds. It is quite obvious that the animal cannot
+scratch himself with his hind paw (as all mammals do) without making use
+of this natural comb. Then the entire foot is modified, so that this
+comb shall be well protected, and yet not be hindered from performing
+its office: thus the inner toe is pressed close to the middle one, and
+so depressed that it comes under the cushion of skin, and cannot
+possibly get before the bristles, or interfere their coming against the
+skin in scratching, as certainly be the case if this toe were free as
+outer one.
+
+Again, the vizcachas appear to form the deep trenches before the burrows
+by scratching the earth violently backwards with the hind claws. Now
+these straight, sharp, dagger-shaped claws, and especially the middle
+one, are so long that the vizcacha is able to perform all this rough
+work without the bristles coming into contact with the ground, and so
+getting worn by the friction. The Tehuelcho Indians in Patagonia comb
+their hair with a brush-comb very much like that on the vizcacha's toe,
+but in their case it does not properly fulfil its office, or else the
+savages make little use of it. Vizcachas have a remarkable way of
+dusting themselves: the animal suddenly throws himself on his back, and,
+bringing over his hind legs towards his head, depresses them till his
+feet touch the ground. In this strange posture he scratches up the earth
+with great rapidity, raising a little cloud of dust, then rights himself
+with a jerk, and, after an interval, repeats the dusting. Usually they
+scratch a hole in the ground to deposit their excrements in. Whilst
+opening one of the outside burrows that had no communication with the
+others, I once discovered a vast deposit of their dung (so great that it
+must have been accumulating for years) at the extremity. To ascertain
+whether this be a constant, or only a casual habit, it would be
+necessary to open up entirely a vast number of vizcacheras. When a
+vizcacha dies in his burrow the carcass is, after some days, dragged out
+and left upon the mound.
+
+The language of the vizcacha is wonderful for its variety. When the male
+is feeding he frequently pauses to utter a succession of loud,
+percussive, and somewhat jarring cries; these he utters in a leisurely
+manner, and immediately after goes on feeding. Often he utters this cry
+in a low grunting tone. One of his commonest expressions sounds like the
+violent hawking of a man clearing his throat. At other times he bursts
+into piercing tones that may be heard a mile off, beginning like the
+excited and quick-repeated squeals of a young pig, and growing longer,
+more attenuated, and quavering towards the end. After retiring alarmed
+into the burrows, he repeats at intervals a deep internal moan. All
+these, and many other indescribable guttural, sighing, shrill, and deep
+tones, are varied a thousand ways in strength and intonation, according
+to the age, sex, or emotions of the individual; and I doubt if there is
+in the world any other four-footed thing so loquacious, or with a
+dialect so extensive. I take great pleasure in going to some spot where
+they are abundant, and sitting quietly to listen to them; for they are
+holding a perpetual discussion, all night long, which the presence of a
+human being will not interrupt.
+
+At night, when the vizcachas are all out feeding, in places where they
+are very abundant (and in some districts they literally swarm) any very
+loud and sudden sound, as the report of a gun, or a clap of unexpected
+thunder, will produce a most extraordinary effect. No sooner has the
+report broken on the stillness of night than a perfect storm of cries
+bursts forth over the surrounding country. After eight or nine seconds
+there is in the storm a momentary hill or pause; and then it breaks
+forth again, apparently louder than before. There is so much difference
+in the tones of different animals that the cries of individuals close at
+hand may be distinguished amidst the roar of blended voices coming from
+a distance. It sounds as if thousands and tens of thousands of them
+were striving to express every emotion at the highest pitch of their
+voices; so that the effect is indescribable, and fills a stranger with
+astonishment. Should a gun be fired off several times, their cries
+become less each time; and after the third or fourth time it produces no
+effect. They have a peculiar, sharp, sudden, "far-darting" alarm-note
+when a dog is spied, that is repeated by all that hear it, and produces
+an instantaneous panic, sending every vizcacha flying to his burrow.
+
+But though they manifest such a terror of dogs when out feeding at night
+(for the slowest dog can overtake them), in the evening, when sitting
+upon their mounds, they treat them with tantalizing contempt. If the dog
+is a novice, the instant he spies the animal he rushes violently at it;
+the vizcacha waits the charge with imperturbable calmness till his enemy
+is within one or two yards, and then disappears into the burrow. After
+having been foiled in this way many times, the dog resorts to stratagem:
+he crouches down as if transformed for the nonce into a Felis, and
+steals on with wonderfully slow and cautious steps, his hair bristling,
+tail hanging, and eyes intent on his motionless intended victim; when
+within seven or eight yards he makes a sudden rush, but invariably with
+the same dis-appointing result. The persistence with which the dogs go
+on hoping against hope in this unprofitable game, in which they always
+act the stupid part, is highly amusing, and is very interesting to the
+naturalist; for it shows that the native dogs on the pampas have
+developed a very remarkable instinct, and one that might be perfected by
+artificial selection; but dogs with the hunting habits of the cat would,
+I think, be of little use to man. When it is required to train dogs to
+hunt the nocturnal armadillo (Dasypus villosus), then this deep-rooted
+(and, it might be added, hereditary) passion for vizcachas is
+excessively annoying, and it is often necessary to administer hundreds
+of blows and rebukes before a dog is induced to track an armadillo
+without leaving the scent every few moments to make futile grabs at his
+old enemies.
+
+The following instance will show how little suspicion of man the
+vizcachas have. A few years ago I went out shooting them on three
+consecutive evenings. I worked in a circle, constantly revisiting the
+same burrows, never going a greater distance from home than could be
+walked in four or five minutes. During the three evenings I shot sixty
+vizcachas dead; and probably as many more escaped badly wounded into
+their burrows; for they are hard to kill, and however badly wounded, if
+sitting near the burrow when struck, are almost certain to escape into
+it. But on the third evening I found them no wilder, and killed about as
+many as on the first. After this I gave up shooting them in disgust; it
+was dull sport, and to exterminate or frighten them away with a gun
+seemed an impossibility.
+
+It is a very unusual thing to eat the vizcacha, most people, and
+especially the gauchos, having a silly unaccountable prejudice against
+their flesh. I have found it very good, and while engaged writing this
+chapter have dined on it served up in various ways. The young animals
+are rather insipid, the old males tough, but the mature females are
+excellent--the flesh being tender, exceedingly white, fragrant to the
+nostrils, and with a very delicate game-flavour.
+
+Within the last ten years so much new land has been brought under
+cultivation that farmers have been compelled to destroy incredible
+numbers of vizcachas: many large "estancieros" (cattle-breeders) have
+followed the example set by the grain-growers, and have had them
+exterminated on their estates. Now all that Azara, on hearsay, tells
+about the vizcachas perishing in their burrows, when these are covered
+up, but that they can support life thus buried for a period of ten or
+twelve days, and that during that time animals will come from other
+villages and disinter them, unless frightened off with dogs, is strictly
+true. Country workmen are so well acquainted with these facts that they
+frequently undertake to destroy all the vizcacheras on an estate for so
+paltry a sum as ten-pence in English money for each one, and yet will
+make double the money at this work than they can at any other. By day
+they partly open up, then cover up the burrows with a great quantity of
+earth, and by night go round with dogs to drive away the vizcachas from
+the still open burrows that come to dig out their buried friends. After
+all the vizcacheras on an estate have been thus served, the workmen are
+usually bound by previous agreement to keep guard over them for a space
+of eight or ten days before they receive their hire: for the animals
+covered up are then supposed to be all dead. Some of these men I have
+talked with have assured me that living vizcachas have been found after
+fourteen days--a proof of their great endurance. There is nothing
+strange, I think, in the mere fact of the vizcacha being unable to work
+his way out when thus buried alive; for, for all I know to the contrary,
+other species may, when their burrows are well covered up, perish in the
+same manner; but it certainly is remarkable that other vizcachas should
+come from a distance to dig out those that are buried alive. In this
+good office they are exceedingly zealous; and I have frequently
+surprised them after sunrise, at a considerable distance from their own
+burrows, diligently scratching at those that had been covered up. The
+vizcachas are fond of each other's society, and live peaceably together;
+but their goodwill is not restricted to the members of their own little
+community; it extends to the whole species, so that as soon as night
+comes many animals leave their own and go to visit the adjacent
+villages. If one approaches a vizcachera at night, usually some of the
+vizcachas on it scamper off to distant burrows: these are neighbours
+merely come to pay a friendly visit. This intercourse is so frequent
+that little straight paths are formed from one vizcachera to another.
+The extreme attachment between members of different communities makes it
+appear less strange that they should assist each other: either the
+desire to see, as usual, their buried neighbours becomes intense enough
+to impel them to work their way to them; or cries of distress from the
+prisoners reach and incite them to attempt their deliverance. Many
+social species are thus powerfully affected by cries of distress from
+one of their fellows; and some will attempt a rescue in the face of
+great danger--the weasel and the peccary for example.
+
+Mild and sociable as the vizcachas are towards each other, each one is
+exceedingly jealous of any intrusion into his particular burrow, and
+indeed always resents such a breach of discipline with the utmost fury.
+Several individuals may reside in the compartments of the same burrow;
+but beyond themselves not even their next-door neighbour is permitted to
+enter; their hospitality ends where it begins, at the entrance. It is
+difficult to compel a vizcacha to enter a burrow not his own; even when
+hotly pursued by dogs they often refuse to do so. When driven into one,
+the instant their enemies retire a little space they rush out of it, as
+if they thought the hiding-place but little less dangerous than the open
+plain. I have frequently seen vizcachas, chased into the wrong burrows,
+summarily ejected by those inside: and sometimes they make their escape
+only after being well bitten for their offence.
+
+I have now stated the most interesting facts I have collected concerning
+the vizcacha: when others rewrite its history they doubtless will,
+according to the opportunities of observation they enjoy, be able to
+make some additions to it, but probably none of great consequence. I
+have observed this species in Patagonia and Buenos Ayres only; and as I
+have found that its habits are considerably modified by circumstances in
+the different localities where I have met with it, I am sure that other
+variations will occur in the more distant regions, where the conditions
+vary.
+
+The most remarkable thing to be said about the vizcacha is, that
+although regarded by Mr. Waterhouse, and others who have studied its
+affinities, as one of the lowest of the rodents, exhibiting strong
+Marsupial characters, the living animal appears to be more intelligent
+than other rodents, not of South America only, but also of those of a
+higher type in other continents. A parallel case is, perhaps, to be
+found in the hairy armadillo, an extremely versatile and intelligent
+animal, although only an edentate. And among birds the ypecaha--a large
+La Plata rail--might also be mentioned as an example of what ought not
+to be; for it is a bold and intelligent bird, more than a match for the
+fowl, both in courage and in cunning; and yet it is one of the family
+which Professor Parker--from the point of view of the
+anatomist--characterizes as a "feeble-minded, cowardly group."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+THE DYING HUANACO.
+
+
+Lest any one should misread the title to this chapter, I hasten to say
+that the huanaco, or guanaco as it is often spelt, is not a perishing
+species; nor, as things are, is it likely to perish soon, despite the
+fact that civilized men, Britons especially, are now enthusiastically
+engaged in the extermination of all the nobler mammalians:--a very
+glorious crusade, the triumphant conclusion of which will doubtless be
+witnessed by the succeeding generation, more favoured in this respect
+than ours. The huanaco, happily for it, exists in a barren, desolate
+region, in its greatest part waterless and uninhabitable to human
+beings; and the chapter-heading refers to a singular instinct of the
+dying animals, in very many cases allowed, by the exceptional conditions
+in which they are placed, to die naturally.
+
+And first, a few words about its place in nature and general habits. The
+huanaco is a small camel--small, that is, compared with its existing
+relation--without a hump, and, unlike the camel of the Old World,
+non-specializad; doubtless it is a very ancient animal on the earth, and
+for all we know to the contrary, may have existed contemporaneously with
+some of the earliest known representatives of the camel type, whose
+remains occur in the lower and upper miocene deposits--Poebrotherium,
+Protolabis, Procamelus, Pliauchenia, and Macrauchenia. It ranges from
+Tierra del Fuego and the adjacent islands, northwards over the whole of
+Patagonia, and along the Andes into Peru and Bolivia. On the great
+mountain chain it is both a wild and a domestic animal, since the llama,
+the beast of burden of the ancient Peruvians, is no doubt only a
+variety: but as man's slave it has changed so greatly from the original
+form that some naturalists have regarded the llama as a distinct
+species, which, like the camel of the East, exists only in a domestic
+state. It has had time enough to vary, as it is more than probable that
+the tamed and useful animal was inherited by the children of the sun
+from races and nations that came before them: and how far back Andean
+civilization extends may be inferred from the belief expressed by the
+famous American archaeologist, Squiers, that the ruined city of
+Tiahuanaco, in the vicinity of Lake Titicaca, is as old as Thebes and
+the Pyramids.
+
+It is, however, with the wild animal, the huanaco, that I am concerned.
+A full-grown male measures seven to eight feet in length, and four feet
+high to the shoulder; it is well clothed in a coat of thick woolly hair,
+of a pale reddish colour, Longest and palest on the under parts. In
+appearance it is very unlike the camel, in spite of the long legs and
+neck; in its finely-shaped head and long ears, and its proud and
+graceful carriage, it resembles an antelope rather than its huge and,
+from an aesthetic point of view, deformed Asiatic relation. In habits it
+is gregarious, and is usually seen in small herds, but herds numbering
+several hundreds or even a thousand are occasionally met with on the
+stony, desolate plateaus of Southern Patagonia; but the huanaco is able
+to thrive and grow fat where almost any other herbivore would starve.
+While the herd feeds one animal acts as sentinel, stationed on the
+hillside, and on the appearance of danger utters a shrill neigh of
+alarm, and instantly all take to flight. But although excessively shy
+and wary they are also very inquisitive, and have enough intelligence to
+know that a single horseman can do them no harm, for they will not only
+approach to look closely at him, but will sometimes follow him for
+miles. They are also excitable, and at times indulge in strange freaks.
+Darwin writes:--"On the mountains of Tierra del Fuego I have more than
+once seen a huanaco, on being approached, not only neigh and squeal, but
+prance and leap about in a most ridiculous manner, apparently in
+defiance as a challenge." And Captain King relates that while sailing
+into Port Desire he witnessed a chase of a huanaco after a fox, both
+animals evidently going at their greatest speed, so that they soon
+passed out of sight. I have known some tame huanacos, and in that state
+they make amusing intelligent pets, fond of being caressed, but often so
+frolicsome and mischievous as to be a nuisance to their master. It is
+well known that at the southern extremity of Patagonia the huanacos have
+a dying place, a spot to which all individuals inhabiting the
+surrounding plains repair at the approach of death to deposit their
+bones. Darwin and Fitzroy first recorded this strange instinct in their
+personal narratives, and their observations have since been fully
+confirmed by others. The best known of these dying or burial-places are
+on the banks of the Santa Cruz and Gallegos rivers, where the river
+valleys are covered with dense primeval thickets of bushes and trees of
+stunted growth; there the ground is covered with the bones of countless
+dead generations. "The animals," says Darwin, "in most cases must have
+crawled, before dying, beneath and among the bushes." A strange instinct
+in a creature so preeminently social in its habits; a dweller all its
+life long on the open, barren plateaus and mountain sides! What a
+subject for a painter! The grey wilderness of dwarf thorn trees, aged
+and grotesque and scanty-leaved, nourished for a thousand years on the
+bones that whiten the stony ground at their roots; the interior lit
+faintly with the rays of the departing sun, chill and grey, and silent
+and motionless--the huanacos' Golgotha. In the long centuries,
+stretching back into a dim immeasurable past, so many of this race have
+journeyed hither from the mountain and the plain to suffer the sharp
+pang of death, that, to the imagination, something of it all seems to
+have passed into that hushed and mournful nature. And now one more, the
+latest pilgrim, has come, all his little strength spent in his struggle
+to penetrate the close thicket; looking old and gaunt and ghostly in the
+twilight; with long ragged hair; staring into the gloom out of
+death-dimmed sunken eyes. England has one artist who might show it to us
+on canvas, who would be able to catch the feeling of such a scene--of
+that mysterious, passionless tragedy of nature--I refer to J. M. Swan,
+the painter of the "Prodigal Son" and the "Lioness Defending her Cubs."
+
+To his account of the animal's dying place and instinct, Darwin adds: "I
+do not at all understand the reason of this, but I may observe that the
+wounded huanacos at the Santa Cruz invariably walked towards the river."
+
+It would, no doubt, be rash to affirm of any instinct that it is
+absolutely unique; but, putting aside some doubtful reports about a
+custom of the Asiatic elephant, which may have originated in the account
+of Sindbad the Sailor's discovery of an elephant's burial place, we have
+no knowledge of an instinct similar to that of the huanaco in any other
+animal. So far as we know, it stands alone and apart, with nothing in
+the actions of other species leading up, or suggesting any family
+likeness to it. But what chiefly attracts the mind to it is its
+strangeness. It looks, in fact, less like an instinct of one of the
+inferior creatures than the superstitious observance of human beings,
+who have knowledge of death, and believe in a continued existence after
+dissolution; of a triba that in past times had conceived the idea that
+the liberated spirit is only able to find its way to its future abode by
+starting at death from the ancient dying-place of the tribe or family,
+and thence moving westward, or skyward, or underground, over the
+well-worn immemorial track, invisible to material eyes.
+
+But, although alone among animal instincts-in its strange and useless
+purpose--for it is as absolutely useless to the species or race as to
+the dying individual--it is not the only useless instinct we know of:
+there are many others, both simple and complex; and of such instincts we
+believe, with good reason, that they once played an important part in
+the life of the species, and were only rendered useless by changes in
+the condition of life, or in the organism, or in both. In other words,
+when the special conditions that gave them value no longer existed, the
+correlated and perfect instinct was not, in these cases, eradicated, but
+remained, in abeyance and still capable of being called into activity by
+a new and false stimulus simulating the old and true. Viewed in this
+way, the huanaco's instinct might be regarded as something remaining to
+the animal from a remote past, not altogether unaffected by time
+perhaps; and like some ceremonial usage among men that has long ceased
+to have any significance, or like a fragment of ancient history, or a
+tradition, which in the course of time has received some new and false
+interpretation. The false interpretation, to continue the metaphor, is,
+in this case, that the _purpose_ of the animal in going to a certain
+spot, to which it has probably never previously resorted, is to die
+there. A false interpretation, because, in the first place, it is
+incredible that an instinct of no advantage to the species, in its
+struggle for existence and predominance should arise and become
+permanent; and, in the second place, it is equally incredible that it
+could ever have been to the advantage of the species or race to, have a
+dying place. We must, then, suppose that there is in the sensations
+preceding death, when death comes slowly, some resemblance to the
+sensations experienced by the animal at a period when its curious
+instinct first took form and crystallized; these would be painful
+sensations that threatened life; and freedom from them, and safety to
+the animal, would only exist in a certain well-remembered spot. Further,
+we might assume that it was at first only the memory of a few
+individuals that caused the animals to seek the place of safety; that a
+habit was thus formed; that in time this traditional habit became
+instinctive, so that the animals, old and young, made their way
+unerringly to the place of refuge whenever the old danger returned. And
+such an instinct, slowly matured and made perfect to enable this animal
+to escape extinction during periods of great danger to mammalian life,
+lasting hundreds or even thousands of years, and destructive of
+numberless other species less hardy and adaptive than the generalized
+huanaco, might well continue to exist, to be occasionally called into
+life by a false stimulus, for many centuries after it had ceased to be
+of any advantage.
+
+Once we accept this explanation as probable--namely, that the huanaco,
+in withdrawing from the herd to drop down and die in the ancient dying
+ground, is in reality only seeking an historically remembered place of
+refuge, and not of death--the action of the animal loses much of its
+mysterious character; we come on to firm ground, and find that we are no
+longer considering an instinct absolutely unique, with no action or
+instinct in any other animal leading up or suggesting any family
+likeness to it, as I said before. We find, in fact, that there is at
+least one very important and very well-known instinct in another class
+of creatures, which has a strong resemblance to that of the huanaco, as
+I have interpreted it, and which may even serve to throw a side light on
+the origin of the huanaco's instinct. I refer to a habit of some
+ophidians, in temperate and cold countries, of returning annually to
+hybernate in the saine den.
+
+A typical instance is that of the rattlesnake in the colder parts of
+North America. On the approach of winter these reptiles go into hiding,
+and it has been observed that in some districts a very large number of
+individuals, hundreds, and even thousands, will repair from the
+surrounding country to the ancestral den. Here the serpents gather in a
+mass to remain in a wholly or semi-torpid condition until the return of
+spring brings them out again, to scatter abroad to their usual summer
+haunts. Clearly in this case the knowledge of the hyberna-ting den is
+not merely traditional--that is, handed down from generation to
+generation, through the young each year following the adults, and so
+forming the habit of repairing at certain seasons to a certain place;
+for the young serpent soon abandons its parent to lead an independent
+life; and on the approach of cold weather the hybernating den may be a
+long distance away, ten or twenty, or even thirty miles from the spot in
+which it was born. The annual return to the hybernating den is then a
+fixed unalterable instinct, like the autumnal migration of some birds to
+a warmer latitude. It is doubtless favourable to the serpents to
+hybernate in large numbers massed together; and the habit of resorting
+annually to the same spot once formed, we can imagine that the
+individuals--perhaps a single couple in the first place--frequenting
+some very deep, dry, and well-sheltered cavern, safe from enemies, would
+have a great advantage over others of their race; that they would be
+stronger and increase more, and spread during the summer months further
+and further from the cavern on all sides; and that the further afield
+they went the more would the instinct be perfected; since all the young
+serpents that did not have the instinct of returning unerringly to the
+ancestral refuge, and that, like the outsiders of their race, to put it
+in that way, merely crept into the first hole they found on the approach
+of the cold season, would be more liable to destruction. Probably most
+snakes get killed long before a natural decline sets in; to say that not
+one in a thousand dies of old age would probably be no exaggeration; but
+if they were as safe from enemies and accidents as some less prolific
+and more highly-organized animals, so that many would reach the natural
+term of life, and death came slowly, we can imagine that in such a
+heat-loving creature the failure of the vital powers would simulate the
+sensations caused by a falling temperature, and cause the old or sick
+serpent, even in midsummer, to creep instinctively away to the ancient
+refuge, where many a long life-killing frost had been safely tided over
+in the past.
+
+The huanaco has never been a hybernating animal; but we must assume
+that, like the crotalus of the north, he had formed a habit of
+congregating with his fellows at certain seasons at the same spot;
+further, that these were seasons of suffering to the animal--the
+suffering, or discomfort and danger, having in the first place given
+rise to the habit. Assuming again that the habit had existed so long as
+to become, like that of the reptile, a fixed, immutable instinct, a
+hereditary knowledge, so that the young huanacos, untaught by the
+adults, would go alone and unerringly to the meeting-place from any
+distance, it is but an easy step to the belief, that after the
+conditions had changed, and the refuges were no longer needed, this
+instinctive knowledge would still exist in them, and that they would
+take the old road when stimulated by the pain of a wound; or the
+miserable sensations experienced in disease or during the decay of the
+life-energy, when the senses grow dim, and the breath fails, and the
+blood is thin and cold.
+
+I presume that most persons who have observed animals a great deal have
+met with cases in which the animal has acted automatically, or
+instinctively, when the stimulus has been a false one. I will relate one
+such case, observed by myself, and which strikes me as being apposite to
+the question I am considering. It must be premised that this is an
+instance of an acquired habit; but this does not affect my argument,
+since I have all along assumed that the huanaco--a highly sagacious
+species in the highest class of vertebrates--first acquired a habit from
+experience of seeking a remembered refuge, and that such habit was the
+parent, as it were, or the first clay model, of the perfect and
+indestructible instinct that was to be.
+
+It is not an uncommon thing in the Argentino pampas--I have on two
+occasions witnessed it myself--for a riding-horse to come home, or to
+the gate of his owner's house, to die. I am speaking of riding-horses
+that are never doctored, nor treated mercifully; that look on their
+master as an enemy rather than a friend; horses that live out in the
+open, and have to be hunted to the corral or enclosure, or roughly
+captured with a lasso as they run, when their services are required. I
+retain a very vivid recollection of the first occasion of witnessing an
+action of this kind in a horse, although I was only a boy at the time.
+On going out one summer evening I saw one of the horses of the
+establishment standing unsaddled and unbridled leaning his head over the
+gate. Going to the spot, I stroked his nose, and then, turning to an old
+native who happened to be near, asked him what could be the meaning of
+such a thing. "I think he is going to die," he answered; "horses often
+come to the house to die." And next morning the poor beast was found
+lying dead not twenty yards from the gate; although he had not appeared
+ill when I stroked his nose on the previous evening; but when I saw him
+lying there dead, and remembered the old native's words, it seemed to me
+as marvellous and inexplicable that a horse should act in that way, as
+if some wild creature--a rhea, a fawn, or dolichotes--had come to exhale
+his last breath at the gates of his enemy and constant persecutor, man.
+
+I now believe that the sensations of sickness and approaching death in
+the riding-horse of the pampas resemble or similate the pains, so often
+experienced, of hunger, thirst and fatigue combined, together with the
+oppressive sensations caused by the ponderous native saddle, or recado,
+with its huge surcingle of raw hide drawn up so tightly as to hinder
+free respiration. The suffering animal remembers how at the last relief
+invariably came, when the twelve or fifteen hours' torture were over,
+the toil and the want, and when the great iron bridle and ponderous gear
+were removed, and he had freedom and food and drink and rest. At the
+gate or at the door of his master's house, the sudden relief had always
+come to him; and there does he sometimes go in his sickness, his fear
+overmastered by his suffering, to find it again.
+
+Discussing this question with a friend, who has a subtle mind and great
+experience of the horse in semi-barbarous countries, and of many other
+animals, wild and tame, in many regions of the globe, he put forward a
+different explanation of the action of the horse in coming home to die,
+which he thinks simpler and more probable than mine. It is, that a dying
+or ailing animal instinctively withdraws itself from its fellows--an
+action of self-preservation in the individual in opposition to the
+well-known instincts of the healthy animals, which impels the whole herd
+to turn upon and persecute the sickly member, thus destroying its
+chances of recovery. The desire of the suffering animal is not only to
+leave its fellows, but to get to some solitary place where they cannot
+follow, or would never find him, to escape at once from a great and
+pressing danger. But on the pastoral pampas, where horses are so
+numerous that on that level, treeless area they are always and
+everywhere visible, no hiding-place is discoverable. In such a case, the
+animal, goaded by its instinctive fear, turns to the one spot that
+horses avoid; and although that spot has hitherto been fearful to him,
+the old fear is forgotten in the present and far more vivid one; the
+vicinity of his master's house represents a solitary place to him, and
+he seeks it, just as the stricken deer seeks the interior of some close
+forest, oblivious for the time, in its anxiety to escape from the herd,
+of the dangers lurking in it, and which he formerly avoided.
+
+I have not set this explanation down merely because it does credit to my
+friend's ingenuity, but because it strikes me that it is the only
+alternative explanation that can be given of the animal's action in
+coming home to die. Another fact concerning the ill-tamed and
+barbarously treated horses of the pampas, which, to my mind, strengthens
+the view I have taken, remains to be mentioned. It is not an uncommon
+thing for one of these horses, after escaping, saddled and bridled, and
+wandering about for anight or night and day on the plains, to return of
+its own accord to the house. It is clear that in a case of this kind the
+animal comes home to seek relief. I have known one horse that always had
+to be hunted like a wild animal to be caught, and that invariably after
+being saddled tried to break loose, to return in this way to the gate
+after wandering about, saddled and bridled, for over twenty hours in
+uncomfortable freedom.
+
+The action of the riding-horse returning to a master he is accustomed to
+fly from, as from an enemy, to be released of saddle and bridle, is, no
+doubt more intelligent than that of the dying horse coming home to be
+relieved from his sufferings, but the motive is the same in both cases;
+at the gate the only pain the animal has ever experienced has invariably
+begun, and there it has ended, and when the spur of some new pain
+afflicts him--new and yet like the old--it is to the well-remembered
+hated gate that it urges him.
+
+To return to the huanaco. After tracing the dying instinct back to its
+hypothetical origin--namely, a habit acquired by the animal in some past
+period of seeking refuge from some kind of pain and danger at a certain
+spot, it is only natural to speculate a little further as to the nature
+of that danger and of the conditions the animal existed in.
+
+If the huanaco is as old on the earth as its antique generalized form
+have led naturalists to suppose, we can well believe that it has
+survived not only a great many lost mammalian types, but many changes in
+the conditions of its life. Let us then imagine that at some remote
+period a change took place in the climate of Patagonia, and that it
+became colder and colder, owing to some cause affecting only that
+portion of the antarctic region; such a cause, for instance, as a great
+accumulation of icebergs on the northern shores of the antarctic
+continent, extending century by century until a large portion of the now
+open sea became blocked up with solid ice. If the change was gradual and
+the snow became deeper each winter and lasted longer, an intelligent,
+gregarious, and exceedingly hardy and active animal like the huanaco,
+able to exist on the driest woody fibres, would stand the beat chance of
+maintaining its existence in such altered conditions, and would form new
+habits to meet the new danger. One would be that at the approach of a
+period of deep snow and deadly cold, all the herds frequenting one
+place would gather together at the most favourable spots in the river
+valleys, where the vegetation is dense and some food could be had while
+the surrounding country continued covered with deep snow. They would, in
+fact, make choice of exactly such localities as are now used for dying
+places. There they would be sheltered from the cutting-winds, the twigs
+and bark would supply them with food, the warmth from a great many
+individuals massed together would serve to keep the snow partially
+melted under foot, and would prevent their being smothered, while the
+stiff and closely interlaced branches would keep a roof of snow above
+them, and thus protected they would keep alive until the return of mild
+weather released them. In the course of many generations all weakly
+animals, and all in which the habit of seeking the refuge at the proper
+time was weak or uncertain in its action would perish, but their loss
+would be an advantage to the survivors.
+
+It is worthy of remark that it is only at the southern extremity of
+Patagonia that the huanacos have dying places. In Northern Patagonia,
+and on the Chilian and Peruvian Andes no such instinct has been
+observed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+My purpose in this paper is to discuss a group of curious and useless
+emotional instincts of social animals, which have not yet been properly
+explained. Excepting two of the number, placed first and last in the
+list, they are not related in their origin; consequently they are here
+grouped together arbitrarily, only for the reason that we are very
+familiar with them on account of their survival in our domestic animals,
+and because they are, as I have said, useless; also because they
+resemble each other, among the passions and actions of the lower
+animals, in their effect on our minds. This is in all cases unpleasant,
+and sometimes exceedingly painful, as when species that rank next to
+ourselves in their developed intelligence and organized societies, such
+as elephants, monkeys, dogs, and cattle, are seen under the domination
+of impulses, in some cases resembling insanity, and in others simulating
+the darkest passions of man.
+
+These instincts are:--
+
+(1) The excitement caused by the smell of blood, noticeable in horses
+and cattle among our domestic animals, and varying greatly in degree,
+from an emotion so slight as to be scarcely perceptible to the greatest
+extremes of rage or terror.
+
+(2) The angry excitement roused in some animals when a scarlet or
+bright-red cloth is shown to them. So well known is this apparently
+insane instinct in our cattle that it has given rise to a proverb and
+metaphor familiar in a variety of forms to everyone.
+
+(3) The persecution of a sick or weakly animal by its companions.
+
+(4) The sudden deadly fury that seizes on the herd or family at the
+sight of a companion in extreme distress. Herbivorous mammals at such
+times will trample and gore the distressed one to death. In the case of
+wolves, and other savage-tempered carnivorous species, the distressed
+fellow is frequently torn to pieces and devoured on the spot.
+
+To take the first two together. When we consider that blood is red; that
+the smell of it is, or may be, or has been, associated with that vivid
+hue in the animal's mind; that blood, seen and smelt is, or has been,
+associated with the sight of wounds and with cries of pain and rage or
+terror from the wounded or captive animal, there appears at first sight
+to be some reason for connecting these two instinctive passions as
+having the same origin--namely, terror and rage caused by the sight of a
+member of the herd struck down and bleeding, or struggling for life in
+the grasp of an enemy. I do not mean to say that such an image is
+actually present in the animal's mind, but that the inherited or
+instinctive passion is one in kind and in its working with the passion
+of the animal when experience and reason were its guides.
+
+But the more I consider the point the more am I inclined to regard these
+two instincts as separate in their origin, although I retain the belief
+that cattle and horses and several wild animals are violently excited by
+the smell of blood for the reason just given--namely, their inherited
+memory associates the smell of blood with the presence among them of
+some powerful enemy that threatens their life. To this point I shall
+return when dealing with the last and most painful of the instincts I am
+considering.
+
+The following incident will show how violently this blood passion
+sometimes affects cattle, when they are permitted to exist in a
+half-wild condition, as on the pampas. I was out with my gun one day, a
+few miles from home, when I came across a patch on the ground where the
+grass was pressed or trodden down and stained with blood. I concluded
+that some thievish gauchos had slaughtered a fat cow there on the
+previous night, and, to avoid detection, had somehow managed to carry
+the whole of it away on their horses. As I walked on, a herd of cattle,
+numbering about three hundred, appeared moving slowly on towards a small
+stream a mile away; they were travelling in a thin long line, and would
+pass the blood-stained spot at a distance of seven to eight hundred
+yards, but the wind from it would blow across their track. When the
+tainted wind struck the leaders of the herd they instantly stood still,
+raising their heads, then broke out into loud excited bellowings; and
+finally turning they started off at a fast trot, following up the scent
+in a straight line, until they arrived at the place where one of their
+kind had met its death. The contagion spread, and before long all the
+cattle were congregated on the fatal spot, and began moving round in a
+dense mass, bellowing continually.
+
+It may be remarked here that the animal has a peculiar language on
+occasions like this; it emits a succession of short bellowing cries,
+like excited exclamations, followed by a very loud cry, alternately
+sinking into a hoarse murmur, and rising to a kind of scream that grates
+harshly on the sense. Of the ordinary "cow-music" I am a great admirer,
+and take as much pleasure in it as in the cries and melody of birds and
+the sound of the wind in trees; but this performance of cattle excited
+by the smell of blood is most distressing to hear.
+
+The animals that had forced their way into the centre of the mass to the
+spot where the blood was, pawed the earth, and dug it up with their
+horns, and trampled each other down in their frantic excitement. It was
+terrible to see and hear them. The action of those on the border of the
+living mass in perpetually moving round in a circle with dolorous
+bellowings, was like that of the women in an Indian village when a
+warrior dies, and all night they shriek and howl with simulated grief,
+going round and round the dead man's hut in an endless procession.
+
+The "bull and red rag" instinct, as it may be called, comes next in
+order. It is a familiar fact that brightness in itself powerfully
+attracts most if not all animals. The higher mammalians are affected in
+the same way as birds and insects, although not in the same degree. This
+fact partly explains the rage of the bull. A scarlet flag fluttering in
+the wind or lying on the grass attracts his attention powerfully, as it
+does that of other animals; but though curious about the nature of the
+bright object, it does not anger him. His anger is excited--and this is
+the whole secret of the matter--when the colour is flaunted by a man;
+when it forces him to fix his attention on a man, i.e. an animal of
+another species that rules or drives him, and that he fears, but with
+only a slight fear, which may at any moment be overcome by his naturally
+bold aggressive disposition, Not only does the vivid colour compel him
+to fix his attention on the being that habitually interferes with his
+liberty, and is consequently regarded with unfriendly eyes, but it also
+produces the illusion on his mind that the man is near him, that he is
+approaching him in an aggressive manner: it is an insult, a challenge,
+which, being of so explosive a temper, he is not slow to accept.
+
+On the pampas I was once standing with some gauchos at the gate of a
+corral into which a herd of half-wild cattle had just been driven. One
+of the men, to show his courage and agility, got off his horse and
+boldly placed himself in the centre of the open gate. His action
+attracted the attention of one of the nearest cows, and lowering her
+horns she began watching him in a threatening manner. He then suddenly
+displayed the scarlet lining of his poncho, and instantly she charged
+him furiously: with a quick movement to one side he escaped her horns,
+and after we had driven her back, resumed his former position and
+challenged her again in the same way. The experiment was repeated not
+less than half a dozen times, and always with the same result. The
+cattle were all in a savage temper, and would have instantly charged him
+on his placing himself before them on foot without the display of
+scarlet cloth, but their fear of the mounted men, standing with lassos
+in their hand on either side of him, kept them in check. But whenever
+the attention of any one individual among them was forcibly drawn to him
+by the display of vivid colour, and fixed on him alone, the presence of
+the horsemen was forgotten and fear was swallowed by rage. It is a fact,
+I think, that most animals that exhibit angry excitement when a scarlet
+rag is flourished aggressively at them, are easily excited to anger at
+all times. Domestic geese and turkeys may be mentioned among birds: they
+do not fly at a grown person, but they will often fly at a child that
+challenges them in this way; and it is a fact that they do not at any
+time fear a child very much and will sometimes attack him without being
+challenged. I think that the probability of the view I have taken is
+increased by another fact--namely, that the sudden display of scarlet
+colour sometimes affects timid animals with an extreme fear, just as, on
+the other hand, it excites those that are bold and aggressive to anger.
+Domestic sheep, forinstance, that vary greatly in disposition in
+different races or breeds, and even in different individuals, may be
+affected in the two opposite ways, some exhibiting extreme terror and
+others only anger at a sudden display of scarlet colour by the shepherd
+or herder.
+
+The persecution of a sick animal by its companions comes next under
+consideration.
+
+It will have been remarked, with surprise by some readers, no doubt,
+that I have set down as two different instincts this persecution of a
+sick or weakly individual by its fellows, and the sudden deadly rage
+that sometimes impels the herd to turn upon and destroy a wounded or
+distressed companion. It is usual for writers on the instincts of
+animals to speak of them as one: and I presume that they regard this
+sudden deadly rage of several individuals against a companion as merely
+an extreme form of the common persecuting instinct or impulse. They are
+not really one, but are as distinct in origin and character as it is
+possible for any two instincts to be. The violent and fatal impulse
+starts simultaneously into life and action, and is contagious, affecting
+all the members of the herd like a sudden madness. The other is neither
+violent nor contagious: the persecution is intermittent: it is often
+confined to one or to a very few members of the herd, and seldom joined
+in by the chief member, the leader or head to whom all the others give
+way.
+
+Concerning this head of the herd, or flock, or pack, it is necessary to
+say something more. Some gregarious animals, particularly birds, live
+together in the most perfect peace and amity; and here no leader is
+required, because in their long association together as a species in
+flocks, they have attained to a oneness of mind, so to speak, which
+causes them to move or rest, and to act at all times harmoniously
+together, as if controlled and guided by an extrane-ous force. I may
+mention that the kindly instinct in animals, which is almost universal
+between male and female in the vertebrates, is most apparent in these
+harmoniously acting birds. Thus, in La Plata, I have remarked, in more
+than one species, that a lame or sick individual, unable to keop pace
+with the flock and find its food, has not only been waited for, but in
+some cases some of the flock have constantly attended it, keeping close
+to it both when flying and on the ground; and, I have no doubt, feeding
+it just as they would have fed their young.
+
+Naturally among such kinds no one member is of more consideration than
+another. But among mammals such equality and harmony is rare. The
+instinct of one and all is to lord it over the others, with the result
+that one more powerful or domineering gets the mastery, to keep it
+thereafter as long as he can. The lower animals are, in this respect,
+very much like us; and in all kinds that are at all fierce-tempered the
+mastery of one over all, and of a few under him over the others, is most
+salutary; indeed, it is inconceivable that they should be able to exist
+together under any other system.
+
+On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to
+keep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these
+animals a great deal, and presume that they are very much like feral
+dogs and wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but when
+a fight begins the head of the pack as a rule rushes to the spot,
+whereupon the fighters separate and march off in different directions,
+or else cast themselves down and deprecate their tyrant's wrath with
+abject gestures and whines. If the combatants are both strong and have
+worked themselves into a mad rage before their head puts in an
+appearance, it may go hard with him: they know him no longer, and all he
+can do is to join in the fray; then, if the fighters turn on him, he may
+be so injured that his power is gone, and the next best dog in the pack
+takes his place. The hottest contests are always between dogs that are
+well matched; neither will give place to the other, and so they fight it
+out; but from the foremost in strength and power down to the weakest
+there is a gradation of authority; each one knows just how far he can
+go, which companion he can bully when he is in a bad temper or wishes to
+assert himself, and to which he must humbly yield in his turn. In such a
+state the weakest one must always yield to all the others, and cast
+himself down, seeming to call himself a slave and worshipper of any
+other member of the pack that chooses to snarl at him, or command him to
+give up his bone with a good grace.
+
+This masterful or domineering temper, so common among social mammals, is
+the cause of the persecution of the sick and weakly. When an animal
+begins to ail he can no longer hold his own; he ceases to resent the
+occasional ill-natured attacks made on him; his non-combative condition
+is quickly discovered, and he at once drops down to a place below the
+lowest; it is common knowledge in the herd that he may be buffeted with
+impunity by all, even by those that have hitherto suffered buffets but
+have given none. But judging from my own observation, this persecution,
+is not, as a rule, severe, and is seldom fatal.
+
+It is often the case that a sick or injured animal withdraws and hides
+himself from the herd; the instinct of the "stricken deer" this might be
+called. But I do not think that we need assume that the ailing
+individual goes away to escape the danger of being ill-used by his
+companions. He is sick and drooping and consequently unfit to be with
+the healthy and vigorous; that is the simplest and probably the true
+explanation of his action; although in some cases he might be driven
+from them by persistent rough usage. However peaceably gregarious
+mammals may live together, and however fond of each other's company they
+may be, they do not, as a rule, treat each other gently. Furthermore,
+their games are exceedingly rough and require that they shall be in a
+vigorous state of health to escape injury. Horned animals have no
+buttons to the sharp weapons they prod and strike each other with in a
+sportive spirit. I have often witnessed the games of wild and half-wild
+horses with astonishment; for it seemed that broken bones must result
+from the sounding kicks they freely bestowed on one another. This
+roughness itself would be a sufficient cause for the action of the
+individual, sick and out of tune and untouched by the glad contagion of
+the others, in escaping from them; and to leave them would be to its
+advantage (and to that of the race) since, if not fatally injured or
+sick unto death, its chances of recovery to perfect health would be
+thereby greatly increased.
+
+It remains now to speak of that seemingly most cruel of instincts which
+stands last on my list. It is very common among gregarious animals that
+are at all combative in disposition, and still survives in our domestic
+cattle, although very rarely witnessed in England. My first experience
+of it was just before I had reached the age of five years. I was not at
+that early period trying to find out any of nature's secrets, but the
+scene I witnessed printed itself very vividly on my mind, so that I can
+recall it as well as if my years had been five-and-twenty; perhaps
+better. It was on a summer's evening, and I was out by myself at some
+distance from the house, playing about the high exposed roots of some
+old trees; on the other side of the trees the cattle, just returned from
+pasture, were gathered on the bare level ground. Hearing a great
+commotion among them, I climbed on to one of the high exposed roots,
+and, looking over, saw a cow on the ground, apparently unable to rise,
+moaning and bellowing in a distressed way, while a number of her
+companions were crowding round and goring her.
+
+What is the meaning of such an instinct? Darwin has but few words on the
+subject. "Can we believe," he says, in his posthumous _Essay on
+Instinct, "_when a wounded herbivorous animal returns to its own herd
+and is then attacked and gored, that this cruel and very common instinct
+is of any service to the species?" At the same time, he hints that such
+an instinct might in some circumstances be useful, and his hint has been
+developed into the current belief among naturalists on the subject. Here
+it is, in Dr. Romanes' words: "We may readily imagine that the instinct
+displayed by many herbivorous animals of goring sick and wounded
+companions, is really of use in countries where the presence of weak
+members in a herd is a source of danger to the herd from the prevalence
+of wild beasts." Here it is assumed that the sick are set upon and
+killed, but this is not the fact; sickness and decay from age or some
+other cause are slow things, and increase imperceptibly, so that the
+sight of a drooping member grows familiar to the herd, as does that of a
+member with some malformation, or unusual shade of colour, or altogether
+white, as in the case of an albino.
+
+Sick and weak members, as we have seen, while subject to some
+ill-treatment from their companions (only because they can be
+ill-treated with impunity), do not rouse the herd to a deadly animosity;
+the violent and fatal attack is often as not made on a member in perfect
+health and vigour and unwounded, although, owing to some accident, in
+great distress, and perhaps danger, at the moment.
+
+The instinct is, then, not only useless but actually detrimental; and,
+this being so, the action of the herd in destroying one of its members
+is not even to be regarded as an instinct proper, but rather as an
+aberration of an instinct, a blunder, into which animals sometimes fall
+when excited to action in unusual circumstances.
+
+The first thing that strikes us is that in these wild abnormal moments
+of social animals, they are acting in violent contradiction to the whole
+tenor of their lives; that in turning against a distressed fellow they
+oppose themselves to the law of their being, to the whole body of
+instincts, primary and secondary, and habits, which have made it
+possible for them to exist together in communities. It is, I think, by
+reflecting on the abnormal character of such an action that we are led
+to a true interpretation of this "dark saying of Nature."
+
+Every one is familiar with Bacon's famous passage about the dog, and the
+noble courage which that animal puts on when "maintained by a man; who
+is to him in place of a God, or _melior natura;_ which courage is
+manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a better
+nature than its own, could never attain." Not so. The dog is a social
+animal, and acts instinctively in concert with his fellows; and the
+courage he manifests is of the family, not the individual. In the
+domestic state the man he is accustomed to associate with and obey
+stands to him in the place of the controlling pack, and to his mind,
+which is canine and not human, _is_ the pack. A similar "noble courage,"
+greatly surpassing that exhibited on all other occasions, is displayed
+by an infinite number of mammals and birds of gregarious habits, when
+repelling the attacks of some powerful and dangerous enemy, or when they
+rush to the rescue of one of their captive fellows. Concerning this rage
+and desperate courage of social animals in the face of an enemy, we see
+(1) that it is excited by the distressed cries, or by the sight of a
+member of the herd or family dying from or struggling in the clutches of
+an enemy; (2) that it affects animals when a number af individuals are
+together, and is eminently contagious, like fear, that communicates
+itself, quick as lightning, from one to another until all are in a
+panic, and like the joyous emotion that impels the members of a herd or
+flock to rush simultaneously into play.
+
+Now, it is a pretty familiar fact that animals acting instinctively, as
+well as men acting intelligently, have at times their delusions and
+their illusions, and see things falsely, and are moved to action by a
+false stimulus to their own disadvantage. When the individuals of a herd
+or family are excited to a sudden deadly rage by the distressed cries of
+one of their fellows, or by the sight of its bleeding wounds and the
+smell of its blood, or when they see it frantically struggling on the
+ground, or in the cleft of a tree or rock, as if in the clutches of a
+powerful enemy, they do not turn on it to kill but to rescue it.
+
+In whatever way the rescuing instinct may have risen, whether simply
+through natural selection or, as is more probable, through an
+intelligent habit becoming fixed and hereditary, its effectiveness
+depends altogether on the emotion of overmastering rage excited in the
+animal--rage against a tangible visible enemy, or invisible, and excited
+by the cries or struggles of a suffering companion; clearly, then, it
+could not provide against the occasional rare accidents that animals
+meet with, which causes them to act precisely in the way they do when
+seized or struck down by an enemy. An illusion is the result of the
+emotion similar to the illusion produced by vivid expectation in
+ourselves, which has caused many a man to see in a friend and companion
+the adversary he looked to see, and to slay him in his false-seeing
+anger.
+
+An illusion just as great, leading to action equally violent, but
+ludicrous rather than painful to witness, may be seen in dogs, when
+encouraged by a man to the attack, and made by his cries and gestures to
+expect that some animal they are accustomed to hunt is about to be
+unearthed or overtaken; and if, when they are in this disposition, he
+cunningly exhibits and sets them on a dummy, made perhaps of old rags
+and leather and stuffed with straw, they will seize, worry, and tear it
+to pieces with the greatest fury, and without the faintest suspicion of
+its true character.
+
+That wild elephants will attack a distressed fellow seemed astonishing
+to Darwin, when he remembered the case of an elephant after escaping
+from a pit helping its fellow to escape also. But it is precisely the
+animals, high or low in the organic scale, that are social, and possess
+the instinct of helping each other, that will on occasions attack a
+fellow in misfortune--such an attack being no more than a blunder of the
+helping instinct.
+
+Felix de Azara records a rather cruel experiment on the temper of some
+tame rats confined in a cage. The person who kept them caught the tail
+of one of the animals and began sharply pinching it, keeping his hand
+concealed under the cage. Its cries of pain and struggles to free itself
+greatly excited the other rats; and after rushing wildly round for some
+moments they flew at their distressed companion, and fixing their teeth
+in its throat quickly dispatched it. In this case if the hand that held
+the tail had been visible and in the cage, the bites would undoubtedly
+have been inflicted on it; but no enemy was visible; yet the fury and
+impulse to attack an enemy was present in the animals. In such
+circumstances, the excitement must be discharged--the instinct obeyed,
+and in the absence of any other object of attack the illusion is
+produced and it discharges itself on the struggling companion. It is
+sometimes seen in dogs, when three or four or five are near together,
+that if one suddenly utters a howl or cry of pain, when no man is near
+it and no cause apparent, the others run to it, and seeing nothing, turn
+round and attack each other. Here the exciting cause--the cry for
+help--is not strong enough to produce the illusion which is sometimes
+fatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly thinks that the
+others, or one of the others, inflicted the injury, and his impulse is
+to take the part of the injured animal. If the cry for help--caused
+perhaps by a sudden cramp or the prick of a thorn--is not very sharp or
+intense, the other dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl at
+each other in a suspicious way.
+
+To go back to Azara's anecdote. Why, it may be asked--and this question
+has been put to me in conversation--if killing a distressed companion is
+of no advantage to the race, and if something must be attacked--why did
+not these rats in this instance attack the cage they were shut in, and
+bite at the woodwork and wires? Or, in the case related by Mr. Andrew
+Lang in _Longman's Magazine_ some time ago, in which the members of a
+herd of cattle in Scotland turned with sudden amazing fury on one of the
+cows that had got wedged between two rocks and was struggling with
+distressed bellowings to free itself--why did they not attack the
+prisoning rocks instead of goring their unfortunate comrade to death?
+For it is well known that animals will, on occasions, turn angrily upon
+and attack inanimate objects that cause them injury or hinder their
+freedom of action. And we know that this mythic faculty--the mind's
+projection of itself into visible nature--survives in ourselves, that
+there are exceptional moments in our lives when it comes back to us; no
+one, for instance, would be astonished to hear that any man, even a
+philosopher, had angrily kicked away or imprecated a stool or other
+inanimate object against which he had accidentally barked his shins. The
+answer is, that there is no connection between these two things--the
+universal mythic faculty of the mind, and that bold and violent instinct
+of social animals of rushing to the rescue of a stricken or distressed
+companion, which has a definite, a narrow, purpose--namely, to fall upon
+an enemy endowed not merely with the life and intelligence common to all
+things, including rocks, trees, and waters, but with animal form and
+motion.
+
+I had intended in this place to give other instances, observed in
+several widely-separated species, including monkeys; but it is not
+necessary, as I consider that all the facts, however varied, are covered
+by the theory I have suggested--even a fact I like the one mentioned in
+this chapter of cattle bellowing and madly digging up the ground where
+the blood of one of their kind had been spilt: also such a fact as that
+of wild cattle and other animals caught in a trap or enclosure attacking
+and destroying each other in their frenzy; and the fact that some
+fierce-tempered carnivorous mammals will devour the companion they have
+killed. It is an instinct of animals like wolves and peccaries to devour
+the enemy they have overcome and slain: thus, when the jaguar captures a
+peccary out of a drove, and does not quickly escape with his prize into
+a tree, he is instantly attacked and slain and then consumed, even to
+the skin and bones. This is the wolf's and the peccary's instinct; and
+the devouring of one of their own companions is an inevitable
+consequence of the mistake made in the first place of attacking and
+killing it. In no other circumstances, not even when starving, do they
+prey on their own species.
+
+If the explanation I have offered should seem a true or highly probable
+one, it will, I feel sure, prove acceptable to many lovers of animals,
+who, regarding tins seemingly ruthless instinct, not as an aberration
+but as in some vague way advantageous to animals in their struggle for
+existence, are yet unable to think of it without pain and horror;
+indeed, I know those who refuse to think of it at all, who would gladly
+disbelieve it if they could.
+
+It should be a relief to them to be able to look on it no longer as
+something ugly and hateful, a blot on nature, but as an illusion, a
+mistake, an unconscious crime, so to speak, that has for its motive the
+noblest passion that animals know--that sublime courage and daring which
+they exhibit in defence of a distressed companion. This fiery spirit in
+animals, which makes them forget their own safety, moves our hearts by
+its close resemblance to one of the most highly-prized human virtues;
+just as we are moved to intellectual admiration by the wonderful
+migratory instinct in birds that simulates some of the highest
+achievements of the mind of man. And we know that this beautiful
+instinct is also liable to mistakes--that many travellers leave us
+annually never to return. Such a mistake was undoubtedly the cause of
+the late visitation of Pallas' sand-grouse: owing perhaps to some
+unusual atmospheric or dynamic condition, or to some change in the
+nervous system of the birds, they deviated widely from their usual
+route, to scatter in countless thousands over the whole of Europe and
+perish slowly in climates not suited to them; while others, overpassing
+the cold strange continent, sped on over colder, stranger seas, to drop
+at last like aerolites, quenching their lives in the waves.
+
+Whether because it is true, as Professor Freeman and some others will
+have it, that humanity is a purely modern virtue; or because the
+doctrine of Darwin, by showing that we are related to other forms of
+life, that our best feelings have their roots low down in the temper and
+instincts of the social species, has brought us nearer in spirit to the
+inferior animals, it is certain that our regard for them has grown, and
+is growing, and that new facts and fresh inferences that make us think
+more highly of them are increasingly welcome.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+HORSE AND MAN.
+
+
+There is no mode of progression so delightful as riding on horseback.
+Walking, rowing, bicycling are pleasant exercises in their way, but the
+muscular exertion and constant exercise of judgment they call for occupy
+the mind partly to the exclusion of other things; so that a long walk
+may sometimes be only a long walk and nothing more. In riding
+we are not conscious of exertion, and as for that close observation and
+accurate discernment necessary in traversing the ground with speed and
+safety, it is left to the faithful servant that carries us. Pitfalls,
+hillocks, slippery places, the thousand little inequalities of the
+surface that have to be measured with infallible eye, these disturb us
+little. To fly or go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough and
+smooth alike, fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hills
+without climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearest
+approach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster bubbles
+and flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from the days of
+Montgolfier downwards have brought us no nearer to it. The aeronaut
+gasping for breath above the clouds offers only a sad spectacle of the
+imbecility of science and man's shattered hopes. To the free inhabitants
+of air we can only liken the mounted Arab, vanishing, hawklike, over the
+boundless desert.
+
+In riding there is always exhilarating motion; yet, if the scenery
+encountered be charming, you are apparently sitting still, while,
+river-like, it flows toward and past you, ever giving place to fresh
+visions of beauty. Above all, the mind is free, as when one lies idly on
+the grass gazing up into the sky. And, speaking of myself, there is even
+more than this immunity from any tax on the understanding such as we
+require in walking; the rhythmic motion, the sensation as of night,
+acting on the brain like a stimulus. That anyone should be able to think
+better lying, sitting, or standing, than when speeding along on
+horseback, is to me incomprehensible. This is doubtless due to early
+training and long use; for on those great pampas where I first saw the
+light and was taught at a tender age to ride, we come to look on man as
+a parasitical creature, fitted by nature to occupy the back of a horse,
+in which position only he has full and free use of all his faculties.
+Possibly the gaucho--the horseman of the pampas--is born with this idea
+in his brain; if so, it would only be reasonable to suppose that its
+correlative exists in a modification of structure. Certain it is that an
+intoxicated gaucho lifted on to the back of his horse is perfectly safe
+in his seat. The horse may do his best to rid himself of his burden; the
+rider's legs--or posterior arms as they might appropriately be
+called--retain their iron grip, notwithstanding the fuddled brain.
+
+The gaucho is more or less bow-legged; and, of course, the more crooked
+his legs are, the better for him in his struggle for existence. Off his
+horse his motions are awkward, like those of certain tardigrade mammals
+of arboreal habits when removed from their tree. He waddles in his walk;
+his hands feel for the reins; his toes turn inwards like a duck's. And
+here, perhaps, we can see why foreign travellers, judging him from their
+own standpoint, invariably bring against him the charge of laziness. On
+horseback he is of all men most active. His patient endurance under
+privations that would drive other men to despair, his laborious days and
+feats of horsemanship, the long journeys he performs without rest or
+food, seem to simple dwellers on the surface of the earth almost like
+miracles. Deprive him of his horse, and he can do nothing but sit on
+the ground cross-legged, or _en cuclillas_,--on his heels. You have, to
+use his own figurative language, cut off his feet.
+
+Darwin in his earlier years appears not to have possessed the power of
+reading men with that miraculous intelligence always distinguishing his
+researches concerning other and lower orders of beings. In the _Voyage
+of a Naturalist,_ speaking of this supposed indolence of the gauchos, he
+tells that in one place where workmen were in great request, seeing a
+poor gaucho sitting in a listless attitude, he asked him why he did not
+work. The man's answer was that _he was too poor to work!_ The
+philosopher was astonished and amused at the reply, but failed to
+understand it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of brief
+phrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned? The
+poor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been stolen--a thing
+of frequent occurrence in that country, or, perhaps, that some minion of
+the Government of the moment had seized them for the use of the State.
+
+To return to the starting point, the pleasures of riding do not flow
+exclusively from the agreeable sensations attendant on flight-like
+motion; there is also the knowledge, sweet in itself, that not a mere
+cunningly fashioned machine, like that fabled horse of brass "on which
+the Tartar king did ride," sustains us; but a something with life and
+thought, like ourselves, that feels what we feel, understands us, and
+keenly participates in our pleasures. Take, for example, the horse on
+which some quiet old country gentleman is accustomed to travel; how
+soberly and evenly he jogs along, picking his way over the ground. But
+let him fall into the hands of a lively youngster, and how soon he picks
+up a frisky spirit! Were horses less plastic, more the creatures of
+custom than they are, it would always be necessary, before buying one,
+to inquire into the disposition of its owner.
+
+When I was thirteen years old I was smitten with love for a horse I once
+saw--an untamable-looking brute, that rolled his eyes, turbulently,
+under a cloud of black mane tumbling over his forehead. I could not take
+my sight off this proud, beautiful creature, and I longed to possess him
+with a great longing. His owner--a worthless vagabond, as it
+happened--marked my enthusiastic admiration, and a day or two
+afterwards, having lost all his money at cards, he came to me, offering
+to sell me the horse. Having obtained my father's consent, I rushed off
+to the man with all the money I possessed--about thirty or thirty-five
+shillings, I believe. After some grumbling, and finding he could get no
+more, he accepted the money. My new possession filled me with unbounded
+delight, and I spent the time caressing him and leading him about the
+grounds in search of succulent grasses and choice leaves to feed him on.
+I am sure this horse understood and loved me, for, in spite of that
+savage look, which his eyes never quite lost, he always displayed a
+singular gentleness towards me. He never attempted to upset me, though
+he promptly threw--to my great delight, I must confess--anyone else who
+ventured to mount him. Probably the secret of his conduct was that he
+hated the whip. Of this individual, if not of the species, the
+celebrated description held true:--"The horse is a docile animal, but if
+you flog him he will not do so." After he had been mine a few days, I
+rode on him one morning to witness a cattle-marking on a neighbouring
+estate. I found thirty or forty gauchos on the ground engaged in
+catching and branding the cattle. It was rough, dangerous work, but
+apparently not rough enough to satisfy the men, so after branding an
+animal and releasing him from their lassos, several of the mounted
+gauchos would, purely for sport, endeavour to knock it down as it rushed
+away, by charging furiously on to it. As I sat there enjoying the fun,
+my horse stood very quietly under me, also eagerly watching the sport.
+At length a bull was released, and, smarting from the fiery torture,
+lowered his horns and rushed away towards the open plain. Three horsemen
+in succession shot out from the crowd, and charged the bull at full
+speed; one by one, by suddenly swerving his body round, he avoided them,
+and was escaping scot-free. At this moment my horse--possibly
+interpreting a casual touch of my hand on his neck, or some movement of
+my body, as a wish to join in the sport--suddenly sprang forward and
+charged on the flying bull like a thunderbolt, striking him full in the
+middle of his body, and hurling him with a tremendous shock to earth.
+The stricken beast rolled violently over, while my horse stood still as
+a stone watching him. Strange to say, I was not unseated, but,
+turning-round, galloped back, greeted by a shout of applause from the
+spectators--the only sound of that description I have ever had the
+privilege of listening to. They little knew that my horse had
+accomplished the perilous feat without his rider's guidance. No doubt he
+had been accustomed to do such things, and, perhaps, for the moment, had
+forgotten that he had passed into the hands of a new owner--one of
+tender years. He never voluntarily attempted an adventure of that kind
+again; he knew, I suppose, that he no longer carried on his back a
+reckless dare-devil, who valued not life. Poor Picaso! he was mine till
+he died. I have had scores of horses since, but never one I loved so
+well.
+
+With the gauchos the union between man and horse is not of so intimate a
+nature as with the Indians of the pampas. Horses are too cheap, where a
+man without shoes to his feet may possess a herd of them, for the
+closest kind of friendship to ripen. The Indian has also less
+individuality of character. The immutable nature of the conditions he is
+placed in, and his savage life, which is a perpetual chase, bring him
+nearer to the level of the beast he rides. And probably the acquired
+sagacity of the horse in the long co-partnership of centuries has become
+hereditary, and of the nature of an instinct. The Indian horse is more
+docile, he understands his master better; the slightest touch of the
+hand on his neck, which seems to have developed a marvellous
+sensitiveness, is sufficient to guide him. The gaucho labours to give
+his horse "a silken mouth," as he aptly calls it; the Indian's horse has
+it from birth. Occasionally the gaucho sleeps in the saddle; the Indian
+can die on his horse. During frontier warfare one hears at times of a
+dead warrior being found and removed with difficulty from the horse that
+carried him out of the fight, and about whose neck his rigid fingers
+were clasped in death. Even in the gaucho country, however, where, I
+grieve to confess, the horse is not deservedly esteemed, there are very
+remarkable instances of equine attachment and fidelity to man, and of a
+fellowship between horse and rider of the closest kind. One only I will
+relate.
+
+When Rosas, that man of "blood and iron," was Dictator of the Argentine
+country--a position which he held for a quarter of a century--desertors
+from the army were inexorably shot when caught, as they generally were.
+But where my boyhood was spent there was a deserter, a man named Santa
+Anna, who for seven years, without ever leaving the neighbourhood of his
+home, succeeded in eluding his pursuers by means of the marvellous
+sagacity and watchful care exercised by his horse. When taking his rest
+on the plain--for he seldom slept under a roof--his faithful horse kept
+guard. At the first sight of mounted men on the horizon he would fly to
+his master, and, seizing his cloak between his teeth, rouse him with a
+vigorous shake. The hunted man would start up, and in a moment man and
+horse would vanish into one of the dense reed-beds abounding in the
+place, and where no man could follow. I have not space to tell more
+about this horse; but at last, in the fulness of time, when the figs
+were ripe--literally as well as figuratively, for it happened in the
+autumn of the year--the long tyrannous rule ended, and Santa Anna came
+out of the reed-beds, where he had lived his wild-animal life, to mix
+with his fellows. I knew him some years later. He was a rather
+heavy-looking man, with little to say, and his reputation for honesty
+was not good in the place; but I dare say there was something good in
+him.
+
+Students of nature are familiar with the modifying effects of new
+conditions on man and brute. Take, for example, the gaucho: he must
+every day traverse vast distances, see quickly, judge rapidly, be ready
+at all times to encounter hunger and fatigue, violent changes of
+temperature, great and sudden perils. These conditions have made him
+differ widely from the peasant of the Peninsula; he has the endurance
+and keen sight of a wolf, is fertile in expedients, quick in action,
+values human life not at all, and is in pain or defeat a Stoic.
+Unquestionably the horse he rides has also suffered a great change. He
+differs as much from the English hunter, for instance, as one animal can
+well differ from another of the same species. He never pounds the earth
+and wastes his energies in vain parade. He has not the dauntless courage
+that performs such brilliant feats in the field, and that often as not
+attempts the impossible. In the chase he husbands all his strength,
+carrying his head low, and almost grazing the ground with his hoofs, so
+that he is not a showy animal. Constant use, or the slow cumulative
+process of natural selection, has served to develop a keenness of sense
+almost preternatural. The vulture's eye, with all the advantage derived
+from the vulture's vast elevation above the scene surveyed, is not so
+far-reaching as the sense of smell in the pampa horse. A common
+phenomenon on the pampas is a sudden migration of the horses of a
+district to some distant place. This occurs in seasons of drought, when
+grass or water fails. The horses migrate to some district where, from
+showers having fallen or other circumstances, there is a better supply
+of food and drink. A slight breeze blowing from the more favoured
+region, which may be forty or fifty miles away, or even much further, is
+enough to start them off. Yet, during the scorching days of midsummer,
+very little moisture or smell of grass can possibly reach them from such
+a distance.
+
+Another phenomenon, even more striking, is familiar to every
+frontiersman. For some reason, the gaucho horse manifests the greatest
+terror at an Indian invasion. No doubt his fear is, in part at any rate,
+an associate feeling, the coming of the Indians being always a time of
+excitement and com-motion, sweeping like a great wave over the country;
+houses are in flames, families flying, cattle being driven at frantic
+speed to places of greater safety. Be this as it may, long before the
+marauders reach the settlement (often when they are still a whole day's
+journey from it) the horses take the alarm and come wildly flying in:
+the contagion quickly spreads to the horned cattle, and a general
+stampede ensues. The gauchos maintain that the horses _smell_ the
+Indians. I believe they are right, for when passing a distant Indian
+camp, from which the wind blew, the horses driven before me have
+suddenly taken fright and run away, leading me a chase of many miles.
+The explanation that ostriches, deer, and other fleet animals driven in
+before the invaders might be the cause of the stampede cannot be
+accepted, since the horses are familiar with the sight of these animals
+flying from their gaucho hunters.
+
+There is a pretty fable of a cat and dog lying in a dark room, aptly
+illustrating the fine senses of these two species. "Listen! I heard a
+feather drop!" said the dog. "Oh, no!" said the cat, "it was a needle;
+I saw it." The horse is not commonly believed to have senses keen as
+that, and a dog tracing his master's steps over the city pavement is
+supposed to be a feat no other animal can equal. No doubt the artificial
+life a horse lives in England, giving so little play to many of his most
+important faculties, has served to blunt them. He is a splendid
+creature; but the noble bearing, the dash and reckless courage that
+distinguish him from the modest horse of the desert, have not been
+acquired without a corresponding loss in other things. When ridden by
+night the Indian horse--and sometimes the same habit is found in the
+gaucho's animal--drops his head lower and lower as the darkness
+increases, with the danger arising from the presence of innumerable
+kennels concealed in the grass, until his nose sweeps the surface like a
+foxhound's. That this action is dictated by a powerful instinct of
+self-preservation is plain; for, when I have attempted to forcibly drag
+the animal's head up, he has answered such an experiment by taking the
+bit in his teeth, and violently pulling the reins out of my hand. His
+miraculous sense of smell measures the exact position of every hidden
+kennel, every treacherous spot, and enables him to pass swiftly and
+securely over it.
+
+On the desert pampa the gaucho, for a reason that he knows, calls the
+puma the "friend of man." The Arab gives this designation to his horse;
+but in Europe, where we do not associate closely with the horse, the dog
+naturally takes the foremost place in our affections. The very highest
+praise yet given to this animal is probably to be found in Bacon's essay
+on Atheism. "For take an example of a dog," he says, "and mark what a
+generosity and courage he will put on when he finds himself maintained
+by a man, who is to him in place of a god, or _melior natura,_ which
+courage is manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a
+better nature than its own, could never attain!" Can we not say as much
+of the horse? The very horses that fly terror-stricken from the smell of
+an Indian will, when "maintained by a man," readily charge into a whole
+host of yelling savages.
+
+I once had a horse at home, born and bred on the place, so docile that
+whenever I required him I could go to him where the horses were at
+pasture, and, though they all galloped off at my approach, he would
+calmly wait to be caught. Springing on to his back, I would go after the
+other horses, or gallop home with only my hand on his neck to guide him.
+I did not often ride him, as he was slow and lazy, but with timid women
+and children he was a favourite; he was also frequently used for farm
+work, in or out of harness, and I could shoot from his back. In the
+peach season he would roam about the plantation, getting the fruit, of
+which he was very fond, by tugging at the lower branches of the trees
+and shaking it down in showers. One intensely dark night I was riding
+home on this horse. I came through a road with a wire fence on each
+side, two miles in length, and when I had got nearly to the end of this
+road my horse suddenly stopped short, uttering a succession of loud
+terrified snorts. I could see nothing but the intense blackness of the
+night before me and tried to encourage him to go on. Touching him on
+the neck, I found his hair wet with the sudden profuse sweat of extreme
+fear. The whip made no impression on him. He continued to back away, his
+eyes apparently fixed on some object of horror just before him, while he
+trembled to such a degree that I was shaken in the saddle. He attempted
+several times to wheel round and run away, but I was determined not to
+yield to him, and continued the contest. Suddenly, when I was beginning
+to despair of getting home by that road, he sprang forward, and
+regularly charged the (to me) invisible object before him, and in
+another moment, when he had apparently passed it, taking the bit between
+his teeth he almost flew over the ground, never pausing till he brought
+me to my own door. When I dismounted his terror seemed gone, but he hung
+his head in a dejected manner, like a horse that has been under the
+saddle all day. I have never witnessed another such instance of almost
+maddening fear. His terror and apprehension were like what we can
+imagine a man experiencing at sight of a ghost in some dark solitary
+place.
+
+Yet he did not forcibly carry me away from it, as he might so easily
+have done; but, finding himself maintained by a "nature superior to his
+own," he preferred to face it. I have never met in the dog a more
+striking example of this noblest kind of brute courage. The incident did
+not impress me very much at the moment, but when I came to reflect that
+my sight was mere blindness compared with that of my horse, and that it
+was not likely his imagination clothed any familiar natural object with
+fantastic terrors, it certainly did impress me very deeply.
+
+I am loth to finish with, my subject, in which, to express myself in the
+manner of the gauchos, I have passed over many matters, like good grass
+and fragrant herbs the galloping horse sniffs at but cannot stay to
+taste; and especially loth to conclude with this last incident, which
+has in it an element of gloom. I would rather first go back for a few
+moments to my original theme--the pleasures of riding, for the sake of
+mentioning a species of pleasure my English reader has probably never
+tasted or even heard of. When riding by night on the pampas, I used to
+enjoy lying back on my horse till my head and shoulders rested well on
+his back, my feet also being raised till they pressed against his neck;
+and in this position, which practice can make both safe and comfortable,
+gaze up into the starry sky. To enjoy this method of riding thoroughly,
+a sure-footed unshod horse with perfect confidence in his rider is
+necessary; and he must be made to go at a swift and smooth pace over
+level grassy ground. With these conditions the sensation is positively
+delightful. Nothing of earth is visible, only the vast circle of the
+heavens glittering with innumerable stars; the muffled sound of the
+hoofs on the soft sward becomes in fancy only the rushing of the wings
+of our Pegasus, while the enchanting illusion that we are soaring
+through space possesses the mind. Unfortunately, however, this method of
+riding is impracticable in England. And, even if people with enthusiasm
+enough could be found to put it in practice by importing swift
+light-footed Arabian or pampa horses, and careering about level parks on
+dark starry nights, probably a shout of derision would be raised against
+so undignified a pastime.
+
+_Apropos_ of dignity, I will relate, in conclusion, an incident in my
+London life which may possibly interest psychologists. Some time ago in
+Oxford Street I got on top of an omnibus travelling west. My mind was
+preoccupied, I was anxious to get home, and, in an absent kind of way, I
+became irritated at the painfully slow rate of progress. It was all an
+old familiar experience, the deep thought, lessening pace, and
+consequent irritation. The indolent brute I imagined myself riding was,
+as usual, taking advantage of his rider's abstraction; but I would soon
+"feelingly persuade" him that I was not so far gone as to lose sight of
+the difference between a swinging gallop and a walk. So, elevating my
+umbrella, I dealt the side of the omnibus a sounding blow, very much to
+the astonishment of my fellow-passengers. So overgrown are we with
+usages, habits, tricks of thought and action springing from the soil we
+inhabit; and when we have broken away and removed ourselves far from it,
+so long do the dead tendrils still cling to us!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV,
+
+SEEN AND LOST,
+
+
+We can imagine what the feelings of a lapidary would be--an enthusiast
+whose life is given to the study of precious stones, and whose sole
+delight is in the contemplation of their manifold beauty--if a stranger
+should come in to him, and, opening his hand, exhibit a new unknown gem,
+splendid as ruby or as sapphire, yet manifestly no mere variety of any
+familiar stone, but differing as widely from all others as diamond from
+opal or cat's-eye; and then, just when he is beginning to rejoice in
+that strange exquisite loveliness, the hand should close and the
+stranger, with a mocking smile on his lips, go forth and disappear from
+sight in the crowd. A feeling such as that would be is not unfrequently
+experienced by the field naturalist whose favoured lot it is to live in
+a country not yet "thoroughly worked out," with its every wild
+inhabitant scientifically named, accurately described, and skilfully
+figured in some colossal monograph. One swift glance of the practised
+eye, ever eagerly searching for some new-thing, and he knows that here
+at length is a form never previously seen by him; but his joy is perhaps
+only for a few moments, and the prize is snatched from sight for ever.
+The lapidary might have some doubts; he might think that the stranger
+had, after all, only mocked him with the sight of a wonderful artificial
+gem, and that a close examination would have proved its worthlessness;
+but the naturalist can have no doubts: if he is an enthusiast, well
+acquainted with the fauna of his district, and has good eyesight, he
+knows that there is no mistake; for there it is, the new strange form,
+photographed by instantaneous process on his mind, and there it will
+remain, a tantalizing image, its sharp lines and fresh colouring
+unblurred by time.
+
+Walking in some open forest glade, he may look up just in time to see a
+great strange butterfly--a blue Morpho, let us say, wandering in some
+far country where this angel insect is unknown--passing athwart his
+vision with careless, buoyant flight, the most sylph-like thing in
+nature, and all blue and pure like its aerial home, but with a more
+delicate and wonderful brilliance in its cerulean colour, giving such
+unimaginable glory to its broad airy wings; and then, almost before his
+soul has had time to feel its joy, it may soar away unloitering over the
+tall trees, to be seen no more.
+
+But the admiration, the delight, and the desire are equally great, and
+the loss just as keenly felt, whether the strange species seen happens
+to be one surpassingly beautiful or not. Its newness is to the
+naturalist its greatest attraction. How beautiful beyond all others
+seems a certain small unnamed brown bird to my mind! So many years have
+passed and its image has not yet grown dim; yet I saw it only for a few
+moments, when it hopped out from, the thick foliage and perched within
+two or three yards of me, not afraid, but only curious; and after
+peering at me first with one eye and then the other, and wiping its
+small dagger on a twig, it flew away and was seen no more. For many days
+I sought for it, and for years waited its reappearance, and it was more
+to me than ninety and nine birds which I had always known; yet it was
+very modest, dressed in a brown suit, very pale on the breast and white
+on the throat, and for distinction a straw-coloured stripe over the
+eye--that ribbon which Queen Nature bestows on so many of her feathered
+subjects, in recognition, I suppose, of some small and common kind of
+merit. If I should meet with it in a collection I should know it again;
+only, in that case it would look plain and homely to me--this little
+bird that for a time made all others seem unbeautiful.
+
+Even a richer prize may come in sight for a brief period--one of the
+nobler mammalians, which are fewer in number, and bound to earth like
+ourselves, and therefore so much better known than the wandering
+children of air. In. some secluded spot, resting amidst luxuriant
+herbage or forest undergrowth, a slight rustling makes us start, and,
+lo! looking at us from the clustering leaves, a strange face; the
+leaf-like ears erect, the dark eyes round with astonishment, and the
+sharp black nose twitching and sniffing audibly, to take in the
+unfamiliar flavour of a human presence from the air, like the pursed-up
+and smacking lips of a wine-drinker tasting a new vintage. No sooner
+seen than gone, like a dream, a phantom, the quaint furry face to be
+thereafter only an image in memory.
+
+Sometimes the prize may be a very rich one, and actually within reach of
+the hand--challenging the hand, as it were, to grasp it, and yet
+presently slip away to be seen no more, although it maybe sought for day
+after day, with a hungry longing comparable to that of some poor tramp
+who finds a gold doubloon in the forest, and just when he is beginning
+to realize all that it means to him drops it in the grass and cannot
+find it again. There is not the faintest motion in the foliage, no
+rustle of any dry leaf, and yet we know that something has
+moved--something has come or has gone; and, gazing fixedly at one spot,
+we suddenly see that it is still there, close to us, the pointed
+ophidian head and long neck, not drawn back and threatening, but sloping
+forward, dark and polished as the green and purple weed-stems springing
+from marshy soil, and with an irregular chain of spots extending down
+the side. Motionless, too, as the stems it is; but presently the tongue,
+crimson and glistening, darts out and flickers, like a small jet of
+smoke and flame, and is withdrawn; then the smooth serpent head drops
+down, and the thing is gone.
+
+How I saw and lost the noble wrestling frog has been recounted in
+Chapter IV.: other tantalizing experiences of the same kind remain to be
+told in the present chapter, which is not intended for the severe
+naturalist, but rather for such readers as may like to hear something
+about the pains and pleasures of the seeker as well as the result of the
+seeking.
+
+One of my earliest experiences of seeing and losing relates to a
+humming-bird--a veritable "jewel of ornithology." I was only a boy at
+the time, but already pretty well acquainted with the birds of the
+district I lived in, near La Plata River, and among them were three
+species of the hummingbird. One spring day I saw a fourth--a wonderful
+little thing, only half as big as the smallest of the other three--the
+well-known Phaithornis splendens--and scarcely larger than a bumble-bee.
+I was within three feet of it as it sucked at the flowers, suspended
+motionless in the air, the wings appearing formless and mist-like from
+their rapid vibratory motion, but the rest of the upper plumage was seen
+distinctly as anything can be seen. The head and neck and upper part of
+the back were emerald green, with the metallic glitter usually seen in
+the burnished scale-like feathers of these small birds; the lower half
+of the back was velvet-black; the tail and tail-coverts white as snow.
+On two other occasions, at intervals of a few days, I saw this brilliant
+little stranger, always very near, and tried without success to capture
+it, after which, it disappeared from the plantation. Four years later I
+saw it once again not far from the same place. It was late in summer,
+and I was out walking on the level plain where the ground was carpeted
+with short grass, and nothing else grew there except a solitary stunted
+cardoou thistle-bush with one flower on its central stem above the
+grey-green artichoke-like leaves. The disc of the great thorny blossom
+was as broad as that of a sunflower, purple in colour, delicately
+frosted with white; on this flat disc several insects were
+feeding--flies, fireflies, and small wasps--and I paused for a few
+minutes in my walk to watch them. Suddenly a small misty object flew
+swiftly downwards past my face, and paused motionless in the air an inch
+or two above the rim of the flower. Once more my lost humming-bird,
+which I remembered so well! The exquisitely graceful form, half circled
+by the misty moth-like wings, the glittering green and velvet-black
+mantle, and snow-white tail spread open like a fan--there it hung like a
+beautiful bird-shaped gem suspended by an invisible gossamer thread.
+One--two--three moments passed, while I gazed, trembling with rapturous
+excitement, and then, before I had time to collect my faculties and make
+a forlorn attempt to capture it with my hat, away it flew, gliding so
+swiftly on the air that form and colour were instantly lost, and in
+appearance it was only an obscure grey line traced rapidly along the
+low sky and fading quickly out ol sight. And that was the last I ever
+saw of it.
+
+The case of this small "winged gem," still wandering nameless in the
+wilds, reminds me of yet another bird seen and lost, also remarkable for
+its diminutive size. For years I looked for it, and when the wished-for
+opportunity came, and it was in my power to secure it, I refrained; and
+Fate punished me by never permitting me to see it again. On several
+occasions while riding on the pampas I had caught glimpses of this
+minute bird flitting up mothlike, with uncertain tremulous flight, and
+again dipping into the weeds, tall grass, or thistles. Its plumage was
+yellowish in hue, like sere dead herbage, and its extremely slender body
+looked longer and slimmer than it was, owing to the great length of its
+tail, or of the two middle tail-feathers. I knew that it was a
+Synallaxis--a genus of small birds of the Woodhewer family. Now, as I
+have said in a former chapter, these are wise little birds, more
+interesting--I had almost said more beautiful--in their wisdom, or
+wisdom-simulating instincts, than the quatzel in its resplendent green,
+or the cock-of-the-rock in its vivid scarlet and orange mantle. Wrens
+and mocking-birds have melody for their chief attraction, and the name
+of each kind is, to our minds, also the name of a certain kind of sweet
+music; we think of swifts and swallows in connection with the mysterious
+migratory instinct; and humming-birds have a glittering mantle, and the
+miraculous motions necessary to display its ever-changing iridescent
+beauty. In like manner, the homely Dendrocolaptidae possess the genius
+for building, and an account of one of these small birds without its
+nest would be like a biography of Sir Christopher Wren that made no
+mention of his works. It was not strange then that when I saw this small
+bird the question rose to my mind, what kind of nest does it build?
+
+One morning in the month of October, the great breeding-time for birds
+in the Southern Hemisphere, while cautiously picking my way through a
+bed of eardoon bushes, the mysterious little creature flitted up and
+perched among the clustering leaves quite near to me. It uttered a
+feeble grasshopper-like chirp; and then a second individual, smaller,
+paler-coloured, and if possible shyer than the first, showed itself for
+two or three seconds, after which both birds dived once more into
+concealment. How glad I was to see them! for here they were, male and
+female, in a suitable spot in my own fields, where they evidently meant
+to breed. Every day after that I paid them one cautious visit, and by
+waiting from five to fifteen minutes, standing motionless among the
+thistles, I always succeeded in getting them to show themselves for a
+few moments. I could easily have secured them then, but my wish was to
+discover their nesting habits; and after watching for some days, I was
+rewarded by finding their nest; then for three days more I watched it
+slowly progressing towards completion, and each time I approached it one
+of the small birds would flit out to vanish into the herbage. The
+structure was about six inches long, and not more than two inches in
+diameter, and was placed horizontally on a broad stiff eardoon leaf,
+sheltered by other leaves above. It was made of the finest dry grass
+loosely woven, and formed a simple perfectly straight tube, open at both
+ends. The aperture was so small that I could only insert my little
+finger, and the bird could not, of course, have turned round in so
+narrow a passage, and so always went in at one end and left by the
+other. On visiting the spot on the fourth day I found, to my intense
+chagrin, that the delicate fabric had been broken and thrown down by
+some animal; also, that the birds had utterly vanished--for I sought
+them in vain, both there and in every weedy and thistly spot in the
+neighbourhood. The bird without the nest had seemed a useless thing to
+possess; now, for all my pains, I had only a wisp of fine dry grass in
+my hand, and no bird. The shy, modest little creature, dwelling
+violet-like amidst clustering leaves, and even when showing itself still
+"half-hidden from the eye," was thereafter to be only a tantalizing
+image in memory. Still, my case was not so hopeless as that of the
+imagined lapidary; for however rare a species may be, and near to its
+final extinction, there must always be many individuals existing, and I
+was cheered by the thought that I might yet meet with one at some future
+time. And, even if this particular species was not to gladden my sight
+again, there were others, scores and hundreds more, and at any moment I
+might expect to see one shining, a living gem, on Nature's open extended
+palm.
+
+Sometimes it has happened that an animal would have been overlooked or
+passed by with scant notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for some
+singular action or habit which has instantly given it a strange
+importance, and made its possession desirable.
+
+I was once engaged in the arduous and monotonous task of driving a large
+number of sheep a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, in
+excessively hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to travelling.
+Five or six gauchos were with me, and we were on the southern pampas of
+Buenos Ayres, near to a long precipitous stony sierra which rose to a
+height of five or six hundred feet above the plain. Who that has
+travelled for eighteen days on a dead level in a broiling sun can resist
+a hill? That sierra was more sublime to us than Conon-dagua, than
+Illimani.
+
+Leaving the sheep, I rode to it with three of the men; aad after
+securing our horses on the lower slope, we began our laborious ascent.
+Now the gaucho when taken from his horse, on which he lives like a kind
+of parasite, is a very slow-moving creature, and I soon left my friends
+far behind. Coming to a place where ferns and flowering herbage grew
+thick, I began to hear all about me sounds of a character utterly unlike
+any natural sound I was acquainted with--innumerable low clear voices
+tinkling or pealing like minute sweet-toned, resonant bells--for the
+sounds were purely metallic and perfectly bell-like. I was completely
+ringed round with the mysterious music, and as I walked it rose and sank
+rhythmically, keeping time to my steps. I stood still, and immediately
+the sounds ceased. I took a step forwards, and again the fairy-bells
+were set ringing, as if at each step my foot touched a central meeting
+point of a thousand radiating threads, each thread attached to a peal of
+little bells hanging concealed among the herbage. I waited for my
+companions, and called their attention to the phenomenon, and to them
+also it was a thing strange and perplexing. "It is the bell-snake!"
+cried one excitedly. This is the rattle-snake; but although at that time
+I had no experience of this reptile, I knew that he was wrong. Yet how
+natural the mistake! The Spanish name of "bell-snake" had made him
+imagine that the whirring sound of the vibrating rattles, resembling
+muffled cicada music, is really bell-like in character. Eventually we
+discovered that the sound was made by grasshoppers; but they were seen
+only to be lost, for I could not capture one, so excessively shy and
+cunning had the perpetual ringing of their own little tocsins made them.
+And presently I had to return to my muttons; and afterwards there was no
+opportunity of revisiting the spot to observe so singular a habit again
+and collect specimens. It was a very slender grasshopper, about an inch
+and a half long, of a uniform, tawny, protective colour--the colour of
+an old dead leaf. It also possessed a protective habit common to most
+grasshoppers, of embracing a slender vertical stem with its four fine
+front legs, and moving cunningly round so as to keep the stem always in
+front of it to screen itself from sight. Only other grasshoppers are
+silent when alarmed, and the silence and masking action are related, and
+together prevent the insect from being detected. But this particular
+species, or race, or colony, living on the sides of the isolated sierra,
+had acquired a contrary habit, resembling a habit of gregarious birds
+and mammals. For this informing sound (unless it mimicked some
+_warning-sound,_ as of a rattlesnake, which it didn't) could not
+possibly be beneficial to individuals living alone, as grasshoppers
+generally do, but, on the contrary, only detrimental; and such a habit
+was therefore purely for the public good, and could only have arisen in
+a species that always lived in communities.
+
+On another occasion, in the middle of the hot season, I was travelling
+alone across-country in a locality which was new to me, a few leagues
+east of La Plata River, in its widest part. About eleven o'clock in the
+morning I came to a low-lying level plain where the close-cropped grass
+was vivid green, although elsewhere all over the country the vegetation
+was scorched and dead, and dry as ashes. The ground being so favourable,
+I crossed this low plain at a swinging gallop, and in about thirty
+minutes' time. In that half-hour I saw a vast number of snakes, all of
+one kind, and a species new to me; but my anxiety to reach my
+destination before the oppressive heat of the afternoon made me hurry
+on. So numerous were the snakes in that green place that frequently I
+had as many as a dozen in sight at one time. It looked to me like a
+coronelia--harmless colubrine snakes--but was more than twice as large
+as either of the two species of that genus I was already familiar with.
+In size they varied greatly, ranging from two to fully five feet in
+length, and the colour was dull yellow or tan, slightly lined and
+mottled with shades of brown. Among dead or partially withered grass and
+herbage they would have been undistinguishable at even a very short
+distance, but on the vivid green turf they were strangely conspicuous,
+some being plainly visible forty or fifty yards away; and not one was
+seen coiled up. They were all lying motionless, stretched out full
+length, and looking like dark yellow or tan-coloured ribbons, thrown on
+to the grass. It was most unusual to see so many snakes together,
+although not surprising in the circumstances. The December heats had
+dried up all the watercourses and killed the vegetation, and made the
+earth hard and harsh as burnt bricks; and at such times snakes,
+especially the more active non-venomous kinds, will travel long
+distances, in their slow way, in search of water. Those I saw during my
+ride had probably been attracted by the moisture from a large area of
+country; and although there was no water, the soft fresh grass must have
+been grateful to them. Snakes are seen coiled up when they are at home;
+when travelling and far afield, they lie as a rule extended full length,
+even when resting--and they are generally resting. Pausing at length,
+before quitting this green plain, to give my horse a minute's rest, I
+got off and approached a large snake; but when I was quite twelve yards
+from it, it lifted its head, and, turning deliberately round, came
+rather swiftly at me. I retreated, and it followed, until, springing on
+to my horse, I left it, greatly surprised at its action, and beginning
+to think that it must be venomous. As I rode on the feeling of surprise
+increased, conquering haste; and in the end, seeing more snakes, I
+dismounted and approached the largest, when exactly the same thing
+occurred again, the snake rousing itself and coming angrily at me when I
+was still (considering the dull lethargic character of the deadliest
+kinds) at an absurd distance from it. Again and again I repeated the
+experiment, with the same result. And at length I stunned one with a
+blow of my whip to examine its mouth, but found no poison-fangs in it.
+
+I then resumed my journey, expecting to meet with more snakes of the
+same kind at my destination; but there were none, and very soon business
+called me to a distant place, and I never met with this species
+afterwards. But when I rode away from that green spot, and was once more
+on the higher, desolate, wind-swept plain surrounding it--a rustling sea
+of giant thistles, still erect, although dead, and red as rust, and
+filling the hot blue sky with silvery down--it was with a very strange
+feeling. The change from the green and living to the dead and dry and
+dusty was so great! There seemed to be something mysterious,
+extra-natural, in that low level plain, so green and fresh and snaky,
+where my horse's hoofs had made no sound--a place where no man dwelt,
+and no cattle pastured, and no wild bird folded its wing. And the
+serpents there were not like others--the mechanical coiled-up thing we
+know, a mere bone-and-muscle man-trap, set by the elements, to spring
+and strike when trodden on: but these had a high intelligence, a lofty
+spirit, and were filled with a noble rage and astonishment that any
+other kind of creature, even a man, should venture there to disturb
+their sacred peace. It was a fancy, born of that sense of mystery which
+the unknown and the unusual in nature wakes in us--an obsolescent
+feeling that still links us to the savage. But the simple fact was
+wonderful enough, and that has been set down simply and apart from all
+fancies. If the reader happens not to be a naturalist, it is right to
+tell him that a naturalist cannot exaggerate consciously; and if he be
+capable of unconscious exaggeration, then ho is no naturalist. He
+should hasten "to join the innumerable caravan that moves" to the
+fantastic realms of romance. Looking at the simple fact scientifically,
+it was a case of mimicry--the harmless snake mimicking the fierce
+threatening gestures and actions proper to some deadly kind. Only with
+this difference: the venomous snake, of all deadly things in nature, is
+the slowest to resentment, the most reluctant to enter into a quarrel;
+whereas in this species angry demonstrations were made when the intruder
+was yet far off, and before he had shown any hostile intentions.
+
+My last case--the last, that is, of the few I have selected--relates to
+a singular variation in the human species. On this occasion I was again
+travelling alone in a strange district on the southern frontier of
+Buenos Ayres. On a bitterly cold midwinter day, shortly before noon, I
+arrived, stiff and tired, at one of those pilgrims' rests on the
+pampas--a wayside _pulperia,_ or public house, where the traveller can
+procure anything he may require or desire, from a tumbler of Brazilian
+rum to make glad his heart, to a poncho, or cloak of blue cloth with
+fluffy scarlet lining, to keep him warm o' nights; and, to speed him on
+his way, a pair of cast-iron spurs weighing six pounds avoirdupois, with
+rowels eight inches in diameter, manufactured in this island for the use
+of barbarous men beyond the sea. The wretched mud-and-grass building was
+surrounded by a foss crossed by a plank drawbridge; outside of the
+enclosure twelve or fourteen saddled horses were standing, and from the
+loud noise of talk and laughter in the bar I conjectured that a goodly
+company of rough frontiersmen were already making merry at that early
+hour. It was necessary for me to go in among them to see the proprietor
+of the place and ask permission to visit his kitchen in order to make
+myself a "tin of coffee," that being the refreshment I felt inclined
+for. When I went in and made my salutation, one man wheeled round square
+before me, stared straight into my oyes, and in an exceedingly
+high-pitched reedy or screechy voice and a sing-song tone returned my
+"good morning," and bade me call for the liquid I loved best at his
+expense. I declined with thanks, and in accordance with gaucho etiquette
+added that I was prepared to pay for his liquor. It was then for him to
+say that he had already been served and so let the matter drop, but he
+did not do so: he screamed out in his wild animal voice that he would
+take gin. I paid for his drink, and would, I think, have felt greatly
+surprised at his strange insolent behaviour, so unlike that of the
+usually courteous gaucho, but this thing affected me not at all, so
+profoundly had his singular appearance and voice impressed me; and for
+the rest of the time I remained in the place I continued to watch him
+narrowly. Professor Huxley has somewhere said, "A variation frequently
+occurs, but those who notice it take no care about noting down the
+particulars." That is not a failing of mine, and this is what I noted
+down while the man's appearance was still fresh in memory. He was about
+five feet eleven inches in height--very tall for a gaucho--straight and
+athletic, with exceedingly broad shoulders, which made his round head
+look small; long arms and huge hands. The round flat face, coarse black
+hair, swarthy reddish colour, and smooth hairless cheeks seemed to show
+that he had more Indian than Spanish blood in him, while his round black
+eyes were even more like those of a rapacious animal in expression than
+in the pure-blooded Indian. He also had the Indian or half-breed's
+moustache, when that natural ornament is permitted to grow, and which is
+composed of thick bristles standing out like a cat's whiskers. The mouth
+was the marvellous feature, for it was twice the size of an average
+mouth, and the two lips were alike in thickness. This mouth did not
+smile, but snarled, both when he spoke and when he should have smiled;
+and when he snarled the wliolo of his teeth and a part of the gums were
+displayed. The teeth were not as in other human beings--incisors,
+canines, and molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, each
+tooth a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched its
+companion teeth, and with a point sharp as the sharpest-pointed dagger.
+They were like the teeth of a shark or crocodile. I noticed that when he
+showed them, which was very often, they were not set together as in
+dogs, weasels, and other savage snarling animals, but apart, showing the
+whole terrible serration in the huge red mouth.
+
+After getting his gin he joined in the boisterous conversation with the
+others, and this gave me an opportunity of studying his face for several
+minutes, all the time with a curious feeling that I had put myself into
+a cage with a savage animal of horrible aspect, whose instincts were
+utterly unknown to me, and were probably not very pleasant. It was
+interesting to note that whenever one of the others addressed him
+directly, or turned to him when speaking, it was with a curious
+expression, not of fear, but partly amusement and partly something else
+which I could not fathom. Now, one might think that this was natural
+enough purely on account of the man's extraordinary appearance. I do not
+think that a sufficient explanation; for however strange a man's
+appearance may be, his intimate friends and associates soon lose all
+sense of wonder at his strangeness, and even forget that he is unlike
+others. My belief is that this curiosity, or whatever it was they showed
+in their faces, was due to something in his character--a mental
+strangeness, showing itself at unexpected times, and which might flash,
+out at any moment to amuse or astonish them. There was certainly a
+correspondence between the snarling action of the mouth and the
+dangerous form of the teeth, perfect as that in any snarling animal; and
+such animals, it should be remembered, snarl not only when angry and
+threatening, but in their playful moods as well. Other and more
+important correspondences or correlations might have existed; and the
+voice was certainly unlike any human voice I have ever heard, whether in
+white, red, or black man. But the time I had for observation was short,
+the conversation revealed nothing further, and by-and-by I went away in
+search of the odorous kitchen, where there would be hot water for
+coffee, or at all events cold water and a kettle, and materials for
+making a fire--to wit, bones of dead cattle, "buffalo chips," and rancid
+fat.
+
+I have never been worried with the wish, or ambition to be a head-hunter
+in the Dyak sense, but on this one occasion I did wish that it had been
+possible, without violating any law, or doing anything to a
+fellow-creature which I should not like done to myself, to have obtained
+possession of this man's head, with its set of unique and terrible
+teeth. For how, in the name of Evolution, did he come by them, and by
+other physical peculiarities--the snarling habit and that high-pitched
+animal voice, for instance--which made him a being different from
+others--one separate and far apart? Was he, so admirably formed, so
+complete and well-balanced, merely a freak of nature, to use an
+old-fashioned phrase--a sport, or spontaneous individual variation--an
+experiment for a new human type, imagined by Nature in some past period,
+inconceivably long ago, but which she had only now, too late, found time
+to carry out? Or rather was he like that little hairy maiden exhibited
+not long ago in London, a reproduction of the past, the mystery called
+reversion--a something in the life of a species like memory in the life
+of an individual, the memory which suddenly brings back to the old man's
+mind the image of his childhood? For no dream-monster in human form ever
+appeared to me with so strange and terrible a face; and this was no
+dream but sober fact, for I saw and spoke with this man; and unless cold
+steel has given him his quietus, or his own horse has crushed him, or a
+mad bull sored him--all natural forms of death in that wild land--he is
+probably still living and in the prime of life, and perhaps at this very
+moment drinking gin at some astonished traveller's expense at that very
+bar where I met him. The old Palaeolithic man, judging from the few
+remains we have of him, must have had an unspeakably savage and, to our
+way of thinking, repulsive and horrible aspect, with his villainous low
+receding forehead, broad nose, great projecting upper jaw, and
+retreating chin; to meet such a man face to face in Piccadilly would
+frighten a nervous person of the present time. But his teeth were not
+unlike our own, only very much larger and more powerful, and well
+adapted to their work of masticating the flesh, underdone and possibly
+raw, of mammoth and rhinoceros. If, then, this living man recalls a type
+of the past, it is of a remoter past, a more primitive man, the volume
+of whose history is missing from the geological record. To speculate on
+such a subject seems idle and useless; and when I coveted possession of
+that head it was not because I thought that it might lead to any fresh
+discovery. A lower motive inspired the feeling. I wished for it only
+that I might bring it over the sea, to drop it like a new apple of
+discord, suited to the spirit of the times, among the anthropologists
+and evolutionists generally of this old and learned world. Inscribed, of
+course, "To the most learned," but giving no locality and no
+particulars. I wished to do that for the pleasure--not a very noble kind
+of pleasure, I allow--of witnessing from some safe hiding-place the
+stupendous strife that would have ensued--a battle more furious, lasting
+and fatal to many a brave knight of biology, than was ever yet fought
+over any bone or bony fragment or fabric ever picked up, including the
+celebrated cranium of the Neanderthal.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX.
+
+THE PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The following passage occurs in an article on "The Naturalist in La
+Plata," by the late Professor Piomanes, which appeared in the
+_Nineteenth Century,_ May, 1893. After quoting the account of the puma's
+habits and character given in the book, the writer says:--"I have
+received corroboration touching all these points from a gentleman who,
+when walking alone and unarmed on the skirts of a forest, was greatly
+alarmed by a large puma coming out to meet him. Deeming it best not to
+stand, he advanced to meet the animal, which thereupon began to gambol
+around his feet and rub against his legs, after the manner of an
+affectionate cat. At first he thought these movements must have been
+preliminary to some peculiar mode of attack, and therefore he did not
+respond, but walked quietly on, until the puma suddenly desisted and
+re-entered the forest. This gentleman says that, until the publication
+of Mr. Hudson's book, he had always remained under the impression that
+that particular puma must have been insane."
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+I have found among my papers the following mislaid note on the subject
+of sportive displays of mammalians, which should have been used on page
+281, where the subject is briefly treated:--Most mammalians are
+comparatively silent and live on the ground, and not having the power to
+escape easily, which birds have, and being more persecuted by man, they
+do not often disport themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it is
+difficult to watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence being
+known or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as we
+might imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which I was,
+or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting themselves in a
+manner that took me completely by surprise. While out tinamou shooting
+one day in autumn, near my own home in La Plata, I spied a troop of
+about a dozen weasels racing madly about over a vizcacha village--the
+mound and group of pit-like burrows inhabited by a community of
+vizcachas. These weasels were of the large common species, Galictis
+barbara, about the size of a cat; and were engaged in a pastime
+resembling a complicated dance, and so absorbed were they on that
+occasion that they took no notice of me when I walked up to within nine
+or ten yards of them, and stood still to watch the performance. They
+were all swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doubling
+quickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and although
+apparently carried away with excitement, and crossing each other's
+tracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with so many changes of
+direction that I became confused when trying to keep any one animal in
+view, they never collided nor even came near enough to touch one
+another. The whole performance resembled, on a greatly magnified scale
+and without its beautiful smoothness and lightning swiftness, the
+fantastic dance of small black water-beetles, frequently seen on the
+surface of a pool or stream, during which the insects glide about in a
+limited area with such celerity as to appear like black curving lines
+traced by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross and
+intersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After watching
+the weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the mound, whereupon
+the animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell into the burrows, but
+only to reappear in a few seconds, thrusting up their long ebony-black
+necks and flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaring
+with fierce, beady eyes.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+In November and December, 1893, a short correspondence appeared in the
+_Field_ on the curious subject of "Dogs burying their dead." It arose
+through a letter from a Mr. Gould, of Albany, Western Australia,
+relating the following incident:--
+
+A settler shot a bitch from a neighbouring estate that had formed the
+habit of coming on to his land to visit and play with his dog. The dog,
+finding his companion dead, was observed to dig a large hole in the
+ground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not cover it with
+earth. The writer wished to know if any reader of the _Field_ had met
+with a similar case. Some notes, which I contributed in reply to this
+letter, bear on one of the subjects treated in the chapter on "strange
+instincts," namely, the instinct of social animals to protect and shield
+their fellows; and for this reason I have thought it best to reproduce
+them in this place.
+
+I remember on one occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, a
+large and very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitch
+that had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but he
+never left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the body
+away, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not succeeding in these
+attempts, he settled down by its side again, although it was evident
+that he was suffering greatly from thirst and heat. It was at last only
+with the greatest trouble that the people of the house succeeded in
+getting the body away and burying it out of his sight.
+
+Another instance, more to the point, occurred at my own house on the
+pampas, and I was one of several persons who witnessed it. A small, red,
+long-haired bitch--a variety of the common native cur--gave birth to
+four or five pups. A peon was told to destroy them, and, waiting until
+the bitch was out of sight, he carried them off to the end of the
+orchard, some 400 or 500 yards from the house, and threw them into a
+pool of water which was only two to three feet deep. The bitch passed
+the rest of the day in rushing frantically about, searching for her
+young, and in the evening, a little after dark, actually succeeded in
+finding them, although they were lying at the bottom of the pool. She
+got them all out, and carried them, one by one, to another part of the
+grounds, where she passed the night with them, uttering at intervals the
+most piercing cries. In the morning she carried them to still another
+spot, where there was a soft mould, and then dug a hole large and deep
+enough to bury them all, covering them over with the loose earth. Her
+task done, she returned to the house to sleep all day, but when night
+came again the whole piteous performance was repeated: the pups were dug
+up, and she passed the long, piercingly cold night--for it was in the
+depth of winter--trying to keep them warm, and uttering, as before,
+distressing cries. Yet a third time the whole thing was repeated; but
+after the third night, when the dog came home to sleep, the dead pups
+were taken out of the ground and buried at a distance.
+
+Such an action as this strikes one with astonishment only because we
+have the custom of burying our dead, and are too ready at all times to
+regard the dog as human-like. But the explanation of the action in this
+case is to be found in the familiar fact that very many animals,
+including the dog, have the habit or instinct of burying or concealing
+the thing they wish to leave in safety. Thus, the dog buries the bone it
+does not want to eat, and when hungry digs it up again. When a dog
+buries or hides the dead body of the she dog it was attached to, or the
+she dog buries her dead young, it is with the same motive--namely, to
+conceal the animal that cannot be roused, and that it would not be safe
+to leave exposed.
+
+It is plain to all who observe their actions that the lower animals have
+no comprehension of death. In the case of two animals that are
+accustomed to play or to be much together, if one dies, or is killed,
+and its body left, the other will come to sniff at, touch, and at last
+try to rouse it; but finding all attempts vain, it will at length go
+away to seek companionship elsewhere. In cases where the attachment is
+much stronger, the dead body may be watched over for an indefinite
+period. A brother of mine once related to me a very pathetic incident
+which occurred at an estancia on the pampas where he was staying. A
+large portion of the land was a low, level, marshy plain, partly
+overgrown with reeds and rushes; and one day, in this wilderness, a
+little boy of eight or nine, from the estancia, lost himself. A small
+dog, his invariable attendant, had gone out with him, but did not
+return. Seven days later the poor boy was found, at a great distance
+from the house, lying on the grass, where he had died of exhaustion. The
+dog was lying coiled up at his side, and appeared to be sleeping; but,
+when spoken to, he did not stir, and was presently found to be dead too.
+The dog could have gone back at any moment to the estancia, but his
+instinct of attachment overcame all others; he kept guard over his
+little master, who slept so soundly and so long, until he, too, slept in
+the same way.
+
+A still more remarkable case of this kind was given in one of my books,
+of a gaucho, accompanied by his dog, who was chased and overtaken by a
+troop of soldiers during one of the civil wars in Uruguay. Suspecting
+him of being a spy, or, at all events, an enemy, his captors cut his
+throat, then rode away, calling to the dog to follow them; but the
+animal refused to leave his dead master's side. Returning to the spot a
+few days later, they saw the body of the man they had killed surrounded
+by a large number of vultures, which the dog, in a frenzy of excitement,
+was occupied in keeping at a respectable distance. It was observed that
+the dog, after making one of his sallies, driving the birds away with
+furious barkings, would set out at a run to a small stream not far from
+the spot; but when half way to it he would look back, and, seeing the
+vultures advancing once more to the corpse, would rush back to protect
+it. The soldiers watched him for some time with great interest, and once
+more they tried in vain to get him to follow them. Two days afterwards
+they revisited the spot, to find the dog lying dead by the side of his
+dead master. I had this story from the lips of one of the witnesses.
+
+In all such cases, whether the dog watches over, conceals, or buries a
+dead body, he is doubtless moved by the same instinct which leads him to
+safeguard the animal he is attached to--another dog or his human master.
+But, as the dead animal is past help, it is, of course, a blunder of the
+instinct; and the blunder must be of very much less frequent occurrence
+among wild than among domestic animals. In a state of nature, when a
+gregarious animal dies, he dies, as a rule, alone; his body is not seen
+by his former companions, and he is not missed. When he dies by
+violence--which is the common fate--the body is carried off or devoured
+by the killer. This being the usual order, there is no instinct, except
+in a very few species, relating to the disposal of the dead among
+mammals and other vertebrates, such as is found in ants and other social
+insects. There are a few mammalians that live together in small
+communities, in a habitation made to last for many generations, in which
+such an instinct would appear necessary, and it accordingly exists, but
+is very imperfect. This is the case with the vizcacha, the large rodent
+of the pampas, which lives with its fellows, to the number of twenty or
+thirty, in a cluster of huge burrows. When a vizcacha dies in a burrow,
+the body is dragged out and thrown on to the mound among the mass of
+rubbish collected on it--but not until he has been dead a long time, and
+there is nothing left of him but the dry bones held together by the
+skin. In that condition the other members of the community probably
+cease to look on him as one of their companions who has fallen into a
+long sleep; he is no more than so much rubbish, which must be cleared
+out of an old disused burrow. Probably the beaver possesses some rude
+instinct similar to that of the vizcacha.
+
+_Apropos_ of animals burying their treasures (or connections) for
+safety, it is worth mentioning that the skunk of the pampas occasionally
+buries her young in the kennel, when hunger compels her to go out
+foraging. I had often heard of this habit of the female skunk from the
+gauchos, and one day had the rare good fortune to witness an animal
+engaged in obliterating her own kennel. The senses of the skunk are so
+defective that one is able at times to approach very near to without
+alarming them. In this instance I sat on my horse at a distance of
+twenty yards, and watched the animal at work, drawing in the loose earth
+with her fore feet until the entrance to the kennel was filled up to
+within three inches of the surface; then, dropping into the shallow
+cavity, she pressed the loose mould down with her nose. Her task
+finished, she trotted away, and the hollow in the soil, when I examined
+it closely, looked only like the mouth of an ancient choked-up burrow.
+The young inhabit a circular chamber, lined with fine dry grass, at the
+end of a narrow passage from 3 ft. to 5 ft. long, and no doubt have air
+enough to serve them until their parent returns; but I believe the skunk
+only buries her young when they are very small.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
+#7 in our series by W. H. Hudson
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
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+*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
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+Title: The Naturalist in La Plata
+
+Author: W. H. Hudson
+
+Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7446]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on May 1, 2003]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Eric Eldred
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA
+
+BY
+
+W. H. HUDSON, C.M.Z.S.
+
+
+JOINT AUTHOR OF "ARGENTINE ORNITHOLOGY"
+
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. SMIT
+
+THIRD EDITION.
+
+NEW YORK
+D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
+1895
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The plan I have followed in this work has been to sift and arrange the
+facts I have gathered concerning the habits of the animals best known to
+me, preserving those only, which, in my judgment, appeared worth
+recording. In some instances a variety of subjects have linked
+themselves together in my mind, and have been grouped under one heading;
+consequently the scope of the book is not indicated by the list of
+contents: this want is, however, made good by an index at the end.
+
+It is seldom an easy matter to give a suitable name to a book of this
+description. I am conscious that the one I have made choice of displays
+a lack of originality; also, that this kind of title has been used
+hitherto for works constructed more or less on the plan of the famous
+_Naturalist on the Amazons._ After I have made this apology the reader,
+on his part, will readily admit that, in treating of the Natural History
+of a district so well known, and often described as the southern portion
+of La Plata, which has a temperate climate, and where nature is neither
+exuberant nor grand, a personal narrative would have seemed superfluous.
+
+The greater portion of the matter contained in this volume has already
+seen the light in the form of papers contributed to the _Field,_ with
+other journals that treat of Natural History; and to the monthly
+magazines:--_Longmans', The Nineteenth Century, The Gentleman's
+Magazine,_ and others: I am indebted to the Editors and Proprietors of
+these periodicals for kindly allowing me to make use of this material.
+
+Of all animals, birds have perhaps afforded me most pleasure; but most
+of the fresh knowledge I have collected in this department is contained
+in a larger work _(Argentine Ornithology),_ of which Dr. P. L. Sclater
+is part author. As I have not gone over any of the subjects dealt with
+in that work, bird-life has not received more than a fair share of
+attention in the present volume.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE DESERT PAMPAS
+
+CHAPTER II. CUB PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA
+
+CHAPTER III. WAVE OF LIFE
+
+CHAPTER IV. SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS
+
+CHAPTER V. FEAR IN BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER VI. PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE MEPHITIC SKUNK
+
+CHAPTER VIII. MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS
+
+CHAPTER IX. DRAGON-FLY STORMS
+
+CHAPTER X. MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS
+
+CHAPTER XI. HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS
+
+CHAPTER XII. A NOBLE WASP
+
+CHAPTER XIII. NATURE'S NIGHT-LIGHTS
+
+CHAPTER XIV. FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS
+
+CHAPTER XV. THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT
+
+CHAPTER XVI. HUMMING-BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE CRESTED SCREAMER
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. THE WOODHEWER FAMILY
+
+CHAPTER XIX. MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE
+
+CHAPTER XX. BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE DYING HUANACO
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. HORSE AND MAN
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. SEEN AND LOST
+
+APPENDIX
+
+INDEX
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA,
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE DESERT PAMPAS.
+
+
+During recent years we have heard much about the great and rapid changes
+now going on in the plants and animals of all the temperate regions of
+the globe colonized by Europeans. These changes, if taken merely as
+evidence of material progress, must be a matter of rejoicing to those
+who are satisfied, and more than satisfied, with our system of
+civilization, or method of outwitting Nature by the removal of all
+checks on the undue increase of our own species. To one who finds a
+charm in things as they exist in the unconquered provinces of Nature's
+dominions, and who, not being over-anxious to reach the end of his
+journey, is content to perform it on horseback, or in a waggon drawn by
+bullocks, it is permissible to lament the altered aspect of the earth's
+surface, together with the disappearance of numberless noble and
+beautiful forms, both of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. For he
+cannot find it in his heart to love the forms by which they are
+replaced; these are cultivated and domesticated, and have only become
+useful to man at the cost of that grace and spirit which freedom and
+wildness give. In numbers they are many--twenty-five millions of sheep
+in this district, fifty millions in that, a hundred millions in a
+third--but how few are the species in place of those destroyed? and when
+the owner of many sheep and much wheat desires variety--for he possesses
+this instinctive desire, albeit in conflict with and overborne by the
+perverted instinct of destruction--what is there left to him, beyond his
+very own, except the weeds that spring up in his fields under all skies,
+ringing him round with old-world monotonous forms, as tenacious of their
+undesired union with him as the rats and cockroaches that inhabit his
+house?
+
+We hear most frequently of North America, New Zealand, and Australia in
+this connection; but nowhere on the globe has civilization "written
+strange defeatures" more markedly than on that great area of level
+country called by English writers _the pampas_, but by the Spanish more
+appropriately _La Pampa_--from the Quichua word signifying open space or
+country--since it forms in most part one continuous plain, extending on
+its eastern border from the river Parana, in latitude 32 degrees, to the
+Patagonian formation on the river Colorado, and comprising about two
+hundred thousand square miles of humid, grassy country.
+
+This district has been colonized by Europeans since the middle of the
+sixteenth century; but down to within a very few years ago immigration
+was on too limited a scale to make any very great change; and, speaking
+only of the pampean country, the conquered territory was a long,
+thinly-settled strip, purely pastoral, and the Indians, with their
+primitive mode of warfare, were able to keep back the invaders from the
+greater portion of their ancestral hunting-grounds. Not twenty years
+ago a ride of two hundred miles, starting from the capital city,
+Buenos Ayres, was enough to place one well beyond the furthest
+south-western frontier outpost. In 1879 the Argentine Government
+determined to rid the country of the aborigines, or, at all events, to
+break their hostile and predatory spirit once for all; with the result
+that the entire area of the grassy pampas, with a great portion of
+the sterile pampas and Patagonia, has been made available to the
+emigrant. There is no longer anything to deter the starvelings
+of the Old World from possessing themselves of this new land of
+promise, flowing, like Australia, with milk and tallow, if not with
+honey; any emasculated migrant from a Genoese or Neapolitan
+slum is now competent to "fight the wilderness" out there, with his
+eight-shilling fowling-piece and the implements of his trade. The
+barbarians no longer exist to frighten his soul with dreadful war cries;
+they have moved away to another more remote and shadowy region, called
+in their own language _Alhuemapu_, and not known to geographers. For
+the results so long and ardently wished for have swiftly followed on
+General Roca's military expedition; and the changes witnessed during the
+last decade on the pampas exceed in magnitude those which had been
+previously effected by three centuries of occupation.
+
+In view of this wave of change now rapidly sweeping away the old
+order, with whatever beauty and grace it possessed, it might not seem
+inopportune at the present moment to give a rapid sketch, from the field
+naturalist's point of view, of the great plain, as it existed before the
+agencies introduced by European colonists had done their work, and as it
+still exists in its remoter parts.
+
+The humid, grassy, pampean country extends, roughly speaking, half-way
+from the Atlantic Ocean and the Plata and Parana rivers to the Andes,
+and passes gradually into the "Monte Formation," or _sterile pampa_--a
+sandy, more or less barren district, producing a dry, harsh, ligneous
+vegetation, principally thorny bushes and low trees, of which the chanar
+(Gurliaca decorticans) is the most common; hence the name of
+"Chanar-steppe" used by some writers: and this formation extends
+southwards down into Patagonia. Scientists have not yet been able to
+explain why the pampas, with a humid climate, and a soil exceedingly
+rich, have produced nothing but grass, while the dry, sterile
+territories on their north, west, and south borders have an arborescent
+vegetation. Darwin's conjecture that the extreme violence of the
+_pampero,_ or south-west wind, prevented trees from growing, is now
+proved to have been ill-founded since the introduction of the Eucalyptus
+globulus; for this noble tree attains to an extraordinary height on the
+pampas, and exhibits there a luxuriance of foliage never seen in
+Australia.
+
+To this level area--my "parish of Selborne," or, at all events, a goodly
+portion of it--with the sea on one hand, and on the other the
+practically infinite expanse of grassy desert--another sea, not "in vast
+fluctuations fixed," but in comparative calm--I should like to conduct
+the reader in imagination: a country all the easier to be imagined on
+account of the absence of mountains, woods, lakes, and rivers. There is,
+indeed, little to be imagined--not even a sense of vastness; and Darwin,
+touching on this point, in the _Journal of a Naturalist,_ aptly
+says:--"At sea, a person's eye being six feet above the surface of the
+water, his horizon is two miles and four-fifths distant. In like manner,
+the more level the plain, the more nearly does the horizon approach
+within these narrow limits; and this, in my opinion, entirely destroys
+the grandeur which one would have imagined that a vast plain would have
+possessed."
+
+I remember my first experience of a hill, after having been always shut
+within "these narrow limits." It was one of the range of sierras near
+Cape Corrientes, and not above eight hundred feet high; yet, when I had
+gained the summit, I was amazed at the vastness of the earth, as it
+appeared to me from that modest elevation. Persons born and bred on the
+pampas, when they first visit a mountainous district, frequently
+experience a sensation as of "a ball in the throat" which seems to
+prevent free respiration.
+
+In most places the rich, dry soil is occupied by a coarse grass, three
+or four feet high, growing in large tussocks, and all the year round of
+a deep green; a few slender herbs and trefoils, with long, twining
+stems, maintain a frail existence among the tussocks; but the strong
+grass crowds out most plants, and scarcely a flower relieves its uniform
+everlasting verdure. There are patches, sometimes large areas, where it
+does not grow, and these are carpeted by small creeping herbs of a
+livelier green, and are gay in spring with flowers, chiefly of the
+composite and papilionaceous kinds; and verbenas, scarlet, purple, rose,
+and white. On moist or marshy grounds there are also several lilies,
+yellow, white, and red, two or three flags, and various other small
+flowers; but altogether the flora of the pampas is the poorest in
+species of any fertile district on the globe. On moist clayey ground
+flourishes the stately pampa grass, Gynerium argenteum, the spears of
+which often attain a height of eight or nine feet. I have ridden through
+many leagues of this grass with the feathery spikes high as my head, and
+often higher. It would be impossible for me to give anything like an
+adequate idea of the exquisite loveliness, at certain times and seasons,
+of this queen of grasses, the chief glory of the solitary pampa.
+Everyone is familiar with it in cultivation; but the garden-plant has a
+sadly decaying, draggled look at all times, and to my mind, is often
+positively ugly with its dense withering mass of coarse leaves, drooping
+on the ground, and bundle of spikes, always of the same dead white or
+dirty cream-colour. Now colour--the various ethereal tints that give a
+blush to its cloud-like purity--is one of the chief beauties of this
+grass on its native soil; and travellers who have galloped across the
+pampas at a season of the year when the spikes are dead, and white as
+paper or parchment, have certainly missed its greatest charm. The plant
+is social, and in some places where scarcely any other kind exists it
+covers large areas with a sea of fleecy-white plumes; in late summer,
+and in autumn, the tints are seen, varying from the most delicate rose,
+tender and illusive as the blush on the white under-plumage of some
+gulls, to purple and violaceous. At no time does it look so perfect as
+in the evening, before and after sunset, when the softened light imparts
+a mistiness to the crowding plumes, and the traveller cannot help
+fancying that the tints, which then seem richest, are caught from the
+level rays of the sun, or reflected from the coloured vapours of the
+afterglow.
+
+The last occasion on which I saw the pampa grass in its full beauty was
+at the close of a bright day in March, ending in one of those perfect
+sunsets seen only in the wilderness, where no lines of house or hedge
+mar the enchanting disorder of nature, and the earth and sky tints are
+in harmony. I had been travelling all day with one companion, and for
+two hours we had ridden through the matchless grass, which spread away
+for miles on every side, the myriads of white spears, touched with
+varied colour, blending in the distance and appearing almost like the
+surface of a cloud. Hearing a swishing sound behind us, we turned
+sharply round, and saw, not forty yards away in our rear, a party of
+five mounted Indians, coming swiftly towards us: but at the very moment
+we saw them their animals came to a dead halt, and at the same instant
+the five riders leaped up, and stood erect on their horses' backs.
+Satisfied that they had no intention of attacking us, and were only
+looking out for strayed horses, we continued watching them for some
+time, as they stood gazing away over the plain in different directions,
+motionless and silent, like bronze men on strange horse-shaped pedestals
+of dark stone; so dark in their copper skins and long black hair,
+against the far-off ethereal sky, flushed with amber light; and at their
+feet, and all around, the cloud of white and faintly-blushing plumes.
+That farewell scene was printed very vividly on my memory, but cannot be
+shown to another, nor could it be even if a Ruskin's pen or a Turner's
+pencil were mine; for the flight of the sea-mew is not more impossible
+to us than the power to picture forth the image of Nature in our souls,
+when she reveals herself in one of those "special moments" which have
+"special grace" in situations where her wild beauty has never been
+spoiled by man.
+
+At other hours and seasons the general aspect of the plain is
+monotonous, and in spite of the unobstructed view, and the unfailing
+verdure and sunshine, somewhat melancholy, although never sombre: and
+doubtless the depressed and melancholy feeling the pampa inspires in
+those who are unfamiliar with it is due in a great measure to the
+paucity of life, and to the profound silence. The wind, as may well be
+imagined on that extensive level area, is seldom at rest; there, as in
+the forest, it is a "bard of many breathings," and the strings it
+breathes upon give out an endless variety of sorrowful sounds, from the
+sharp fitful sibilations of the dry wiry grasses on the barren places,
+to the long mysterious moans that swell and die in the tall polished
+rushes of the marsh. It is also curious to note that with a few
+exceptions the resident birds are comparatively very silent, even those
+belonging to groups which elsewhere are highly loquacious. The reason of
+this is not far to seek. In woods and thickets, where birds abound
+most, they are continually losing sight of each other, and are only
+prevented from scattering by calling often; while the muffling effect on
+sound of the close foliage, to' which may be added a spirit of emulation
+where many voices are heard, incites most species, especially those that
+are social, to exert their voices to the utmost pitch in singing,
+calling, and screaming. On the open pampas, birds, which are not
+compelled to live concealed on the surface, can see each other at long
+distances, and perpetual calling is not needful: moreover, in that still
+atmosphere sound travels far. As a rule their voices are strangely
+subdued; nature's silence has infected them, and they have become silent
+by habit. This is not the case with aquatic species, which are nearly
+all migrants from noisier regions, and mass themselves in lagoons and
+marshes, where they are all loquacious together. It is also noteworthy
+that the subdued bird-voices, some of which are exceedingly sweet and
+expressive, and the notes of many of the insects and batrachians have a
+great resemblance, and seem to be in accord with the aeolian tones of
+the wind in reeds and grasses: a stranger to the pampas, even a
+naturalist accustomed to a different fauna, will often find it hard to
+distinguish between bird, frog, and insect voices.
+
+The mammalia is poor in species, and with the single exception of the
+well-known vizcacha (Lagostomus trichodactylus), there is not one of
+which it can truly be said that it is in any special way the product of
+the pampas, or, in other words, that its instincts are better suited to
+the conditions of the pampas than to those of other districts. As a
+fact, this large rodent inhabits a vast extent of country, north, west,
+and south of the true pampas, but nowhere is he so thoroughly on his
+native heath as on the great grassy plain. There, to some extent, he
+even makes his own conditions, like the beaver. He lives in a small
+community of twenty or thirty members, in a village of deep-chambered
+burrows, all with their pit-like entrances closely grouped together; and
+as the village endures for ever, or for an indefinite time, the earth
+constantly being brought up forms a mound thirty or forty feet in
+diameter; and this protects the habitation from floods on low or level
+ground. Again, he is not swift of foot, and all rapacious beasts are his
+enemies; he also loves to feed on tender succulent herbs and grasses, to
+seek for which he would have to go far afield among the giant grass,
+where his watchful foes are lying in wait to seize him; he saves himself
+from this danger by making a clearing all round his abode, on which a
+smooth turf is formed; and here the animals feed and have their evening
+pastimes in comparative security: for when an enemy approaches, he is
+easily seen; the note of alarm is sounded, and the whole company
+scuttles away to their refuge. In districts having a different soil and
+vegetation, as in Patagonia, the vizcachas' curious, unique instincts
+are of no special advantage, which makes it seem probable that they have
+been formed on the pampas.
+
+How marvellous a thing it seems that the two species of mammalians--the
+beaver and the vizcacha--that most nearly simulate men's intelligent
+actions in their social organizing instincts, and their habitations,
+which are made to endure, should belong to an order so low down as the
+Rodents! And in the case of the latter species, it adds to the marvel
+when we find that the vizcacha, according to Water-house, is the lowest
+of the order in its marsupial affinities.
+
+The vizcacha is the most common rodent on the pampas, and the Rodent
+order is represented by the largest number of species. The finest is the
+so-called Patagonian hare--Dolichotis patagonica--a beautiful animal
+twice as large as a hare, with ears shorter and more rounded, and legs
+relatively much longer. The fur is grey and chestnut brown. It is
+diurnal in its habits, lives in kennels, and is usually met with in
+pairs, or small flocks. It is better suited to a sterile country like
+Patagonia than to the grassy humid plain; nevertheless it was found
+throughout the whole of the pampas; but in a country where the wisdom of
+a Sir William Harcourt was never needed to slip the leash, this king of
+the Rodentia is now nearly extinct.
+
+A common rodent is the coypu--Myiopotamus coypu--yellowish in colour
+with bright red incisors; a rat in shape, and as large as an otter. It
+is aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where there are no banks it
+makes a platform nest among the rushes. Of an evening they are all out
+swimming and playing in the water, conversing together in their strange
+tones, which sound like the moans and cries of wounded and suffering
+men; and among them the mother-coypu is seen with her progeny, numbering
+eight or nine, with as many on her back as she can accommodate, while
+the others swim after her, crying for a ride.
+
+With reference to this animal, which, as we have seen, is prolific, a
+strange thing once happened in Buenos Ayres. The coypu was much more
+abundant fifty years ago than now, and its skin, which has a fine fur
+under the long coarse hair, was largely exported to Europe. About that
+time the Dictator Rosas issued a decree prohibiting the hunting of the
+coypu. The result was that the animals increased and multiplied
+exceedingly, and, abandoning their aquatic habits, they became
+terrestrial and migratory, and swarmed everywhere in search of food.
+Suddenly a mysterious malady fell on them, from which they quickly
+perished, and became almost extinct.
+
+What a blessed thing it would be for poor rabbit-worried Australia if a
+similar plague should visit that country, and fall on the right animal!
+On the other hand, what a calamity if the infection, wide-spread,
+incurable, and swift as the wind in its course, should attack the
+too-numerous sheep! And who knows what mysterious, unheard-of
+retributions that revengeful deity Nature may not be meditating in her
+secret heart for the loss of her wild four-footed children slain by
+settlers, and the spoiling of her ancient beautiful order!
+
+A small pampa rodent worthy of notice is the Cavia australis, called
+_cui_ in the vernacular from its voice: a timid, social, mouse-coloured
+little creature, with a low gurgling language, like running babbling
+waters; in habits resembling its domestic pied relation the guinea pig.
+It loves to run on clean ground, and on the pampas makes little
+rat-roads all about its hiding-place, which little roads tell a story to
+the fox, and such like; therefore the little cavy's habits, and the
+habits of all cavies, I fancy, are not so well suited to the humid
+grassy region as to other districts, with sterile ground to run and play
+upon, and thickets in which to hide.
+
+A more interesting animal is the Ctenomys magellanica, a little less
+than the rat in size, with a shorter tail, pale grey fur, and red
+incisors. It is called _tuco-tuco_ from its voice, and _oculto_ from its
+habits; for it is a dweller underground, and requires a loose, sandy
+soil in which, like the mole, it may _swim_ beneath the surface.
+Consequently the pampa, with its heavy, moist mould, is not the tuco's
+proper place; nevertheless, wherever there is a stretch of sandy soil,
+or a range of dunes, there it is found living; not seen, but heard; for
+all day long and all night sounds its voice, resonant and loud, like a
+succession of blows from a hammer; as if a company of gnomes were
+toiling far down underfoot, beating on their anvils, first with strong
+measured strokes, then with lighter and faster, and with a swing and
+rhythm as if the little men were beating in time to some rude chant
+unheard above the surface. How came these isolated colonies of a species
+so subterranean in habits, and requiring a sandy soil to move in, so far
+from their proper district--that sterile country from which they are
+separated by wide, unsuitable areas? They cannot perform long overland
+journeys like the rat. Perhaps the dunes have travelled, carrying their
+little cattle with them.
+
+Greatest among the carnivores are the two cat-monarchs of South America,
+the jaguar and puma. Whatever may be their relative positions elsewhere,
+on the pampas the puma is mightiest, being much more abundant and better
+able to thrive than its spotted rival. Versatile in its preying habits,
+its presence on the pampa is not surprising; but probably only an
+extreme abundance of large mammalian prey, which has not existed in
+recent times, could have, tempted an animal of the river and
+forest-loving habits of the jaguar to colonize this cold, treeless, and
+comparatively waterless desert. There are two other important cats. The
+grass-cat, not unlike Felis catus in its robust form and dark colour,
+but a larger, more powerful animal, inexpressibly savage in disposition.
+The second, Felis geoffroyi, is a larger and more beautiful animal,
+coloured like a leopard; it is called wood-cat, and, as the name would
+seem to indicate, is an intruder from wooded districts north of the
+pampas.
+
+There are two canines: one is Azara's beautiful grey fox-like dog,
+purely a fox in habits, and common everywhere. The other is far more
+interesting and extremely rare; it is called _aguara,_ its nearest ally
+being the _aguara-guazu,_ the Canis jubatus or maned wolf of
+naturalists, found north of the pampean district. The aguara is smaller
+and has no mane; it is like the dingo in size, but slimmer and with a
+sharper nose, and lias a much brighter red colour. At night when camping
+out I have heard its dismal screams, but the screamer was sought in
+vain; while from the gauchos of the frontier I could only learn that it
+is a harmless, shy, solitary animal, that ever flies to remoter wilds
+from its destroyer, man. They offered me a skin--what more could I want?
+Simple souls! it was no more to me than the skin of a dead dog, with
+long, bright red hair. Those who love dead animals may have them in any
+number by digging with a. spade in that vast sepulchre of the pampas,
+where perished the hosts of antiquity. I love the living that are above
+the earth; and how small a remnant they are in South America we know,
+and now yearly becoming more precious as it dwindles away.
+
+The pestiferous skunk is universal; and there are two quaint-looking
+weasels, intensely black in colour, and grey on the back and flat crown.
+One, the Galictis barbara, is a large bold animal that hunts in
+companies; and when these long-bodied creatures sit up erect, glaring
+with beady eyes, grinning and chattering at the passer-by, they look
+like little friars in black robes and grey cowls; but the expression on
+their round faces is malignant and bloodthirsty beyond anything in
+nature, and it would perhaps be more decent to liken them to devils
+rather than to humans.
+
+On the pampas there is, strictly speaking, only one ruminant, the Cervus
+campestris, which is common. The most curious thing about this animal is
+that the male emits a rank, musky odour, so powerful that when the wind
+blows from it the effluvium comes in nauseating gusts to the nostrils
+from a distance exceeding two miles. It is really astonishing that only
+one small ruminant should be found on this immense grassy area, so
+admirably suited to herbivorous quadrupeds, a portion of which at the
+present moment affords sufficient pasture to eighty millions of sheep,
+cattle, and horses. In La Plata the author of _The Mammoth and the
+Flood_ will find few to quarrel with his doctrine.
+
+Of Edentates there are four. The giant armadillo does not range so far,
+and the delicate little pink fairy armadillo, the truncated
+Chlamydophorus, is a dweller in the sand-dunes of Mendoza, and has never
+colonized the grassy pampas. The Tatusia hybrida, called "little mule"
+from the length of its ears, and the Dasypus tricinctus, which, when
+disturbed, rolls itself into a ball, the wedge-shaped head and
+wedge-shaped tail admirably fitting into the deep-cut shell side by
+side; and the _quirquincho_ (Dasypus minutus), all inhabit the pampa,
+are diurnal, and feed exclusively on insects, chiefly ants. Wherever the
+country becomes settled, these three disappear, owing to the dulness of
+their senses, especially that of sight, and to the diurnal habit, which
+was an advantage to them, and enabled them to survive when rapacious
+animals, which are mostly nocturnal, were their only enemies. The
+fourth, and most important, is the hairy armadillo, with habits which
+are in strange contrast to those of its perishing congeners, and which
+seem to mock many hard-and-fast rules concerning animal life. It is
+omnivorous, and will thrive on anything from grass to flesh, found dead
+and in all stages of decay, or captured by means of its own strategy.
+Furthermore, its habits change to suit its conditions: thus, where
+nocturnal carnivores are its enemies, it is diurnal; but where man
+appears as a chief persecutor, it becomes nocturnal. It is much hunted
+for its flesh, dogs being trained for the purpose; yet it actually
+becomes more abundant as population increases in any district; and, if
+versatility in habits or adaptiveness can be taken as a measure of
+intelligence, this poor armadillo, a survival of the past, so old on the
+earth as to have existed contemporaneously with the giant glyptodon, is
+the superior of the large-brained cats and canines.
+
+To finish with the mammalia, there are two interesting opossums, both of
+the genus Didelphys, but in habits as wide apart as cat from otter. One
+of these marsupials appears so much at home on the plains that I almost
+regret having said that the vizcacha alone gives us the idea of being in
+its habits the _product_ of the pampas. This animal--Didelphys
+crassicaudata--has a long slender, wedge-, shaped head and body,
+admirably adapted for pushing through the thick grass and rushes; for it
+is both terrestrial and aquatic, therefore well suited to inhabit low,
+level plains liable to be flooded. On dry land its habits are similar to
+those of a weasel; in lagoons, where it dives and swims with great ease,
+it constructs a globular nest suspended from the rushes. The fur is
+soft, of a rich yellow, reddish above, and on the sides and under
+surfaces varying in some parts to orange, in others exhibiting beautiful
+copper and terra-cotta tints. These lovely tints and the metallic lustre
+soon fade from the fur, otherwise this animal would be much sought after
+in the interests of those who love to decorate themselves with the
+spoils of beautiful dead animals--beast and bird. The other opossum is
+the black and white Didelphys azarae; and it is indeed strange to find
+this animal on the pampas, although its presence there is not so
+mysterious as that of the tuco-tuco. It shuffles along slowly and
+awkwardly on the ground, but is a great traveller nevertheless. Tschudi
+met it mountaineering on the Andes at an enormous altitude, and, true to
+its lawless nature, it confronted me in Patagonia, where the books say
+no marsupial dwells. In every way it is adapted to an arboreal life, yet
+it is everywhere found on the level country, far removed from the
+conditions which one would imagine to be necessary to its existence. For
+how many thousands of years has this marsupial been a dweller on the
+plain, all its best faculties unexercised, its beautiful grasping hands
+pressed to the ground, and its prehensile tail dragged like an idle rope
+behind it! Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will take to it as
+readily as a duck to water, or an armadillo to earth, climbing up the
+trunk and about the branches with a monkey-like agility. How reluctant
+Nature seems in some cases to undo her own work! How long she will
+allow a specialized organ, with the correlated instinct, to rest without
+use, yet ready to flash forth on the instant, bright and keen-edged, as
+in the ancient days of strife, ages past, before peace came to dwell on
+earth!
+
+The avi-fauna is relatively much richer than the mammalia, owing to the
+large number of aquatic species, most of which are migratory with their
+"breeding" or "subsistence-areas" on the pampas. In more senses than one
+they constitute a "floating population," and their habits have in no way
+been modified by the conditions of the country. The order, including
+storks, ibises, herons, spoonbills, and flamingoes, counts about
+eighteen species; and the most noteworthy birds in it are two great
+ibises nearly as large as turkeys, with mighty resonant voices. The duck
+order is very rich, numbering at least twenty species, including two
+beautiful upland geese, winter visitors from Magellanic lands, and two
+swans, the lovely black-necked, and the pure white with rosy bill. Of
+rails, or ralline birds, there are ten or twelve, ranging from a small
+spotted creature no bigger than a thrush to some large majestic birds.
+One is the courlan, called "crazy widow" from its mourning plumage and
+long melancholy screams, which on still evenings may be heard a league
+away. Another is the graceful variegated _ypicaha,_ fond of social
+gatherings, where the birds perform a dance and make the desolate
+marshes resound with their insane humanlike voices. A smaller kind,
+Porphyriops melanops, has a night-cry like a burst of shrill hysterical
+laughter, which has won for it the name of "witch;" while another,
+Rallus rythyrhynchus, is called "little donkey" from its braying cries.
+Strange eerie voices have all these birds. Of the remaining aquatic
+species, the most important is the spur-winged crested screamer; a noble
+bird as large as a swan, yet its favourite pastime is to soar upwards
+until it loses itself to sight in the blue ether, whenca it pours forth
+its resounding choral notes, which reach the distant earth clarified,
+and with a rhythmic swell and fall as of chiming bells. It also sings by
+night, "counting the hours," the gauchos say, and where they have
+congregated together in tens of thousands the mighty roar of their
+combined voices produces an astonishingly grand effect.
+
+The largest aquatic order is that of the Limicolse--snipes, plover, and
+their allies--which has about twenty-five species. The vociferous
+spur-winged lapwing; the beautiful black and white stilt; a true snipe,
+and a painted snipe, are, strictly speaking, the only residents; and it
+is astonishing to find, that, of the five-and-twenty species, at least
+thirteen are visitors from North America, several of them having their
+breeding-places quite away in the Arctic regions. This is one of those
+facts concerning the annual migration of birds which almost stagger
+belief; for among them are species with widely different habits, upland,
+marsh and sea-shore birds, and in their great biannual journey they pass
+through a variety of climates, visiting many countries where the
+conditions seem suited to their requirements. Nevertheless, in
+September, and even as early as August, they begin to arrive on the
+pampas, the golden plover often still wearing his black nuptial dress;
+singly and in pairs, in small flocks, and in clouds they come--curlew,
+godwit, plover, tatler, tringa--piping the wild notes to which the
+Greenlander listened in June, now to the gaucho herdsman on the green
+plains of La Plata, then to the wild Indian in his remote village; and
+soon, further south, to the houseless huanaco-hunter in the grey
+wilderness of Patagonia.
+
+Here is a puzzle for ornithologists. In summer on the pampas we have a
+godwit--Limosa hudsonica; in March it goes north to breed; later in the
+season flocks of the same species arrive from the south to winter on the
+pampas. And besides this godwit, there are several other North American
+species, which have colonies in the southern hemi-spere, with a reversed
+migration and breeding season. Why do these southern birds winter so far
+south? Do they really breed in Patagonia? If so, their migration is an
+extremely limited one compared with that of the northern birds--seven or
+eight hundred miles, on the outside, in one case, against almost as many
+thousands of miles in the other. Considering that some species which
+migrate as far south as Patagonia breed in the Arctic regions as far
+north as latitude 82 degrees, and probably higher still, it would be
+strange indeed if none of the birds which winter in Patagonia and on the
+pampas were summer visitors to that great austral continent, which has
+an estimated area twice as large as that of Europe, and a climate milder
+than the arctic one. The migrants would have about six hundred miles of
+sea to cross from Tierra del Fuego; but we know that the golden plover
+and other species, which sometimes touch at the Bermudas when
+travelling, fly much further than that without resting. The fact that a
+common Argentine titlark, a non-migrant and a weak flyer, has been met
+with at the South Shetland Islands, close to the antarctic continent,
+shows that the journey may be easily accomplished by birds with strong
+flight; and that even the winter climate of that unknown land is not too
+severe to allow an accidental colonist, like this small delicate bird,
+to survive. The godwit, already mentioned, has been observed in flocks
+at the Falkland Islands in May, that is, three months after the same
+species had taken its autumal departure from the neighbouring mainland.
+Can it be believed that these late visitors to the Falklands were
+breeders in Patagonia, and had migrated east to winter in so bleak a
+region? It is far more probable that they came from the south. Officers
+of sailing ships beating round Cape Horn might be able to settle this
+question definitely by looking out, and listening at night, for flights
+of birds, travelling north from about the first week in January to the
+end of February; and in September and October travelling south. Probably
+not fewer than a dozen species of the plover order are breeders on the
+great austral continent; also other aquatic birds--ducks and geese; and
+many Passerine birds, chiefly of the Tyrant family.
+
+Should the long projected Australasian expedition to the South Polar
+regions ever be carried to a successful issue, there will probably be
+important results for ornithology, in spite of the astounding theory
+which has found a recent advocate in Canon Tristram, that all life
+originated at the North Pole, whence it spread over the globe, but never
+succeeded in crossing the deep sea surrounding the antarctic continent,
+which has consequently remained till now desolate, "a giant ash (and
+ice) of death." Nor is it unlikely that animals of a higher class than
+birds exist there; and the discovery of new mammalians, differing in
+type from those we know, would certainly be glad tidings to most
+students of nature.
+
+Land birds on the pampas are few in species and in numbers. This may be
+accounted for by the absence of trees and other elevations on which
+birds prefer to roost and nest; and by the scarcity of food. Insects are
+few in dry situations; and the large perennial grasses, which occupy
+most of the ground, yield a miserable yearly harvest of a few minute
+seeds; so that this district is a poor one both for soft and hard billed
+birds. Hawks of several genera, in moderate numbers, are there, but
+generally keep to the marshes. Eagles and vultures are somewhat
+unworthily represented by carrion-hawks (Polyborinae); the lordly
+carancho, almost eagle-like in size, black and crested, with a very
+large, pale blue, hooked beak--his battle axe: and his humble follower
+and jackal, the brown and harrier-like chimango. These nest on the
+ground, are versatile in their habits, carrion-eaters, also killers on
+their own account, and, like wild dogs, sometimes hunt in bands, which
+gives them an advantage. They are the unfailing attendants of all
+flesh-hunters, human or feline; and also furiously pursue and persecute
+all eagles and true vultures that venture on that great sea of grass, to
+wander thereafter, for ever lost and harried, "the Hagars and Ishmaels
+of their kind."
+
+The owls are few and all of wide-ranging species. The most common is the
+burrowing-owl, found in both Americas. Not a retiring owl this, but all
+day long, in cold and in heat, it stands exposed at the mouth of its
+kennel, or on the vizcacha's mound, staring at the passer-by with an
+expression of grave surprise and reprehension in its round yellow eyes;
+male and female invariably together, standing stiff and erect, almost
+touching--of all birds that pair for life the most Darby and Joan like.
+
+Of the remaining land birds, numbering about forty species, a few that
+are most attractive on account of their beauty, engaging habits, or
+large size, may be mentioned here. On the southern portion of the pampas
+the military starling (Sturnella) is found, and looks like the European
+starling, with the added beauty of a scarlet breast: among resident
+pampas birds the only one with a touch of brilliant colouring. It has a
+pleasing, careless song, uttered on the wing, and in winter congregates
+in great flocks, to travel slowly northwards over the plains. When thus
+travelling the birds observe a kind of order, and the flock feeding
+along the ground shows a very extended front--a representation in
+bird-life of the "thin red line"--and advances by the hindmost birds
+constantly flying over the others and alighting in the front ranks.
+
+Among the tyrant-birds are several species of the beautiful wing-banded
+genus, snow-white in colour, with black on the wings and tail: these are
+extremely graceful birds, and strong flyers, and in desert places, where
+man seldom intrudes, they gather to follow the traveller, calling to
+each other with low whistling notes, and in the distance look like white
+flowers as they perch on the topmost stems of the tall bending grasses.
+
+The most characteristic pampean birds are the tinamous--called
+partridges in the vernacular--the rufous tinamou, large as a fowl, and
+the spotted tinamou, which is about the size of the English partridge.
+Their habits are identical: both lay eggs of a beautiful wine-purple
+colour, and in both species the young acquire the adult plumage and
+power of flight when very small, and fly better than the adults. They
+have small heads, slender curved beaks, unfeathered legs and feet, and
+are tailless; the plumage is deep yellowish, marked with black and brown
+above. They live concealed, skulking like rails through the tall grass,
+fly reluctantly, and when driven up, their flight is exceedingly noisy
+and violent, the bird soon exhausting itself. They are solitary, but
+many live in proximity, frequently calling to each other with soft
+plaintive voices. The evening call-notes of the larger bird are
+flute-like in character, and singularly sweet and expressive.
+
+The last figure to be introduced into this sketch--which is not a
+catalogue--is that of the Rhea. Glyptodon, Toxodon, Mylodon,
+Megatherium, have passed away, leaving no descendants, and only pigmy
+representatives if any; but among the feathered inhabitants of the pampa
+the grand archaic ostrich of America survives from a time when there
+were also giants among the avians. Vain as such efforts usually are, one
+cannot help trying to imagine something of the past history of this
+majestic bird, before man came to lead the long chase now about to end
+so mournfully. Its fleetness, great staying powers, and beautiful
+strategy when hunted, make it seem probable that it was not without
+pursuers, other than the felines, among its ancient enemies, long-winded
+and tenacious of their quarry; and these were perhaps of a type still
+represented by the wolf or hound-like aguara and aguara-guazu. It might
+be supposed that when almost all the larger forms, both mammal and bird,
+were overtaken by destruction, and when the existing rhea was on the
+verge of extinction, these long-legged swift canines changed their
+habits and lost their bold spirit, degenerating at last into hunters of
+small birds and mammals, on which they are said to live.
+
+The rhea possesses a unique habit, which is a puzzle to us, although it
+probably once had some significance--namely, that of running, when
+hunted, with one wing raised vertically, like a great sail--a veritable
+"ship of the wilderness." In every way it is adapted to the conditions
+of the pampas in a far greater degree than other pampean birds, only
+excepting the rufous and spotted tinamous. Its commanding stature gives
+it a wide horizon; and its dim, pale, bluish-grey colour assimilates to
+that of the haze, and renders it invisible at even a moderate distance.
+Its large form fades out of sight mysteriously, and the hunter strains
+his eyes in vain to distinguish it on the blue expanse. Its figure and
+carriage have a quaint majestic grace, somewhat unavian in character,
+and peculiar to itself. There are few more strangely fascinating sights
+in nature than that of the old black-necked cock bird, standing with
+raised agitated wings among the tall plumed grasses, and calling
+together his scattered hens with hollow boomings and long mysterious
+suspira-tions, as if a wind blowing high up in the void sky had found a
+voice. Rhea-hunting with the bolas, on a horse possessing both speed and
+endurance, and trained to follow the bird in all his quick doublings, is
+unquestionably one of the most fascinating forms of sport ever invented,
+by man. The quarry has even more than that fair chance of escape,
+without which all sport degenerates into mere butchery, unworthy of
+rational beings; moreover, in this unique method of hunting the ostrich
+the capture depends on a preparedness for all the shifts .and sudden
+changes of course practised by the bird when closely followed, which is
+like instinct or intuition; and, finally, in a dexterity in casting the
+bolas at the right moment, with a certain aim, which no amount of
+practice can give to those who are not to the manner born.
+
+This 'wild mirth of the desert,' which the gaucho has known for the last
+three centuries, is now passing away, for the rhea's fleetness can no
+longer avail him. He may scorn the horse and his rider, what time he
+lifts himself up, but the cowardly murderous methods of science, and a
+systematic war of extermination, have left him no chance. And with the
+rhea go the flamingo, antique and splendid; and the swans in their
+bridal plumage; and the rufous tinamou--sweet and mournful melodist of
+the eventide; and the noble crested screamer, that clarion-voiced
+watch-bird of the night in the wilderness. Those, and the other large
+avians, together with the finest of the mammalians, will shortly be lost
+to the pampas utterly as the great bustard is to England, and as the
+wild turkey and bison and many other species will shortly be lost to
+North America. What a wail there would be in the world if a sudden
+destruction were to fall on the accumulated art-treasures of the
+National Gallery, and the marbles in the British Museum, and the
+contents of the King's Library--the old prints and' mediaeval
+illuminations! And these are only the work of human hands and
+brains--impressions of individual genius on perishable material,
+immortal only in the sense that the silken cocoon of the dead moth is
+so, because they continue to exist and shine when the artist's hands and
+brain are dust:--and man has the long day of life before him in which to
+do again things like these, and better than these, if there is any truth
+in evolution. But the forms of life in the two higher vertebrate classes
+are Nature's most perfect work; and the life of even a single species is
+of incalculably greater value to mankind, for what it teaches and would
+continue to teach, than all the chiselled marbles and painted canvases
+the world contains; though doubtless there are many persons who are
+devoted to art, but blind to some things greater than art, who will set
+me down as a Philistine for saying so. And, above all others, we should
+protect and hold sacred those types, Nature's masterpieces, which are
+first singled out for destruction on account of their size, or
+splendour, or rarity, and that false detestable glory which is accorded
+to their most successful slayers. In ancient times the spirit of life
+shone brightest in these; and when others that shared the earth with
+them were taken by death they were left, being more worthy of
+perpetuation. Like immortal flowers they have drifted down to us on the
+ocean of time, and their strangeness and beauty bring to our
+imaginations a dream and a picture of that unknown world, immeasurably
+far removed, where man was not: and when they perish, something of
+gladness goes out from nature, and the sunshine loses something of its
+brightness. Nor does their loss affect us and our times only. The
+species now being exterminated, not only in South America but everywhere
+on the globe, are, so far as we know, untouched by decadence. They are
+links in a chain, and branches on the tree of life, with their roots in
+a past inconceivably remote; and but for our action they would continue
+to flourish, reaching outward to an equally distant future, blossoming
+into higher and more beautiful forms, and gladdening innumerable
+generations of our descendants. But we think nothing of all this: we
+must give full scope to our passion for taking life, though by so doing
+we "ruin the great work of time;" not in the sense in which the poet
+used those words, but in one truer, and wider, and infinitely sadder.
+Only when this sporting rage has spent itself, when there are no longer
+any animals of the larger kinds remaining, the loss we are now
+inflicting on this our heritage, in which we have a life-interest only,
+will be rightly appreciated. It is hardly to be supposed or hoped that
+posterity will feel satisfied with our monographs of extinct species,
+and the few crumbling bones and faded feathers, which may possibly
+survive half a dozen centuries in some happily-placed museum. On the
+contrary, such dreary mementoes will only serve to remind them of their
+loss; and if they remember us at all, it will only be to hate our
+memory, and our age--this enlightened, scientific, humanitarian age,
+which should have for a motto "Let us slay all noble and beautiful
+things, for tomorrow we die."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE PUMA, OB LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The Puma has been singularly unfortunate in its biographers. Formerly it
+often happened that writers were led away by isolated and highly
+exaggerated incidents to attribute very shining qualities to their
+favourite animals; the lion of the Old World thus came to be regarded as
+brave and I magnanimous above all beasts of the field--the Bayard of the
+four-footed kind, a reputation which these prosaic and sceptical times
+have not suffered it to keep. Precisely the contrary has happened with
+the puma of literature; for, although to those personally acquainted
+with the habits of this lesser lion of the New World it is known to
+possess a marvellous courage and daring, it is nevertheless
+always spoken of in books of natural history as the most pusillanimous
+of the larger carnivores. It does not attack man, and Azara is perfectly
+correct when he affirms that it never hurts, or threatens to hurt, man
+or child, even when it finds them sleeping. This, however, is not a full
+statement of the facts; the puma will not even defend itself against
+man. How natural, then, to conclude that it is too timid to attack a
+human being, or to defend itself, but scarcely philosophical; for even
+the most cowardly carnivores we know--dogs and hyaenas, for
+instance--will readily attack a disabled or sleeping man when pressed by
+hunger; and when driven to desperation no animal is too small or too
+feeble to make a show of resistance. In such a case "even the armadillo
+defends itself," as the gaucho proverb says. Besides, the conclusion is
+in contradiction to many other well-known facts. Putting-aside the
+puma's passivity in the presence of man, it is a bold hunter that
+invariably prefers large to small game; in desert places killing
+peccary, tapir, ostrich, deer, huanaco, &c., all powerful, well-armed,
+or swift animals. Huanaco skeletons seen in Patagonia almost invariably
+have the neck dislocated, showing that the puma was the executioner.
+Those only who have hunted the huanaco on the sterile plains and
+mountains it inhabits know how wary, keen-scented, and fleet of foot it
+is. I once spent several weeks with a surveying party in a district
+where pumas were very abundant, and saw not less than half a dozen deer
+every day, freshly killed in most cases, and all with dislocated necks.
+Where prey is scarce and difficult to capture, the puma, after
+satisfying its hunger, invariably conceals the animal it has killed,
+covering it over carefully with grass and brushwood; these deer,
+however, had all been left exposed to the caracaras and foxes after a
+portion of the breast had been eaten, and in many cases the flesh had
+not been touched, the captor having satisfied itself with sucking the
+blood. It struck me very forcibly that the puma of the desert pampas is,
+among mammals, like the peregrine falcon of the same district among
+birds; for there this wide-ranging raptor only attacks comparatively
+large birds, and, after fastidiously picking a meal from the flesh of
+the head and neck, abandons the untouched body to the polybori and other
+hawks of the more ignoble sort.
+
+In pastoral districts the puma is very destructive to the larger
+domestic animals, and has an extraordinary fondness for horseflesh. This
+was first noticed by Molina, whose _Natural History of Chili_ was
+written a century and a half ago. In Patagonia I heard on all sides that
+it was extremely difficult to breed horses, as the colts were mostly
+killed by the pumas. A native told me that on one occasion, while
+driving his horses home through the thicket, a puma sprang out of the
+bushes on to a colt following behind the troop, killing it before his
+eyes and not more than six yards from his horse's head. In this
+instance, my informant said, the puma alighted directly on the colt's
+back, with one fore foot grasping its bosom, while with the other it
+seized the head, and, giving it a violent wrench, dislocated the neck.
+The colt fell to the earth as if shot, and he affirmed that it was dead
+before it touched the ground.
+
+Naturalists have thought it strange that the horse, once common
+throughout America, should have become extinct over a continent
+apparently so well suited to it and where it now multiplies so greatly.
+As a fact wherever pumas abound the wild horse of the present time,
+introduced from Europe, can hardly maintain its existence. Formerly in
+many places horses ran wild and multiplied to an amazing extent, but
+this happened, I believe, only in districts where the puma was scarce or
+had already been driven out by man. My own experience is that on the
+desert pampas wild horses are exceedingly scarce, and from all accounts
+it is the same throughout Patagonia.
+
+Next to horseflesh, sheep is preferred, and where the puma can come at a
+flock, he will not trouble himself to attack horned cattle. In Patagonia
+especially I found this to be the case. I resided for some time at an
+estancia close to the town of El Carmen, on the Rio Negro, which during
+my stay was infested by a very bold and cunning puma. To protect the
+sheep from his attacks an enclosure was made of upright willow-poles
+fifteen feet long, while the gate, by which he would have to enter, was
+close to the house and nearly six feet high. In spite of the
+difficulties thus put in the way, and of the presence of several large
+dogs, also of the watch we kept in the hope of shooting him, every
+cloudy night he came, and after killing one or more sheep got safely
+away. One dark night he killed four sheep; I detected him in the act,
+and going up to the gate, was trying to make out his invisible form in
+the gloom as he flitted about knocking the sheep over, when suddenly he
+leaped clear over my head and made his escape, the bullets I sent after
+him in the dark failing to hit him. Yet at this place twelve or fourteen
+calves, belonging to the milch cows, were every night shut into a small
+brushwood pen, at a distance from the house where the enemy could easily
+have destroyed every one of them. When I expressed surprise at this
+arrangement, the owner said that the puma was not fond of calves' flesh,
+and came only for the sheep. Frequently after his nocturnal visits we
+found, by tracing his footprints in the loose sand, that he had actually
+used the calves' pen as a place of concealment while waiting to make his
+attack on the sheep.
+
+The puma often kills full-grown cows and horses, but exhibits a still
+greater daring when attacking the jaguar, the largest of American
+carnivores, although, compared with its swift, agile enemy, as heavy as
+a rhinoceros. Azara states that it is generally believed in La Plata and
+Paraguay that the puma attacks and conquers the jaguar; but he did not
+credit what he heard, which was not strange, since he had already set
+the puma down as a cowardly animal, because it does not attempt to harm
+man or child. Nevertheless, it is well known that where the two species
+inhabit the same district they are at enmity, the puma being the
+persistent persecutor of the jaguar, following and harassing it as a
+tyrant-bird harasses an eagle or hawk, moving about it with such
+rapidity as to confuse it, and, when an opportunity occurs, springing
+upon its back and inflicting terrible wounds with teeth and claws.
+Jaguars with scarred backs are frequently killed, and others, not long
+escaped from their tormentors, have been found so greatly lacerated that
+they were easily overcome by the hunters.
+
+In Kingsley's American _Standard Natural History_, it is stated that the
+puma in North California has a feud with the grizzly bear similar to
+that of the southern animal with the jaguar. In its encounter with the
+grizzly it is said to be always the victor; and this is borne out by the
+finding of the bodies of bears, which have evidently perished in the
+struggle.
+
+How strange that this most cunning, bold, and bloodthirsty of the
+Felidae, the persecutor of the jaguar and the scourge of the ruminants
+in the regions it inhabits, able to kill its prey with the celerity of a
+rifle bullet, never attacks a human being! Even the cowardly,
+carrion-feeding dog will attack a man when it can do so with impunity;
+but in places where the puma is the only large beast of prey, it is
+notorious that it is there perfectly safe for even a small child to go
+out and sleep on the plain. At the same time it will not fly from man
+(though the contrary is always stated in books of Natural History)
+except in places where it is continually persecuted. Nor is this all: it
+will not, as a rule, even defend itself against man, although in some
+rare instances it has been known to do so.
+
+The mysterious, gentle instinct of this ungentle species, which causes
+the gauchos of the pampas to name it man's friend--"amigo del
+cristiano"--has been persistently ignored by all travellers and
+naturalists who have mentioned the puma. They have thus made it a very
+incongruous creature, strong enough to kill a horse, yet so cowardly
+withal that it invariably flies from a human being--even from a sleeping
+child! Possibly its real reputation was known to some of those who havo
+spoken about it; if so, they attributed what they heard to the love of
+the marvellous and the romantic, natural to the non-scientific mind; or
+else preferred not to import into their writings matter which has so
+great a likeness to fable, and might have the effect of imperilling
+their reputation for sober-mindedness.
+
+It is, however, possible that the singular instinct of tho southern
+puma, which is unique among animals in a state of nature, is not
+possessed by the entire species, ranging as it does over a hundred
+degrees of latitude, from British North America to Tierra del Fuego. The
+widely different conditions of life in the various regions it inhabits
+must necessarily have caused some divergence. Concerning its habits in
+the dense forests of the Amazonian region, where it must have developed
+special instincts suited to its semi-arboreal life, scarcely anything
+has been recorded. Everyone is, however, familiar with the dreaded
+cougar, catamount, or panther--sometimes called "painter"--of North
+American literature, thrilling descriptions of encounters with this
+imaginary man-eating monster being freely scattered through the
+backwoods or border romances, many of them written by authors who have
+the reputation of being true to nature. It may be true that this cougar
+of a cold climate did occasionally attack man, or, as it is often
+stated, follow him in the forest with the intention of springing on him
+unawares; but on this point nothing definite will ever be known, as the
+pioneers hunters of the past were only anxious to shoot cougar and not
+to study its instinct and disposition. It is now many years since
+Audubon and Bachman wrote, "This animal, which has excited so much
+terror in the minds of the ignorant and timid, has been nearly
+exterminated in all the Atlantic States, and we do not recollect a
+single well-authenticated instance where any hunter's life fell a
+sacrifice in a cougar hunt." It might be added, I believe, that no
+authentic instance has been recorded of the puma making an unprovoked
+attack on any human being. In South America also the traveller in the
+wilderness is sometimes followed by a puma; but he would certainly be
+very much surprised if told that it follows with the intention of
+springing on him unawares and devouring his flesh,
+
+I have spoken of the comparative ease with which the puma overcomes even
+large animals, comparing it in this respect with the peregrine falcon;
+but all predacious species are liable to frequent failures, sometimes to
+fatal mishaps, and even the cunning, swift-killing puma is no exception.
+Its attacks are successfully resisted by the ass, which does not, like
+the horse, lose his presence of mind, but when assaulted thrusts his
+head well down between its fore-legs and kicks violently until the enemy
+is thrown or driven off. Pigs, when in large herds, also safely defy the
+puma, massing themselves together for defence in their well-known
+manner, and presenting a serried line of tusks to the aggressor. During
+my stay in Patagonia a puma met its fate in a manner so singular that
+the incident caused considerable sensation among the settlers on the Rio
+Negro at the time. A man named Linares, the chief of the tame Indians
+settled in the neighbourhood of El Carmen, while riding near the river
+had his curiosity aroused by the appearance and behaviour of a young cow
+standing alone in the grass, her head, armed with long and exceedingly
+sharp horns, much raised, and watching his approach in a manner which
+betokened a state of dangerous excitement. She had recently dropped her
+calf, and he at once conjectured that it had been attacked, and perhaps
+killed, by some animal of prey. To satisfy himself on this point he
+began to search for it, and while thus engaged the cow repeatedly
+charged him with the greatest fury. Presently he discovered the calf
+lying dead among the long grass; and by its side lay a full-grown puma,
+also dead, and with a large wound in its side, just behind the shoulder.
+The calf had been killed by the puma, for its throat showed the wounds
+of large teeth, and the puma had been killed by the cow. When he saw it
+he could, he affirmed, scarcely believe the evidence of his own senses,
+for was an unheard-of thing that a puma should be injured by any other
+animal. His opinion was that it had come down from the hills in a
+starving condition, and having sprung upon the calf, the taste of blood
+had made it for a moment careless of its own safety, and during that
+moment the infuriated cow had charged, and driving one of her long sharp
+horns into some vital part, killed it instantly.
+
+The puma is, with the exception of some monkeys, the most playful animal
+in existence. The young of all the Felidae spend a large portion of
+their time in characteristic gambols; the adults, however, acquire a
+grave and dignified demeanour, only the female playing on occasions with
+her offspring; but this she always does with a certain formality of
+manner, as if the relaxation were indulged in not spontaneously, but for
+the sake of the young and as being a necessary part of their education.
+Some writer has described the lion's assumption of gaiety as more grim
+than its most serious moods. The puma at heart is always a kitten,
+taking unmeasured delight in its frolics, and when, as often happens,
+one lives alone in the desert, it will amuse itself by the hour fighting
+mock battles or playing at hide-and-seek with imaginary companions, and
+lying in wait and putting all its wonderful strategy in practice to
+capture a passing butterfly. Azara kept a young male for four months,
+which spent its whole time playing with the slaves. This animal, he
+says, would not refuse any food offered to it; but when not hungry it
+would bury the meat in the sand, and when inclined to eat dig it up,
+and, taking it to the water-trough, wash it clean. I have only known one
+puma kept as a pet, and this animal, in seven or eight years had never
+shown a trace of ill-temper. When approached, he would lie down, purring
+loudly, and twist himself about a person's legs, begging to be caressed.
+A string or handkerchief drawn about was sufficient to keep him in a
+happy state of excitement for an hour; and when one person was tired of
+playing with him he was ready for a game with the next comer.
+
+I was told by a person who had spent most of his life on the pampas that
+on one occasion, when travelling in the neighbourhood of Cape
+Corrientes, his horse died under him, and he was compelled to continue
+his journey on foot, burdened with his heavy native horse-gear. At night
+he made his bed under the shelter of a rock, on the slope of a stony
+sierra; a bright moon was shining, and about nine o'clock in the evening
+four pumas appeared, two adults with their two half-grown young. Not
+feeling the least alarm at their presence, he did not stir; and after a
+while they began to gambol together close to him, concealing themselves
+from each other among the rocks, just as kittens do, and frequently
+while pursuing one another leaping over him. He continued watching them
+until past midnight, then fell asleep, and did not wake until morning,
+when they had left him.
+
+This man was an Englishman by birth, but having gone very young to South
+America he had taken kindly to the semi-barbarous life of the gauchos,
+and had imbibed all their peculiar notions, one of which is that human
+life is not worth very much. "What does it matter?" they often say, and
+shrug their shoulders, when told of a comrade's death; "so many
+beautiful horses die!" I asked him if he had ever killed a puma, and he
+replied that he had killed only one and had sworn never to kill another.
+He said that while out one day with another gaucho looking for cattle a
+puma was found. It sat up with its back against a stone, and did not
+move even when his companion threw the noose of his lasso over its neck.
+My informant then dismounted, and, drawing his knife, advanced to kill
+it: still the puma made no attempt to free itself from the lasso, but it
+seemed to know, he said, what was coming, for it began to tremble, the
+tears ran from its eyes, and it whined in the most pitiful manner. He
+killed it as it sat there unresisting before him, but after
+accomplishing the deed felt that he had committed a murder. It was the
+only thing ho had ever done in his life, he added, which filled him with
+remorse when he remembered it. This I thought a rather startling
+declaration, as I knew that he had killed several individuals of his own
+species in duels, fought with knives, in the fashion of the gauchos.
+
+All who have killed or witnessed the killing of the puma--and I have
+questioned scores of hunters on this point--agree that it resigns itself
+in this unresisting, pathetic manner to death at the hands of man.
+Claudio Gay, in his _Natural History of Chili,_ says, "When attacked by
+man its energy and daring at once forsake it, and it becomes a weak,
+inoffensive animal, and trembling, and uttering piteous moans, and
+shedding abundant tears, it seems to implore compassion from a generous
+enemy." The enemy is not often generous; but many gauchos have assured
+me, when speaking on this subject, that although they kill the puma
+readily to protect their domestic animals, they consider it an evil
+thing to take its life in desert places, where it is man's only friend
+among the wild animals.
+
+When the hunter is accompanied by dogs, then the puma, instead of
+drooping and shedding tears, is roused to a sublime rage: its hair
+stands erect; its eyes shine like balls of green flame; it spits and
+snarls like a furious torn cat. The hunter's presence seems at such
+times to be ignored altogether, its whole attention being given to the
+dogs and its rage directed against them. In Patagonia a sheep-farming
+Scotchman, with whom I spent some days, showed me the skulls of five
+pumas which he had shot in the vicinity of his ranche. One was of an
+exceptionally large individual, and I here relate what he told me of his
+encounter with this animal, as it shows just how the puma almost
+invariably behaves when attacked by man and dogs. He was out on foot
+with his flock, when the dogs discovered the animal concealed among the
+bushes. He had left his gun at home, and having no weapon, and finding
+that the dogs dared not attack it where it sat in a defiant attitude
+with its back against a thorny bush, he looked about and found a large
+dry stick, and going boldly up to it tried to stun it with a violent
+blow on the head. But though it never looked at him, its fiery eyes
+gazing steadily at the dogs all the time, he could not hit it, for with
+a quick side movement it avoided every blow. The small heed the puma
+paid him, and the apparent ease with which it avoided his best-aimed
+blows, only served to rouse his spirit, and at length striking with
+increased force his stick came to the ground and was broken to pieces.
+For some moments he now stood within two yards of the animal perfectly
+defenceless and not knowing what to do. Suddenly it sprang past him,
+actually brushing against his arm with its side, and began pursuing the
+dogs round and round among the bushes. In the end my informant's partner
+appeared on the scene with his rifle, and the puma was shot.
+
+In encounters of this kind the most curious thing is that the puma
+steadfastly refuses to recognize an enemy in man, although it finds him
+acting in concert with its hated canine foe, about whose hostile
+intentions it has no such delusion.
+
+Several years ago a paragraph, which reached me in South America,
+appeared in the English papers relating an incident characteristic of
+the puma in a wild beast show in this country. The animal was taken out
+of its cage and led about the grounds by its keeper, followed by a large
+number of spectators. Suddenly it was struck motionless by some object
+in the crowd, at which it gazed steadily with a look of intense
+excitement; then springing violently away it dragged the chain from the
+keeper's hand and dashed in among the people, who immediately fled
+screaming in all directions. Their fears were, however, idle, the object
+of the puma's rage being a dog which it had spied among the crowd.
+
+It is said that when taken adult pumas invariably pine away and die;
+when brought up in captivity they invariably make playful, affectionate
+pets, and are gentle towards all human beings, but very seldom overcome
+their instinctive animosity towards the dog.
+
+One of the very few authentic instances I have met with of this animal
+defending itself against a human being was related to me at a place on
+the pampas called Saladillo. At the time of my visit there jaguars and
+pumas were very abundant and extremely destructive to the cattle and
+horses. Sheep it had not yet been considered worth while to introduce,
+but immense herds of pigs were kept at every estancia, these animals
+being able to protect themselves. One gaucho had so repeatedly
+distinguished himself by his boldness and dexterity in killing jaguars
+that he was by general consent made the leader of every tiger-hunt. One
+day the comandante of the district got twelve or fourteen men together,
+the tiger-slayer among them, and started in search of a jaguar which had
+been seen that morning in the neighbourhood of his estancia. The animal
+was eventually found and surrounded, and as it was crouching among some
+clumps of tall pampas grass, where throwing a lasso over its neck would
+be a somewhat difficult and dangerous operation, all gave way to the
+famous hunter, who at once uncoiled his lasso and proceeded in a
+leisurely manner to form the loop. While thus engaged he made the
+mistake of allowing his horse, which had grown restive, to turn aside
+from the hunted animal. The jaguar, instantly taking advantage of the
+oversight, burst from its cover and sprang first on to the haunches of
+the horse, then seizing the hunter by his poncho dragged him to the
+earth, and would no doubt have quickly despatched him if a lasso, thrown
+by one of the other men, had not closed round its neck at this critical
+moment. It was quickly dragged off, and eventually killed. But the
+discomfited hunter did not stay to assist at the finish. He arose from
+the ground unharmed, but in a violent passion and blaspheming horribly,
+for he knew that his reputation, which he priced above everything, had
+suffered a great blow, and that he would be mercilessly ridiculed by his
+associates. Getting on his horse he rode away by himself from the scene
+of his misadventure. Of what happened to him on his homeward ride there
+were no witnesses; but his own account was as follows, and inasmuch as
+it told against his own prowess it was readily believed: Before riding a
+league, and while his bosom was still burning with rage, a puma started
+up from the long grass in his path, but made no attempt to run away; it
+merely sat up, he said, and looked at him in a provokingly fearless
+manner. To slay this animal with his knife, and so revenge himself on it
+for the defeat he had just suffered, was his first thought. He alighted
+and secured his horse by tying its fore feet together, then, drawing his
+long, heavy knife, rushed at the puma. Still it did not stir. Raising
+his weapon he struck with a force which would have split the animal's
+skull open if the blow had fallen where it was intended to fall, but
+with a quick movement the puma avoided it, and at the same time lifted a
+foot and with lightning rapidity dealt the aggressor a blow on the face,
+its unsheathed claws literally dragging down the flesh from his cheek,
+laying the bone bare. After inflicting this terrible punishment and
+eyeing its fallen foe for a few seconds it trotted quietly away. The
+wounded man succeeded in getting on to his horse and reaching his home.
+The hanging flesh was restored to its place and the ghastly rents sewn
+up, and in the end he recovered: but he was disfigured for life; his
+temper also completely changed; he became morose and morbidly sensitive
+to the ridicule of his neighbours, and he never again ventured to join
+them in their hunting expeditions. I inquired of the comandante, and of
+others, whether any case had come to their knowledge in that district in
+which the puma had shown anything beyond a mere passive friendliness
+towards man; in reply they related the following incident, which had
+occurred at the Saladillo a few years before my visit: The men all went
+out one day beyond the frontier to form a _cerco,_ as it is called, to
+hunt ostriches and other game. The hunters, numbering about thirty,
+spread themselves round in a vast ring and, advancing towards the
+centre, drove the animals before them. During the excitement of the
+chase which followed, while they were all engaged in preventing the
+ostriches, deer, &c., from doubling back and escaping, it was not
+noticed that one of the hunters had disappeared; his horse, however,
+returned to its home during the evening, and on the next morning a fresh
+hunt for the lost man was organized. He was eventually found lying on
+the ground with a broken leg, where he had been thrown at the beginning
+of the hunt. He related that about an hour after it had become dark a
+puma appeared and sat near him, but did not seem to notice him. After a
+while it became restless, frequently going away and returning, and
+finally it kept away so long, that he thought it had left him for good.
+About midnight he heard the deep roar of a jaguar, and gave himself up
+for lost. By raising himself on his elbow he was able to see the outline
+of the beast crouching near him, but its face was turned from him, and
+it appeared to be intently watching some object on which it was about to
+spring. Presently it crept out of sight, then he heard snarlings and
+growlings and the sharp yell of a puma, and he knew that the two beasts
+were fighting. Before morning he saw the jaguar several times, but the
+puma renewed the contest with it again and again until morning appeared,
+after which he saw and heard no more of them.
+
+Extraordinary as this story sounds, it did not seem so to me when I
+heard it, for I had already met with many anecdotes of a similar nature
+in various parts of the country, some of them vastly more interesting
+than the one I have just narrated; only I did not get them at first
+hand, and am consequently not able to vouch for their accuracy; but in
+this case it seemed to me that there was really no room for doubt. All
+that I had previously heard had compelled me to believe that the puma
+really does possess a unique instinct of friendliness for man, the
+origin of which, like that of many other well-known instincts of
+animals, must remain a mystery. The fact that the puma never makes an
+unprovoked attack on a human being, or eats human flesh, and that it
+refuses, except in some very rare cases, even to defend itself, does not
+seem really less wonderful in an animal of its bold and sanguinary
+temper thau that it should follow the traveller in the wilderness, or
+come near him when he lies sleeping or disabled, and even occasionally
+defend him from its enemy the jaguar. We know that certain sounds,
+colours, or smells, which are not particularly noticed by most animals,
+produce an extraordinary effect on some species; and it is possible to
+believe, I think, that the human form or countenance, or the odour of
+the human body, may also have the effect on the puma of suspending its
+predatory instincts and inspiring it with a gentleness towards man,
+which we are only accustomed to see in our domesticated carnivores or in
+feral animals towards those of their own species. Wolves, when pressed
+with hunger, will sometimes devour a fellow wolf; as a rule, however,
+rapacious animals will starve to death rather than prey on one of their
+own kind, nor is it a common thing for them to attack other species
+possessing instincts similar to their own. The puma, we have seen,
+violently attacks other large carnivores, not to feed on them, but
+merely to satisfy its animosity; and, while respecting man, it is,
+within the tropics, a great hunter and eater of monkeys, which of all
+animals most resemble men. We can only conclude with Humboldt that there
+is something mysterious in the hatreds and affections of animals.
+
+The view here taken of the puma's character imparts, I think, a fresh
+interest to some things concerning the species, which have appeared in
+historical and other works, and which I propose to discuss briefly in
+this place.
+
+There is a remarkable passage in Byron's _Narrative of the loss of the
+Wager,_ which was quoted by Admiral Fitzroy in his _Voyage of the
+Beagle,_ to prove that tho puma inhabits Tierra del Fuego and the
+adjacent islands; no other large beast of prey being known in that part
+of America. "I heard," he says, "a growling close by me, which made me
+think it advisable to retire as soon as possible: the woods were, so
+gloomy I could see nothing; but, as I retired, this noise followed me
+close till I got out of them. Some of our men did assure me that they
+had seen a very large beast in the woods. . . I proposed to four of the
+people to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from the
+bell tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam, which I had
+discovered in a walk that way on our first landing. This we covered to
+windward with seaweed; and, lighting a fire, laid ourselves down in
+hopes of finding a remedy for our hunger in sleep; but we had not long
+composed ourselves before one of our company was disturbed by the
+blowing of some animal at his face; and, upon opening his eyes, was not
+a little astonished to see by the glimmering of the fire, a large beast
+standing over him. He had presence of mind enough to snatch a brand from
+the fire, which was now very low, and thrust it at the nose of tho
+animal, which thereupon made off. . . . In the morning we were not a
+little anxious to know how our companions had fared; and this anxiety
+was increased upon our tracing the footsteps of the beast in the sand,
+in a direction towards the bell tent. The impression was deep and plain,
+of a large round foot well furnished with claws. Upon acquainting the
+people in the tent with the circumstances of our story, we found that
+they had been visited by the same unwelcome guest."
+
+Mr. Andrew Murray, in his work on the Geographical Distribution of
+Mammals, gives the Straits of Magellan as the extreme southern limit of
+the puma's range, and in discussing the above passage from Byron he
+writes: "This reference, however, gives no support to the notion of the
+animal alluded to having been a puma. . . . The description of the
+footprints clearly shows that the animal could not have been a puma.
+None of the cat tribe leave any trace of a claw in their footprints. . .
+The dogs, on the other hand, leave a very well-defined claw-mark. . . .
+Commodore Byron and his party had therefore suffered a false alarm. The
+creature which had disturbed them was, doubtless, one of the harmless
+domestic dogs of the natives."
+
+The assurance that the bold hardy adventurer and his men suffered a
+false alarm, and were thrown into a great state of excitement at the
+appearance of one of the wretched domestic dogs of the Fuegians, with
+which they were familiar, comes charmingly, it must be said, from a
+closet naturalist, who surveys the world of savage beasts from his
+London study. He apparently forgets that Commodore Byron lived in a time
+when the painful accuracy and excessive minuteness we are accustomed to
+was not expected from a writer, whenever he happened to touch on any
+matters connected with zoology.
+
+This kind of criticism, which seizes on a slight inaccuracy in one
+passage, and totally ignores an important statement in another--as, for
+instance, that of the "great beast" seen in the woods--might be extended
+to other portions of the book, and Byron's entire narrative made to
+appear as purely a work of the imagination as Peter Wilkin's adventures
+in those same antarctic seas.
+
+Mr. J. W. Boddam Whetham, in his work _Across Central America_ (1877),
+gives an anecdote of the puma, which he heard at Sacluk, in Guatemala,
+and which strangely resembles some of the stories I have heard on the
+pampas. He writes: "The following event, most extraordinary if true, is
+said to have occurred in this forest to a mahogany-cutter, who had been
+out marking trees. As he was returning to his hut, he suddenly felt a
+soft body pressing against him, and on looking down saw a cougar, which,
+with tail erect, and purring like a cat, twisted itself in and out of
+his legs, and glided round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if with
+laughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on, and the
+terrible animal still circled about, now rolling over, and now touching
+him with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse. At last the suspense
+became too great, and with a loud shout he struck desperately at the
+creature with his axe. It bounded on one side and crouched snarling and
+showing its teeth. Just as it was about to spring, the man's companion,
+who had heard his call, appeared in the distance, and with a growl the
+beast vanished into the thick bushes."
+
+Now, after allowing for exaggeration, if there is no foundation for
+stories of this character, it is really a very wonderful coincidence
+that they should be met with in countries so widely separated as
+Patagonia and Central America. Pumas, doubtless, are scarce in
+Guatemala; and, as in other places where they have met with nothing but
+persecution from man, they are shy of him; but had this adventure
+occurred on the pampas, where they are better known, the person
+concerned in it would not have said that the puma played with him as a
+cat with a mouse, but rather as a tame cat plays with a child; nor,
+probably, would he have been terrified into imagining that the animal,
+even after its caresses had met with so rough a return, was about to
+spring on him.
+
+In Clavigero's _History of Lower California,_ it is related that a very
+extraordinary state of things was discovered to exist in that country by
+the first missionaries who settled there at the end of the seventeenth
+century, and which was actually owing to the pumas. The author says that
+there were no bears or tigers (jaguars); these had most probably been
+driven out by their old enemies; but the pumas had increased to a
+prodigious extent, so that the whole peninsula was overrun by them; and
+this was owing to the superstitious regard in which they were held by
+the natives, who not only did not kill them, but never ventured to
+disturb them in any way. The Indians were actually to some extent
+dependent on the puma's success in hunting for their subsistence; they
+watched the movements of the vultures in order to discover the spot in
+which the remains of any animal it had captured had been left by the
+puma, and whenever the birds were seen circling about persistently over
+one place, they hastened to take possession of the carcass, discovered
+in this way. The domestic animals, imported by the missionaries, were
+quickly destroyed by the virtual masters of the country, and against
+these enemies the Jesuits preached a crusade in vain: for although the
+Indians readily embraced Christianity and were baptized, they were not
+to be shaken in their notions concerning the sacred _Chimbica,_ as the
+puma was called. The missions languished in consequence; the priests
+existed in a state of semi-starvation, depending on provisions sent to
+them at long intervals from the distant Mexican settlements; and for
+many years all their efforts to raise the savages from their miserable
+condition were thrown away. At length, in 1701, the mission of Loreto
+was taken charge of by one Padre Ugarte, described by Clavigero as a
+person of indomitable energy, and great physical strength and courage, a
+true muscular Christian, who occasionally varied his method of
+instruction by administering corporal chastisements to his hearers when
+they laughed at his doctrines, or at the mistakes he made in their
+language, while preaching to them. Ugarte, like his predecessors, could
+not move the Indians to hunt the puma, but he was a man of action, with
+a wholesome belief in the efficacy of example, and his opportunity came
+at last.
+
+One day, while riding in the wood, he saw at a distance a puma walking
+deliberately towards him. Alighting from his mule, he took up a large
+stone and advanced to meet the animal, and when sufficiently near hurled
+the missile with such precision and force that he knocked ifc down
+senseless. After killing it, he found that the heaviest part of his task
+remained, as it was necessary for the success of his project to carry
+the beast, still warm and bleeding, to the Indian village; but mow his
+mule steadfastly refused to approach it. Father Ugarte was not,
+however, to be defeated, and partly by stratagem, partly by force, he
+finally succeeded in getting the puma on to the mule's back, after which
+he rode in triumph to the settlement. The Indians at first thought it
+all a trick of their priest, who was so anxious to involve them in a
+conflict with the pumas, and standing at a distance they began jeering
+at him, and exclaiming that he had found the animal dead! But when they
+were induced to approach, and saw that it was still warm and bleeding,
+they were astonished beyond measure, and began to watch the priest
+narrowly, thinking that he would presently drop down and die in sight of
+them all. It was their belief that death would quickly overtake the
+slayer of a puma. As this did not happen, the priest gained a great
+influence over them, and in the end they were persuaded to turn their
+weapons against the Chimbica.
+
+Clavigero has nothing to say concerning the origin of this Californian
+superstition; but with some knowledge of the puma's character, it is not
+difficult to imagine what it may have been. No doubt these savages had
+been very well acquainted from ancient times with the animal's instinct
+of friendliness toward man, and its extreme hatred of other carnivores,
+which prey on the human species; and finding it ranged on their side, as
+it were, in the hard struggle of life in the desert, they were induced
+to spare it, and even to regard it as a friend; and such a feeling,
+among primitive men, might in the course of time degenerate into such a
+superstition as that of the Californians.
+
+I shall, in conclusion, relate here the story of Maldonada, which is not
+generally known, although familiar to Buenos Ayreans as the story of
+Lady Godiva's ride through Coventry is to the people of that town. The
+case of Maldonada is circumstantially narrated by Rui Diaz de Guzman, in
+his history of the colonization of the Plata: he was a person high in
+authority in the young colonies, and is regarded by students of South
+American history as an accurate and sober-minded chronicler of the
+events of his own times. He relates that in the year 1536 the settlers
+at Buenos Ayres, having exhausted their provisions, and being compelled
+by hostile Indians to keep within their pallisades, were reduced to the
+verge of starvation. The Governor Mendoza went off to seek help from the
+other colonies up the river, deputing his authority to one Captain Ruiz,
+who, according to all accounts, displayed an excessively tyrannous and
+truculent disposition while in power. The people were finally reduced to
+a ration of sis ounces of flour per day for each person; but as the
+flour was putrid and only made them ill, they were forced to live on any
+small animals they could capture, including snakes, frogs and toads.
+Some horrible details are given by Rui Diaz, and other writers; one, Del
+Barco Centenera, affirms that of two thousand persons in the town
+eighteen hundred perished of hunger. During this unhappy time, beasts of
+prey in large numbers were attracted to the settlement by the effluvium
+of the corpses, buried just outside the pallisades; and this made the
+condition of the survivors more miserable still, since they could
+venture into the neighbouring woods only at the risk of a violent death.
+Nevertheless, many did so venture, and among these was the young woman
+Maldonada, who, losing herself in the forest, strayed to a distance, and
+was eventually found by a party of Indians, and carried by them to their
+village.
+
+Some months later, Captain Ruiz discovered her whereabouts, and
+persuaded the savages to bring her to the settlement; then, accusing her
+of having gone to the Indian village in order to betray the colony, he
+condemned her to be devoured by wild beasts. She was taken to a wood at
+a distance of a league from the town, and left there, tied to a tree,
+for the space of two nights and a day. A party of soldiers then went to
+the spot, expecting to find her bones picked clean by the beasts, but
+were greatly astonished to find Maldonada still alive, without hurt or
+scratch. She told them that a puma had come to her aid, and had kept at
+her side, defending her life against all the other beasts that
+approached her. She was instantly released, and taken back to the town,
+her deliverance through the action of the puma probably being looked on
+as direct interposition of Providence to save her.
+
+Rui Diaz concludes with the following paragraph, in which he affirms
+that he knew the woman Maldonada, which may be taken as proof that she
+was among the few that survived the first disastrous settlement and
+lived on to more fortunate times: his pious pun on her name would be
+lost in a translation:--"De esta manera quedo libre la que ofrecieron a
+las fieras: la cual mujer yo la conoci, y la llamaban la Maldonada, que
+mas bien se le podia llamar la BIENDONADA; pues por este suceso se ha de
+ver no haber merecido el castigo a que la ofrecieron."
+
+If such a thing were to happen now, in any portion of southern South
+America, where the puma's disposition is best known, it would not be
+looked on as a miracle, as it was, and that unavoidably, in the case of
+Maldonada.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A WAVE OF LIFE,
+
+
+For many years, while living in my own home on the pampas, I kept a
+journal, in which all my daily observations on the habits of animals and
+kindred matters were carefully noted. Turning back to 1872-3, I find my
+jottings for that season contain a history of one of those waves of
+life--for I can think of no better name for the phenomenon in
+question--that are of such frequent occurrence in thinly-settled
+regions, though in countries like England, seen very rarely, and on a
+very limited scale. An exceptionally bounteous season, the accidental
+mitigation of a check, or other favourable circumstance, often causes an
+increase so sudden and inordinate of small prolific species, that when
+we actually witness it we are no longer surprised at the notion
+prevalent amongst the common people that mice, frogs, crickets, &c., are
+occasionally rained down from the clouds.
+
+In the summer of 1872-3 we had plenty of sunshine, with frequent
+showers; so that the hot months brought no dearth of wild flowers, as in
+most years. The abundance of flowers resulted in a wonderful increase of
+humble bees. I have never known them so plentiful before; in and about
+the plantation adjoining my house I found, during the season, no fewer
+than seventeen nests.
+
+The season was also favourable for mice; that is, of course, favourable
+for the time being, unfavourable in the long run, since the short-lived,
+undue preponderance of a species is invariably followed by a long period
+of undue depression. These prolific little creatures were soon so
+abundant that the dogs subsisted almost exclusively on them; the fowls
+also, from incessantly pursuing and killing them, became quite rapacious
+in their manner; whilst the sulphur tyrant-birds (Pitangus) and the
+Guira cuckoos preyed on nothing but mice.
+
+The domestic cats, as they invariably do in such plentiful seasons,
+absented themselves from the house, assuming all the habits of their
+wild congeners, and slinking from the sight of man--even of a former
+fireside companion--with a shy secrecy in their motions, an apparent
+affectation of fear, almost ludicrous to see. Foxes, weasels, and
+opossums fared sumptuously. Even for the common armadillo (Dasypus
+villosus) it was a season of affluence, for this creature is very adroit
+in capturing mice. This fact might seem surprising to anyone who marks
+the uncouth figure, toothless gums, and the motions--anything but light
+and graceful--of the armadillo and perhaps fancying that, to be a
+dexterous mouser, an animal should bear some resemblance in habits and
+structure to the felidas. But animals, like men, are compelled to adapt
+themselves to their surroundings; new habits are acquired, and the exact
+co-relation between habit and structure is seldom maintained.
+
+I kept an armadillo at this time, and good cheer and the sedentary life
+he led in captivity made him excessively fat; but the mousing exploits
+of even this individual were most interesting. Occasionally I took him
+into the fields to give him a taste of liberty, though at such times I
+always took the precaution to keep hold of a cord fastened to one of his
+hind legs; for as often as he came to a kennel of one of his wild
+fellows, he would attempt to escape into it. He invariably travelled
+with an ungainly trotting gait, carrying his nose, beagle-like, close to
+the ground. His sense of smell was exceedingly acute, and when near his
+prey he became agitated, and quickened his motions, pausing frequently
+to sniff the earth, till, discovering the exact spot where the mouse
+lurked, he would stop and creep cautiously to it; then, after slowly
+raising himself to a sitting posture, spring suddenly forwards, throwing
+his body like a trap over the mouse, or nest of mice, concealed beneath
+the grass.
+
+A curious instance of intelligence in a cat was brought to my notice at
+this time by one of my neighbours, a native. His children had made the
+discovery that some excitement and fun was to be had by placing a long
+hollow stalk of the giant thistle with a mouse in it--and every hollow
+stalk at this time had one for a tenant--before a cat, and then watching
+her movements. Smelling her prey, she would spring at one end of the
+stalk--the end towards which the mouse would be moving at the same time,
+but would catch nothing, for the mouse, instead of running out, would
+turn back to run to the other end; whereupon the cat, all excitement,
+would jump there to seize it; and so the contest would continue for a
+long time, an exhibition of the cleverness and the stupidity of
+instinct, both of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several cats
+at the house, and all acted in the same way except one. When a stalk was
+placed before this cat, instead of becoming excited like the others, it
+went quickly to one end and smelt' at the opening, then, satisfied that
+its prey was inside, it deliberately bit a long piece out of the stalk
+with its teeth, then another strip, and so on progressively, until the
+entire stick had been opened up to within six or eight inches of the
+further end, when the mouse came out and was caught. Every stalk placed
+before this cat was demolished in the same businesslike way; but the
+other cats, though they were made to look on while the stick was being
+broken up by their fellow, could never learn the trick.
+
+In the autumn of the .year countless numbers of storks (Ciconia maguari)
+and of short-eared owls (Otus brachyotus) made their appearance. They
+had also come to assist at the general feast.
+
+Remembering the opinion of Mr. E. Newman, quoted by Darwin, that
+two-thirds of the humble bees in England are annually destroyed by mice,
+I determined to continue observing these insects, in order to ascertain
+whether the same thing occurred on the pampas. I carefully revisited all
+the nests I had found, and was amazed at the rapid disappearance of all
+the bees. I was quite convinced that the mice had devoured or driven
+them out, for the weather was still warm, and flowers and fruit on which
+humble bees feed were very abundant.
+
+After cold weather set in the storks went away, probably on account of
+the scarcity of water, for the owls remained. So numerous were they
+during the winter, that any evening after sunset I could count forty or
+fifty individuals hovering over the trees about my house. Unfortunately
+they did not confine their attentions to the mice, but became
+destructive to the birds as well. I frequently watched them at dusk,
+beating about the trees and bushes in a systematic manner, often a dozen
+or more of them wheeling together about one tree, like so many moths
+about a candle, and one occasionally dashing through the branches until
+a pigeon--usually the Zenaida maculata--or other bird was scared from
+its perch. The instant the bird left the tree they would all give chase,
+disappearing in the darkness. I could not endure to see the havoc they
+were making amongst the ovenbirds (Furnarius rufus--a species for which
+I have a regard and affection almost superstitious), so I began to shoot
+the marauders. Very soon, however, I found it was impossible to protect
+my little favourites. Night after night the owls mustered in their usual
+numbers, so rapidly were the gaps I made in their ranks refilled. I grew
+sick of the cruel war in which I had so hopelessly joined, and resolved,
+not without pain, to let things take their course. A singular
+circumstance was that the owls began to breed in the middle of winter.
+The field-labourers and boys found many nests with eggs and young birds
+in the neighbourhood. I saw one nest in July, our coldest month, with
+three half-grown young birds in it. They were excessively fat, and,
+though it was noon-day, had their crops full. There were three mice and
+two young cavies (Cavia australis) lying untouched in the nest.
+
+The short-eared owl is of a wandering disposition, ard performs long
+journeys at all seasons of the year in search of districts where food is
+abundant; and perhaps these winter-breeders came from a region where
+scarcity of prey, or some such cause, had prevented them from nesting at
+their usual time in summer.
+
+The gradual increase or decrease continually going on in many species
+about us is little remarked; but the sudden infrequent appearance in
+vast numbers of large and comparatively rare species is regarded by most
+people as a very wonderful phenomenon, not easily explained. On the
+pampas, whenever grasshoppers, mice, frogs or crickets become
+excessively abundant we confidently look for the appearance of
+multitudes of the birds that prey on them. However obvious may be the
+cause of the first phenomenon--the sudden inordinate increase during a
+favourable year of a species always prolific--the attendant one always
+creates astonishment: For how, it is asked, do these largo birds, seldom
+seen at other times, receive information in the distant regions they
+inhabit of an abundance of food in any particular locality? Years have
+perhaps passed during which, scarcely an individual of these kinds has
+been seen: all at once armies of the majestic white storks are seen
+conspicuously marching about the plain in all directions; while the
+night air resounds with the solemn hootings of innumerable owls. It is
+plain that these birds have been drawn from over an immense area to one
+spot; and the question is how have they been drawn?
+
+Many large birds possessing great powers of flight are, when not
+occupied with the business of propagation, incessantly wandering from
+place to place in search of food. They are not, as a rule, regular
+migrants, for their wanderings begin and end irrespective of seasons,
+and where they find abundance they remain the whole year. They fly at a
+very great height, and traverse immense distances. When the favourite
+food of any one of these species is plentiful in any particular region
+all the individuals that discover it remain, and attract to them all of
+their kind passing overhead. This happens on the pampas with the stork,
+the short-eared owl, the hooded gull and the dominican or black-backed
+gull--the leading species among the feathered nomads: a few first appear
+like harbingers; these are presently joined by new comers in
+considerable numbers, and before long they are in myriads. Inconceivable
+numbers of birds are, doubtless, in these regions, continually passing
+over us unseen. It was once a subject of very great wonder to me that
+flocks of black-necked swans should almost always appear flying by
+immediately after a shower of rain, even when none had been visible for
+a long time before, and when they must have come from a very great
+distance. When the reason at length occurred to me, I felt very much
+disgusted with myself for being puzzled over so very simple a matter.
+After rain a flying swan may be visible to the eye at a vastly greater
+distance than during fair weather; the sun shining on its intense white
+plumage against the dark background of a rain-cloud making it
+exceedingly conspicuous. The fact that swans are almost always seen
+after rain shows only that they are almost always passing.
+
+Whenever we are visited by a dust-storm on the pampas myriads of hooded
+gulls--Larus macnlipen-nis--appear flying before the dark dust-cloud,
+even when not a gull has been seen for months. Dust-storms are of rare
+occurrence, and come only after a long drought, and, the water-courses
+being all dry, the gulls cannot have been living in the region over
+which the storm passes. Yet in seasons of drought gulls must be
+continually passing by at a great height, seeing but not seen, except
+when driven together and forced towards the earth by the fury of the
+storm.
+
+By August (1873) the owls had vanished, and they had, indeed, good cause
+for leaving. The winter had been one of continued drought; the dry grass
+and herbage of the preceding year had been consumed by the cattle and
+wild animals, or had turned to dust, and with the disappearance of their
+food and cover the mice had ceased to be. The famine-stricken cats
+sneaked back to the house. It was pitiful to see the little burrowing
+owls; for these birds, not having the powerful wings and prescient
+instincts of the vagrant Otus brachyotus, are compelled to face the
+poverty from which the others escape. Just as abundance had before made
+the domestic cats wild, scarcity now made the burrowing owls tame and
+fearless of man. They were so reduced as scarcely to be able to fly, and
+hung about the houses all day long on the look-out for some stray morsel
+of food. I have frequently seen one alight and advance within two or
+three yards of the door-step, probably attracted by the smell of roasted
+meat. The weather continued dry until late in spring, so reducing the
+sheep and cattle that incredible numbers perished during a month of cold
+and rainy weather that followed the drought.
+
+How clearly we can see in all this that the tendency to multiply
+rapidly, so advantageous in normal seasons, becomes almost fatal to a
+species in seasons of exceptional abundance. Cover and food without
+limit enabled the mice to increase at such an amazing rate that the
+lesser checks interposed by predatory species were for a while
+inappreciable. But as the mice increased, so did their enemies.
+Insectivorous and other species acquired the habits of owls and weasels,
+preying exclusively on them; while to this innumerable army of residents
+was shortly added multitudes of wandering birds coming from distant
+regions. No sooner had the herbage perished, depriving the little
+victims of cover and food, than the effects of the war became apparent.
+In autumn the earth so teemed with them that one could scarcely walk
+anywhere without treading on mice; while out of every hollow weed-stalk
+lying on the ground dozens could be shaken; but so rapidly had they
+devoured, by the trained army of persecutors, that in spring it was hard
+to find a survivor, even in the barns and houses. The fact that species
+tend to increase in a geometrical ratio makes these great and sudden
+changes frequent in many regions of the earth; but it is not often they
+present themselves so vividly as in the foregoing instance, for here,
+scene after scene in one of Nature's silent passionless tragedies opens
+before us, countless myriads of highly organized beings rising into
+existence only to perish almost immediately, scarcely a hard-pressed
+remnant remaining after the great reaction to continue the species.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS.
+
+
+Strictly speaking, the only weapons of vertebrates are teeth, claws,
+horns, and spurs. Horns belong only to the ruminants, and the spur is a
+rare weapon. There are also many animals in which teeth and claws are
+not suited to inflict injury, or in which the proper instincts and
+courage to use and develop them are wanted; and these would seem, to be
+in a very defenceless condition. Defenceless they are in one sense, but
+as a fact they are no worse off than the well-armed species, having
+either a protective colouring or a greater swiftness or cunning to
+assist them in escaping from their enemies. And there are also many of
+these practically toothless and clawless species which have yet been
+provided with other organs and means of offence and defence out of
+Nature's curious armoury, and concerning a few of these species I
+propose to speak in this place.
+
+Probably such distinctive weapons as horns, spurs, tusks and spines
+would be much more common in nature if the conditions of life always
+remained the same. But these things are long in fashioning; meanwhile,
+conditions are changing; climate, soil, vegetation vary; foes and rivals
+diminish or increase; the old go, and others with different weapons and
+a new strategy take their place; and just as a skilful man "fighting the
+wilderness" fashions a plough from a hunting-knife, turns his implements
+into weapons of war, and for everything he possesses discovers a use
+never contemplated by its maker, so does Nature--only with an ingenuity
+exceeding that of man--use the means she has to meet all contingencies,
+and enable her creatures, seemingly so ill-provided, to maintain their
+fight for life. Natural selection, like an angry man, can make a weapon
+of anything; and, using the word in this wide sense, the mucous
+secretions the huanaco discharges into the face of an adversary, and the
+pestilential drops "distilled" by the skunk, are weapons, and may be as
+effectual in defensive warfare as spines, fangs and tushes.
+
+I do not know of a more striking instance in the animal kingdom of
+adaptation of structure to habit than is afforded by the hairy
+armadillo--Dasypus villosus. He appears to us, roughly speaking, to
+resemble an ant-eater saddled with a dish cover; yet this creature, with
+the cunning Avhich Nature has given it to supplement all deficiencies,
+has discovered in its bony encumbrance a highly efficient weapon of
+offence. Most other edentates are diurnal and almost exclusively
+insectivorous, some feeding only on ants; they have unchangeable habits,
+very limited intelligence, and vanish before civilization. The hairy
+armadillo alone has struck out a line for itself. Like its fast
+disappearing congeners, it is an insect-eater still, but does not like
+them seek its food on the surface and in the ant-hill only; all kinds of
+insects are preyed on, and by means of its keen scent it discovers worms
+and larvae several inches beneath the surface. Its method of taking
+worms and grubs resembles that of probing birds, for it throws up no
+earth, but forces its sharp snout and wedge-shaped head down to the
+required depth; and probably while working it moves round in a circle,
+for the hole is conical, though the head of the animal is flat. Where it
+has found a rich hunting-ground, the earth is seen pitted with hundreds
+of these neat symmetrical bores. It is also an enemy to ground-nesting
+birds, being fond of eggs and fledglings; and when unable to capture
+prey it will feed on carrion as readily as a wild dog or vulture,
+returning night after night to the carcase of a horse or cow as long as
+the flesh lasts. Failing animal food, it subsists on vegetable diet; and
+I have frequently found their stomachs stuffed with clover, and,
+stranger still, with the large, hard grains of the maize, swallowed
+entire.
+
+It is not, therefore, strange that at all seasons, and even when other
+animals are starving, the hairy armadillo is always fat and vigorous. In
+the desert it is diurnal; but where man appears it becomes more and more
+nocturnal, and in populous districts does not go abroad until long after
+dark. Yet when a district becomes thickly settled it increases in
+numbers; so readily does it adapt itself to new conditions. It is not to
+be wondered at that the gauchos, keen observers of nature as they are,
+should make this species the hero of many of their fables of the "Uncle
+Remus" type, representing it as a versatile creature, exceedingly
+fertile in expedients, and duping its sworn friend the fox in various
+ways, just as "Brer Rabbit" serves the fox in the North American fables.
+
+The hairy armadillo will, doubtless, long survive all the other
+armadillos, and on this account alone it will have an ever-increasing
+interest for the naturalist. I have elsewhere described how it captures
+mice; when preying on snakes it proceeds in another manner. A friend of
+mine, a careful observer, who was engaged in cattle-breeding amongst the
+stony sierras near Cape Corrientes, described to me an encounter he
+witnessed between an armadillo and a poisonous snake. While seated on
+the hillside one day he observed a snake, about twenty inches in length,
+lying coiled up on a stoue five or six yards beneath him. By-and-by, a
+hairy armadillo appeared trotting directly towards it. Apparently the
+snake perceived and feared its approach, for it quickly uncoiled itself
+and began gliding away. Instantly the armadillo rushed on to it, and,
+squatting close down, began swaying its body backward and forward with a
+regular sawing motion, thus lacerating its victim with the sharp,
+deep-cut edges of its bony covering. The snake struggled to free itself,
+biting savagely at its aggressor, for its head and neck were disengaged.
+Its bites made no impression, and very soon it dropped its head, and
+when its enemy drew off, it was dead and very much mangled. The
+armadillo at once began its meal, taking the tail in its mouth and
+slowly progressing towards the head; but when about a third of the snake
+still remained it seemed satisfied, and, leaving that portion, trotted
+away.
+
+Altogether, in its rapacious and varied habits this armadillo appears to
+have some points of resemblance with the hedgehog; and possibly, like
+the little European mammal it resembles, it is not harmed by the bite of
+venomous snakes.
+
+I once had a cat that killed every snake it found, purely for sport,
+since it never ate them. It would jump nimbly round and across its
+victim, occasionally dealing it a blow with its cruel claws. The enemies
+of the snake are legion. Burrowing owls feed largely on them; so do
+herons and storks, killing them with a blow of their javelin beaks, and
+swallowing them entire. The sulphur tyrant-bird picks up the young snake
+by the tail, and, flying to a branch or stone, uses it like a flail till
+its life is battered out. The bird is highly commended in consequence,
+reminding one of very ancient words: "Happy shall he be that taketh thy
+little ones and dasheth them against the stones." In arraying such a
+variety of enemies against the snake, nature has made ample amends for
+having endowed it with deadly weapons. Besides, the power possessed by
+venomous snakes only seems to us disproportionate; it is not really so,
+except in occasional individual encounters. Venomous snakes are always
+greatly outnumbered by non-venomous ones in the same district; at any
+rate this is the case on the pampas. The greater activity of the latter
+counts for more in the result than the deadly weapons of the former.
+
+The large teguexin lizard of the pampas, called iguana by the country
+people, is a notable snake-killer. Snakes have in fact, no more
+formidable enemy, for he is quick to see, and swift to overtake them. He
+is practically invulnerable, and deals them sudden death with his
+powerful tail. The gauchos say that dogs attacking the iguana are
+sometimes known to have their legs broken, and I do not doubt it. A
+friend of mine was out riding one day after his cattle, and having
+attached one end of his lasso to the saddle, He let it trail on the
+ground. He noticed a large iguana lying apparently asleep in the sun,
+and though he rode by it very closely, it did not stir; but no sooner
+had he passed it, than it raised its head, and fixed its attention on
+the forty feet of lasso slowly trailing by. Suddenly it rushed after the
+rope, and dealt it a succession of violent blows with its tail. When the
+whole of the lasso, several yards of which had been pounded in vain, had
+been dragged by, the lizard, with uplifted head, continued gazing after
+it with the greatest astonishment. Never had such a wonderful snake
+crossed its path before!
+
+Molina, in his _Natural History of Chill,_ says the vizcacha uses its
+tail as a weapon; but then Molina is not always reliable. I have
+observed vizcachas all my life, and never detected them making use of
+any weapon except their chisel teeth. The tail is certainly very
+curious, being straight at the base, then curving up outwardly, and
+slightly down again at the tip, resembling the spout of a china teapot.
+The under surface of the straight portion of the base is padded with a
+thick, naked, corneous skin; and, when the animal performs the curious
+sportive antics in which it occasionally indulges, it gives rapid
+loud-sounding blows on the ground with this part of the tail. The
+peculiar form of the tail also makes it a capital support, enabling the
+vizcacha to sit erect, with ease and security.
+
+The frog is a most timid, inoffensive creature, saving itself, when
+pursued, by a series of saltatory feats unparalleled amongst
+vertebrates. Consequently, when I find a frog, I have no hesitation in
+placing my hands upon it, and the cold sensation it gives one is the
+worse result I fear. It came to pass, however, that I once encountered a
+frog that was not like other frogs, for it possessed an instinct and
+weapons of offence which greatly astonished me. I was out snipe shooting
+one day when, peering into an old disused burrow, two or three feet
+deep, I perceived a burly-looking frog sitting it. It was larger and
+stouter-looking than our common Rana, though like it in colour, and I at
+once dropped on to my knees and set about its capture. Though it watched
+me attentively, the frog remained perfectly motionless, and this greatly
+surprised me. Before I was sufficiently near to make a grab, it sprang
+straight at my hand, and, catching two of my fingers round with its fore
+legs, administered a hug so sudden and violent as to cause an acute
+sensation of pain; then, at the very instant I experienced this feeling,
+which made me start back quickly, it released its hold and bounded out
+and away. I flew after it, and barely managed to overtake it before it
+could gain the water. Holding it firmly pressed behind the shoulders, it
+was powerless to attack me, and I then noticed the enormous development
+of the muscles of the fore legs, usually small in frogs, bulging out in
+this individual, like a second pair of thighs, and giving-it a strangely
+bold and formidable appearance. On holding my gun within its reach, it
+clasped the barrel with such energy as to bruise the skin of its breast
+and legs. After allowing it to partially exhaust itself in these
+fruitless huggings, I experimented by letting it seize my hand again,
+and I noticed that invariably after each squeeze it made a quick,
+violent attempt to free itself. Believing that I had discovered a frog
+differing in structure from all known species, and possessing a strange
+unique instinct of self-preservation, I carried my captive home,
+intending to show it to Dr. Burmeister, the director of the National
+Museum at Buenos Ayres-Unfortunately, after I had kept it some days, it
+effected its escape by pushing up the glass cover of its box, and I have
+never since met with another individual like it. That this singular
+frog has it in its power to seriously injure an opponent is, of course,
+out of the question; but its unexpected attack must be of great
+advantage. The effect of the sudden opening of an umbrella in the face
+of an angry bull gives, I think, only a faint idea of the astonishment
+and confusion it must cause an adversary by its leap, quick as
+lightning, and the violent hug it administers; and in the confusion it
+finds time to escape. I cannot for a moment believe that an instinct so
+admirable, correlated as it is with the structure of the fore legs, can
+be merely an individual variation; and I confidently expect that all I
+have said about my lost frog will some day be confirmed by others. Rana
+luctator would be a good name for this species.
+
+The toad is a slow-moving creature that puts itself in the way of
+persecution; yet, strange to say, the acrid juice it exudes when
+irritated is a surer protection to it than venomous fangs are to the
+deadliest snake. Toads are, in fact, with a very few exceptions, only
+attacked and devoured by snakes, by lizards, and by their own venomous
+relative, Ceratophrys ornata. Possibly the cold sluggish natures of all
+these creatures protects them against the toad's secretion, which would
+be poison to most warm-blooded animals, but I am not so sure that all
+fish enjoy a like immunity. I one day noticed a good-sized fish (bagras)
+floating, belly upmost, on the water. It had apparently just died, and
+had such a glossy, well-nourished look about it, and appeared so full, I
+was curious to know the cause of its death. On opening it I found its
+stomach quite filled with a very large toad it had swallowed. The toad
+looked perfectly fresh, not even a faint discoloration of the skin
+showing that the gastric juices had begun to take effect; the fish, in
+fact, must have died immediately after swallowing the toad. The country
+people in South America believe that the milky secretion exuded by the
+toad possesses wonderful curative properties; it is their invariable
+specific for shingles--a painful, dangerous malady common amongst them,
+and to cure it living toads are applied to the inflamed parb. I dare say
+learned physicians would laugh at this cure, but then, if I mistake not,
+the learned have in past times laughed at other specifics used by the
+vulgar, but which now have honourable places in the pharmacopoeia--
+pepsine, for example. More than two centuries ago (very ancient times
+for South America) the gauchos were accustomed to take the lining of the
+rhea's stomach, dried and powdered, for ailments caused by impaired
+digestion; and the remedy is popular still. Science has gone over to
+them, and the ostrich-hunter now makes a double profit, one from the
+feathers, and the other from the dried stomachs which he supplies to the
+chemists of Buenos Ayres. Yet he was formerly told that to take the
+stomach of the ostrich to improve his digestion was as wild an idea as
+it would be to swallow birds' feathers in order to fly.
+
+I just now called Ceratophrys ornata venomous, though its teeth are not
+formed to inject poison into the veins, like serpents' teeth. It is a
+singular creature, known as _escuerzo_ in the vernacular, and though
+beautiful in colour, is in form hideous beyond description. The skin is
+of a rich brilliant green, with chocolate-coloured patches, oval in
+form, and symmetrically disposed. The lips are bright yellow, the
+cavernous mouth pale flesh colour, the throat and under-surface dull
+white. The body is lumpy, and about the size of a large man's fist. The
+eyes, placed on the summit of a disproportionately large head, are
+embedded in horn-like protuberances, capable of being elevated or
+depressed at pleasure. When the creature is undisturbed, the eyes, which
+are of a pale gold colour, look out as from a couple of watch towers,
+but when touched on the head or menaced, the prominences sink down to a
+level with the head, closing the eyes completely, and giving the
+creature the appearance of being eyeless. The upper jaw is armed with
+minute teeth, and there are two teeth in the centre of the lower jaw,
+the remaining portions of the jaw being armed with two exceedingly
+sharp-edged bony plates. In place of a tongue, it has a round muscular
+process with a rough flat disc the size of a halfpenny.
+
+It is common all over the pampas, ranging as far south as the Rio
+Colorado in Patagonia. In the breeding season it congregates in pools,
+and one is then struck by their extraordinary vocal powers, which they
+exercise by night. The performance in no way resembles the series of
+percussive sounds uttered by most batrachians. The notes it utters are
+long, as of a wind instrument, not unmelodious, and so powerful as to
+make themselves heard distinctly a mile off on still evenings. After the
+amorous period these toads retire to moist places and sit inactive,
+buried just deep enough to leave the broad green back on a level with
+the surface, and it is then very difficult to detect them. In this
+position they wait for their prey--frogs, toads, birds, and small
+mammals. Often they capture and attempt to swallow things too large for
+them, a mistake often made by snakes. In very wet springs they sometimes
+come about houses and lie in wait for chickens and ducklings. In
+disposition they are most truculent, savagely biting at anything that
+comes near them; and when they bite they hang on with the tenacity of a
+bulldog, poisoning the blood with their glandular secretions. When
+teased, the creature swells itself out to such an extent one almost
+expects to see him burst; he follows his tormentors about with slow
+awkward leaps, his vast mouth wide open, and uttering an incessant harsh
+croaking sound. A gaucho I knew was once bitten by one. He sat down on
+the grass, and, dropping his hand at his side, had it seized, and only
+freed himself by using his hunting knife to force the creature's mouth
+open. He washed and bandaged the wound, and no bad result followed; but
+when the toad cannot be shaken off, then the result is different. One
+summer two horses were found dead on the plain near my home. One, while
+lying down, had been seized by a fold in the skin near the belly; the
+other had been grasped by the nose while cropping grass. In both
+instances the vicious toad was found dead, with jaws tightly closed,
+still hanging to the dead horse. Perhaps they are sometimes incapable of
+letting go at will, and like honey bees, destroy themselves in these
+savage attacks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+FEAR IN BIRDS.
+
+
+The statement that birds instinctively fear man is frequently met with
+in zoological works written since the _Origin of Species_ appeared; but
+almost the only reason--absolutely the only plausible reason, all the
+rest being mere supposition--given in support of such a notion is that
+birds in desert islands show at first no fear of man, but afterwards,
+finding him a dangerous neighbour, they become wild; and their young
+also grow up wild. It is thus assumed that the habit acquired by the
+former has become hereditary in the latter--or, at all events, that in
+time it becomes hereditary. Instincts, which are few in number in any
+species, and practically endure for ever, are not, presumably, acquired
+with such extraordinary facility.
+
+Birds become shy where persecuted, and the young, even when not
+disturbed, learn a shy habit from the parents, and from other adults
+they associate with. I have found small birds shyer in desert places,
+where the human form was altogether strange to them, than in
+thickly-settled districts. Large birds are actually shyer than the small
+ones, although, to the civilized or shooting man they seem astonishingly
+tame where they have never been fired at. I have frequently walked quite
+openly to within twenty-five or thirty yards of a flock of flamingoes
+without alarming them. This, however, was when they were in the water,
+or on the opposite side of a stream. Having no experience of guns, they
+fancied themselves secure as long as a strip of water separated them
+from the approaching object. When standing on dry land they would not
+allow so near an approach. Sparrows in England aro very much tamer than
+the sparrows I have observed in desert places, where they seldom see a
+human being. Nevertheless young sparrows in England are very much tamer
+than old birds, as anyone may see for himself. During the past summer,
+while living near Kew Gardens, I watched the sparrows a great deal, and
+fed forty or fifty of them every day from a back window. The bread and
+seed was thrown on to a low roof just outside the window, and I noticed
+that the young birds when first able to fly were always brought by the
+parents to this feeding place, and that after two or three visits they
+would begin to come of their own accord. At such times they would
+venture quite close to me, showing as little suspicion as young
+chickens. The adults, however, although so much less shy than birds of
+other species, were extremely suspicious, snatching up the bread and
+flying away; or, if they remained, hopping about in a startled manner,
+craning their necks to view me, and making so many gestures and motions,
+and little chirps of alarm, that presently the young would become
+infected with fear. The lesson was taught them in a surprisingly short
+time; their suspicion was seen to increase day by day, and about a week
+later they were scarcely to be distinguished, in behaviour from the
+adults. It is plain that, with these little birds, fear of man is an
+associate feeling, and that, unless it had been taught them, his
+presence would trouble them as little as does that of horse, sheep, or
+cow. But how about the larger species, used as food, and which have had
+a longer and sadder experience of man's destructive power?
+
+The rhea, or South American ostrich, philosophers tell us, is a very
+ancient bird on the earth; and from its great size and inability to
+escape by flight, and its excellence as food, especially to savages, who
+prefer fat rank-flavoured flesh, it must have been systematically
+persecuted by man as long as, or longer than, any bird now existing on
+the globe. If fear of man ever becomes hereditary in birds, we ought
+certainly to find some trace of such an instinct in this species. I have
+been unable to detect any, though I have observed scores of young rheas
+in captivity, taken before the parent bird had taught them what to fear.
+I also once kept a brood myself, captured just after they had hatched
+out. With regard to food they were almost, or perhaps quite,
+independent, spending most of the time catching flies, grasshoppers, and
+other insects with surprising dexterity; but of the dangers encompassing
+the young rhea they knew absolutely frothing. They would follow me about
+as if they took me for their parent; and, whenever I imitated the loud
+snorting or rasping warning-call emitted the old bird in moments of
+danger, they would to me in the greatest terror, though no animal was in
+sight, and, squatting at my feet, endeavour to conceal themselves by
+thrusting their heads and long necks up my trousers. If I had caused a
+person to dress in white or yellow clothes for several consecutive days,
+and had then uttered the warning cry each time he showed himself to the
+birds, I have no doubt that they would soon have acquired a habit of
+running in terror from him, even without the warning cry, and that the
+fear of a person in white or yellow would have continued all their
+lives. Up to within about twenty years ago, rheas were seldom or never
+shot in La Plata and Patagonia, but were always hunted on horseback and
+caught with the bolas. The sight of a mounted man would set them off at
+once, while a person on foot could walk quite openly to within easy
+shooting distance of them; yet their fear of a horseman dates only two
+hundred years back--a very short time, when we consider that, before the
+Indian borrowed the horse from the invader, he must have systematically
+pursued the rhea on foot for centuries. The rhea changed its habits when
+the hunter changed his, and now, if an _estanciero_ puts down ostrich
+hunting on his estate, in a very few years the birds, although wild
+birds still, become as fearless and familiar as domestic animals. I have
+known old and ill-tempered males to become a perfect nuisance on some
+estancias, running after and attacking every person, whether on foot or
+on horseback, that ventured near them. An old instinct of a whole race
+could not be thus readily lost here and there on isolated estates
+wherever a proprietor chose to protect his birds for half a dozen years.
+
+I suppose the Talegallus--the best-known brush-turkey--must be looked on
+as an exception to all other birds with regard to the point I am
+considering; for this abnormal form buries its eggs in the huge mound
+made by the male, and troubles herself no more about them. When the
+young is fully developed it simply kicks the coffin to pieces in which
+its mother interred it, and, burrowing its way up to the sunshine,
+enters on the pleasures and pains of an independent existence from
+earliest infancy--that is, if a species born into the world in full
+possession of all the wisdom of the ancients, can be said ever to know
+infancy. At all events, from Mr. Bartlett's observations on the young
+hatched in the Zoological Gardens, it appears that they took no notice
+of the old birds, but lived quite independently from the moment they
+came out of the ground, even flying up into a tree and roosting
+separately at night. I am not sure, however, that these observations are
+quite conclusive; for it is certain that captivity plays strange pranks
+with the instincts of some species, and it is just possible that in a
+state of nature the old birds exercise at first some slight parental
+supervision, and, like all other species, have a peculiar cry to warn
+the young of the dangers to be avoided. If this is not so, then the
+young Talegallus must fly or hide with instinctive tear from every
+living thing that approaches it. I, at any rate, find it hard to believe
+that it has a knowledge, independent of experience, of the different
+habits of man and kangaroo, and dis-criminates at first sight between
+animals that are dangerous to it and those that are not. This
+interesting point will probably never be determined, as, most unhappily,
+the Australians are just now zealously engaged in exterminating their
+most wonderful bird for the sake of its miserable flesh; and with less
+excuse than the Maories could plead with regard to the moa, since they
+cannot deny that they have mutton and rabbit enough to satisfy hunger.
+
+Whether birds fear or have instinctive knowledge of any of their enemies
+is a much larger question. Species that run freely on the ground from
+the time of quitting the shell know their proper food, and avoid
+whatever is injurious. Have all young birds a similarly discriminating
+instinct with regard to their enemies? Darwin says, "Fear of any
+particular enemy is certainly an instinctive quality, as may be seen in
+nestling birds." Here, even man seems to be included among the enemies
+feared instinctively; and in another passage he says, "Young chickens
+have lost, wholly from habit, that fear of the dog and cat which, no
+doubt, was originally instinctive in them." My own observations point to
+a contrary conclusion; and I may say that I have had unrivalled
+opportunities for studying the habits of young birds.
+
+Animals of all classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear from
+any strange object approaching them. A piece of newspaper carried
+accidentally by the wind is as great an object of terror to an
+inexperienced young bird as a buzzard sweeping down with death in its
+talons. Among birds not yet able to fly there are, however, some curious
+exceptions; thus the young of most owls and pigeons are excited to anger
+rather than fear, and, puffing themselves up, snap and strike at an
+intruder with their beaks. Other fledglings simply shrink down in the
+nest or squat 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 approaches 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 corning 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 wild 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 what may be seen in nestling birds, n very young, and
+before their education has begun, if quietly approached and touched,
+they open their bills and take food as readily from a man as from the
+parent bird. But if while being thus fed the parent returns and emits
+the warning note, they instantly cease their hunger-cries, close their
+gaping mouths, and crouch down frightened in the nest. This fear caused
+by the parent bird's warning note begins to manifest itself even before
+the young are hatched--and my observations on this point refer to
+several species in three widely separated orders. When the little
+prisoner is hammering at its shell, and uttering its feeble _peep,_ as
+if begging to be let out, if the warning note is uttered, even at a
+considerable distance, the strokes and complaining instantly cease, and
+the chick will then remain quiescent in the shell for a long time, or
+until the parent, by a changed note, conveys to it an intimation that
+the danger is over. Another proof that the nestling has absolutely no
+instinctive knowledge of particular enemies, but is taught to fear them
+by the parents, is to be found in the striking contrast between the
+habits of parasitical and genuine young in the nest, and after they have
+left it, while still unable to find their own food. I have had no
+opportunities of observing the habits of the young cuckoo in England
+with regard to this point, and do not know whether other observers have
+paid any attention to the matter or not, but I am very familiar with the
+manners of the parasitical starling or cow-bird of South America. The
+warning cries of the foster parent have no effect on the young cow-bird
+at any time. Until they are able to fly they will readily devour worms
+from the hand of a man, even when the old birds are hovering close by
+and screaming their danger notes, and while their own young, if the
+parasite has allowed any to survive in the nest, are crouching down in
+the greatest fear. After the cow-bird has left the nest it is still
+stupidly tame, and more than once I have seen one carried off from its
+elevated perch by a milvago hawk, when, if it had understood the warning
+cry of the foster parent, it would have dropped down into the bush or
+grass and escaped. But as soon as the young cow-birds are able to shift
+for themselves, and begin to associate with their own kind, their habits
+change, and they become suspicious and wild like other birds.
+
+On this point--the later period at which the parasitical young bird
+acquires fear of man--and also bearing on the whole subject under
+discussion, I shall add here some observations I once made on a dove
+hatched and reared by a pigeon at my home on the pampas. A very large
+ombu tree grew not far from the dove-cote, and some of the pigeons used
+to make their nests on the lower horizontal branches. One summer a dove
+of the most common species, Zenaida maculata, in size a third less than
+the domestic pigeon, chanced to drop an egg in one of these nests, and a
+young dove was hatched and reared; and, in due time, when able to fly,
+it was brought to the dove-cote. I watched it a great deal, and it was
+evident that this foster-young, though' with the pigeons, was not nor
+ever would be of them, for it could not take kiudly to their flippant
+flirty ways. Whenever a male approached it, and with guttural noises and
+strange gestures made a pompous declaration of amorous feelings, the
+dove would strike vigorously at its undesirable lover, and drive him
+off, big as he was; and, as a rule, it would sit apart, afoot or so,
+from the others. The dove was also a male; but its male companions, with
+instinct tainted by domestication, were ignorant alike of its sex and
+different species. Now, it chanced that my pigeons, never being fed and
+always finding their own living on the plain like wild birds, were,
+although still domestic, not nearly so tame as pigeons usually are in
+England. They would not allow a person to approach within two or three
+yards of them without flying, and if grain was thrown to them they would
+come to it very suspiciously, or not at all. And, of course, the young
+pigeons always acquired the exact degree of suspicion shown by the
+adults as soon as they were able to fly and consort with the others. But
+the foundling Zenaida did not know what their startled gestures and
+notes of fear meant when a person approached too near, and as he saw
+none of his own kind, he did not acquire their suspicious habit. On the
+contrary, he was perfectly tame, although by parentage a wild bird, and
+showed no more fear of a man than of a horse. Throughout the winter it
+remained with the pigeons, going afield every day with them, and
+returning to the dove-cote; but as spring approached the slight tie
+which united him to them began to be loosened; their company grew less
+and less congenial, and he began to lead a solitary life. But he did not
+go to the trees yet. He came to the house, and his favourite perch was
+on the low overhanging roof of a vine-covered porch, just over the main
+entrance. Here he would pass several hours every day, taking no notice
+of the people passing in and out at all times; and when the weather grew
+warm he would swell out his breast and coo mournfully by the hour for
+our pleasure.
+
+We can, no doubt, learn best by observing the behaviour of nestlings and
+young birds; nevertheless, I find much even in the confirmed habits of
+adults to strengthen me in the belief that fear of particular enemies is
+in nearly all cases--for I will not say all--the result of experience
+and tradition.
+
+Hawks are the most open, violent, and persistent enemies birds have; and
+it is really wonderful to see how well the persecuted kinds appear to
+know the power for mischief possessed by different raptorial species,
+and how exactly the amount of alarm exhibited is in proportion to the
+extent of the danger to be apprehended. Some raptors never attack birds,
+others only occasionally; still others prey only on the young and
+feeble; and, speaking of La Plata district, where I have observed hawks,
+from the milvago chimango--chiefly a carrion-eater--to the destructive
+peregrine falcon, there is a very great variety of predatory habits, and
+all degrees of courage to be found; yet all these raptors are treated
+differently by species liable to be preyed on, and have just as much
+respect paid them as their strength and daring entitles them to, and no
+more, So much discrimination must seem almost incredible to those who
+are not very familiar with the manners of wild birds; I do not think it
+could exist if the fear shown resulted from instinct or inherited habit.
+There would be no end to the blunders of such an instinct as that; and
+in regions where hawks are extremely abundant most of the birds would bo
+in a constant state of trepidation. On the pampas the appearance of the
+comparatively harmless chimango excites not the least alarm among small
+birds, yet at a distance it closely resembles a henharrier, and it also
+readily attacks young, sick, and wounded birds; all others know how
+little they have to fear from it. When it appears unexpectedly,
+sweeping over a hedge or grove with a rapid flight, it is sometimes
+mistaken for a more dangerous species; there is then a little flutter of
+alarm, some birds springing into the air, but in two or three seconds of
+time they discover their mistake, and settle down quietly again, taking
+no further notice of the despised carrion-eater. On the other hand, I
+have frequently mistaken a harrier (Circus cinereus, in the brown state
+of plumage) for a chimango, and have only discovered my mistake by
+seeing the commotion among the small birds. The harrier I have
+mentioned, also the C. macropterus, feed partly on small birds, which
+they flush from the ground and strike down with their claws. When the
+harrier appears moving along with a loitering flight near the surface,
+it is everywhere attended by a little whirlwind of alarm, small birds
+screaming or chirping excitedly and diving into the grass or bushes; but
+the alarm does not spread far, and subsides as soon as the hawk has
+passed on its way. Buzzards (Buteo and Urubitinga) are much more feared,
+and create a more widespread alarm, and they ars certainly more
+destructive to birds than harriers. Another curious instance is that of
+the sociable hawk (Rostrhanrus sociabilis). This bird spends the summer
+and breeds in marshes in La Plata, and birds pay no attention to it, for
+it feeds exclusively on water-snails (Ampullaria). But when it visits
+woods and plantations to roost, during migration, its appearance creates
+as much alarm as that of a true buzzard, which it closely resembles.
+Wood-birds, unaccustomed to see it, do not know its peculiar preying
+habits, and how little they need fear its presence. I may also mention
+that the birds of La Plata seem to fear the kite-like Elanus less than
+other hawks, and I believe that its singular resemblance to the common
+gull of the district in its size, snowy-white plumage and manner of
+flight, has a deceptive effect on most species, and makes them so little
+suspicious of it,
+
+The wide-ranging peregrine falcon is a common species in La Plata,
+although, oddly enough, not included in any notice of the avifauna of
+that region before 1888. The consternation caused among birds by its
+appearance is vastly greater than that produced by any of the raptors I
+have mentioned: and it is unquestionably very much more destructive to
+birds, since it preys exclusively on them, and, as a rule, merely picks
+the flesh from the head and neck, and leaves the untouched body to its
+jackal, the carrion-hawk. When the peregrine appears speeding through
+the air in a straight line at a great height, the feathered world, as
+far as one able to see, is thrown into the greatest commo-tion, all
+birds, from the smallest up to species large as duck, ibis, and curlew,
+rushing about in the air as if distracted. When the falcon has
+disappeared in the sky, and the wave of terror attending its progress
+subsides behind it, the birds still continue wild and excited for some
+time, showing how deeply they have been moved; for, as a rule, fear is
+exceedingly transitory in its effects on animals,
+
+I must, before concluding this part of my subject, mention another
+raptor, also a true falcon, but differing from the peregrine in being
+exclusively a marsh-hawk. In size it is nearly a third less than the
+male peregrine, which it resembles in its sharp wings and manner of
+flight, but its flight is much more rapid. The whole plumage, is
+uniformly of a dark grey colour. Unfortunately, though I have observed
+it not fewer than a hundred times, I have never been able to procure a
+specimen, nor do I find that it is like any American falcon already
+described; so that for the present it must remain nameless. Judging
+solely from the effect produced by the appearance of this hawk, it must
+be even more daring and destructive than its larger relation, the
+peregrine. It flies at a great height, and sometimes descends vertically
+and with extraordinary velocity, the wings producing a sound like a
+deep-toned horn. The sound is doubtless produced at will, and is
+certainly less advantageous to the hawk than to the birds it pursues. No
+doubt it can afford to despise the wing-power of its quarry; and I have
+sometimes thought that it takes a tyrannous delight in witnessing the
+consternation caused by its hollow trumpeting sound. This may be only a
+fancy, but some hawks do certainly take pleasure in pursuing and
+striking birds when not seeking prey. The peregrine has been observed,
+Baird says, capturing birds, only to kill and drop them. Many of the
+Felidae, we know, evince a similar habit; only these prolong their
+pleasure by practising a more refined and deliberate cruelty.
+
+The sudden appearance overhead of this hawk produces an effect wonderful
+to witness. I have frequently seen all the inhabitants of a marsh struck
+with panic, acting as if demented, and suddenly grown careless to all
+other dangers; and on such occasions I have looked up confident of
+seeing the sharp-winged death, suspended above them in the sky. All
+birds that happen to be on the wing drop down as if shot into the reeds
+or water; ducks away from the margin stretch out their necks
+horizontally and drag their bodies, as if wounded, into closer cover;
+not one bird is found bold enough to rise up and wheel about the
+marauder--a usual proceeding in the case of other hawks; while, at every
+sudden stoop the falcon makes, threatening to dash down on his prey, a
+low cry of terror rises from the birds beneath; a sound expressive of an
+emotion so contagious that it quickly runs like a murmur all over the
+marsh, as if a gust of wind had swept moaning through, the rushes. As
+long as the falcon hangs overhead, always at a height of about forty
+yards, threatening at intervals to dash down, this murmuring sound, made
+up of many hundreds of individual cries, is heard swelling and dying
+away, and occasionally, when he drops lower than usual, rising to a
+sharp scream of terror.
+
+Sometimes when I have been riding over marshy ground, one of these hawks
+has placed himself directly over my head, within fifteen or twenty yards
+of me; and it has perhaps acquired the habit of following a horseman in
+this way in order to strike at any birds driven up. On one occasion my
+horse almost trod on a couple of snipe squatting terrified in the short
+grass. The instant they rose the hawk struck at one, the end of his wing
+violently smiting my cheek as he stooped, and striking at the snipe on a
+level with the knees of my horse. The snipe escaped by diving under the
+bridle, and immediately dropped down on the other side of me, and the
+hawk, rising up, flew away.
+
+To return. I think I am justified in believing that fear of hawks, like
+fear of men, is, in very nearly all cases, the result of experience and
+tradition. Nevertheless, I think it probable that in some species which
+have always lived in the open, continually exposed to attack, and which
+are preferred as food by raptors, such as duck, snipe, and plover, the
+fear of the falcon may be an inherited habit. Among passerine birds I am
+also inclined to think that swallows show inherited fear of hawks.
+Swallows and humming-birds have least to fear from raptors; yet, while
+humming-birds readily pursue and tease hawks, thinking as little of them
+as of pigeons or herons, swallows everywhere manifest the greatest
+terror at the approach of a true falcon; and they also fear other birds
+of prey, though in a much less degree. It has been said that the
+European hobby occasionally catches swal-lows on the wing, but this
+seems a rare and exceptional habit, and in South America I have never
+seen any bird of prey attempt the pursuit of a swallow. The question
+then arises, how did this unnecessary fear, so universal in swallows,
+originate? Can it be a survival of a far past--a time when some
+wide-ranging small falcon, aerial in habits as the swallow itself,
+preyed by preference on hirundines only ?
+
+[NOTE.-Herbert Spencer, who accepts Darwin's inference, explains how the
+fear of man, acquired by experience, becomes instinctive in birds, in
+the following passage: "It is well known that in newly-discovered lands
+not inhabited by man, birds are so devoid of fear as to allow themselves
+to be knocked over with sticks; but that, in the course of generations,
+they acquire such a dread of man as to fly on his approach: and that
+this dread is manifested by young as well as by old. Now unless this
+change be ascribed to the killing-off of the least fearful, and the
+preservation and multiplication of the most fearful which, considering
+the comparatively small number killed by man, is an inadequate cause, it
+must be ascribed to accumulated experience; and each experience must be
+held to have a share in producing it. We must conclude that in each bird
+that escapes with injuries inflicted by man, or is alarmed by the
+outcries of other members of the flock (gregarious creatures of any
+intelligence being necessarily more or less sympathetic), there is
+established an association of ideas between the human aspect and the
+pains, direct and in-direct, suffered from human agency. And we must
+further con-clude, that the state of consciousness which compels the
+bird to take flight, is at first nothing more than an ideal reproduction
+of those painful impressions which before followed man's approach; that
+such ideal reproduction becomes more vivid and more massive as the
+painful experiences, direct or sympathetic, increase; and that thus the
+emotion, in its incipient state, is nothing else than an aggregation of
+the revived pains before experience.
+
+"As, in the course of generations, the young birds of this race begin to
+display a fear of man before yet they have been injured by him, it is an
+unavoidable inference that the nervous system of the race has been
+organically modified by these experiences, we have no choice but to
+conclude, that when a young bird is led to fly, it is because the
+impression produced in its senses by the approaching man entails,
+through an incipiently reflex action, a partial excitement of all those
+nerves which in its ancestors had been excited under the like
+conditions; that this partial excitement has its accompanying painful
+consciousness, and that the vague painful consciousness thus arising
+constitutes emotion proper--_emotion undecomposable into specific
+experiences, and, therefore, seemingly homogeneous"_ (Essays, vol. i. p.
+320.)]
+
+It is comforting to know that the "unavoidable inference" is, after all,
+erroneous, and that the nervous system in birds has not yet been
+organically altered as a result of man's persecution; for in that case
+it would take long to undo the mischief, and we should be indeed far
+from that "better friendship" with the children of the air which many of
+us would like to see.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS.
+
+
+Under this heading I have put together several notes from my journals on
+subjects which have no connection with each other, except that they
+relate chiefly to the parental instincts of some animals I have
+observed, and to the instincts of the young at a very early period of
+life.
+
+While taking bats one day in December, I captured a female of our common
+Buenos Ayrean species (Molossus bonariensis), with her two young
+attached to her, so large that it seemed incredible she should be able
+to fly and take insects with such a weight to drag her down. The young
+were about a third less in size than the mother, so that she had to
+carry a weight greatly exceeding that of her own body. They were
+fastened to her breast and belly, one on each side, as when first born;
+and, possibly, the young bat does not change its position, or move, like
+the young developed opossum, to other parts of the body, until mature
+enough to begin an independent life. On forcibly separating them from
+their parent, I found that they were not yet able to fly, but when set
+free fluttered feebly to the ground. This bat certainly appeared more
+burdened with its young than any animal I had ever observed. I have seen
+an old female opossum (Didelphys azarae) with eleven young, large as old
+rats--the mother being less than a cat in size--all clinging to various
+parts of her body; yet able to climb swiftly and with the greatest
+agility in the higher branches of a tree. The actual weight was in this
+case relatively much greater than in that of the female bat: but then
+the opossum never quitted its hold on the tree, and it also supplemented
+its hand-like feet, furnished with crooked claws, with its teeth and
+long prehensile tail. The poor bat had to seek its living in the empty
+air, pursuing its prey with the swiftness of a swallow, and it seemed
+wonderful to me that she should have been able to carry about that great
+burden with her one pair of wings, and withal to be active enough to
+supply herself and her young with food.
+
+In the end I released her, and saw her fly away and disappear among the
+trees, after which I put back the two young bats in the place I had
+taken them from, among the thick-clustering foliage of a small acacia
+tree. When set free they began to work their way upwards through the
+leaves and slender twigs in the most adroit manner, catching a twig with
+their teeth, then embracing a whole cluster of leaves with their wings,
+just as a person would take up a quantity of loose clothes and hold them
+tight by pressing them against the chest. The body would then emerge
+above the clasped leaves, and a higher twig would be caught by the
+teeth; and so on successively, until they had got as high as they
+wished, when they proceeded to hook themselves to a twig and assume the
+inverted position side by side; after which, one drew in its head and
+went to sleep, while the other began licking the end of its wing, where
+my finger and thumb had pressed the delicate membrane. Later in the day
+I attempted to feed them with small insects, but they rejected my
+friendly attentions in the most unmistakable manner, snapping viciously
+at me every time I approached them. In the evening, I stationed myself
+close to the tree, and presently had the satisfaction of seeing the
+mother return, flying straight to the spot where I had taken her, and in
+a few moments she was away again and over the trees with her twins.
+
+Assuming that these two young bats had, before I found them, existed
+like parasites clinging to the parent, their adroit actions when
+liberated, and their angry demonstrations at my approach, were very
+astonishing; for in all other mammals born in a perfectly helpless
+state, like rodents, weasels, edentates, and even marsupials, the
+instincts of self-preservation are gradually developed after the period
+of activity begins, when the mother leads them out, and they play with
+her and Avith each other. In the bat the instincts must ripen to
+perfection without exercise or training, and while the animal exists as
+passively as a fruit on its stem.
+
+I have observed that the helpless young of some of the mammals I have
+just mentioned seem at first to have no instinctive understanding of the
+language of alarm and fear in the parent, as all young-birds have, even
+before their eyes are open. Nor is it necessary that they should have
+such an instinct, since, in most cases, they are well concealed in
+kennels or other safe places; but when, through some accident, they are
+exposed, the want of such an instinct makes the task of protecting them
+doubly hard for the parent. I once surprised a weasel (Galictis barbara)
+in the act of removing her young, or conducting them, rather; and when
+she was forced to quit them, although still keeping close by, and
+uttering the most piercing cries of anger and solicitude, the young
+continued piteously crying out in their shrill voices and moving about
+in circles, without making the slightest attempt to escape, or to
+conceal themselves, as young birds do.
+
+Some field mice breed on the surface of the ground in ill-constructed
+nests, and their young are certainly the most helpless things in nature.
+It is possible that where this dangerous habit exists, the parent has
+some admirable complex instincts to safeguard her young, in addition to
+the ordinary instincts of most animals of this kind. This idea was
+suggested to me by the action of a female mouse which I witnessed by
+chance. While walking in a field of stubble one day in autumn, near
+Buenos Ayres, I suddenly heard, issuing from near my feet, a chorus of
+shrill squealing voices--the familiar excessively sharp little needles
+of sound emitted by young, blind and naked mice, when they are disturbed
+or in pain. Looking down, I saw close to my foot a nest of them--there
+were nine in all, wriggling about and squealing; for the parent,
+frightened at my step, had just sprung from them, overturning in her
+hurry to escape the slight loosely-felted dome of fine grass and
+thistledown which had covered them. I saw her running away, but after
+going six or seven yards she stopped, and, turning partly round so as to
+watch me, waited in fear and trembling. I remained perfectly
+motionless--a sure way to allay fear and suspicion in any wild
+creature,--and in a few moments she returned, but with the utmost
+caution, frequently pausing to start and tremble, and masking her
+approach with corn stumps and little inequalities in the surface of the
+ground, until, reaching the nest, she took one of the young in her
+mouth, and ran rapidly away to a distance of eight or nine yards and
+concealed it in a tuft of dry grass.
+
+Leaving it, she returned a second time, in the same cautious manner, and
+taking another, ran with it to the same spot, and concealed it along
+with the first. It was curious that the first young mouse had continued
+squealing after being hidden by the mother, for I could hear it
+distinctly, the air being very still, but when the second mouse had been
+placed with it, the squealing ceased. A third time the old mouse came,
+and then instead of going to the same spot, as I had expected, she ran
+off in an opposite direction and disappeared among the dry weeds; a
+fourth was carried to the same place as the third; and in this way they
+were all removed to a distance of some yards from the nest, and placed
+in couples, until the last and odd one remained. In due time she came
+for it, and ran away with it in a new direction, and was soon out of
+sight; and although I waited fully ten minutes, she did not return; nor
+could I afterwards find any of the young mice when I looked for them, or
+even hear them squeal.
+
+I have frequently observed newly-born lambs on the pampas, and have
+never failed to be surprised at the extreme imbecility they display in
+their actions; although this may be due partly to inherited degeneracy
+caused by domestication. This imbecile condition continues for two,
+sometimes for three days, during which time the lamb apparently acts
+purely from instincts, which are far from perfect; but after that,
+experience and its dam teach it a better way. When born its first
+impulse is to struggle up on to its feet; its second to suck, but here
+it does not discriminate like the newly-hatched bird that picks up its
+proper food, or it does not know what to suck. It will take into its
+mouth whatever comes near, in most cases a tuft of wool on its dam's
+neck; and at this it will continue sucking for an indefinite time. It is
+highly probable that the strong-smelling secretion of the sheep's udder
+attracts the lamb at length to that part; and that without something of
+the kind to guide it, in many cases it would actually starve without
+finding the teats. I have often seen lambs many hours after birth still
+confining their attention to the most accessible locks of wool on the
+neck or fore legs of the dams, and believe that in such cases the long
+time it took them to find the source of nourishment arose from a
+defective sense of smell. Its next important instinct, which comes into
+play from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels it to follow after
+any object receding from it, and, on the other hand, to run from
+anything approaching it. If the dam turns round and approaches it from
+even a very short distance, it will start back and run from her in fear,
+and will not understand her voice when she bleats to it: at the same
+time it will confidently follow after a man, dog, horse, or any other
+animal moving from it. A very common experience on the pampas, in the
+sheep-country, is to see a lamb start up from sleep and follow the
+rider, running along close to the heels of the horse. This is
+distressing to a merciful man, tor he cannot shake the little simpleton
+off, and if he rides on, no matter how fast, it will keep up him, or
+keep him in sight, for half a mile or a mile, and never recover its dam.
+The gaucho, who is not merciful, frequently saves himself all trouble
+and delay by knocking it senseless with a blow of his whip-handle, and
+without checking his horse. I have seen a lamb, about two days old,
+start up from sleep, and immediately start off in pursuit of a puff ball
+about as big as a man's head, carried past it over the smooth turf by
+the wind, and chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until the
+dry ball was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse grass. This
+blundering instiuct is quickly laid aside when the lamb has learned to
+distinguish its dam from other objects, and its dam's voice from other
+sounds. When four or five days old it will start from sleep, but instead
+of rushing blindly away after any receding object, it first looks about
+it, and will then recognize and run to its dam.
+
+I have often been struck with the superiority of the pampa or
+creolla--the old native breed of sheep--in the greater vigour of the
+young when born over the improved European varieties. The pampa descends
+to us from the first sheep introduced into La Plata about three
+centuries ago, and is a tall, gaunt bony animal, with lean dry flesh,
+like venison, and long straight wool, like goats' hair. In their
+struggle for existence in a country subject to sudden great changes of
+temperature, to drought, and failure of grass, they have in a great
+measure lost the qualities which make the sheep valuable to man as a
+food and wool-producing animal; but on the other hand they have to some
+extent recovered the vigour of a wild animal, being hardy enough to
+exist without any shelter, and requiring from their master man only
+protection from the larger carnivores. They are keen-scented, swift of
+foot and Wonderfully active, and thrive where other breeds would quickly
+starve. I have often seen a lamb dropped on the frosty ground in
+bitterly cold windy weather in midwinter, and in less than five seconds
+struggle to its feet, and seem as vigorous as any day-old lamb of other
+breeds. The dam, impatient at the short delay, and not waiting to give
+it suck, has then started off at a brisk trot after the flock, scattered
+and galloping before the wind like huanacos rather than sheep, with the
+lamb, scarcely a minute in the world, running freely at her side.
+Notwithstanding its great vigour it has been proved that the pampa sheep
+has not so far outgrown the domestic taint as to be able to maintain its
+own existence when left entirely to itself. During the first half of
+this century, when cattle-breeding began to be profitable, and wool was
+not worth the trouble of shearing, and the gaucho workman would not eat
+mutton when beef was to be had, some of the estancieros on the southern
+pampas determined to get rid of their sheep, which were of no value to
+them; and many flocks were driven a distance out and lost in the wilds.
+Out of many thousands thus turned loose to shift for themselves, not one
+pair survived to propagate a new race of feral sheep; in a short time
+pumas, wild dogs, and other beasts of prey, had destroyed them all. The
+sterling qualities of the pampa sheep had their value in other times; at
+present the improved kinds are alone considered worth having, and the
+original sheep of the country is now rapidly disappearing, though still
+found in remote and poor districts, especially in the province of
+Cordova; and probably before long it will become extinct, together with
+the curious pug-nosed cow of the pampas.
+
+I have had frequent opportunities of observing the young, from one to
+three days old, of the Cervus campestris--the common deer of the pampas,
+and the perfection of its instincts at that tender age seem very
+wonderful in a ruminant. When the doe with, fawn is approached by a
+horseman, even when accompanied with dogs, she stands perfectly
+motionless, gazing fixedly at the enemy, the fawn motionless at her
+side; and suddenly, as if at a preconcerted signal, the fawn rushes
+directly away from her at its utmost speed; and going to a distance of
+six hundred to a thousand yards conceals itself in a hollow in the
+ground or among the long grass, lying down very close with neck
+stretched out horizontally, and will thus remain until sought by the
+dam. When very young if found in its hiding-place it will allow itself
+to be taken, making no further effort to escape. After the fawn has run
+away the doe still maintains her statuesque attitude, as if resolved to
+await the onset, and only when the dogs are close to her she also rushes
+away, but invariably in a direction as nearly opposite to that taken by
+the fawn as possible. At first she runs slowly, with a limping gait, and
+frequently pausing, as if to entice her enemies on, like a partridge,
+duck or plover when driven from its young; but as they begin to press
+her more closely her speed increases, becoming greater the further she
+succeeds in leading them from the starting-point.
+
+The alarm-cry of this deer is a peculiar whistling bark, a low but
+far-reaching sound; but when approaching a doe with young I have never
+been able to hear it, nor have I seen any movement on the part of the
+doe. Yet it is clear that in some mysterious way she inspires the fawn
+with sudden violent fear; while the fawn, on its side, instead of being
+affected like the young in other mammals, and sticking closer to its
+mother, acts in a contrary way, and runs from her.
+
+Of the birds I am acquainted with, the beautiful jacana (Parra jacana)
+appears to come into the world with its faculties and powers in the most
+advanced state. It is, in fact, ready to begin active life from the very
+moment of leaving the shell, as I once accidentally observed. I found a
+nest on a small mound of earth in a shallow lagoon, containing four
+eggs, with the shells already chipped by the birds in them. Two yards
+from the small nest mound there was a second mound covered with coarse
+grass. I got off my horse to examine the nest, and the old birds,
+excited beyond measure, fluttered round me close by pouring out their
+shrill rapidly-reiterated cries in an unbroken stream, sounding very
+much like a policeman's rattle. While I was looking closely at one of
+the eggs lying on the palm of my hand, all at once the cracked shell
+parted, and at the same moment the young bird leaped from my hand and
+fell into the water. I am quite sure that the young bird's sudden escape
+from the shell and my hand was the result of a violent effort on its
+part to free itself; and it was doubtless inspired to make the effort by
+the loud persistent screaming of the parent birds, which it heard while
+in the shell. Stooping to pick it up to save it from perishing, I soon
+saw that my assistance was not required, for immediately on dropping
+into the water, it put out its neck, and with the body nearly submerged,
+like a wounded duck trying to escape observation, it swam rapidly to the
+second small mound I have mentioned, and, escaping from the water,
+concealed itself in the grass, lying close and perfectly motionless like
+a young plover.
+
+In the case of the pampa or creolla sheep, I have shown that during its
+long, rough life in La Plata, this variety has in some measure recovered
+the natural vigour and ability to maintain existence in adverse
+circumstances of its wild ancestors. As much can be said of the creolla
+fowl of the pampas; and some observations of mine on the habits of this
+variety will perhaps serve to throw light on a vexed question of Natural
+History--namely, the cackling of the hen after laying, an instinct which
+has been described as "useless" and "disadvantageous." In fowls that
+live unconfined, and which are allowed to lay where they like, the
+instinct, as we know it, is certainly detrimental, since egg-eating dogs
+and pigs soon learn the cause of the outcry, and acquire a habit of
+rushing off to find the egg when they hear it. The question then arises:
+Does the wild jungle fowl possess the same pernicious instinct?
+
+The creolla is no doubt the descendant of the fowl originally introduced
+about three centuries ago by the first colonists in La Plata, and has
+probably not only been uncrossed with any other improved variety, such
+as are now fast taking its place, and has lived a much freer life than
+is usual with the fowl in Europe. It is a rather small, lean, extremely
+active bird, lays about a dozen eggs, and hatches them all, and is of a
+yellowish red colour--a hue which is common, I believe, in the old
+barn-door fowl of England. The creolla fowl is strong on the wing, and
+much more carnivorous and rapacious in habits than other breeds; mice,
+frogs, and small snakes are eagerly hunted and devoured by it. At my
+home on the pampas a number of these fowls were kept, and were allowed
+to range freely about the plantation, which was large, and the adjacent
+grounds, where there were thickets of giant cardoon thistle, red-weed,
+thorn apple, &c. They always nested at a distance from the house, and it
+was almost impossible ever to find their eggs, on account of the extreme
+circumspection they observed in going to and from their nests; and when
+they succeeded in escaping foxes, skunks, weasels, and opossums, which,
+strange to say, they often did, they would rear their chickens away out
+of sight and hearing of the house, and only bring them home when winter
+deprived them of their leafy covering and made food scarce. During the
+summer, in my rambles about the plantation, T would occasionally
+surprise one of these half-wild hens with her brood; her distracted
+screams and motions would then cause her chicks to scatter and vanish in
+all directions, and, until the supposed danger was past, they would lie
+as close and well-concealed as young partridges. These fowls in summer
+always lived in small parties, each party composed of one cock and as
+many hens as he could collect--usually three or four. Each family
+occupied its own feeding ground, where it would pass a greater portion
+of each day. The hen would nest at a considerable distance from the
+feeding ground, sometimes as far as four or five hundred yards away.
+After laying an egg she would quit the nest, not walking from it as
+other fowls do, but flying, the flight extending to a distance of from
+fifteen to about fifty yards; after which, still keeping silence, she
+would walk or run, until, arrived at the feeding ground, she would begin
+to cackle. At once the cock, if within hearing, would utter a responsive
+cackle, whereupon she would run to him and cackle no more. Frequently
+the cackling call-note would not be uttered more than two or three
+times, sometimes only once, and in a much lower tone than in fowls of
+other breeds.
+
+If we may assume that these fowls, in their long, semi-independent
+existence in La Plata, have reverted to the original instincts of the
+wild Gallus bankiva, we can see here how advantageous the cackling
+instinct must be in enabling the hen in dense tropical jungles to rejoin
+the flock after laying an egg. If there are egg-eating animals in the
+jungle intelligent enough to discover the meaning of such a short,
+subdued cackling call, they would still be unable to find the nest by
+going back on the bird's scent, since she flies from the nest in the
+first place; and the wild bird probably flies further than the creolla
+hen of La Plata. The clamorous cackling of our fowls would appear then
+to be nothing more than a perversion of a very useful instinct.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE MEPHITIC SKUNK.
+
+
+It might possibly give the reader some faint conception of the odious
+character of this creature (for adjectives are weak to describo it) when
+I say that, in talking to strangers from abroad, I have never thought it
+necessary to speak of sunstroke, jaguars, or the assassin's knife, but
+have never omitted to warn them of the skunk, minutely describing its
+habits and personal appearance.
+
+I knew an Englishman who, on taking a first gallop across the pampas,
+saw one, and, quickly dismounting, hurled himself bodily on to it to
+effect its capture. Poor man! he did not know that the little animal is
+never unwilling to be caught. Men have been blinded for ever by a
+discharge of the fiery liquid full in their faces. On a mucous membrane
+it burns like sulphuric acid, say the unfortunates who have had the
+experience. How does nature protect the skunk itself from the injurious
+effects of its potent fluid? I have not unfrequently found individuals
+stone-blind, sometimes moving so briskly about that the blindness must
+have been of long standing--very possibly in some cases an accidental
+drop discharged by the animal itself has caused the loss of sight. When
+coming to close quarters with a skunk, by covering up the face, one's
+clothes only are ruined. But this is not all one has to fear from an
+encounter; the worst is that effluvium, after which crushed garlic is
+lavender, which tortures the olfactory nerves, and appears to pervade
+the whole system like a pestilent ether, nauseating one until
+sea-sickness seems almost a pleasant sensation in comparison.
+
+To those who know the skunk only from reputation, my words might seem
+too strong; many, however, who have come to close quarters with the
+little animal will think them ridiculously weak. And consider what must
+the feelings be of one who has had the following experience--not an
+uncommon experience on the pampas. There is to be a dance at a
+neighbouring house a few miles away; he has been looking forward to it,
+and, dressing himself with due care, mounts his horse and sets out full
+of joyous anticipations. It is a dark windy evening, but there is a
+convenient bridle-path through the dense thicket of giant thistles, and
+striking it he puts his horse into a swinging gallop. Unhappily the path
+is already occupied by a skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, in
+obedience to the promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get out
+of it, until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kicked
+football into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as high as
+his knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider, after coming out
+into the open, dismounts and walks away twenty yards from his animal,
+and literally _smells_ himself all over, and with a feeling of profound
+relief pronounces himself Not the minutest drop of the diabolical spray
+has touched his dancing shoes! Springing into the saddle he proceeds to
+his journey's end, is warmly welcomed by his host, and speedily
+forgetting his slight misadventure, mingles with a happy crowd of
+friends. In a little while people begin exchanging whispers and
+significant glances; men are seen smiling at nothing in particular; the
+hostess wears a clouded face; the ladies cough and put their scented
+handkerchiefs to their noses, and presently they begin to feel faint and
+retire from the room. Our hero begins to notice that there is something
+wrong, and presently discovers its cause; he, unhappily, has been the
+last person in the room to remark that familiar but most abominable
+odour, rising like a deadly exhalation from the floor, conquering all
+other odours, and every moment becoming more powerful. A drop _has_
+touched his shoe after all; and fearing to be found out, and edging
+towards the door, he makes his escape, and is speedily riding home
+again; knowing full well that his sudden and early departure from the
+scene will be quickly discovered and set down to the right cause.
+
+In that not always trustworthy book _The Natural History of Chili,_
+Molina tells us how they deal with the animal in the trans-Andine
+regions. "When one appears," he says, "some of the company begiu by
+caressing it, until an opportunity offers for one of them to seize it by
+the tail. In this position the muscles become contracted, the animal is
+unable to eject its fluid, and is quickly despatched." One might just as
+well talk of caressing a cobra de capello; yet this laughable fiction
+finds believers all over South and North America. Professor Baird
+gravely introduces it into his great work on the mammalia. I was once
+talking about animals in a rancho, when a person present (an Argentine
+officer) told that, while visiting an Indian encampment, he had asked
+the savages how they contrived to kill skunks without making even a life
+in the desert intolerable. A grave old Cacique informed him that the
+secret was to go boldly up to the animal, take it by the tail, and
+despatch it; for, he said, when you fear it not at all, then it respects
+your courage and dies like a lamb--sweetly. The officer, continuing his
+story, said that on quitting the Indian camp he started a skunk, and,
+glad of an opportunity to test the truth of what he had heard,
+dismounted and proceeded to put the Indian plan in practice. Here the
+story abruptly ended, and when I eagerly demanded to hear the sequel,
+the amateur hunter of furs lit a cigarette and vacantly watched the
+ascending smoke. The Indians aro grave jokers, they seldom smile; and
+this old traditional skunk-joke, which has run the length of a
+continent, finding its way into many wise books, is their revenge on a
+superior race.
+
+I have shot a great many eagles, and occasionally a carancho (Polyborus
+tharus), with the plumage smelling strongly of skunk, which shows that
+these birds, pressed by hunger, often commit the fearful mistake of
+attacking the animal. My friend Mr. Ernest Gibson, of Buenos Ayres, in a
+communication to the _Ibis,_ describes an encounter he actually
+witnessed between a carancho and a skunk. Riding home one afternoon, he
+spied a skunk "shuffling along in the erratic manner usual to that
+odoriferous quadruped;" following it at a very short distance was an
+eagle-vulture, evidently bent on mischief. Every time the bird came near
+the bushy tail rose menacingly; then the carancho would fall behind,
+and, after a few moments' hesitation, follow on again. At length,
+growing bolder, it sprung forward, seizing the threatening tail with its
+claw, but immediately after "began staggering about with dishevelled
+plumage, tearful eyes, and a profoundly woe-begone expression on its
+vulture face. The skunk, after turning and regarding its victim with an
+I-told-you-so look for a few moments, trotted unconcernedly off."
+
+I was told in Patagonia by a man named Molinos, who was frequently
+employed by the Government as guide to expeditions in the desert, that
+everywhere throughout that country the skunk is abundant. Some years ago
+he was sent with two other men to find and treat with an Indian chief
+whose whereabouts were not known. Far in the interior Molinos was
+overtaken by a severe winter, his horses died of thirst and fatigue, and
+during the three bitterest months of the year he kept himself and his
+followers alive by eating the flesh of skunks, the only wild animal that
+never failed them. No doubt, on those vast sterile plains where the
+skunk abounds, and goes about by day and by night careless of enemies,
+the terrible nature of its defensive weapon is the first lesson
+experience teaches to every young eagle, fox, wild cat, and puma.
+
+Dogs kill skunks when made to do so, but it is not a sport they delight
+in. One moonlight night, at home, I went out to where the dogs, twelve
+in number, were sleeping: while I stood there a skunk appeared and
+deliberately came towards me, passing through the dogs where they lay,
+and one by one as he passed them they rose up, and, with their tails
+between their legs, skulked off. When made to kill skunks often they
+become seasoned; but always perform the loathsome task expeditiously,
+then rush away with frothing mouths to rub their faces in the wet clay
+and rid themselves of the fiery sensation. At one time I possessed only
+one dog that could be made to face a skunk, and as the little robbers
+were very plentiful, and continually coining about the house in their
+usual open, bold way, it was rather hard for the poor brute. This dog
+detested them quite as strongly as the others, only he was more
+obedient, faithful, and brave. Whenever I bade him attack one of them
+he would come close up to me and look up into my face with piteous
+pleading eyes, then, finding that he was not to be let off from the
+repulsive task, he would charge upon the doomed animal with a blind fury
+wonderful to see. Seizing it between his teeth, he would shake it madly,
+crushing its bones, then hurl it several feet from him, only to rush
+again and again upon it to repeat the operation, doubtless with a
+Caligula-like wish in his frantic breast that all the skunks on the
+globe had but one backbone.
+
+I was once on a visit to a sheep-farming brother, far away on the
+southern frontier of Buenos Ayres, and amongst the dogs I found there
+was one most interesting creature, He was a great, lumbering, stupid,
+good-tempered brute, so greedy that when you offered him a piece of meat
+he would swallow half your arm, and so obedient that at a word he would
+dash himself against the horns of a bull, and face death and danger in
+any shape. But, my brother told me, he would not face a skunk--he would
+die first. One day I took him out and found a skunk, and for upwards of
+half an hour I sat on my horse vainly cheering on my cowardly follower,
+and urging him to battle. The very sight of the enemy gave him a fit of
+the shivers; and when the irascible little enemy began to advance
+against us, going through the performance by means of which he generally
+puts his foes to flight without resorting to malodorous
+measures--stamping his little feet in rage, jumping up, spluttering and
+hissing and flourishing his brush like a warlike banner above his
+head--then hardly could I restrain my dog from turning tail and flying
+home in abject terror. My cruel persistence was rewarded at last.
+Continued shouts, cheers, and hand-clappings began to stir the brute to
+a kind of frenzy. Torn by conflicting emotions, he began to revolve
+about the skunk at a lumbering gallop, barking, howling, and bristling
+up his hair; and at last, shutting his eyes, and with a yell of
+desperation, he charged. I fully expected to see the enemy torn to
+pieces in a few seconds, but when the dog was still four or five feet
+from him the fatal discharge came, and he dropped down as if shot dead.
+For some time he lay on the earth perfectly motionless, watched and
+gently bedewed by the victorious skunk; then he got up and crept whining
+away. Gradually he quickened his pace, finally breaking into a frantic
+run. In vain I followed him, shouting at the top of my lungs; he stayed
+not to listen, and very speedily vanished from sight--a white speck on
+the vast level plain. At noon on the following day he made his
+appearance, gaunt and befouled with mud, staggering forward like a
+galvanized skeleton. Too worn out even to eat, he flung himself down,
+and for hours lay like a dead thing, sleeping off the effects of those
+few drops of perfume.
+
+Dogs, I concluded, like men, have their idiosyncrasies; but I had gained
+my point, and proved once more--if any proof were needed--the truth of
+that noble panegyric of Bacon's on our faithful servant and companion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS.
+
+
+There is in La Plata a large handsome grasshopper (Zoniopoda tarsata),
+the habits of which in its larva and imago stages are in strange
+contrast, like those in certain lepidoptera, in which the caterpillars
+form societies and act in concert. The adult has a greenish protective
+colouring, brown and green banded thighs, bright red hind wings, seen
+only during flight. It is solitary and excessively shy in its habits,
+living always in concealment among the dense foliage near the surface of
+the ground. The yonng are intensely black, like grasshoppers cut out of
+jet or ebony, and gregarious in habit, living in bands of forty or fifty
+to three or four hundred; and so little shy, that they may sometimes be
+taken up by handfuls before they begin to scatter in alarm. Their
+gregarious habits and blackness--of all hues in nature the most obvious
+to the sight--would alone be enough to make them the most conspicuous of
+insects; but they have still other habits which appear as if specially
+designed to bring them more prominently into notice. Thus, they all keep
+so close together at all times as to have their bodies actually
+touching, and when travelling, move so slowly that the laziest snail
+might easily overtake and pass one of their bands, and even disappear
+beyond their limited horizon in a very short time.
+
+They often select an exposed weed to feed on, clustering together on its
+summit above the surrounding verdure, an exceedingly conspicuous object
+to every eye in the neighbourhood. They also frequently change their
+feeding-ground; at such times they deliberately cross wide roads and
+other open spaces, barren of grass, where, moving so slowly that they
+scarcely seem to move at all, they look at a distance like a piece of
+black velvet lying on the ground. Thus in every imaginable way they
+expose themselves and invite attack; yet, in spite of it all, I have
+never detected birds preying on them, and I have sometimes kept one of
+these black societies under observation near my house for several days,
+watching them at intervals, in places where the trees overhead were the
+resort of Icterine and tyrant birds, Guira cuckoos, and other species,
+all great hunters after grasshoppers. A young grasshopper is, moreover,
+a morsel that seldom comes amiss to any bird, whether insect or seed
+eater; and, as a rule, it is extremely shy, nimble, and inconspicuous.
+It seems clear that, although the young Zoniopoda does not mimic in its
+form any black protected insect, it nevertheless owes its safety to its
+blackness, together with the habit it possesses of exposing itself in so
+open and bold a manner. Blackness is so common in large protected
+insects, as, for instance, in the un-palatable leaf-cutting ants,
+scorpions, mygale spiders, wasps, and other dangerous kinds, that it is
+manifestly a "warning colour," the most universal and best known in
+nature; and the grasshopper, I believe, furthermore mimics the fearless
+demeanour of the protected or venomous species, which birds and other
+insect-eaters know and respect. It might be supposed that the young
+Zoniopoda is itself unpalatable; but this is scarcely probable, for when
+the deceptive black mask is once dropped, the excessive shyness, love of
+concealment, and protective colouring of the insect show that it is much
+sought after by birds.
+
+While setting this down as an undoubted case of "mimicry," although it
+differs in some respects from all other cases I have seen reported, I
+cannot help remarking that this most useful word appears to be in some
+danger of losing the meaning originally attached to it in zoology. There
+are now very few cases of an accidental resemblance found between two
+species in nature which are not set down by someone to "mimicry," some
+in which even the wildest imagination might well fail to see any
+possible benefit to the supposed mimic. In cases where the outward
+resemblance of some feeble animal to a widely different and
+well-protected species, or to some object like a leaf or stick, and
+where such resemblance is manifestly advantageous and has reacted on and
+modified the life habits, it is conceivable that slight spontaneous
+variations in the structure and colouring of the unprotected species
+have been taken advantage of by the principle of natural selection, and
+a case of "mimicry" set up, to become more and more perfect in time, as
+successive casual variations in the same direction increased the
+resemblance.
+
+The stick-insect is perhaps the most perfect example where resemblance
+to an inanimate object has been the result aimed at, so to speak, by
+nature; the resemblance of the volucella fly to the humble-bee, on which
+it is parasitical, is the most familiar example of one species growing
+like another to its own advantage, since only by means of its deceptive
+likeness to the humble-bee is it able to penetrate into the nest with
+impunity. These two cases, with others of a similar character, were
+first called cases of "mimicry" by Kirby and Spence, in their
+ever-delightful _Introduction to Entomology--_an old book, but,
+curiously enough in these days of popular treatises on all matters of
+the kind, still the only general work on insects in the English language
+which one who is not an entomologist can read with pleasure.
+
+A second case of mimicry not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen in
+another grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa of
+Thun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and thorax
+chocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen steel-blue or
+purple, a colour I have not seen in any other insects of this family.
+The fore wings have a protective colouring; the hind wings are bright
+red. When at rest, with the red and purple tints concealed, it is only a
+very pretty grasshopper, but the instant it takes wing it becomes the
+fac-simile of a very common wasp of the genus Pepris. These wasps vary
+greatly in size, some being as large as the hornet; they are solitary,
+and feed on the honey of flowers and on fruit, and, besides being
+furnished with stings like other wasps--though their sting is nok so
+venomous as in other genera--they also, when angry, emit a most
+abominable odour, and are thus doubly protected against their enemies.
+Their excessive tameness, slow flight, and indolent motions serve to
+show that they are not accustomed to be interfered with. All these
+strong-smelling wasps have steel-blue or purple bodies, and bright red
+wings. So exactly does the Rhomalea grasshopper mimic the Pepris when
+flying, that I have been deceived scores of times. I have even seen it
+on the leaves, and, after it has flown and settled once more, I have
+gone to look at it again, to make sure that my eyes had not deceived me.
+It is curious to see how this resemblance has reacted on and modified
+the habits of the grasshopper. It is a great flyer, and far more aerial
+in its habits than any other insect I am acquainted with in this family,
+living always in trees, instead of on or near the surface of the ground.
+It is abundant in orchards and plantations round Buenos Ayres, where its
+long and peculiarly soft, breezy note may be heard all summer. If the
+ancient Athenians possessed so charming an insect as this, their great
+regard for the grasshopper was not strange: I only wish that the
+"Athenians of South America," as my fellow-townsmen sometimes call
+themselves in moments of exaltation, had a feeling of the samo kind--the
+regard which does _not_ impale its object on a pin--for the pretty
+light-hearted songster of their groves and gardens.
+
+When taken in the hand, it has the habit, common to most grasshoppers,
+of pouring out an inky fluid from its mouth; only the discharge is
+unusually copious in this species. It has another habit in defending
+itself which is very curious. When captured it instantly curls its body
+round, as a wasp does to sting. The suddenness of this action has more
+than once caused me to drop an insect I had taken, actually thinking for
+the moment that I had taken hold of a wasp. Whether birds would be
+deceived and made to drop it or not is a question it would not be easy
+to settle; but the instinct certainly looks like 'one of a series of
+small adaptations, all tending to make the resemblance to a wasp more
+complete and effective.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+DRAGON-FLY STORMS.
+
+
+One of the most curious things I have encountered in my observations on
+animal life relates to a habit of the larger species of dragon-flies
+inhabiting the Pampas and Patagonia. Dragon-flies are abundant
+throughout the country wherever there is water. There are several
+species, all more or less brilliantly coloured. The kinds that excited
+my wonder, from their habits, are twice as large as the common widely
+distributed insects, being three inches to four inches in length, and as
+a rule they are sober-coloured, although there is one species--the
+largest among them--entirely of a brilliant scarlet. This kind is,
+however, exceedingly rare. All the different kinds (of the large
+dragon-flies) when travelling associate together, and occasionally, in a
+flight composed of countless thousands, one of these brilliant-hued
+individuals will catch the eye, appearing as conspicuous among the
+others as a poppy or scarlet geranium growing alone in an otherwise
+flowerless field. The most common species--and in some cases the entire
+flight seems to be composed of this kind only--is the Aeschna
+bonariensis Raml, the prevailing colour of which is pale blue. But the
+really wonderful thing about them all alike is, that they appear only
+when flying before the southwest wind, called _pampero_--the wind that
+blows from the interior of the pampas. The pampero is a dry, cold wind,
+exceedingly violent. It bursts on the plains very suddenly, and usually
+lasts only a short time, sometimes not more than ten minutes; it comes
+irregularly, and at all seasons of the year, but is most frequent in the
+hot season, and after exceptionally sultry weather. It is in summer and
+autumn that the large dragon-flies appear; not _with_ the wind, but--and
+this is the most curious part of the matter--in advance of it; and
+inasmuch as these insects are not seen in the country at other times,
+and frequently appear in seasons of prolonged drought, when all the
+marshes and watercourses for many hundreds of miles are dry, they must
+of course traverse immense distances, flying before the wind at a speed
+of seventy or eighty miles an hour. On some occasions they appear almost
+simultaneously with the wind, going by like a flash, and instantly
+disappearing from sight. You have scarcely time to see them before the
+wind strikes you. As a rule, however, they make their appearance from
+five to fifteen minutes before the wind strikes; and when they are in
+great numbers the air, to a height of ten or twelve feet above the
+surface of the ground, is all at once seen to be full of them, rushing
+past with extraordinary velocity in a north-easterly direction. In very
+oppressive weather, and when the swiftly advancing pampero brings no
+moving mountains of mingled cloud and dust, and is consequently not
+expected, the sudden apparition of the dragon-fly is a most welcome one,
+for then an immediate burst of cold wind is confidently looked for. In
+the expressive vernacular of the gauchos the large dragon-fly is called
+_hijo del pampero_--son of the south-west wind.
+
+It is clear that these great and frequent dragonfly movements are not
+explicable on any current hypothesis regarding the annual migrations of
+birds, the occasional migrations of butterflies, or the migrations of
+some mammals, like the reindeer and buffalo of Arctic America, which,
+according to Rae and other observers, perform long journeys north and
+south at regular seasons, "from a sense of polarity." Neither this
+hypothetical sense in animals, nor "historical memory" will account for
+the dragon-fly storms, as the phenomenon of the pampas might be called,
+since the insects do not pass and repass between "breeding and
+subsistence areas," but all journey in a north-easterly direction; and
+of the countless millions flying like thistledown before the great
+pampero wind, not one solitary traveller ever returns.
+
+The cause of the flight is probably dynamical, affecting the insects
+with a sudden panic, and compelling them to rush away before the
+approaching tempest. The mystery is that they should fly from the wind
+before it reaches them, and yet travel in the same direction with it.
+When they pass over the level, treeless country, not one insect lags
+behind, or permits the wind to overtake it; but, on arriving at a wood
+or large plantation they swarm into it, as if seeking shelter from some
+swift-pursuing enemy, and on such occasions they sometimes remain
+clinging to the trees while the wind spends its force. This is
+particularly the case when the wind blows up at a late hour of the day;
+then, on the following morning, the dragon-flies are seen clustering to
+the foliage in such numbers that many trees are covered with them, a
+large tree often appearing as if hung with curtains of some brown
+glistening material, too thick to show the green leaves beneath.
+
+In Patagonia, where the phenomenon of dragon-fly storms is also known,
+an Englishman residing at the Rio Negro related to me the following
+occurrence which he witnessed there. A race meeting was being held near
+the town of El Carmen, on a high exposed piece of ground, when, shortly
+before sunset, a violent pampero wind came up, laden with dense
+dust-clouds. A few moments before the storm broke, the air all at once
+became obscured with a prodigious cloud of dragon-flies. About a hundred
+men, most of them on horseback, were congregated on the course at the
+time, and the insects, instead of rushing by in their usual way, settled
+on the people in such quantities that men and horses were quickly
+covered with clinging masses of them. My informant said--and this agrees
+with my own observation--that he was greatly impressed by the appearance
+of terror shown by the insects; they clung to him as if for dear life,
+so that he had the greatest difficulty in ridding himself of them.
+
+Weissenborn, in London's _Magazine of Natural History_ (N. S. vol. iii.)
+describes a great migration of dragon-flies which he witnessed in
+Germany in 1839, and also mentions a similar phenomenon occurring in
+1816, and extending over a large portion of Europe. But in these cases
+the movement took place at the end of May, and the insects travelled due
+south; their migrations were therefore similar to those of birds and
+butterflies, and were probably due to the same cause. I have been unable
+to find any mention of a phenomenon resembling the one with which we are
+so familiar on the pampas, and which, strangely enough, has not been
+recorded by any European naturalists who have travelled there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS.
+
+
+There cannot be a doubt that some animals possess an instinctive
+knowledge of their enemies--or, at all events, of some of their
+enemies--though I do not believe that this faculty is so common as many
+naturalists imagine. The most striking example I am acquainted with is
+seen in gnats or mosquitoes, and in the minute South American sandflies
+(Simulia), when a dragon-fly appears in a place where they are holding
+their aerial pastimes. The sudden appearance of a ghost among human
+revellers could not produce a greater panic. I have spoken in the last
+chapter of periodical storms or waves of dragon-flies in the Plata
+region, and mentioned incidentally that the appearance of these insects
+is most welcome in oppressively hot weather, since they are known to
+come just in advance of a rush of cool wind. In La Plata we also look
+for the dragon-fly, and rejoice at its coming, for another reason. We
+know that the presence of this noble insect will cause the clouds of
+stinging gnats and flies, which make life a burden, to vanish like
+smoke.
+
+When a flight of dragon-flies passes over the country many remain along
+the route, as I have said, sheltering themselves wherever trees occur;
+and, after the storm blows over, these strangers and stragglers remain
+for some days hawking for prey in the neighbourhood. It is curious to
+note that they do not show any disposition to seek for watercourses. It
+may be that they feel lost in a strange region, or that the panic they
+have suffered, in their long flight before the wind, has unsettled their
+instincts; for it is certain that they do not, like the dragon-fly in
+Mrs. Browning's poem, "return to dream upon the river." They lead
+instead a kind of vagabond existence, hanging about the plantations, and
+roaming over the surrounding plains. It is then remarked that gnats and
+sand-flies apparently cease to exist, even in places where they have
+been most abundant. They have not been devoured by the dragon-flies,
+which are perhaps very few in number; they have simply got out of the
+way, and will remain in close concealment until their enemies take their
+departure, or have all been devoured by martins, tyrant birds, and the
+big robber-flies or devil's dykes--no name is bad enough for them--of
+the family Asilidaa. During these peaceful gnatless days, if a person
+thrusts himself into the bushes or herbage in some dark sheltered place,
+he will soon begin to hear the thin familiar sounds, as of "horns of
+elf-land faintly blowing"; and presently, from the ground and the under
+surface of every leaf, the ghost-like withered little starvelings will
+appear in scores and in hundreds to settle on him, fear not having
+blunted their keen appetites.
+
+When riding over the pampas on a hot still day, with a pertinacious
+cloud of gnats or sandflies hovering just above my head and keeping me
+company for miles, I have always devoutly wished for a stray dragon-fly
+to show himself. Frequently the wish has been fulfilled, the dragon-fly,
+apparently "sagacious of his quarry from afar," sweeping straight at his
+prey, and instantly, as if by miracle, the stinging rain has ceased and
+the noxious cloud vanished from overhead, to be re-formed no more. This
+has always seemed very extraordinary to me; for in other matters gnats
+do not appear to possess even that proverbial small dose of intellect
+for which we give most insects credit. Before the advent of the
+dragon-fly it has perhaps happened that I have been vigorously striking
+at them, making it very unpleasant for them, and also killing and
+disabling many hundreds--a larger number than the most voracious
+dragon-fly could devour in the course of a whole day; and yet, after
+brushing and beating them off until my arms have ached with the
+exertion, they have continued to rush blindly on their fate, exhibiting
+not the faintest symptom of fear. I suppose that for centuries
+mosquitoes have, in this way, been brushed and beaten away with hands
+and with tails, without learning caution. It is not in their knowledge
+that there are hands and tails. A large animal is simply a field on
+which they confidently settle to feed, sounding shrill flourishes on
+their little trumpets to show how fearless they are. But the dragon-fly
+is very ancient on the earth, and if, during the Devonian epoch, when it
+existed, it preyed on some blood-sucking insect from which or Culicidae
+have come, then these stupid little insects have certainly had ample
+time in which to learn well at least one lesson.
+
+There is not in all organic nature, to my mind, any instance of wasted
+energy comparable in magnitude with the mosquito's thirst for blood, and
+the instincts and elaborate blood-pumping apparatus with which it is
+related. The amount of pollen given off by some wind-fertilized
+trees--so great in some places that it covers hundreds of square miles
+of earth and water with a film of yellow dust---strikes us as an amazing
+waste of material on the part of nature; but in these cases we readily
+see that this excessive prodigality is necessary to continue the
+species, and that a sufficient number of flowers would not be
+impregnated unless the entire trees were bathed for days in the
+fertilizing cloud, in which only one out of many millions of floating
+particles can ever hit the mark. The mosquito is able to procreate
+without ever satisfying its ravenous appetite for blood. To swell its
+grey thread-like abdomen to a coral bead is a delight to the insect, but
+not necessary to its existence, like food and water to ours; it is the
+great prize in the lottery of life, which few can ever succeed in
+drawing. In a hot summer, when one has ridden perhaps for half a day
+over a low-lying or wet district, through an atmosphere literally
+obscured with a fog of mosquitoes, this fact strikes the mind very
+forcibly, for in such places it frequently is the case that mammals do
+not exist, or are exceedingly rare. In Europe it is different. There, as
+Reaumur said, possibly one gnat in every hundred may be able to gratify
+its appetite for blood; but of the gnats in many districts in South
+America it would be nearer the mark to say that only one in a hundred
+millions can ever do so.
+
+Curtis discovered that only the female mosquito bites or sucks blood,
+the male being without tongue or mandibles; and he asks, What, then,
+does the male feed on? He conjectures that it feeds on flowers; but, had
+he visited some swampy places in hot countries, where flowers are few
+and the insects more numerous than the sands on the seashore, he would
+most probably have said that the males subsist on decaying vegetable
+matter and moisture of slime. It is, however, more important to know
+what the female subsists on. We know that she thirsts for warm mammalian
+blood, that she seeks it with avidity, and is provided with an admirable
+organ for its extraction--only, unfortunately for her, she does not get
+it, or, at all events, the few happy individuals that do get it are
+swamped in the infinite multitude of those that are doomed by nature to
+total abstinence.
+
+I should like to know whether this belief of Curtis, shared by Westwood
+and other distinguished entomologists, but originally put forward merely
+as a conjecture, has ever been tested by careful observation and
+experiment. If not, then it is strange that it should have crept into
+many important works, where it is stated not as a mere guess, but as an
+established fact. Thus, Van Beneden, in his work on parasites, while
+classing female mosquitoes with his "miserable wretches," yet says, "If
+blood fails them, they live, like the males, on the juices of flowers."
+If this be so, it is quite certain that the juices fail to satisfy them;
+and that, like Dr. Tanner, who was ravenously hungry during his forty
+days' fast, in spite of his frequent sips of water, the mosquito still
+craves for something better than a cool vegetarian diet. I cannot help
+thinking, though the idea may seem fanciful, that mosquitoes feed on
+nothing. We know that the ephemerae take no refreshment in the imago
+state, the mouth being aborted or atrophied in these short-lived
+creatures; but we also know that they belong to an exceedingly ancient
+tribe, and possibly, after the earth had ceased to produce their proper
+nourishment there came in their history a long hungry period, which did
+not kill them, but lasted until their feeding instincts became obsolete,
+the mouth lost its use, and their life in its perfect state dwindled to
+its present length.
+
+In any case, how unsatisfactory is the mosquitoes' existence, and what a
+curious position they occupy in nature! Let us suppose that, owing to
+some great change in the conditions of the earth, rapacious birds were
+no longer able to capture prey, and that, by a corresponding change in
+their organizations, they were able to subsist on the air they breathed,
+with perhaps an occasional green leaf and a sip of water, and yet
+retained the old craving for solid food, and the old predatory instincts
+and powers undiminished; they would be in the position of mosquitoes in
+the imago state. And if then fifty or a hundred individuals were to
+succeed every year in capturing something and making one hearty meal,
+these few fortunate diners would bear about the same proportion to all
+the raptors on the globe as the mosquitoes that succeed in sucking blood
+to their unsuccessful fellows. In the case of the hawks, the effect of
+the few meals on the entire rapacious family or order would certainly be
+_nil;_ and it is impossible to believe for a moment that the
+comparatively infinitesimal amount of blood sucked by mosquitoes can.
+serve to invigorate the species. The wonder is that the machinery, which
+accomplishes nothing, should continue in such perfect working order.
+
+When we consider the insect's delicate organ, so admirably fitted for
+the purpose to which it is applied, it becomes difficult to believe that
+it could have been so perfected except in a condition of things utterly
+unlike the present. There must have been a time when mosquitoes found
+their proper nourishment, and when warm mammalian blood was as necessary
+to their existence as honey is to that of the bee, or insect food to the
+dragon-fly.
+
+This applies to many blood-sucking insects besides mosquitoes, and with
+special force to the tick tribes (Ixodes), which swarm throughout
+Central and South America; for in these degraded spiders the whole body
+has been manifestly modified to fit it for a parasitical life; while the
+habits of the insect during its blind, helpless, waiting existence on
+trees, and its sudden great development when it succeeds in attaching
+itself to an animal body, also point irresistibly to the same
+conclusion. In the sunny uplands they act (writes Captain Burton) like
+the mosquitoes of the hot, humid Beiramar. "The nuisance is general; it
+seems to be in the air; every blade of grass has its colony; clusters of
+hundreds adhere to the twigs; myriads are found in the bush clumps. Lean
+and flat when growing to the leaves, the tick catches man or beast
+brushing by, fattens rapidly, and, at the end-of a week's good living,
+drops off, _plena cruoris."_ When on trees, Belt says, they
+instinctively place themselves on the extreme tips of leaves and shoots,
+with their hind legs stretching out, each foot armed with two hooks or
+claws, with which to lay hold of any animal brushing by. During this
+wretched, incom-plete existence (from which, in most cases, it is never
+destined to emerge), its greatest length is about one-fourth of an inch;
+but where it fastens itself to an animal the abdomen increases to a
+globe as big as a medium-sized Barcelona nut. Being silvery-grey or
+white in colour, it becomes, when thus distended, very conspicuous on
+any dark surface. I have frequently seen black, smooth-haired dogs with
+their coats, turned into a perfect garden of these white spider-flowers
+or mushrooms. The white globe is leathery, and nothing can injure it;
+and the poor beast cannot rub, bite, or scratch it off, as it is
+anchored to his flesh by eight sets of hooks and a triangle of teeth.
+
+The ticks inhabiting regions rich in bird and insect life, but with few
+mammals, are in the same condition as mosquitoes, as far as the supply
+of blood goes; and, like the mosquitoes, they are compelled and able to
+exist without the nourishment best suited to them. They are nature's
+miserable castaways, parasitical tribes lost in a great dry wilderness
+where no blood is; and every marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hunger
+gnawing its vitals, and every forest tick, blindly feeling with its
+grappling-irons for the beast that never brushes by, seems to tell us of
+a world peopled with gigantic forms, mammalian and reptilian, which once
+afforded abundant pasture to the parasite, and which the parasite
+perhaps assisted to overthrow.
+
+It is almost necessary to transport oneself to the vast tick-infested
+wilderness of the New World to appreciate the full significance of a
+passage in Belt's _Naturalist in Nicaragua,_ in which it is suggested
+that man's hairless condition was perhaps brought about by natural
+selection in tropical regions, where he was greatly troubled with
+parasites of this kind. It is certain that if in such a country as
+Brazil he possessed a hairy coat, affording cover to the tick and
+enabling it to get a footing on the body, his condition would be a very
+sad one. Savages abhor hairs on the body, and even pluck them off their
+faces. This seems like a survival of an ancient habit acquired when the
+whole body was clothed with hair; and if primitive man ever possessed
+such a habit, nature only followed his lead in giving him a hairless
+offspring.
+
+Is it not also probable that the small amount of mammalian life in South
+America, and the aquatic habits of nearly all the large animals in the
+warmer districts, is due to the persecutions of the tick?
+
+The only way in which a large animal can rid itself of the pest is by
+going into the water or wallowing in the mud; and this perhaps accounts
+for the more or less aquatic habits of the jaguar, aguara-guazu, the
+large Cervus paluclosus, tapir, capybara, and peccary. Monkeys, which
+are most abundant, are a notable exception; but these animals have the
+habit of attending to each other's skins, and spend a great deal of
+their time in picking off the parasites. But how do birds escape the
+ticks, since these parasites do not confine their attacks to any one
+class of aninials, but attach themselves impartially to any living thing
+coming within reach of their hooks, from snake to man? My own
+observations bearing on this point refer less to the Ixodes than to the
+minute bete-rouge, which is excessively abundant in the Plata district,
+where it is known as _bicho colorado,_ and in size and habits resembles
+the English Leptus autumnalis. It is so small that, notwithstanding its
+bright scarlet colour, it can only be discerned by bringing the eye
+close to it; and being, moreover, exceedingly active and abundant in all
+shady places in summer--making life a misery to careless human
+beings--it must be very much more dangerous to birds than the larger
+sedentary Ixodes. The bete-rouge invariably lodges beneath the wings of
+birds, where the loose scanty plumage affords easy access to the skin.
+Domestic birds suffer a great deal from its persecutions, and their.
+young, if allowed to run about in shady places, die of the irritation.
+Wild birds, however, seem to be very little troubled, and most of those
+I have examined have been almost entirely free from parasites. Probably
+they are much more sensitive than the domestic birds, and able to feel
+and pick off the insects with their beaks before they have penetrated
+into the skin. I believe they are also able to protect themselves in
+another way, namely, by preventing the parasites from reaching their
+bodies at all. I was out under the trees one day with a pet oven-bird
+(Furnarius rufus), which had full liberty to range about at will, and
+noticed that at short intervals it went through the motions of picking
+something from its toes or legs, though I could see nothing on them. At
+length I approached my eyes to within a few inches of the bird's feet,
+and discovered that the large dry branch on which it stood was covered
+with a multitude of parasites, all running rapidly about like foraging
+ants, and whenever one came to the bird's feet it at once ran up the
+leg. Every time this happened, so far as I could see, the bird felt it.
+and quickly and deftly picked it off with the point of its bill. It
+seemed very astonishing that the horny covering of the toes and legs
+should be so exquisitely sensitive, for the insects are so small and
+light that they cannot be felt on the hand, even when a score of them
+are running over it; but the fact is as I have stated, and it is highly
+probable, I think, that most wild birds keep themselves free from these
+little torments in the same way.
+
+Some observations of mine on a species of Orni-thomyia--a fly
+parasitical on birds--might possibly be of use in considering the
+question of the anomalous position in nature of insects possessing the
+instincts and aptitudes of parasites, and organs manifestly modified to
+suit a parasitical mode of life, yet compelled and able to exist free,
+feeding, perhaps, on vegetable juices, or, like the ephemerae, on
+nothing at all. For it must be borne in mind that I do not assert that
+these "occasional" or "accidental" parasites, as some one calls them,
+explaining nothing, do not feed on such juices. I do not know what they
+feed on. I only know that the joyful alacrity with which gnats and
+stinging flies of all kinds abandon the leaves, supposed to afford them
+pasture, to attack a warm-blooded animal, serves to show how strong the
+impulse is, and how ineradicable the instinct, which must have had an
+origin. Perhaps the habits of the bird-fly I have mentioned will serve
+to show how, in some cases, the free life of some blood-sucking flies
+and other insects might have originated.
+
+Kirby and Spence, in their _Introduction,_ mention that one or two
+species of Ornithomyia have been observed flying about and alighting on
+men; and in one case the fly extracted blood and was caught, the species
+being thus placed beyond doubt. This circumstance led the authors to
+believe that the insect, when the bird it is parasitical on dies,
+takes to flight and migrates from body to body, occasionally tasting
+blood until, coming to the right body--to wit, that of a bird, or of a
+particular species of bird--it once more establishes itself permanently
+in the plumage. I fancy that the insect sometimes leads a freer life and
+ranges much more than the authors imagined; and I refer to Kirby and
+Spence, with apologies to those who regard the _Introduction_ as out of
+date, only because I am not aware that we have any later observations on
+the subject.
+
+There is in La Plata a small very common Dendrocolaptine bird--Anumbius
+acuticaudatus--much infested by an Ornithomyia, a pretty, pale insect,
+half the size of a house-fly, and elegantly striped with green. It is a
+very large parasite for so small a bird, yet so cunning and alert is it,
+and so swiftly is it able to swim through the plumage, that the bird is
+unable to rid itself of so undesirable a companion. The bird lives with
+its mate all the year round, much of the time with its grown-up young,
+in its nest--a large structure, in which so much building-material is
+used that the bird is called in the vernacular Lenatero, or
+Firewood-gatherer. On warm bright days without wind, during the absence
+of the birds, I have frequently seen a company of from half a dozen to a
+dozen or fifteen of the parasitical fly wheeling about in the air above
+the nest, hovering and gambolling together, just like house-flies in a
+room in summer; but always on the appearance of the birds, returning
+from their feeding-ground, they would instantly drop down and disappear
+into the nest. How curious this instinct seems! The fly regards the
+bird, which affords it the warmth and food essential to life, as its
+only deadly enemy; and with an inherited wisdom, like that of the
+mosquito with regard to the dragon-fly, or of the horse-fly with regard
+to the Monedula wasp, vanishes like smoke from its presence, and only
+approaches the bird secretly from a place of concealment.
+
+The parasitical habit tends inevitably to degrade the species acquiring
+it, dulling its senses and faculties, especially those of sight and
+locomotion; but the Ornithomyia seems an exception, its dependent life
+having had a contrary effect; the extreme sensitiveness, keenness of
+sight, and quickness of the bird having reacted on the insect, giving it
+a subtlety in its habits and motions almost without a parallel even
+among free insects. A man with a blood-sucking flat-bodied flying
+squirrel, concealing itself among his clothing and gliding and dodging
+all over his body with so much artifice and rapidity as to defeat all
+efforts made to capturo it or knock it off, would be a case parallel to
+that of the bird-fly on the small bird. It might be supposed that the
+Firewood-gatherer, like some ants that keep domestic pets, makes a pet
+of the fly; for it is a very pretty insect, barred with green, and with
+rainbow reflections on its wings--and birds are believed by some
+theorists to possess aesthetic tastes; but the discomfort of having such
+a vampire on the body would, I imagine, be too great to allow a kindly
+instinct of that nature to grow up. Moreover, I have on several
+occasions seen the bird making frantic efforts to capture one of the
+flies, which had incautiously flown up from the nest at the wrong
+moment. Bird and fly seem to know each other wonderfully well.
+
+Here, then, we have a parasitical insect specialized in the highest
+degree, yet retaining all its pristine faculties unimpaired, its love of
+liberty, and of associating in numbers together for sportive exercises,
+and well able to take care of itself during its free intervals. And
+probably when thrown on the world, as when nests are blown down, or the
+birds get killed, or change their quarters, as they often do, it is able
+to exist for some time without avian blood. Let us then imagine some of
+these orphaned colonies, unable to find birds, but through a slight
+change in habits or organization able to exist in the imago state
+without sucking blood until they laid their eggs; and succeeding
+generations, still better able to stand the altered conditions of life
+until they become practically independent (like gnats), multiplying
+greatly, and disporting themselves in clouds over forests, yet still
+retaining the old hunger for blood and the power to draw it, and ready
+at any moment to return to the ancestral habit. It might be said that if
+such a result were possible it would have occurred, but that we find no
+insect like the Ornithomyia existing independently. With the bird-fly it
+has not occurred, as far as we know; but in the past history of some
+independent parasites it is possible that something similar to the
+imaginary case I have sketched may have taken place. The bush-tick is a
+more highly specialized, certainly a more degraded, creature than the
+bird-fly, and the very fact of its existence seems to show that it is
+possible for even the lowest of the fallen race of parasites to start
+afresh in life under new conditions, and to reascend in the scale of
+being, although still bearing about it the marks of former degeneracy.
+
+The connection between the flea and the mammal it feeds on is even less
+close than that which exists between the Ornithomyia and bird. The fact
+that fleas are so common and universal--for in all lands we have them,
+like the poor, always with us; and that they are found on all mammals,
+from the king of beasts to the small modest mouse--seems to show a great
+amount of variability and adaptiveness, as well as a very high
+antiquity. It has often been reported that fleas have been found hopping
+on the ground in desert places, where they could not have been dropped
+by man or beast; and it has been assumed that these "independent" fleas
+must, like gnats and ticks, subsist on vegetable juices. There is no
+doubt that they are able to exist and propagate for one or two years
+after being deprived of their proper aliment; houses shut up for a year
+or longer are sometimes found infested with them; possibly in the
+absence of "vegetable juices" they flourish on dust. I have never
+detected them hopping on the ground in uninhabited places, although I
+once found them in Patagonia, in a hamlet which had been attacked and
+depopulated by the Indians about twenty months before my visit. On
+entering one of the deserted huts I found the floor literally swarming
+with fleas, and in less than ten seconds my legs, to the height of my
+knees, were almost black with their numbers. This proves that they are
+able toincrease greatly for a period without blood; but I doubt that
+they can go on existing and increasing for an indefinite time; perhaps
+their true position, with regard to the parasitical habit, is midway
+between that of the strict parasite which never leaves the body, and
+that of independent parasites like the Culex and the Ixodes, and all
+those which are able to exist free for ever, and are parasitical only
+when the opportunity offers.
+
+Entomologists regard the flea as a degraded fly. Certainly it is very
+much more degraded than the bird-borne Ornithomyia, with its subtle
+motions and instinct, its power of flight and social pastimes. The poor
+pulex has lost every trace of wings; nevertheless, in its fallen
+condition it has developed some remarkable qualities and saltatory
+powers, which give it a lower kind of glory; and, compared with another
+parasite with which it shares the human species, it is almost a noble
+insect. Darwin has some remarks about the smallness of the brain of an
+ant, assuming that this insect possesses a very high intelligence, but I
+doubt very much that the ant, which moves in a groove, is mentally the
+superior of the unsocial flea. The last is certainly the most teachable;
+and if fleas were generally domesticated and made pets of, probably
+there would be as many stories about their marvellous intelligence and
+fidelity to man as we now hear about our over-praised "friend" the dog.
+
+With regard to size, the flea probably started on its downward course as
+a comparatively large insect, probably larger than the Ornithomyia. That
+insect has been able to maintain its existence, without dwindling like
+the Leptus into a mere speck, through the great modification in organs
+and instinct, which adapt it so beautifully to the feathery element in
+which it moves. The bush-tick, wingless from the beginning, and
+diverging in another direction, has probably been greatly increased in
+size by its parasitical habit; this seems proven by the fact, that as
+long as it is parasitical on nothing it remains small, but when able to
+fasten itself to an animal it rapidly developes to a great size. Again,
+the big globe of its abdomen is coriaceous and elastic, and is probably
+as devoid of sensation as a ball of india-rubber. The insect, being made
+fast by hooks and teeth to its victim, all efforts to remove it only
+increase the pain it causes; and animals that know it well do not
+attempt to rub, scratch, or bite it off, therefore the great size and
+the conspicuous colour of the tick are positive advantages to it. The
+flea, without the subtlety and highly-specialized organs of the
+Ornithomyia, or the stick-fast powers and leathery body of the Ixodes,
+can only escape its vigilant enemies by making itself invisible; hence
+every variation, i.e. increase in jumping-power and diminished bulk,
+tending towards this result, has been taken advantage of by natural
+selection.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS.
+
+
+Two humble-bees, Bombus thoracicus and B. violaceus, are found on the
+pampas; the first, with a primrose yellow thorax, and the extremity of
+the abdomen bright rufous, slightly resembles the English B. terrestris;
+the rarer species, which is a trifle smaller than the first, is of a
+uniform intense black, the body having the appearance of velvet, the
+wings being of a deep violaceous blue.
+
+A census of the humble-bees in any garden or field always shows that the
+yellow bees outnumber the black in the proportion of about seven to one;
+and I have also found their nests for many years in the same proportion;
+about seven nests of the yellow to one nest of the black species. In
+habits they are almost identical, and when two species so closely allied
+are found inhabiting the same locality, it is only reasonable to infer
+that one possesses some advantage over the other, and that the least
+favoured species will eventually disappear. In this case, where one so
+greatly outnumbers the other, it might be thought that the rarer species
+is dying out, or that, on the contrary, it is a new-comer destined to
+supplant the older more numerous species. Yet, during the twenty years I
+have observed them, there has occurred no change in their relative
+positions; though both have greatly increased in numbers during that
+time, owing to the spread of cultivation. And yet it would scarcely be
+too much to expect some marked change in a period so long as that, even
+through the slow-working agency of natural selection; for it is not as
+if there had been an exact balance of power between them. In the same
+period of time I have seen several species, once common, almost or quite
+disappear, while others, very low down as to numbers, have been exalted
+to the first rank. In insect life especially, these changes have been
+numerous, rapid, and widespread.
+
+In the district where, as a boy, I chased and caught tinamous, and also
+chased ostriches, but failed to catch them, the continued presence of
+our two humble-bees, sucking the same flowers and making their nests in
+the same situations, has remained a puzzle to my mind.
+
+The site of the nest is usually a slight depression in the soil in the
+shelter of a cardoon bush. The bees deepen the hollow by burrowing in
+the earth; and when the spring foliage sheltering it withers up, they
+construct a dome-shaped covering of small sticks, thorns, and leaves
+bitten into extremely minute pieces. They sometimes take possession of a
+small hole or cavity in the ground, and save themselves the labour of
+excavation.
+
+Their architecture closely resembles that of B. terrestris. They make
+rudely-shaped oval honey-cells, varying from half an inch to an inch and
+a half in length, the smaller ones being the first made; later in the
+season the old cocoons are utilized for storing honey. The wax is
+chocolate-coloured, and almost the only difference I can find in the
+economy of the two species is that the black bee uses a large quantity
+of wax in plastering the interior of its nest. The egg-cell of the
+yellow bee always contains from twelve to sixteen eggs; that of the
+black bee from ten to fourteen; and the eggs of this species are the
+largest though the bee is smallest. At the entrance on the edge of the
+mound one bee is usually stationed, and, when approached, it hums a
+shrill challenge, and throws itself into a menacing attitude. The sting
+is exceedingly painful.
+
+One summer I was so fortunate as to discover two nests of the two kinds
+within twelve yards of each other, and I resolved to watch them very
+carefully, in order to see whether the two species ever came into
+collision, as sometimes happens with ants of different species living
+close together. Several times I saw a yellow bee leave its own nest and
+hover round or settle on the neighbouring one, upon which the sentinel
+black bee would attack and drive it off. One day, while watching, I was
+delighted to see a yellow bee actually enter its neighbour's nest, the
+sentinel being off duty. In about five minutes' time it came out again
+and flew away unmolested. I concluded from this that humble-bees, like
+their relations of the hive, occasionally plunder each other's sweets.
+On another occasion I found a black bee dead at the entrance of the
+yellow bees' nest; doubtless this individual had been caught in the act
+of stealing honey, and, after it had been stung to death, it had been
+dragged out and left there as a warning to others with like felonious
+intentions.
+
+There is one striking difference between the two species. The yellow bee
+is inodorous; the black bee, when angry and attacking, emits an
+exceedingly powerful odour: curiously enough, this smell is identical in
+character with that made when angry by all the wasps of the South
+American genus Pepris--dark blue wasps with red wings. This odour at
+first produces a stinging sensation on the nerve of smell, but when
+inhaled in large measure becomes very nauseating. On one occasion, while
+I was opening a nest, several of the bees buzzing round my head and
+thrusting their stings through the veil I wore for protection, gave out
+so pungent a smell that I found it unendurable, and was compelled to
+retreat.
+
+It seems strange that a species armed with a venomous sting and
+possessing the fierce courage of the humble-bee should also have this
+repulsive odour for a protection. It is, in fact, as incongruous as it
+would be were our soldiers provided with guns and swords first, and
+after with phials of assafoatida to be uncorked in the face of an enemy.
+
+Why, or how, animals came to be possessed of the power of emitting
+pestiferous odours is a mystery; we only see that natural selection has,
+in some mstances, chiefly among insects, taken advantage of it to
+furnish some of the weaker, more unprotected species with a means of
+escape from their enemies. The most stinking example I know is that of a
+large hairy caterpillar I have found on dry wood in Patagonia, and
+which, when touched, emits an intensely nauseous effluvium. Happily it
+is very volatile, but while it lasts it is even more detestable than
+that of the skunk.
+
+The skunk itself offers perhaps the one instance amongst the higher
+vertebrates of an animal in which all the original instincts of
+self-preservation have died out, giving place to this lower kind of
+protection. All the other members of the family it belongs to are
+cunning, swift of foot, and, when overtaken, fierce-tempered and well
+able to defend themselves with their powerful well-armed jaws.
+
+For some occult reason they are provided with a gland charged with a
+malodorous secretion; and out of this mysterious liquor Nature has
+elaborated the skunk's inglorious weapon. The skunk alone when attacked
+makes no attempt to escape or to defend itself by biting; but, thrown by
+its agitation into a violent convulsion, involuntarily discharges its
+foetid liquor into the face of an opponent. When this animal had once
+ceased to use so good a weapon as its teeth in defending itself,
+degenerating at the same time into a slow-moving creature, without fear
+and without cunning, the strength and vileness of its odour would be
+continually increased by the cumulative process of natural selection:
+and how effective the protection has become is shown by the abundance of
+the species throughout the whole American continent. It is lucky for
+mankind--especially for naturalists and sportsmen--that other species
+have not been improved in the same direction.
+
+But what can we say of the common deer of the pampas (Cervus
+campestris), the male of which gives out an effluvium quite as
+far-reaching although not so abominable in character as that of the
+Mephitis? It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human nostril when the
+perfumer of the wilderness is not even in sight. Yet it is not a
+protection; on the contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling
+white plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a direct disadvantage,
+informing all enemies for leagues around of its whereabouts. It is not,
+therefore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer are never very
+abundant; the only wonder is that, like the ancient horse of America,
+they have not become extinct.
+
+The gauchos of the pampas, however, give _a reason_ for the powerful
+smell of the male deer; and, after some hesitation, I have determined to
+set it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, as he thinks
+proper. I neither believe nor disbelieve it; for although I do not put
+great faith in gaucho natural history, my own observations have not
+infrequently confirmed statements of theirs, which a sceptical person
+would have regarded as wild indeed. To give one instance: I heard a
+gaucho relate that while out riding he had been pursued for a
+considerable distance by a large spider; his hearers laughed at him for
+a romancer; but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, both when on
+foot and on horseback, by a large wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I
+did not join in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of C. campestris
+is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just as pyrethrum powder is to most
+insects, and even go so far as to describe its effect as fatal to them;
+according to this, the smell is therefore a protection to the deer. In
+places where venomous snakes are extremely abundant, as in the Sierra
+district on the southern pampas of Buenos Ayres, the gaucho frequently
+ties a strip of the male deer's skin, which retains its powerful odour
+for an indefinite time, round the neck of a valuable horse as a
+protection. It is certain that domestic animals are frequently lost here
+through snake-bites. The most common poisonous species--the
+Craspedo-cephalus alternatus, called _Vivora de la Cruz_ in the
+vernacular--has neither bright colour nor warning rattle to keep off
+heavy hoofs, and is moreover of so sluggish a temperament that it will
+allow itself to be trodden on before stirring, with the result that its
+fangs are not infrequently struck into the nose or foot of browsing
+beast. Considering, then, the conditions in which C. campestris is
+placed--and it might also be supposed that venomous snakes have in past
+times been much more numerous than they are now--it is not impossible to
+believe that the powerful smell it emits has been made protective,
+especially when we see in other species how repulsive odours have been
+turned to account by the principle of natural selection.
+
+After all, perhaps the wild naturalist of the pampas knows what he is
+about when he ties a strip of deer-skin to the neck of his steed and
+turns him loose to graze among the snakes.
+
+The gaucho also affirms that the deer cherishes a wonderful animosity
+against snakes; that it becomes greatly excited when it sees one, and
+proceeds at once to destroy it; _they say,_ by running round and round
+it in a circle, emitting its violent smell in larger measure, until the
+snake dies of suffocation. It is hard to believe that the effect can be
+so great; but that the deer is a snake hater and killer is certainly
+true: in North America, Ceylon, and other districts deer have been
+observed excitedly leaping on serpents, and killing them with their
+sharp cutting hoofs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+A NOBLE WASP.
+
+_(Monedula punctata.)_
+
+
+Naturalists, like kings and emperors, have their favourites, and as my
+zoological sympathies, which are wider than my knowledge, embrace all
+classes of beings, there are of course several insects for which I have
+a special regard; a few in each of the principal orders. My chief
+favourite among the hymenopteras is the one representative of the
+curious genus Monedula known in La Plata. It is handsome and has
+original habits, but it is specially interesting to me for another
+reason: I can remember the time when it was extremely rare on the
+pampas, so rare that in boyhood the sight of one used to be a great
+event to me; and I have watched its rapid increase year by year till it
+has come to be one of our commonest species. Its singular habits and
+intelligence give it a still better claim to notice. It is a big, showy,
+loud-buzzing insect, with pink head and legs, wings with brown
+reflections, and body encircled with alternate bands of black and pale
+gold, and has a preference for large composite flowers, on the honey of
+which it feeds. Its young is, however, an insect-eater; but the Monedula
+does not, like other burrowing or sand wasps, put away a store of
+insects or spiders, partially paralyzed, as a provision for the grub
+till it reaches the pupa state; it actually supplies the grub with
+fresh-caught insects as long as food is required, killing the prey it
+captures outright, and bringing it in to its young; so that its habits,
+in this particular, are more bird- than wasp-like.
+
+The wasp lays its solitary egg at the extremity of a hole it excavates
+for itself on a bare hard piece of ground, and many holes are usually
+found close together. When the grub--for I have never been able to find
+more than one in a hole--has come out from the egg, the parent begins to
+bring in insects, carefully filling up the mouth of the hole with loose
+earth after every visit. Without this precaution, which entails a vast
+amount of labour, I do not believe one grub out of every fifty would
+survive, so overrun are these barren spots of ground used as
+breeding-places with hunting spiders, ants, and tiger-beetles. The grub
+is a voracious eater, but the diligent mother brings in as much as it
+can devour. I have often found as many as six or seven insects,
+apparently fresh killed, and not yet touched by the pampered little
+glutton, coiled up in the midst of them waiting for an appetite.
+
+The Monedula is an adroit fly-catcher, for though it kills numbers of
+fire-flies and other insects, flies are always preferred, possibly
+because they are so little encumbered with wings, and are also more
+easily devoured. It occasionally captures insects on the wing, but the
+more usual method is to pounce down on its prey when it is at rest. At
+one time, before I had learnt their habits, I used frequently to be
+startled by two or three or more of these wasps rushing towards my face,
+and continuing hovering before it, loudly buzzing, attending me in my
+walks about the fields. The reason of this curious proceeding is that
+the Monedula preys largely on stinging flies, having learnt from
+experience that the stinging fly will generally neglect its own safety
+when it has once fastened on a good spot to draw blood from. When a man
+or horse stands perfectly motionless the wasps take no notice, but the
+moment any movement is made of hand, tail, or stamping hoof, they rush
+to the rescue, expecting to find a stinging fly. On the other hand, the
+horse has learnt to know and value this fly-scourge, and will stand very
+quietly with half a dozen loud Avasps hovering in an alarming manner
+close to his head, well knowing that every fly that settles on him will
+be instantly snatched away, and that the boisterous Monedula is a better
+protection even than the tail--which, by the way, the horse wears very
+long in Buenos Ayres.
+
+I have, in conclusion, to relate an incident I onco witnessed, and which
+does not show the Monedula in a very amiable light. I was leaning over a
+gate watching one of these wasps feeding on a sunflower. A small
+leaf-cutting bee was hurrying about with its shrill busy hum in the
+vicinity, and in due time came to the sunflower and settled on it. The
+Monedula became irritated, possibly at the shrill voice and bustling
+manner of its neighbour, and, after watching it for a few moments on the
+flower, deliberately rushed at and drove it off. The leaf-cutter quickly
+returned, however--for bees are always extremely averse to leaving a
+flower unexplored--but was again driven away with threats and
+demonstrations on the part of the Monedula. The little thing went off
+and sunned itself on a leaf for a time, then returned to the flower,
+only to be instantly ejected again. Other attempts were made, but the
+big wasp now kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, and
+would not allow it to come within several inches of the flower without
+throwing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee retired to
+sun itself once more, apparently determined to wait for the big tyrant
+to go away; but the other seemed to know what was wanted, and spitefully
+made up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter then gave up the
+contest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it hovered, hawk-like, above
+the Monedula for a moment, then pounced down on its back, and clung
+there, furiously biting, until its animosity was thoroughly appeased;
+then it flew off, leaving the other master of the field certainly, but
+greatly discomposed, and perhaps seriously injured about the base of the
+wings. I was rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for a
+leaf-cutting bee can use its teeth as deftly as a tailor can his shears.
+
+Doubtless to bees, as to men, revenge is sweeter than honey. But, in the
+face of mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale of
+organization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything so
+intelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "which
+implies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the person
+(or bee) offended?" According to Bain _(Mental and Moral Science)_ only
+the highest animals--stags and bulls he mentions-can be credited with
+the developed form of anger, which, he describes as an excitement caused
+by pain, reaching the centres of activity, and containing an impulse
+knowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if man
+only is meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel of
+gunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the breast of
+nearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high according to Bain,
+though I myself should place him nearly on a level mentally with the
+majority of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable of
+a wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag can
+manifestly have no associations, personal or political, for the bull,
+shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another instance of
+misdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar .as that of the bull
+and red rag, is used as an illustration by one of the prophets: "My
+heritage is unto me as a speckled bird; the birds round, about are
+against it." I have frequently seen the birds of a thicket gather round
+some singularly marked accidental visitor, and finally drive him with
+great anger from the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in a
+little here, since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured or
+marked, might be looked on as a bird of prey.
+
+The flesh-fly laying its eggs on the carrion-flower is only a striking
+instance of the mistakes all instincts are liable to, never more
+markedly than in the inherited tendency to fits of frenzied excitement:
+the feeling is frequently excited by the wrong object, and explodes at
+inopportune moments.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+NATURE'S NIGHT LIGHTS.
+
+_(Remarks about Fireflies and other matters.)_
+
+
+It was formerly supposed that the light of the firefly (in any family
+possessing the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks of
+other insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirby
+and Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all the
+attention it would receive from modern entomologists: just at present
+any observer who lived in the pre-Darwin days is regarded as one of the
+ancients. The reasons given for the notion or theory in the celebrated
+_Introduction to Entomology_ were not conclusive; nevertheless it was
+not an improbable supposition of the authors'; while the theory which
+has taken its place in recent zoological writings seems in every way
+even less satisfactory.
+
+Let us first examine the antiquated theory, as it must now be called. By
+bringing a raptorial insect and a firefly together, we find that the
+flashing light of the latter does actually scare away the former, and is
+therefore, for the moment, a protection as effectual as the camp-fire
+the traveller lights in a district abounding with beasts of prey.
+Notwithstanding this fact, and assuming that we have here the whole
+reason of the existence of the light-emitting power, a study of the
+firefly's habits compels us to believe that the insect would be just as
+well off without the power as with it. Probably it experiences some
+pleasure in emitting flashes of light during its evening pastimes, but
+this could scarcely be considered an advantage in its struggle for
+existence, and it certainly does not account for the possession of the
+faculty.
+
+About the habits of Pyrophorus, the large tropical firefly which has the
+seat of its luminosity on the upper surface of the thorax, nothing
+definite appears to be known; but it has been said that this instinct is
+altogether nocturnal. The Pyrophorus is only found in the sub-tropical
+portion of the Argentine country, and I have never met with it. With the
+widely-separated Cratomorphus, and the tortoise-shaped Aspisoma, which
+emit the light from the abdomen, I am familiar; one species of
+Cratomorphus--a long slender insect with yellow wing-cases marked with
+two parallel black lines--is "the firefly" known to every one and
+excessively abundant in the southern countries of La Plata. This insect
+is strictly diurnal in its habits--as much so, in fact, as diurnal
+butterflies. They are seen flying about, wooing their mates, and feeding
+on composite and umbelliferous flowers at all hours of the day, and are
+as active as wasps during the full glare of noon. Birds do not feed on
+them, owing to the disagreeable odour, resembling that of phosphorus,
+they emit, and probably because they are to be uneatable; but their
+insect enemies are not so squeamish, and devour them readily, just as
+they also do the blister-fly, which one would imagine a morsel fitted to
+disagree with any stomach. One of their enemies is the Monedula wasp;
+another, a fly, of the rapacious Asilidas family; and this fly is also a
+wasp in appearance, having a purple body and bright red wings, like a
+Pepris, and this mimetic resemblance doubtless serves it as a protection
+against birds. A majority of raptorial insects are, however, nocturnal,
+and from all these enemies that go about under cover of night, the
+firefly, as Kirby and Spence rightly conjectured, protects itself, or
+rather is involuntarily protected, by means of its frequent flashing
+light. We are thus forced to the conclusion that, while the common house
+fly and many other diurnal insects spend a considerable portion of the
+daylight in purely sportive exercises, the firefly, possessing in its
+light a protection from nocturnal enemies, puts off its pastimes until
+the evening; then, when its carnival of two or three hours' duration is
+over, retires also to rest, putting out its candle, and so exposing
+itself to the dangers which surround other diurnal species during the
+hours of darkness. I have spoken of the firefly's pastimes advisedly,
+for I have really never been able to detect it doing anything in the
+evening beyond flitting aimlessly about, like house flies in a room,
+hovering and revolving in company by the hour, apparently for amusement.
+Thus, the more closely we look at the facts, the more unsatisfactory
+does the explanation seem. That the firefly should have become possessed
+of so elaborate a machinery, producing incidentally such splendid
+results, merely as a protection against one set of enemies for a portion
+only of the period during which they are active, is altogether
+incredible.
+
+The current theory, which we owe to Belt, is a prettier one. Certain
+insects (also certain Batrachians, reptiles, &c.) are unpalatable to the
+rapacious kinds; it is therefore a direct advantage to these unpalatable
+species to be distinguishable from all the persecuted, and the more
+conspicuous and well-known they are, the less likely are they to be
+mistaken by birds, insectivorous mammals, &c., for eatable kinds and
+caught or injured. Hence we find that many such species have acquired
+for their protection very brilliant or strongly-contrasted
+colours--warning colours--which insect-eaters come to know.
+
+The firefly, a soft-bodied, slow-flying insect, is easily caught and
+injured, but it is not fit for food, and, therefore, says the theory,
+lest it should be injured or killed by mistake, it has a fiery spark to
+warn enemies---birds, bats, and rapacious insects--that it is uneatable.
+
+The theory of warning colours is an excellent one, but it has been
+pushed too far. We have seen that one of the most common fireflies is
+diurnal in habits, or, at any rate, that it performs all the important
+business of its life by day, when it has neither bright colour nor light
+to warn its bird enemies; and out of every hundred species of
+insect-eating birds at least ninety-nine are diurnal. Raptorial insects,
+as I have said, feed freely on fireflies, so that the supposed warning
+is not for them, and it would be hard to believe that the magnificent
+display made by luminous insects is useful only in preventing accidental
+injuries to them from a few crepuscular bats and goatsuckers. And to
+believe even this we should first have to assume that bats and
+goatsuckers are differently constituted from all other creatures; for in
+other animals--insects, birds, and mammalians--the appearance of fire by
+night seems to confuse and frighten, but it certainly cannot be said to
+_warn,_ in the sense in which that word is used when we speak of the
+brilliant colours of some butterflies, or even of the gestures of some
+venomous snakes, and of the sounds they emit.
+
+Thus we can see that, while the old theory of Kirby and Spence had some
+facts to support it, the one now in vogue is purely fanciful. Until some
+better suggestion is made, it would perhaps be as well to consider the
+luminous organ as having "no very close and direct relation to present
+habits of life." About their present habits, however, especially their
+crepuscular habits, there is yet much to learn. One thing I have
+observed in them has always seemed very strange to me. Occasionally an
+individual insect is seen shining with a very large and steady light, or
+with a light which very gradually decreases and increases in power, and
+at such times it is less active than at others, remaining for long
+intervals motionless on the leaves, or moving with a very slow flight.
+In South America a firefly displaying this abnormal splendour is said to
+be dying, and it is easy to imagine how such a notion originated. The
+belief is, however, erroneous, for sometimes, on very rare occasions,
+all the insects in one place are simultaneously affected in the same
+way, and at such times they mass themselves together in myriads, as if
+for migration, or for some other great purpose. Mr. Bigg-Wither, in
+South Brazil, and D'Albertis, in New Guinea, noticed these firefly
+gatherings; I also once had the rare good fortune to witness a
+phenomenon of the kind on a very grand scale. Riding on the pampas one
+dark evening an hour after sunset, and passing from high ground
+overgrown with giant thistles to a low plain covered with long grass,
+bordering a stream of water, I found it all ablaze with myriads of
+fireflies. I noticed that all the insects gave out an exceptionally
+large, brilliant light, which shone almost steadily. The long grass was
+thickly studded with them, while they literally swarmed in the air, all
+moving up the valley with a singularly slow and languid flight. When I
+galloped down into this river of phosphorescent fire, my horse plunged
+and snorted with alarm. I succeeded at length in quieting him, and then
+rode slowly through, compelled to keep my mouth and eyes closed, so
+thickly did the insects rain on to my face. The air was laden with the
+sickening phosphorous smell they emit, but when I had once got free of
+the broad fiery zone, stretching away on either hand for miles along the
+moist valley, I stood still and gazed back for some time on a scene the
+most wonderful and enchanting I have ever witnessed.
+
+The fascinating and confusing effect which the appearance of fire at
+night has on animals is a most interesting subject; and although it is
+not probable that anything very fresh remains to be said about it, I am
+tempted to add here the results of my own experience.
+
+When travelling by night, I have frequently been struck with the
+behaviour of my horse at the sight of natural fire, or appearance of
+fire, always so different from that caused by the sight of fire
+artificially created. The steady gleam from the open window or door of a
+distant house, or even the unsteady wind-tossed flame of some lonely
+camp-fire, has only served to rouse a fresh spirit in him and the desire
+to reach it; whereas those infrequent displays of fire which nature
+exhibits, such as lightning, or the ignis fatuus, or even a cloud of
+fireflies, has always produced a disquieting effect. Experience has
+evidently taught the domestic horse to distinguish a light kindled by
+man from all others; and, knowing its character, he is just as well able
+as his rider to go towards it without experiencing that confusion of
+mind caused by a glare in the darkness, the origin and nature of which
+is a mystery. The artificially-lighted fire is to the horse only the
+possible goal of the journey, and is associated with the thought of rest
+and food. Wild animals, as a rule, at any rate in thinly-settled
+districts, do not know the meaning of any fire; it only excites
+curiosity and fear in them; and they are most disturbed at the sight of
+fires made by man, which are brighter and steadier than most natural
+fires. We can understand this sensation in animals, since we ourselves
+experience a similar one (although in a less degree and not associated
+with fear) in the effect which mere brightness has on us, both by day
+and night.
+
+On riding across the monotonous grey Patagonian uplands, where often for
+hours one sees not the faintest tinge of bright colour, the intense
+glowing crimson of a cactus-fruit, or the broad shining white bosom of
+the Patagonian eagle-buzzard (Buteo erythronotus), perched on the summit
+of a distant bush, has had a strangely fascinating effect on me, so that
+I have been unable to take my eyes off it as long as it continued before
+me. Or in passing through extensive desolate marshes, the dazzling white
+plumage of a stationary egret has exercised the same attraction. At
+night we experience the sensation in a greater degree, when the silver
+sheen of the moon makes a broad path on the water; or when a meteor
+leaves a glowing track across the sky; while a still more familiar
+instance is seen in the powerful attraction on the sight of glowing
+embers in a darkened room. The mere brightness, or vividness of the
+contrast, fascinates the mind; but the effect on man is comparatively
+weak, owing to his fiery education and to his familiarity with brilliant
+dyes artificially obtained from nature. How strong this attraction of
+mere brightness, even where there is no mystery about it, is to wild
+animals is shown by birds of prey almost invariably singling out white
+or bright-plumaged birds for attack where bright and sober-coloured
+kinds are mingled together. By night the attraction is immeasurably
+greater than by day, and the light of a fire steadily gazed at quickly
+confuses the mind. The fires which, travellers make for their protection
+actually serve to attract the beasts of prey, but the confusion and fear
+caused by the bright glare makes it safe for the traveller to lie down
+and sleep in the light. Mammals do not lose their heads altogether,
+because they are walking on firm ground where muscular exertion and an
+exercise of judgment are necessary at every step; whereas birds floating
+buoyantly and with little effort through the air are quickly bewildered.
+Incredible numbers of migratory birds kill them-selves by dashing
+against the windows of lighthouses; on bright moonlight nights the
+voyagers are comparatively safe; but during dark cloudy weather the
+slaughter is very great; over six hundred birds were killed by striking
+a lighthouse in Central America in a single night. On insects the effect
+is the same as on the higher animals: on the ground they are attracted
+by the light, but keep, like wolves and tigers, at a safe distance from
+it; when rushing through the air and unable to keep their eyes from it
+they fly into it, or else revolve about it, until, coming too close,
+their wings are singed.
+
+I find that when I am on horseback, going at a swinging gallop, a bright
+light affects me far more powerfully than when I am trudging along on
+foot. A person mounted on a bicycle and speeding over a level plain on a
+dark night, with nothing to guide him except the idea of the direction
+in his mind, would be to some extent in the position of the migratory
+bird. An exceptionally brilliant ignis fatuus flying before him would
+affect him as the gleam of a lamp placed high above the surface affects
+the migrants: he would not be able to keep his eyes from it, but would
+quickly lose the sense of direction, and probably end his career much as
+the bird does, by breaking his machine and perhaps his bones against
+some unseen obstruction in the way.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS.
+
+
+Some time ago, while turning over a quantity of rubbish in a little-used
+room, I disturbed a large black spider. Rushing forth, just in time to
+save itself from destruction through the capsizing of a pile of books,
+it paused for one moment, took a swift comprehensive glance at the
+position, then scuttled away across the floor, and was lost in an
+obscure corner of the room. This incident served to remind me of a fact
+I was nearly forgetting, that England is not a spiderless country. A
+foreigner, however intelligent, coming from warmer regions, might very
+easily make that mistake. In Buenos Ayres, the land of my nativity,
+earth teems with these interesting little creatures. They abound in and
+on the water, they swarm in the grass and herbage, which everywhere
+glistens with the silvery veil they spin over it. Indeed it is scarcely
+an exaggeration to say that there is an atmosphere of spiders, for they
+are always floating about invisible in the air; their filmy threads are
+unfelt when they fly against you; and often enough you are not even
+aware of the little arrested aeronaut hurrying over your face with feet
+lighter than the lightest thistledown.
+
+It is somewhat strange that although, where other tribes of living
+creatures are concerned, I am something of a naturalist, spiders I have
+always observed and admired in a non-scientific spirit, and this must be
+my excuse for mentioning the habits of some spiders without giving their
+specific names--an omission always vexing to the severely-technical
+naturalist. They have ministered to the love of the beautiful, the
+grotesque, and the marvellous in me; but I have never _collected_ a
+spider, and if I wished to preserve one should not know how to do it. I
+have been "familiar with the face" of these monsters so long that I have
+even learnt to love them; and I believe that if Emerson rightly predicts
+that spiders are amongst the things to be expelled from earth by the
+perfected man of the future, then a great charm and element of interest
+will be lost to nature. Though loving them, I cannot, of course, feel
+the same degree of affection towards all the members of so various a
+family. The fairy gossamer, scarce seen, a creature of wind and
+sunshine; the gem-like Epeira in the centre of its Starry web; even the
+terrestrial Salticus, with its puma-like strategy, certainly appeal more
+to our aesthetic feelings than does the slow heavy Mygale, looking at a
+distance of twenty yards away, as he approaches you, like a gigantic
+cockroach mounted on stilts. The rash fury with which the female
+wolf-spider defends her young is very admirable; but the admiration she
+excites is mingled with other feelings when we remember that the brave
+mother proves to her consort a cruel and cannibal spouse.
+
+Possibly my affection for spiders is due in a great measure to the
+compassion I have always felt for them. Pity, 'tis said, is akin to
+love; and who can help experiencing that tender emotion that considers
+the heavy affliction nature has laid on the spiders in compensation for
+the paltry drop of venom with which she, unasked, endowed them! And
+here, of course, I am alluding to the wasps. These insects, with a
+refinement of cruelty, prefer not to kill their victims outright, but
+merely maim them, then house them in cells where the grubs can vivisect
+them at leisure. This is one of those revolting facts the fastidious
+soul cannot escape from in warm climates; for in and out of open windows
+and doors, all day long, all the summer through, comes the busy
+beautiful mason-wasp. A long body, wonderfully slim at the waist, bright
+yellow legs and thorax, and a dark crimson abdomen,--what object can be
+prettier to look at? But in her life this wasp is not beautiful. At
+home in summer they were the pests of my life, for nothing would serve
+to keep them out. One day, while we were seated at dinner, a clay nest,
+which a wasp had succeeded in completing unobserved, detached itself
+from the ceiling and fell with a crash on to the table, where it was
+shattered to pieces, scattering a shower of green half-living spiders
+round it. I shall never forget the feeling of intense repugnance I
+experienced at the sight, coupled with detestation of the pretty but
+cruel little architect. There is, amongst our wasps, even a more
+accomplished spider-scourge than the mason-wasp, and I will here give a
+brief account of its habits. On the grassy pampas, dry bare spots of
+soil are resorted to by a class of spiders that either make or take
+little holes in the ground to reside in, and from which they rush forth
+to seize their prey. They also frequently sit inside their dens and
+patiently wait there for the intrusion of some bungling insect. Now, in
+summer, to a dry spot of ground like this, comes a small wasp, scarcely
+longer than a blue-bottle fly, body and wings of a deep shining purplish
+blue colour, with only a white mark like a collar on the thorax. It
+flirts its blue wings, hurrying about here and there, and is extremely
+active, and of a slender graceful figure--the type of an assassin. It
+visits and explores every crack and hole in the ground, and, if you
+watch it attentively, you will at length see it, on arriving at a hole,
+give a little start backwards. It knows that a spider lies concealed
+within. Presently, having apparently matured a plan of attack, it
+disappears into the hole and remains there for some time. Then, just
+when you are beginning to think that the little blue explorer has been
+trapped, out it rushes, flying in terror, apparently, from the spider
+who issues close behind in hot pursuit; but, before they are three
+inches away from the hole, quick as lightning the wasp turns on its
+follower, and the two become locked together in a deadly embrace.
+Looking like one insect, they spin rapidly round for a few moments, then
+up springs the wasp--victorious. The wretched victim is not dead; its
+legs move a little, but its soft body is paralyzed, and lies collapsed,
+flabby, and powerless as a stranded jellyfish. And this is the
+invariable result of every such conflict. In other classes of beings,
+even the weakest hunted thing occasionally succeeds in inflicting pain
+on its persecutor, and the small trembling mouse, unable to save itself,
+can sometimes make the cat shriek with paiu; but there is no weak spot
+in the wasp's armour, no fatal error of judgment, not even an accident,
+ever to save the wretched victim from its fate. And now comes the most
+iniquitous part of the proceeding. When the wasp has sufficiently rested
+after the struggle, it deliberately drags the disabled spider back into
+its own hole, and, having packed it away at the extremity, lays an egg
+alongside of it, then, coming out again, gathers dust and rubbish with
+which it fills up and obliterates the hole; and, having thus concluded
+its Machiavellian task, it flies cheerfully off in quest of another
+victim.
+
+The extensive Epeira family supply the mason-wasps and other
+spider-killers with the majority of their victims. These spiders have
+soft, plump, succulent bodies like pats of butter; they inhabit trees
+and bushes chiefly, where their geometric webs-betray their whereabouts;
+they are timid, comparatively innocuous, and reluctant to quit the
+shelter of their green bower, made of a rolled-up leaf; so that there
+are many reasons why they should be persecuted. They exhibit a great
+variety of curious forms; many are also very richly coloured; but even
+their brightest hues--orange, silver, scarlet--have not been given
+without regard to the colouring of their surroundings. Green-leafed
+bushes arc frequented by vividly green Epeiras, but the imitative
+resemblance does not quite end here. The green spider's method of
+escape, when the bush is roughly shaken, is to drop itself down on the
+earth, where it lies simulating death. In falling, it drops just as a
+green leaf would drop, that is, not quite so rapidly as a round, solid
+body like a beetle or spider. Now in the bushes there is another Epeira,
+in size and form like the last, but differing in colour; for instead of
+a vivid green, it is of a faded yellowish white--the exact hue of a
+dead, dried-up leaf. This spider, when it lets itself drop--for it has
+the same protective habit as the other--falls not so rapidly as a green
+freshly broken off leaf or as the green spider would fall, but with a
+slower motion, precisely like a leaf withered up till it has become
+almost light as a feather. It is not difficult to imagine how this comes
+about: either a thicker line, or a greater stiffness or tenacity of the
+viscid fluid composing the web and attached to the point the spider
+drops from, causes one to fall slower than the other. But how many
+tentative variations in the stiffness of the web material must there
+have been before the precise degree was attained enabling the two
+distinct species, differing in colour, to complete their resemblance to
+falling leaves--a fresh green leaf in one case and a dead, withered leaf
+in the other!
+
+The Tetragnatha--a genus of the Epeira family, and known also in
+England--are small spiders found on the margin of streams. Their bodies
+are slender, oblong, and resembling a canoe in shape; and when they sit
+lengthwise on a stem or blade of grass, their long, hair-like legs
+arranged straight before and behind them, it is difficult to detect
+them, so closely do they resemble a discoloured stripe on the herbage. A
+species of Tetragnatha with a curious modification of structure abounds
+on the pampas. The long leg of this spider is no thicker than a bristle
+from a pig's back, but at the extremity it is flattened and broad,
+giving it a striking resemblance to an oar. These spiders are only found
+in herbage overhanging the borders of streams: they are very numerous,
+and, having a pugnacious temper, are incessantly quarrelling; and it
+frequently happens that in these encounters, or where they are pursuing
+each other through the leaves, they drop into the water below. I
+believe, in fact, that they often drop themselves purposely into it as
+the readiest means of escape when hard pressed. When this happens, the
+advantage of the modified structure of the legs is seen. The fallen
+spider, sitting boat-like on the surface, throws out its long legs, and,
+dipping the broad ends into the water, literally rows itself rapidly to
+land.
+
+The gossamer-spider, most spiritual of living things, of which there are
+numerous species, some extremely beautiful in colouring and markings, is
+the most numerous of our spiders. Only when the declining sun flings a
+broad track of shiny silver light on the plain does one get some faint
+conception of the unnumbered millions of these buoyant little creatures
+busy weaving their gauzy veil over the earth and floating unseen, like
+an ethereal vital dust, in the atmosphere.
+
+This spider carries within its diminutive abdomen a secret which will
+possibly serve to vex subtle intellects for a long time to come; for it
+is hard to believe that merely by mechanical force, even aided by
+currents of air, a creature half as big as a barley grain can
+instantaneously snoot out filaments twenty or thirty inches long, and by
+means of which it floats itself in the air.
+
+Naturalists are now giving a great deal of attention to the migrations
+of birds in different parts of the world: might not insect and spider
+migrations be included with advantage to science in their observations?
+The common notion is that the gossamer makes use of its unique method of
+locomotion, only to shift its quarters, impelled by want of food or
+unfavourable conditions--perhaps only by a roving disposition. I believe
+that besides these incessant flittings about from place to place
+throughout the summer the gossamer-spiders have great periodical
+migrations which are, as a rule, in-visible, since a single floating web
+cannot be remarked, and each individual rises and floats away by itself
+from its own locality when influenced by the instinct. When great
+numbers of spiders rise up simultaneously over a large area, then,
+sometimes, the movement forces itself on our attention; for at such
+times the whole sky may be filled with visible masses of floating web.
+All the great movements of gossamers I have observed have occurred in
+the autumn, or, at any rate, several weeks after the summer solstice;
+and, like the migrations of birds at the same season of the year, have
+been in a northerly direction. I do not assert or believe that the
+migratory instinct in the gossamer is universal. In a moist island, like
+England, for instance, where the condition of the atmosphere is seldom
+favourable, and where the little voyagers would often be blown by
+adverse winds to perish far out at sea, it is difficult to believe that
+such migrations take place. But where they inhabit a vast area of land,
+as in South America, extending without interruption from the equator to
+the cold Magellanic regions, and where there is a long autumn of dry,
+hot weather, then such an instinct as migration might have been
+developed. For this is not a faculty merely of a few birds: the impulse
+to migrate at certain seasons affects birds, insects, and even mammals.
+In a few birds only is it highly developed, but the elementary feeling,
+out of which the wonderful habit of the swallow has grown, exists widely
+throughout animated nature. On the continent of Europe it also seems
+probable that a great autumnal movement of these spiders takes place;
+although, I must confess, I have no grounds for this statement, except
+that the floating gossamer is called in Germany "Der fliegender
+Summer"--the flying or departing summer.
+
+I have stated that all migrations of gossamers I have witnessed have
+been in the autumn; excepting in one instance, these flights occurred
+when the weather was still hot and dry. The exceptionally late migration
+was on March 22--a full month after the departure of martins,
+humming-birds, flycatchers, and most other true bird-migrants. It struck
+me as being so remarkable, and seems to lend so much force to the idea I
+have suggested, that I wish to give here an exact copy of the entries
+made at the time and on the spot in my notebook.
+
+"March 22. This afternoon, while I was out shooting, the
+gossamer-spiders presented an appearance quite new to me. Walking along
+a stream (the Conchitas, near Buenos Ayres), I noticed a broad white
+line skirting the low wet ground. This I found was caused by gossamer
+web lying in such quantities over the earth as almost to hide the grass
+ad thistles under it. The white zone was about twenty yards wide, and
+outside it only a few scattered webs were visible on the grass; its
+exact length I did not ascertain, but followed it for about two miles
+without finding the end. The spiders were so numerous that they
+continually baulked one another in their efforts to rise in the air. As
+soon as one threw out its lines they would become entangled with those
+of another spider, lanced out at the same moment; both spiders would
+immediately seem to know the cause of the trouble, for as soon as their
+lines fouled they would rush angrily towards each other, each trying to
+drive the other from the elevation. Notwithstanding these difficulties,
+numbers were continually floating off on the breeze which blew from the
+south.
+
+"I noticed three distinct species: one with a round scarlet body;
+another, velvet black, with large square cephalothorax and small pointed
+abdomen; the third and most abundant kind were of different shades of
+olive green, and varied greatly in size, the largest being fully a
+quarter of an inch in length. Apparently these spiders had been driven
+up from the low ground along the stream where it was wet, and had
+congregated along the borders of the dry ground in readiness to migrate.
+
+"25th. Went again to visit the spiders, scarcely expecting to find them,
+as, since first seeing them, we have had much wind and rain. To my
+surprise I found them in greatly increased numbers: on the tops of
+cardoons, posts, and other elevated situations they were literally lying
+together in heaps. Most of them were large and of the olive-coloured
+species; their size had probably prevented them from getting away
+earlier, but they were now floating off in great numbers, the weather
+being calm and tolerably dry. To-day I noticed a new species with a grey
+body, elegantly striped with black, and pink legs--a very pretty spider.
+
+"26th. Went again to-day and found that the whole vast army of
+gossamers, with the exception of a few stragglers sitting on posts and
+dry stalks, had vanished. They had taken advantage of the short spell of
+fine weather we are now having, after an unusually wet and boisterous
+autumn, to make their escape."
+
+Here it seemed to me that a conjunction of circumstances--first, the
+unfavourable season preventing migration at the proper time, and
+secondly, the strip of valley out of which the spiders had been driven
+to the higher ground till they were massed together--only served to make
+visible and evident that a vast annual migration takes place which we
+have only to look closely for to discover.
+
+One of the most original spiders in Buenos Ayres--mentally original, I
+mean--is a species of Pholcus; a quiet, inoffensive creature found in
+houses, and so abundant that they literally swarm where they are not
+frequently swept away from ceilings and obscure corners. Certainly it
+seems a poor spider after the dynamical and migratory gossamer; but it
+happens, curiously enough, that a study of the habits of this dusty
+domestic creature leads us incidentally into the realms of fable and
+romance. It is remarkable for the extreme length of its legs, and
+resembles in colour and general appearance a crane fly, but is double
+the size of that insect. It has a singular method of protecting itself:
+when attacked or approached even, gathering its feet together and
+fastening them to the centre of its web, it swings itself round and
+round with the velocity of a whirligig, so that it appears like a mist
+on the web, offering no point for an enemy to strike at. "When a fly is
+captured the spider approaches it cautiously and spins a web round it,
+continually narrowing the circle it describes, until the victim is
+inclosed in a cocoon-like covering. This is a common method with
+spiders; but the intelligence--for I can call it by no other word--of
+the Pholcus has supplemented this instinctive procedure with a very
+curious and unique habit. The Pholcus, in spite of its size, is a weak
+creature, possessing little venom to despatch its prey with, so that it
+makes a long and laborious task of killing a fly. A fly when caught in
+a web is a noisy creature, and it thus happens that when the
+Daddylonglegs--as Anglo-Argentines have dubbed this species--succeeds in
+snaring a captive the shrill outrageous cries of the victim are heard
+for a long time--often for ten or twelve minutes. This noise greatly
+excites other spiders in the vicinity, and presently they are seen
+quitting their webs and flurrying to the scene of conflict. Sometimes
+the captor is driven off, and then the strongest or most daring spider
+carries away the fly. But where a large colony are allowed to continue
+for a long time in undisturbed possession of a ceiling, when one has
+caught a fly he proceeds rapidly to throw a covering of web over it,
+then, cutting it away, drops it down and lets it hang suspended by a
+line at a distance of two or three feet from the ceiling. The other
+spiders arrive on the scene, and after a short investigation retreat to
+their own webs, and when the coast is clear our spider proceeds to draw
+up the captive fly, which is by this time exhausted with its struggles."
+
+Now, I have repeatedly remarked that all spiders, when the shrill
+humming of an insect caught in a web is heard near them, become
+agitated, like the Pholcus, and will, in the same way, quit their own
+webs and hurry to the point the sound proceeds from. This fact convinced
+me many years ago that spiders are attracted by the sound of musical
+instruments, such as violins, concertinas, guitars, &c., simply because
+the sound produces the same effect on them as the shrill buzzing of a
+captive fly. I have frequently seen spiders come down walls or from
+ceilings, attracted by the sound of a guitar, softly played; and by
+gently touching metal strings, stretched on a piece of wood, I have
+succeeded in attracting spiders on to the strings, within two or three
+inches of my fingers; and I always noticed that the spiders seemed to be
+eagerly searching for something which they evidently expected to find
+there, moving about in an excited manner and looking very hungry and
+fierce. I have no doubt that Pelisson's historical spider in the
+Bastille came down in a mood and with a manner just as ferocious when
+the prisoner called it with musical sounds to be fed.
+
+The spiders I have spoken of up till now are timid, inoffensive
+creatures, chiefly of the Epeira family; but there are many others
+exceedingly high-spirited and, like some of the most touchy
+hymenopteras, always prepared to "greatly quarrel" over matters of
+little moment. The Mygales, of which we have several species, are not to
+be treated with contempt. One is extremely abundant on the pampas, the
+Mygale fusca, a veritable monster, covered with dark brown hair, and
+called in the vernacular _aranea peluda_--hairy spider. In the hot
+month of December these spiders take to roaming about on the open plain,
+and are then everywhere seen travelling in a straight line with a slow
+even pace. They are very great in attitudes, and when one is approached
+it immediately throws itself back, like a pugilist preparing for an
+encounter, and stands up so erect on its four hind feet that the under
+surface of its body is displayed. Humble-bees are commonly supposed to
+carry the palm in attitudinizing; and it is wonderful to see the
+grotesque motions of these irascible insects when their nest is
+approached, elevating their abdomens and two or three legs at a time, so
+that they resemble a troupe of acrobats balancing themselves on their
+heads or hands, and kicking their legs about in the air. And to impress
+the intruder with the dangerous significance of this display they hum a
+shrill warning or challenge, and stab at the air with their naked
+stings, from which limpid drops of venom are seen to exude. These
+threatening gestures probably have an effect. In the case of the hairy
+spider, I do not think any creature, however stupid, could mistake its
+meaning when it stands suddenly up, a figure horribly grotesque; then,
+dropping down on all eights, charges violently forwards. Their long,
+shiny black, sickle-shaped falces are dangerous weapons. I knew a native
+woman who had been bitten on the leg, and who, after fourteen years,
+still suffered at intervals acute pains in the limb.
+
+The king of the spiders on the pampas is, however, not a Mygale, but a
+Lycosa of extraordinary size, light grey in colour, with a black ring
+round its middle. It is active and swift, and irritable to such a degree
+that one can scarcely help thinking that in this species nature has
+overshot her mark.
+
+When a person passes near one--say, within three or four yards of its
+lurking-place--it starts up and gives chase, and will often follow for a
+distance of thirty or forty yards. I came once very nearly being bitten
+by one of these savage creatures Riding at an easy trot over the dry
+grass, I suddenly observed a spider pursuing me, leaping swiftly along
+and keeping up with my beast. I aimed a blow with my whip, and the point
+of the lash struck the ground close to it, when it instantly leaped upon
+and ran up the lash, and was actually within three or four inches of my
+hand when I flung the whip from me.
+
+The gauchos have a very quaint ballad which tells that the city of
+Cordova was once invaded by an army of monstrous spiders, and that the
+townspeople went out with beating drums and flags flying to repel the
+invasion, and that after firing several volleys they were forced to turn
+and fly for their lives. I have no doubt that a sudden great increase of
+the man-chasing spiders, in a year exceptionally favourable to them,
+suggested this fable to some rhyming satirist of the town.
+
+In conclusion of this part of my subject, I will describe a single
+combat of a very terrible nature I once witnessed between two little
+spiders belong-ing to the same species. One had a small web against a
+wall, and of this web the other coveted possession. After vainly trying
+by a series of strategic movements to drive out the lawful owner, it
+rushed on to the web, and the two envenomed httle duellists closed in
+mortal combat. They did nothing so vulgar and natural as to make use of
+their falces, and never once actually touched each other, but the fight
+was none the less deadly. Rapidly revolving about, or leaping over, or
+passing under, each other, each endeavoured to impede or entangle his
+adversary, and the dexterity with which each avoided the cunningly
+thrown snare, trying at the same time to entangle its opponent, was
+wonderful to see. At length, after this equal battle had raged for some
+time, one of the combatants made some fatal mistake, and for a moment
+there occurred a break in his motions; instantly the other perceived his
+advantage, and began leaping backwards and forwards across his
+struggling adversary with such rapidity as to confuse the sight,
+producing the appearance of two spiders attacking a third one lying
+between them. He then changed his tactics, and began revolving round and
+round his prisoner, and very soon the poor vanquished wretch--the
+aggressor, let us hope, in the interests of justice--was closely wrapped
+in a silvery cocoon, which, unlike the cocoon the caterpillar weaves for
+itself, was also its winding-sheet.
+
+In the foregoing pages I have thrown together some of the most salient
+facts I have noted; but the spider-world still remains to me a
+wonderland of which I know comparatively nothing. Nor is any very
+intimate knowledge of spiders to be got from books, though numberless
+lists of new species are constantly being printed; for they have not yet
+had, like the social bees and ants, many loving and patient chroniclers
+of their ways. The Hubens and Lubbocks have been many; the Moggridges
+few. But even a very slight study of these most versatile and
+accomplished of nature's children gives rise to some interesting
+reflections. One fact that strikes the mind very forcibly is the
+world-wide distribution of groups of species possessing highly developed
+instincts. One is the zebra-striped Salticus, with its unique
+strategy--that is to say, unique amongst spiders. It is said that the
+Australian savage approaches a kangaroo in the open by getting up in
+sight of its prey and standing perfectly motionless till he is regarded
+as an inanimate object, and every time the animal's attention wanders
+advancing a step or two until sufficiently near to hurl his spear. The
+Salticus approaches a fly in the same manner, till near enough to make
+its spring. Another is the Trapdoor spider. Another the Dolomedes, that
+runs over the surface of the water in pursuit of its prey, and dives
+down to escape from its enemies; and, strangest of all, the Argyroneta,
+that has its luminous dwelling at the bottom of streams; and just as a
+mason carries bricks and mortar to its building, so does this spider
+carry down bubbles of air from the surface to enlarge its mysterious
+house, in which it lays its eggs and rears its young. Community of
+descent must be supposed of species having such curious and complex
+instincts; but how came these feeble creatures, unable to transport
+themselves over seas and continents like the aerial gossamer, to be so
+widely distributed, and inhabiting regions with such different
+conditions? This can only be attributed to the enormous antiquity of the
+species, and of this antiquity the earliness in which the instinct
+manifests itself in the young spiders is taken as evidence.
+
+A more important matter, the intelligence of spiders, has not yet
+received the attention it deserves. The question of insect
+intelligence--naturalists are agreed that insects do possess
+intelligence--is an extremely difficult one; probably some of our
+conclusions on this matter will have to be reconsidered. For instance,
+we regard the Order Hymenoptera as the most intelligent because most of
+the social insects are included in it; but it has not yet been proved,
+probably never will be proved, that the social instincts resulted from
+intelligence which has "lapsed." Whether ants and bees were more
+intelligent than other insects during the early stages of their organic
+societies or not, it will hardly be disputed by any naturalist who has
+observed insects for long that many solitary species display more
+intelligence in their actions than those that live in communities.
+
+The nature of the spider's food and the difficulties in the way of
+providing for their wants impose on them a life of solitude: hunger,
+perpetual watchfulness, and the sense of danger have given them a
+character of mixed ferocity and timidity. But these very conditions,
+which have made it impossible for them to form societies like some
+insects and progress to a state of things resembling civilization in
+men, have served to develop the mind that is in a spider, making of him
+a very clever barbarian-The spider's only weapon of defence---his
+falces--are as poor a protection against the assaults of his insect foes
+as are teeth and finger-nails in man employed against wolves, bears, and
+tigers. And the spider is here even worse off than man, since his
+enemies are winged and able to sweep down instantly on him from above;
+they are also protected with an invulnerable shield, and are armedwith
+deadly stings. Like man, also, the spider has a soft, unprotected body,
+while his muscular strength, compared with that of the insects he has to
+contend with, is almost _nil._ His position in nature then, with
+relation to his enemies, is like that of man; only the spider has this
+disadvantage, that he cannot combine with others for protection. That he
+does protect himself and maintains his place in nature is due, not to
+special instincts, which are utterly insufficient, but to the
+intelligence which supplements them. At the same time this superior
+cunning is closely related with, and probably results indirectly from,
+the web he is provided with, and which is almost of the nature of an
+artificial aid. Let us take the imaginary case of a man-like monkey, or
+of an arboreal man, born with a cord of great length attached to his
+waist, which could be either dragged after him or carried in a coil.
+After many accidents, experience would eventually teach him to put it to
+some use; practice would make him more and more skilful in handling it,
+and, indirectly, it would be the means of developing his latent mental
+faculties. He would begin by using it, as the monkey does its prehensile
+tail, to swing himself from branch to branch, and finally, to escape
+from an enemy or in pursuit of his prey, he would be able by means of
+his cord to drop himself with safety from the tallest trees, or fly down
+the steepest precipices. He would coil up his cord to make a bed to lie
+on, and also use it for binding branches together when building himself
+a refuge. In a close fight, he would endeavour to entangle an adversary,
+and at last he would learn to make a snare with it to capture his prey.
+To all these, and to a hundred other uses, the spider has put his web.
+And when we see him spread his beautiful geometric snare, held by lines
+fixed to widely separated points, while he sits concealed in his
+web-lined retreat amongst the leaves where every touch on the
+far-reaching structure is telegraphed to him by the communicating line
+faithfully as if a nerve had been touched, we must admire the wonderful
+perfection to which he has attained in the use of his cord. By these
+means he is able to conquer creatures too swift and strong for him, and
+make them his prey. When we see him repairing damages, weighting his
+light fabric in windy weather with pebbles or sticks, as a fisher
+weights his net, and cutting loose a captive whose great strength
+threatens the destruction of the web, then we begin to suspect that he
+has, above his special instinct, a reason that guides, modifies, and in
+many ways supplements it. It is not, however, only on these great
+occasions, when the end is sought by unusual means, that spiders show
+their intelligence; for even these things might be considered by some as
+merely parts of one great complex instinct; but at all times, in all
+things, the observer who watches them closely cannot fail to be
+convinced that they possess a guiding principle which is not mere
+instinct. What the stick or stone was to primitive man, when he had made
+the discovery that by holding it in his hand he greatly increased the
+force of his blow, the possession of a web has been to the spider in
+developing that spark of intellect which it possesses in common with all
+animal organisms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT.
+
+
+Most people are familiar with the phenomenon of "death-feigning,"
+commonly seen in coleopterous insects, and in many spiders. This highly
+curious instinct is also possessed by some vertebrates. In insects it is
+probably due to temporary paralysis occasioned by sudden concussion, for
+when beetles alight abruptly, though voluntarily, they assume that
+appearance of death, which lasts for a few moments. Some species,
+indeed, are so highly sensitive that the slightest touch, or even a
+sudden menace, will instantly throw them into this motionless,
+death-simulating condition. Curiously enough, the same causes which
+produce this trance in slow-moving species, like those of Scarabseus for
+example, have a precisely contrary effect on species endowed with great
+activity. Rapacious beetles, when disturbed, scuttle quickly out of
+sight, and some water-beetles spin about the surface, in circles or
+zigzag lines, so rapidly as to confuse the eye. Our common long-legged
+spiders (Pholcus) when approached draw their feet together in the middle
+of the web, and spin the body round with such velocity as to resemble a
+whirligig.
+
+Certain mammals and birds also possess the death-simulating instinct,
+though it is hardly possible to believe that the action springs from the
+same immediate cause in vertebrates and in insects. In the latter it
+appears to be a purely physical instinct, the direct result of an
+extraneous cause, and resembling the motions of a plant. In mammals and
+birds it is evident that violent emotion, and not the rough handling
+experienced, is the final cause of the swoon.
+
+Passing over venomous snakes, skunks, and a few other species in which
+the presence of danger excites only anger, fear has a powerful, and in
+some cases a disabling, effect on animals; and it is this paralyzing
+effect of fear on which the death-feigning instinct, found only in a few
+widely-separated species, has probably been built up by the slow
+cumulative process of natural selection.
+
+I have met with some curious instances of the paralyzing effect of fear.
+I was told by some hunters in an outlying district of the pampas of its
+effect on a jaguar they started, and which took refuge in a dense clump
+of dry reeds. Though they could see it, it was impossible to throw the
+lasso over its head, and, after vainly trying to dislodge it, they at
+length set fire to the reeds. Still it refused to stir, but lay with
+head erect, fiercely glaring at them through the flames. Finally it
+disappeared from sight in the black smoke; and when the fire had burnt
+itself out, it was found, dead and charred, in the same spot.
+
+On the pampas the gauchos frequently take the black-necked swan by
+frightening it. When the birds are feeding or resting on the grass, two
+or three men or boys on horseback go quietly to leeward of the flock,
+and when opposite to it suddenly wheel and charge it at full speed,
+uttering loud shouts, by which the birds are thrown into such terror
+that they are incapable of flying, and are quickly despatched.
+
+I have also seen gaucho boys catch the Silver-bill (Lichenops
+perspicillata) by hurling a stick or stone at the bird, then rushing at
+it, when it sits perfectly still, disabled by fear, and allows itself to
+be taken. I myself once succeeded in taking a small bird of another
+species in the same way.
+
+Amongst mammals our common fox (Canis azarae), and one of the opossums
+(Didelphys azarae), are strangely subject to the death-simulating swoon.
+For it does indeed seem strange that animals so powerful, fierce, and
+able to inflict such terrible injury with their teeth should also
+possess this safeguard, apparently more suited to weak inactive
+creatures that cannot resist or escape from an enemy and to animals very
+low down in the scale of being. When a fox is caught in a trap or run
+down by dogs he fights savagely at first, but by-and-by relaxes his
+efforts, drops on the ground, and apparently yields up the ghost. The
+deception is so well carried out, that dogs are constantly taken in by
+it, and no one, not previously acquainted with this clever trickery of
+nature, but would at once pronounce the creature dead, and worthy of
+some praise for having perished in so brave a spirit. Now, when in this
+condition of feigning death, I am quite sure that the animal does not
+altogether lose consciousness. It is exceedingly difficult to discover
+any evidence of life in the opossum; but when one withdraws a little way
+from the feigning fox, and watches him very attentively, a slight
+opening of the eye may be detected; and, finally, when left to himself,
+he does not recover and start up like an animal that has been stunned,
+but slowly and cautiously raises his head first, and only gets up when
+his foes are at a safe distance. Yet I have seen gauchos, who are very
+cruel to animals, practise the most barbarous experiments on a captive
+fox without being able to rouse it into exhibiting any sign of life.
+This has greatly puzzled me, since, if death-feigning is simply a
+cunning habit, the animal could not suffer itself to be mutilated
+without wincing. I can only believe that the fox, though not insensible,
+as its behaviour on being left to itself appears to prove, yet has its
+body thrown by extreme terror into that benumbed condition which
+simulates death, and during which it is unable to feel the tortures
+practised on it.
+
+The swoon sometimes actually takes place before the animal has been
+touched, and even when the exciting cause is at a considerable distance.
+I was once riding with a gaucho, when we saw, on the open level ground
+before us, a fox, not yet fully grown, standing still and watching our
+approach. All at once it dropped, and when we came up to the spot it was
+lying stretched out, with eyes closed, and apparently dead. Before
+passing on my companion, who said it was not the first time he had seen
+such a thing, lashed it vigorously with his whip for some moments, but
+without producing the slightest effect.
+
+The death-feigning instinct is possessed in a very marked degree by the
+spotted tinamou or common partridge of the pampas (Nothura maculosa).
+When captured, after a few violent struggles to escape, it drops its
+head, gasps two or three times, and to all appearances dies. If, when
+you have seen this, you release your hold, the eyes open instantly, and,
+with startling suddenness and a noise of wings, it is up and away, and
+beyond your reach for ever. Possibly, while your grasp is on the bird it
+does actually become insensible, though its recovery from that condition
+is almost instantaneous. Birds when captured do sometimes die in the
+hand, purely from terror. The tinamou is excessively timid, and
+sometimes when birds of this species are chased--for gaucho boys
+frequently run them down on horseback--and when they find no burrows or
+thickets to escape into, they actually drop down dead on the plain.
+Probably, when they feign death in their captor's hand, they are in
+reality very near to death.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+HUMMING-BIRDS.
+
+
+Humming-birds are perhaps the very loveliest things in nature, and many
+celebrated writers have exhausted their descriptive powers in vain
+efforts to picture them to the imagination. The temptation was certainly
+great, after describing the rich setting of tropical foliage and flower,
+to speak at length of the wonderful gem contained within it; but they
+would in this case have been wise to imitate that modest novel-writer
+who introduced a blank space on the page where the description of his
+matchless heroine should have appeared. After all that has been written,
+the first sight of a living humming-bird, so unlike in its beauty all
+other beautiful things, comes like a revelation to the mind. To give any
+true conception of it by means of mere word-painting is not more
+impossible than it would be to bottle up a supply of the "living
+sunbeams" themselves, and convey them across the Atlantic to scatter
+them in a sparkling shower over the face of England.
+
+Doubtless many who have never seen them in a state of nature imagine
+that a tolerably correct idea of their appearance can be gained from
+Gould's colossal monograph. The pictures there, however, only represent
+dead humming-birds. A dead robin is, for purposes of bird-portraiture,
+as good as a live robin; the same may be said of even many
+brilliant-plumaged species less aerial in their habits than
+humming-birds. In butterflies the whole beauty is seldom seen until the
+insect is dead, or, at any rate, captive. It was not when Wallace saw
+the Ornithoptera croesus flying about, but only when he held it in his
+hands, and opened its glorious wings, that the sight of its beauty
+overcame him so powerfully. The special kind of beauty which makes the
+first sight of a humming-bird a revelation depends on the swift singular
+motions as much as on the intense gem-like and metallic brilliancy of
+the plumage.
+
+The minute exquisite form, when the bird hovers on misty wings, probing
+the flowers with its coral spear, the fan-like tail expanded, and
+poising motionless, exhibits the feathers shot with many hues; and the
+next moment vanishes, or all but vanishes, then reappears at another
+flower only to vanish again, and so on successively, showing its
+splendours not continuously, but like the intermitted flashes of the
+firefly--this forms a picture of airy grace and loveliness that baffles
+description. All this glory disappears when the bird is dead, and even
+when it alights to rest on a bough. Sitting still, it looks like an
+exceedingly attenuated kingfisher, without the pretty plumage of that
+bird, but retaining its stiff artificial manner. No artist has been so
+bold as to attempt to depict the bird as it actually appears, when
+balanced before a flower the swift motion of the wings obliterates their
+form, making them seem like a mist encircling the body; yet it is
+precisely this formless cloud on which the glittering body hangs
+suspended, which contributes most to give the humming-bird its wonderful
+sprite-like or extra-natural appearance. How strange, then, to find
+bird-painters persisting in their efforts to show the humming-bird
+flying! When they draw it stiff and upright on its perch the picture is
+honest, if ugly; the more ambitious representation is a delusion and a
+mockery.
+
+Coming to the actual colouring--the changeful tints that glow with such
+intensity on the scale-like feathers, it is curious to find that Gould
+seems to have thought that all difficulties here had been successfully
+overcome. The "new process" he spoke so confidently about might no doubt
+be used with advantage in reproducing the coarser metallic reflections
+on a black plumage, such as we see in the corvine birds; but the
+glittering garment of the humming-bird, like the silvery lace woven by
+the Epeira, gemmed with dew and touched with rainbow-coloured light, has
+never been and never can be imitated by art.
+
+On this subject one of the latest observers of humming-birds, Mr.
+Everard im Thurn, in his work on British Guiana, has the following
+passage:--"Hardly more than one point of colour is in reality ever
+visible in any one humming-bird at one and the same time, for each point
+only shows its peculiar and glittering colour when the light falls upon
+it from a particular direction. A true representation of one of these
+birds would show it in somewhat sombre colours, except just at the one
+point which, when the bird is in the position chosen for representation,
+meets the light at the requisite angle, and that point alone should be
+shown in full brilliance of colour. A flowery shrub is sometimes seen
+surrounded by a cloud of humming-birds, all of one species, and each, of
+course, in a different position. If someone would draw such a scene as
+that, showing a different detail of colour in each bird, according to
+its position, then some idea of the actual appearance of the bird might
+be given to one who had never seen an example."
+
+It is hardly to be expected that anyone will carry out the above
+suggestion, and produce a monograph with pages ten or fifteen feet wide
+by eighteen feet long, each one showing a cloud of humming-birds of one
+species flitting about a flowery bush; but even in such a picture as
+that would be, the birds, suspended on unlovely angular projections
+instead of "hazy semicircles of indistinctness," and each with an
+immovable fleck of brightness on the otherwise sombre plumage, would be
+as unlike living humming-birds as anything in the older monographs.
+
+Whether the glittering iridescent tints and singular ornaments for which
+this family is famous result from the cumulative process of conscious or
+voluntary sexual selection, as Darwin thought, or are merely the outcome
+of a superabundant vitality, as Dr. A. R.. Wallace so strongly
+maintains, is a question which science has not yet answered
+satisfactorily. The tendency to or habit of varying in the direction of
+rich colouring and beautiful or fantastic ornament, might, for all we
+know to the contrary, have descended to humming-birds from some
+diminutive, curiously-shaped, bright-tinted, flying reptile of arboreal
+habits that lived in some far-off epoch in the world's history. It is
+not, at all events, maintained by anyone that _all_ birds sprang
+originally from one reptilian stock; and the true position of
+humming-birds in a natural classification has not yet been settled, for
+no intermediate forms exist connecting them with any other group, To the
+ordinary mind they appear utterly unlike all other feathered creatures,
+and as much entitled to stand apart as, for instance, the pigeon and
+ostrich families. It has been maintained by some writers that they are
+anatomically related to the swifts, although the differences separating
+the two families appear so great as almost to stagger belief in this
+notion. Now, however, the very latest authority on this subject, Dr.
+Schufeldt, has come to the conclusion that swifts are only greatly
+modified Passeres, and that the humming-birds should form an order by
+themselves.
+
+Leaving this question, and regarding them simply with the ornithological
+eye that does not see far below the surface of things, when we have
+sufficiently admired the unique beauty and marvellous velocity of
+humming-birds, there is little more to be said about them. They are
+lovely to the eye--indescribably so; and it is not strange that Gould
+wrote rapturously of the time when he was at length "permitted to revel
+in the delight of seeing the humming-bird in a state of nature." The
+feeling, he wrote, which animated him with regard to these most
+wonderful works of creation it was impossible to describe, and could
+only be appreciated by those who have made natural history a study, and
+who "pursue the investigations of her charming mysteries with ardour and
+delight." This we can understand; but to what an astonishing degree the
+feeling was carried in him, when, after remarking that enthusiasm and
+excitement with regard to most things in life become lessened and
+eventually deadened by time in most of us, he was able to add, "not
+so, however, I believe, with those who take up the study of the Family
+of Humming-birds!" It can only be supposed that he regarded natural
+history principally as a "science of dead animals--a _necrology_," and
+collected humming-birds just as others collect Roman coins, birds' eggs,
+old weapons, or blue china, their zeal in the pursuit and faith in its
+importance increasing with the growth of their treasures, until they at
+last come to believe that though all the enthusiasms and excitements
+which give a zest to the lives of other men fade and perish with time,
+it is not so with their particular pursuit. The more rational kind of
+pleasure experienced by the ornithologist in studying habits and
+disposition no doubt results in a great measure from the fact that the
+actions of the feathered people have a savour of intelligence in them.
+Whatever his theory or conviction about the origin of instincts may
+happen to be, or even if he has no convictions on the subject, it must
+nevertheless seem plain to him that intelligence is, after all, in most
+cases, the guiding principle of life, supplementing and modifying habits
+to bring them into closer harmony with the environment, and enlivening
+every day with countless little acts which result from judgment and
+experience, and form no part of the inherited complex instincts. The
+longer he observes any one species or individual, the more does he find
+in it to reward his attention; this is not the case, however, with
+humming-birds, which possess the avian body but do not rank mentally
+with birds. The pleasure one takes in their beauty soon evaporates, and
+is succeeded by no fresh interest, so monotonous and mechanical are all
+their actions; and we accordingly find that those who are most familiar
+with them from personal observation have very little to say about them.
+A score of hummingbirds, of as many distinct species, are less to the
+student of habits than one little brown-plurnaged bird haunting his
+garden or the rush-bed of a neighbouring stream; and, doubtless, for a
+reason similar to that which makes a lovely human face uninformed by
+intellect seem less permanently attractive than many a homelier
+countenance. He grows tired of seeing the feathered fairies perpetually
+weaving their aerial ballet-dance about the flowers, and finds it a
+relief to watch the little finch or wren or flycatcher of shy temper and
+obscure protective colouring. Perhaps it possesses a graceful form and
+melodious voice to give it aesthetic value, but even without such
+accessories he can observe it day by day with increasing interest and
+pleasure; and it only adds piquancy to the feeling to know that the
+little bird also watches him with a certain amount of intelligent
+curiosity and a great deal of suspicion, and that it studiously
+endeavours to conceal from him all the little secrets its life which he
+is bent on discovering.
+
+It has frequently been remarked that humming birds are more like insects
+than birds in disposition. Some species, on quitting their perch,
+perform wide bee-like circles about the tree before shooting away in a
+straight line. Their aimless attacks on other species approaching or
+passing near them, even on large birds like hawks and pigeons, is a
+habit they have in common with many solitary wood-boring bees. They
+also, like dragon-flies and other insects, attack each other when they
+come together while feeding; and in this case their action strangely
+resembles that of a couple of butterflies, as they revolve about each
+other and rise vertically to a great height in the air. Again, like
+insects, they are undisturbed at the presence of man while feeding, or
+even when engaged in building and incubation; and like various solitary
+bees, wasps, &c., they frequently come close to a person walking or
+standing, to hover suspended in the air within a few inches of his face;
+and if then struck at they often, insect-like, return to circle round
+his head. All other birds, even those which display the least
+versatility, and in districts where man is seldom seen, show as much
+caution as curiosity in his presence; they recognize in the upright
+unfamiliar form a living being and a possible enemy. Mr. Whiteley, who
+observed humming-birds in Peru, says it is an amusing sight to watch the
+Lesbia nuna attempting to pass to a distant spot in a straight line
+during a high wind, which, acting on the long tail feathers, carries it
+quite away from the point aimed at. Insects presenting a large surface
+to the wind are always blown from their course in the same way, for even
+in the most windy districts they never appear to learn to guide
+themselves; and I have often seen a butterfly endeavouring to reach an
+isolated flower blown from it a dozen times before it finally succeeded
+or gave up the contest. Birds when shaping their course, unless young
+and inexperienced, always make allowance for the force of the wind.
+Humming-birds often fly into open rooms, impelled apparently by a
+fearless curiosity, and may then be chased about until they drop
+exhausted or are beaten down and caught, and, as Gould says, "if then
+taken into the hand, they almost immediately feed on any sweet, or pump
+up any liquid that may be offered to them, without betraying either fear
+or resentment at the previous treatment." Wasps and bees taken in the
+same way endeavour to sting their captor, as most people know from
+experience, nor do they cease struggling violently to free themselves;
+but the dragon-fly is like the humming-bird, and is no sooner caught
+after much ill-treatment, than it will greedily devour as many flies and
+mosquitoes as one likes to offer it. Only in beings very low in the
+scale of nature do we see the instinct of self-preservation in this
+extremely simple condition, unmixed with reason or feeling, and so
+transient in its effects. The same insensibility to danger is seen when
+humming-birds are captured and confined in a room, and when, before a
+day is over, they will flutter about their captor's face and even take
+nectar from his lips.
+
+Some observers have thought that hummingbirds come nearest to
+humble-bees in their actions. I do not think so. Mr. Bates writes: "They
+do not proceed in that methodical manner which bees follow, taking the
+flowers seriatim, but skip about from one part of a tree to another in
+the most capricious manner." I have observed humble-bees a great deal,
+and feel convinced that they arc among the most highly intelligent of
+the social hymenoptera. Humming-birds, to my mind, have a much closer
+resemblance to the solitary wood-boring bees and to dragon-flies. It
+must also be borne in mind that insects have very little time in which
+to acquire experience, and that a large portion of their life, in the
+imago state, is taken up with the complex business of reproduction.
+
+The Trochilidae, although confined to one continent, promise to exceed
+all other families--even the cosmopolitan finches and warblers--in
+number of species. At present over five hundred are known, or as many as
+all the species of birds in Europe together; and good reasons exist for
+believing that very many more--not less perhaps than one or two hundred
+species--yet remain to be discovered. The most prolific region, and
+where humming-birds are most highly developed, is known to be West
+Brazil and the eastern slopes of the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. This
+is precisely the least known portion of South America; the few
+naturalists and collectors who have reached it have returned laden with
+spoil, to tell us of a region surpassing all others in the
+superabundance and beauty of its bird life. Nothing, however, which can
+be said concerning these vast unexplored areas of tropical mountain and
+forest so forcibly impresses us with the idea of the unknown riches
+contained in them as the story of the Loddigesia mirabilis. This is
+perhaps the most wonderful humming-bird known, and no one who had not
+previously seen it figured could possibly form an idea of what it is
+like from a mere description. An outline sketch of it would probably be
+taken by most people as a fantastic design representing a bird-form in
+combination with leaves, in size and shape resembling poplar leaves, but
+on leaf-stalks of an impossible length, curving and crossing each other
+so as to form geometrical figures unlike anything in nature. Yet this
+bird (a single specimen) was obtained in Peru half a century ago, and
+for upwards of twenty years after its discovery Gould tried to obtain
+others, offering as much as fifty pounds for one; but no second specimen
+ever gladdened his eyes, nor was anything more heard of it until
+Stolzmann refound it in the year 1880.
+
+The addition of many new species to the long list would, however, be a
+matter of small interest, unless fresh facts concerning their habits and
+structure were at the same time brought to light; but we can scarcely
+expect that the as yet unknown species will supply any link connecting
+the Trochilidae with other existing families of birds. The eventual
+conclusion will perhaps be that this family has come down independently
+from an exceedingly remote past, and with scarcely any modification.
+While within certain very narrow limits humming-birds vary more than
+other families, outside of these limits they appear relatively
+stationary; and, conversely, other birds exhibit least variability in
+the one direction in which humming-birds vary excessively. On account of
+a trivial difference in habit they have sometimes been separated in two
+sub-families: the Phaethornithinae, found in shady tropical forests; and
+the Trochilinae, comprising humming-birds which inhabit open sunny
+places--and to this division they mostly belong. In both of these purely
+arbitrary groups, however, the aerial habits and manner of feeding
+poised in the air are identical, although the birds living in shady
+forests, where flowers are scarce, obtain their food principally from
+the under surfaces of leaves. In their procreant habits the uniformity
+is also very great. In all cases the nest is small, deep, cup-shaped, or
+conical, composed of soft felted materials, and lined inside with
+vegetable down. The eggs are white, and never exceed two in number.
+Broadly speaking, they resemble each other as closely in habits as in
+structure; the greatest differences in habit in the most widely
+separated genera being no greater than may be found in two wrens or
+sparrows of the same genus.
+
+This persistence of character in humming-birds, both as regards
+structure and habit, seems the more remarkable when we consider their
+very wide distribution over a continent so varied in its conditions, and
+where they range from the lowest levels to the limit of perpetual snow
+on the Andes, and from the tropics to the wintry Magellanic district;
+also that a majority of genera inhabit very circumscribed areas--these
+facts, as Dr. Wallace remarks, clearly pointing to a very high
+antiquity.
+
+It is perhaps a law of nature that when a species (or group) fits itself
+to a place not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to no
+opposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so great a
+perfection as to be able easily to overcome all opposition, the
+character eventually loses its original plasticity, or tendency to vary,
+since improvement in such a case would be superfluous, and becomes, so
+to speak, crystallized in that form which continues thereafter
+unaltered. It is, at any rate, clear that while all other birds rub
+together in the struggle for existence, the humming-bird, owing to its
+aerial life and peculiar manner of seeking its food, is absolutely
+untouched by this kind of warfare, and is accordingly as far removed
+from all competition with other birds as the solitary savage is removed
+from the struggle of life affecting and modifying men in crowded
+communities. The lower kind of competition affecting hummingbirds, that
+with insects and, within the family, of species with species, has
+probably only served to intensify their unique characteristics, and,
+perhaps, to lower their intelligence.
+
+Not only are they removed from that indirect struggle for existence
+which acts so powerfully on other families, but they are also, by their
+habits and the unequalled velocity of their flight, placed out of reach
+of that direct war waged on all other small birds by the rapacious
+kinds--birds, mammals, and reptiles. One result of this immunity is that
+humming-birds are excessively numerous, albeit such slow breeders; for,
+as we have seen, they only lay two eggs, and not only so, but the second
+egg is often dropped so long after incubation has begun in the first
+that only one is really hatched. Yet Belt expressed the opinion that in
+Nicaragua, where he observed humming-birds, they out-numbered all the
+other birds together. Considering how abundant birds of all kinds are in
+that district, and that most of them have a protective colouring and lay
+several eggs, it would be impossible to accept such a statement unless
+we believed that humming-birds have, practically, no enemies.
+
+Another result of their immunity from persecution is the splendid
+colouring and strange and beautiful feather ornaments distinguishing
+them above all other birds; and excessive variation in this direction is
+due, it seems to me, to the very causes which serve to check variation
+in all other directions. In their plumage, as Martin long ago wrote,
+nature has strained at every variety of effect and revelled in an
+infinitude of modifications. How wonderful their garb is, with colours
+so varied, so intense, yet seemingly so evanescent!--the glittering
+mantle of powdered gold; the emerald green that changes to velvet black;
+ruby reds and luminous scarlets; dull bronze that brightens and burns
+like polished brass, and pale neutral tints that kindle to rose and
+lilac-coloured flame. And to the glory of prismatic colouring are added
+feather decorations, such as the racket-plumes and downy muffs of
+Spathura, the crest and frills of Lophornis, the sapphire gorget burning
+on the snow-white breast of Oreotrochilus, the fiery tail of Cometes,
+and, amongst grotesque forms, the long pointed crest-feathers,
+representing horns, and flowing-white beard adorning the piebald
+goat-like face of Oxypogon.
+
+Excessive variation in this direction is checked in nearly all other
+birds by the need of a protective colouring, few kinds so greatly
+excelling in strength and activity as to be able to maintain their
+existence without it. Bright feathers constitute a double danger, for
+not only do they render their possessor conspicuous, but, just as the
+butterfly chooses the gayest flower, so do hawks deliberately single out
+from many obscure birds the one with brilliant plumage; but the
+rapacious kinds do not waste their energies in the vain pursuit of
+hummingbirds. These are in the position of neutrals, free to range at
+will amidst the combatants, insulting all alike, and flaunting their
+splendid colours with impunity. They are nature's favourites, endowed
+with faculties bordering on the miraculous, and all other kinds, gentle
+or fierce, ask only to be left alone by them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE CRESTED SCREAMER.
+
+_(Chalina chavarria.)_
+
+
+Amongst the feathered notables from all parts of the world found
+gathered at the Zoological Gardens in London is the Crested Screamer
+from South America. It is in many respects a very singular species, and
+its large size, great strength, and majestic demeanour, with the
+surprising docility and intelligence it displays when domesticated, give
+it a character amongst birds somewhat like that of the elephant amongst
+mammals. Briefly and roughly to describe it: in size it is like a swan,
+in shape like a lapwing, only with a powerful curved gallinaceous beak.
+It is adorned with a long pointed crest and a black neck-ring, the
+plumage being otherwise of a pale slaty blue, while the legs and the
+naked skin about the eyes are bright red. On each wing, in both sexes,
+there are two formidable spurs; the first one, on the second joint, is
+an inch and a half long, nearly straight, triangular, and exceedingly
+sharp; the second spur, on the last joint, being smaller, broad, and
+curved, and roughly resembling in shape and size a lion's claw. There is
+another stinking peculiarity. The skin is _emphysematous_--that is,
+bloated and yielding to pressure. It crackles when touched, and the
+surface, when the feathers are removed, presents a swollen bubbly
+appearance; for under the skin there is a layer of air-bubbles extending
+over the whole body and even down the legs under the horny tesselated
+skin to the toes, the legs thus having a somewhat massive appearance.
+
+And now just a few words about the position of the screamer in
+systematic zoology. It is placed in the Family Palamedeidae, which
+contains only three species, but about the Order it belongs to there is
+much disagreement. It was formerly classed with the rails, and in
+popular books of Natural History still keeps its place with them. "Now
+the rail-tribe," says Professor Parker, speaking on this very matter,
+"has for a long time been burdened (on paper) with a very false army
+list. Everything alive that has had the misfortune to be possessed of
+large unwieldy feet has been added to this feeble-minded cowardly group,
+until it has become a mixed multitude with discordant voices and with
+manners and customs having no consonance or relation." He takes the
+screamer from the rail-tribe and classes it with the geese (as also does
+Professor Huxley), and concludes his study with these words:--"Amongst
+living birds there is not one possessing characters of higher interest,
+none that I am acquainted with come nearer, in some important points, to
+the lizard; and there are parts of the organization which make it very
+probable that it is one of the nearest living relations of the
+marvellous _Archaeopteryx_"--an intermediate form between birds and
+reptiles belonging to the Upper Jurassic period.
+
+The screamer's right to dwell with the geese has not been left
+unchallenged. The late Professor Garrod finds that "from considerations
+of pterylosis, visceral anatomy, myology, and osteology the screamer
+cannot be placed along with the Anserine birds." He finds that in some
+points it resembles the ostrich and rhea, and concludes: "It seems
+therefore to me that, summing these results, the screamer must have
+sprung from the primary avian stock as an independent offshoot at much
+the same time as did most of the other important families." This time,
+he further tells us, was when there occurred a general break-up of the
+ancient terrestrial bird-type, when the acquisition of wings brought
+many intruders into domains already occupied, calling forth a new
+struggle for existence, and bringing out many special qualities by means
+of natural selection.
+
+With this archaeological question I have little to do, and only quote
+the above great authorities to show that the screamer appears to be
+nearly the last descendant of an exceedingly ancient family, with little
+or no relationship to other existing families, and that its pedigree has
+been hopelessly lost in the night of an incalculable antiquity. I have
+only to speak of the bird as a part of the visible world and as it
+appears to the non-scientific lover of nature; for, curiously enough,
+while anatomists nave been laboriously seeking for the screamer's
+affinities in that "biological field which is as wide as the earth and
+deep as the sea," travellers and ornithologists have told us almost
+nothing about its strange character and habits.
+
+Though dressed with Quaker-like sobriety, and without the elegance of
+form distinguishing the swan or peacock, this bird yet appeals to the
+aesthetic feelings in man more than any species I am acquainted with.
+Voice is one of its strong points, as one might readily infer from the
+name: nevertheless the name is not an appropriate one, for though the
+bird certainly does scream, and that louder than the peacock, its scream
+is only a powerful note of alarm uttered occasionally, while the notes
+uttered at intervals in the night, or in the day-time, when it soars
+upwards like the lark of some far-off imaginary epoch in the world's
+history when all tilings, larks included, were on a gigantic scale, are.
+properly speaking, singing notes and in quality utterly unlike screams.
+Sometimes when walking across Regent's Park I bear the resounding cries
+of the bird confined there attempting to sing; above the concert of
+cranes, the screams of eagles and macaws, the howling of dogs and wolves
+and the muffled roar of lions, one can hear it all over the park. But
+those loud notes only sadden me. Exile and captivity have taken all
+joyousness from the noble singer, and a moist climate has made him
+hoarse; the long clear strains are no more, and he hurries through his
+series of confused shrieks as quickly as possible, as if ashamed of the
+performance. A lark singing high up in a sunny sky and a lark singing in
+a small cage hanging against a shady wall in a London street produce
+very different effects; and the spluttering medley of shrill and harsh
+sounds from the street singer scarcely seems to proceed from the same
+kind of bird as that matchless melody filling the blue heavens. There is
+even a greater difference in the notes of the crested screamer when
+heard in Regent's Park and when heard on the pampas, where the bird
+soars upwards until its bulky body disappears from sight, and from that
+vast elevation pours down a perpetual rain of jubilant sound.
+
+_Screamer_ being a misnomer, I prefer to call the bird by its vernacular
+name of _chaja,_ or _chakar_, a more convenient spelling.
+
+With the chakar the sexes are faithful, even in very large flocks the
+birds all being ranged in couples. When one bird begins to sing its
+partner immediately joins, but with notes entirely different in quality.
+Both birds have some short deep notes, the other notes of the female
+being long powerful notes with a trill in them; but over them sounds the
+clear piercing voice of the male, ringing forth at the close with great
+strength and purity. The song produces the effect of harmony, but,
+comparing it with human singing, it is less like a _duo_ than a
+_terzetto_ composed of bass, contralto, and soprano.
+
+At certain times, in districts favourable to them, the chakars often
+assemble in immense flocks, thousands of individuals being sometimes
+seen congregated together, and in these gatherings the birds frequently
+all sing in concert. They invariably--though without rising--sing at
+intervals during the night, "counting the hours," as the gauchos say;
+the first song being at about nine o'clock, the second at midnight, and
+the third just before dawn, but the hours vary in different districts.
+
+I was once travelling with a party of gauchos when, about midnight, it
+being intensely dark, a couple of chakars broke out singing right ahead
+of us, thus letting us know that we were approaching a watercourse,
+where we intended refreshing our horses. We found it nearly dry, and
+when we rode down to the rill of water meandering over the broad dry bed
+of the river, a flock of about a thousand chakars set up a perfect roar
+of alarm notes, all screaming together, with intervals of silence after;
+then they rose up with a mighty rush of wings. They settled down again a
+few hundred yards off, and all together burst forth in one of their
+grand midnight songs, making the plains echo for miles around.
+
+There is something strangely impressive in these spontaneous outbursts
+of a melody so powerful from one of these large flocks, and though
+accustomed to hear these birds from childhood, I have often been
+astonished at some new effect produced by a large multitude singing
+under certain conditions. Travelling alone one summer day, I carne at
+noon to a lake on the pampas called Kakel--a sheet of water narrow
+enough for one to see across. Chakars in countless numbers were gathered
+along its shores, but they were all ranged in well-defined flocks,
+averaging about five hundred birds in each flock. These flocks seemed to
+extend all round the lake, and had probably been driven by the drought
+from all the plains around to this spot. Presently one flock near me
+began singing, and continued their powerful chant for three or four
+minutes; when they ceased the next flock took up the strains, and after
+it the next, and so on until the notes of the flocks on the opposite
+shore came floating strong and clear across the water--then passed away,
+growing fainter and fainter, until once more the sound approached me
+travelling round to my side again. The effect was very curious, and I
+was astonished at the orderly way with which each flock waited its turn
+to sing, instead of a general outburst taking place after the first
+flock had given the signal. On another occasion I was still more
+impressed, for here the largest number of birds I have ever found
+congregated at one place all sung together. This was on the southern
+pampas, at a place called Gualicho, where I had ridden for an hour
+before sunset over a marshy plain where there was still much standing
+water in the rushy pools, though it was at the height of the dry season.
+This whole plain was covered with an endless flock of chakars, not in
+close order, but scattered about in pairs and small groups. In this
+desolate spot I found a small rancho inhabited by a gaucho and his
+family, and I spent the night with them. The birds were all about the
+house, apparently as tame as the domestic fowls, and when I went out to
+look for a spot for my horse to feed on, they would not fly away from
+me, but merely moved, a few steps out of my path About nine o'clock we
+were eating supper in the rancho when suddenly the entire multitude of
+birds covering the marsh for miles around burst forth into a tremendous
+evening song. It is impossible to describe the effect of this mighty
+rush of sound; but let the reader try to imagine half-a-million voices,
+each far more powerful than that one which makes itself heard all over
+Regent's Park, bursting forth on the silent atmosphere of that dark
+lonely plain. One peculiarity was that in this mighty noise, which
+sounded louder than the sea thundering on a rocky coast, I seemed to be
+able to distinguish hundreds, even thousands, of individual voices.
+Forgetting my supper, I sat motionless and overcome with astonishment,
+while the air, and even the frail rancho, seemed to be trembling in that
+tempest of sound. When it ceased my host remarked with a smile, "We are
+accustomed to this, senor--every evening we have this concert." It was a
+concert well worth riding a hundred miles to hear. But the chakar
+country is just now in a transitional state, and the precise conditions
+which made it possible for birds so large in size to form such immense
+congregations are rapidly passing away. In desert places, the bird
+subsists chiefly on leaves and seeds of aquatic plants; but when the
+vast level area of the pampas was settled by man, the ancient stiff
+grass-vegetation gave place to the soft clovers and grasses of Europe,
+and to this new food the birds took very kindly. Other circumstances
+also favoured their increase. They were never persecuted, for the
+natives do not eat them, though they are really very good--the flesh
+being something like wild goose in flavour. A _higher_ civilization is
+changing all this: the country is becoming rapidly overrun with
+emigrants, especially by Italians, the pitiless enemies of all
+bird-life.
+
+The chakars, like the skylark, love to soar upwards when singing, and at
+such times when they have risen till their dark bulky bodies appear like
+floating specks on the blue sky, or until they disappear from sight
+altogether, the notes become wonderfully etherealized by distance to a
+soft silvery sound, and it is then very delightful to listen to them.
+
+It seems strange that so ponderous a fowl with only six feet and a half
+spread of wings should possess a power of soaring equal to that of
+vultures and eagles. Even the vulture with its marvellous wing power
+soars chiefly from necessity, and when its crop is full finds no
+pleasure in "scaling the heavens by invisible stairs." The chakar leaves
+its grass-plot after feeding and soars purely for recreation, taking so
+much pleasure in its aerial exercises that in bright warm weather, in
+winter and spring, it spends a great part of the day in the upper
+regions of the air. On the earth its air is grave and its motions
+measured and majestic, and it rises with immense labour, the wings
+producing a sound like a high wind. But as the bird mounts higher,
+sweeping round as it ascends, just as vultures and eagles do, it
+gradually appears to become more buoyant, describing each succeeding
+circle with increasing grace. I can only account for this magnificent
+flight, beginning so laboriously, by supposing that the bubble space
+under the skin becomes inflated with an air lighter than atmospheric
+air, enabling a body so heavy with wings disproportionately short to
+float with such ease and evident enjoyment at the vast heights to which
+the bird ascends. The heavenward flight of a large bird is always a
+magnificent spectacle; that of the chakar is peculiarly fascinating on
+account of the resounding notes it sings while soaring, and in which the
+bird seems to exult in its sublime power and freedom.
+
+I was once very much surprised at the behaviour of a couple of chakars
+during a thunderstorm. On a still sultry day in summer I was standing
+watching masses of black cloud coming rapidly over the sky, while a
+hundred yards from me stood the two birds also apparently watching the
+approaching storm with interest. Presently the edge of the cloud touched
+the sun, and a twilight gloom fell on the earth. The very moment the sun
+disappeared the birds rose up and soon began singing their long'
+resounding notes, though it was loudly thundering at the time, while
+vivid flashes of lightning lit the black cloud overhead at short
+intervals. I watched their flight and listened to their notes, till
+suddenly as they made a wide sweep upwards they disappeared in the
+cloud, and at the same moment their voices became muffled, and seemed to
+come from an immense distance. The cloud continued emitting sharp
+flashes of lightning, but the birds never reappeared, and after six or
+seven minutes once more their notes sounded loud and clear above the
+muttering thunder. I suppose they had passed through the cloud into the
+clear atmosphere above it, but I was extremely surprised at their
+fearlessness; for as a rule when soaring birds see a storm coming they
+get out of its way, flying before it or stooping to the earth to seek
+shelter of some kind, for most living things appear to have a wholesome
+dread of thunder and lightning.
+
+When taken young the chakar becomes very tame and attached to man,
+showing no inclination to go back to a wild life. There was one kept at
+an estancia called Mangrullos, on the western frontier of Buenos Ayres,
+and the people of the house gave me a very curious account of it. The
+bird was a male, and had been reared by a soldier's wife at a frontier
+outpost called La Esperanza, about twenty-five miles from Mangrullos.
+Four years before I saw the bird the Indians had invaded the frontier,
+destroying the Esperanza settlement and all the estancias for some
+leagues around. For some weeks after the invasion the chakar wandered
+about the country, visiting all the ruined estancias, apparently in
+quest of human beings, and on arriving at Mangrullos, which had not been
+burnt and was still inhabited, it settled down at ones and never
+afterwards showed any disposition to go away. It was extremely tame,
+associating by day with the poultry, and going to roost with them at
+night OH a high perch, probably for the sake of companionship, for in a
+wild state the bird roosts on the ground. It was friendly towards all
+the members of the household except one, a peon, and against this person
+from the first the bird always displayed the greatest antipathy,
+threatening him with its wings, puffing itself out, and hissing like an
+angry goose. The man had a swarthy, beardless face, and it was
+conjectured that the chakar associated him in its mind with the savages
+who had destroyed its early home.
+
+Close to the house there was a lagoon, never dry, which was frequently
+visited by flocks of wild chakars. Whenever a flock appeared the tame
+bird would go out to join them; and though the chakars are mild-tempered
+birds and very rarely quarrel, albeit so well provided with formidable
+weapons, they invariably attacked the visitor with great fury, chasing
+him back to the house, and not ceasing their persecutions till the
+poultry-yard was reached. They appeared to regard this tame bird that
+dwelt with man as a kind of renegade, and hated him accordingly.
+
+Before he had been long at the estancia it began to be noticed that he
+followed the broods of young chickens about very assiduously, apparently
+taking great interest in their welfare, and even trying to entice them
+to follow him. A few newly-hatched chickens were at length offered to
+him as an experiment, and he immediately took charge of them with every
+token of satisfaction, conducting them about in search of food and
+imitating all the actions of a hen. Finding him so good a nurse, large
+broods were given to him, and the more the foster-chickens were the
+better he seemed pleased. It was very curious to see this big bird with
+thirty or forty little animated balls of yellow cotton following him
+about, while he moved majestically along, setting down his feet with the
+greatest care not to tread on them, and swelling himself up with jealous
+anger at the approach of a cat or dog.
+
+The intelligence, docility, and attachment to man displayed by the
+chakar in a domestic state, with perhaps other latent aptitudes only
+waiting to be developed by artificial selection, seem to make this
+species one peculiarly suited for man's protection, without which it
+must inevitably perish. It is sad to reflect that all our domestic
+animals have descended to us from those ancient times which we are
+accustomed to regard as dark or barbarous, while the effect of our
+modern so-called humane civilization has been purely destructive to
+animal life. Not one type do we rescue from the carnage going on at an
+ever-increasing rate over all the globe. To Australia and America, North
+and South, we look in vain for new domestic species, while even from
+Africa, with its numerous fine mammalian forms, and where England has
+been the conquering colonizing power for nearly a century, we take
+nothing. Even the sterling qualities of the elephant, the unique beauty
+of the zebra, appeal to us in vain. We are only teaching the tribes of
+that vast continent to exterminate a hundred noble species they would
+not tame. With grief and shame, even with dismay, we call to mind that
+our country is now a stupendous manufactory of destructive engines,
+which we are rapidly placing in the hands of all the savage and
+semi-savage peoples of the earth, thus ensuring the speedy destruction
+of all the finest types in the animal kingdom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE WOODHEWER FAMILY.
+
+_(Dendrocolaptidae.)_
+
+
+The South American Tree-creepers, or Woodhewers, as they are sometimes
+called, although confined exclusively to one continent, their range
+extending from Southern Mexico to the Magellanic islands, form one of
+the largest families of the order Passeres; no fewer than about two
+hundred and ninety species (referable to about forty-six genera) having
+been already described. As they are mostly small, inconspicuous,
+thicket-frequenting birds, shy and fond of concealment to excess, it is
+only reasonable to suppose that our list of this family is more
+incomplete than of any other family of birds known. Thus, in the
+southern Plata and north Pata-gonian districts, supposed to be
+exhausted, where my observations have been made, and where, owing to the
+open nature of the country, birds are more easily remarked than in the
+forests and marshes of the tropical region, I have made notes on the
+habits of five species, of which I did not preserve specimens, and
+which, as far as I know, have never been described and named. Probably
+long before the whole of South America has been "exhausted," there will
+be not less than four to five hundred Dendrocolaptine species known. And
+yet with the exception of that dry husk of knowledge, concerning size,
+form and colouration, which classifiers and cataloguers obtain from
+specimens, very little indeed--scarcely anything, in fact--is known
+about the Tree-creepers; and it would not be too much to say that there
+are many comparatively obscure and uninteresting species in Europe, any
+one of which has a larger literature than the entire Tree-creeper
+family. No separate work about these birds has seen the light, even in
+these days of monographs; but the reason of this comparative neglect is
+not far to seek. In the absence of any knowledge, except of the most
+fragmentary kind, of the life-habits of exotic species, the
+monograph-makers of the Old World naturally take up only the most
+important groups--i.e. the groups which most readily attract the
+traveller's eye with their gay conspicuous colouring, and which have
+acquired a wide celebrity. We thus have a succession of splendid and
+expensive works dealing separately with such groups as woodpeckers,
+trogons, humming-birds, tanagers, king-fishers, and birds of paradise;
+for with these, even if there be nothing to record beyond the usual
+dreary details and technicalities concerning geographical distribution,
+variations in size and markings of different species, &c., the little
+interest of the letter-press is compensated for in the accompanying
+plates, which are now produced on a scale of magnitude, and with so
+great a degree of perfection, as regards brilliant colouring, spirited
+attitudes and general fidelity to nature, that leaves little further
+improvement in this direction to be looked for. The Tree-creepers, being
+without the inferior charm of bright colour, offer no attraction to the
+bird-painter, whose share in the work of the pictorial monograph is, of
+course, all-important. Yet even the very slight knowledge we possess of
+this family is enough to show that in many respects it is one richly
+endowed, possessing characters of greater interest to the student of the
+instincts and mental faculties of birds, than any of |the gaily-tinted
+families I have mentioned.
+
+There is, in the Dendrocolaptidae, a splendid harvest for future
+observers of the habits of South American birds: some faint idea of its
+richness may perhaps be gathered from the small collection of the most
+salient facts known to us about them I have brought together and put in
+order in this place. And I am here departing a little from the plan
+usually observed in this book, which is chiefly occupied with matters of
+personal knowledge, seasoned with a little speculation; but in this case
+I have thought it best to supplement my own observations with those of
+others [Footnote: Azara; D'Orbigny; Darwin; Bridges; Frazer; Leotaud;
+Gaumer; Wallace; Bates; Cunningham; Stolzmann; Jelski; Durnford; Gibson;
+Burrows; Doering; White, &c.] who have collected and observed birds in
+South America, so as to give as comprehensive a survey of the family as
+I could.
+
+It is strange to find a Passerine family, numerous as the Tree-creepers,
+uniformly of one colour, or nearly so; for, with few exceptions, these
+birds have a brown plumage, without a particle of bright colour. But
+although they possess no brilliant or metallic tints, in some species,
+as we shall see, there are tints approaching to brightness.
+Notwithstanding this family likeness in colour, any person, not an
+ornithologist, looking at a collection of specimens comprising many
+genera, would hear with surprise and almost incredulity that they all
+belonged to one family, so great is the diversity exhibited in their
+structure. In size they vary from species smaller than the
+golden-crested wren to others larger than the woodcock; but the
+differences in size are as nothing compared with those shown in the form
+of the beak. Between the minute, straight, conical, tit-like beaks of
+the Laptasthenura--a tit in appearance and habits--and the extravagantly
+long, sword-shaped bill of Nasica, or the excessively attenuated,
+sickle-shaped organ in Xiphorynchus, the divergence is amazing, compared
+with what is found in other families; while between these two extremes
+there is a heterogeneous assemblage of birds with beaks like creepers,
+nuthatches, finches, tyrant-birds, woodpeckers, crows, and even curlews
+and ibises. In legs, feet and tails, there are corresponding
+differences. There are tails of all lengths and all forms; soft and
+stiff, square, acuminated, broad and fan-like, narrow and spine-like,
+and many as in the woodpeckers, and used as in that bird to support the
+body in climbing. An extremely curious modification is found in
+Sittosoma: the tail-feathers in this genus are long and graduated, and
+the shafts, projecting beyond the webs at the ends, curve downwards and
+form stiff hooks. Concerning the habits of these birds, it has only been
+reported that they climb on the trunks of trees: probably they are able
+to run vertically up or down with equal facility, and even to suspend
+themselves by their feather-hooks when engaged in dislodging insects.
+Another curious variation is found in Sylviothorhynchus, a small
+wren-like bird and the only member known of the genus, with a tail
+resembling that of the lyre-bird, the extravagantly long feathers being
+so narrow as to appear almost like shafts destitute of webs. This tail
+appears to be purely ornamental.
+
+This extreme variety in structure indicates a corresponding diversity in
+habits; and, assuming it to be a true doctrine that habits vary first
+and structure afterwards, anyone might infer from a study of their forms
+alone that these birds possess a singular plasticity, or tendency to
+vary, in their habits--or, in other words, that they are exceptionally
+intelligent; and that such a conclusion would be right I believe a study
+of their habits will serve to show.
+
+The same species is often found to differ in its manner of life in
+different localities. Some species of Xenops and Magarornis, like
+woodpeckers, climb vertically on tree-trunks in search of insect prey,
+but also, like tits, explore the smaller twigs and foliage at the
+extremity of the branches; so that the whole tree, from its root to its
+topmost foliage, is hunted over by them. The Sclerurus, although an
+inhabitant of the darkest forest, and provided with sharply-curved
+claws, never seeks its food on trees, but exclusively on the ground,
+among the decaying fallen leaves; but, strangely enough, when alarmed it
+flies to the trunk of the nearest tree, to which it clings in a vertical
+position, and, remaining silent and motionless, escapes observation by
+means of its dark protective colour. The Drymornis, a large bird, with
+feet and tail like a woodpecker, climbs on tree-trunks to seek its food;
+but also possesses the widely-different habit of resorting to the open
+plain, especially after a shower, to feed on larvae and earthworms,
+extracting them from a depth of three or four inches beneath the surface
+with its immense curved probing beak.
+
+Again, when we consider a large number of species of different groups,
+we find that there is not with the Tree-creepers, as with most families,
+any special habit or manner of life linking them together; but that, on
+the contrary, different genera, and, very frequently, different species
+belonging to one genus, possess habits peculiarly their own. In other
+families, even where the divergence is greatest, what may be taken as
+the original or ancestral habit is seldom or never quite obsolete in any
+of the members. This we see, for instance, in the woodpeckers, some of
+which have acquired the habit of seeking their food exclusively on the
+ground in open places, and even of nesting in the banks of streams. Yet
+all these wanderers, even those which have been structurally modified in
+accordance with their altered way of life, retain the primitive habit of
+clinging vertically to the trunks of trees, although the habit has lost
+its use. With the tyrant birds--a family showing an extraordinary amount
+of variation--it is the same; for the most divergent kinds are
+frequently seen reverting to the family habit of perching on an
+elevation, from which to make forays after passing insects, returning
+after each capture to the same stand. The thrushes, ranging all over the
+globe, afford another striking example. Without speaking of their
+nesting habits, their relationship appears in their love of fruit, in
+their gait, flight, statuesque attitudes, and abrupt motions.
+
+With the numerous Dendrocolaptine groups, so widely separated and
+apparently unrelated, it would be difficult indeed to say which, of
+their most striking habits is the ancestral one. Many of the smaller
+species live in trees or bushes, and in their habits resemble tits,
+warblers, wrens, and other kinds that subsist on small caterpillars,
+spiders, &c., gleaned from the leaves and smaller twigs. The Anumbius
+nests on trees, but feeds exclusively on the ground in open places;
+while other ground-feeders seek their food among dead leaves in dense
+gloomy forests. Coryphistera resembles the lark and pipit in its habits;
+Cinclodes, the wagtail; Geobates a Saxicola; Limnornis lives in reed
+beds growing in the water; Henicornis in reed beds growing out of the
+water; and many other ground species exist concealed in the grass on dry
+plains; Homorus seeks its food by digging in the loose soil and dead
+leaves about the roots of trees; while Geo-sitta, Furnarius, and
+Upercerthia obtain a livelihood chiefly by probing in the soil. It would
+not be possible within the present limits to mention in detail all the
+different modes of life of those species or groups which do not possess
+the tree-creeping habit; after them comes a long array of genera in
+which this habit is ingrained, and in which the greatly modified feet
+and claws are suited to a climbing existence. As these genera comprise
+the largest half of the family, also the largest birds in it, we might
+expect to find in the tree-creeping the parental habit of the
+Dendrocolaptidae, and that from these tropical forest groups have sprung
+the widely-diverging thicket, ground, marsh, sea-beach, and
+rock-frequenting groups. It happens, however, that these birds resemble
+each other only in their climbing feet; in the form of their beaks they
+are as wide apart as are nuthatches, woodpeckers, crows, and curlews.
+They also differ markedly in the manner of seeking their food. Some dig
+like woodpeckers in decayed wood; others probe only in soft rotten wood;
+while the humming-bird-billed Xiphorhynchus, with a beak too long and
+slender for probing, explores the interior of deep holes in the trunks
+to draw out nocturnal insects, spiders, and centipedes from their
+concealment. Xiphoco-laptes uses its sword-like beak as a lever,
+thrusting it under and forcing up the loose bark; while Dendrornis, with
+its stout corvine beak, tears the bark off.
+
+In the nesting habits the diversity is greatest. Some ground species
+excavate in the earth like kingfishers, only with greater skill, making
+cylindrical burrows often four to five feet deep, and terminating in a
+round chamber. Others build a massive oven-shaped structure of clay on a
+branch or other elevated site. Many of those that creep on trees nest in
+holes in the wood. The marsh-frequenting kinds attach spherical or oval
+domed nests to the reeds; and in some cases woven grass and clay are so
+ingeniously combined that the structure, while light as a basket, is
+perfectly impervious to the wet and practically indestructible. The most
+curious nests, however, are the large stick structures on trees and
+bushes, in the building and repairing of which the birds are in many
+cases employed more or less constantly all the year round. These stick
+nests vary greatly in form, size, and in other respects. Some have a
+spiral passage-way leading from the entrance to the nest cavity, and the
+cavity is in many cases only large enough to accommodate the bird; but
+in the gigantic structure of Homorus gutturalis it is so large that, if
+the upper half of the nest or dome were removed, a condor could
+comfortably hatch her eggs and rear her young in it. This nest is
+spherical. The allied Homorus lophotis builds a nest equally large, but
+with a small cavity for the eggs inside, and outwardly resembling a
+gigantic powder-flask, lying horizontally among the lower branches of a
+spreading tree. Pracellodomtis sibila-trix, a bird in size like the
+English house sparrow, also makes a huge nest, and places it on the
+twigs at the terminal end of a horizontal branch from twelve to fifteen
+feet above the ground; but when finished, the weight of the structure
+bears down the branch-end to within one or two feet of the surface. Mr.
+Barrows, who describes this nest, says: "When other branches of the same
+tree are similarly loaded, and other trees close at hand bear the same
+kind of fruit, the result is very picturesque." Synallaxis phryganophila
+makes a stick nest about a foot in depth, and from the top a tubular
+passage, formed of slender twigs interlaced, runs down the entire length
+of the nest, like a rain-pipe on the wall of a house, and then becoming
+external slopes upward, ending at a distance of two to three feet from
+the nest. Throughout South America there are several varieties of these
+fruit-and-stem or watering-pot shaped nests; they are not, however, all
+built by birds of one genus, while in the genus Synallaxis many species
+have no tubular passageways attached to their nests. One species--erythro
+thorax--in Yucatan, makes so large a nest of sticks, that the
+natives do not believe that so small a bird can be the builder. They say
+that when the _tzapatan_ begins to sing, all the birds in the forest
+repair to it, each one carrying a stick to add to the structure; only
+one, a tyrant-bird, brings two sticks, one for itself and one for the
+_urubu_ or vulture, that bird being considered too large, heavy, and
+ignorant of architecture to assist personally in the work.
+
+In the southern part of South America, where scattered thorn trees grow
+on a dry soil, these big nests are most abundant. "There are plains,"
+Mr. Barrows writes, "within two miles of the centre of this town
+(Concepcion, Argentine Republic), where I have stood and counted, from
+one point within a radius of twenty rods, over two hundred of these
+curious nests, varying in size from that of a small pumpkin to more than
+the volume of a barrel. Often a single tree will contain half a dozen
+nests or more; and, not unfrequently, the nests of several different
+species are seen crowding each other out of shape on the same bush or
+tree."
+
+It would be a mistake to think that the widely different nesting habits
+I have mentioned are found in different genera. I have just spoken of
+the big stick nests, with or without passage-ways, of the Synallaxes,
+yet the nest of one member of this group is simply a small straight tube
+of woven grass, the aperture only large enough to admit the finger, and
+open at both ends, so that the bird can pass in and out without turning
+round. Another species scoops a circular hollow in the soil, and builds
+over it a dome of fine woven grass. It should be mentioned that the
+nesting habits of only about fifteen out of the sixty-five species
+comprised in this genus are known to us. In the genus Furnarius the
+oven-shaped clay structure is known to be made by three species; a
+fourth builds a nest of sticks in a tree; a fifth burrows in the side of
+a bank, like a kingfisher.
+
+The explanation of the most striking features of the Dendrocolaptidae,
+their monotonous brown plumage, diversity of structure, versatile
+habits, and the marvellous development of the nest-making instinct which
+they exhibit is to be found, it appears to me, in the fact that they are
+the most defenceless of birds. They are timid, unresisting creatures,
+without strength or weapons; their movements arc less quick and vigorous
+than those of other kinds, and their flight is exceedingly feeble. The
+arboreal species flit at intervals from one tree to another; those that
+frequent thickets refuse to leave their chosen shelter; while those
+inhabiting grassy plains or marshes study concealment, and, when forced
+to rise, flutter away just above the surface, like flying-fish
+frightened from the water, and, when they have gone thirty or forty
+yards, dip into the grass or reeds again. Their life is thus one of
+perpetual danger in a far greater degree than with other passerine
+families, such as warblers, tyrants, finches, thrushes, &c.; while an
+exclusively insect diet, laboriously extracted from secret places, and
+inability to change their climate, contribute to make their existence a
+hard one. It has been with these birds as with human beings, bred in
+"misfortune's school," and subjected to keen competition. One of their
+most striking characteristics is a methodical, plodding, almost painful
+diligence of manner while seeking their food, so that when viewed side
+by side with other species, rejoicing in a gayer plumage and stronger
+flight, they seem like sober labourers that never rest among holiday
+people bent only on enjoyment. That they are able not only to maintain
+their existence, but to rise to the position of a dominant family, is
+due to an intelligence and adaptiveness exceeding that of other kinds,
+and which has been strengthened, and perhaps directly results from the
+hard conditions of their life.
+
+How great their adaptiveness and variability must be when we find that
+every portion of the South American continent is occupied by them; for
+there is really no climate, and no kind of soil or vegetation, which
+does not possess its appropriate species, modified in colour, form, and
+habits to suit the surrounding conditions. In the tropical region, so
+rich in bird life of all kinds, in forest, marsh, and savanna, they are
+everywhere abundant--food is plentiful there; but when we go to higher
+elevations avd cold sterile deserts, where their companion families of
+the tropics dwindle away and disappear, the creepers are still present,
+for they are evidently able to exist where other kinds would starve. On
+the stony plateaus of the Andes, and on the most barren spots in
+Patagonia, where no other bird is seen, there are small species of
+Synallaxis, which, in their obscure colour and motions on the ground,
+resemble mice rather than birds; indeed, the Quichua name for one of
+these Synallaxes is _ukatchtuka,_ or mouse-bird. How different is the
+life habit here from what we see in the tropical groups--the large birds
+with immense beaks, that run vertically on the trunks of the great
+forest trees!
+
+At the extreme southern extremity of the South American continent we
+find several species of Cin-clodes, seeking a subsistence like
+sandpipers on the beach; they also fly out to sea, and run about on the
+floating kelp, exploring the fronds for the small marine animals on
+which they live. In the dreary forests of Tierra del Fuego another
+creeper, Uxyurus, is by far the commonest bird. "Whether high up or low
+down, in the most gloomy, wet, and scarcely penetrable ravines," says
+Darwin, "this little bird is to be met with;" and Dr. Cunningham also
+relates that in these wintry, savage woods he was always attended in his
+walks by parties of these little creepers, which assembled to follow him
+out of curiosity.
+
+To birds placed at so great a disadvantage, by a feeble flight and other
+adverse circumstances, in the race of life bright colours would
+certainly prove fatal. It is true that brown is not in itself a
+protective colour, and the clear, almost silky browns and bright
+chestnut tints in several species are certainly not protective; but
+these species are sufficiently protected in other ways, and can afford
+to be without a strictly adaptive colour, so long as they are not
+conspicuous. In a majority of cases, however, the colour is undoubtedly
+protective, the brown hue being of a shade that assimilates very closely
+to the surroundings. There are pale yellowish browns, lined and mottled,
+in species living amidst a sere, scanty vegetation; earthy browns, in
+those frequenting open sterile or stony places; while the species that
+creep on trees in forests are dark brown in colour, and in many cases
+the feathers are mottled in such a manner as to make them curiously
+resemble the bark of a tree. The genera Lochmias and Sclerurus are the
+darkest, the plumage in these birds being nearly or quite black, washed
+or tinged with rhubarb yellow. Their black plumage would render them
+conspicuous in the sunshine, but they pass their lives in dense tropical
+forests, where the sun at noon sheds only a gloomy twilight.
+
+If "colour is ever tending to increase and to appear where it is
+absent," as Dr. Wallace believes, then we ought to find it varying in
+the direction of greater brightness in some species in a family so
+numerous and variable as the Dendrocolaptidae, however feeble and in
+need of a protective colouring these birds may be in a majority of
+pases. And this in effect we do find. In many of the dark-plumaged
+species that live in perpetual shade some parts are a very bright
+chestnut; while in a few that live in such close concealment as to be
+almost independent of protective colouring, the lower plumage has become
+pure white. A large number of species have a bright or nearly bright
+guiar spot. This is most remarkable in Synallaxis phryganophila, the
+chin being sulphur-yellow, beneath which is a spot of velvet-black, and
+on either side a white patch, the throat thus having three strongly
+contrasted colours, arranged in four divisions. The presence of this
+bright throat spot in so many species cannot very well be attributed to
+voluntary sexual selection, although believers in that theory are of
+course at liberty to imagine that when engaged in courtship, the male
+bird, or rather male and female both, as both sexes possess the spot,
+hold up their heads vertically to exhibit it. Perhaps it would be safer
+to look on it as a mere casual variation, which, like the exquisitely
+pencilled feathers and delicate tints on the concealed sides and under
+surfaces of the wings of many species possessing outwardly an obscure
+protective colouring, is neither injurious nor beneficial in any way,
+either to the birds or to the theory. It is more than probable, however,
+that in such small feeble-winged, persecuted birds, this spot of colour
+would prove highly dangerous on any conspicuous part of the body. In
+some of the more vigorous, active species, we can see a tendency towards
+a brighter colouring on large, exposed surfaces. In Auto-malus the tail
+is bright satiny rufous; in Pseudo-colaptes the entire under surface is
+rufous of a peculiar vivid tint, verging on orange or red; in Magarornis
+the bosom is black, and beautifully ornamented with small leaf-shaped
+spots of a delicate straw-colour. There are several other very pretty
+birds in this homely family; but the finest of all is Thripodectes
+flammulatus, the whole body being tortoise-shell colour, the wings and
+tail bright chesnut. The powerful tanager-like beak of this species
+seems also to show that it has diverged from its timid shade-loving
+congeners in another direction by becoming a seed and fruit eater.
+
+Probably the sober and generally protective colouring of the
+tree-creepers, even with the variability and adaptiveness displayed in
+their habits superadded, would be insufficient to preserve such feeble
+birds in the struggle of life without the further advantage derived from
+their wonderful nests. It has been said of domed nests that they are a
+danger rather than a protection, owing to their large size, which makes
+it easy for carnivorous species that prey on eggs and young birds to
+find them; while small open nests are usually well concealed. This may
+be the case with covered nests made of soft materials, loosely put
+together; but it cannot be said of the solid structure the tree-creeper
+bnilds, and which, as often as not, the bird erects in the most
+conspicuous place it can find, as if, writes Azara, it desired all the
+world to admire its work. The annual destruction of adult birds is very
+great--more than double that, I believe, which takes place in other
+passerine families. Their eggs and young are, however, practically safe
+in their great elaborate nests or deep burrows, and, as a rule, they lay
+more eggs than other kinds, the full complement being seldom less than
+five in the species I am acquainted with, while some lay as many as
+nine. Their nests are also made so as to keep out a greater pest than
+their carnivorous or egg-devouring enemies--namely, the parasitical
+starlings (Molo-thrus), which are found throughout South America, and
+are excessively abundant and destructive to birds' nests in some
+districts. In most cases, in the big, strong-domed nest or deep burrow,
+all the eggs are hatched and all the young reared, the thinning, out
+process commencing only after the brood has been led forth into a world
+beset with perils. With other families, on the contrary, the greatest
+amount of destruction falls on the eggs or fledglings. I have frequently
+kept a dozen or twenty pairs of different species--warblers, finches,
+tyrants, starlings, &c.--under observation during the breeding season,
+and have found that in some cases no young-were reared at all; in other
+cases one or two young; while, as often as not, the young actually
+reared were only parasitical starlings after all.
+
+I have still to speak of the voice of the tree-creepers, an important
+point in the study of these birds; for, though not accounted singers,
+some species emit remarkable sounds; moreover, language in birds is
+closely related to the social instinct. They seem to be rather solitary
+than gregarious; and this seems only natural in birds so timid,
+weak-winged, and hard pressed. It would also be natural to conclude from
+what has been said concerning their habits that they are comparatively
+silent; for, as a rule, vigorous social birds are loquacious and
+loud-voiced, while shy solitary kinds preservo silence, except in the
+love season. Nevertheless the creepers are loquacious and have loud
+resonant voices; this fact, however, does not really contradict a
+well-known principle, for the birds possess the social disposition in an
+eminent degree, only the social habit is kept down in them by the
+conditions of a life which makes solitude necessary. Thus, a large
+proportion of species are found to pair for life; and the only
+reasonable explanation of this habit in birds--one which is not very
+common in the mammalia--is that such species possess the social temper
+or feeling, and live in pairs only because they cannot afford to live in
+flocks. Strictly gregarious species pair only for the breeding season.
+In the creepers the attachment between the birds thus mated for life is
+very great, and, as Azara truly says of Anumbius, so fond of each
+other's society are these birds, that when one incubates the other sits
+at the entrance to the nest, and when one carries food to its young the
+other accompanies it, even if it has found nothing to cany. In these
+species that live in pairs, when the two birds are separated they are
+perpetually calling to each other, showing how impatient of solitude
+they are; while even from the more solitary kind, a high-pitched
+call-note is constantly heard in the woods, for these birds, debarred
+from associating together, satisfy their instinct by conversing with one
+another over long distances.
+
+The foregoing remarks apply to the Dendrocolap-tidae throughout the
+temperate countries of South America--the birds inhabiting extensive
+grassy plains and marshes, and districts with a scanty or scattered tree
+and bush vegetation. In the forest areas of the hotter regions it is
+different; there the birds form large gatherings or "wandering bands,"
+composed of all the different species found in each district, associated
+with birds of other families--wood-peckers, tyrant-birds, bush shrikes,
+and many others. These miscellaneous gatherings are not of rare
+occurrence, but out of the breeding season are formed daily, the birds
+beginning to assemble at about nine or ten o'clock in the morning,
+their number increasing through the day until it reaches its maximum
+between two and four o'clock in the afternoon, after which it begins to
+diminish, each bird going off to its customary shelter or
+dwelling-place. Mr. Bates, who first described these wandering bands,
+says that he could always find the particular band belonging to a
+district any day he wished, for when he failed to meet with it in one
+part of the forest he would try other paths, until he eventually found
+it. The great Amazonian forests, he tells us, appear strangely silent
+and devoid of bird life, and it is possible to ramble about for whole
+days without seeing or hearing birds. But now and then the surrounding
+trees and bushes appear suddenly swarming with them. "The bustling
+crowd loses no time, and, always moving in concert, each bird is
+occupied on its own account in searching bark, or leaf, or twig. In a
+few moments the host is gone, and the forest path remains deserted and
+silent as before." Stolzmann, who observed them in Peru, says that the
+sound caused by the busy crowd searching through the foliage, and the
+falling of dead leaves and twigs, resembles that produced by a shower of
+rain. The Indians of the Amazons, Mr. Bates writes, have a curious
+belief to explain these bird armies; they say that the Papa-uira,
+supposed to be a small grey bird, fascinates all the others, and leads
+them on a weary perpetual dance through the forest. It seems very
+wonderful that birds, at other times solitary, should thus combine daily
+in large numbers, including in their bands scores of widely different
+species, and in size ranging from those no larger than a wren to others
+as big as a magpie. It is certainly very advantageous to them. As Belt
+remarks, they play into each other's hands; for while the larger
+creepers explore the trunks of big trees, others run over the branches
+and cling to the lesser twigs, so that every tree in their route, from
+its roots to the topmost foliage, is thoroughly examined, and every
+spider and caterpillar taken, while the winged insects, driven from
+their lurking-places, are seized where they settle, or caught flying by
+the tyrant birds.
+
+I have observed the wandering bands only in Patagonia, where they are on
+a very small scale compared with those of the tropical forests. In the
+Patagonia thickets the small tit-like creeper, Laptas-thenura, is the
+prime mover; and after a considerable number of these have gathered,
+creepers of other species and genera unite with them, and finally the
+band, as it moves through the thickets, draws to itself other
+kinds--flycatchers, finches, &c.--many of the birds running or hopping
+on the ground to search for insects in the loose soil or under dead
+leaves, while others explore the thorny bushes. My observations of these
+small bands lead me to believe that everywhere in South America the
+Dendrocolaptidae are the first in combining to act in concert, and that
+the birds of other families follow their march and associate with them,
+knowing from experience that a rich harvest may be thus reaped. In the
+same way birds of various kinds follow the movements of a column of
+hunting ants, to catch the insects flying up from the earth to escape
+from their enemies; swallows also learn to keep company with the
+traveller on horseback, and, crossing and recrossing just before the
+hoofs, they catch the small twilight moths driven up from the grass.
+
+To return to the subject of voice. The tree-creepers do not possess
+melodious, or at any rate mellow notes, although in so numerous a family
+there is great variety of tone, ranging from a small reedy voice like
+the faint stridulation of a grasshopper, to the resounding,
+laughter-like, screaming concerts of Homorus, which may be heard
+distinctly two miles away. As a rule, the notes are loud ringing calls;
+and in many species the cry, rapidly reiterated, resembles a peal of
+laughter. With scarcely an exception, they possess no set song; but in
+most species that live always in pairs there are loud, vehement,
+gratulatory notes uttered by the two birds in concert when they meet
+after a brief separation. This habit they possess in common with birds
+of other families, as, for instance, the tyrants; but, in some creepers,
+out of this confused outburst of joyous sound has been developed a.
+musical performance very curious, and perhaps unique among birds. On
+meeting, the male and female, standing close together and facing each
+other, utter their clear ringing concert, one emitting loud single
+measured notes, while the notes of its fellow are rapid, rhythmical
+triplets; their voices have a joyous character, and seem to accord, thus
+producing a kind of harmony. This manner of singing is perhaps most
+perfect in the oven-bird, Furnarias, and it is very curious that the
+young birds, when only partially fledged, are constantly heard in the
+nest or oven apparently practising these duets in the intervals when the
+parents are absent; single measured notes, triplets, and long concluding
+trills are all repeated with wonderful fidelity, although these notes
+are in character utterly unlike the hunger cry, which is like that of
+other fledglings. I cannot help thinking that this fact of the young
+birds beginning to sing like the adults, while still confined in their
+dark cradle, is one of very considerable significance, especially when
+we consider the singular character of the performance; and that it might
+even be found to throw some light on the obscure question of the
+comparative antiquity of the different and widely separated
+Dendrocolaptine groups. It is a doctrine in evolutionary science that
+the early maturing of instincts in the young indicates a high antiquity
+for the species or group; and there is no reason why this principle
+should not be extended, in the case of birds at any rate, to language.
+It is true that Daines Barrington's notion that young song-birds learn
+to sing only by imitating the adults still holds its ground; and Darwin
+gives it his approval in his _Descent of Man._ It is perhaps one of
+those doctrines which are partially true, or which do not contain the
+whole truth; and it is possible to believe that, while many singing
+birds do so learn their songs, or acquire a greater proficiency in them
+from hearing the adults, in other species the song comes instinctively,
+and is, like other instincts and habits, purely an "inherited memory."
+
+The case of a species in another order of birds--Crypturi--strikes me as
+being similar to this of the oven-bird, and seems to lend some force to
+the suggestion I have made concerning the early development of voice in
+the young.
+
+Birds peculiar to South America are said by anatomists to be less
+specialized, lower, more ancient, than the birds of the northern
+continents, and among those which are considered lowest and most ancient
+are the Tinamous (rail and partridge like in their habits), birds that
+lead a solitary, retiring life, and in most cases have sweet melancholy
+voices. Rhynchotus rufescens, a bird the size of a fowl, inhabiting the
+pampas, is perhaps the sweetest-voiced, and sings with great frequency.
+Its song or call is heard oftenest towards the evening, and is composed
+of five modulated notes, flute-like in character, very expressive, and
+uttered by many individuals answering each other as they sit far apart
+concealed in the grass. As we might have expected, the faculties and
+instincts of the young of this species mature at a very early period;
+when extremely small, they abandon their parents to shift for themselves
+in solitude; and when not more than one-fourth the size they eventually
+attain, they acquire the adult plumage and are able to fly as well as an
+old bird. I observed a young bird of this species, less than a quail in
+size, at a house on the pampas, and was told that it had been taken from
+the nest when just breaking the shell; it had, therefore, never seen or
+heard the parent birds. Yet this small chick, every day at the approach
+of evening, would retire to the darkest corner of the dining room, and,
+concealed under a piece of furniture, would continue uttering its
+evening song for an hour or longer at short intervals, and rendering it
+so perfectly that I was greatly surprised to hear it; for a thrush or
+other songster at the same period of life, when attempting to sing, only
+produces a chirping sound.
+
+The early singing of the oven-bird fledgling is important, owing to the
+fact that the group it belongs to comprises the least specialized forms
+in the family. They are strong-legged, square-tailed, terrestrial birds,
+generally able to perch, have probing beaks, and build the most perfect
+mud or stick nests, or burrow in the ground. In the numerous
+tree-creeping groups, which, seem as unrelated to the oven-bird as the
+woodpecker is to the hoopoe, we find a score of wonderfully different
+forms of beak; but many of them retain the probing character, and are
+actually used to probe in rotten wood on trees, and to explore the holes
+and deep crevices in the trunk. We have also seen that some of these
+tree-creepers revert to the ancestral habit (if I may so call it) of
+seeking their food by probing in the soil. In others, like Dendrornis,
+in which the beak has lost this character, and is used to dig in the
+wood or to strip off the bark, it has not been highly specialized, and,
+compared with the woodpecker's beak, is a very imperfect organ,
+considering the purpose for which it is used. Yet, on the principle that
+"similar functional requirements frequently lead to the development of
+similar structures in animals which are otherwise very distinct"--as we
+see in the tubular tongue in honey-eaters and humming birds--we might
+have expected to find in the Dendrocolaptidae a better imitation of the
+woodpecker in so variable an organ as the beak, if not in the tongue.
+
+Probably the oven-birds, and their nearest relations--generalized,
+hardy, builders of strong nests, and prolific--represent the parental
+form; and when birds of this type had spread over the entire continent
+they became in different districts frequenters of marshes, forests,
+thickets and savannas. With altered life-habits the numerous divergent
+forms originated; some, like Xiphorynchus, retaining a probing beak in a
+wonderfully modified form, attenuated in an extreme degree, and bent
+like a sickle; others diverging more in the direction of nuthatches and
+woodpeckers.
+
+This sketch of the Dendrocolaptidae, necessarily slight and imperfect,
+is based on a knowledge of the habits of about sixty species, belonging
+to twenty-eight genera: from personal observation I am acquainted with
+less than thirty species. It is astonishing to find how little has been
+written about these most interesting birds in South America. One
+tree-creeper only, Furnarius rufus, the oven-bird _par excellence,_ has
+been mentioned, on account of its wonderful architecture, in almost
+every general work of natural history published during the present
+century; yet the oven-bird does not surpass, or even equal in interest,
+many others in this family of nearly three hundred members.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+
+In reading books of Natural History we meet with numerous instances of
+birds possessing the habit of assembling together, in many cases always
+at the same spot, to indulge in antics and dancing performances, with or
+without the accompaniment of music, vocal or instrumental; and by
+instrumental music is here meant all sounds other than vocal made
+habitually and during the more or less orderly performances; as, for
+instance, drumming and tapping noises; smiting of wings; and humming,
+whip-cracking, fan-shutting, grinding, scraping, and horn-blowing
+sounds, produced as a rule by the quills.
+
+There are human dances, in which only one person performs at a time, the
+rest of the company looking on; and some birds, in widely separated
+genera, have dances of this kind. A striking example is the Rupicola, or
+cock of-the-rock, of tropical South America. A mossy level spot of earth
+surrounded by bushes is selected for a dancing-place, and kept well
+cleared of sticks and stones; round this area the birds assemble, when a
+cock-bird, with vivid orange-scarlet crest and plumage, steps into it,
+and, with spreading wings and tail, begins a series of movements as if
+dancing a minuet; finally, carried away with excitement, he leaps and
+gyrates in the most astonishing manner, until, becoming exhausted, he
+retires, and another bird takes his place.
+
+In other species all the birds in a company unite in the set
+performances, and seem to obey an impulse which affects them
+simultaneously and in the same degree; but sometimes one bird prompts
+the others and takes a principal part. One of the most curious instances
+I have come across in reading is contained in Mr. Bigg-Wither's
+_Pioneering in South Brazil._ He relates that one morning in the dense
+forest his attention was roused by the unwonted sound of a bird
+singing--songsters being rare in that district. His men, immediately
+they caught the sound, invited him to follow them, hinting that he would
+probably witness a very curious sight. Cautiously making their way
+through the dense undergrowth, they finally came in sight of a small
+stony spot of ground, at the end of a tiny glade; and on this spot, some
+on the stone and some on the shrubs, were assembled a number of little
+birds, about the size of tom-tits, with lovely blue plumage and red
+top-knots. One was perched quite still on a twig, singing merrily, while
+the others were keeping time with wings and feet in a kind of dance, and
+all twittering an accompaniment. He watched them for some time, and was
+satisfied that they were having a ball and concert, and thoroughly
+enjoying themselves; they then became alarmed, and the performance
+abruptly terminated, the birds all going off in different directions.
+The natives told him that these little creatures were known as the
+"dancing birds."
+
+This species was probably solitary, except when assembling for the
+purpose of display; but in a majority of cases, especially in the
+Passerine order, the solitary species performs its antics alone, or with
+no witness but its mate. Azara, describing a small finch, which he aptly
+named _Oscilador,_ says that early and late in the day it mounts up
+vertically to a moderate height; then, flies off to a, distance of
+twenty yards, describing a perfect curve in its passage; turning, it
+flies back over the imaginary line it has traced, and so on repeatedly,
+appearing like a pendulum swung in space by an invisible thread.
+
+Those who seek to know the cause and origin of this kind of display and
+of song in animals are referred to Darwin's _Descent of Man_ for an
+explanation. The greater part of that work is occupied with a laborious
+argument intended to prove that the love-feeling inspires the animals
+engaged in these exhibitions, and that sexual selection, or the
+voluntary selection of mates by the females, is the final cause of all
+set musical and dancing performances, as well as of bright and
+harmonious colouring, and of ornaments.
+
+The theory, with regard to birds is, that in the love-season, when the
+males are excited and engage in courtship, the females do not fall to
+the strongest and most active, nor to those that are first in the field;
+but that in a large number of species they are endowed with a faculty
+corresponding to the aesthetic feeling or taste in man, and deliberately
+select males for their superiority in some aesthetic quality, such as
+graceful or fantastic motions, melody of voice, brilliancy of colour, or
+perfection of ornaments. Doubtless all birds were originally
+plain-coloured, without ornaments and without melody, and it is assumed
+that so it would always have been in many cases but for the action of
+this principle, which, like natural selection, has gone on accumulating
+countless small variations, tending to give a greater lustre to the
+species in each case, and resulting in all that we most admire in the
+animal world--the Rupicola's flame-coloured mantle, the peacock's crest
+and starry train, the joyous melody of the lark, and the pretty or
+fantastic dancing performances of birds.
+
+My experience is that mammals and birds, with few exceptions--probably
+there are really no exceptions--possess the habit of indulging
+frequently in more or less regular or set performances, with or without
+sound, or composed of sound exclusively; and that these performances,
+which in many animals are only discordant cries and choruses,
+and uncouth, irregular motions, in the more aerial, graceful, and
+melodious kinds take immeasurably higher, more complex, and more
+beautiful forms. Among the mammalians the instinct appears
+almost universal; but their displays are, as a rule, less admirable than
+those seen in birds. There are some kinds, it is true, like the
+squirrels and monkeys, of arboreal habits, almost birdlike in their
+restless energy, and in the swiftness and certitude of their motions, in
+which the slightest impulse can be instantly expressed in graceful or
+fantastic action; others, like the Chinchillidae family, have greatly
+developed vocal organs, and resemble birds in loquacity; but mammals
+generally, compared with birds, are slow and heavy, and not so readily
+moved to exhibitions of the kind I am discussing.
+
+The terrestrial dances, often very elaborate, of heavy birds, like those
+of the gallinaceous kind, are represented in the more volatile species
+by performances in the air, and these are very much more beautiful;
+while a very large number of birds--hawks, vultures, swifts, swallows,
+nightjars, storks, ibises, spoonbills, and gulls--circle about in the
+air, singly or in flocks. Sometimes, in serene weather, they rise to a
+vast altitude, and float about in one spot for an hour or longer at a
+stretch, showing a faint bird-cloud in the blue, that does not change
+its form, nor grow lighter and denser like a flock of starlings; but in
+the seeming confusion there is perfect order, and amidst many hundreds
+each swift- or slow-gliding figure keeps its proper distance with such
+exactitude that no two ever touch, even with the extremity of the
+long-wings, flapping or motionless:--such a multitude, and such
+miraculous precision in the endless curving motions of all the members
+of it, that the spectator can lie for an hour on his back without
+weariness watching this mystic cloud-dance in the empyrean.
+
+The black-faced ibis of Patagonia, a bird nearly as large as a turkey,
+indulges in a curious mad performance, usually in the evening when
+feeding-time is over. The birds of a flock, while winging their way to
+the roosting-place, all at once seem possessed with frenzy,
+simultaneously dashing downwards with amazing violence, doubling about
+in the most eccentric manner; and when close to the surface rising again
+to repeat the action, all the while making the air palpitate for miles
+around with their hard, metallic cries. Other ibises, also birds of
+other genera, have similar aerial performances.
+
+The displays of most ducks known to me take the form of mock fights on
+the water; one exception is the handsome and loquacious whistling
+widgeon of La Plata, which has a pretty aerial performance. A dozen or
+twenty birds rise up until they appear like small specks in the sky, and
+sometimes disappear from sight altogether; and at that great altitude
+they continue hovering in one spot, often for an hour or longer,
+alternately closing and separating; the fine, bright, whistling notes
+and flourishes of the male curiously harmonizing with the grave,
+measured notes of the female; and every time they close they slap each
+other on the wings so smartly that the sound can be distinctly heard,
+like applauding hand-claps, even after the birds have ceased to be
+visible.
+
+The rails, active, sprightly birds with powerful and varied voices, are
+great performers; but owing to the nature of the ground they inhabit and
+to their shy, suspicious character, it is not easy to observe their
+antics. The finest of the Platan rails is the ypecaha, a beautiful,
+active bird about the size of the fowl. A number of ypecahas have their
+assembling place on a small area of smooth, level ground, just above the
+water, and hemmed in by dense rush beds. First, one bird among the
+rushes emits a powerful cry, thrice repeated; and this is a note of
+invitation, quickly responded to by other birds from all sides as they
+hurriedly repair to the usual place. In a few moments they appear, to
+the number of a dozen or twenty, bursting from the rushes and running
+into the open space, and instantly beginning the performance. This is a
+tremendous screaming concert. The screams they utter have a certain
+resemblance to the human voice, exerted to its utmost pitch and
+expressive of extreme terror, frenzy, and despair. A long, piercing
+shriek, astonishing for its vehemence and power, is succeeded by a lower
+note, as if in the first the creature had well nigh exhausted itself:
+this double scream is repeated several times, and followed by other
+sounds, resembling, as they rise and fall, half smothered cries of pains
+and moans of anguish. Suddenly the unearthly shrieks are renewed in all
+their power. While screaming the birds rush from side to side, as if
+possessed with madness, the wings spread and vibrating, the long-beak
+wide open and raised vertically. This exhibition lasts three or four
+minntes, after which the assembly peacefully breaks up.
+
+The singular wattled, wing-spurred, and long-, toed jacana has a
+remarkable performance, which seems specially designed to bring out the
+concealed beauty of the silky, greenish-golden wing-quills-The birds go
+singly or in pairs, and a dozen or fifteen individuals may be found in a
+marshy place feeding within sight of each other. Occasionally, in
+response to a note of invitation, they all in a moment leave off feeding
+and fly to one spot, and, forming a close cluster, and emitting short,
+excited, rapidly repeated notes, display their wings, like beautiful
+flags grouped loosely together: some hold the wings up vertically and
+motionless; others, half open and vibrating rapidly, while still others
+wave them up and down with a slow, measured motion.
+
+In the ypecaha and jacana displays both sexes take part. A stranger
+performance is that of the spur-winged lapwing of the same region--a
+species resembling the lapwing of Europe, but a third larger, brighter
+coloured, and armed with spurs. The lapwing display, called by the
+natives its "dance," or "serious dance"--by which they mean square
+dance--requires three birds for its performance, and is, so far as I
+know, unique in this respect. The birds are so fond of it that they
+indulge in it all the year round, and at frequent intervals during the
+day, also on moonlight nights. If a person watches any two birds for
+some time--for they live in pairs--he will see another lapwing, one of a
+neighbouring couple, rise up and fly to them, leaving his own mate to
+guard their chosen ground; and instead of resenting this visit as an
+unwarranted intrusion on their domain, as they would certainly resent
+the approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it with notes and
+signs of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place themselves
+behind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid march, uttering
+resonant drumming notes in time with their movements; the notes of the
+pair behind being emitted in a stream, like a drum-roll, while the
+leader utters loud single notes at regular intervals. The march ceases;
+the leader elevates his wings and stands erect and motionless, still
+uttering loud notes; while the other two, with puffed-out plumage and
+standing exactly abreast stoop forward and downward until the tips of
+their beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their rhythmical voices to a
+murmur, remain for some time in this posture. The performance is then
+over and the visitor goes back to his own ground and mate, to receive a
+visitor himself later on.
+
+In the Passerine order, not the least remarkable displays are witnessed
+in birds that are not accounted songsters, as they do not possess the
+highly developed vocal organ confined to the suborder Oscines. The
+tyrant-birds, which represent in South America the fly-catchers of the
+Old World, all have displays of some kind; in a vast majority of cases
+these are simply joyous, excited duets between male and female, composed
+of impetuous and more or less confused notes and screams, accompanied
+with beating of wings and other gestures. In some species choruses take
+the place of duets, while in others entirely different forms of display
+have been developed. In one group--Cnipolegus--the male indulges in
+solitary antics, while the silent, modest-coloured female keeps in
+hiding. Thus, the male of Cnipolegus Hudsoni, an intensely
+black-plumaged species with a concealed white wing-band, takes his stand
+on a dead twig on the summit of a bush. At intervals he leaves his
+perch, displaying the intense white on the quills, and producing, as the
+wings are thrown open and shut alternately, the effect of successive
+flashes of light. Then suddenly the bird begins revolving in the air
+about its perch, like a moth wheeling round and close to the flame of a
+candle, emitting a series of sharp clicks and making a loud humming with
+the wings. While performing this aerial waltz the black and white on the
+quills mix, the wings appearing like a grey mist encircling the body.
+The fantastic dance over, the bird drops suddenly on to its perch again;
+and, until moved to another display, remains as stiff and motionless as
+a bird carved out of jet.
+
+The performance of the scissors-tail, another tyrant-bird, is also
+remarkable. This species is grey and white, with black head and tail and
+a crocus-yellow crest. On the wing it looks like a large swallow, but
+with the two outer tail-feathers a foot long. The scissors-tails always
+live in pairs, but at sunset several pairs assemble, the birds calling
+excitedly to each other; they then mount upwards, like rockets, to a
+great height in the anand, after wheeling about for a few moments,
+pro-cipitate themselves downwards with amazing violence in a wild
+zigzag, opening and shutting the long tail-feathers like a pair of
+shears, and producing loud whirring sounds, as of clocks being wound
+rapidly up, with a slight pause after each turn of the key. This aerial
+dance over, they alight in separate couples on the tree tops, each
+couple joining in a kind of duet of rapidly repeated, castanet-like
+sounds.
+
+The displays of the wood-hewers, or Dendrocolap-tidae, another extensive
+family, resemble those of the tyrant-birds in being chiefly duets, male
+and female singing excitedly in piercing or resonant voices, and with
+much action. The habit varies somewhat in the cachalote, a Patagonian
+species of the genus Homorus, about the size of the missel-thrush. Old
+and young birds live in a family together, and at intervals, on any fine
+day, they engage in a grand screaming contest, which may be heard
+distinctly at a distance of a mile and a half. One bird mounts on to a
+bush and calls, and instantly all the others hurry to the spot, and
+burst out into a chorus of piercing cries that sound like peals and
+shrieks of insane laughter. After the chorus, they all pursue each other
+wildly about among the bushes for some minutes.
+
+In some groups the usual duet-like performances have developed into a
+kind of harmonious singing, which is very curious and pleasant to hear.
+This is pre-eminently the case with the oven-birds, as D'Orbigney first
+remarked. Thus, in the red oven-bird, the first bird, on the appearance
+of its mate flying to join it, begins to emit loud, measured notes, and
+sometimes a continuous trill, somewhat metallic in sound; but
+immediately on the other bird striking in this introductory passage is
+changed to triplets, strongly accented on the first note, in a _tempo
+vivace;_ while the second bird utters loud single notes in the same
+time. While thus singing they stand facing each other, necks
+outstretched and tails expanded, the wings of the first bird vibrating
+rapidly to the rapid utterance, while those of the second bird beat
+measured time. The finale consists of three or four notes, uttered by
+the second bird alone, strong and clear, in an ascending scale, the last
+very piercing.
+
+In the melodists proper the displays, in a majority of cases, are
+exclusively vocal, the singer sitting still on his perch. In the
+Troupials, a family of starling-like birds numbering about one hundred
+and forty species, there are many that accompany singing with pretty or
+grotesque antics. The male screaming cow-bird of La Plata, when perched,
+emits a hollow-sounding internal note that swells at the end into a
+sharp metallic ring, almost bell-like: this is uttered with wings and
+tail spread and depressed, the whole plumage being puffed out as in a
+strutting turkey-cock, while the bird hops briskly up and down on its
+perch as if dancing. The bell-like note of the male is followed by an
+impetuous scream from the female, and the dance ends. Another species,
+the common Argentine cow-bird of La Plata, when courting puffs out his
+glossy rich violet plumage, and, with wings vibrating, emits a
+succession of deep internal notes, followed by a set song in clear,
+ringing tones; and then, suddenly taking wing, he flies straight away,
+close to the surface, fluttering like a moth, and at a distance of
+twenty to thirty yards turns and flies in a wide circle round the
+female, singing loudly all the time, hedging her in with melody as it
+were.
+
+Many songsters in widely different families possess the habit of soaring
+and falling alternately while singing, and in some cases all the aerial
+postures and movements, the swift or slow descent, vertical, often, with
+oscillations, or in a spiral, and sometimes with a succession of smooth
+oblique lapses, seem to have an admirable correspondence with the
+changing and falling voice--melody and motion being united in a more
+intimate and beautiful way than in the most perfect and poetic forms of
+human dancing.
+
+One of the soaring singers is a small yellow field-finch of La
+Plata--Sycalis luteola; and this species, like some others, changes the
+form of its display with the seasons. It lives in immense flocks, and
+during the cold season it has, like most finches, only aerial pastimes,
+the birds wheeling about in a cloud, pursuing each other with lively
+chirpings. In August, when the trees begin to blossom, the flock betakes
+itself to a plantation, and, sitting on the branches, the birds sing in
+a concert of innumerable voices, producing a great volume of sound, as
+of a high wind when heard at a distance. Heard near, it is a great mass
+of melody; not a confused tangle of musical sounds as when a host of
+Troupials sing in concert, but the notes, although numberless, seem to
+flow smoothly and separately, producing an effect on the ear similar to
+that which rain does on the sight, when the sun shines on and lightens
+up the myriads of falling drops all falling one way. In this manner the
+birds sing for hours, without intermission, every day. Then the passion
+of love infects them; the pleasant choir breaks up, and its ten thousand
+members scatter wide over the surrounding fields and pasture lands.
+During courtship the male has a feeble, sketchy music, but his singing
+is then accompanied with very charming love antics. His circlings about
+the hen-bird; his numberless advances and retreats, and little soarings
+above her when his voice swells with importunate passion; his fluttering
+lapses back to earth, where he lies prone with outspread, tremulous
+wings, a suppliant at her feet, his languishing voice meanwhile dying
+down to lispings--all these apt and graceful motions seem to express the
+very sickness of the heart. But the melody during this emotional period
+is nothing. After the business of pairing and nest-building is over, his
+musical displays take a new and finer form. He sits perched on a stalk
+above the grass, and at intervals soars up forty or fifty yards high;
+rising, he utters a series of long melodious notes; then he descends in
+a graceful spiral, the set of the motionless wings giving him the
+appearance of a slowly-falling parachute; the voice then also falls, the
+notes coming lower, sweeter, and more expressive until he reaches the
+surface. After alighting the song continues, the strains becoming
+longer, thinner, and clearer, until they dwindle to the finest threads
+of sound and faintest tinklings, as from a cithern touched by fairy
+fingers. The great charm of the song is in this slow gradation from the
+somewhat throaty notes emitted by the bird when ascendino-to the
+excessively attenuated sounds at the close.
+
+In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one species more--the
+white-banded mocking-bird of Patagonia, which greatly excels all other
+songsters known to me in the copiousness, variety and brilliant
+character of its music. Concealed in the foliage this bird will sing by
+the half-hour, reproducing with miraculous fidelity the more or less
+melodious set songs of a score of species--a strange and beautiful
+performance; but wonderful as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceases
+to admire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, as if to show by
+contrast his unapproachable superiority, bursts into his own divine
+song, uttered with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, but
+greatly exceeding, that of the skylark "singing at heaven's gate;" the
+notes issuing in a continuous torrent; the voice so brilliant and
+infinitely varied, that if "rivalry and emulation" have as large a place
+in feathered breasts as some imagine all that hear this surpassing
+melody might well languish ever after in silent despair.
+
+In a vast majority of the finest musical performances the same notes are
+uttered in the same order, and after an interval the song is repeated
+without any variation: and it seems impossible that we could in any
+other way have such beautiful contrasts and harmonious lights and
+shades--the whole song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played in
+tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in the mocking-bird's
+song: the notes never come in the same order again and again, but, as if
+inspired, in a changed order, with variations and new sounds: and here
+again it has some resemblance to the skylark's song, and might be
+described as the lark's song with endless variations and brightened and
+spiritualized in a degree that cannot be imagined.
+
+This mocking-bird is one of those species that accompany music with
+appropriate motions. And just as its song is, so to speak, inspired and
+an im-provization, unlike any song the bird has ever uttered, so its
+motions all have the same character of spontaneity, and follow no order,
+and yet have a grace and passion and a perfect harmony with the music
+unparalleled among birds possessing a similar habit. While singing he
+passes from bush to bush, sometimes delaying a few moments on and at
+others just touching the summits, and at times sinking out of sight in
+the foliage: then, in an access of rapture, soaring vertically to a
+height of a hundred feet, with measured wing-beats, like those of a
+heron: or, mounting suddenly in a wild, hurried zigzag, then slowly
+circling downwards, to sit at last with tail outspread fanwise, and
+vans, glistening white in the sunshine, expanded and vibrating, or waved
+languidly up and down, with, a motion like that of some broad-winged
+butterfly at rest on a flower.
+
+I wish now to put this question: What relation that we can see or
+imagine to the passion of love and the business of courtship, have these
+dancing and vocal performances in nine cases out of ten? In such cases,
+for instance, as that of the scissors-tail tyrant-bird, and its
+pyrotechnic evening displays, when a number of couples leave their nests
+containing eggs and young to join in a wild aerial dance: the mad
+exhibitions of ypecahas and ibises, and the jacanas' beautiful
+exhibition of grouped wings: the triplet dances of the spur-winged
+lapwing, to perform which two birds already mated are compelled to call
+in a third bird to complete the set: the harmonious duets of the
+oven-birds, and the duets and choruses of nearly all the wood-hewers,
+and the wing-slapping aerial displays of the whistling widgeons--will it
+be seriously contended that the female of this species makes choice of
+the male able to administer the most vigorous and artistic slaps?
+
+The believer in the theory would put all these cases lightly aside, to
+cite that of the male cow-bird practising antics before the female and
+drawing a wide circle of melody round her; or that of the jet-black,
+automaton-like, dancing tyrant-bird; and concerning this species he
+would probably say that the plain-plumaged female went about unseen,
+critically watching the dancing of different males, to discover the most
+excellent performer according to the traditional standard. And this was,
+in substance, what Darwin did. There are many species in which the male,
+singly or with others, practises antics or sings during the love-season
+before the female; and when all such cases, or rather those that are
+most striking and bizarre, are brought together, and when it is
+gratuitously asserted that the females _do_ choose the males that show
+off in the best manner or that sing best, a case for sexual selection
+seems to be made out. How unfair the argument is, based on these
+carefully selected cases gathered from all regions of the globe, and
+often not properly reported, is seen when we turn from the book to
+nature and closely consider the habits and actions of all the species
+inhabiting any _one_ district. We see then that such cases as those
+described and made so much of in the _Descent of Man,_ and cases like
+those mentioned in this chapter, are not essentially different in
+character, but are manifestations of one instinct, which appears to be
+almost universal among the animals. The explanation I have to offer lies
+very much on the surface and is very simple indeed, and, like that of
+Dr. Wallace with regard [Footnote: It is curious to find that Dr.
+Wallace's idea about colour has been independently hit upon by Ruskin.
+Of stones he writes in _Frondes Agrestis_:--"I have often had occasion
+to allude to the apparent connection of brilliancy of colour with vigour
+of life and purity of substance. This is pre-eminently the case in the
+mineral kingdom. The perfection with which the particles of any
+substance unite in crystallization, corresponds in that kingdom to the
+vital power in organic nature."] to colour and ornaments covers the
+whole of the facts. We see that the inferior animals, when the
+conditions of life are favourable, are subject to periodical fits of
+gladness affecting them powerfully and standing out in vivid contrast to
+their ordinary temper. And we know what this feeling is--this periodic
+intense elation which even civilized man occasionally experiences when
+in perfect health, more especially when young. There are moments when
+he is mad with joy, when he cannot keep still, when his impulse is to
+sing and shout aloud and laugh at nothing, to run and leap and exert
+himself in some extravagant way. Among the heavier mammalians the
+feeling is manifested in loud noises, bellowings and screamings, and in
+lumbering, uncouth motions--throwing up of heels, pretended panics, and
+ponderous mock battles.
+
+In smaller and livelier animals, with greater celerity and certitude in
+their motions, the feeling shows itself in more regular and often in
+more complex ways. Thus, Felidae when young, and, in very agile,
+sprightly species like the Puma, throughout life, simulate all the
+actions of an animal hunting its prey--sudden, intense excitement of
+discovery, concealment, gradual advance, masked by intervening objects,
+with intervals of watching, when they crouch motionless, the eyes
+flashing and tail waved from side to side; finally, the rush and spring,
+when the playfellow is captured, rolled over on his back and worried to
+imaginary death. Other species of the most diverse kinds, in which voice
+is greatly developed, join in noisy concerts and choruses; many of the
+cats may be mentioned, also dogs and foxes, capybaras and other
+loquacious rodents; and in the howling monkeys this kind of performance
+rises to the sublime uproar of the tropical forest at eventide.
+
+Birds are more subject to this universal joyous instinct than mammals,
+and there are times when some species are constantly overflowing with
+it; and as they are so much freer than mammals, more buoyant and
+graceful in action, more loquacious, and have voices so much finer,
+their gladness shows itself in a greater variety of ways, with more
+regular and beautiful motions, and with melody. But every species, or
+group of species, has its own inherited form or style of performance;
+and, however rude and irregular this may be, as in the case of the
+pretended stampedes and fights of wild cattle, that is the form in which
+the feeling will always be expressed. If all men, at some exceedingly
+remote period in their history, had agreed to express the common glad
+impulse, which they now express in such an infinite variety of ways or
+do not express at all, by dancing a minuet, and minuet-dancing had at
+last come to be instinctive, and taken to spontaneously by children at
+an early period, just as they take to walking "on their hind legs,"
+man's case would be like that of the inferior animals.
+
+I was one day watching a flock of plovers, quietly feeding on the
+ground, when, in a moment, all the birds were seized by a joyous
+madness, and each one, after making a vigorous peck at his nearest
+neighbour, began running wildly about, each trying in passing to peck
+other birds, while seeking by means of quick doublings to escape being
+pecked in turn. This species always expresses its glad impulse in the
+same way; but how different in form is this simple game of
+touch-who-touch-can from the triplet dances of the spur-winged lapwings,
+with their drumming music, pompous gestures, and military precision of
+movement! How different also from the aerial performance of another bird
+of the same family--the Brazilian stilt--in which one is pursued by the
+others, mounting upwards in a wild, eccentric flight until they are all
+but lost to view; and back to earth again, and then, skywards once more;
+the pursued bird when overtaken giving place to another individual, and
+the pursuing pack making the air ring with their melodious barking
+cries! How different again are all these from the aerial pastimes of the
+snipe, in which the bird, in its violent descent, is able to produce
+such wonderful, far-reaching sounds with its tail-feathers! The snipe,
+as a rule, is a solitary bird, and, like the oscillating finch mentioned
+early in this paper, is content to practise its pastimes without a
+witness. In the gregarious kinds all perform together: for this feeling,
+like fear, is eminently contagious, and the sight of one bird mad with
+joy will quickly make the whole flock mad. There are also species that
+always live in pairs, like the scissors-tails already mentioned, that
+periodically assemble in numbers for the purpose of display. The crested
+screamer, a very large bird, may also be mentioned: male and female sing
+somewhat harmoniously together, with voices of almost unparalleled
+power: but these birds also congregate in large numbers, and a thousand
+couples, or even several thousands, may be assembled together: and, at
+intervals, both by day and night, all sing in concert, their combined
+voices producing a thunderous melody which seems to shake the earth. As
+a rule, however, birds that live always in pairs do not assemble for the
+purpose of display, but the joyous instinct is expressed by duet-like
+performances between male and female. Thus, in the three South American
+Passerine families, the tyrant-birds, wood-hewers, and ant-thrushes,
+numbering together between eight and nine hundred species, a very large
+majority appear to have displays of this description.
+
+In my own experience, in cases where the male and female together, or
+assembled with others, take equal parts in the set displays, the sexes
+arc similar, or differ little; but where the female takes no part in the
+displays the superiority of the male in brightness of colour is very
+marked. One or two instances bearing on this point may be given.
+
+A scarlet-breasted troupial of La Plata perches conspicuously on a tall
+plant in afield, and at intervals soars up vertically, singing, and, at
+the highest ascending point, flight and song end in a kind of aerial
+somersault and vocal flourish at the same moment. Meanwhile, the
+dull-plumaged female is not seen and not heard: for not even a skulking
+crake lives in closer seclusion under the herbage--so widely have the
+sexes diverged in this species. Is the female, then, without an instinct
+so common r--has she no sudden fits of irrepressible gladness?
+Doubtless she has them, and manifests them down in her place of
+concealment in lively chirpings and quick motions--the simple, primitive
+form in which gladness is expressed in the class of birds. In the
+various species of the genus Cnipolegus, already mentioned, the
+difference in the sexes is just as great as in the case of the troupial:
+the solitary, intensely black, statuesque male has, we have seen, a set
+and highly fantastic performance; but on more than one occasion I have
+seen four or five females of one species meet together and have a little
+simple performance all to themselves--in form a kind of lively mock
+fight.
+
+It might be objected that when a bird takes its stand and repeats a set
+finished song at intervals for an hour at a stretch, remaining quietly
+perched, such a performance appears to be different in character from
+the irregular and simple displays which are unmistakably caused by a
+sudden glad impulse. But we are familiar with the truth that in organic
+nature great things result from small beginnings--a common flower, and
+our own bony skulls, to say nothing of the matter contained within them,
+are proofs of it. Only a limited number of species sing in a highly
+finished manner. Looking at many species, we find every gradation, every
+shade, from the simple joyous chirp and cry to the most perfect melody.
+Even in a single branch of the true vocalists we may see it--from the
+chirping bunting, and noisy but tuneless sparrow, to linnet and
+goldfinch and canary. Not only do a large majority of species show the
+singing instinct, or form of display, in a primitive, undeveloped state,
+but in that state it continues to show itself in the young of many birds
+in which melody is most highly developed in the adult. And where the
+development has been solely in the male the female never rises above
+that early stage; in her lively chirpings and little mock fights and
+chases, and other simple forms which gladness takes in birds, as well as
+in her plainer plumage, and absence of ornament, she represents the
+species at some remote period. And as with song so with antics and all
+set performances aerial or terrestrial, from those of the whale and the
+elephant to those of the smallest insect.
+
+Another point remains to be noticed, and that is the greater frequency
+and fulness in displays of all kinds, including song, during the love
+season. And here Dr. Wallace's colour and ornament theory helps us to an
+explanation. At the season of courtship, when the conditions of life are
+most favourable vitality is at its maximum, and naturally it is then
+that the proficiency in all kinds of dancing-antics, aerial and
+terrestrial, appears greatest, and that melody attains its highest
+perfection. This applies chiefly to birds, but even among birds there
+are exceptions, as we have seen in the case of the field-finch, Sycalis
+luteola. The love-excitement is doubtless pleasurable to them, and it
+takes the form in which keenly pleasurable emotions are habitually
+expressed, although not infrequently with variations due to the greater
+intensity of the feeling. In some migrants the males arrive before the
+females, and no sooner have they recovered from the effects of their
+journey than they burst out into rapturous singing; these are not
+love-strains, since the females have not yet arrived, and pairing-time
+is perhaps a mouth distant; their singing merely expresses their
+overflowing gladness. The forest at that season is vocal, not only with
+the fine melody of the true songsters, but with hoarse cawings, piercing
+cries, shrill duets, noisy choruses, drummings, boomings, trills,
+wood-tappings--every sound with which different species express the glad
+impulse; and birds like the parrot that only exert their powerful voices
+in screamings--because "they can do no other"--then scream their
+loudest. When courtship begins it has in many cases the effect of
+increasing the beauty of the performance, giving added sweetness, verve,
+and brilliance to the song, and freedom and grace to the gestures and
+motions. But, as I have said, there are exceptions. Thus, some birds
+that are good melodists at other times sing in a feeble, disjointed
+manner during courtship. In Patagonia I found that several of the birds
+with good voices--one a mocking bird--were, like the robin at home,
+autumn and winter songsters.
+
+The argument has been stated very binefly: but little would be gained by
+the mere multiplication of instances, since, however many, they would bo
+selected instances--from a single district, it is true, while those in
+the _Descent of Man_ were brought together from an immeasurably wider
+field; but the principle is the same in both cases, and to what I have
+written it may be objected that, if, instead of twenty-five, I had given
+a hundred cases, taking them as they came, they might have shown a
+larger proportion of instances like that of the cow-bird, in which the
+male has a set performance practised only during the love-season and in
+the presence of the female.
+
+It is, no doubt, true that all collections of facts relating to animal
+life present nature to us somewhat as a "fantastic realm"--unavoidably
+so, in a measure, since the writing would be too bulky, or too dry, or
+too something inconvenient, if we did not take only the most prominent
+facts that come before us, remove them from their places, where alone
+they can be seen in their proper relations to numerous other less
+prominent facts, and rearrange them patch work-wise to make up our
+literature. But I am convinced that any student of the subject who will
+cast aside his books--supposing that they have not already bred a habit
+in his mind of seeing only "in accordance with verbal statement"--and go
+directly to nature to note the actions of animals for himself--actions
+which, in many cases, appear to lose all significance when set down in
+writing--the result of such independent investigation will be a
+conviction that conscious sexual selection on the part of the female is
+not the cause of music and dancing performances in birds, nor of the
+brighter colours and ornaments that distinguish the male. It is true
+that the females of some species, both in the vertebrate and insect
+kingdoms, do exercise a preference; but in a vast majority of species
+the male takes the female he finds, or that he is able to win from other
+competitors; and if we go to the reptile class we find that in the
+ophidian order, which excels in variety and richness of colour, there is
+no such thing as preferential mating; and if we go to the insect class,
+we find that in butterflies, which surpass all creatures in their
+glorious beauty, the female gives herself up to the embrace of the first
+male that appears, or else is captured by the strongest male, just as
+she might be by a mantis or some other rapacious insect.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA.
+
+_(Lagostomus Trichodactylus.)_
+
+
+The vizcacha is perhaps the most characteristic of the South American
+Rodentia, [Footnote: "According to Mr. Waterhouse, of all rodents the
+vizcacha is most nearly related to marsupials; but in the points in
+which it approaches this order its relations are general, that is, not
+to any one marsupial species more than to another. As these points of
+affinity are believed to be real and not merely adaptive, they must be
+due in accordance with our view to inheritance from a common progenitor.
+Therefore wo must suppose either that all rodents, including the
+vizcacha, branched off from some ancient marsupial, which will naturally
+have been more or less intermediate in character with respect to all
+existing marsupials; or, that both lodents and marsupials branched off
+from a common progenitor. ... On either view we must suppose that the
+vizcacha has retained, by inheritance, more of the characters of its
+ancient progenitor than have other rodents."--DARWIN; _Origin of
+Species._] while its habits, in some respects, are more interesting than
+those of any other rodent known: it is, moreover, the most common mammal
+we have on the pampas; and all these considerations have induced me to
+write a very full account of its customs. It is necessary to add that
+since the following pages were written at my home on the pampas a great
+war of extermination has been waged against this animal by the
+landowners, which has been more fortunate in its results--or unfortunate
+if one's sympathies are with the vizcacha--than the war of the
+Australians against their imported rodent--the smaller and more prolific
+rabbit.
+
+The vizcachas on the pampas of Buenos Ayres live in societies, usually
+numbering twenty or thirty members. The village, which is called
+Vizcachera, is composed of a dozen or fifteen burrows or mouths; for one
+entrance often serves for two or more distinct holes. Often, where the
+ground is soft, there are twenty or thirty or more burrows in an old
+vizcachera; but on stony, or "tosca" soil even an old one may have no
+more than four or five burrows. They are deep wide-mouthed holes, placed
+very close together, the entire village covering an area of from one
+hundred to two hundred square feet of ground.
+
+The burrows vary greatly in extent; and usually in a vizcachera there
+are several that, at a distance of from four to six feet from the
+entrance, open into large circular chambers. From these chambers other
+burrows diverge in all directions, some running horizontally, others
+obliquely downwards to a maximum depth of six feet from the surface:
+some of these burrows or galleries communicate with those of other
+burrows. A vast amount of loose earth is thus brought up, and forms a
+very irregular mound, fifteen to thirty inches above the surrounding
+level.
+
+It will afford some conception of the numbers of these vizcacheras on
+the settled pampas when I say that, in some directions, a person might
+ride five hundred miles and never advance half a mile without seeing one
+or more of them. In districts where, as far as the eye can see, the
+plains are as level and smooth as a bowling-green, especially in winter
+when the grass is close-cropped, and where the rough giant-thistle has
+not sprung up, these mounds appear like brown or dark spots on a green
+surface. They are the only irregularities that occur to catch the eye,
+and consequently form an important feature in the scenery. In some
+places they are so near together that a person on horseback may count a
+hundred of them from one point of view.
+
+The sites of which the vizcacha invariably makes choice to work on, as
+well as his manner of burrow-ing, adapt him peculiarly to live and
+thrive on the open pampas. Other burrowing species seem always to fix
+upon some spot where there is a bank or a sudden depression in the soil,
+or where there is rank herbage, or a bush or tree, about the roots of
+which to begin their kennel. They are averse to commence digging on a
+clear level surface, either because it is not easy for them where they
+have nothing to rest their foreheads against while scratching, or
+because they possess a wary instinct that impels them to place the body
+in concealment whilst working on the surface, thus securing the
+concealment of the burrow after it is made. Certain it is that where
+large hedges have been planted on the pampas, multitudes of opossums,
+weasels, skunks, armadillos, &c., come and make their burrows beneath
+them; and where there are no hedges or trees, all these species make
+their kennels under bushes of the perennial thistle, or where there is a
+shelter of some kind. The vizcacha, on the contrary, chooses an open
+level spot, the cleanest he can find to burrow on. The first thing that
+strikes the observer when viewing the vizcachera closely is the enormous
+size of the entrance of the burrows, or, at least, of several of the
+central ones in the mound; for there are usually several smaller outside
+burrows. The pit-like opening to some of these principal burrows is
+often four to six feet across the mouth, and sometimes deep enough for a
+tall man to stand up waist-deep in. How these large entrances can be
+made on a level surface may be seen when the first burrow or burrows of
+an incipient vizcachera are formed. It is not possible to tell what
+induces a vizcacha to be the founder of a new community; for they
+increase very slowly, and furthermore are extremely fond of each other's
+society; and it is invariably one individual that leaves his native
+village to found a new and independent one. If it were to have better
+pasture at hand, then he would certainly remove to a considerable
+distance; but he merely goes from forty to fifty or sixty yards off to
+begin his work. Thus it is that in desert places, where these animals
+are rare, a solitary vizcachera is never seen; but there are always
+several close together, though there may be no others on the surrounding
+plain for leagues. When the vizcacha has made his habitation, it is but
+a single burrow, with only himself for an inhabitant, perhaps for many
+months. Sooner or later, however, others join him: and these will be the
+parents of innumerable generations; for they construct no temporary
+lodging-place, as do the armadillos and other species, but their
+posterity continues in the quiet possession of the habitations
+bequeathed to it; how long, it is impossible to say. Old men who have
+lived all their lives in one district remember that many of the
+vizcacheras around them existed when they were children. It is
+invariably a male that begins a new village, and makes his burrow in the
+following manner, though he does not always observe the same method. He
+works very straight into the earth, digging a hole twelve or fourteen
+inches wide, but not so deep, at an angle of about 25 degrees with the
+surface. But after he has progressed inwards a few feet, the vizcacha is
+no longer satisfied with merely scattering away the loose earth he
+fetches up, but cleans it away so far in a straight line from the
+entrance, and scratches so much on this line (apparently to make the
+slope gentler), that he soon forms a trench a foot or more in depth, and
+often three or four feet in length. Its use is, as I have inferred, to
+facilitate the conveying of the loose earth as far as possible from the
+entrance of the burrow. But after a while the animal is unwilling that
+it should accumulate even at the end of this long passage; he therefore
+proceeds to make two additional trenches, that form an acute, sometimes
+a right angle, converging into the first, so that when the whole is
+completed it takes the form of a capital Y.
+
+These trenches are continually deepened and lengthened as the burrow
+progresses, the angular segment of earth between them, scratched away,
+until by degrees it has been entirely conveyed off, and in its place is
+the one deep great unsymmetrical mouth I have already described. There
+are soils that will not admit of the animals working in this manner.
+Where there are large cakes of "tosca" near the surface, as in many
+localities on the southern pampas, the vizcacha makes its burrow as best
+he can, and without the regular trenches. In earths that crumble much,
+sand or gravel, he also works under great disadvantages.
+
+The burrows are made best in the black and red moulds of the pampas; but
+even in such soils the entrances of many burrows are made differently.
+In some the central trench is wanting, or is so short that there appear
+but two passages converging directly into the burrow; or these two
+trenches may be so curved inwards as to form the segment of a circle.
+Many other forms may also be noticed, but usually they appear to be only
+modifications of the most common Y-shaped system.
+
+As I have remarked that its manner of burrowing has peculiarly adapted
+the vizcacha to the pampas, it may be asked what particular advantage a
+species that makes a wide-mouthed burrow possesses over those that
+excavate in the usual way. On a declivity, or at the base of rocks or
+trees, there would be none; but on the perfectly level and shelterless
+pampas, the durability of the burrow, a circumstance favourable to the
+animal's preservation, is owing altogether to its being made in this
+way, and to several barrows being made together. The two outer trenches
+diverge so widely from the mouth that half the earth brought out is cast
+behind instead of before it, thus creating a mound of equal height about
+the entrance, by which it is secured from water during great rainfalls,
+while the cattle avoid treading over the great pit-like entrances. But
+the burrows of the dolichotis, armadillo, and other species, when made
+on perfectly level ground, are soon trod on and broken in by cattle; in
+summer they are choked up with dust and rubbish; and, the loose earth
+having all been thrown up together in a heap on one side, there is no
+barrier to the water which in eveiy great rainfall flows in and
+obliterates the kennel, drowning or driving out the tenant.
+
+I have been minute in describing the habitations of the vizcacha, as I
+esteem the subject of prime importance in considering the zoology of
+this portion of America. The vizcacha does not benefit himself alone by
+his perhaps unique style of burrowing; but this habit has proved
+advantageous to several other species, and has been so favourable to two
+of our birds that they are among the most common species found here,
+whereas without these burrows they would have been exceedingly rare,
+since the natural banks in which they breed are scarcely found anywhere
+on the pampas. I refer to the Minera (Geositta cunicularia), which makes
+its breeding-holes in the bank-like sides of the vizcacha's burrow, and
+to the little swallow (Atticora cyanoleuca) which breeds in these
+excavations when forsaken by the Minera. Few old vizcacheras are seen
+without some of these little parasitical burrows in them.
+
+Birds are not the only beings in this way related to the vizcachas: the
+fox and the weasel of the pampas live almost altogether in them. Several
+insects also frequent these burrows that are seldom found anywhere else.
+Of these the most interesting are:--a large predacious nocturnal bug,
+shining black, with red wings; a nocturnal Cicindela, a beautiful
+insect, with dark green striated wing-cases and pale red legs; also
+several diminutive wingless wasps. Of the last I have counted six
+species, most of them marked with strongly contrasted colours, black,
+red, and white. There are also other wasps that prey on the spiders
+found on the vizcachera. All these and others are so numerous on the
+mounds that dozens of them might there be collected any summer day; but
+if sought for in other situations they are exceedingly rare. If the dry
+mound of soft earth which the vizcacha elevates amidst a waste of humid,
+close-growing grass is not absolutely necessary to the existence of all
+these species, it supplies them with at least one favourable condition,
+and without doubt thereby greatly increases their numbers: they, too,
+whether predacious or preyed on, have so many relations with other
+outside species, and these again with still others, that it would be no
+mere fancy to say that probably hundreds of species are either directly
+or indirectly affected in their struggle for existence by the
+vizcacheras so abundantly sprinkled over the pampas.
+
+In winter the vizcachas seldom leave their burrows till dark, but in
+summer come out before sunset; and the vizcachera is then a truly
+interesting spectacle. Usually one of the old males first appears, and
+sits on some prominent place on the mound, apparently in no haste to
+begin his evening meal. When approached from the front he stirs not, but
+eyes the intruder with a bold indifferent stare. If the person passes to
+one side, he deigns not to turn his head.
+
+Other vizcachas soon begin to appear, each one quietly taking up his
+station at his burrow's mouth, the females, known by their greatly
+inferior size and lighter grey colour, sitting upright on their
+haunches, as if to command a better view, and indicating by divers
+sounds and gestures that fear and curiosity struggles in them for
+mastery; for they are always wilder and sprightlier in their motions
+than the males. With eyes fixed on the intruder, at intervals they dodge
+the head, emitting at the same time an internal note with great
+vehemence; and suddenly, as the danger comes nearer, they plunge
+simultaneously, with a startled cry, into their burrows. But in some
+curiosity is the strongest emotion; for, in spite of their fellow's
+contagious example, and already half down the entrance, again they start
+up to scrutinize the stranger, and will then often permit him to walk
+within five or six paces of them.
+
+Standing on the mound there is frequently a pair of burrowing owls
+(Pholeoptynx cunicularia). These birds generally make their own burrows
+to breed in, or sometimes take possession of one of the lesser outside
+burrows of the village; but their favourite residence, when not engaged
+in tending their eggs or young, is on the vizcachera. Here a pair will
+sit all day; and I have often remarked a couple close together on the
+edge of the burrow; and when the vizcacha came out in the evening,
+though but a hand's breadth from them, they did not stir, nor did he
+notice them, so accustomed are these creatures to each other. Usually a
+couple of the little burrowing Geositta are also present. They are
+lively creatures, running with great rapidity about the mound and bare
+space that surrounds it, suddenly stopping and jerking their tails in a
+slow deliberate manner, and occasionally uttering their cry, a trill, or
+series of quick short clear notes, resembling somewhat the shrill
+excessive laughter of a child. Among the grave, stationary vizcachas, of
+which they take no heed, perhaps half a dozen or more little swallows
+(Atticora cyanoleuca) are seen, now clinging altogether to the bank-like
+entrance of a burrow, now hovering over it in a moth-like manner, as if
+uncertain where to alight, and anon sweeping about in circles, but never
+ceasing their low and sorrowful notes.
+
+The vizcachera with all its incongruous inhabitants thus collected upon
+it is to a stranger one of the most novel sights the pampas afford.
+
+The vizcacha appears to be a rather common species over all the
+extensive Argentine territory; but they are so exceedingly abundant on
+the pampas inhabited by man, and comparatively so rare in the desert
+places I have been in, that I was at first much surprised at finding
+them so unequally distributed. I have also mentioned that the vizcacha
+is a tame familiar creature. This is in the pastoral districts, where
+they are never disturbed; but in wild regions, where he is scarce, he is
+exceedingly wary, coming forth long after dark, and plunging into his
+burrow on the slightest alarm, so that it is a rare thing to get a sight
+of him. The reason is evident enough; in desert regions the vizcacha has
+several deadly enemies in the larger rapacious mammals. Of these the
+puma or lion (Felis concolor) is the most numerous, as it is also the
+swiftest, most subtle, and most voracious; for, as regards these traits,
+the jaguar (F. onca) is an inferior animal. To the insatiable bloody
+appetite of this creature nothing comes amiss; he takes the male ostrich
+by surprise, and slays that wariest of wild things on his nest; He
+captures little birds with the dexterity of a cat, and hunts for diurnal
+armadillos; he comes unawares upon the deer and huanaco, and, springing
+like lightning on them, dislocates their necks before their bodies touch
+the earth. Often after he has thus slain them, he leaves their bodies
+untouched for the Polyborus and vulture to feast on, so great a delight
+does he take in destroying life. The vizcacha falls an easy victim to
+this subtle creature; and it is not to be wondered at that it becomes
+wild to excess, and rare in regions hunted over by such an enemy, even
+when all other conditions are favourable to its increase. But as soon
+as these wild regions are settled by man the pumas are exterminated, and
+the sole remaining foe of the vizcacha is the fox, comparatively an
+insignificant one.
+
+The fox takes up his residence in a vizcachera, and succeeds, after
+some quarrelling (manifested in snarls, growls, and other subterranean
+warlike sounds), in ejecting the rightful owners of one of the burrows,
+which forthwith becomes his. Certainly the vizcachas are not much
+injured by being compelled to relinquish the use of one of their kennels
+for a season or permanently; for, if the locality suits him, the fox
+remains with them always. Soon they grow accustomed to the unwelcome
+stranger; he is quiet and unassuming in demeanour, and often in the
+evening sits on the mound in their company, until they regard him with
+the same indifference they do the burrowing owl. But in spring, when the
+young vizcachas are large enough to leave their cells, then the fox
+makes them his prey; and if it is a bitch fox, with a family of eight or
+nine young to provide for, she will grow so bold as to hunt her helpless
+quarry from hole to hole, and do battle with the old ones, and carry off
+the young in spite of them, so that all the young animals in the village
+are eventually destroyed. Often when the young foxes are large enough to
+follow their mother, the whole family takes leave of the vizcachera
+where such cruel havoc has been made to settle in another, there to
+continue their depredations. But the fox has ever a relentless foe in
+man, and meets with no end of bitter persecutions; it is consequently
+much more abundant in desert or thinly settled districts than in such as
+are populous, so that in these the check the vizcachas receive from the
+foxes is not appreciable.
+
+The abundance of cattle on the pampas has made it unnecessary to use the
+vizcacha as an article of food. His skin is of no value; therefore man,
+the destroyer of his enemies, has hitherto been the greatest benefactor
+of his species. Thus they have been permitted to multiply and spread
+themselves to an amazing extent, so that the half-domestic cattle on the
+pampas are not nearly so familiar with man, or so fearless of his
+presence as are the vizcachas. It is not that they do him no injury, but
+because they do it indirectly, that they have so long enjoyed immunity
+from persecution. It is amusing to see the sheep-farmer, the greatest
+sufferer from the vizcachas, regarding them with such indifference as to
+permit them to swarm on his "run," and burrow within a stone's throw of
+his dwelling with impunity, and yet going a distance from home to
+persecute with unreasonable animosity a fox, skunk, or opossum on
+account of the small annual loss it inflicts on the poultry-yard. That
+the vizcacha has comparatively no adverse conditions to war with
+wherever man is settled is evident when we consider its very slow rate
+of increase, and yet see them in such incalculable numbers. The female
+has but one litter in the year of two young, sometimes of three. She
+becomes pregnant late in April, and brings forth in September; the
+period of gestation is, I think, rather less than five months.
+
+The vizcacha is about two years growing. A full-sized male measures to
+the root of the tail twenty-two inches, and weighs from fourteen to
+fifteen pounds; the female is nineteen inches in length, and her
+greatest weight nine pounds. Probably it is a long-lived, and certainly
+it is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green substance to eat it
+never drinks water; but after a long summer drought, when for months it
+has subsisted on bits of dried thistle-stalks and old withered grass, if
+a shower falls it will come out of its burrows even at noonday and drink
+eagerly from the pools. It has been erroneously stated that vizcachas
+subsist on roots. Their food is grass and seeds; but they may also
+sometimes eat roots, as the ground is occasionally seen scratched up
+about the burrows. In March, when the stalks of the perennial cardoon or
+Castile thistle (Cynara cardunculus) are dry, the vizcachas fell them by
+gnawing about their roots, and afterwards tear to pieces the great dry
+flower-heads to get the seeds imbedded deeply in them, of which they
+seem very fond. Large patches of thistle are often found served thus,
+the ground about them literally white with the silvery bristles they
+have scattered. This cutting down tall plants to get the seeds at the
+top seems very like an act of pure intelligence; but the fact is, the
+vizcachas cut down every tall plant they can. I have seen whole acres of
+maize destroyed by them, yet the plants cut down were left untouched. If
+posts be put into the ground within range of their nightly rambles they
+will gnaw till they have felled them, unless of a wood hard enough to
+resist their chisel-like incisors.
+
+The strongest instinct of this animal is to clear the ground thoroughly
+about its burrows; and it is this destructive habit that makes it
+necessary for cultivators of the soil to destroy all the vizcachas in or
+near their fields. On the uninhabited pampas, where the long grasses
+grow, I have often admired the vizcachera; for it is there the centre of
+a clean space, often of half an acre in extent, on which there is an
+even close-shaven turf: this clearing is surrounded by the usual rough
+growth of herbs and giant grasses. In such situations this habit of
+clearing the ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affords
+them a comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, and
+over which they can fly to their burrows without meeting any
+obstruction, on the slightest alarm.
+
+Of course the instinct continues to operate where it is no longer of any
+advantage. In summer, when the thistles are green, even when growing
+near the burrows, and the giant thistle (Carduus mariana) springs up
+most luxuriantly right on the mound, the vizcachas will not touch them,
+either disliking the strong astringent sap, or repelled by the thorns
+with which they are armed. As soon as they dry, and the thorns become
+brittle, they are levelled; afterwards, when the animal begins to drag
+them about and cut them up, as his custom is, he accidentally discovers
+and feasts on the seed: for vizcachas are fond of exercising their teeth
+on hard substances, such as sticks and bones, just as cats are of
+"sharpening their claws" on trees.
+
+Another remarkable habit of the vizcacha, that of dragging to and
+heaping about the mouth of his burrow every stalk he cuts down, and
+every portable object that by dint of great strength he can carry, has
+been mentioned by Azara, Darwin, and others. On the level plains it is a
+useful habit; for as the vizcachas are continually deepening and
+widening their burrows, the earth thrown out soon covers up these
+materials, and so assists in raising the mound. On the Buenos-Ayrean
+pampas numbers of vizcacheras would annually be destroyed by water in
+the great sudden rainfalls were the mounds loss high. But this is only
+an advantage when the animals inhabit a perfectly level country subject
+to flooding rains; for where the surface is unequal they invariably
+prefer high to low ground to burrow on, and are thus secured from
+destruction by water; yet the instinct is as strong in such situations
+as on the level plains. The most that can be said of a habit apparently
+so obscure in its origin and uses is, that it appears to be part of the
+instinct of clearing the ground about the village. Every tall stalk the
+vizcacha cuts down, every portable object he finds, must be removed to
+make the surface clean and smooth; but while encumbered with it he does
+not proceed further from his burrows, but invariably re-tires towards
+them, and so deposits it upon the mound. So well known is this habit,
+that whatever article is lost by night--whip, pistol, or knife--the
+loser next morning visits the vizcacheras in the vicinity, quite sure of
+finding it there. People also visit the vizcacheras to pick up sticks
+for firewood.
+
+The vizcachas are cleanly in their habits; and the fur, though it has a
+strong earthy smell, is kept exceedingly neat. The hind leg and foot
+afford a very beautiful instance of adaptation. Propped by the hard
+curved tail, they sit up erect, and as firmly on the long horny disks on
+the undersides of the hind legs as a man stands on his feet. Most to be
+admired, on the middle toe the skin thickens into a round cushion, in
+which the curved teeth-like bristles are set; nicely graduated in
+length, so that "each particular hair" may come into contact with the
+skin when the animal scratches or combs itself. As to the uses of this
+appendage there can be no difference of opinion, as there is about the
+serrated claw in birds. It is quite obvious that the animal cannot
+scratch himself with his hind paw (as all mammals do) without making use
+of this natural comb. Then the entire foot is modified, so that this
+comb shall be well protected, and yet not be hindered from performing
+its office: thus the inner toe is pressed close to the middle one, and
+so depressed that it comes under the cushion of skin, and cannot
+possibly get before the bristles, or interfere their coming against the
+skin in scratching, as certainly be the case if this toe were free as
+outer one.
+
+Again, the vizcachas appear to form the deep trenches before the burrows
+by scratching the earth violently backwards with the hind claws. Now
+these straight, sharp, dagger-shaped claws, and especially the middle
+one, are so long that the vizcacha is able to perform all this rough
+work without the bristles coming into contact with the ground, and so
+getting worn by the friction. The Tehuelcho Indians in Patagonia comb
+their hair with a brush-comb very much like that on the vizcacha's toe,
+but in their case it does not properly fulfil its office, or else the
+savages make little use of it. Vizcachas have a remarkable way of
+dusting themselves: the animal suddenly throws himself on his back, and,
+bringing over his hind legs towards his head, depresses them till his
+feet touch the ground. In this strange posture he scratches up the earth
+with great rapidity, raising a little cloud of dust, then rights himself
+with a jerk, and, after an interval, repeats the dusting. Usually they
+scratch a hole in the ground to deposit their excrements in. Whilst
+opening one of the outside burrows that had no communication with the
+others, I once discovered a vast deposit of their dung (so great that it
+must have been accumulating for years) at the extremity. To ascertain
+whether this be a constant, or only a casual habit, it would be
+necessary to open up entirely a vast number of vizcacheras. When a
+vizcacha dies in his burrow the carcass is, after some days, dragged out
+and left upon the mound.
+
+The language of the vizcacha is wonderful for its variety. When the male
+is feeding he frequently pauses to utter a succession of loud,
+percussive, and somewhat jarring cries; these he utters in a leisurely
+manner, and immediately after goes on feeding. Often he utters this cry
+in a low grunting tone. One of his commonest expressions sounds like the
+violent hawking of a man clearing his throat. At other times he bursts
+into piercing tones that may be heard a mile off, beginning like the
+excited and quick-repeated squeals of a young pig, and growing longer,
+more attenuated, and quavering towards the end. After retiring alarmed
+into the burrows, he repeats at intervals a deep internal moan. All
+these, and many other indescribable guttural, sighing, shrill, and deep
+tones, are varied a thousand ways in strength and intonation, according
+to the age, sex, or emotions of the individual; and I doubt if there is
+in the world any other four-footed thing so loquacious, or with a
+dialect so extensive. I take great pleasure in going to some spot where
+they are abundant, and sitting quietly to listen to them; for they are
+holding a perpetual discussion, all night long, which the presence of a
+human being will not interrupt.
+
+At night, when the vizcachas are all out feeding, in places where they
+are very abundant (and in some districts they literally swarm) any very
+loud and sudden sound, as the report of a gun, or a clap of unexpected
+thunder, will produce a most extraordinary effect. No sooner has the
+report broken on the stillness of night than a perfect storm of cries
+bursts forth over the surrounding country. After eight or nine seconds
+there is in the storm a momentary hill or pause; and then it breaks
+forth again, apparently louder than before. There is so much difference
+in the tones of different animals that the cries of individuals close at
+hand may be distinguished amidst the roar of blended voices coming from
+a distance. It sounds as if thousands and tens of thousands of them
+were striving to express every emotion at the highest pitch of their
+voices; so that the effect is indescribable, and fills a stranger with
+astonishment. Should a gun be fired off several times, their cries
+become less each time; and after the third or fourth time it produces no
+effect. They have a peculiar, sharp, sudden, "far-darting" alarm-note
+when a dog is spied, that is repeated by all that hear it, and produces
+an instantaneous panic, sending every vizcacha flying to his burrow.
+
+But though they manifest such a terror of dogs when out feeding at night
+(for the slowest dog can overtake them), in the evening, when sitting
+upon their mounds, they treat them with tantalizing contempt. If the dog
+is a novice, the instant he spies the animal he rushes violently at it;
+the vizcacha waits the charge with imperturbable calmness till his enemy
+is within one or two yards, and then disappears into the burrow. After
+having been foiled in this way many times, the dog resorts to stratagem:
+he crouches down as if transformed for the nonce into a Felis, and
+steals on with wonderfully slow and cautious steps, his hair bristling,
+tail hanging, and eyes intent on his motionless intended victim; when
+within seven or eight yards he makes a sudden rush, but invariably with
+the same dis-appointing result. The persistence with which the dogs go
+on hoping against hope in this unprofitable game, in which they always
+act the stupid part, is highly amusing, and is very interesting to the
+naturalist; for it shows that the native dogs on .the pampas have
+developed a very remarkable instinct, and one that might be perfected by
+artificial selection; but dogs with the hunting habits of the cat would,
+I think, be of little use to man. When it is required to train dogs to
+hunt the nocturnal armadillo (Dasypus villosus), then this deep-rooted
+(and, it might be added, hereditary) passion for vizcachas is
+excessively annoying, and it is often necessary to administer hundreds
+of blows and rebukes before a dog is induced to track an armadillo
+without leaving the scent every few moments to make futile grabs at his
+old enemies.
+
+The following instance will show how little suspicion of man the
+vizcachas have. A few years ago I went out shooting them on three
+consecutive evenings. I worked in a circle, constantly revisiting the
+same burrows, never going a greater distance from home than could be
+walked in four or five minutes. During the three evenings I shot sixty
+vizcachas dead; and probably as many more escaped badly wounded into
+their burrows; for they are hard to kill, and however badly wounded, if
+sitting near the burrow when struck, are almost certain to escape into
+it. But on the third evening I found them no wilder, and killed about as
+many as on the first. After this I gave up shooting them in disgust; it
+was dull sport, and to exterminate or frighten them away with a gun
+seemed an impossibility.
+
+It is a very unusual thing to eat the vizcacha, most people, and
+especially the gauchos, having a silly unaccountable prejudice against
+their flesh. I have found it very good, and while engaged writing this
+chapter have dined on it served up in various ways. The young animals
+are rather insipid, the old males tough, but the mature females are
+excellent--the flesh being tender, exceedingly white, fragrant to the
+nostrils, and with a very delicate game-flavour.
+
+Within the last ten years so much new land has been brought under
+cultivation that farmers have been compelled to destroy incredible
+numbers of vizcachas: many large "estancieros" (cattle-breeders) have
+followed the example set by the grain-growers, and have had them
+exterminated on their estates. Now all that Azara, on hearsay, tells
+about the vizcachas perishing in their burrows, when these are covered
+up, but that they can support life thus buried for a period of ten or
+twelve days, and that during that time animals will come from other
+villages and disinter them, unless frightened off with dogs, is strictly
+true. Country workmen are so well acquainted with these facts that they
+frequently undertake to destroy all the vizcacheras on an estate for so
+paltry a sum as ten-pence in English money for each one, and yet will
+make double the money at this work than they can at any other. By day
+they partly open up, then cover up the burrows with a great quantity of
+earth, and by night go round with dogs to drive away the vizcachas from
+the still open burrows that come to dig out their buried friends. After
+all the vizcacheras on an estate have been thus served, the workmen are
+usually bound by previous agreement to keep guard over them for a space
+of eight or ten days before they receive their hire: for the animals
+covered up are then supposed to be all dead. Some of these men I have
+talked with have assured me that living vizcachas have been found after
+fourteen days--a proof of their great endurance. There is nothing
+strange, I think, in the mere fact of the vizcacha being unable to work
+his way out when thus buried alive; for, for all I know to the contrary,
+other species may, when their burrows are well covered up, perish in the
+same manner; but it certainly is remarkable that other vizcachas should
+come from a distance to dig out those that are buried alive. In this
+good office they are exceedingly zealous; and I have frequently
+surprised them after sunrise, at a considerable distance from their own
+burrows, diligently scratching at those that had been covered up. The
+vizcachas are fond of each other's society, and live peaceably together;
+but their goodwill is not restricted to the members of their own little
+community; it extends to the whole species, so that as soon as night
+comes many animals leave their own and go to visit the adjacent
+villages. If one approaches a vizcachera at night, usually some of the
+vizcachas on it scamper off to distant burrows: these are neighbours
+merely come to pay a friendly visit. This intercourse is so frequent
+that little straight paths are formed from one vizcachera to another.
+The extreme attachment between members of different communities makes it
+appear less strange that they should assist each other: either the
+desire to see, as usual, their buried neighbours becomes intense enough
+to impel them to work their way to them; or cries of distress from the
+prisoners reach and incite them to attempt their deliverance. Many
+social species are thus powerfully affected by cries of distress from
+one of their fellows; and some will attempt a rescue in the face of
+great danger--the weasel and the peccary for example.
+
+Mild and sociable as the vizcachas are towards each other, each one is
+exceedingly jealous of any intrusion into his particular burrow, and
+indeed always resents such a breach of discipline with the utmost fury.
+Several individuals may reside in the compartments of the same burrow;
+but beyond themselves not even their next-door neighbour is permitted to
+enter; their hospitality ends where it begins, at the entrance. It is
+difficult to compel a vizcacha to enter a burrow not his own; even when
+hotly pursued by dogs they often refuse to do so. When driven into one,
+the instant their enemies retire a little space they rush out of it, as
+if they thought the hiding-place but little less dangerous than the open
+plain. I have frequently seen vizcachas, chased into the wrong burrows,
+summarily ejected by those inside: and sometimes they make their escape
+only after being well bitten for their offence.
+
+I have now stated the most interesting facts I have collected concerning
+the vizcacha: when others rewrite its history they doubtless will,
+according to the opportunities of observation they enjoy, be able to
+make some additions to it, but probably none of great consequence. I
+have observed this species in Patagonia and Buenos Ayres only; and as I
+have found that its habits are considerably modified by circumstances in
+the different localities where I have met with it, I am sure that other
+variations will occur in the more distant regions, where the conditions
+vary.
+
+The most remarkable thing to be said about the vizcacha is, that
+although regarded by Mr. Waterhouse, and others who have studied its
+affinities, as one of the lowest of the rodents, exhibiting strong
+Marsupial characters, the living animal appears to be more intelligent
+than other rodents, not of South America only, but also of those of a
+higher type in other continents. A parallel case is, perhaps, to be
+found in the hairy armadillo, an extremely versatile and intelligent
+animal, although only an edentate. And among birds the ypecaha--a large
+La Plata rail--might also be mentioned as an example of what ought not
+to be; for it is a bold and intelligent bird, more than a match for the
+fowl, both in courage and in cunning; and yet it is one of the family
+which Professor Parker--from the point of view of the
+anatomist--characterizes as a "feeble-minded, cowardly group."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+THE DYING HUANACO.
+
+
+Lest any one should misread the title to this chapter, I hasten to say
+that the huanaco, or guanaco as it is often spelt, is not a perishing
+species; nor, as things are, is it likely to perish soon, despite the
+fact that civilized men, Britons especially, are now enthusiastically
+engaged in the extermination of all the nobler mammalians:--a very
+glorious crusade, the triumphant conclusion of which will doubtless be
+witnessed by the succeeding generation, more favoured in this respect
+than ours. The huanaco, happily for it, exists in a barren, desolate
+region, in its greatest part waterless and uninhabitable to human
+beings; and the chapter-heading refers to a singular instinct of the
+dying animals, in very many cases allowed, by the exceptional conditions
+in which they are placed, to die naturally.
+
+And first, a few words about its place in nature and general habits. The
+huanaco is a small camel--small, that is, compared with its existing
+relation--without a hump, and, unlike the camel of the Old World,
+non-specializad; doubtless it is a very ancient animal on the earth, and
+for all we know to the contrary, may have existed contemporaneously with
+some of the earliest known representatives of the camel type, whose
+remains occur in the lower and upper miocene deposits--Poebrotherium,
+Protolabis, Procamelus, Pliauchenia, and Macrauchenia. It ranges from
+Tierra del Fuego and the adjacent islands, northwards over the whole of
+Patagonia, and along the Andes into Peru and Bolivia. On the great
+mountain chain it is both a wild and a domestic animal, since the llama,
+the beast of burden of the ancient Peruvians, is no doubt only a
+variety: but as man's slave it has changed so greatly from the original
+form that some naturalists have regarded the llama as a distinct
+species, which, like the camel of the East, exists only in a domestic
+state. It has had time enough to vary, as it is more than probable that
+the tamed and useful animal was inherited by the children of the sun
+from races and nations that came before them: and how far back Andean
+civilization extends may be inferred from the belief expressed by the
+famous American archaeologist, Squiers, that the ruined city of
+Tiahuanaco, in the vicinity of Lake Titicaca, is as old as Thebes and
+the Pyramids.
+
+It is, however, with the wild animal, the huanaco, that I am concerned.
+A full-grown male measures seven to eight feet in length, and four feet
+high to the shoulder; it is well clothed in a coat of thick woolly hair,
+of a pale reddish colour, Longest and palest on the under parts. In
+appearance it is very unlike the camel, in spite of the long legs and
+neck; in its finely-shaped head and long ears, and its proud and
+graceful carriage, it resembles an antelope rather than its huge and,
+from an aesthetic point of view, deformed Asiatic relation. In habits it
+is gregarious, and is usually seen in small herds, but herds numbering
+several hundreds or even a thousand are occasionally met with on the
+stony, desolate plateaus of Southern Patagonia; but the huanaco is able
+to thrive and grow fat where almost any other herbivore would starve.
+While the herd feeds one animal acts as sentinel, stationed on the
+hillside, and on the appearance of danger utters a shrill neigh of
+alarm, and instantly all take to flight. But although excessively shy
+and wary they are also very inquisitive, and have enough intelligence to
+know that a single horseman can do them no harm, for they will not only
+approach to look closely at him, but will sometimes follow him for
+miles. They are also excitable, and at times indulge in strange freaks.
+Darwin writes:--"On the mountains of Tierra del Fuego I have more than
+once seen a huanaco, on being approached, not only neigh and squeal, but
+prance and leap about in a most ridiculous manner, apparently in
+defiance as a challenge." And Captain King relates that while sailing
+into Port Desire he witnessed a chase of a huanaco after a fox, both
+animals evidently going at their greatest speed, so that they soon
+passed out of sight. I have known some tame huanacos, and in that state
+they make amusing intelligent pets, fond of being caressed, but often so
+frolicsome and mischievous as to be a nuisance to their master. It is
+well known that at the southern extremity of Patagonia the huanacos have
+a dying place, a spot to which all individuals inhabiting the
+surrounding plains repair at the approach of death to deposit their
+bones. Darwin and Fitzroy first recorded this strange instinct in their
+personal narratives, and their observations have since been fully
+confirmed by others. The best known of these dying or burial-places are
+on the banks of the Santa Cruz and Gallegos rivers, where the river
+valleys are covered with dense primeval thickets of bushes and trees of
+stunted growth; there the ground is covered with the bones of countless
+dead generations. "The animals," says Darwin, "in most cases must have
+crawled, before dying, beneath and among the bushes." A strange instinct
+in a creature so preeminently social in its habits; a dweller all its
+life long on the open, barren plateaus and mountain sides! What a
+subject for a painter! The grey wilderness of dwarf thorn trees, aged
+and grotesque and scanty-leaved, nourished for a thousand years on the
+bones that whiten the stony ground at their roots; the interior lit
+faintly with the rays of the departing sun, chill and grey, and silent
+and motionless--the huanacos' Golgotha. In the long centuries,
+stretching back into a dim immeasurable past, so many of this race have
+journeyed hither from the mountain and the plain to suffer the sharp
+pang of death, that, to the imagination, something of it all seems to
+have passed into that hushed and mournful nature. And now one more, the
+latest pilgrim, has come, all his little strength spent in his struggle
+to penetrate the close thicket; looking old and gaunt and ghostly in the
+twilight; with long ragged hair; staring into the gloom out of
+death-dimmed sunken eyes. England has one artist who might show it to us
+on canvas, who would be able to catch the feeling of such a scene--of
+that mysterious, passionless tragedy of nature--I refer to J. M. Swan,
+the painter of the "Prodigal Son" and the "Lioness Defending her Cubs."
+
+To his account of the animal's dying place and instinct, Darwin adds: "I
+do not at all understand the reason of this, but I may observe that the
+wounded huanacos at the Santa Cruz invariably walked towards the river."
+
+It would, no doubt, be rash to affirm of any instinct that it is
+absolutely unique; but, putting aside some doubtful reports about a
+custom of the Asiatic elephant, which may have originated in the account
+of Sindbad the Sailor's discovery of an elephant's burial place, we have
+no knowledge of an instinct similar to that of the huanaco in any other
+animal. So far as we know, it stands alone and apart, with nothing in
+the actions of other species leading up, or suggesting any family
+likeness to it. But what chiefly attracts the mind to it is its
+strangeness. It looks, in fact, less like an instinct of one of the
+inferior creatures than the superstitious observance of human beings,
+who have knowledge of death, and believe in a continued existence after
+dissolution; of a triba that in past times had conceived the idea that
+the liberated spirit is only able to find its way to its future abode by
+starting at death from the ancient dying-place of the tribe or family,
+and thence moving westward, or skyward, or underground, over the
+well-worn immemorial track, invisible to material eyes.
+
+But, although alone among animal instincts-in its strange and useless
+purpose--for it is as absolutely useless to the species or race as to
+the dying individual--it is not the only useless instinct we know of:
+there are many others, both simple and complex; and of such instincts we
+believe, with good reason, that they once played an important part in
+the life of the species, and were only rendered useless by changes in
+the condition of life, or in the organism, or in both. In other words,
+when the special conditions that gave them value no longer existed, the
+correlated and perfect instinct was not, in these cases, eradicated, but
+remained, in abeyance and still capable of being called into activity by
+a new and false stimulus simulating the old and true. Viewed in this
+way, the huanaco's instinct might be regarded as something remaining to
+the animal from a remote past, not altogether unaffected by time
+perhaps; and like some ceremonial usage among men that has long ceased
+to have any significance, or like a fragment of ancient history, or a
+tradition, which in the course of time has received some new and false
+interpretation. The false interpretation, to continue the metaphor, is,
+in this case, that the _purpose_ of the animal in going to a certain
+spot, to which it has probably never previously resorted, is to die
+there. A false interpretation, because, in the first place, it is
+incredible that an instinct of no advantage to the species, in its
+struggle for existence and predominance should arise and become
+permanent; and, in the second place, it is equally incredible that it
+could ever have been to the advantage of the species or race to, have a
+dying place. We must, then, suppose that there is in the sensations
+preceding death, when death comes slowly, some resemblance to the
+sensations experienced by the animal at a period when its curious
+instinct first took form and crystallized; these would be painful
+sensations that threatened life; and freedom from them, and safety to
+the animal, would only exist in a certain well-remembered spot. Further,
+we might assume that it was at first only the memory of a few
+individuals that caused the animals to seek the place of safety; that a
+habit was thus formed; that in time this traditional habit became
+instinctive, so that the animals, old and young, made their way
+unerringly to the place of refuge whenever the old danger returned. And
+such an instinct, slowly matured and made perfect to enable this animal
+to escape extinction during periods of great danger to mammalian life,
+lasting hundreds or even thousands of years, and destructive of
+numberless other species less hardy and adaptive than the generalized
+huanaco, might well continue to exist, to be occasionally called into
+life by a false stimulus, for many centuries after it had ceased to be
+of any advantage.
+
+Once we accept this explanation as probable--namely, that the huanaco,
+in withdrawing from the herd to drop down and die in the ancient dying
+ground, is in reality only seeking an historically remembered place of
+refuge, and not of death--the action of the animal loses much of its
+mysterious character; we come on to firm ground, and find that we are no
+longer considering an instinct absolutely unique, with no action or
+instinct in any other animal leading up or suggesting any family
+likeness to it, as I said before. We find, in fact, that there is at
+least one very important and very well-known instinct in another class
+of creatures, which has a strong resemblance to that of the huanaco, as
+I have interpreted it, and which may even serve to throw a side light on
+the origin of the huanaco's instinct. I refer to a habit of some
+ophidians, in temperate and cold countries, of returning annually to
+hybernate in the saine den.
+
+A typical instance is that of the rattlesnake in the colder parts of
+North America. On the approach of winter these reptiles go into hiding,
+and it has been observed that in some districts a very large number of
+individuals, hundreds, and even thousands, will repair from the
+surrounding country to the ancestral den. Here the serpents gather in a
+mass to remain in a wholly or semi-torpid condition until the return of
+spring brings them out again, to scatter abroad to their usual summer
+haunts. Clearly in this case the knowledge of the hyberna-ting den is
+not merely traditional--that is, handed down from generation to
+generation, through the young each year following the adults, and so
+forming the habit of repairing at certain seasons to a certain place;
+for the young serpent soon abandons its parent to lead an independent
+life; and on the approach of cold weather the hybernating den may be a
+long distance away, ten or twenty, or even thirty miles from the spot in
+which it was born. The annual return to the hybernating den is then a
+fixed unalterable instinct, like the autumnal migration of some birds to
+a warmer latitude. It is doubtless favourable to the serpents to
+hybernate in large numbers massed together; and the habit of resorting
+annually to the same spot once formed, we can imagine that the
+individuals--perhaps a single couple in the first place--frequenting
+some very deep, dry, and well-sheltered cavern, safe from enemies, would
+have a great advantage over others of their race; that they would be
+stronger and increase more, and spread during the summer months further
+and further from the cavern on all sides; and that the further afield
+they went the more would the instinct be perfected; since all the young
+serpents that did not have the instinct of returning unerringly to the
+ancestral refuge, and that, like the outsiders of their race, to put it
+in that way, merely crept into the first hole they found on the approach
+of the cold season, would be more liable to destruction. Probably most
+snakes get killed long before a natural decline sets in; to say that not
+one in a thousand dies of old age would probably be no exaggeration; but
+if they were as safe from enemies and accidents as some less prolific
+and more highly-organized animals, so that many would reach the natural
+term of life, and death came slowly, we can imagine that in such a
+heat-loving creature the failure of the vital powers would simulate the
+sensations caused by a falling temperature, and cause the old or sick
+serpent, even in midsummer, to creep instinctively away to the ancient
+refuge, where many a long life-killing frost had been safely tided over
+in the past.
+
+The huanaco has never been a hybernating animal; but we must assume
+that, like the crotalus of the north, he had formed a habit of
+congregating with his fellows at certain seasons at the same spot;
+further, that these were seasons of suffering to the animal--the
+suffering, or discomfort and danger, having in the first place given
+rise to the habit. Assuming again that the habit had existed so long as
+to become, like that of the reptile, a fixed, immutable instinct, a
+hereditary knowledge, so that the young huanacos, untaught by the
+adults, would go alone and unerringly to the meeting-place from any
+distance, it is but an easy step to the belief, that after the
+conditions had changed, and the refuges were no longer needed, this
+instinctive knowledge would still exist in them, and that they would
+take the old road when stimulated by the pain of a wound; or the
+miserable sensations experienced in disease or during the decay of the
+life-energy, when the senses grow dim, and the breath fails, and the
+blood is thin and cold.
+
+I presume that most persons who have observed animals a great deal have
+met with cases in which the animal has acted automatically, or
+instinctively, when the stimulus has been a false one. I will relate one
+such case, observed by myself, and which strikes me as being apposite to
+the question I am considering. It must be premised that this is an
+instance of an acquired habit; but this does not affect my argument,
+since I have all along assumed that the huanaco--a highly sagacious
+species in the highest class of vertebrates--first acquired a habit from
+experience of seeking a remembered refuge, and that such habit was the
+parent, as it were, or the first clay model, of the perfect and
+indestructible instinct that was to be.
+
+It is not an uncommon thing in the Argentino pampas--I have on two
+occasions witnessed it myself--for a riding-horse to come home, or to
+the gate of his owner's house, to die. I am speaking of riding-horses
+that are never doctored, nor treated mercifully; that look on their
+master as an enemy rather than a friend; horses that live out in the
+open, and have to be hunted to the corral or enclosure, or roughly
+captured with a lasso as they run, when their services are required. I
+retain a very vivid recollection of the first occasion of witnessing an
+action of this kind in a horse, although I was only a boy at the time.
+On going out one summer evening I saw one of the horses of the
+establishment standing unsaddled and unbridled leaning his head over the
+gate. Going to the spot, I stroked his nose, and then, turning to an old
+native who happened to be near, asked him what could be the meaning of
+such a thing. "I think he is going to die," he answered; "horses often
+come to the house to die." And next morning the poor beast was found
+lying dead not twenty yards from the gate; although he had not appeared
+ill when I stroked his nose on the previous evening; but when I saw him
+lying there dead, and remembered the old native's words, it seemed to me
+as marvellous and inexplicable that a horse should act in that way, as
+if some wild creature--a rhea, a fawn, or dolichotes--had come to exhale
+his last breath at the gates of his enemy and constant persecutor, man.
+
+I now believe that the sensations of sickness and approaching death in
+the riding-horse of the pampas resemble or similate the pains, so often
+experienced, of hunger, thirst and fatigue combined, together with the
+oppressive sensations caused by the ponderous native saddle, or recado,
+with its huge surcingle of raw hide drawn up so tightly as to hinder
+free respiration. The suffering animal remembers how at the last relief
+invariably came, when the twelve or fifteen hours' torture were over,
+the toil and the want, and when the great iron bridle and ponderous gear
+were removed, and he had freedom and food and drink and rest. At the
+gate or at the door of his master's house, the sudden relief had always
+come to him; and there does he sometimes go in his sickness, his fear
+overmastered by his suffering, to find it again.
+
+Discussing this question with a friend, who has a subtle mind and great
+experience of the horse in semi-barbarous countries, and of many other
+animals, wild and tame, in many regions of the globe, he put forward a
+different explanation of the action of the horse in coming home to die,
+which he thinks simpler and more probable than mine. It is, that a dying
+or ailing animal instinctively withdraws itself from its fellows--an
+action of self-preservation in the individual in opposition to the
+well-known instincts of the healthy animals, which impels the whole herd
+to turn upon and persecute the sickly member, thus destroying its
+chances of recovery. The desire of the suffering animal is not only to
+leave its fellows, but to get to some solitary place where they cannot
+follow, or would never find him, to escape at once from a great and
+pressing danger. But on the pastoral pampas, where horses are so
+numerous that on that level, treeless area they are always and
+everywhere visible, no hiding-place is discoverable. In such a case, the
+animal, goaded by its instinctive fear, turns to the one spot that
+horses avoid; and although that spot has hitherto been fearful to him,
+the old fear is forgotten in the present and far more vivid one; the
+vicinity of his master's house represents a solitary place to him, and
+he seeks it, just as the stricken deer seeks the interior of some close
+forest, oblivious for the time, in its anxiety to escape from the herd,
+of the dangers lurking in it, and which he formerly avoided.
+
+I have not set this explanation down merely because it does credit to my
+friend's ingenuity, but because it strikes me that it is the only
+alternative explanation that can be given of the animal's action in
+coming home to die. Another fact concerning the ill-tamed and
+barbarously treated horses of the pampas, which, to my mind, strengthens
+the view I have taken, remains to be mentioned. It is not an uncommon
+thing for one of these horses, after escaping, saddled and bridled, and
+wandering about for anight or night and day on the plains, to return of
+its own accord to the house. It is clear that in a case of this kind the
+animal comes home to seek relief. I have known one horse that always had
+to be hunted like a wild animal to be caught, and that invariably after
+being saddled tried to break loose, to return in this way to the gate
+after wandering about, saddled and bridled, for over twenty hours in
+uncomfortable freedom.
+
+The action of the riding-horse returning to a master he is accustomed to
+fly from, as from an enemy, to be released of saddle and bridle, is, no
+doubt more intelligent than that of the dying horse coming home to be
+relieved from his sufferings, but the motive is the same in both cases;
+at the gate the only pain the animal has ever experienced has invariably
+begun, and there it has ended, and when the spur of some new pain
+afflicts him--new and yet like the old--it is to the well-remembered
+hated gate that it urges him.
+
+To return to the huanaco. After tracing the dying instinct back to its
+hypothetical origin--namely, a habit acquired by the animal in some past
+period of seeking refuge from some kind of pain and danger at a certain
+spot, it is only natural to speculate a little further as to the nature
+of that danger and of the conditions the animal existed in.
+
+If the huanaco is as old on the earth as its antique generalized form
+have led naturalists to suppose, we can well believe that it has
+survived not only a great many lost mammalian types, but many changes in
+the conditions of its life. Let us then imagine that at some remote
+period a change took place in the climate of Patagonia, and that it
+became colder and colder, owing to some cause affecting only that
+portion of the antarctic region; such a cause, for instance, as a great
+accumulation of icebergs on the northern shores of the antarctic
+continent, extending century by century until a large portion of the now
+open sea became blocked up with solid ice. If the change was gradual and
+the snow became deeper each winter and lasted longer, an intelligent,
+gregarious, and exceedingly hardy and active animal like the huanaco,
+able to exist on the driest woody fibres, would stand the beat chance of
+maintaining its existence in such altered conditions, and would form new
+habits to meet the new danger. One would be that at the approach of a
+period of deep snow and deadly cold, all the herds frequenting one
+place would gather together at the most favourable spots in the river
+valleys, where the vegetation is dense and some food could be had while
+the surrounding country continued covered with deep snow. They would, in
+fact, make choice of exactly such localities as are now used for dying
+places. There they would be sheltered from the cutting-winds, the twigs
+and bark would supply them with food, the warmth from a great many
+individuals massed together would serve to keep the snow partially
+melted under foot, and would prevent their being smothered, while the
+stiff and closely interlaced branches would keep a roof of snow above
+them, and thus protected they would keep alive until the return of mild
+weather released them. In the course of many generations all weakly
+animals, and all in which the habit of seeking the refuge at the proper
+time was weak or uncertain in its action would perish, but their loss
+would be an advantage to the survivors.
+
+It is worthy of remark that it is only at the southern extremity of
+Patagonia that the huanacos have dying places. In Northern Patagonia,
+and on the Chilian and Peruvian Andes no such instinct has been
+observed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+My purpose in this paper is to discuss a group of curious and useless
+emotional instincts of social animals, which have not yet been properly
+explained. Excepting two of the number, placed first and last in the
+list, they are not related in their origin; consequently they are here
+grouped together arbitrarily, only for the reason that we are very
+familiar with them on account of their survival in our domestic animals,
+and because they are, as I have said, useless; also because they
+resemble each other, among the passions and actions of the lower
+animals, in their effect on our minds. This is in all cases unpleasant,
+and sometimes exceedingly painful, as when species that rank next to
+ourselves in their developed intelligence and organized societies, such
+as elephants, monkeys, dogs, and cattle, are seen under the domination
+of impulses, in some cases resembling insanity, and in others simulating
+the darkest passions of man.
+
+These instincts are:--
+
+(1) The excitement caused by the smell of blood, noticeable in horses
+and cattle among our domestic animals, and varying greatly in degree,
+from an emotion so slight as to be scarcely perceptible to the greatest
+extremes of rage or terror.
+
+(2) The angry excitement roused in some animals when a scarlet or
+bright-red cloth is shown to them. So well known is this apparently
+insane instinct in our cattle that it has given rise to a proverb and
+metaphor familiar in a variety of forms to everyone.
+
+(3) The persecution of a sick or weakly animal by its companions.
+
+(4) The sudden deadly fury that seizes on the herd or family at the
+sight of a companion in extreme distress. Herbivorous mammals at such
+times will trample and gore the distressed one to death. In the case of
+wolves, and other savage-tempered carnivorous species, the distressed
+fellow is frequently torn to pieces and devoured on the spot.
+
+To take the first two together. When we consider that blood is red; that
+the smell of it is, or may be, or has been, associated with that vivid
+hue in the animal's mind; that blood, seen and smelt is, or has been,
+associated with the sight of wounds and with cries of pain and rage or
+terror from the wounded or captive animal, there appears at first sight
+to be some reason for connecting these two instinctive passions as
+having the same origin--namely, terror and rage caused by the sight of a
+member of the herd struck down and bleeding, or struggling for life in
+the grasp of an enemy. I do not mean to say that such an image is
+actually present in the animal's mind, but that the inherited or
+instinctive passion is one in kind and in its working with the passion
+of the animal when experience and reason were its guides.
+
+But the more I consider the point the more am I inclined to regard these
+two instincts as separate in their origin, although I retain the belief
+that cattle and horses and several wild animals are violently excited by
+the smell of blood for the reason just given--namely, their inherited
+memory associates the smell of blood with the presence among them of
+some powerful enemy that threatens their life. To this point I shall
+return when dealing with the last and most painful of the instincts I am
+considering.
+
+The following incident will show how violently this blood passion
+sometimes affects cattle, when they are permitted to exist in a
+half-wild condition, as on the pampas. I was out with my gun one day, a
+few miles from home, when I came across a patch on the ground where the
+grass was pressed or trodden down and stained with blood. I concluded
+that some thievish gauchos had slaughtered a fat cow there on the
+previous night, and, to avoid detection, had somehow managed to carry
+the whole of it away on their horses. As I walked on, a herd of cattle,
+numbering about three hundred, appeared moving slowly on towards a small
+stream a mile away; they were travelling in a thin long line, and would
+pass the blood-stained spot at a distance of seven to eight hundred
+yards, but the wind from it would blow across their track. When the
+tainted wind struck the leaders of the herd they instantly stood still,
+raising their heads, then broke out into loud excited bellowings; and
+finally turning they started off at a fast trot, following up the scent
+in a straight line, until they arrived at the place where one of their
+kind had met its death. The contagion spread, and before long all the
+cattle were congregated on the fatal spot, and began moving round in a
+dense mass, bellowing continually.
+
+It may be remarked here that the animal has a peculiar language on
+occasions like this; it emits a succession of short bellowing cries,
+like excited exclamations, followed by a very loud cry, alternately
+sinking into a hoarse murmur, and rising to a kind of scream that grates
+harshly on the sense. Of the ordinary "cow-music" I am a great admirer,
+and take as much pleasure in it as in the cries and melody of birds and
+the sound of the wind in trees; but this performance of cattle excited
+by the smell of blood is most distressing to hear.
+
+The animals that had forced their way into the centre of the mass to the
+spot where the blood was, pawed the earth, and dug it up with their
+horns, and trampled each other down in their frantic excitement. It was
+terrible to see and hear them. The action of those on the border of the
+living mass in perpetually moving round in a circle with dolorous
+bellowings, was like that of the women in an Indian village when a
+warrior dies, and all night they shriek and howl with simulated grief,
+going round and round the dead man's hut in an endless procession.
+
+The "bull and red rag" instinct, as it may be called, comes next in
+order. It is a familiar fact that brightness in itself powerfully
+attracts most if not all animals. The higher mammalians are affected in
+the same way as birds and insects, although not in the same degree. This
+fact partly explains the rage of the bull. A scarlet flag fluttering in
+the wind or lying on the grass attracts his attention powerfully, as it
+does that of other animals; but though curious about the nature of the
+bright object, it does not anger him. His anger is excited--and this is
+the whole secret of the matter--when the colour is flaunted by a man;
+when it forces him to fix his attention on a man, i.e. an animal of
+another species that rules or drives him, and that he fears, but with
+only a slight fear, which may at any moment be overcome by his naturally
+bold aggressive disposition, Not only does the vivid colour compel him
+to fix his attention on the being that habitually interferes with his
+liberty, and is consequently regarded with unfriendly eyes, but it also
+produces the illusion on his mind that the man is near him, that he is
+approaching him in an aggressive manner: it is an insult, a challenge,
+which, being of so explosive a temper, he is not slow to accept.
+
+On the pampas I was once standing with some gauchos at the gate of a
+corral into which a herd of half-wild cattle had just been driven. One
+of the men, to show his courage and agility, got off his horse and
+boldly placed himself in the centre of the open gate. His action
+attracted the attention of one of the nearest cows, and lowering her
+horns she began watching him in a threatening manner. He then suddenly
+displayed the scarlet lining of his poncho, and instantly she charged
+him furiously: with a quick movement to one side he escaped her horns,
+and after we had driven her back, resumed his former position and
+challenged her again in the same way. The experiment was repeated not
+less than half a dozen times, and always with the same result. The
+cattle were all in a savage temper, and would have instantly charged him
+on his placing himself before them on foot without the display of
+scarlet cloth, but their fear of the mounted men, standing with lassos
+in their hand on either side of him, kept them in check. But whenever
+the attention of any one individual among them was forcibly drawn to him
+by the display of vivid colour, and fixed on him alone, the presence of
+the horsemen was forgotten and fear was swallowed by rage. It is a fact,
+I think, that most animals that exhibit angry excitement when a scarlet
+rag is flourished aggressively at them, are easily excited to anger at
+all times. Domestic geese and turkeys may be mentioned among birds: they
+do not fly at a grown person, but they will often fly at a child that
+challenges them in this way; and it is a fact that they do not at any
+time fear a child very much and will sometimes attack him without being
+challenged. I think that the probability of the view I have taken is
+increased by another fact--namely, that the sudden display of scarlet
+colour sometimes affects timid animals with an extreme fear, just as, on
+the other hand, it excites those that are bold and aggressive to anger.
+Domestic sheep, forinstance, that vary greatly in disposition in
+different races or breeds, and even in different individuals, may be
+affected in the two opposite ways, some exhibiting extreme terror and
+others only anger at a sudden display of scarlet colour by the shepherd
+or herder.
+
+The persecution of a sick animal by its companions comes next under
+consideration.
+
+It will have been remarked, with surprise by some readers, no doubt,
+that I have set down as two different instincts this persecution of a
+sick or weakly individual by its fellows, and the sudden deadly rage
+that sometimes impels the herd to turn upon and destroy a wounded or
+distressed companion. It is usual for writers on the instincts of
+animals to speak of them as one: and I presume that they regard this
+sudden deadly rage of several individuals against a companion as merely
+an extreme form of the common persecuting instinct or impulse. They are
+not really one, but are as distinct in origin and character as it is
+possible for any two instincts to be. The violent and fatal impulse
+starts simultaneously into life and action, and is contagious, affecting
+all the members of the herd like a sudden madness. The other is neither
+violent nor contagious: the persecution is intermittent: it is often
+confined to one or to a very few members of the herd, and seldom joined
+in by the chief member, the leader or head to whom all the others give
+way.
+
+Concerning this head of the herd, or flock, or pack, it is necessary to
+say something more. Some gregarious animals, particularly birds, live
+together in the most perfect peace and amity; and here no leader is
+required, because in their long association together as a species in
+flocks, they have attained to a oneness of mind, so to speak, which
+causes them to move or rest, and to act at all times harmoniously
+together, as if controlled and guided by an extrane-ous force. I may
+mention that the kindly instinct in animals, which is almost universal
+between male and female in the vertebrates, is most apparent in these
+harmoniously acting birds. Thus, in La Plata, I have remarked, in more
+than one species, that a lame or sick individual, unable to keop pace
+with the flock and find its food, has not only been waited for, but in
+some cases some of the flock have constantly attended it, keeping close
+to it both when flying and on the ground; and, I have no doubt, feeding
+it just as they would have fed their young.
+
+Naturally among such kinds no one member is of more consideration than
+another. But among mammals such equality and harmony is rare. The
+instinct of one and all is to lord it over the others, with the result
+that one more powerful or domineering gets the mastery, to keep it
+thereafter as long as he can. The lower animals are, in this respect,
+very much like us; and in all kinds that are at all fierce-tempered the
+mastery of one over all, and of a few under him over the others, is most
+salutary; indeed, it is inconceivable that they should be able to exist
+together under any other system.
+
+On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to
+keep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these
+animals a great deal, and presume that they are very much like feral
+dogs and wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but when
+a fight begins the head of the pack as a rule rushes to the spot,
+whereupon the fighters separate and march off in different directions,
+or else cast themselves down and deprecate their tyrant's wrath with
+abject gestures and whines. If the combatants are both strong and have
+worked themselves into a mad rage before their head puts in an
+appearance, it may go hard with him: they know him no longer, and all he
+can do is to join in the fray; then, if the fighters turn on him, he may
+be so injured that his power is gone, and the next best dog in the pack
+takes his place. The hottest contests are always between dogs that are
+well matched; neither will give place to the other, and so they fight it
+out; but from the foremost in strength and power down to the weakest
+there is a gradation of authority; each one knows just how far he can
+go, which companion he can bully when he is in a bad temper or wishes to
+assert himself, and to which he must humbly yield in his turn. In such a
+state the weakest one must always yield to all the others, and cast
+himself down, seeming to call himself a slave and worshipper of any
+other member of the pack that chooses to snarl at him, or command him to
+give up his bone with a good grace.
+
+This masterful or domineering temper, so common among social mammals, is
+the cause of the persecution of the sick and weakly. When an animal
+begins to ail he can no longer hold his own; he ceases to resent the
+occasional ill-natured attacks made on him; his non-combative condition
+is quickly discovered, and he at once drops down to a place below the
+lowest; it is common knowledge in the herd that he may be buffeted with
+impunity by all, even by those that have hitherto suffered buffets but
+have given none. But judging from my own observation, this persecution,
+is not, as a rule, severe, and is seldom fatal.
+
+It is often the case that a sick or injured animal withdraws and hides
+himself from the herd; the instinct of the "stricken deer" this might be
+called. But I do not think that we need assume that the ailing
+individual goes away to escape the danger of being ill-used by his
+companions. He is sick and drooping and consequently unfit to be with
+the healthy and vigorous; that is the simplest and probably the true
+explanation of his action; although in some cases he might be driven
+from them by persistent rough usage. However peaceably gregarious
+mammals may live together, and however fond of each other's company they
+may be, they do not, as a rule, treat each other gently. Furthermore,
+their games are exceedingly rough and require that they shall be in a
+vigorous state of health to escape injury. Horned animals have no
+buttons to the sharp weapons they prod and strike each other with in a
+sportive spirit. I have often witnessed the games of wild and half-wild
+horses with astonishment; for it seemed that broken bones must result
+from the sounding kicks they freely bestowed on one another. This
+roughness itself would be a sufficient cause for the action of the
+individual, sick and out of tune and untouched by the glad contagion of
+the others, in escaping from them; and to leave them would be to its
+advantage (and to that of the race) since, if not fatally injured or
+sick unto death, its chances of recovery to perfect health would be
+thereby greatly increased.
+
+It remains now to speak of that seemingly most cruel of instincts which
+stands last on my list. It is very common among gregarious animals that
+are at all combative in disposition, and still survives in our domestic
+cattle, although very rarely witnessed in England. My first experience
+of it was just before I had reached the age of five years. I was not at
+that early period trying to find out any of nature's secrets, but the
+scene I witnessed printed itself very vividly on my mind, so that I can
+recall it as well as if my years had been five-and-twenty; perhaps
+better. It was on a summer's evening, and I was out by myself at some
+distance from the house, playing about the high exposed roots of some
+old trees; on the other side of the trees the cattle, just returned from
+pasture, were gathered on the bare level ground. Hearing a great
+commotion among them, I climbed on to one of the high exposed roots,
+and, looking over, saw a cow on the ground, apparently unable to rise,
+moaning and bellowing in a distressed way, while a number of her
+companions were crowding round and goring her.
+
+What is the meaning of such an instinct? Darwin has but few words on the
+subject. "Can we believe," he says, in his posthumous _Essay on
+Instinct, "_when a wounded herbivorous animal returns to its own herd
+and is then attacked and gored, that this cruel and very common instinct
+is of any service to the species?" At the same time, he hints that such
+an instinct might in some circumstances be useful, and his hint has been
+developed into the current belief among naturalists on the subject. Here
+it is, in Dr. Romanes' words: "We may readily imagine that the instinct
+displayed by many herbivorous animals of goring sick and wounded
+companions, is really of use in countries where the presence of weak
+members in a herd is a source of danger to the herd from the prevalence
+of wild beasts." Here it is assumed that the sick are set upon and
+killed, but this is not the fact; sickness and decay from age or some
+other cause are slow things, and increase imperceptibly, so that the
+sight of a drooping member grows familiar to the herd, as does that of a
+member with some malformation, or unusual shade of colour, or altogether
+white, as in the case of an albino.
+
+Sick and weak members, as we have seen, while subject to some
+ill-treatment from their companions (only because they can be
+ill-treated with impunity), do not rouse the herd to a deadly animosity;
+the violent and fatal attack is often as not made on a member in perfect
+health and vigour and unwoundecl, although, owing to some accident, in
+great distress, and perhaps danger, at the moment.
+
+The instinct is, then, not only useless but actually detrimental; and,
+this being so, the action of the herd in destroying one of its members
+is not even to be regarded as an instinct proper, but rather as an
+aberration of an instinct, a blunder, into which animals sometimes fall
+when excited to action in unusual circumstances.
+
+The first thing that strikes us is that in these wild abnormal moments
+of social animals, they are acting in violent contradiction to the whole
+tenor of their lives; that in turning against a distressed fellow they
+oppose themselves to the law of their being, to the whole body of
+instincts, primary and secondary, and habits, which have made it
+possible for them to exist together in communities. It is, I think, by
+reflecting on the abnormal character of such an action that we are led
+to a true interpretation of this "dark saying of Nature."
+
+Every one is familiar with Bacon's famous passage about the dog, and the
+noble courage which that animal puts on when "maintained by a man; who
+is to him in place of a God, or _melior natura;_ which courage is
+manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a better
+nature than its own, could never attain." Not so. The dog is a social
+animal, and acts instinctively in concert with his fellows; and the
+courage he manifests is of the family, not the individual. In the
+domestic state the man he is accustomed to associate with and obey
+stands to him in the place of the controlling pack, and to his mind,
+which is canine and not human, _is_ the pack. A similar "noble courage,"
+greatly surpassing that exhibited on all other occasions, is displayed
+by an infinite number of mammals and birds of gregarious habits, when
+repelling the attacks of some powerful and dangerous enemy, or when they
+rush to the rescue of one of their captive fellows. Concerning this rage
+and desperate courage of social animals in the face of an enemy, we see
+(1) that it is excited by the distressed cries, or by the sight of a
+member of the herd or family dying from or struggling in the clutches of
+an enemy; (2) that it affects animals when a number af individuals are
+together, and is eminently contagious, like fear, that communicates
+itself, quick as lightning, from one to another until all are in a
+panic, and like the joyous emotion that impels the members of a herd or
+flock to rush simultaneously into play.
+
+Now, it is a pretty familiar fact that animals acting instinctively, as
+well as men acting intelligently, have at times their delusions and
+their illusions, and see things falsely, and are moved to action by a
+false stimulus to their own disadvantage. When the individuals of a herd
+or family are excited to a sudden deadly rage by the distressed cries of
+one of their fellows, or by the sight of its bleeding wounds and the
+smell of its blood, or when they see it frantically struggling on the
+ground, or in the cleft of a tree or rock, as if in the clutches of a
+powerful enemy, they do not turn on it to kill but to rescue it.
+
+In whatever way the rescuing instinct may have risen, whether simply
+through natural selection or, as is more probable, through an
+intelligent habit becoming fixed and hereditary, its effectiveness
+depends altogether on the emotion of overmastering rage excited in the
+animal--rage against a tangible visible enemy, or invisible, and excited
+by the cries or struggles of a suffering companion; clearly, then, it
+could not provide against the occasional rare accidents that animals
+meet with, which causes them to act precisely in the way they do when
+seized or struck down by an enemy. An illusion is the result of the
+emotion similar to the illusion produced by vivid expectation in
+ourselves, which has caused many a man to see in a friend and companion
+the adversary he looked to see, and to slay him in his false-seeing
+anger.
+
+An illusion just as great, leading to action equally violent, but
+ludicrous rather than painful to witness, may be seen in dogs, when
+encouraged by a man to the attack, and made by his cries and gestures to
+expect that some animal they are accustomed to hunt is about to be
+unearthed or overtaken; and if, when they are in this disposition, he
+cunningly exhibits and sets them on a dummy, made perhaps of old rags
+and leather and stuffed with straw, they will seize, worry, and tear it
+to pieces with the greatest fury, and without the faintest suspicion of
+its true character.
+
+That wild elephants will attack a distressed fellow seemed astonishing
+to Darwin, when he remembered the case of an elephant after escaping
+from a pit helping its fellow to escape also. But it is precisely the
+animals, high or low in the organic scale, that are social, and possess
+the instinct of helping each other, that will on occasions attack a
+fellow in misfortune--such an attack being no more than a blunder of the
+helping instinct.
+
+Felix de Azara records a rather cruel experiment on the temper of some
+tame rats confined in a cage. The person who kept them caught the tail
+of one of the animals and began sharply pinching it, keeping his hand
+concealed under the cage. Its cries of pain and struggles to free itself
+greatly excited the other rats; and after rushing wildly round for some
+moments they flew at their distressed companion, and fixing their teeth
+in its throat quickly dispatched it. In this case if the hand that held
+the tail had been visible and in the cage, the bites would undoubtedly
+have been inflicted on it; but no enemy was visible; yet the fury and
+impulse to attack an enemy was present in the animals. In such
+circumstances, the excitement must be discharged--the instinct obeyed,
+and in the absence of any other object of attack the illusion is
+produced and it discharges itself on the struggling companion. It is
+sometimes seen in dogs, when three or four or five are near together,
+that if one suddenly utters a howl or cry of pain, when no man is near
+it and no cause apparent, the others run to it, and seeing nothing, turn
+round and attack each other. Here the exciting cause--the cry for
+help--is not strong enough to produce the illusion which is sometimes
+fatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly thinks that the
+others, or one of the others, inflicted the injury, and his impulse is
+to take the part of the injured animal. If the cry for help--caused
+perhaps by a sudden cramp or the prick of a thorn--is not very sharp or
+intense, the other dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl at
+each other in a suspicious way.
+
+To go back to Azara's anecdote. Why, it may be asked--and this question
+has been put to me in conversation--if killing a distressed companion is
+of no advantage to the race, and if something must be attacked--why did
+not these rats in this instance attack the cage they were shut in, and
+bite at the woodwork and wires? Or, in the case related by Mr. Andrew
+Lang in _Longman's Magazine_ some time ago, in which the members of a
+herd of cattle in Scotland turned with sudden amazing fury on one of the
+cows that had got wedged between two rocks and was struggling with
+distressed bellowings to free itself--why did they not attack the
+prisoning rocks instead of goring their unfortunate comrade to death?
+For it is well known that animals will, on occasions, turn angrily upon
+and attack inanimate objects that cause them injury or hinder their
+freedom of action. And we know that this mythic faculty--the mind's
+projection of itself into visible nature--survives in ourselves, that
+there are exceptional moments in our lives when it comes back to us; no
+one, for instance, would be astonished to hear that any man, even a
+philosopher, had angrily kicked away or imprecated a stool or other
+inanimate object against which he had accidentally barked his shins. The
+answer is, that there is no connection between these two things--the
+universal mythic faculty of the mind, and that bold and violent instinct
+of social animals of rushing to the rescue of a stricken or distressed
+companion, which has a definite, a narrow, purpose--namely, to fall upon
+an enemy endowed not merely with the life and intelligence common to all
+things, including rocks, trees, and waters, but with animal form and
+motion.
+
+I had intended in this place to give other instances, observed in
+several widely-separated species, including monkeys; but it is not
+necessary, as I consider that all the facts, however varied, are covered
+by the theory I have suggested--even a fact I like the one mentioned in
+this chapter of cattle bellowing and madly digging up the ground where
+the blood of one of their kind had been spilt: also such a fact as that
+of wild cattle and other animals caught in a trap or enclosure attacking
+and destroying each other in their frenzy; and the fact that some
+fierce-tempered carnivorous mammals will devour the companion they have
+killed. It is an instinct of animals like wolves and peccaries to devour
+the enemy they have overcome and slain: thus, when the jaguar captures a
+peccary out of a drove, and does not quickly escape with his prize into
+a tree, he is instantly attacked and slain and then consumed, even to
+the skin and bones. This is the wolf's and the peccary's instinct; and
+the devouring of one of their own companions is an inevitable
+consequence of the mistake made in the first place of attacking and
+killing it. In no other circumstances, not even when starving, do they
+prey on their own species.
+
+If the explanation I have offered should seem a true or highly probable
+one, it will, I feel sure, prove acceptable to many lovers of animals,
+who, regarding tins seemingly ruthless instinct, not as an aberration
+but as in some vague way advantageous to animals in their struggle for
+existence, are yet unable to think of it without pain and horror;
+indeed, I know those who refuse to think of it at all, who would gladly
+disbelieve it if they could.
+
+It should be a relief to them to be able to look on it no longer as
+something ugly and hateful, a blot on nature, but as an illusion, a
+mistake, an unconscious crime, so to speak, that has for its motive the
+noblest passion that animals know--that sublime courage and daring which
+they exhibit in defence of a distressed companion. This fiery spirit in
+animals, which makes them forget their own safety, moves our hearts by
+its close resemblance to one of the most highly-prized human virtues;
+just as we are moved to intellectual admiration by the wonderful
+migratory instinct in birds that simulates some of the highest
+achievements of the mind of man. And we know that this beautiful
+instinct is also liable to mistakes--that many travellers leave us
+annually never to return. Such a mistake was undoubtedly the cause of
+the late visitation of Pallas' sand-grouse: owing perhaps to some
+unusual atmospheric or dynamic condition, or to some change in the
+nervous system of the birds, they deviated widely from their usual
+route, to scatter in countless thousands over the whole of Europe and
+perish slowly in climates not suited to them; while others, overpassing
+the cold strange continent, sped on over colder, stranger seas, to drop
+at last like aerolites, quenching their lives in the waves.
+
+Whether because it is true, as Professor Freeman and some others will
+have it, that humanity is a purely modern virtue; or because the
+doctrine of Darwin, by showing that we are related to other forms of
+life, that our best feelings have their roots low down in the temper and
+instincts of the social species, has brought us nearer in spirit to the
+inferior animals, it is certain that our regard for them has grown, and
+is growing, and that new facts and fresh inferences that make us think
+more highly of them are increasingly welcome.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+HORSE AND MAN.
+
+
+There is no mode of progression so delightful as riding on horseback.
+Walking, rowing, bicycling are pleasant exercises in their way, but the
+muscular exertion and constant exercise of judgment they call for occupy
+the mind partly to the exclusion of other things; so that a long walk
+may sometimes be only a long walk and nothing more. In riding
+we are not conscious of exertion, and as for that close observation and
+accurate discernment necessary in traversing the ground with speed and
+safety, it is left to the faithful servant that carries us. Pitfalls,
+hillocks, slippery places, the thousand little inequalities of the
+surface that have to be measured with infallible eye, these disturb us
+little. To fly or go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough and
+smooth alike, fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hills
+without climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearest
+approach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster bubbles
+and flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from the days of
+Montgolfier downwards have brought us no nearer to it. The aeronaut
+gasping for breath above the clouds offers only a sad spectacle of the
+imbecility of science and man's shattered hopes. To the free inhabitants
+of air we can only liken the mounted Arab, vanishing, hawklike, over the
+boundless desert.
+
+In riding there is always exhilarating motion; yet, if the scenery
+encountered be charming, you are apparently sitting still, while,
+river-like, it flows toward and past you, ever giving place to fresh
+visions of beauty. Above all, the mind is free, as when one lies idly on
+the grass gazing up into the sky. And, speaking of myself, there is even
+more than this immunity from any tax on the understanding such as we
+require in walking; the rhythmic motion, the sensation as of night,
+acting on the brain like a stimulus. That anyone should be able to think
+better lying, sitting, or standing, than when speeding along on
+horseback, is to me incomprehensible. This is doubtless due to early
+training and long use; for on those great pampas where I first saw the
+light and was taught at a tender age to ride, we come to look on man as
+a parasitical creature, fitted by nature to occupy the back of a horse,
+in which position only he has full and free use of all his faculties.
+Possibly the gaucho--the horseman of the pampas--is born with this idea
+in his brain; if so, it would only be reasonable to suppose that its
+correlative exists in a modification of structure. Certain it is that an
+intoxicated gaucho lifted on to the back of his horse is perfectly safe
+in his seat. The horse may do his best to rid himself of his burden; the
+rider's legs--or posterior arms as they might appropriately be
+called--retain their iron grip, notwithstanding the fuddled brain.
+
+The gaucho is more or less bow-legged; and, of course, the more crooked
+his legs are, the better for him in his struggle for existence. Off his
+horse his motions are awkward, like those of certain tardigrade mammals
+of arboreal habits when removed from their tree. He waddles in his walk;
+his hands feel for the reins; his toes turn inwards like a duck's. And
+here, perhaps, we can see why foreign travellers, judging him from their
+own standpoint, invariably bring against him the charge of laziness. On
+horseback he is of all men most active. His patient endurance under
+privations that would drive other men to despair, his laborious days and
+feats of horsemanship, the long journeys he performs without rest or
+food, seem to simple dwellers on the surface of the earth almost like
+miracles. Deprive him of his horse, and he can do nothing but sit on
+the ground cross-legged, or _en cuclillas_,--on his heels. You have, to
+use his own figurative language, cut off his feet.
+
+Darwin in his earlier years appears not to have possessed the power of
+reading men with that miraculous intelligence always distinguishing his
+researches concerning other and lower orders of beings. In the _Voyage
+of a Naturalist,_ speaking of this supposed indolence of the gauchos, he
+tells that in one place where workmen were in great request, seeing a
+poor gaucho sitting in a listless attitude, he asked him why he did not
+work. The man's answer was that _he was too poor to work!_ The
+philosopher was astonished and amused at the reply, but failed to
+understand it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of brief
+phrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned? The
+poor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been stolen--a thing
+of frequent occurrence in that country, or, perhaps, that some minion of
+the Government of the moment had seized them for the use of the State.
+
+To return to the starting point, the pleasures of riding do not flow
+exclusively from the agreeable sensations attendant on flight-like
+motion; there is also the knowledge, sweet in itself, that not a mere
+cunningly fashioned machine, like that fabled horse of brass "on which
+the Tartar king did ride," sustains us; but a something with life and
+thought, like ourselves, that feels what we feel, understands us, and
+keenly participates in our pleasures. Take, for example, the horse on
+which some quiet old country gentleman is accustomed to travel; how
+soberly and evenly he jogs along, picking his way over the ground. But
+let him fall into the hands of a lively youngster, and how soon he picks
+up a frisky spirit! Were horses less plastic, more the creatures of
+custom than they are, it would always be necessary, before buying one,
+to inquire into the disposition of its owner.
+
+When I was thirteen years old I was smitten with love for a horse I once
+saw--an untamable-looking brute, that rolled his eyes, turbulently,
+under a cloud of black mane tumbling over his forehead. I could not take
+my sight off this proud, beautiful creature, and I longed to possess him
+with a great longing. His owner--a worthless vagabond, as it
+happened--marked my enthusiastic admiration, and a day or two
+afterwards, having lost all his money at cards, he came to me, offering
+to sell me the horse. Having obtained my father's consent, I rushed off
+to the man with all the money I possessed--about thirty or thirty-five
+shillings, I believe. After some grumbling, and finding he could get no
+more, he accepted the money. My new possession filled me with unbounded
+delight, and I spent the time caressing him and leading him about the
+grounds in search of succulent grasses and choice leaves to feed him on.
+I am sure this horse understood and loved me, for, in spite of that
+savage look, which his eyes never quite lost, he always displayed a
+singular gentleness towards me. He never attempted to upset me, though
+he promptly threw--to my great delight, I must confess--anyone else who
+ventured to mount him. Probably the secret of his conduct was that he
+hated the whip. Of this individual, if not of the species, the
+celebrated description held true:--"The horse is a docile animal, but if
+you flog him he will not do so." After he had been mine a few days, I
+rode on him one morning to witness a cattle-marking on a neighbouring
+estate. I found thirty or forty gauchos on the ground engaged in
+catching and branding the cattle. It was rough, dangerous work, but
+apparently not rough enough to satisfy the men, so after branding an
+animal and releasing him from their lassos, several of the mounted
+gauchos would, purely for sport, endeavour to knock it down as it rushed
+away, by charging furiously on to it. As I sat there enjoying the fun,
+my horse stood very quietly under me, also eagerly watching the sport.
+At length a bull was released, and, smarting from the fiery torture,
+lowered his horns and rushed away towards the open plain. Three horsemen
+in succession shot out from the crowd, and charged the bull at full
+speed; one by one, by suddenly swerving his body round, he avoided them,
+and was escaping scot-free. At this moment my horse--possibly
+interpreting a casual touch of my hand on his neck, or some movement of
+my body, as a wish to join in the sport--suddenly sprang forward and
+charged on the flying bull like a thunderbolt, striking him full in the
+middle of his body, and hurling him with a tremendous shock to earth.
+The stricken beast rolled violently over, while my horse stood still as
+a stone watching him. Strange to say, I was not unseated, but,
+turning-round, galloped back, greeted by a shout of applause from the
+spectators--the only sound of that description I have ever had the
+privilege of listening to. They little knew that my horse had
+accomplished the perilous feat without his rider's guidance. No doubt he
+had been accustomed to do such things, and, perhaps, for the moment, had
+forgotten that he had passed into the hands of a new owner--one of
+tender years. He never voluntarily attempted an adventure of that kind
+again; he knew, I suppose, that he no longer carried on his back a
+reckless dare-devil, who valued not life. Poor Picaso! he was mine till
+he died. I have had scores of horses since, but never one I loved so
+well.
+
+With the gauchos the union between man and horse is not of so intimate a
+nature as with the Indians of the pampas. Horses are too cheap, where a
+man without shoes to his feet may possess a herd of them, for the
+closest kind of friendship to ripen. The Indian has also less
+individuality of character. The immutable nature of the conditions he is
+placed in, and his savage life, which is a perpetual chase, bring him
+nearer to the level of the beast he rides. And probably the acquired
+sagacity of the horse in the long co-partnership of centuries has become
+hereditary, and of the nature of an instinct. The Indian horse is more
+docile, he understands his master better; the slightest touch of the
+hand on his neck, which seems to have developed a marvellous
+sensitiveness, is sufficient to guide him. The gaucho labours to give
+his horse "a silken mouth," as he aptly calls it; the Indian's horse has
+it from birth. Occasionally the gaucho sleeps in the saddle; the Indian
+can die on his horse. During frontier warfare one hears at times of a
+dead warrior being found and removed with difficulty from the horse that
+carried him out of the fight, and about whose neck his rigid fingers
+were clasped in death. Even in the gaucho country, however, where, I
+grieve to confess, the horse is not deservedly esteemed, there are very
+remarkable instances of equine attachment and fidelity to man, and of a
+fellowship between horse and rider of the closest kind. One only I will
+relate.
+
+When Rosas, that man of "blood and iron," was Dictator of the Argentine
+country--a position which he held for a quarter of a centuiy--desertors
+from the army were inexorably shot when caught, as they generally were.
+But where my boyhood was spent there was a deserter, a man named Santa
+Anna, who for seven years, without ever leaving the neighbourhood of his
+home, succeeded in eluding his pursuers by means of the marvellous
+sagacity and watchful care exercised by his horse. When taking his rest
+on the plain--for he seldom slept under a roof--his faithful horse kept
+guard. At the first sight of mounted men on the horizon he would fly to
+his master, and, seizing his cloak between his teeth, rouse him with a
+vigorous shake. The hunted man would start up, and in a moment man and
+horse would vanish into one of the dense reed-beds abounding in the
+place, and where no man could follow. I have not space to tell more
+about this horse; but at last, in the fulness of time, when the figs
+were ripe--literally as well as figuratively, for it happened in the
+autumn of the year--the long tyrannous rule ended, and Santa Anna came
+out of the reed-beds, where he had lived his wild-animal life, to mix
+with his fellows. I knew him some years later. He was a rather
+heavy-looking man, with little to say, and his reputation for honesty
+was not good in the place; but I dare say there was something good in
+him.
+
+Students of nature are familiar with the modifying effects of new
+conditions on man and brute. Take, for example, the gaucho: he must
+every day traverse vast distances, see quickly, judge rapidly, be ready
+at all times to encounter hunger and fatigue, violent changes of
+temperature, great and sudden perils. These conditions have made him
+differ widely from the peasant of the Peninsula; he has the endurance
+and keen sight of a wolf, is fertile in expedients, quick in action,
+values human life not at all, and is in pain or defeat a Stoic.
+Unquestionably the horse he rides has also suffered a great change. He
+differs as much from the English hunter, for instance, as one animal can
+well differ from another of the same species. He never pounds the earth
+and wastes his energies in vain parade. He has not the dauntless courage
+that performs such brilliant feats in the field, and that often as not
+attempts the impossible. In the chase he husbands all his strength,
+carrying his head low, and almost grazing the ground with his hoofs, so
+that he is not a showy animal. Constant use, or the slow cumulative
+process of natural selection, has served to develop a keenness of sense
+almost preternatural. The vulture's eye, with all the advantage derived
+from the vulture's vast elevation above the scene surveyed, is not so
+far-reaching as the sense of smell in the pampa horse. A common
+phenomenon on the pampas is a sudden migration of the horses of a
+district to some distant place. This occurs in seasons of drought, when
+grass or water fails. The horses migrate to some district where, from
+showers having fallen or other circumstances, there is a better supply
+of food and drink. A slight breeze blowing from the more favoured
+region, which may be forty or fifty miles away, or even much further, is
+enough to start them off. Yet, during the scorching days of midsummer,
+very little moisture or smell of grass can possibly reach them from such
+a distance.
+
+Another phenomenon, even more striking, is familiar to every
+frontiersman. For some reason, the gaucho horse manifests the greatest
+terror at an Indian invasion. No doubt his fear is, in part at any rate,
+an associate feeling, the coming of the Indians being always a time of
+excitement and com-motion, sweeping like a great wave over the country;
+houses are in flames, families flying, cattle being driven at frantic
+speed to places of greater safety. Be this as it may, long before the
+marauders reach the settlement (often when they are still a whole day's
+journey from it) the horses take the alarm and come wildly flying in:
+the contagion quickly spreads to the horned cattle, and a general
+stampede ensues. The gauchos maintain that the horses _smell_ the
+Indians. I believe they are right, for when passing a distant Indian
+camp, from which the wind blew, the horses driven before me have
+suddenly taken fright and run away, leading me a chase of many miles.
+The explanation that ostriches, deer, and other fleet animals driven in
+before the invaders might be the cause of the stampede cannot be
+accepted, since the horses are familiar with the sight of these animals
+flying from their gaucho hunters.
+
+There is a pretty fable of a cat and dog lying in a dark room, aptly
+illustrating the fine senses of these two species. "Listen! I heard a
+feather drop!" said the dog. "Oh, no!" said the cat, "it was a, needle;
+I saw it." The horse is not commonly believed to have senses keen as
+that, and a dog tracing his master's steps over the city pavement is
+supposed to be a feat no other animal can equal. No doubt the artificial
+life a horse lives in England, giving so little play to many of his most
+important faculties, has served to blunt them. He is a splendid
+creature; but the noble bearing, the dash and reckless courage that
+distinguish him from the modest horse of the desert, have not been
+acquired without a corresponding loss in other things. When ridden by
+night the Indian horse--and sometimes the same habit is found in the
+gaucho's animal--drops his head lower and lower as the darkness
+increases, with the danger arising from the presence of innumerable
+kennels concealed in the grass, until his nose sweeps the surface like a
+foxhound's. That this action is dictated by a powerful instinct of
+self-preservation is plain; for, when I have attempted to forcibly drag
+the animal's head up, he has answered such an experiment by taking the
+bit in his teeth, and violently pulling the reins out of my hand. His
+miraculous sense of smell measures the exact position of every hidden
+kennel, every treacherous spot, and enables him to pass swiftly and
+securely over it.
+
+On the desert pampa the gaucho, for a reason that he knows, calls the
+puma the "friend of man." The Arab gives this designation to his horse;
+but in Europe, where we do not associate closely with the horse, the dog
+naturally takes the foremost place in our affections. The very highest
+praise yet given to this animal is probably to be found in Bacon's essay
+on Atheism. "For take an example of a dog," he says, "and mark what a
+generosity and courage he will put on when he finds himself maintained
+by a man, who is to him in place of a god, or _melior natura,_ which
+courage is manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a
+better nature than its own, could never attain!" Can we not say as much
+of the horse? The very horses that fly terror-stricken from the smell of
+an Indian will, when "maintained by a man," readily charge into a whole
+host of yelling savages.
+
+I once had a horse at home, born and bred on the place, so docile that
+whenever I required him I could go to him where the horses were at
+pasture, and, though they all galloped off at my approach, he would
+calmly wait to be caught. Springing on to his back, I would go after the
+other horses, or gallop home with only my hand on his neck to guide him.
+I did not often ride him, as he was slow and lazy, but with timid women
+and children he was a favourite; he was also frequently used for farm
+work, in or out of harness, and I could shoot from his back. In the
+peach season he would roam about the plantation, getting the fruit, of
+which he was very fond, by tugging at the lower branches of the trees
+and shaking it down in showers. One intensely dark night I was riding
+home on this horse. I came through a road with a wire fence on each
+side, two miles in length, and when I had got nearly to the end of this
+road my horse suddenly stopped short, uttering a succession of loud
+terrified snorts. I could see nothing but the intense blackness of the
+night before me and tried to encourage him to go on. Touching him on
+the neck, I found his hair wet with the sudden profuse sweat of extreme
+fear. The whip made no impression on him. He continued to back away, his
+eyes apparently fixed on some object of horror just before him, while he
+trembled to such a degree that I was shaken in the saddle. He attempted
+several times to wheel round and run away, but I was determined not to
+yield to him, and continued the contest. Suddenly, when I was beginning
+to despair of getting home by that road, he sprang forward, and
+regularly charged the (to me) invisible object before him, and in
+another moment, when he had apparently passed it, taking the bit between
+his teeth he almost flew over the ground, never pausing till he brought
+me to my own door. When I dismounted his terror seemed gone, but he hung
+his head in a dejected manner, like a horse that has been under the
+saddle all day. I have never witnessed another such instance of almost
+maddening fear. His terror and apprehension were like what we can
+imagine a man experiencing at sight of a ghost in some dark solitary
+place.
+
+Yet he did not forcibly carry me away from it, as he might so easily
+have done; but, finding himself maintained by a "nature superior to his
+own," he preferred to face it. I have never met in the dog a more
+striking example of this noblest kind of brute courage. The incident did
+not impress me very much at the moment, but when I came to reflect that
+my sight was mere blindness compared with that of my horse, and that it
+was not likely his imagination clothed any familiar natural object with
+fantastic terrors, it certainly did impress me very deeply.
+
+I am loth to finish with, my subject, in which, to express myself in the
+manner of the gauchos, I have passed over many matters, like good grass
+and fragrant herbs the galloping horse sniffs at but cannot stay to
+taste; and especially loth to conclude with this last incident, which
+has in it an element of gloom. I would rather first go back for a few
+moments to my original theme--the pleasures of riding, for the sake of
+mentioning a species of pleasure my English reader has probably never
+tasted or even heard of. When riding by night on the pampas, I used to
+enjoy lying back on my horse till my head and shoulders rested well on
+his back, my feet also being raised till they pressed against his neck;
+and in this position, which practice can make both safe and comfortable,
+gaze up into the starry sky. To enjoy this method of riding thoroughly,
+a sure-footed unshod horse with perfect confidence in his rider is
+necessary; and he must be made to go at a swift and smooth pace over
+level grassy ground. With these conditions the sensation is positively
+delightful. Nothing of earth is visible, only the vast circle of the
+heavens glittering with innumerable stars; the muffled sound of the
+hoofs on the soft sward becomes in fancy only the rushing of the wings
+of our Pegasus, while the enchanting illusion that we are soaring
+through space possesses the mind. Unfortunately, however, this method of
+riding is impracticable in England. And, even if people with enthusiasm
+enough could be found to put it in practice by importing swift
+light-footed Arabian or pampa horses, and careering about level parks on
+dark starry nights, probably a shout of derision would be raised against
+so undignified a pastime.
+
+_Apropos_ of dignity, I will relate, in conclusion, an incident in my
+London life which may possibly interest psychologists. Some time ago in
+Oxford Street I got on top of an omnibus travelling west. My mind was
+preoccupied, I was anxious to get home, and, in an absent kind of way, I
+became irritated at the painfully slow rate of progress. It was all an
+old familiar experience, the deep thought, lessening pace, and
+consequent irritation. The indolent brute I imagined myself riding was,
+as usual, taking advantage of his rider's abstraction; but I would soon
+"feelingly persuade" him that I was not so far gone as to lose sight of
+the difference between a swinging gallop and a walk. So, elevating my
+umbrella, I dealt the side of the omnibus a sounding blow, very much to
+the astonishment of my fellow-passengers. So overgrown are we with
+usages, habits, tricks of thought and action springing from the soil we
+inhabit; and when we have broken away and removed ourselves far from it,
+so long do the dead tendrils still cling to us!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV,
+
+SEEN AND LOST,
+
+
+We can imagine what the feelings of a lapidary would be--an enthusiast
+whose life is given to the study of precious stones, and whose sole
+delight is in the contemplation of their manifold beauty--if a stranger
+should come in to him, and, opening his hand, exhibit a new unknown gem,
+splendid as ruby or as sapphire, yet manifestly no mere variety of any
+familiar stone, but differing as widely from all others as diamond from
+opal or cat's-eye; and then, just when he is beginning to rejoice in
+that strange exquisite loveliness, the hand should close and the
+stranger, with a mocking smile on his lips, go forth and disappear from
+sight in the crowd. A feeling such as that would be is not unfrequently
+experienced by the field naturalist whose favoured lot it is to live in
+a country not yet "thoroughly worked out," with its every wild
+inhabitant scientifically named, accurately described, and skilfully
+figured in some colossal monograph. One swift glance of the practised
+eye, ever eagerly searching for some new-thing, and he knows that here
+at length is a form never previously seen by him; but his joy is perhaps
+only for a few moments, and the prize is snatched from sight for ever.
+The lapidary might have some doubts; he might think that the stranger
+had, after all, only mocked him with the sight of a wonderful artificial
+gem, and that a close examination would have proved its worthlessness;
+but the naturalist can have no doubts: if he is an enthusiast, well
+acquainted with the fauna of his district, and has good eyesight, he
+knows that there is no mistake; for there it is, the new strange form,
+photographed by instantaneous process on his mind, and there it will
+remain, a tantalizing image, its sharp lines and fresh colouring
+unblurred by time.
+
+Walking in some open forest glade, he may look up just in time to see a
+great strange butterfly--a blue Morpho, let us say, wandering in some
+far country where this angel insect is unknown--passing athwart his
+vision with careless, buoyant flight, the most sylph-like thing in
+nature, and all blue and pure like its aerial home, but with a more
+delicate and wonderful brilliance in its cerulean colour, giving such
+unimaginable glory to its broad airy wings; and then, almost before his
+soul has had time to feel its joy, it may soar away unloitering over the
+tall trees, to be seen no more.
+
+But the admiration, the delight, and the desire are equally great, and
+the loss just as keenly felt, whether the strange species seen happens
+to be one surpassingly beautiful or not. Its newness is to the
+naturalist its greatest attraction. How beautiful beyond all others
+seems a certain small unnamed brown bird to my mind! So many years have
+passed and its image has not yet grown dim; yet I saw it only for a few
+moments, when it hopped out from, the thick foliage and perched within
+two or three yards of me, not afraid, but only curious; and after
+peering at me first with one eye and then the other, and wiping its
+small dagger on a twig, it flew away and was seen no more. For many days
+I sought for it, and for years waited its reappearance, and it was more
+to me than ninety and nine birds which I had always known; yet it was
+very modest, dressed in a brown suit, very pale on the breast and white
+on the throat, and for distinction a straw-coloured stripe over the
+eye--that ribbon which Queen Nature bestows on so many of her feathered
+subjects, in recognition, I suppose, of some small and common kind of
+merit. If I should meet with it in a collection I should know it again;
+only, in that case it would look plain and homely to me--this little
+bird that for a time made all others seem unbeautiful.
+
+Even a richer prize may come in sight for a brief period--one of the
+nobler mammalians, which are fewer in number, and bound to earth like
+ourselves, and therefore so much better known than the wandering
+children of air. In. some secluded spot, resting amidst luxuriant
+herbage or forest undergrowth, a slight rustling makes us start, and,
+lo! looking at us from the clustering leaves, a strange face; the
+leaf-like ears erect, the dark eyes round with astonishment, and the
+sharp black nose twitching and sniffing audibly, to take in the
+unfamiliar flavour of a human presence from the air, like the pursed-up
+and smacking lips of a wine-drinker tasting a new vintage. No sooner
+seen than gone, like a dream, a phantom, the quaint furry face to be
+thereafter only an image in memory.
+
+Sometimes the prize may be a very rich one, and actually within reach of
+the hand--challenging the hand, as it were, to grasp it, and yet
+presently slip away to be seen no more, although it maybe sought for day
+after day, with a hungry longing comparable to that of some poor tramp
+who finds a gold doubloon in the forest, and just when he is beginning
+to realize all that it means to him drops it in the grass and cannot
+find it again. There is not the faintest motion in the foliage, no
+rustle of any dry leaf, and yet we know that something has
+moved--something has come or has gone; and, gazing fixedly at one spot,
+we suddenly see that it is still there, close to us, the pointed
+ophidian head and long neck, not drawn back and threatening, but sloping
+forward, dark and polished as the green and purple weed-stems springing
+from marshy soil, and with an irregular chain of spots extending down
+the side. Motionless, too, as the stems it is; but presently the tongue,
+crimson and glistening, darts out and flickers, like a small jet of
+smoke and flame, and is withdrawn; then the smooth serpent head drops
+down, and the thing is gone.
+
+How I saw and lost the noble wrestling frog has been recounted in
+Chapter IV.: other tantalizing experiences of the same kind remain to be
+told in the present chapter, which is not intended for the severe
+naturalist, but rather for such readers as may like to hear something
+about the pains and pleasures of the seeker as well as the result of the
+seeking.
+
+One of my earliest experiences of seeing and losing relates to a
+humming-bird--a veritable "jewel of ornithology." I was only a boy at
+the time, but already pretty well acquainted with the birds of the
+district I lived in, near La Plata River, and among them were three
+species of the hummingbird. One spring day I saw a fourth--a wonderful
+little thing, only half as big as the smallest of the other three--the
+well-known Phaithornis splendens--and scarcely larger than a bumble-bee.
+I was within three feet of it as it sucked at the flowers, suspended
+motionless in the air, the wings appearing formless and mist-like from
+their rapid vibratory motion, but the rest of the upper plumage was seen
+distinctly as anything can be seen. The head and neck and upper part of
+the back were emerald green, with the metallic glitter usually seen in
+the burnished scale-like feathers of these small birds; the lower half
+of the back was velvet-black; the tail and tail-coverts white as snow.
+On two other occasions, at intervals of a few days, I saw this brilliant
+little stranger, always very near, and tried without success to capture
+it, after which, it disappeared from the plantation. Four years later I
+saw it once again not far from the same place. It was late in summer,
+and I was out walking on the level plain where the ground was carpeted
+with short grass, and nothing else grew there except a solitary stunted
+cardoou thistle-bush with one flower on its central stem above the
+grey-green artichoke-like leaves. The disc of the great thorny blossom
+was as broad as that of a sunflower, purple in colour, delicately
+frosted with white; on this flat disc several insects were
+feeding--flies, fireflies, and small wasps--and I paused for a few
+minutes in my walk to watch them. Suddenly a small misty object flew
+swiftly downwards past my face, and paused motionless in the air an inch
+or two above the rim of the flower. Once more my lost humming-bird,
+which I remembered so well! The exquisitely graceful form, half circled
+by the misty moth-like wings, the glittering green and velvet-black
+mantle, and snow-white tail spread open like a fan--there it hung like a
+beautiful bird-shaped gem suspended by an invisible gossamer thread.
+One--two--three moments passed, while I gazed, trembling with rapturous
+excitement, and then, before I had time to collect my faculties and make
+a forlorn attempt to capture it with my hat, away it flew, gliding so
+swiftly on the air that form and colour were instantly lost, and in
+appearance it was only an obscure grey line traced rapidly along the,
+low sky and fading quickly out ol sight. And that was the last I ever
+saw of it.
+
+The case of this small "winged gem," still wandering nameless in the
+wilds, reminds me of yet another bird seen and lost, also remarkable for
+its diminutive size. For years I looked for it, and when the wished-for
+opportunity came, and it was in my power to secure it, I refrained; and
+Fate punished me by never permitting me to see it again. On several
+occasions while riding on the pampas I had caught glimpses of this
+minute bird flitting up mothlike, with uncertain tremulous flight, and
+again dipping into the weeds, tall grass, or thistles. Its plumage was
+yellowish in hue, like sere dead herbage, and its extremely slender body
+looked longer and slimmer than it was, owing to the great length of its
+tail, or of the two middle tail-feathers. I knew that it was a
+Synallaxis--a genus of small birds of the Woodhewer family. Now, as I
+have said in a former chapter, these are wise little birds, more
+interesting--I had almost said more beautiful--in their wisdom, or
+wisdom-simulating instincts, than the quatzel in its resplendent green,
+or the cock-of-the-rock in its vivid scarlet and orange mantle. Wrens
+and mocking-birds have melody for their chief attraction, and the name
+of each kind is, to our minds, also the name of a certain kind of sweet
+music; we think of swifts and swallows in connection with the mysterious
+migratory instinct; and humming-birds have a glittering mantle, and the
+miraculous motions necessary to display its ever-changing iridescent
+beauty. In like manner, the homely Dendrocolaptidae possess the genius
+for building, and an account of one of these small birds without its
+nest would be like a biography of Sir Christopher Wren that made no
+mention of his works. It was not strange then that when I saw this small
+bird the question rose to my mind, what kind of nest does it build?
+
+One morning in the month of October, the great breeding-time for birds
+in the Southern Hemisphere, while cautiously picking my way through a
+bed of eardoon bushes, the mysterious little creature flitted up and
+perched among the clustering leaves quite near to me. It uttered a
+feeble grasshopper-like chirp; and then a second individual, smaller,
+paler-coloured, and if possible shyer than the first, showed itself for
+two or three seconds, after which both birds dived once more into
+concealment. How glad I was to see them! for here they were, male and
+female, in a suitable spot in my own fields, where they evidently meant
+to breed. Every day after that I paid them one cautious visit, and by
+waiting from five to fifteen minutes, standing motionless among the
+thistles, I always succeeded in getting them to show themselves for a
+few moments. I could easily have secured them then, but my wish was to
+discover their nesting habits; and after watching for some days, I was
+rewarded by finding their nest; then for three days more I watched it
+slowly progressing towards completion, and each time I approached it one
+of the small birds would flit out to vanish into the herbage. The
+structure was about six inches long, and not more than two inches in
+diameter, and was placed horizontally on a broad stiff eardoon leaf,
+sheltered by other leaves above. It was made of the finest dry grass
+loosely woven, and formed a simple perfectly straight tube, open at both
+ends. The aperture was so small that I could only insert my little
+finger, and the bird could not, of course, have turned round in so
+narrow a passage, and so always went in at one end and left by the
+other. On visiting the spot on the fourth day I found, to my intense
+chagrin, that the delicate fabric had been broken and thrown down by
+some animal; also, that the birds had utterly vanished--for I sought
+them in vain, both there and in every weedy and thistly spot in the
+neighbourhood. The bird without the nest had seemed a useless thing to
+possess; now, for all my pains, I had only a wisp of fine dry grass in
+my hand, and no bird. The shy, modest little creature, dwelling
+violet-like amidst clustering leaves, and even when showing itself still
+"half-hidden from the eye," was thereafter to be only a tantalizing
+image in memory. Still, my case was not so hopeless as that of the
+imagined lapidary; for however rare a species may be, and near to its
+final extinction, there must always be many individuals existing, and I
+was cheered by the thought that I might yet meet with one at some future
+time. And, even if this particular species was not to gladden my sight
+again, there were others, scores and hundreds more, and at any moment I
+might expect to see one shining, a living gem, on Nature's open extended
+palm.
+
+Sometimes it has happened that an animal would have been overlooked or
+passed by with scant notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for some
+singular action or habit which has instantly given it a strange
+importance, and made its possession desirable.
+
+I was once engaged in the arduous and monotonous task of driving a large
+number of sheep a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, in
+excessively hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to travelling.
+Five or six gauchos were with me, and we were on the southern pampas of
+Buenos Ayres, near to a long precipitous stony sierra which rose to a
+height of five or six hundred feet above the plain. Who that has
+travelled for eighteen days on a dead level in a broiling sun can resist
+a hill? That sierra was more sublime to us than Conon-dagua, than
+Illimani.
+
+Leaving the sheep, I rode to it with three of the men; aad after
+securing our horses on the lower slope, we began our laborious ascent.
+Now the gaucho when taken from his horse, on which he lives like a kind
+of parasite, is a very slow-moving creature, and I soon left my friends
+far behind. Coming to a place where ferns and flowering herbage grew
+thick, I began to hear all about me sounds of a character utterly unlike
+any natural sound I was acquainted with--innumerable low clear voices
+tinkling or pealing like minute sweet-toned, resonant bells--for the
+sounds were purely metallic and perfectly bell-like. I was completely
+ringed round with the mysterious music, and as I walked it rose and sank
+rhythmically, keeping time to my steps. I stood still, and immediately
+the sounds ceased. I took a step forwards, and again the fairy-bells
+were set ringing, as if at each step my foot touched a central meeting
+point of a thousand radiating threads, each thread attached to a peal of
+little bells hanging concealed among the herbage. I waited for my
+companions, and called their attention to the phenomenon, and to them
+also it was a thing strange and perplexing. "It is the bell-snake!"
+cried one excitedly. This is the rattle-snake; but although at that time
+I had no experience of this reptile, I knew that he was wrong. Yet how
+natural the mistake! The Spanish name of "bell-snake" had made him
+imagine that the whirring sound of the vibrating rattles, resembling
+muffled cicada music, is really bell-like in character. Eventually we
+discovered that the sound was made by grasshoppers; but they were seen
+only to be lost, for I could not capture one, so excessively shy and
+cunning had the perpetual ringing of their own little tocsins made them.
+And presently I had to return to my muttons; and afterwards there was no
+opportunity of revisiting the spot to observe so singular a habit again
+and collect specimens. It was a very slender grasshopper, about an inch
+and a half long, of a uniform, tawny, protective colour--the colour of
+an old dead leaf. It also possessed a protective habit common to most
+grasshoppers, of embracing a slender vertical stem with its four fine
+front legs, and moving cunningly round so as to keep the stem always in
+front of it to screen itself from sight. Only other grasshoppers are
+silent when alarmed, and the silence and masking action are related, and
+together prevent the insect from being detected. But this particular
+species, or race, or colony, living on the sides of the isolated sierra,
+had acquired a contrary habit, resembling a habit of gregarious birds
+and mammals. For this informing sound (unless it mimicked some
+_warning-sound,_ as of a rattlesnake, which it didn't) could not
+possibly be beneficial to individuals living alone, as grasshoppers
+generally do, but, on the contrary, only detrimental; and such a habit
+was therefore purely for the public good, and could only have arisen in
+a species that always lived in communities.
+
+On another occasion, in the middle of the hot season, I was travelling
+alone across-country in a locality which was new to me, a few leagues
+east of La Plata River, in its widest part. About eleven o'clock in the
+morning I came to a low-lying level plain where the close-cropped grass
+was vivid green, although elsewhere all over the country the vegetation
+was scorched and dead, and dry as ashes. The ground being so favourable,
+I crossed this low plain at a swinging gallop, and in about thirty
+minutes' time. In that half-hour I saw a vast number of snakes, all of
+one kind, and a species new to me; but my anxiety to reach my
+destination before the oppressive heat of the afternoon made me hurry
+on. So numerous were the snakes in that green place that frequently I
+had as many as a dozen in sight at one time. It looked to me like a
+coronelia--harmless colubrine snakes--but was more than twice as large
+as either of the two species of that genus I was already familiar with.
+In size they varied greatly, ranging from two to fully five feet in
+length, and the colour was dull yellow or tan, slightly lined and
+mottled with shades of brown. Among dead or partially withered grass and
+herbage they would have been undistinguishable at even a very short
+distance, but on the vivid green turf they were strangely conspicuous,
+some being plainly visible forty or fifty yards away; and not one was
+seen coiled up. They were all lying motionless, stretched out full
+length, and looking like dark yellow or tan-coloured ribbons, thrown on
+to the grass. It was most unusual to see so many snakes together,
+although not surprising in the circumstances. The December heats had
+dried up all the watercourses and killed the vegetation, and made the
+earth hard and harsh as burnt bricks; and at such times snakes,
+especially the more active non-venomous kinds, will travel long
+distances, in their slow way, in search of water. Those I saw during my
+ride had probably been attracted by the moisture from a large area of
+country; and although there was no water, the soft fresh grass must have
+been grateful to them. Snakes are seen coiled up when they are at home;
+when travelling and far afield, they lie as a rule extended full length,
+even when resting--and they are generally resting. Pausing at length,
+before quitting this green plain, to give my horse a minute's rest, I
+got off and approached a large snake; but when I was quite twelve yards
+from it, it lifted its head, and, turning deliberately round, came
+rather swiftly at me. I retreated, and it followed, until, springing on
+to my horse, I left it, greatly surprised at its action, and beginning
+to think that it must be venomous. As I rode on the feeling of surprise
+increased, conquering haste; and in the end, seeing more snakes, I
+dismounted and approached the largest, when exactly the same thing
+occurred again, the snake rousing itself and coming angrily at me when I
+was still (considering the dull lethargic character of the deadliest
+kinds) at an absurd distance from it. Again and again I repeated the
+experiment, with the same result. And at length I stunned one with a
+blow of my whip to examine its mouth, but found no poison-fangs in it.
+
+I then resumed my journey, expecting to meet with more snakes of the
+same kind at my destination; but there were none, and very soon business
+called me to a distant place, and I never met with this species
+afterwards. But when I rode away from that green spot, and was once more
+on the higher, desolate, wind-swept plain surrounding it--a rustling sea
+of giant thistles, still erect, although dead, and red as rust, and
+filling the hot blue sky with silvery down--it was with a very strange
+feeling. The change from the green and living to the dead and dry and
+dusty was so great! There seemed to be something mysterious,
+extra-natural, in that low level plain, so green and fresh and snaky,
+where my horse's hoofs had made no sound--a place where no man dwelt,
+and no cattle pastured, and no wild bird folded its wing. And the
+serpents there were not like others--the mechanical coiled-up thing we
+know, a mere bone-and-muscle man-trap, set by the elements, to spring
+and strike when trodden on: but these had a high intelligence, a lofty
+spirit, and were filled with a noble rage and astonishment that any
+other kind of creature, even a man, should venture there to disturb
+their sacred peace. It was a fancy, born of that sense of mystery which
+the unknown and the unusual in nature wakes in us--an obsolescent
+feeling that still links us to the savage. But the simple fact was
+wonderful enough, and that has been set down simply and apart from all
+fancies. If the reader happens not to be a naturalist, it is right to
+tell him that a naturalist cannot exaggerate consciously; and if he be
+capable of unconscious exaggeration, then ho is no naturalist. He
+should hasten "to join the innumerable caravan that moves" to the
+fantastic realms of romance. Looking at the simple fact scientifically,
+it was a case of mimicry--the harmless snake mimicking the fierce
+threatening gestures and actions proper to some deadly kind. Only with
+this difference: the venomous snake, of all deadly things in nature, is
+the slowest to resentment, the most reluctant to enter into a quarrel;
+whereas in this species angry demonstrations were made when the intruder
+was yet far off, and before he had shown any hostile intentions.
+
+My last case--the last, that is, of the few I have selected--relates to
+a singular variation in the human species. On this occasion I was again
+travelling alone in a strange district on the southern frontier of
+Buenos Ayres. On a bitterly cold midwinter day, shortly before noon, I
+arrived, stiff and tired, at one of those pilgrims' rests on the pampas
+--a wayside _pulperia,_ or public house, where the traveller can procure
+anything he may require or desire, from a tumbler of Brazilian rum to
+make glad his heart, to a poncho, or cloak of blue cloth with fluffy
+scarlet lining, to keep him warm o' nights; and, to speed him on his
+way, a pair of cast-iron spurs weighing six pounds avoirdupois, with
+rowels eight inches in diameter, manufactured in this island for the use
+of barbarous men beyond the sea. The wretched mud-and-grass building was
+surrounded by a foss crossed by a plank drawbridge; outside of the
+enclosure twelve or fourteen saddled horses were standing, and from the
+loud noise of talk and laughter in the bar I conjectured that a goodly
+company of rough frontiersmen were already making merry at that early
+hour. It was necessary for me to go in among them to see the proprietor
+of the place and ask permission to visit his kitchen in order to make
+myself a "tin of coffee," that being the refreshment I felt inclined
+for. When I went in and made my salutation, one man wheeled round square
+before me, stared straight into my oyes, and in an exceedingly
+high-pitched reedy or screechy voice and a sing-song tone returned my
+"good morning," and bade me call for the liquid I loved best at his
+expense. I declined with thanks, and in accordance with gaucho etiquette
+added that I was prepared to pay for his liquor. It was then for him to
+say that he had already been served and so let the matter drop, but he
+did not do so: he screamed out in his wild animal voice that he would
+take gin. I paid for his drink, and would, I think, have felt greatly
+surprised at his strange insolent behaviour, so unlike that of the
+usually courteous gaucho, but this thing affected me not at all, so
+profoundly had his singular appearance and voice impressed me; and for
+the rest of the time I remained in the place I continued to watch him
+narrowly. Professor Huxley has somewhere said, "A variation frequently
+occurs, but those who notice it take no care about noting down the
+particulars." That is not a failing of mine, and this is what I noted
+down while the man's appearance was still fresh in memory. He was about
+five feet eleven inches in height--very tall for a gaucho--straight and
+athletic, with exceedingly broad shoulders, which made his round head
+look small; long arms and huge hands. The round flat face, coarse black
+hair, swarthy reddish colour, and smooth hairless cheeks seemed to show
+that he had more Indian than Spanish blood in him, while his round black
+eyes were even more like those of a rapacious animal in expression than
+in the pure-blooded Indian. He also had the Indian or half-breed's
+moustache, when that natural ornament is permitted to grow, and which is
+composed of thick bristles standing out like a cat's whiskers. The mouth
+was the marvellous feature, for it was twice the size of an average
+mouth, and the two lips were alike in thickness. This mouth did not
+smile, but snarled, both when he spoke and when he should have smiled;
+and when he snarled the wliolo of his teeth and a part of the gums were
+displayed. The teeth were not as in other human beings--incisors,
+canines, and molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, each
+tooth a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched its
+companion teeth, and with a point sharp as the sharpest-pointed dagger.
+They were like the teeth of a shark or crocodile. I noticed that when he
+showed them, which was very often, they were not set together as in
+dogs, weasels, and other savage snarling animals, but apart, showing the
+whole terrible serration in the huge red mouth.
+
+After getting his gin he joined in the boisterous conversation with the
+others, and this gave me an opportunity of studying his face for several
+minutes, all the time with a curious feeling that I had put myself into
+a cage with a savage animal of horrible aspect, whose instincts were
+utterly unknown to me, and were probably not very pleasant. It was
+interesting to note that whenever one of the others addressed him
+directly, or turned to him when speaking, it was with a curious
+expression, not of fear, but partly amusement and partly something else
+which I could not fathom. Now, one might think that this was natural
+enough purely on account of the man's extraordinary appearance. I do not
+think that a sufficient explanation; for however strange a man's
+appearance may be, his intimate friends and associates soon lose all
+sense of wonder at his strangeness, and even forget that he is unlike
+others. My belief is that this curiosity, or whatever it was they showed
+in their faces, was due to something in his character--a mental
+strangeness, showing itself at unexpected times, and which might flash,
+out at any moment to amuse or astonish them. There was certainly a
+correspondence between the snarling action of the mouth and the
+dangerous form of the teeth, perfect as that in any snarling animal; and
+such animals, it should be remembered, snarl not only when angry and
+threatening, but in their playful moods as well. Other and more
+important correspondences or correlations might have existed; and the
+voice was certainly unlike any human voice I have ever heard, whether in
+white, red, or black man. But the time I had for observation was short,
+the conversation revealed nothing further, and by-and-by I went away in
+search of the odorous kitchen, where there would be hot water for
+coffee, or at all events cold water and a kettle, and materials for
+making a fire--to wit, bones of dead cattle, "buffalo chips," and rancid
+fat.
+
+I have never been worried with the wish, or ambition to be a head-hunter
+in the Dyak sense, but on this one occasion I did wish that it had been
+possible, without violating any law, or doing anything to a
+fellow-creature which I should not like done to myself, to have obtained
+possession of this man's head, with its set of unique and terrible
+teeth. For how, in the name of Evolution, did he come by them, and by
+other physical peculiarities--the snarling habit and that high-pitched
+animal voice, for instance--which made him a being different from
+others--one separate and far apart? Was he, so admirably formed, so
+complete and well-balanced, merely a freak of nature, to use an
+old-fashioned phrase--a sport, or spontaneous individual variation--an
+experiment for a new human type, imagined by Nature in some past period,
+inconceivably long ago, but which she had only now, too late, found time
+to carry out? Or rather was he like that little hairy maiden exhibited
+not long ago in London, a reproduction of the past, the mystery called
+reversion--a something in the life of a species like memory in the life
+of an individual, the memory which suddenly brings back to the old man's
+mind the image of his childhood? For no dream-monster in human form ever
+appeared to me with so strange and terrible a face; and this was no
+dream but sober fact, for I saw and spoke with this man; and unless cold
+steel has given him his quietus, or his own horse has crushed him, or a
+mad bull sored him--all natural forms of death in that wild land--he is
+probably still living and in the prime of life, and perhaps at this very
+moment drinking gin at some astonished traveller's expense at that very
+bar where I met him. The old Palaeolithic man, judging from the few
+remains we have of him, must have had an unspeakably savage and, to our
+way of thinking, repulsive and horrible aspect, with his villainous low
+receding forehead, broad nose, great projecting upper jaw, and
+retreating chin; to meet such a man face to face in Piccadilly would
+frighten a nervous person of the present time. But his teeth were not
+unlike our own, only very much larger and more powerful, and well
+adapted to their work of masticating the flesh, underdone and possibly
+raw, of mammoth and rhinoceros. If, then, this living man recalls a type
+of the past, it is of a remoter past, a more primitive man, the volume
+of whose history is missing from the geological record. To speculate on
+such a subject seems idle and useless; and when I coveted possession of
+that head it was not because I thought that it might lead to any fresh
+discovery. A lower motive inspired the feeling. I wished for it only
+that I might bring it over the sea, to drop it like a new apple of
+discord, suited to the spirit of the times, among the anthropologists
+and evolutionists generally of this old and learned world. Inscribed, of
+course, "To the most learned," but giving no locality and no
+particulars. I wished to do that for the pleasure--not a very noble kind
+of pleasure, I allow--of witnessing from some safe hiding-place the
+stupendous strife that would have ensued--a battle more furious, lasting
+and fatal to many a brave knight of biology, than was ever yet fought
+over any bone or bony fragment or fabric ever picked up, including the
+celebrated cranium of the Neanderthal.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX.
+
+THE PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The following passage occurs in an article on "The Naturalist in La
+Plata," by the late Professor Piomanes, which appeared in the
+_Nineteenth Century,_ May, 1893. After quoting the account of the puma's
+habits and character given in the book, the writer says:--"I have
+received corroboration touching all these points from a gentleman who,
+when walking alone and unarmed on the skirts of a forest, was greatly
+alarmed by a large puma coming out to meet him. Deeming it best not to
+stand, he advanced to meet the animal, which thereupon began to gambol
+around his feet and rub against his legs, after the manner of an
+affectionate cat. At first he thought these movements must have been
+preliminary to some peculiar mode of attack, and therefore he did not
+respond, but walked quietly on, until the puma suddenly desisted and
+re-entered the forest. This gentleman says that, until the publication
+of Mr. Hudson's book, he had always remained under the impression that
+that particular puma must have been insane."
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+I have found among my papers the following mislaid note on the subject
+of sportive displays of mammalians, which should have been used on page
+281, where the subject is briefly treated:--Most mammalians are
+comparatively silent and live on the ground, and not having the power to
+escape easily, which birds have, and being more persecuted by man, they
+do not often disport themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it is
+difficult to watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence being
+known or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as we
+might imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which I was,
+or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting themselves in a
+manner that took me completely by surprise. While out tinamou shooting
+one day in autumn, near my own home in La Plata, I spied a troop of
+about a dozen weasels racing madly about over a vizcacha village--the
+mound and group of pit-like burrows inhabited by a community of
+vizcachas. These weasels were of the large common species, Galictis
+barbara, about the size of a cat; and were engaged in a pastime
+resembling a complicated dance, and so absorbed were they on that
+occasion that they took no notice of me when I walked up to within nine
+or ten yards of them, and stood still to watch the performance. They
+were all swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doubling
+quickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and although
+apparently carried away with excitement, and crossing each other's
+tracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with so many changes of
+direction that I became confused when trying to keep any one animal in
+view, they never collided nor even came near enough to touch one
+another. The whole performance resembled, on a greatly magnified scale
+and without its beautiful smoothness and lightning swiftness, the
+fantastic dance of small black water-beetles, frequently seen on the
+surface of a pool or stream, during which the insects glide about in a
+limited area with such celerity as to appear like black curving lines
+traced by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross and
+intersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After watching
+the weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the mound, whereupon
+the animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell into the burrows, but
+only to reappear in a few seconds, thrusting up their long ebony-black
+necks and flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaring
+with fierce, beady eyes.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+In November and December, 1893, a short correspondence appeared in the
+_Field_ on the curious subject of "Dogs burying their dead." It arose
+through a letter from a Mr. Gould, of Albany, Western Australia,
+relating the following incident:--
+
+A settler shot a bitch from a neighbouring estate that had formed the
+habit of coming on to his land to visit and play with his dog. The dog,
+finding his companion dead, was observed to dig a large hole in the
+ground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not cover it with
+earth. The writer wished to know if any reader of the _Field_ had met
+with a similar case. Some notes, which I contributed in reply to this
+letter, bear on one of the subjects treated in the chapter on "strange
+instincts," namely, the instinct of social animals to protect and shield
+their fellows; and for this reason I have thought it best to reproduce
+them in this place.
+
+I remember on one occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, a
+large and very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitch
+that had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but he
+never left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the body
+away, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not succeeding in these
+attempts, he settled down by its side again, although it was evident
+that he was suffering greatly from thirst and heat. It was at last only
+with the greatest trouble that the people of the house succeeded in
+getting the body away and burying it out of his sight.
+
+Another instance, more to the point, occurred at my own house on the
+pampas, and I was one of several persons who witnessed it. A small, red,
+long-haired bitch--a variety of the common native cur--gave birth to
+four or five pups. A peon was told to destroy them, and, waiting until
+the bitch was out of sight, he carried them off to the end of the
+orchard, some 400 or 500 yards from the house, and threw them into a
+pool of water which was only two to three feet deep. The bitch passed
+the rest of the day in rushing frantically about, searching for her
+young, and in the evening, a little after dark, actually succeeded in
+finding them, although they were lying at the bottom of the pool. She
+got them all out, and carried them, one by one, to another part of the
+grounds, where she passed the night with them, uttering at intervals the
+most piercing cries. In the morning she carried them to still another
+spot, where there was a soft mould, and then dug a hole large and deep
+enough to bury them all, covering them over with the loose earth. Her
+task done, she returned to the house to sleep all day, but when night
+came again the whole piteous performance was repeated: the pups were dug
+up, and she passed the long, piercingly cold night--for it was in the
+depth of winter--trying to keep them warm, and uttering, as before,
+distressing cries. Yet a third time the whole thing was repeated; but
+after the third night, when the dog came home to sleep, the dead pups
+were taken out of the ground and buried at a distance.
+
+Such an action as this strikes one with astonishment only because we
+have the custom of burying our dead, and are too ready at all times to
+regard the dog as human-like. But the explanation of the action in this
+case is to be found in the familiar fact that very many animals,
+including the dog, have the habit or instinct of burying or concealing
+the thing they wish to leave in safety. Thus, the dog buries the bone it
+does not want to eat, and when hungry digs it up again. When a dog
+buries or hides the dead body of the she dog it was attached to, or the
+she dog buries her dead young, it is with the same motive--namely, to
+conceal the animal that cannot be roused, and that it would not be safe
+to leave exposed,
+
+It is plain to all who observe their actions that the lower animals have
+no comprehension of death. In the case of two animals that are
+accustomed to play or to be much together, if one dies, or is killed,
+and its body left, the other will come to sniff at, touch, and at last
+try to rouse it; but finding all attempts vain, it will at length go
+away to seek companionship elsewhere. In cases where the attachment is
+much stronger, the dead body may he watched over for an indefinite
+period. A brother of mine once related to me a very pathetic incident
+which occurred at an estancia on the pampas where he was staying. A
+large portion of the land was a low, level, marshy plain, partly
+overgrown with reeds and rushes; and one day, in this wilderness, a
+little boy of eight or nine, from the estancia, lost himself. A small
+dog, his invariable attendant, had gone out with him, but did not
+return. Seven days later the poor boy was found, at a great distance
+from the house, lying on the grass, where he had died of exhaustion. The
+dog was lying coiled up at his side, and appeared to be sleeping; but,
+when spoken to, he did not stir, and was presently found to be dead too.
+The dog could have gone back at any moment to the estancia, but his
+instinct of attachment overcame all others; he kept guard over his
+little master, who slept so soundly and so long, until he, too, slept in
+the same way.
+
+A still more remarkable case of this kind was given in one of my books,
+of a gaucho, accompanied by his dog, who was chased and overtaken by a
+troop of soldiers during one of the civil wars in Uruguay. Suspecting
+him of being a spy, or, at all events, an enemy, his captors cut his
+throat, then rode away, calling to the dog to follow them; but the
+animal refused to leave his dead master's side. Returning to the spot a
+few days later, they saw the body of the man they had killed surrounded
+by a large number of vultures, which the dog, in a frenzy of excitement,
+was occupied in keeping at a respectable distance. It was observed that
+the dog, after making one of his sallies, driving the birds away with
+furious barkings, would set out at a run to a small stream not far from
+the spot; but when half way to it he would look back, and, seeing the
+vultures advancing once more to the corpse, would rush back to protect
+it. The soldiers watched him for some time with great interest, and once
+more they tried in vain to get him to follow them. Two days afterwards
+they revisited the spot, to find the dog lying dead by the side of his
+dead master. I had this story from the lips of one of the witnesses.
+
+In all such cases, whether the dog watches over, conceals, or buries a
+dead body, he is doubtless moved by the same instinct which leads him to
+safeguard the animal he is attached to--another dog or his human master.
+But, as the dead animal is past help, it is, of course, a blunder of the
+instinct; and the blunder must be of very much less frequent occurrence
+among wild than among domestic animals. In a state of nature, when a
+gregarious animal dies, he dies, as a rule, alone; his body is not seen
+by his former companions, and he is not missed. When he dies by
+violence--which is the common fate--the body is carried off or devoured
+by the killer. This being the usual order, there is no instinct, except
+in a very few species, relating to the disposal of the dead among
+mammals and other vertebrates, such as is found in ants and other social
+insects. There are a few mammalians that live together in small
+communities, in a habitation made to last for many generations, in which
+such an instinct would appear necessary, and it accordingly exists, but
+is very imperfect. This is the case with the vizcacha, the large rodent
+of the pampas, which lives with its fellows, to the number of twenty or
+thirty, in a cluster of huge burrows. When a vizcacha dies in a burrow,
+the body is dragged out and thrown on to the mound among the mass of
+rubbish collected on it--but not until he has been dead a long time, and
+there is nothing left of him but the dry bones held together by the
+skin. In that condition the other members of the community probably
+cease to look on him as one of their companions who has fallen into a
+long sleep; he is no more than so much rubbish, which must be cleared
+out of an old disused burrow. Probably the beaver possesses some rude
+instinct similar to that of the vizcacha.
+
+_Apropos_ of animals burying their treasures (or connections) for
+safety, it is worth mentioning that the skunk of the pampas occasionally
+buries her young in the kennel, when hunger compels her to go out
+foraging. I had often heard of this habit of the female skunk from the
+gauchos, and one day had the rare good fortune to witness an animal
+engaged in obliterating her own kennel. The senses of the skunk are so
+defective that one is able at times to approach very near to without
+alarming them. In this instance I sat on my horse at a distance of
+twenty yards, and watched the animal at work, drawing in the loose earth
+with her fore feet until the entrance to the kennel was filled up to
+within three inches of the surface; then, dropping into the shallow
+cavity, she pressed the loose mould down with her nose. Her task
+finished, she trotted away, and the hollow in the soil, when I examined
+it closely, looked only like the mouth of an ancient choked-up burrow.
+The young inhabit a circular chamber, lined with fine dry grass, at the
+end of a narrow passage from 3 ft. to 5 ft. long, and no doubt have air
+enough to serve them until their parent returns; but I believe the skunk
+only buries her young when they are very small.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
+#7 in our series by W. H. Hudson
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+Title: The Naturalist in La Plata
+
+Author: W. H. Hudson
+
+Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7446]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on May 1, 2003]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+Character set encoding: ISO-Latin-1
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Eric Eldred
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA
+
+BY
+
+W. H. HUDSON, C.M.Z.S.
+
+
+JOINT AUTHOR OF "ARGENTINE ORNITHOLOGY"
+
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. SMIT
+
+THIRD EDITION.
+
+NEW YORK
+D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
+1895
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The plan I have followed in this work has been to sift and arrange the
+facts I have gathered concerning the habits of the animals best known to
+me, preserving those only, which, in my judgment, appeared worth
+recording. In some instances a variety of subjects have linked
+themselves together in my mind, and have been grouped under one heading;
+consequently the scope of the book is not indicated by the list of
+contents: this want is, however, made good by an index at the end.
+
+It is seldom an easy matter to give a suitable name to a book of this
+description. I am conscious that the one I have made choice of displays
+a lack of originality; also, that this kind of title has been used
+hitherto for works constructed more or less on the plan of the famous
+_Naturalist on the Amazons._ After I have made this apology the reader,
+on his part, will readily admit that, in treating of the Natural History
+of a district so well known, and often described as the southern portion
+of La Plata, which has a temperate climate, and where nature is neither
+exuberant nor grand, a personal narrative would have seemed superfluous.
+
+The greater portion of the matter contained in this volume has already
+seen the light in the form of papers contributed to the _Field,_ with
+other journals that treat of Natural History; and to the monthly
+magazines:--_Longmans', The Nineteenth Century, The Gentleman's
+Magazine,_ and others: I am indebted to the Editors and Proprietors of
+these periodicals for kindly allowing me to make use of this material.
+
+Of all animals, birds have perhaps afforded me most pleasure; but most
+of the fresh knowledge I have collected in this department is contained
+in a larger work _(Argentine Ornithology),_ of which Dr. P. L. Sclater
+is part author. As I have not gone over any of the subjects dealt with
+in that work, bird-life has not received more than a fair share of
+attention in the present volume.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I. THE DESERT PAMPAS
+
+CHAPTER II. CUB PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA
+
+CHAPTER III. WAVE OF LIFE
+
+CHAPTER IV. SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS
+
+CHAPTER V. FEAR IN BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER VI. PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE MEPHITIC SKUNK
+
+CHAPTER VIII. MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS
+
+CHAPTER IX. DRAGON-FLY STORMS
+
+CHAPTER X. MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS
+
+CHAPTER XI. HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS
+
+CHAPTER XII. A NOBLE WASP
+
+CHAPTER XIII. NATURE'S NIGHT-LIGHTS
+
+CHAPTER XIV. FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS
+
+CHAPTER XV. THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT
+
+CHAPTER XVI. HUMMING-BIRDS
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE CRESTED SCREAMER
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. THE WOODHEWER FAMILY
+
+CHAPTER XIX. MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE
+
+CHAPTER XX. BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE DYING HUANACO
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. HORSE AND MAN
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. SEEN AND LOST
+
+APPENDIX
+
+INDEX
+
+
+
+
+THE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA,
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE DESERT PAMPAS.
+
+
+During recent years we have heard much about the great and rapid changes
+now going on in the plants and animals of all the temperate regions of
+the globe colonized by Europeans. These changes, if taken merely as
+evidence of material progress, must be a matter of rejoicing to those
+who are satisfied, and more than satisfied, with our system of
+civilization, or method of outwitting Nature by the removal of all
+checks on the undue increase of our own species. To one who finds a
+charm in things as they exist in the unconquered provinces of Nature's
+dominions, and who, not being over-anxious to reach the end of his
+journey, is content to perform it on horseback, or in a waggon drawn by
+bullocks, it is permissible to lament the altered aspect of the earth's
+surface, together with the disappearance of numberless noble and
+beautiful forms, both of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. For he
+cannot find it in his heart to love the forms by which they are
+replaced; these are cultivated and domesticated, and have only become
+useful to man at the cost of that grace and spirit which freedom and
+wildness give. In numbers they are many--twenty-five millions of sheep
+in this district, fifty millions in that, a hundred millions in a
+third--but how few are the species in place of those destroyed? and when
+the owner of many sheep and much wheat desires variety--for he possesses
+this instinctive desire, albeit in conflict with and overborne by the
+perverted instinct of destruction--what is there left to him, beyond his
+very own, except the weeds that spring up in his fields under all skies,
+ringing him round with old-world monotonous forms, as tenacious of their
+undesired union with him as the rats and cockroaches that inhabit his
+house?
+
+We hear most frequently of North America, New Zealand, and Australia in
+this connection; but nowhere on the globe has civilization "written
+strange defeatures" more markedly than on that great area of level
+country called by English writers _the pampas_, but by the Spanish more
+appropriately _La Pampa_--from the Quichua word signifying open space or
+country--since it forms in most part one continuous plain, extending on
+its eastern border from the river Parana, in latitude 32 degrees, to the
+Patagonian formation on the river Colorado, and comprising about two
+hundred thousand square miles of humid, grassy country.
+
+This district has been colonized by Europeans since the middle of the
+sixteenth century; but down to within a very few years ago immigration
+was on too limited a scale to make any very great change; and, speaking
+only of the pampean country, the conquered territory was a long,
+thinly-settled strip, purely pastoral, and the Indians, with their
+primitive mode of warfare, were able to keep back the invaders from the
+greater portion of their ancestral hunting-grounds. Not twenty years
+ago a ride of two hundred miles, starting from the capital city,
+Buenos Ayres, was enough to place one well beyond the furthest
+south-western frontier outpost. In 1879 the Argentine Government
+determined to rid the country of the aborigines, or, at all events, to
+break their hostile and predatory spirit once for all; with the result
+that the entire area of the grassy pampas, with a great portion of
+the sterile pampas and Patagonia, has been made available to the
+emigrant. There is no longer anything to deter the starvelings
+of the Old World from possessing themselves of this new land of
+promise, flowing, like Australia, with milk and tallow, if not with
+honey; any emasculated migrant from a Genoese or Neapolitan
+slum is now competent to "fight the wilderness" out there, with his
+eight-shilling fowling-piece and the implements of his trade. The
+barbarians no longer exist to frighten his soul with dreadful war cries;
+they have moved away to another more remote and shadowy region, called
+in their own language _Alhuemapu_, and not known to geographers. For
+the results so long and ardently wished for have swiftly followed on
+General Roca's military expedition; and the changes witnessed during the
+last decade on the pampas exceed in magnitude those which had been
+previously effected by three centuries of occupation.
+
+In view of this wave of change now rapidly sweeping away the old
+order, with whatever beauty and grace it possessed, it might not seem
+inopportune at the present moment to give a rapid sketch, from the field
+naturalist's point of view, of the great plain, as it existed before the
+agencies introduced by European colonists had done their work, and as it
+still exists in its remoter parts.
+
+The humid, grassy, pampean country extends, roughly speaking, half-way
+from the Atlantic Ocean and the Plata and Paraná rivers to the Andes,
+and passes gradually into the "Monte Formation," or _sterile pampa_--a
+sandy, more or less barren district, producing a dry, harsh, ligneous
+vegetation, principally thorny bushes and low trees, of which the chañar
+(Gurliaca decorticans) is the most common; hence the name of
+"Chañar-steppe" used by some writers: and this formation extends
+southwards down into Patagonia. Scientists have not yet been able to
+explain why the pampas, with a humid climate, and a soil exceedingly
+rich, have produced nothing but grass, while the dry, sterile
+territories on their north, west, and south borders have an arborescent
+vegetation. Darwin's conjecture that the extreme violence of the
+_pampero,_ or south-west wind, prevented trees from growing, is now
+proved to have been ill-founded since the introduction of the Eucalyptus
+globulus; for this noble tree attains to an extraordinary height on the
+pampas, and exhibits there a luxuriance of foliage never seen in
+Australia.
+
+To this level area--my "parish of Selborne," or, at all events, a goodly
+portion of it--with the sea on one hand, and on the other the
+practically infinite expanse of grassy desert--another sea, not "in vast
+fluctuations fixed," but in comparative calm--I should like to conduct
+the reader in imagination: a country all the easier to be imagined on
+account of the absence of mountains, woods, lakes, and rivers. There is,
+indeed, little to be imagined--not even a sense of vastness; and Darwin,
+touching on this point, in the _Journal of a Naturalist,_ aptly
+says:--"At sea, a person's eye being six feet above the surface of the
+water, his horizon is two miles and four-fifths distant. In like manner,
+the more level the plain, the more nearly does the horizon approach
+within these narrow limits; and this, in my opinion, entirely destroys
+the grandeur which one would have imagined that a vast plain would have
+possessed."
+
+I remember my first experience of a hill, after having been always shut
+within "these narrow limits." It was one of the range of sierras near
+Cape Corrientes, and not above eight hundred feet high; yet, when I had
+gained the summit, I was amazed at the vastness of the earth, as it
+appeared to me from that modest elevation. Persons born and bred on the
+pampas, when they first visit a mountainous district, frequently
+experience a sensation as of "a ball in the throat" which seems to
+prevent free respiration.
+
+In most places the rich, dry soil is occupied by a coarse grass, three
+or four feet high, growing in large tussocks, and all the year round of
+a deep green; a few slender herbs and trefoils, with long, twining
+stems, maintain a frail existence among the tussocks; but the strong
+grass crowds out most plants, and scarcely a flower relieves its uniform
+everlasting verdure. There are patches, sometimes large areas, where it
+does not grow, and these are carpeted by small creeping herbs of a
+livelier green, and are gay in spring with flowers, chiefly of the
+composite and papilionaceous kinds; and verbenas, scarlet, purple, rose,
+and white. On moist or marshy grounds there are also several lilies,
+yellow, white, and red, two or three flags, and various other small
+flowers; but altogether the flora of the pampas is the poorest in
+species of any fertile district on the globe. On moist clayey ground
+flourishes the stately pampa grass, Gynerium argenteum, the spears of
+which often attain a height of eight or nine feet. I have ridden through
+many leagues of this grass with the feathery spikes high as my head, and
+often higher. It would be impossible for me to give anything like an
+adequate idea of the exquisite loveliness, at certain times and seasons,
+of this queen of grasses, the chief glory of the solitary pampa.
+Everyone is familiar with it in cultivation; but the garden-plant has a
+sadly decaying, draggled look at all times, and to my mind, is often
+positively ugly with its dense withering mass of coarse leaves, drooping
+on the ground, and bundle of spikes, always of the same dead white or
+dirty cream-colour. Now colour--the various ethereal tints that give a
+blush to its cloud-like purity--is one of the chief beauties of this
+grass on its native soil; and travellers who have galloped across the
+pampas at a season of the year when the spikes are dead, and white as
+paper or parchment, have certainly missed its greatest charm. The plant
+is social, and in some places where scarcely any other kind exists it
+covers large areas with a sea of fleecy-white plumes; in late summer,
+and in autumn, the tints are seen, varying from the most delicate rose,
+tender and illusive as the blush on the white under-plumage of some
+gulls, to purple and violaceous. At no time does it look so perfect as
+in the evening, before and after sunset, when the softened light imparts
+a mistiness to the crowding plumes, and the traveller cannot help
+fancying that the tints, which then seem richest, are caught from the
+level rays of the sun, or reflected from the coloured vapours of the
+afterglow.
+
+The last occasion on which I saw the pampa grass in its full beauty was
+at the close of a bright day in March, ending in one of those perfect
+sunsets seen only in the wilderness, where no lines of house or hedge
+mar the enchanting disorder of nature, and the earth and sky tints are
+in harmony. I had been travelling all day with one companion, and for
+two hours we had ridden through the matchless grass, which spread away
+for miles on every side, the myriads of white spears, touched with
+varied colour, blending in the distance and appearing almost like the
+surface of a cloud. Hearing a swishing sound behind us, we turned
+sharply round, and saw, not forty yards away in our rear, a party of
+five mounted Indians, coming swiftly towards us: but at the very moment
+we saw them their animals came to a dead halt, and at the same instant
+the five riders leaped up, and stood erect on their horses' backs.
+Satisfied that they had no intention of attacking us, and were only
+looking out for strayed horses, we continued watching them for some
+time, as they stood gazing away over the plain in different directions,
+motionless and silent, like bronze men on strange horse-shaped pedestals
+of dark stone; so dark in their copper skins and long black hair,
+against the far-off ethereal sky, flushed with amber light; and at their
+feet, and all around, the cloud of white and faintly-blushing plumes.
+That farewell scene was printed very vividly on my memory, but cannot be
+shown to another, nor could it be even if a Ruskin's pen or a Turner's
+pencil were mine; for the flight of the sea-mew is not more impossible
+to us than the power to picture forth the image of Nature in our souls,
+when she reveals herself in one of those "special moments" which have
+"special grace" in situations where her wild beauty has never been
+spoiled by man.
+
+At other hours and seasons the general aspect of the plain is
+monotonous, and in spite of the unobstructed view, and the unfailing
+verdure and sunshine, somewhat melancholy, although never sombre: and
+doubtless the depressed and melancholy feeling the pampa inspires in
+those who are unfamiliar with it is due in a great measure to the
+paucity of life, and to the profound silence. The wind, as may well be
+imagined on that extensive level area, is seldom at rest; there, as in
+the forest, it is a "bard of many breathings," and the strings it
+breathes upon give out an endless variety of sorrowful sounds, from the
+sharp fitful sibilations of the dry wiry grasses on the barren places,
+to the long mysterious moans that swell and die in the tall polished
+rushes of the marsh. It is also curious to note that with a few
+exceptions the resident birds are comparatively very silent, even those
+belonging to groups which elsewhere are highly loquacious. The reason of
+this is not far to seek. In woods and thickets, where birds abound
+most, they are continually losing sight of each other, and are only
+prevented from scattering by calling often; while the muffling effect on
+sound of the close foliage, to' which may be added a spirit of emulation
+where many voices are heard, incites most species, especially those that
+are social, to exert their voices to the utmost pitch in singing,
+calling, and screaming. On the open pampas, birds, which are not
+compelled to live concealed on the surface, can see each other at long
+distances, and perpetual calling is not needful: moreover, in that still
+atmosphere sound travels far. As a rule their voices are strangely
+subdued; nature's silence has infected them, and they have become silent
+by habit. This is not the case with aquatic species, which are nearly
+all migrants from noisier regions, and mass themselves in lagoons and
+marshes, where they are all loquacious together. It is also noteworthy
+that the subdued bird-voices, some of which are exceedingly sweet and
+expressive, and the notes of many of the insects and batrachians have a
+great resemblance, and seem to be in accord with the aeolian tones of
+the wind in reeds and grasses: a stranger to the pampas, even a
+naturalist accustomed to a different fauna, will often find it hard to
+distinguish between bird, frog, and insect voices.
+
+The mammalia is poor in species, and with the single exception of the
+well-known vizcacha (Lagostomus trichodactylus), there is not one of
+which it can truly be said that it is in any special way the product of
+the pampas, or, in other words, that its instincts are better suited to
+the conditions of the pampas than to those of other districts. As a
+fact, this large rodent inhabits a vast extent of country, north, west,
+and south of the true pampas, but nowhere is he so thoroughly on his
+native heath as on the great grassy plain. There, to some extent, he
+even makes his own conditions, like the beaver. He lives in a small
+community of twenty or thirty members, in a village of deep-chambered
+burrows, all with their pit-like entrances closely grouped together; and
+as the village endures for ever, or for an indefinite time, the earth
+constantly being brought up forms a mound thirty or forty feet in
+diameter; and this protects the habitation from floods on low or level
+ground. Again, he is not swift of foot, and all rapacious beasts are his
+enemies; he also loves to feed on tender succulent herbs and grasses, to
+seek for which he would have to go far afield among the giant grass,
+where his watchful foes are lying in wait to seize him; he saves himself
+from this danger by making a clearing all round his abode, on which a
+smooth turf is formed; and here the animals feed and have their evening
+pastimes in comparative security: for when an enemy approaches, he is
+easily seen; the note of alarm is sounded, and the whole company
+scuttles away to their refuge. In districts having a different soil and
+vegetation, as in Patagonia, the vizcachas' curious, unique instincts
+are of no special advantage, which makes it seem probable that they have
+been formed on the pampas.
+
+How marvellous a thing it seems that the two species of mammalians--the
+beaver and the vizcacha--that most nearly simulate men's intelligent
+actions in their social organizing instincts, and their habitations,
+which are made to endure, should belong to an order so low down as the
+Rodents! And in the case of the latter species, it adds to the marvel
+when we find that the vizcacha, according to Water-house, is the lowest
+of the order in its marsupial affinities.
+
+The vizcacha is the most common rodent on the pampas, and the Rodent
+order is represented by the largest number of species. The finest is the
+so-called Patagonian hare--Dolichotis patagonica--a beautiful animal
+twice as large as a hare, with ears shorter and more rounded, and legs
+relatively much longer. The fur is grey and chestnut brown. It is
+diurnal in its habits, lives in kennels, and is usually met with in
+pairs, or small flocks. It is better suited to a sterile country like
+Patagonia than to the grassy humid plain; nevertheless it was found
+throughout the whole of the pampas; but in a country where the wisdom of
+a Sir William Harcourt was never needed to slip the leash, this king of
+the Rodentia is now nearly extinct.
+
+A common rodent is the coypú--Myiopotamus coypú--yellowish in colour
+with bright red incisors; a rat in shape, and as large as an otter. It
+is aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where there are no banks it
+makes a platform nest among the rushes. Of an evening they are all out
+swimming and playing in the water, conversing together in their strange
+tones, which sound like the moans and cries of wounded and suffering
+men; and among them the mother-coypú is seen with her progeny, numbering
+eight or nine, with as many on her back as she can accommodate, while
+the others swim after her, crying for a ride.
+
+With reference to this animal, which, as we have seen, is prolific, a
+strange thing once happened in Buenos Ayres. The coypú was much more
+abundant fifty years ago than now, and its skin, which has a fine fur
+under the long coarse hair, was largely exported to Europe. About that
+time the Dictator Rosas issued a decree prohibiting the hunting of the
+coypú. The result was that the animals increased and multiplied
+exceedingly, and, abandoning their aquatic habits, they became
+terrestrial and migratory, and swarmed everywhere in search of food.
+Suddenly a mysterious malady fell on them, from which they quickly
+perished, and became almost extinct.
+
+What a blessed thing it would be for poor rabbit-worried Australia if a
+similar plague should visit that country, and fall on the right animal!
+On the other hand, what a calamity if the infection, wide-spread,
+incurable, and swift as the wind in its course, should attack the
+too-numerous sheep! And who knows what mysterious, unheard-of
+retributions that revengeful deity Nature may not be meditating in her
+secret heart for the loss of her wild four-footed children slain by
+settlers, and the spoiling of her ancient beautiful order!
+
+A small pampa rodent worthy of notice is the Cavia australis, called
+_cui_ in the vernacular from its voice: a timid, social, mouse-coloured
+little creature, with a low gurgling language, like running babbling
+waters; in habits resembling its domestic pied relation the guinea pig.
+It loves to run on clean ground, and on the pampas makes little
+rat-roads all about its hiding-place, which little roads tell a story to
+the fox, and such like; therefore the little cavy's habits, and the
+habits of all cavies, I fancy, are not so well suited to the humid
+grassy region as to other districts, with sterile ground to run and play
+upon, and thickets in which to hide.
+
+A more interesting animal is the Ctenomys magellanica, a little less
+than the rat in size, with a shorter tail, pale grey fur, and red
+incisors. It is called _tuco-tuco_ from its voice, and _oculto_ from its
+habits; for it is a dweller underground, and requires a loose, sandy
+soil in which, like the mole, it may _swim_ beneath the surface.
+Consequently the pampa, with its heavy, moist mould, is not the tuco's
+proper place; nevertheless, wherever there is a stretch of sandy soil,
+or a range of dunes, there it is found living; not seen, but heard; for
+all day long and all night sounds its voice, resonant and loud, like a
+succession of blows from a hammer; as if a company of gnomes were
+toiling far down underfoot, beating on their anvils, first with strong
+measured strokes, then with lighter and faster, and with a swing and
+rhythm as if the little men were beating in time to some rude chant
+unheard above the surface. How came these isolated colonies of a species
+so subterranean in habits, and requiring a sandy soil to move in, so far
+from their proper district--that sterile country from which they are
+separated by wide, unsuitable areas? They cannot perform long overland
+journeys like the rat. Perhaps the dunes have travelled, carrying their
+little cattle with them.
+
+Greatest among the carnivores are the two cat-monarchs of South America,
+the jaguar and puma. Whatever may be their relative positions elsewhere,
+on the pampas the puma is mightiest, being much more abundant and better
+able to thrive than its spotted rival. Versatile in its preying habits,
+its presence on the pampa is not surprising; but probably only an
+extreme abundance of large mammalian prey, which has not existed in
+recent times, could have, tempted an animal of the river and
+forest-loving habits of the jaguar to colonize this cold, treeless, and
+comparatively waterless desert. There are two other important cats. The
+grass-cat, not unlike Felis catus in its robust form and dark colour,
+but a larger, more powerful animal, inexpressibly savage in disposition.
+The second, Felis geoffroyi, is a larger and more beautiful animal,
+coloured like a leopard; it is called wood-cat, and, as the name would
+seem to indicate, is an intruder from wooded districts north of the
+pampas.
+
+There are two canines: one is Azara's beautiful grey fox-like dog,
+purely a fox in habits, and common everywhere. The other is far more
+interesting and extremely rare; it is called _aguará,_ its nearest ally
+being the _aguará-guazú,_ the Canis jubatus or maned wolf of
+naturalists, found north of the pampean district. The aguará is smaller
+and has no mane; it is like the dingo in size, but slimmer and with a
+sharper nose, and lias a much brighter red colour. At night when camping
+out I have heard its dismal screams, but the screamer was sought in
+vain; while from the gauchos of the frontier I could only learn that it
+is a harmless, shy, solitary animal, that ever flies to remoter wilds
+from its destroyer, man. They offered me a skin--what more could I want?
+Simple souls! it was no more to me than the skin of a dead dog, with
+long, bright red hair. Those who love dead animals may have them in any
+number by digging with a. spade in that vast sepulchre of the pampas,
+where perished the hosts of antiquity. I love the living that are above
+the earth; and how small a remnant they are in South America we know,
+and now yearly becoming more precious as it dwindles away.
+
+The pestiferous skunk is universal; and there are two quaint-looking
+weasels, intensely black in colour, and grey on the back and flat crown.
+One, the Galictis barbara, is a large bold animal that hunts in
+companies; and when these long-bodied creatures sit up erect, glaring
+with beady eyes, grinning and chattering at the passer-by, they look
+like little friars in black robes and grey cowls; but the expression on
+their round faces is malignant and bloodthirsty beyond anything in
+nature, and it would perhaps be more decent to liken them to devils
+rather than to humans.
+
+On the pampas there is, strictly speaking, only one ruminant, the Cervus
+campestris, which is common. The most curious thing about this animal is
+that the male emits a rank, musky odour, so powerful that when the wind
+blows from it the effluvium comes in nauseating gusts to the nostrils
+from a distance exceeding two miles. It is really astonishing that only
+one small ruminant should be found on this immense grassy area, so
+admirably suited to herbivorous quadrupeds, a portion of which at the
+present moment affords sufficient pasture to eighty millions of sheep,
+cattle, and horses. In La Plata the author of _The Mammoth and the
+Flood_ will find few to quarrel with his doctrine.
+
+Of Edentates there are four. The giant armadillo does not range so far,
+and the delicate little pink fairy armadillo, the truncated
+Chlamydophorus, is a dweller in the sand-dunes of Mendoza, and has never
+colonized the grassy pampas. The Tatusia hybrida, called "little mule"
+from the length of its ears, and the Dasypus tricinctus, which, when
+disturbed, rolls itself into a ball, the wedge-shaped head and
+wedge-shaped tail admirably fitting into the deep-cut shell side by
+side; and the _quirquincho_ (Dasypus minutus), all inhabit the pampa,
+are diurnal, and feed exclusively on insects, chiefly ants. Wherever the
+country becomes settled, these three disappear, owing to the dulness of
+their senses, especially that of sight, and to the diurnal habit, which
+was an advantage to them, and enabled them to survive when rapacious
+animals, which are mostly nocturnal, were their only enemies. The
+fourth, and most important, is the hairy armadillo, with habits which
+are in strange contrast to those of its perishing congeners, and which
+seem to mock many hard-and-fast rules concerning animal life. It is
+omnivorous, and will thrive on anything from grass to flesh, found dead
+and in all stages of decay, or captured by means of its own strategy.
+Furthermore, its habits change to suit its conditions: thus, where
+nocturnal carnivores are its enemies, it is diurnal; but where man
+appears as a chief persecutor, it becomes nocturnal. It is much hunted
+for its flesh, dogs being trained for the purpose; yet it actually
+becomes more abundant as population increases in any district; and, if
+versatility in habits or adaptiveness can be taken as a measure of
+intelligence, this poor armadillo, a survival of the past, so old on the
+earth as to have existed contemporaneously with the giant glyptodon, is
+the superior of the large-brained cats and canines.
+
+To finish with the mammalia, there are two interesting opossums, both of
+the genus Didelphys, but in habits as wide apart as cat from otter. One
+of these marsupials appears so much at home on the plains that I almost
+regret having said that the vizcacha alone gives us the idea of being in
+its habits the _product_ of the pampas. This animal--Didelphys
+crassicaudata--has a long slender, wedge-, shaped head and body,
+admirably adapted for pushing through the thick grass and rushes; for it
+is both terrestrial and aquatic, therefore well suited to inhabit low,
+level plains liable to be flooded. On dry land its habits are similar to
+those of a weasel; in lagoons, where it dives and swims with great ease,
+it constructs a globular nest suspended from the rushes. The fur is
+soft, of a rich yellow, reddish above, and on the sides and under
+surfaces varying in some parts to orange, in others exhibiting beautiful
+copper and terra-cotta tints. These lovely tints and the metallic lustre
+soon fade from the fur, otherwise this animal would be much sought after
+in the interests of those who love to decorate themselves with the
+spoils of beautiful dead animals--beast and bird. The other opossum is
+the black and white Didelphys azarae; and it is indeed strange to find
+this animal on the pampas, although its presence there is not so
+mysterious as that of the tuco-tuco. It shuffles along slowly and
+awkwardly on the ground, but is a great traveller nevertheless. Tschudi
+met it mountaineering on the Andes at an enormous altitude, and, true to
+its lawless nature, it confronted me in Patagonia, where the books say
+no marsupial dwells. In every way it is adapted to an arboreal life, yet
+it is everywhere found on the level country, far removed from the
+conditions which one would imagine to be necessary to its existence. For
+how many thousands of years has this marsupial been a dweller on the
+plain, all its best faculties unexercised, its beautiful grasping hands
+pressed to the ground, and its prehensile tail dragged like an idle rope
+behind it! Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will take to it as
+readily as a duck to water, or an armadillo to earth, climbing up the
+trunk and about the branches with a monkey-like agility. How reluctant
+Nature seems in some cases to undo her own work! How long she will
+allow a specialized organ, with the correlated instinct, to rest without
+use, yet ready to flash forth on the instant, bright and keen-edged, as
+in the ancient days of strife, ages past, before peace came to dwell on
+earth!
+
+The avi-fauna is relatively much richer than the mammalia, owing to the
+large number of aquatic species, most of which are migratory with their
+"breeding" or "subsistence-areas" on the pampas. In more senses than one
+they constitute a "floating population," and their habits have in no way
+been modified by the conditions of the country. The order, including
+storks, ibises, herons, spoonbills, and flamingoes, counts about
+eighteen species; and the most noteworthy birds in it are two great
+ibises nearly as large as turkeys, with mighty resonant voices. The duck
+order is very rich, numbering at least twenty species, including two
+beautiful upland geese, winter visitors from Magellanic lands, and two
+swans, the lovely black-necked, and the pure white with rosy bill. Of
+rails, or ralline birds, there are ten or twelve, ranging from a small
+spotted creature no bigger than a thrush to some large majestic birds.
+One is the courlan, called "crazy widow" from its mourning plumage and
+long melancholy screams, which on still evenings may be heard a league
+away. Another is the graceful variegated _ypicaha,_ fond of social
+gatherings, where the birds perform a dance and make the desolate
+marshes resound with their insane humanlike voices. A smaller kind,
+Porphyriops melanops, has a night-cry like a burst of shrill hysterical
+laughter, which has won for it the name of "witch;" while another,
+Rallus rythyrhynchus, is called "little donkey" from its braying cries.
+Strange eerie voices have all these birds. Of the remaining aquatic
+species, the most important is the spur-winged crested screamer; a noble
+bird as large as a swan, yet its favourite pastime is to soar upwards
+until it loses itself to sight in the blue ether, whenca it pours forth
+its resounding choral notes, which reach the distant earth clarified,
+and with a rhythmic swell and fall as of chiming bells. It also sings by
+night, "counting the hours," the gauchos say, and where they have
+congregated together in tens of thousands the mighty roar of their
+combined voices produces an astonishingly grand effect.
+
+The largest aquatic order is that of the Limicolse--snipes, plover, and
+their allies--which has about twenty-five species. The vociferous
+spur-winged lapwing; the beautiful black and white stilt; a true snipe,
+and a painted snipe, are, strictly speaking, the only residents; and it
+is astonishing to find, that, of the five-and-twenty species, at least
+thirteen are visitors from North America, several of them having their
+breeding-places quite away in the Arctic regions. This is one of those
+facts concerning the annual migration of birds which almost stagger
+belief; for among them are species with widely different habits, upland,
+marsh and sea-shore birds, and in their great biannual journey they pass
+through a variety of climates, visiting many countries where the
+conditions seem suited to their requirements. Nevertheless, in
+September, and even as early as August, they begin to arrive on the
+pampas, the golden plover often still wearing his black nuptial dress;
+singly and in pairs, in small flocks, and in clouds they come--curlew,
+godwit, plover, tatler, tringa--piping the wild notes to which the
+Greenlander listened in June, now to the gaucho herdsman on the green
+plains of La Plata, then to the wild Indian in his remote village; and
+soon, further south, to the houseless huanaco-hunter in the grey
+wilderness of Patagonia.
+
+Here is a puzzle for ornithologists. In summer on the pampas we have a
+godwit--Limosa hudsonica; in March it goes north to breed; later in the
+season flocks of the same species arrive from the south to winter on the
+pampas. And besides this godwit, there are several other North American
+species, which have colonies in the southern hemi-spere, with a reversed
+migration and breeding season. Why do these southern birds winter so far
+south? Do they really breed in Patagonia? If so, their migration is an
+extremely limited one compared with that of the northern birds--seven or
+eight hundred miles, on the outside, in one case, against almost as many
+thousands of miles in the other. Considering that some species which
+migrate as far south as Patagonia breed in the Arctic regions as far
+north as latitude 82 degrees, and probably higher still, it would be
+strange indeed if none of the birds which winter in Patagonia and on the
+pampas were summer visitors to that great austral continent, which has
+an estimated area twice as large as that of Europe, and a climate milder
+than the arctic one. The migrants would have about six hundred miles of
+sea to cross from Tierra del Fuego; but we know that the golden plover
+and other species, which sometimes touch at the Bermudas when
+travelling, fly much further than that without resting. The fact that a
+common Argentine titlark, a non-migrant and a weak flyer, has been met
+with at the South Shetland Islands, close to the antarctic continent,
+shows that the journey may be easily accomplished by birds with strong
+flight; and that even the winter climate of that unknown land is not too
+severe to allow an accidental colonist, like this small delicate bird,
+to survive. The godwit, already mentioned, has been observed in flocks
+at the Falkland Islands in May, that is, three months after the same
+species had taken its autumal departure from the neighbouring mainland.
+Can it be believed that these late visitors to the Falklands were
+breeders in Patagonia, and had migrated east to winter in so bleak a
+region? It is far more probable that they came from the south. Officers
+of sailing ships beating round Cape Horn might be able to settle this
+question definitely by looking out, and listening at night, for flights
+of birds, travelling north from about the first week in January to the
+end of February; and in September and October travelling south. Probably
+not fewer than a dozen species of the plover order are breeders on the
+great austral continent; also other aquatic birds--ducks and geese; and
+many Passerine birds, chiefly of the Tyrant family.
+
+Should the long projected Australasian expedition to the South Polar
+regions ever be carried to a successful issue, there will probably be
+important results for ornithology, in spite of the astounding theory
+which has found a recent advocate in Canon Tristram, that all life
+originated at the North Pole, whence it spread over the globe, but never
+succeeded in crossing the deep sea surrounding the antarctic continent,
+which has consequently remained till now desolate, "a giant ash (and
+ice) of death." Nor is it unlikely that animals of a higher class than
+birds exist there; and the discovery of new mammalians, differing in
+type from those we know, would certainly be glad tidings to most
+students of nature.
+
+Land birds on the pampas are few in species and in numbers. This may be
+accounted for by the absence of trees and other elevations on which
+birds prefer to roost and nest; and by the scarcity of food. Insects are
+few in dry situations; and the large perennial grasses, which occupy
+most of the ground, yield a miserable yearly harvest of a few minute
+seeds; so that this district is a poor one both for soft and hard billed
+birds. Hawks of several genera, in moderate numbers, are there, but
+generally keep to the marshes. Eagles and vultures are somewhat
+unworthily represented by carrion-hawks (Polyborinae); the lordly
+carancho, almost eagle-like in size, black and crested, with a very
+large, pale blue, hooked beak--his battle axe: and his humble follower
+and jackal, the brown and harrier-like chimango. These nest on the
+ground, are versatile in their habits, carrion-eaters, also killers on
+their own account, and, like wild dogs, sometimes hunt in bands, which
+gives them an advantage. They are the unfailing attendants of all
+flesh-hunters, human or feline; and also furiously pursue and persecute
+all eagles and true vultures that venture on that great sea of grass, to
+wander thereafter, for ever lost and harried, "the Hagars and Ishmaels
+of their kind."
+
+The owls are few and all of wide-ranging species. The most common is the
+burrowing-owl, found in both Americas. Not a retiring owl this, but all
+day long, in cold and in heat, it stands exposed at the mouth of its
+kennel, or on the vizcacha's mound, staring at the passer-by with an
+expression of grave surprise and reprehension in its round yellow eyes;
+male and female invariably together, standing stiff and erect, almost
+touching--of all birds that pair for life the most Darby and Joan like.
+
+Of the remaining land birds, numbering about forty species, a few that
+are most attractive on account of their beauty, engaging habits, or
+large size, may be mentioned here. On the southern portion of the pampas
+the military starling (Sturnella) is found, and looks like the European
+starling, with the added beauty of a scarlet breast: among resident
+pampas birds the only one with a touch of brilliant colouring. It has a
+pleasing, careless song, uttered on the wing, and in winter congregates
+in great flocks, to travel slowly northwards over the plains. When thus
+travelling the birds observe a kind of order, and the flock feeding
+along the ground shows a very extended front--a representation in
+bird-life of the "thin red line"--and advances by the hindmost birds
+constantly flying over the others and alighting in the front ranks.
+
+Among the tyrant-birds are several species of the beautiful wing-banded
+genus, snow-white in colour, with black on the wings and tail: these are
+extremely graceful birds, and strong flyers, and in desert places, where
+man seldom intrudes, they gather to follow the traveller, calling to
+each other with low whistling notes, and in the distance look like white
+flowers as they perch on the topmost stems of the tall bending grasses.
+
+The most characteristic pampean birds are the tinamous--called
+partridges in the vernacular--the rufous tinamou, large as a fowl, and
+the spotted tinamou, which is about the size of the English partridge.
+Their habits are identical: both lay eggs of a beautiful wine-purple
+colour, and in both species the young acquire the adult plumage and
+power of flight when very small, and fly better than the adults. They
+have small heads, slender curved beaks, unfeathered legs and feet, and
+are tailless; the plumage is deep yellowish, marked with black and brown
+above. They live concealed, skulking like rails through the tall grass,
+fly reluctantly, and when driven up, their flight is exceedingly noisy
+and violent, the bird soon exhausting itself. They are solitary, but
+many live in proximity, frequently calling to each other with soft
+plaintive voices. The evening call-notes of the larger bird are
+flute-like in character, and singularly sweet and expressive.
+
+The last figure to be introduced into this sketch--which is not a
+catalogue--is that of the Rhea. Glyptodon, Toxodon, Mylodon,
+Megatherium, have passed away, leaving no descendants, and only pigmy
+representatives if any; but among the feathered inhabitants of the pampa
+the grand archaic ostrich of America survives from a time when there
+were also giants among the avians. Vain as such efforts usually are, one
+cannot help trying to imagine something of the past history of this
+majestic bird, before man came to lead the long chase now about to end
+so mournfully. Its fleetness, great staying powers, and beautiful
+strategy when hunted, make it seem probable that it was not without
+pursuers, other than the felines, among its ancient enemies, long-winded
+and tenacious of their quarry; and these were perhaps of a type still
+represented by the wolf or hound-like aguará and aguara-guazú. It might
+be supposed that when almost all the larger forms, both mammal and bird,
+were overtaken by destruction, and when the existing rhea was on the
+verge of extinction, these long-legged swift canines changed their
+habits and lost their bold spirit, degenerating at last into hunters of
+small birds and mammals, on which they are said to live.
+
+The rhea possesses a unique habit, which is a puzzle to us, although it
+probably once had some significance--namely, that of running, when
+hunted, with one wing raised vertically, like a great sail--a veritable
+"ship of the wilderness." In every way it is adapted to the conditions
+of the pampas in a far greater degree than other pampean birds, only
+excepting the rufous and spotted tinamous. Its commanding stature gives
+it a wide horizon; and its dim, pale, bluish-grey colour assimilates to
+that of the haze, and renders it invisible at even a moderate distance.
+Its large form fades out of sight mysteriously, and the hunter strains
+his eyes in vain to distinguish it on the blue expanse. Its figure and
+carriage have a quaint majestic grace, somewhat unavian in character,
+and peculiar to itself. There are few more strangely fascinating sights
+in nature than that of the old black-necked cock bird, standing with
+raised agitated wings among the tall plumed grasses, and calling
+together his scattered hens with hollow boomings and long mysterious
+suspira-tions, as if a wind blowing high up in the void sky had found a
+voice. Rhea-hunting with the bolas, on a horse possessing both speed and
+endurance, and trained to follow the bird in all his quick doublings, is
+unquestionably one of the most fascinating forms of sport ever invented,
+by man. The quarry has even more than that fair chance of escape,
+without which all sport degenerates into mere butchery, unworthy of
+rational beings; moreover, in this unique method of hunting the ostrich
+the capture depends on a preparedness for all the shifts .and sudden
+changes of course practised by the bird when closely followed, which is
+like instinct or intuition; and, finally, in a dexterity in casting the
+bolas at the right moment, with a certain aim, which no amount of
+practice can give to those who are not to the manner born.
+
+This 'wild mirth of the desert,' which the gaucho has known for the last
+three centuries, is now passing away, for the rhea's fleetness can no
+longer avail him. He may scorn the horse and his rider, what time he
+lifts himself up, but the cowardly murderous methods of science, and a
+systematic war of extermination, have left him no chance. And with the
+rhea go the flamingo, antique and splendid; and the swans in their
+bridal plumage; and the rufous tinamou--sweet and mournful melodist of
+the eventide; and the noble crested screamer, that clarion-voiced
+watch-bird of the night in the wilderness. Those, and the other large
+avians, together with the finest of the mammalians, will shortly be lost
+to the pampas utterly as the great bustard is to England, and as the
+wild turkey and bison and many other species will shortly be lost to
+North America. What a wail there would be in the world if a sudden
+destruction were to fall on the accumulated art-treasures of the
+National Gallery, and the marbles in the British Museum, and the
+contents of the King's Library--the old prints and' mediaeval
+illuminations! And these are only the work of human hands and
+brains--impressions of individual genius on perishable material,
+immortal only in the sense that the silken cocoon of the dead moth is
+so, because they continue to exist and shine when the artist's hands and
+brain are dust:--and man has the long day of life before him in which to
+do again things like these, and better than these, if there is any truth
+in evolution. But the forms of life in the two higher vertebrate classes
+are Nature's most perfect work; and the life of even a single species is
+of incalculably greater value to mankind, for what it teaches and would
+continue to teach, than all the chiselled marbles and painted canvases
+the world contains; though doubtless there are many persons who are
+devoted to art, but blind to some things greater than art, who will set
+me down as a Philistine for saying so. And, above all others, we should
+protect and hold sacred those types, Nature's masterpieces, which are
+first singled out for destruction on account of their size, or
+splendour, or rarity, and that false detestable glory which is accorded
+to their most successful slayers. In ancient times the spirit of life
+shone brightest in these; and when others that shared the earth with
+them were taken by death they were left, being more worthy of
+perpetuation. Like immortal flowers they have drifted down to us on the
+ocean of time, and their strangeness and beauty bring to our
+imaginations a dream and a picture of that unknown world, immeasurably
+far removed, where man was not: and when they perish, something of
+gladness goes out from nature, and the sunshine loses something of its
+brightness. Nor does their loss affect us and our times only. The
+species now being exterminated, not only in South America but everywhere
+on the globe, are, so far as we know, untouched by decadence. They are
+links in a chain, and branches on the tree of life, with their roots in
+a past inconceivably remote; and but for our action they would continue
+to flourish, reaching outward to an equally distant future, blossoming
+into higher and more beautiful forms, and gladdening innumerable
+generations of our descendants. But we think nothing of all this: we
+must give full scope to our passion for taking life, though by so doing
+we "ruin the great work of time;" not in the sense in which the poet
+used those words, but in one truer, and wider, and infinitely sadder.
+Only when this sporting rage has spent itself, when there are no longer
+any animals of the larger kinds remaining, the loss we are now
+inflicting on this our heritage, in which we have a life-interest only,
+will be rightly appreciated. It is hardly to be supposed or hoped that
+posterity will feel satisfied with our monographs of extinct species,
+and the few crumbling bones and faded feathers, which may possibly
+survive half a dozen centuries in some happily-placed museum. On the
+contrary, such dreary mementoes will only serve to remind them of their
+loss; and if they remember us at all, it will only be to hate our
+memory, and our age--this enlightened, scientific, humanitarian age,
+which should have for a motto "Let us slay all noble and beautiful
+things, for tomorrow we die."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE PUMA, OB LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The Puma has been singularly unfortunate in its biographers. Formerly it
+often happened that writers were led away by isolated and highly
+exaggerated incidents to attribute very shining qualities to their
+favourite animals; the lion of the Old World thus came to be regarded as
+brave and I magnanimous above all beasts of the field--the Bayard of the
+four-footed kind, a reputation which these prosaic and sceptical times
+have not suffered it to keep. Precisely the contrary has happened with
+the puma of literature; for, although to those personally acquainted
+with the habits of this lesser lion of the New World it is known to
+possess a marvellous courage and daring, it is nevertheless
+always spoken of in books of natural history as the most pusillanimous
+of the larger carnivores. It does not attack man, and Azara is perfectly
+correct when he affirms that it never hurts, or threatens to hurt, man
+or child, even when it finds them sleeping. This, however, is not a full
+statement of the facts; the puma will not even defend itself against
+man. How natural, then, to conclude that it is too timid to attack a
+human being, or to defend itself, but scarcely philosophical; for even
+the most cowardly carnivores we know--dogs and hyaenas, for
+instance--will readily attack a disabled or sleeping man when pressed by
+hunger; and when driven to desperation no animal is too small or too
+feeble to make a show of resistance. In such a case "even the armadillo
+defends itself," as the gaucho proverb says. Besides, the conclusion is
+in contradiction to many other well-known facts. Putting-aside the
+puma's passivity in the presence of man, it is a bold hunter that
+invariably prefers large to small game; in desert places killing
+peccary, tapir, ostrich, deer, huanaco, &c., all powerful, well-armed,
+or swift animals. Huanaco skeletons seen in Patagonia almost invariably
+have the neck dislocated, showing that the puma was the executioner.
+Those only who have hunted the huanaco on the sterile plains and
+mountains it inhabits know how wary, keen-scented, and fleet of foot it
+is. I once spent several weeks with a surveying party in a district
+where pumas were very abundant, and saw not less than half a dozen deer
+every day, freshly killed in most cases, and all with dislocated necks.
+Where prey is scarce and difficult to capture, the puma, after
+satisfying its hunger, invariably conceals the animal it has killed,
+covering it over carefully with grass and brushwood; these deer,
+however, had all been left exposed to the caracaras and foxes after a
+portion of the breast had been eaten, and in many cases the flesh had
+not been touched, the captor having satisfied itself with sucking the
+blood. It struck me very forcibly that the puma of the desert pampas is,
+among mammals, like the peregrine falcon of the same district among
+birds; for there this wide-ranging raptor only attacks comparatively
+large birds, and, after fastidiously picking a meal from the flesh of
+the head and neck, abandons the untouched body to the polybori and other
+hawks of the more ignoble sort.
+
+In pastoral districts the puma is very destructive to the larger
+domestic animals, and has an extraordinary fondness for horseflesh. This
+was first noticed by Molina, whose _Natural History of Chili_ was
+written a century and a half ago. In Patagonia I heard on all sides that
+it was extremely difficult to breed horses, as the colts were mostly
+killed by the pumas. A native told me that on one occasion, while
+driving his horses home through the thicket, a puma sprang out of the
+bushes on to a colt following behind the troop, killing it before his
+eyes and not more than six yards from his horse's head. In this
+instance, my informant said, the puma alighted directly on the colt's
+back, with one fore foot grasping its bosom, while with the other it
+seized the head, and, giving it a violent wrench, dislocated the neck.
+The colt fell to the earth as if shot, and he affirmed that it was dead
+before it touched the ground.
+
+Naturalists have thought it strange that the horse, once common
+throughout America, should have become extinct over a continent
+apparently so well suited to it and where it now multiplies so greatly.
+As a fact wherever pumas abound the wild horse of the present time,
+introduced from Europe, can hardly maintain its existence. Formerly in
+many places horses ran wild and multiplied to an amazing extent, but
+this happened, I believe, only in districts where the puma was scarce or
+had already been driven out by man. My own experience is that on the
+desert pampas wild horses are exceedingly scarce, and from all accounts
+it is the same throughout Patagonia.
+
+Next to horseflesh, sheep is preferred, and where the puma can come at a
+flock, he will not trouble himself to attack horned cattle. In Patagonia
+especially I found this to be the case. I resided for some time at an
+estancia close to the town of El Carmen, on the Rio Negro, which during
+my stay was infested by a very bold and cunning puma. To protect the
+sheep from his attacks an enclosure was made of upright willow-poles
+fifteen feet long, while the gate, by which he would have to enter, was
+close to the house and nearly six feet high. In spite of the
+difficulties thus put in the way, and of the presence of several large
+dogs, also of the watch we kept in the hope of shooting him, every
+cloudy night he came, and after killing one or more sheep got safely
+away. One dark night he killed four sheep; I detected him in the act,
+and going up to the gate, was trying to make out his invisible form in
+the gloom as he flitted about knocking the sheep over, when suddenly he
+leaped clear over my head and made his escape, the bullets I sent after
+him in the dark failing to hit him. Yet at this place twelve or fourteen
+calves, belonging to the milch cows, were every night shut into a small
+brushwood pen, at a distance from the house where the enemy could easily
+have destroyed every one of them. When I expressed surprise at this
+arrangement, the owner said that the puma was not fond of calves' flesh,
+and came only for the sheep. Frequently after his nocturnal visits we
+found, by tracing his footprints in the loose sand, that he had actually
+used the calves' pen as a place of concealment while waiting to make his
+attack on the sheep.
+
+The puma often kills full-grown cows and horses, but exhibits a still
+greater daring when attacking the jaguar, the largest of American
+carnivores, although, compared with its swift, agile enemy, as heavy as
+a rhinoceros. Azara states that it is generally believed in La Plata and
+Paraguay that the puma attacks and conquers the jaguar; but he did not
+credit what he heard, which was not strange, since he had already set
+the puma down as a cowardly animal, because it does not attempt to harm
+man or child. Nevertheless, it is well known that where the two species
+inhabit the same district they are at enmity, the puma being the
+persistent persecutor of the jaguar, following and harassing it as a
+tyrant-bird harasses an eagle or hawk, moving about it with such
+rapidity as to confuse it, and, when an opportunity occurs, springing
+upon its back and inflicting terrible wounds with teeth and claws.
+Jaguars with scarred backs are frequently killed, and others, not long
+escaped from their tormentors, have been found so greatly lacerated that
+they were easily overcome by the hunters.
+
+In Kingsley's American _Standard Natural History_, it is stated that the
+puma in North California has a feud with the grizzly bear similar to
+that of the southern animal with the jaguar. In its encounter with the
+grizzly it is said to be always the victor; and this is borne out by the
+finding of the bodies of bears, which have evidently perished in the
+struggle.
+
+How strange that this most cunning, bold, and bloodthirsty of the
+Felidae, the persecutor of the jaguar and the scourge of the ruminants
+in the regions it inhabits, able to kill its prey with the celerity of a
+rifle bullet, never attacks a human being! Even the cowardly,
+carrion-feeding dog will attack a man when it can do so with impunity;
+but in places where the puma is the only large beast of prey, it is
+notorious that it is there perfectly safe for even a small child to go
+out and sleep on the plain. At the same time it will not fly from man
+(though the contrary is always stated in books of Natural History)
+except in places where it is continually persecuted. Nor is this all: it
+will not, as a rule, even defend itself against man, although in some
+rare instances it has been known to do so.
+
+The mysterious, gentle instinct of this ungentle species, which causes
+the gauchos of the pampas to name it man's friend--"amigo del
+cristiano"--has been persistently ignored by all travellers and
+naturalists who have mentioned the puma. They have thus made it a very
+incongruous creature, strong enough to kill a horse, yet so cowardly
+withal that it invariably flies from a human being--even from a sleeping
+child! Possibly its real reputation was known to some of those who havo
+spoken about it; if so, they attributed what they heard to the love of
+the marvellous and the romantic, natural to the non-scientific mind; or
+else preferred not to import into their writings matter which has so
+great a likeness to fable, and might have the effect of imperilling
+their reputation for sober-mindedness.
+
+It is, however, possible that the singular instinct of tho southern
+puma, which is unique among animals in a state of nature, is not
+possessed by the entire species, ranging as it does over a hundred
+degrees of latitude, from British North America to Tierra del Fuego. The
+widely different conditions of life in the various regions it inhabits
+must necessarily have caused some divergence. Concerning its habits in
+the dense forests of the Amazonian region, where it must have developed
+special instincts suited to its semi-arboreal life, scarcely anything
+has been recorded. Everyone is, however, familiar with the dreaded
+cougar, catamount, or panther--sometimes called "painter"--of North
+American literature, thrilling descriptions of encounters with this
+imaginary man-eating monster being freely scattered through the
+backwoods or border romances, many of them written by authors who have
+the reputation of being true to nature. It may be true that this cougar
+of a cold climate did occasionally attack man, or, as it is often
+stated, follow him in the forest with the intention of springing on him
+unawares; but on this point nothing definite will ever be known, as the
+pioneers hunters of the past were only anxious to shoot cougar and not
+to study its instinct and disposition. It is now many years since
+Audubon and Bachman wrote, "This animal, which has excited so much
+terror in the minds of the ignorant and timid, has been nearly
+exterminated in all the Atlantic States, and we do not recollect a
+single well-authenticated instance where any hunter's life fell a
+sacrifice in a cougar hunt." It might be added, I believe, that no
+authentic instance has been recorded of the puma making an unprovoked
+attack on any human being. In South America also the traveller in the
+wilderness is sometimes followed by a puma; but he would certainly be
+very much surprised if told that it follows with the intention of
+springing on him unawares and devouring his flesh,
+
+I have spoken of the comparative ease with which the puma overcomes even
+large animals, comparing it in this respect with the peregrine falcon;
+but all predacious species are liable to frequent failures, sometimes to
+fatal mishaps, and even the cunning, swift-killing puma is no exception.
+Its attacks are successfully resisted by the ass, which does not, like
+the horse, lose his presence of mind, but when assaulted thrusts his
+head well down between its fore-legs and kicks violently until the enemy
+is thrown or driven off. Pigs, when in large herds, also safely defy the
+puma, massing themselves together for defence in their well-known
+manner, and presenting a serried line of tusks to the aggressor. During
+my stay in Patagonia a puma met its fate in a manner so singular that
+the incident caused considerable sensation among the settlers on the Rio
+Negro at the time. A man named Linares, the chief of the tame Indians
+settled in the neighbourhood of El Carmen, while riding near the river
+had his curiosity aroused by the appearance and behaviour of a young cow
+standing alone in the grass, her head, armed with long and exceedingly
+sharp horns, much raised, and watching his approach in a manner which
+betokened a state of dangerous excitement. She had recently dropped her
+calf, and he at once conjectured that it had been attacked, and perhaps
+killed, by some animal of prey. To satisfy himself on this point he
+began to search for it, and while thus engaged the cow repeatedly
+charged him with the greatest fury. Presently he discovered the calf
+lying dead among the long grass; and by its side lay a full-grown puma,
+also dead, and with a large wound in its side, just behind the shoulder.
+The calf had been killed by the puma, for its throat showed the wounds
+of large teeth, and the puma had been killed by the cow. When he saw it
+he could, he affirmed, scarcely believe the evidence of his own senses,
+for was an unheard-of thing that a puma should be injured by any other
+animal. His opinion was that it had come down from the hills in a
+starving condition, and having sprung upon the calf, the taste of blood
+had made it for a moment careless of its own safety, and during that
+moment the infuriated cow had charged, and driving one of her long sharp
+horns into some vital part, killed it instantly.
+
+The puma is, with the exception of some monkeys, the most playful animal
+in existence. The young of all the Felidae spend a large portion of
+their time in characteristic gambols; the adults, however, acquire a
+grave and dignified demeanour, only the female playing on occasions with
+her offspring; but this she always does with a certain formality of
+manner, as if the relaxation were indulged in not spontaneously, but for
+the sake of the young and as being a necessary part of their education.
+Some writer has described the lion's assumption of gaiety as more grim
+than its most serious moods. The puma at heart is always a kitten,
+taking unmeasured delight in its frolics, and when, as often happens,
+one lives alone in the desert, it will amuse itself by the hour fighting
+mock battles or playing at hide-and-seek with imaginary companions, and
+lying in wait and putting all its wonderful strategy in practice to
+capture a passing butterfly. Azara kept a young male for four months,
+which spent its whole time playing with the slaves. This animal, he
+says, would not refuse any food offered to it; but when not hungry it
+would bury the meat in the sand, and when inclined to eat dig it up,
+and, taking it to the water-trough, wash it clean. I have only known one
+puma kept as a pet, and this animal, in seven or eight years had never
+shown a trace of ill-temper. When approached, he would lie down, purring
+loudly, and twist himself about a person's legs, begging to be caressed.
+A string or handkerchief drawn about was sufficient to keep him in a
+happy state of excitement for an hour; and when one person was tired of
+playing with him he was ready for a game with the next comer.
+
+I was told by a person who had spent most of his life on the pampas that
+on one occasion, when travelling in the neighbourhood of Cape
+Corrientes, his horse died under him, and he was compelled to continue
+his journey on foot, burdened with his heavy native horse-gear. At night
+he made his bed under the shelter of a rock, on the slope of a stony
+sierra; a bright moon was shining, and about nine o'clock in the evening
+four pumas appeared, two adults with their two half-grown young. Not
+feeling the least alarm at their presence, he did not stir; and after a
+while they began to gambol together close to him, concealing themselves
+from each other among the rocks, just as kittens do, and frequently
+while pursuing one another leaping over him. He continued watching them
+until past midnight, then fell asleep, and did not wake until morning,
+when they had left him.
+
+This man was an Englishman by birth, but having gone very young to South
+America he had taken kindly to the semi-barbarous life of the gauchos,
+and had imbibed all their peculiar notions, one of which is that human
+life is not worth very much. "What does it matter?" they often say, and
+shrug their shoulders, when told of a comrade's death; "so many
+beautiful horses die!" I asked him if he had ever killed a puma, and he
+replied that he had killed only one and had sworn never to kill another.
+He said that while out one day with another gaucho looking for cattle a
+puma was found. It sat up with its back against a stone, and did not
+move even when his companion threw the noose of his lasso over its neck.
+My informant then dismounted, and, drawing his knife, advanced to kill
+it: still the puma made no attempt to free itself from the lasso, but it
+seemed to know, he said, what was coming, for it began to tremble, the
+tears ran from its eyes, and it whined in the most pitiful manner. He
+killed it as it sat there unresisting before him, but after
+accomplishing the deed felt that he had committed a murder. It was the
+only thing ho had ever done in his life, he added, which filled him with
+remorse when he remembered it. This I thought a rather startling
+declaration, as I knew that he had killed several individuals of his own
+species in duels, fought with knives, in the fashion of the gauchos.
+
+All who have killed or witnessed the killing of the puma--and I have
+questioned scores of hunters on this point--agree that it resigns itself
+in this unresisting, pathetic manner to death at the hands of man.
+Claudio Gay, in his _Natural History of Chili,_ says, "When attacked by
+man its energy and daring at once forsake it, and it becomes a weak,
+inoffensive animal, and trembling, and uttering piteous moans, and
+shedding abundant tears, it seems to implore compassion from a generous
+enemy." The enemy is not often generous; but many gauchos have assured
+me, when speaking on this subject, that although they kill the puma
+readily to protect their domestic animals, they consider it an evil
+thing to take its life in desert places, where it is man's only friend
+among the wild animals.
+
+When the hunter is accompanied by dogs, then the puma, instead of
+drooping and shedding tears, is roused to a sublime rage: its hair
+stands erect; its eyes shine like balls of green flame; it spits and
+snarls like a furious torn cat. The hunter's presence seems at such
+times to be ignored altogether, its whole attention being given to the
+dogs and its rage directed against them. In Patagonia a sheep-farming
+Scotchman, with whom I spent some days, showed me the skulls of five
+pumas which he had shot in the vicinity of his ranche. One was of an
+exceptionally large individual, and I here relate what he told me of his
+encounter with this animal, as it shows just how the puma almost
+invariably behaves when attacked by man and dogs. He was out on foot
+with his flock, when the dogs discovered the animal concealed among the
+bushes. He had left his gun at home, and having no weapon, and finding
+that the dogs dared not attack it where it sat in a defiant attitude
+with its back against a thorny bush, he looked about and found a large
+dry stick, and going boldly up to it tried to stun it with a violent
+blow on the head. But though it never looked at him, its fiery eyes
+gazing steadily at the dogs all the time, he could not hit it, for with
+a quick side movement it avoided every blow. The small heed the puma
+paid him, and the apparent ease with which it avoided his best-aimed
+blows, only served to rouse his spirit, and at length striking with
+increased force his stick came to the ground and was broken to pieces.
+For some moments he now stood within two yards of the animal perfectly
+defenceless and not knowing what to do. Suddenly it sprang past him,
+actually brushing against his arm with its side, and began pursuing the
+dogs round and round among the bushes. In the end my informant's partner
+appeared on the scene with his rifle, and the puma was shot.
+
+In encounters of this kind the most curious thing is that the puma
+steadfastly refuses to recognize an enemy in man, although it finds him
+acting in concert with its hated canine foe, about whose hostile
+intentions it has no such delusion.
+
+Several years ago a paragraph, which reached me in South America,
+appeared in the English papers relating an incident characteristic of
+the puma in a wild beast show in this country. The animal was taken out
+of its cage and led about the grounds by its keeper, followed by a large
+number of spectators. Suddenly it was struck motionless by some object
+in the crowd, at which it gazed steadily with a look of intense
+excitement; then springing violently away it dragged the chain from the
+keeper's hand and dashed in among the people, who immediately fled
+screaming in all directions. Their fears were, however, idle, the object
+of the puma's rage being a dog which it had spied among the crowd.
+
+It is said that when taken adult pumas invariably pine away and die;
+when brought up in captivity they invariably make playful, affectionate
+pets, and are gentle towards all human beings, but very seldom overcome
+their instinctive animosity towards the dog.
+
+One of the very few authentic instances I have met with of this animal
+defending itself against a human being was related to me at a place on
+the pampas called Saladillo. At the time of my visit there jaguars and
+pumas were very abundant and extremely destructive to the cattle and
+horses. Sheep it had not yet been considered worth while to introduce,
+but immense herds of pigs were kept at every estancia, these animals
+being able to protect themselves. One gaucho had so repeatedly
+distinguished himself by his boldness and dexterity in killing jaguars
+that he was by general consent made the leader of every tiger-hunt. One
+day the comandante of the district got twelve or fourteen men together,
+the tiger-slayer among them, and started in search of a jaguar which had
+been seen that morning in the neighbourhood of his estancia. The animal
+was eventually found and surrounded, and as it was crouching among some
+clumps of tall pampas grass, where throwing a lasso over its neck would
+be a somewhat difficult and dangerous operation, all gave way to the
+famous hunter, who at once uncoiled his lasso and proceeded in a
+leisurely manner to form the loop. While thus engaged he made the
+mistake of allowing his horse, which had grown restive, to turn aside
+from the hunted animal. The jaguar, instantly taking advantage of the
+oversight, burst from its cover and sprang first on to the haunches of
+the horse, then seizing the hunter by his poncho dragged him to the
+earth, and would no doubt have quickly despatched him if a lasso, thrown
+by one of the other men, had not closed round its neck at this critical
+moment. It was quickly dragged off, and eventually killed. But the
+discomfited hunter did not stay to assist at the finish. He arose from
+the ground unharmed, but in a violent passion and blaspheming horribly,
+for he knew that his reputation, which he priced above everything, had
+suffered a great blow, and that he would be mercilessly ridiculed by his
+associates. Getting on his horse he rode away by himself from the scene
+of his misadventure. Of what happened to him on his homeward ride there
+were no witnesses; but his own account was as follows, and inasmuch as
+it told against his own prowess it was readily believed: Before riding a
+league, and while his bosom was still burning with rage, a puma started
+up from the long grass in his path, but made no attempt to run away; it
+merely sat up, he said, and looked at him in a provokingly fearless
+manner. To slay this animal with his knife, and so revenge himself on it
+for the defeat he had just suffered, was his first thought. He alighted
+and secured his horse by tying its fore feet together, then, drawing his
+long, heavy knife, rushed at the puma. Still it did not stir. Raising
+his weapon he struck with a force which would have split the animal's
+skull open if the blow had fallen where it was intended to fall, but
+with a quick movement the puma avoided it, and at the same time lifted a
+foot and with lightning rapidity dealt the aggressor a blow on the face,
+its unsheathed claws literally dragging down the flesh from his cheek,
+laying the bone bare. After inflicting this terrible punishment and
+eyeing its fallen foe for a few seconds it trotted quietly away. The
+wounded man succeeded in getting on to his horse and reaching his home.
+The hanging flesh was restored to its place and the ghastly rents sewn
+up, and in the end he recovered: but he was disfigured for life; his
+temper also completely changed; he became morose and morbidly sensitive
+to the ridicule of his neighbours, and he never again ventured to join
+them in their hunting expeditions. I inquired of the comandante, and of
+others, whether any case had come to their knowledge in that district in
+which the puma had shown anything beyond a mere passive friendliness
+towards man; in reply they related the following incident, which had
+occurred at the Saladillo a few years before my visit: The men all went
+out one day beyond the frontier to form a _cerco,_ as it is called, to
+hunt ostriches and other game. The hunters, numbering about thirty,
+spread themselves round in a vast ring and, advancing towards the
+centre, drove the animals before them. During the excitement of the
+chase which followed, while they were all engaged in preventing the
+ostriches, deer, &c., from doubling back and escaping, it was not
+noticed that one of the hunters had disappeared; his horse, however,
+returned to its home during the evening, and on the next morning a fresh
+hunt for the lost man was organized. He was eventually found lying on
+the ground with a broken leg, where he had been thrown at the beginning
+of the hunt. He related that about an hour after it had become dark a
+puma appeared and sat near him, but did not seem to notice him. After a
+while it became restless, frequently going away and returning, and
+finally it kept away so long, that he thought it had left him for good.
+About midnight he heard the deep roar of a jaguar, and gave himself up
+for lost. By raising himself on his elbow he was able to see the outline
+of the beast crouching near him, but its face was turned from him, and
+it appeared to be intently watching some object on which it was about to
+spring. Presently it crept out of sight, then he heard snarlings and
+growlings and the sharp yell of a puma, and he knew that the two beasts
+were fighting. Before morning he saw the jaguar several times, but the
+puma renewed the contest with it again and again until morning appeared,
+after which he saw and heard no more of them.
+
+Extraordinary as this story sounds, it did not seem so to me when I
+heard it, for I had already met with many anecdotes of a similar nature
+in various parts of the country, some of them vastly more interesting
+than the one I have just narrated; only I did not get them at first
+hand, and am consequently not able to vouch for their accuracy; but in
+this case it seemed to me that there was really no room for doubt. All
+that I had previously heard had compelled me to believe that the puma
+really does possess a unique instinct of friendliness for man, the
+origin of which, like that of many other well-known instincts of
+animals, must remain a mystery. The fact that the puma never makes an
+unprovoked attack on a human being, or eats human flesh, and that it
+refuses, except in some very rare cases, even to defend itself, does not
+seem really less wonderful in an animal of its bold and sanguinary
+temper thau that it should follow the traveller in the wilderness, or
+come near him when he lies sleeping or disabled, and even occasionally
+defend him from its enemy the jaguar. We know that certain sounds,
+colours, or smells, which are not particularly noticed by most animals,
+produce an extraordinary effect on some species; and it is possible to
+believe, I think, that the human form or countenance, or the odour of
+the human body, may also have the effect on the puma of suspending its
+predatory instincts and inspiring it with a gentleness towards man,
+which we are only accustomed to see in our domesticated carnivores or in
+feral animals towards those of their own species. Wolves, when pressed
+with hunger, will sometimes devour a fellow wolf; as a rule, however,
+rapacious animals will starve to death rather than prey on one of their
+own kind, nor is it a common thing for them to attack other species
+possessing instincts similar to their own. The puma, we have seen,
+violently attacks other large carnivores, not to feed on them, but
+merely to satisfy its animosity; and, while respecting man, it is,
+within the tropics, a great hunter and eater of monkeys, which of all
+animals most resemble men. We can only conclude with Humboldt that there
+is something mysterious in the hatreds and affections of animals.
+
+The view here taken of the puma's character imparts, I think, a fresh
+interest to some things concerning the species, which have appeared in
+historical and other works, and which I propose to discuss briefly in
+this place.
+
+There is a remarkable passage in Byron's _Narrative of the loss of the
+Wager,_ which was quoted by Admiral Fitzroy in his _Voyage of the
+Beagle,_ to prove that tho puma inhabits Tierra del Fuego and the
+adjacent islands; no other large beast of prey being known in that part
+of America. "I heard," he says, "a growling close by me, which made me
+think it advisable to retire as soon as possible: the woods were, so
+gloomy I could see nothing; but, as I retired, this noise followed me
+close till I got out of them. Some of our men did assure me that they
+had seen a very large beast in the woods. . . I proposed to four of the
+people to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from the
+bell tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam, which I had
+discovered in a walk that way on our first landing. This we covered to
+windward with seaweed; and, lighting a fire, laid ourselves down in
+hopes of finding a remedy for our hunger in sleep; but we had not long
+composed ourselves before one of our company was disturbed by the
+blowing of some animal at his face; and, upon opening his eyes, was not
+a little astonished to see by the glimmering of the fire, a large beast
+standing over him. He had presence of mind enough to snatch a brand from
+the fire, which was now very low, and thrust it at the nose of tho
+animal, which thereupon made off. . . . In the morning we were not a
+little anxious to know how our companions had fared; and this anxiety
+was increased upon our tracing the footsteps of the beast in the sand,
+in a direction towards the bell tent. The impression was deep and plain,
+of a large round foot well furnished with claws. Upon acquainting the
+people in the tent with the circumstances of our story, we found that
+they had been visited by the same unwelcome guest."
+
+Mr. Andrew Murray, in his work on the Geographical Distribution of
+Mammals, gives the Straits of Magellan as the extreme southern limit of
+the puma's range, and in discussing the above passage from Byron he
+writes: "This reference, however, gives no support to the notion of the
+animal alluded to having been a puma. . . . The description of the
+footprints clearly shows that the animal could not have been a puma.
+None of the cat tribe leave any trace of a claw in their footprints. . .
+The dogs, on the other hand, leave a very well-defined claw-mark. . . .
+Commodore Byron and his party had therefore suffered a false alarm. The
+creature which had disturbed them was, doubtless, one of the harmless
+domestic dogs of the natives."
+
+The assurance that the bold hardy adventurer and his men suffered a
+false alarm, and were thrown into a great state of excitement at the
+appearance of one of the wretched domestic dogs of the Fuegians, with
+which they were familiar, comes charmingly, it must be said, from a
+closet naturalist, who surveys the world of savage beasts from his
+London study. He apparently forgets that Commodore Byron lived in a time
+when the painful accuracy and excessive minuteness we are accustomed to
+was not expected from a writer, whenever he happened to touch on any
+matters connected with zoology.
+
+This kind of criticism, which seizes on a slight inaccuracy in one
+passage, and totally ignores an important statement in another--as, for
+instance, that of the "great beast" seen in the woods--might be extended
+to other portions of the book, and Byron's entire narrative made to
+appear as purely a work of the imagination as Peter Wilkin's adventures
+in those same antarctic seas.
+
+Mr. J. W. Boddam Whetham, in his work _Across Central America_ (1877),
+gives an anecdote of the puma, which he heard at Sacluk, in Guatemala,
+and which strangely resembles some of the stories I have heard on the
+pampas. He writes: "The following event, most extraordinary if true, is
+said to have occurred in this forest to a mahogany-cutter, who had been
+out marking trees. As he was returning to his hut, he suddenly felt a
+soft body pressing against him, and on looking down saw a cougar, which,
+with tail erect, and purring like a cat, twisted itself in and out of
+his legs, and glided round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if with
+laughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on, and the
+terrible animal still circled about, now rolling over, and now touching
+him with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse. At last the suspense
+became too great, and with a loud shout he struck desperately at the
+creature with his axe. It bounded on one side and crouched snarling and
+showing its teeth. Just as it was about to spring, the man's companion,
+who had heard his call, appeared in the distance, and with a growl the
+beast vanished into the thick bushes."
+
+Now, after allowing for exaggeration, if there is no foundation for
+stories of this character, it is really a very wonderful coincidence
+that they should be met with in countries so widely separated as
+Patagonia and Central America. Pumas, doubtless, are scarce in
+Guatemala; and, as in other places where they have met with nothing but
+persecution from man, they are shy of him; but had this adventure
+occurred on the pampas, where they are better known, the person
+concerned in it would not have said that the puma played with him as a
+cat with a mouse, but rather as a tame cat plays with a child; nor,
+probably, would he have been terrified into imagining that the animal,
+even after its caresses had met with so rough a return, was about to
+spring on him.
+
+In Clavigero's _History of Lower California,_ it is related that a very
+extraordinary state of things was discovered to exist in that country by
+the first missionaries who settled there at the end of the seventeenth
+century, and which was actually owing to the pumas. The author says that
+there were no bears or tigers (jaguars); these had most probably been
+driven out by their old enemies; but the pumas had increased to a
+prodigious extent, so that the whole peninsula was overrun by them; and
+this was owing to the superstitious regard in which they were held by
+the natives, who not only did not kill them, but never ventured to
+disturb them in any way. The Indians were actually to some extent
+dependent on the puma's success in hunting for their subsistence; they
+watched the movements of the vultures in order to discover the spot in
+which the remains of any animal it had captured had been left by the
+puma, and whenever the birds were seen circling about persistently over
+one place, they hastened to take possession of the carcass, discovered
+in this way. The domestic animals, imported by the missionaries, were
+quickly destroyed by the virtual masters of the country, and against
+these enemies the Jesuits preached a crusade in vain: for although the
+Indians readily embraced Christianity and were baptized, they were not
+to be shaken in their notions concerning the sacred _Chimbicá,_ as the
+puma was called. The missions languished in consequence; the priests
+existed in a state of semi-starvation, depending on provisions sent to
+them at long intervals from the distant Mexican settlements; and for
+many years all their efforts to raise the savages from their miserable
+condition were thrown away. At length, in 1701, the mission of Loreto
+was taken charge of by one Padre Ugarte, described by Clavigero as a
+person of indomitable energy, and great physical strength and courage, a
+true muscular Christian, who occasionally varied his method of
+instruction by administering corporal chastisements to his hearers when
+they laughed at his doctrines, or at the mistakes he made in their
+language, while preaching to them. Ugarte, like his predecessors, could
+not move the Indians to hunt the puma, but he was a man of action, with
+a wholesome belief in the efficacy of example, and his opportunity came
+at last.
+
+One day, while riding in the wood, he saw at a distance a puma walking
+deliberately towards him. Alighting from his mule, he took up a large
+stone and advanced to meet the animal, and when sufficiently near hurled
+the missile with such precision and force that he knocked ifc down
+senseless. After killing it, he found that the heaviest part of his task
+remained, as it was necessary for the success of his project to carry
+the beast, still warm and bleeding, to the Indian village; but mow his
+mule steadfastly refused to approach it. Father Ugarte was not,
+however, to be defeated, and partly by stratagem, partly by force, he
+finally succeeded in getting the puma on to the mule's back, after which
+he rode in triumph to the settlement. The Indians at first thought it
+all a trick of their priest, who was so anxious to involve them in a
+conflict with the pumas, and standing at a distance they began jeering
+at him, and exclaiming that he had found the animal dead! But when they
+were induced to approach, and saw that it was still warm and bleeding,
+they were astonished beyond measure, and began to watch the priest
+narrowly, thinking that he would presently drop down and die in sight of
+them all. It was their belief that death would quickly overtake the
+slayer of a puma. As this did not happen, the priest gained a great
+influence over them, and in the end they were persuaded to turn their
+weapons against the Chimbicá.
+
+Clavigero has nothing to say concerning the origin of this Californian
+superstition; but with some knowledge of the puma's character, it is not
+difficult to imagine what it may have been. No doubt these savages had
+been very well acquainted from ancient times with the animal's instinct
+of friendliness toward man, and its extreme hatred of other carnivores,
+which prey on the human species; and finding it ranged on their side, as
+it were, in the hard struggle of life in the desert, they were induced
+to spare it, and even to regard it as a friend; and such a feeling,
+among primitive men, might in the course of time degenerate into such a
+superstition as that of the Californians.
+
+I shall, in conclusion, relate here the story of Maldonada, which is not
+generally known, although familiar to Buenos Ayreans as the story of
+Lady Godiva's ride through Coventry is to the people of that town. The
+case of Maldonada is circumstantially narrated by Rui Diaz de Guzman, in
+his history of the colonization of the Plata: he was a person high in
+authority in the young colonies, and is regarded by students of South
+American history as an accurate and sober-minded chronicler of the
+events of his own times. He relates that in the year 1536 the settlers
+at Buenos Ayres, having exhausted their provisions, and being compelled
+by hostile Indians to keep within their pallisades, were reduced to the
+verge of starvation. The Governor Mendoza went off to seek help from the
+other colonies up the river, deputing his authority to one Captain Ruiz,
+who, according to all accounts, displayed an excessively tyrannous and
+truculent disposition while in power. The people were finally reduced to
+a ration of sis ounces of flour per day for each person; but as the
+flour was putrid and only made them ill, they were forced to live on any
+small animals they could capture, including snakes, frogs and toads.
+Some horrible details are given by Rui Diaz, and other writers; one, Del
+Barco Centenera, affirms that of two thousand persons in the town
+eighteen hundred perished of hunger. During this unhappy time, beasts of
+prey in large numbers were attracted to the settlement by the effluvium
+of the corpses, buried just outside the pallisades; and this made the
+condition of the survivors more miserable still, since they could
+venture into the neighbouring woods only at the risk of a violent death.
+Nevertheless, many did so venture, and among these was the young woman
+Maldonada, who, losing herself in the forest, strayed to a distance, and
+was eventually found by a party of Indians, and carried by them to their
+village.
+
+Some months later, Captain Ruiz discovered her whereabouts, and
+persuaded the savages to bring her to the settlement; then, accusing her
+of having gone to the Indian village in order to betray the colony, he
+condemned her to be devoured by wild beasts. She was taken to a wood at
+a distance of a league from the town, and left there, tied to a tree,
+for the space of two nights and a day. A party of soldiers then went to
+the spot, expecting to find her bones picked clean by the beasts, but
+were greatly astonished to find Maldonada still alive, without hurt or
+scratch. She told them that a puma had come to her aid, and had kept at
+her side, defending her life against all the other beasts that
+approached her. She was instantly released, and taken back to the town,
+her deliverance through the action of the puma probably being looked on
+as direct interposition of Providence to save her.
+
+Rui Diaz concludes with the following paragraph, in which he affirms
+that he knew the woman Maldonada, which may be taken as proof that she
+was among the few that survived the first disastrous settlement and
+lived on to more fortunate times: his pious pun on her name would be
+lost in a translation:--"De esta manera quedo libre la que ofrecieron a
+las fieras: la cual mujer yo la conoci, y la llamaban la Maldonada, que
+mas bien se le podia llamar la BIENDONADA; pues por este suceso se ha de
+ver no haber merecido el castigo á que la ofrecieron."
+
+If such a thing were to happen now, in any portion of southern South
+America, where the puma's disposition is best known, it would not be
+looked on as a miracle, as it was, and that unavoidably, in the case of
+Maldonada.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A WAVE OF LIFE,
+
+
+For many years, while living in my own home on the pampas, I kept a
+journal, in which all my daily observations on the habits of animals and
+kindred matters were carefully noted. Turning back to 1872-3, I find my
+jottings for that season contain a history of one of those waves of
+life--for I can think of no better name for the phenomenon in
+question--that are of such frequent occurrence in thinly-settled
+regions, though in countries like England, seen very rarely, and on a
+very limited scale. An exceptionally bounteous season, the accidental
+mitigation of a check, or other favourable circumstance, often causes an
+increase so sudden and inordinate of small prolific species, that when
+we actually witness it we are no longer surprised at the notion
+prevalent amongst the common people that mice, frogs, crickets, &c., are
+occasionally rained down from the clouds.
+
+In the summer of 1872-3 we had plenty of sunshine, with frequent
+showers; so that the hot months brought no dearth of wild flowers, as in
+most years. The abundance of flowers resulted in a wonderful increase of
+humble bees. I have never known them so plentiful before; in and about
+the plantation adjoining my house I found, during the season, no fewer
+than seventeen nests.
+
+The season was also favourable for mice; that is, of course, favourable
+for the time being, unfavourable in the long run, since the short-lived,
+undue preponderance of a species is invariably followed by a long period
+of undue depression. These prolific little creatures were soon so
+abundant that the dogs subsisted almost exclusively on them; the fowls
+also, from incessantly pursuing and killing them, became quite rapacious
+in their manner; whilst the sulphur tyrant-birds (Pitangus) and the
+Guira cuckoos preyed on nothing but mice.
+
+The domestic cats, as they invariably do in such plentiful seasons,
+absented themselves from the house, assuming all the habits of their
+wild congeners, and slinking from the sight of man--even of a former
+fireside companion--with a shy secrecy in their motions, an apparent
+affectation of fear, almost ludicrous to see. Foxes, weasels, and
+opossums fared sumptuously. Even for the common armadillo (Dasypus
+villosus) it was a season of affluence, for this creature is very adroit
+in capturing mice. This fact might seem surprising to anyone who marks
+the uncouth figure, toothless gums, and the motions--anything but light
+and graceful--of the armadillo and perhaps fancying that, to be a
+dexterous mouser, an animal should bear some resemblance in habits and
+structure to the felidas. But animals, like men, are compelled to adapt
+themselves to their surroundings; new habits are acquired, and the exact
+co-relation between habit and structure is seldom maintained.
+
+I kept an armadillo at this time, and good cheer and the sedentary life
+he led in captivity made him excessively fat; but the mousing exploits
+of even this individual were most interesting. Occasionally I took him
+into the fields to give him a taste of liberty, though at such times I
+always took the precaution to keep hold of a cord fastened to one of his
+hind legs; for as often as he came to a kennel of one of his wild
+fellows, he would attempt to escape into it. He invariably travelled
+with an ungainly trotting gait, carrying his nose, beagle-like, close to
+the ground. His sense of smell was exceedingly acute, and when near his
+prey he became agitated, and quickened his motions, pausing frequently
+to sniff the earth, till, discovering the exact spot where the mouse
+lurked, he would stop and creep cautiously to it; then, after slowly
+raising himself to a sitting posture, spring suddenly forwards, throwing
+his body like a trap over the mouse, or nest of mice, concealed beneath
+the grass.
+
+A curious instance of intelligence in a cat was brought to my notice at
+this time by one of my neighbours, a native. His children had made the
+discovery that some excitement and fun was to be had by placing a long
+hollow stalk of the giant thistle with a mouse in it--and every hollow
+stalk at this time had one for a tenant--before a cat, and then watching
+her movements. Smelling her prey, she would spring at one end of the
+stalk--the end towards which the mouse would be moving at the same time,
+but would catch nothing, for the mouse, instead of running out, would
+turn back to run to the other end; whereupon the cat, all excitement,
+would jump there to seize it; and so the contest would continue for a
+long time, an exhibition of the cleverness and the stupidity of
+instinct, both of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several cats
+at the house, and all acted in the same way except one. When a stalk was
+placed before this cat, instead of becoming excited like the others, it
+went quickly to one end and smelt' at the opening, then, satisfied that
+its prey was inside, it deliberately bit a long piece out of the stalk
+with its teeth, then another strip, and so on progressively, until the
+entire stick had been opened up to within six or eight inches of the
+further end, when the mouse came out and was caught. Every stalk placed
+before this cat was demolished in the same businesslike way; but the
+other cats, though they were made to look on while the stick was being
+broken up by their fellow, could never learn the trick.
+
+In the autumn of the .year countless numbers of storks (Ciconia maguari)
+and of short-eared owls (Otus brachyotus) made their appearance. They
+had also come to assist at the general feast.
+
+Remembering the opinion of Mr. E. Newman, quoted by Darwin, that
+two-thirds of the humble bees in England are annually destroyed by mice,
+I determined to continue observing these insects, in order to ascertain
+whether the same thing occurred on the pampas. I carefully revisited all
+the nests I had found, and was amazed at the rapid disappearance of all
+the bees. I was quite convinced that the mice had devoured or driven
+them out, for the weather was still warm, and flowers and fruit on which
+humble bees feed were very abundant.
+
+After cold weather set in the storks went away, probably on account of
+the scarcity of water, for the owls remained. So numerous were they
+during the winter, that any evening after sunset I could count forty or
+fifty individuals hovering over the trees about my house. Unfortunately
+they did not confine their attentions to the mice, but became
+destructive to the birds as well. I frequently watched them at dusk,
+beating about the trees and bushes in a systematic manner, often a dozen
+or more of them wheeling together about one tree, like so many moths
+about a candle, and one occasionally dashing through the branches until
+a pigeon--usually the Zenaida maculata--or other bird was scared from
+its perch. The instant the bird left the tree they would all give chase,
+disappearing in the darkness. I could not endure to see the havoc they
+were making amongst the ovenbirds (Furnarius rufus--a species for which
+I have a regard and affection almost superstitious), so I began to shoot
+the marauders. Very soon, however, I found it was impossible to protect
+my little favourites. Night after night the owls mustered in their usual
+numbers, so rapidly were the gaps I made in their ranks refilled. I grew
+sick of the cruel war in which I had so hopelessly joined, and resolved,
+not without pain, to let things take their course. A singular
+circumstance was that the owls began to breed in the middle of winter.
+The field-labourers and boys found many nests with eggs and young birds
+in the neighbourhood. I saw one nest in July, our coldest month, with
+three half-grown young birds in it. They were excessively fat, and,
+though it was noon-day, had their crops full. There were three mice and
+two young cavies (Cavia australis) lying untouched in the nest.
+
+The short-eared owl is of a wandering disposition, ard performs long
+journeys at all seasons of the year in search of districts where food is
+abundant; and perhaps these winter-breeders came from a region where
+scarcity of prey, or some such cause, had prevented them from nesting at
+their usual time in summer.
+
+The gradual increase or decrease continually going on in many species
+about us is little remarked; but the sudden infrequent appearance in
+vast numbers of large and comparatively rare species is regarded by most
+people as a very wonderful phenomenon, not easily explained. On the
+pampas, whenever grasshoppers, mice, frogs or crickets become
+excessively abundant we confidently look for the appearance of
+multitudes of the birds that prey on them. However obvious may be the
+cause of the first phenomenon--the sudden inordinate increase during a
+favourable year of a species always prolific--the attendant one always
+creates astonishment: For how, it is asked, do these largo birds, seldom
+seen at other times, receive information in the distant regions they
+inhabit of an abundance of food in any particular locality? Years have
+perhaps passed during which, scarcely an individual of these kinds has
+been seen: all at once armies of the majestic white storks are seen
+conspicuously marching about the plain in all directions; while the
+night air resounds with the solemn hootings of innumerable owls. It is
+plain that these birds have been drawn from over an immense area to one
+spot; and the question is how have they been drawn?
+
+Many large birds possessing great powers of flight are, when not
+occupied with the business of propagation, incessantly wandering from
+place to place in search of food. They are not, as a rule, regular
+migrants, for their wanderings begin and end irrespective of seasons,
+and where they find abundance they remain the whole year. They fly at a
+very great height, and traverse immense distances. When the favourite
+food of any one of these species is plentiful in any particular region
+all the individuals that discover it remain, and attract to them all of
+their kind passing overhead. This happens on the pampas with the stork,
+the short-eared owl, the hooded gull and the dominican or black-backed
+gull--the leading species among the feathered nomads: a few first appear
+like harbingers; these are presently joined by new comers in
+considerable numbers, and before long they are in myriads. Inconceivable
+numbers of birds are, doubtless, in these regions, continually passing
+over us unseen. It was once a subject of very great wonder to me that
+flocks of black-necked swans should almost always appear flying by
+immediately after a shower of rain, even when none had been visible for
+a long time before, and when they must have come from a very great
+distance. When the reason at length occurred to me, I felt very much
+disgusted with myself for being puzzled over so very simple a matter.
+After rain a flying swan may be visible to the eye at a vastly greater
+distance than during fair weather; the sun shining on its intense white
+plumage against the dark background of a rain-cloud making it
+exceedingly conspicuous. The fact that swans are almost always seen
+after rain shows only that they are almost always passing.
+
+Whenever we are visited by a dust-storm on the pampas myriads of hooded
+gulls--Larus macnlipen-nis--appear flying before the dark dust-cloud,
+even when not a gull has been seen for months. Dust-storms are of rare
+occurrence, and come only after a long drought, and, the water-courses
+being all dry, the gulls cannot have been living in the region over
+which the storm passes. Yet in seasons of drought gulls must be
+continually passing by at a great height, seeing but not seen, except
+when driven together and forced towards the earth by the fury of the
+storm.
+
+By August (1873) the owls had vanished, and they had, indeed, good cause
+for leaving. The winter had been one of continued drought; the dry grass
+and herbage of the preceding year had been consumed by the cattle and
+wild animals, or had turned to dust, and with the disappearance of their
+food and cover the mice had ceased to be. The famine-stricken cats
+sneaked back to the house. It was pitiful to see the little burrowing
+owls; for these birds, not having the powerful wings and prescient
+instincts of the vagrant Otus brachyotus, are compelled to face the
+poverty from which the others escape. Just as abundance had before made
+the domestic cats wild, scarcity now made the burrowing owls tame and
+fearless of man. They were so reduced as scarcely to be able to fly, and
+hung about the houses all day long on the look-out for some stray morsel
+of food. I have frequently seen one alight and advance within two or
+three yards of the door-step, probably attracted by the smell of roasted
+meat. The weather continued dry until late in spring, so reducing the
+sheep and cattle that incredible numbers perished during a month of cold
+and rainy weather that followed the drought.
+
+How clearly we can see in all this that the tendency to multiply
+rapidly, so advantageous in normal seasons, becomes almost fatal to a
+species in seasons of exceptional abundance. Cover and food without
+limit enabled the mice to increase at such an amazing rate that the
+lesser checks interposed by predatory species were for a while
+inappreciable. But as the mice increased, so did their enemies.
+Insectivorous and other species acquired the habits of owls and weasels,
+preying exclusively on them; while to this innumerable army of residents
+was shortly added multitudes of wandering birds coming from distant
+regions. No sooner had the herbage perished, depriving the little
+victims of cover and food, than the effects of the war became apparent.
+In autumn the earth so teemed with them that one could scarcely walk
+anywhere without treading on mice; while out of every hollow weed-stalk
+lying on the ground dozens could be shaken; but so rapidly had they
+devoured, by the trained army of persecutors, that in spring it was hard
+to find a survivor, even in the barns and houses. The fact that species
+tend to increase in a geometrical ratio makes these great and sudden
+changes frequent in many regions of the earth; but it is not often they
+present themselves so vividly as in the foregoing instance, for here,
+scene after scene in one of Nature's silent passionless tragedies opens
+before us, countless myriads of highly organized beings rising into
+existence only to perish almost immediately, scarcely a hard-pressed
+remnant remaining after the great reaction to continue the species.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+SOME CURIOUS ANIMAL WEAPONS.
+
+
+Strictly speaking, the only weapons of vertebrates are teeth, claws,
+horns, and spurs. Horns belong only to the ruminants, and the spur is a
+rare weapon. There are also many animals in which teeth and claws are
+not suited to inflict injury, or in which the proper instincts and
+courage to use and develop them are wanted; and these would seem, to be
+in a very defenceless condition. Defenceless they are in one sense, but
+as a fact they are no worse off than the well-armed species, having
+either a protective colouring or a greater swiftness or cunning to
+assist them in escaping from their enemies. And there are also many of
+these practically toothless and clawless species which have yet been
+provided with other organs and means of offence and defence out of
+Nature's curious armoury, and concerning a few of these species I
+propose to speak in this place.
+
+Probably such distinctive weapons as horns, spurs, tusks and spines
+would be much more common in nature if the conditions of life always
+remained the same. But these things are long in fashioning; meanwhile,
+conditions are changing; climate, soil, vegetation vary; foes and rivals
+diminish or increase; the old go, and others with different weapons and
+a new strategy take their place; and just as a skilful man "fighting the
+wilderness" fashions a plough from a hunting-knife, turns his implements
+into weapons of war, and for everything he possesses discovers a use
+never contemplated by its maker, so does Nature--only with an ingenuity
+exceeding that of man--use the means she has to meet all contingencies,
+and enable her creatures, seemingly so ill-provided, to maintain their
+fight for life. Natural selection, like an angry man, can make a weapon
+of anything; and, using the word in this wide sense, the mucous
+secretions the huanaco discharges into the face of an adversary, and the
+pestilential drops "distilled" by the skunk, are weapons, and may be as
+effectual in defensive warfare as spines, fangs and tushes.
+
+I do not know of a more striking instance in the animal kingdom of
+adaptation of structure to habit than is afforded by the hairy
+armadillo--Dasypus villosus. He appears to us, roughly speaking, to
+resemble an ant-eater saddled with a dish cover; yet this creature, with
+the cunning Avhich Nature has given it to supplement all deficiencies,
+has discovered in its bony encumbrance a highly efficient weapon of
+offence. Most other edentates are diurnal and almost exclusively
+insectivorous, some feeding only on ants; they have unchangeable habits,
+very limited intelligence, and vanish before civilization. The hairy
+armadillo alone has struck out a line for itself. Like its fast
+disappearing congeners, it is an insect-eater still, but does not like
+them seek its food on the surface and in the ant-hill only; all kinds of
+insects are preyed on, and by means of its keen scent it discovers worms
+and larvae several inches beneath the surface. Its method of taking
+worms and grubs resembles that of probing birds, for it throws up no
+earth, but forces its sharp snout and wedge-shaped head down to the
+required depth; and probably while working it moves round in a circle,
+for the hole is conical, though the head of the animal is flat. Where it
+has found a rich hunting-ground, the earth is seen pitted with hundreds
+of these neat symmetrical bores. It is also an enemy to ground-nesting
+birds, being fond of eggs and fledglings; and when unable to capture
+prey it will feed on carrion as readily as a wild dog or vulture,
+returning night after night to the carcase of a horse or cow as long as
+the flesh lasts. Failing animal food, it subsists on vegetable diet; and
+I have frequently found their stomachs stuffed with clover, and,
+stranger still, with the large, hard grains of the maize, swallowed
+entire.
+
+It is not, therefore, strange that at all seasons, and even when other
+animals are starving, the hairy armadillo is always fat and vigorous. In
+the desert it is diurnal; but where man appears it becomes more and more
+nocturnal, and in populous districts does not go abroad until long after
+dark. Yet when a district becomes thickly settled it increases in
+numbers; so readily does it adapt itself to new conditions. It is not to
+be wondered at that the gauchos, keen observers of nature as they are,
+should make this species the hero of many of their fables of the "Uncle
+Remus" type, representing it as a versatile creature, exceedingly
+fertile in expedients, and duping its sworn friend the fox in various
+ways, just as "Brer Rabbit" serves the fox in the North American fables.
+
+The hairy armadillo will, doubtless, long survive all the other
+armadillos, and on this account alone it will have an ever-increasing
+interest for the naturalist. I have elsewhere described how it captures
+mice; when preying on snakes it proceeds in another manner. A friend of
+mine, a careful observer, who was engaged in cattle-breeding amongst the
+stony sierras near Cape Corrientes, described to me an encounter he
+witnessed between an armadillo and a poisonous snake. While seated on
+the hillside one day he observed a snake, about twenty inches in length,
+lying coiled up on a stoue five or six yards beneath him. By-and-by, a
+hairy armadillo appeared trotting directly towards it. Apparently the
+snake perceived and feared its approach, for it quickly uncoiled itself
+and began gliding away. Instantly the armadillo rushed on to it, and,
+squatting close down, began swaying its body backward and forward with a
+regular sawing motion, thus lacerating its victim with the sharp,
+deep-cut edges of its bony covering. The snake struggled to free itself,
+biting savagely at its aggressor, for its head and neck were disengaged.
+Its bites made no impression, and very soon it dropped its head, and
+when its enemy drew off, it was dead and very much mangled. The
+armadillo at once began its meal, taking the tail in its mouth and
+slowly progressing towards the head; but when about a third of the snake
+still remained it seemed satisfied, and, leaving that portion, trotted
+away.
+
+Altogether, in its rapacious and varied habits this armadillo appears to
+have some points of resemblance with the hedgehog; and possibly, like
+the little European mammal it resembles, it is not harmed by the bite of
+venomous snakes.
+
+I once had a cat that killed every snake it found, purely for sport,
+since it never ate them. It would jump nimbly round and across its
+victim, occasionally dealing it a blow with its cruel claws. The enemies
+of the snake are legion. Burrowing owls feed largely on them; so do
+herons and storks, killing them with a blow of their javelin beaks, and
+swallowing them entire. The sulphur tyrant-bird picks up the young snake
+by the tail, and, flying to a branch or stone, uses it like a flail till
+its life is battered out. The bird is highly commended in consequence,
+reminding one of very ancient words: "Happy shall he be that taketh thy
+little ones and dasheth them against the stones." In arraying such a
+variety of enemies against the snake, nature has made ample amends for
+having endowed it with deadly weapons. Besides, the power possessed by
+venomous snakes only seems to us disproportionate; it is not really so,
+except in occasional individual encounters. Venomous snakes are always
+greatly outnumbered by non-venomous ones in the same district; at any
+rate this is the case on the pampas. The greater activity of the latter
+counts for more in the result than the deadly weapons of the former.
+
+The large teguexin lizard of the pampas, called iguana by the country
+people, is a notable snake-killer. Snakes have in fact, no more
+formidable enemy, for he is quick to see, and swift to overtake them. He
+is practically invulnerable, and deals them sudden death with his
+powerful tail. The gauchos say that dogs attacking the iguana are
+sometimes known to have their legs broken, and I do not doubt it. A
+friend of mine was out riding one day after his cattle, and having
+attached one end of his lasso to the saddle, He let it trail on the
+ground. He noticed a large iguana lying apparently asleep in the sun,
+and though he rode by it very closely, it did not stir; but no sooner
+had he passed it, than it raised its head, and fixed its attention on
+the forty feet of lasso slowly trailing by. Suddenly it rushed after the
+rope, and dealt it a succession of violent blows with its tail. When the
+whole of the lasso, several yards of which had been pounded in vain, had
+been dragged by, the lizard, with uplifted head, continued gazing after
+it with the greatest astonishment. Never had such a wonderful snake
+crossed its path before!
+
+Molina, in his _Natural History of Chill,_ says the vizcacha uses its
+tail as a weapon; but then Molina is not always reliable. I have
+observed vizcachas all my life, and never detected them making use of
+any weapon except their chisel teeth. The tail is certainly very
+curious, being straight at the base, then curving up outwardly, and
+slightly down again at the tip, resembling the spout of a china teapot.
+The under surface of the straight portion of the base is padded with a
+thick, naked, corneous skin; and, when the animal performs the curious
+sportive antics in which it occasionally indulges, it gives rapid
+loud-sounding blows on the ground with this part of the tail. The
+peculiar form of the tail also makes it a capital support, enabling the
+vizcacha to sit erect, with ease and security.
+
+The frog is a most timid, inoffensive creature, saving itself, when
+pursued, by a series of saltatory feats unparalleled amongst
+vertebrates. Consequently, when I find a frog, I have no hesitation in
+placing my hands upon it, and the cold sensation it gives one is the
+worse result I fear. It came to pass, however, that I once encountered a
+frog that was not like other frogs, for it possessed an instinct and
+weapons of offence which greatly astonished me. I was out snipe shooting
+one day when, peering into an old disused burrow, two or three feet
+deep, I perceived a burly-looking frog sitting it. It was larger and
+stouter-looking than our common Rana, though like it in colour, and I at
+once dropped on to my knees and set about its capture. Though it watched
+me attentively, the frog remained perfectly motionless, and this greatly
+surprised me. Before I was sufficiently near to make a grab, it sprang
+straight at my hand, and, catching two of my fingers round with its fore
+legs, administered a hug so sudden and violent as to cause an acute
+sensation of pain; then, at the very instant I experienced this feeling,
+which made me start back quickly, it released its hold and bounded out
+and away. I flew after it, and barely managed to overtake it before it
+could gain the water. Holding it firmly pressed behind the shoulders, it
+was powerless to attack me, and I then noticed the enormous development
+of the muscles of the fore legs, usually small in frogs, bulging out in
+this individual, like a second pair of thighs, and giving-it a strangely
+bold and formidable appearance. On holding my gun within its reach, it
+clasped the barrel with such energy as to bruise the skin of its breast
+and legs. After allowing it to partially exhaust itself in these
+fruitless huggings, I experimented by letting it seize my hand again,
+and I noticed that invariably after each squeeze it made a quick,
+violent attempt to free itself. Believing that I had discovered a frog
+differing in structure from all known species, and possessing a strange
+unique instinct of self-preservation, I carried my captive home,
+intending to show it to Dr. Burmeister, the director of the National
+Museum at Buenos Ayres-Unfortunately, after I had kept it some days, it
+effected its escape by pushing up the glass cover of its box, and I have
+never since met with another individual like it. That this singular
+frog has it in its power to seriously injure an opponent is, of course,
+out of the question; but its unexpected attack must be of great
+advantage. The effect of the sudden opening of an umbrella in the face
+of an angry bull gives, I think, only a faint idea of the astonishment
+and confusion it must cause an adversary by its leap, quick as
+lightning, and the violent hug it administers; and in the confusion it
+finds time to escape. I cannot for a moment believe that an instinct so
+admirable, correlated as it is with the structure of the fore legs, can
+be merely an individual variation; and I confidently expect that all I
+have said about my lost frog will some day be confirmed by others. Rana
+luctator would be a good name for this species.
+
+The toad is a slow-moving creature that puts itself in the way of
+persecution; yet, strange to say, the acrid juice it exudes when
+irritated is a surer protection to it than venomous fangs are to the
+deadliest snake. Toads are, in fact, with a very few exceptions, only
+attacked and devoured by snakes, by lizards, and by their own venomous
+relative, Ceratophrys ornata. Possibly the cold sluggish natures of all
+these creatures protects them against the toad's secretion, which would
+be poison to most warm-blooded animals, but I am not so sure that all
+fish enjoy a like immunity. I one day noticed a good-sized fish (bagras)
+floating, belly upmost, on the water. It had apparently just died, and
+had such a glossy, well-nourished look about it, and appeared so full, I
+was curious to know the cause of its death. On opening it I found its
+stomach quite filled with a very large toad it had swallowed. The toad
+looked perfectly fresh, not even a faint discoloration of the skin
+showing that the gastric juices had begun to take effect; the fish, in
+fact, must have died immediately after swallowing the toad. The country
+people in South America believe that the milky secretion exuded by the
+toad possesses wonderful curative properties; it is their invariable
+specific for shingles--a painful, dangerous malady common amongst them,
+and to cure it living toads are applied to the inflamed parb. I dare say
+learned physicians would laugh at this cure, but then, if I mistake not,
+the learned have in past times laughed at other specifics used by the
+vulgar, but which now have honourable places in the pharmacopoeia--
+pepsine, for example. More than two centuries ago (very ancient times
+for South America) the gauchos were accustomed to take the lining of the
+rhea's stomach, dried and powdered, for ailments caused by impaired
+digestion; and the remedy is popular still. Science has gone over to
+them, and the ostrich-hunter now makes a double profit, one from the
+feathers, and the other from the dried stomachs which he supplies to the
+chemists of Buenos Ayres. Yet he was formerly told that to take the
+stomach of the ostrich to improve his digestion was as wild an idea as
+it would be to swallow birds' feathers in order to fly.
+
+I just now called Ceratophrys ornata venomous, though its teeth are not
+formed to inject poison into the veins, like serpents' teeth. It is a
+singular creature, known as _escuerzo_ in the vernacular, and though
+beautiful in colour, is in form hideous beyond description. The skin is
+of a rich brilliant green, with chocolate-coloured patches, oval in
+form, and symmetrically disposed. The lips are bright yellow, the
+cavernous mouth pale flesh colour, the throat and under-surface dull
+white. The body is lumpy, and about the size of a large man's fist. The
+eyes, placed on the summit of a disproportionately large head, are
+embedded in horn-like protuberances, capable of being elevated or
+depressed at pleasure. When the creature is undisturbed, the eyes, which
+are of a pale gold colour, look out as from a couple of watch towers,
+but when touched on the head or menaced, the prominences sink down to a
+level with the head, closing the eyes completely, and giving the
+creature the appearance of being eyeless. The upper jaw is armed with
+minute teeth, and there are two teeth in the centre of the lower jaw,
+the remaining portions of the jaw being armed with two exceedingly
+sharp-edged bony plates. In place of a tongue, it has a round muscular
+process with a rough flat disc the size of a halfpenny.
+
+It is common all over the pampas, ranging as far south as the Rio
+Colorado in Patagonia. In the breeding season it congregates in pools,
+and one is then struck by their extraordinary vocal powers, which they
+exercise by night. The performance in no way resembles the series of
+percussive sounds uttered by most batrachians. The notes it utters are
+long, as of a wind instrument, not unmelodious, and so powerful as to
+make themselves heard distinctly a mile off on still evenings. After the
+amorous period these toads retire to moist places and sit inactive,
+buried just deep enough to leave the broad green back on a level with
+the surface, and it is then very difficult to detect them. In this
+position they wait for their prey--frogs, toads, birds, and small
+mammals. Often they capture and attempt to swallow things too large for
+them, a mistake often made by snakes. In very wet springs they sometimes
+come about houses and lie in wait for chickens and ducklings. In
+disposition they are most truculent, savagely biting at anything that
+comes near them; and when they bite they hang on with the tenacity of a
+bulldog, poisoning the blood with their glandular secretions. When
+teased, the creature swells itself out to such an extent one almost
+expects to see him burst; he follows his tormentors about with slow
+awkward leaps, his vast mouth wide open, and uttering an incessant harsh
+croaking sound. A gaucho I knew was once bitten by one. He sat down on
+the grass, and, dropping his hand at his side, had it seized, and only
+freed himself by using his hunting knife to force the creature's mouth
+open. He washed and bandaged the wound, and no bad result followed; but
+when the toad cannot be shaken off, then the result is different. One
+summer two horses were found dead on the plain near my home. One, while
+lying down, had been seized by a fold in the skin near the belly; the
+other had been grasped by the nose while cropping grass. In both
+instances the vicious toad was found dead, with jaws tightly closed,
+still hanging to the dead horse. Perhaps they are sometimes incapable of
+letting go at will, and like honey bees, destroy themselves in these
+savage attacks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+FEAR IN BIRDS.
+
+
+The statement that birds instinctively fear man is frequently met with
+in zoological works written since the _Origin of Species_ appeared; but
+almost the only reason--absolutely the only plausible reason, all the
+rest being mere supposition--given in support of such a notion is that
+birds in desert islands show at first no fear of man, but afterwards,
+finding him a dangerous neighbour, they become wild; and their young
+also grow up wild. It is thus assumed that the habit acquired by the
+former has become hereditary in the latter--or, at all events, that in
+time it becomes hereditary. Instincts, which are few in number in any
+species, and practically endure for ever, are not, presumably, acquired
+with such extraordinary facility.
+
+Birds become shy where persecuted, and the young, even when not
+disturbed, learn a shy habit from the parents, and from other adults
+they associate with. I have found small birds shyer in desert places,
+where the human form was altogether strange to them, than in
+thickly-settled districts. Large birds are actually shyer than the small
+ones, although, to the civilized or shooting man they seem astonishingly
+tame where they have never been fired at. I have frequently walked quite
+openly to within twenty-five or thirty yards of a flock of flamingoes
+without alarming them. This, however, was when they were in the water,
+or on the opposite side of a stream. Having no experience of guns, they
+fancied themselves secure as long as a strip of water separated them
+from the approaching object. When standing on dry land they would not
+allow so near an approach. Sparrows in England aro very much tamer than
+the sparrows I have observed in desert places, where they seldom see a
+human being. Nevertheless young sparrows in England are very much tamer
+than old birds, as anyone may see for himself. During the past summer,
+while living near Kew Gardens, I watched the sparrows a great deal, and
+fed forty or fifty of them every day from a back window. The bread and
+seed was thrown on to a low roof just outside the window, and I noticed
+that the young birds when first able to fly were always brought by the
+parents to this feeding place, and that after two or three visits they
+would begin to come of their own accord. At such times they would
+venture quite close to me, showing as little suspicion as young
+chickens. The adults, however, although so much less shy than birds of
+other species, were extremely suspicious, snatching up the bread and
+flying away; or, if they remained, hopping about in a startled manner,
+craning their necks to view me, and making so many gestures and motions,
+and little chirps of alarm, that presently the young would become
+infected with fear. The lesson was taught them in a surprisingly short
+time; their suspicion was seen to increase day by day, and about a week
+later they were scarcely to be distinguished, in behaviour from the
+adults. It is plain that, with these little birds, fear of man is an
+associate feeling, and that, unless it had been taught them, his
+presence would trouble them as little as does that of horse, sheep, or
+cow. But how about the larger species, used as food, and which have had
+a longer and sadder experience of man's destructive power?
+
+The rhea, or South American ostrich, philosophers tell us, is a very
+ancient bird on the earth; and from its great size and inability to
+escape by flight, and its excellence as food, especially to savages, who
+prefer fat rank-flavoured flesh, it must have been systematically
+persecuted by man as long as, or longer than, any bird now existing on
+the globe. If fear of man ever becomes hereditary in birds, we ought
+certainly to find some trace of such an instinct in this species. I have
+been unable to detect any, though I have observed scores of young rheas
+in captivity, taken before the parent bird had taught them what to fear.
+I also once kept a brood myself, captured just after they had hatched
+out. With regard to food they were almost, or perhaps quite,
+independent, spending most of the time catching flies, grasshoppers, and
+other insects with surprising dexterity; but of the dangers encompassing
+the young rhea they knew absolutely frothing. They would follow me about
+as if they took me for their parent; and, whenever I imitated the loud
+snorting or rasping warning-call emitted the old bird in moments of
+danger, they would to me in the greatest terror, though no animal was in
+sight, and, squatting at my feet, endeavour to conceal themselves by
+thrusting their heads and long necks up my trousers. If I had caused a
+person to dress in white or yellow clothes for several consecutive days,
+and had then uttered the warning cry each time he showed himself to the
+birds, I have no doubt that they would soon have acquired a habit of
+running in terror from him, even without the warning cry, and that the
+fear of a person in white or yellow would have continued all their
+lives. Up to within about twenty years ago, rheas were seldom or never
+shot in La Plata and Patagonia, but were always hunted on horseback and
+caught with the bolas. The sight of a mounted man would set them off at
+once, while a person on foot could walk quite openly to within easy
+shooting distance of them; yet their fear of a horseman dates only two
+hundred years back--a very short time, when we consider that, before the
+Indian borrowed the horse from the invader, he must have systematically
+pursued the rhea on foot for centuries. The rhea changed its habits when
+the hunter changed his, and now, if an _estanciero_ puts down ostrich
+hunting on his estate, in a very few years the birds, although wild
+birds still, become as fearless and familiar as domestic animals. I have
+known old and ill-tempered males to become a perfect nuisance on some
+estancias, running after and attacking every person, whether on foot or
+on horseback, that ventured near them. An old instinct of a whole race
+could not be thus readily lost here and there on isolated estates
+wherever a proprietor chose to protect his birds for half a dozen years.
+
+I suppose the Talegallus--the best-known brush-turkey--must be looked on
+as an exception to all other birds with regard to the point I am
+considering; for this abnormal form buries its eggs in the huge mound
+made by the male, and troubles herself no more about them. When the
+young is fully developed it simply kicks the coffin to pieces in which
+its mother interred it, and, burrowing its way up to the sunshine,
+enters on the pleasures and pains of an independent existence from
+earliest infancy--that is, if a species born into the world in full
+possession of all the wisdom of the ancients, can be said ever to know
+infancy. At all events, from Mr. Bartlett's observations on the young
+hatched in the Zoological Gardens, it appears that they took no notice
+of the old birds, but lived quite independently from the moment they
+came out of the ground, even flying up into a tree and roosting
+separately at night. I am not sure, however, that these observations are
+quite conclusive; for it is certain that captivity plays strange pranks
+with the instincts of some species, and it is just possible that in a
+state of nature the old birds exercise at first some slight parental
+supervision, and, like all other species, have a peculiar cry to warn
+the young of the dangers to be avoided. If this is not so, then the
+young Talegallus must fly or hide with instinctive tear from every
+living thing that approaches it. I, at any rate, find it hard to believe
+that it has a knowledge, independent of experience, of the different
+habits of man and kangaroo, and dis-criminates at first sight between
+animals that are dangerous to it and those that are not. This
+interesting point will probably never be determined, as, most unhappily,
+the Australians are just now zealously engaged in exterminating their
+most wonderful bird for the sake of its miserable flesh; and with less
+excuse than the Maories could plead with regard to the moa, since they
+cannot deny that they have mutton and rabbit enough to satisfy hunger.
+
+Whether birds fear or have instinctive knowledge of any of their enemies
+is a much larger question. Species that run freely on the ground from
+the time of quitting the shell know their proper food, and avoid
+whatever is injurious. Have all young birds a similarly discriminating
+instinct with regard to their enemies? Darwin says, "Fear of any
+particular enemy is certainly an instinctive quality, as may be seen in
+nestling birds." Here, even man seems to be included among the enemies
+feared instinctively; and in another passage he says, "Young chickens
+have lost, wholly from habit, that fear of the dog and cat which, no
+doubt, was originally instinctive in them." My own observations point to
+a contrary conclusion; and I may say that I have had unrivalled
+opportunities for studying the habits of young birds.
+
+Animals of all classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear from
+any strange object approaching them. A piece of newspaper carried
+accidentally by the wind is as great an object of terror to an
+inexperienced young bird as a buzzard sweeping down with death in its
+talons. Among birds not yet able to fly there are, however, some curious
+exceptions; thus the young of most owls and pigeons are excited to anger
+rather than fear, and, puffing themselves up, snap and strike at an
+intruder with their beaks. Other fledglings simply shrink down in the
+nest or squat 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 approaches 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 corning 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 wild 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 what may be seen in nestling birds, n very young, and
+before their education has begun, if quietly approached and touched,
+they open their bills and take food as readily from a man as from the
+parent bird. But if while being thus fed the parent returns and emits
+the warning note, they instantly cease their hunger-cries, close their
+gaping mouths, and crouch down frightened in the nest. This fear caused
+by the parent bird's warning note begins to manifest itself even before
+the young are hatched--and my observations on this point refer to
+several species in three widely separated orders. When the little
+prisoner is hammering at its shell, and uttering its feeble _peep,_ as
+if begging to be let out, if the warning note is uttered, even at a
+considerable distance, the strokes and complaining instantly cease, and
+the chick will then remain quiescent in the shell for a long time, or
+until the parent, by a changed note, conveys to it an intimation that
+the danger is over. Another proof that the nestling has absolutely no
+instinctive knowledge of particular enemies, but is taught to fear them
+by the parents, is to be found in the striking contrast between the
+habits of parasitical and genuine young in the nest, and after they have
+left it, while still unable to find their own food. I have had no
+opportunities of observing the habits of the young cuckoo in England
+with regard to this point, and do not know whether other observers have
+paid any attention to the matter or not, but I am very familiar with the
+manners of the parasitical starling or cow-bird of South America. The
+warning cries of the foster parent have no effect on the young cow-bird
+at any time. Until they are able to fly they will readily devour worms
+from the hand of a man, even when the old birds are hovering close by
+and screaming their danger notes, and while their own young, if the
+parasite has allowed any to survive in the nest, are crouching down in
+the greatest fear. After the cow-bird has left the nest it is still
+stupidly tame, and more than once I have seen one carried off from its
+elevated perch by a milvago hawk, when, if it had understood the warning
+cry of the foster parent, it would have dropped down into the bush or
+grass and escaped. But as soon as the young cow-birds are able to shift
+for themselves, and begin to associate with their own kind, their habits
+change, and they become suspicious and wild like other birds.
+
+On this point--the later period at which the parasitical young bird
+acquires fear of man--and also bearing on the whole subject under
+discussion, I shall add here some observations I once made on a dove
+hatched and reared by a pigeon at my home on the pampas. A very large
+ombú tree grew not far from the dove-cote, and some of the pigeons used
+to make their nests on the lower horizontal branches. One summer a dove
+of the most common species, Zenaida maculata, in size a third less than
+the domestic pigeon, chanced to drop an egg in one of these nests, and a
+young dove was hatched and reared; and, in due time, when able to fly,
+it was brought to the dove-cote. I watched it a great deal, and it was
+evident that this foster-young, though' with the pigeons, was not nor
+ever would be of them, for it could not take kiudly to their flippant
+flirty ways. Whenever a male approached it, and with guttural noises and
+strange gestures made a pompous declaration of amorous feelings, the
+dove would strike vigorously at its undesirable lover, and drive him
+off, big as he was; and, as a rule, it would sit apart, afoot or so,
+from the others. The dove was also a male; but its male companions, with
+instinct tainted by domestication, were ignorant alike of its sex and
+different species. Now, it chanced that my pigeons, never being fed and
+always finding their own living on the plain like wild birds, were,
+although still domestic, not nearly so tame as pigeons usually are in
+England. They would not allow a person to approach within two or three
+yards of them without flying, and if grain was thrown to them they would
+come to it very suspiciously, or not at all. And, of course, the young
+pigeons always acquired the exact degree of suspicion shown by the
+adults as soon as they were able to fly and consort with the others. But
+the foundling Zenaida did not know what their startled gestures and
+notes of fear meant when a person approached too near, and as he saw
+none of his own kind, he did not acquire their suspicious habit. On the
+contrary, he was perfectly tame, although by parentage a wild bird, and
+showed no more fear of a man than of a horse. Throughout the winter it
+remained with the pigeons, going afield every day with them, and
+returning to the dove-cote; but as spring approached the slight tie
+which united him to them began to be loosened; their company grew less
+and less congenial, and he began to lead a solitary life. But he did not
+go to the trees yet. He came to the house, and his favourite perch was
+on the low overhanging roof of a vine-covered porch, just over the main
+entrance. Here he would pass several hours every day, taking no notice
+of the people passing in and out at all times; and when the weather grew
+warm he would swell out his breast and coo mournfully by the hour for
+our pleasure.
+
+We can, no doubt, learn best by observing the behaviour of nestlings and
+young birds; nevertheless, I find much even in the confirmed habits of
+adults to strengthen me in the belief that fear of particular enemies is
+in nearly all cases--for I will not say all--the result of experience
+and tradition.
+
+Hawks are the most open, violent, and persistent enemies birds have; and
+it is really wonderful to see how well the persecuted kinds appear to
+know the power for mischief possessed by different raptorial species,
+and how exactly the amount of alarm exhibited is in proportion to the
+extent of the danger to be apprehended. Some raptors never attack birds,
+others only occasionally; still others prey only on the young and
+feeble; and, speaking of La Plata district, where I have observed hawks,
+from the milvago chimango--chiefly a carrion-eater--to the destructive
+peregrine falcon, there is a very great variety of predatory habits, and
+all degrees of courage to be found; yet all these raptors are treated
+differently by species liable to be preyed on, and have just as much
+respect paid them as their strength and daring entitles them to, and no
+more, So much discrimination must seem almost incredible to those who
+are not very familiar with the manners of wild birds; I do not think it
+could exist if the fear shown resulted from instinct or inherited habit.
+There would be no end to the blunders of such an instinct as that; and
+in regions where hawks are extremely abundant most of the birds would bo
+in a constant state of trepidation. On the pampas the appearance of the
+comparatively harmless chimango excites not the least alarm among small
+birds, yet at a distance it closely resembles a henharrier, and it also
+readily attacks young, sick, and wounded birds; all others know how
+little they have to fear from it. When it appears unexpectedly,
+sweeping over a hedge or grove with a rapid flight, it is sometimes
+mistaken for a more dangerous species; there is then a little flutter of
+alarm, some birds springing into the air, but in two or three seconds of
+time they discover their mistake, and settle down quietly again, taking
+no further notice of the despised carrion-eater. On the other hand, I
+have frequently mistaken a harrier (Circus cinereus, in the brown state
+of plumage) for a chimango, and have only discovered my mistake by
+seeing the commotion among the small birds. The harrier I have
+mentioned, also the C. macropterus, feed partly on small birds, which
+they flush from the ground and strike down with their claws. When the
+harrier appears moving along with a loitering flight near the surface,
+it is everywhere attended by a little whirlwind of alarm, small birds
+screaming or chirping excitedly and diving into the grass or bushes; but
+the alarm does not spread far, and subsides as soon as the hawk has
+passed on its way. Buzzards (Buteo and Urubitinga) are much more feared,
+and create a more widespread alarm, and they ars certainly more
+destructive to birds than harriers. Another curious instance is that of
+the sociable hawk (Rostrhanrus sociabilis). This bird spends the summer
+and breeds in marshes in La Plata, and birds pay no attention to it, for
+it feeds exclusively on water-snails (Ampullaria). But when it visits
+woods and plantations to roost, during migration, its appearance creates
+as much alarm as that of a true buzzard, which it closely resembles.
+Wood-birds, unaccustomed to see it, do not know its peculiar preying
+habits, and how little they need fear its presence. I may also mention
+that the birds of La Plata seem to fear the kite-like Elanus less than
+other hawks, and I believe that its singular resemblance to the common
+gull of the district in its size, snowy-white plumage and manner of
+flight, has a deceptive effect on most species, and makes them so little
+suspicious of it,
+
+The wide-ranging peregrine falcon is a common species in La Plata,
+although, oddly enough, not included in any notice of the avifauna of
+that region before 1888. The consternation caused among birds by its
+appearance is vastly greater than that produced by any of the raptors I
+have mentioned: and it is unquestionably very much more destructive to
+birds, since it preys exclusively on them, and, as a rule, merely picks
+the flesh from the head and neck, and leaves the untouched body to its
+jackal, the carrion-hawk. When the peregrine appears speeding through
+the air in a straight line at a great height, the feathered world, as
+far as one able to see, is thrown into the greatest commo-tion, all
+birds, from the smallest up to species large as duck, ibis, and curlew,
+rushing about in the air as if distracted. When the falcon has
+disappeared in the sky, and the wave of terror attending its progress
+subsides behind it, the birds still continue wild and excited for some
+time, showing how deeply they have been moved; for, as a rule, fear is
+exceedingly transitory in its effects on animals,
+
+I must, before concluding this part of my subject, mention another
+raptor, also a true falcon, but differing from the peregrine in being
+exclusively a marsh-hawk. In size it is nearly a third less than the
+male peregrine, which it resembles in its sharp wings and manner of
+flight, but its flight is much more rapid. The whole plumage, is
+uniformly of a dark grey colour. Unfortunately, though I have observed
+it not fewer than a hundred times, I have never been able to procure a
+specimen, nor do I find that it is like any American falcon already
+described; so that for the present it must remain nameless. Judging
+solely from the effect produced by the appearance of this hawk, it must
+be even more daring and destructive than its larger relation, the
+peregrine. It flies at a great height, and sometimes descends vertically
+and with extraordinary velocity, the wings producing a sound like a
+deep-toned horn. The sound is doubtless produced at will, and is
+certainly less advantageous to the hawk than to the birds it pursues. No
+doubt it can afford to despise the wing-power of its quarry; and I have
+sometimes thought that it takes a tyrannous delight in witnessing the
+consternation caused by its hollow trumpeting sound. This may be only a
+fancy, but some hawks do certainly take pleasure in pursuing and
+striking birds when not seeking prey. The peregrine has been observed,
+Baird says, capturing birds, only to kill and drop them. Many of the
+Felidae, we know, evince a similar habit; only these prolong their
+pleasure by practising a more refined and deliberate cruelty.
+
+The sudden appearance overhead of this hawk produces an effect wonderful
+to witness. I have frequently seen all the inhabitants of a marsh struck
+with panic, acting as if demented, and suddenly grown careless to all
+other dangers; and on such occasions I have looked up confident of
+seeing the sharp-winged death, suspended above them in the sky. All
+birds that happen to be on the wing drop down as if shot into the reeds
+or water; ducks away from the margin stretch out their necks
+horizontally and drag their bodies, as if wounded, into closer cover;
+not one bird is found bold enough to rise up and wheel about the
+marauder--a usual proceeding in the case of other hawks; while, at every
+sudden stoop the falcon makes, threatening to dash down on his prey, a
+low cry of terror rises from the birds beneath; a sound expressive of an
+emotion so contagious that it quickly runs like a murmur all over the
+marsh, as if a gust of wind had swept moaning through, the rushes. As
+long as the falcon hangs overhead, always at a height of about forty
+yards, threatening at intervals to dash down, this murmuring sound, made
+up of many hundreds of individual cries, is heard swelling and dying
+away, and occasionally, when he drops lower than usual, rising to a
+sharp scream of terror.
+
+Sometimes when I have been riding over marshy ground, one of these hawks
+has placed himself directly over my head, within fifteen or twenty yards
+of me; and it has perhaps acquired the habit of following a horseman in
+this way in order to strike at any birds driven up. On one occasion my
+horse almost trod on a couple of snipe squatting terrified in the short
+grass. The instant they rose the hawk struck at one, the end of his wing
+violently smiting my cheek as he stooped, and striking at the snipe on a
+level with the knees of my horse. The snipe escaped by diving under the
+bridle, and immediately dropped down on the other side of me, and the
+hawk, rising up, flew away.
+
+To return. I think I am justified in believing that fear of hawks, like
+fear of men, is, in very nearly all cases, the result of experience and
+tradition. Nevertheless, I think it probable that in some species which
+have always lived in the open, continually exposed to attack, and which
+are preferred as food by raptors, such as duck, snipe, and plover, the
+fear of the falcon may be an inherited habit. Among passerine birds I am
+also inclined to think that swallows show inherited fear of hawks.
+Swallows and humming-birds have least to fear from raptors; yet, while
+humming-birds readily pursue and tease hawks, thinking as little of them
+as of pigeons or herons, swallows everywhere manifest the greatest
+terror at the approach of a true falcon; and they also fear other birds
+of prey, though in a much less degree. It has been said that the
+European hobby occasionally catches swal-lows on the wing, but this
+seems a rare and exceptional habit, and in South America I have never
+seen any bird of prey attempt the pursuit of a swallow. The question
+then arises, how did this unnecessary fear, so universal in swallows,
+originate? Can it be a survival of a far past--a time when some
+wide-ranging small falcon, aerial in habits as the swallow itself,
+preyed by preference on hirundines only ?
+
+[NOTE.-Herbert Spencer, who accepts Darwin's inference, explains how the
+fear of man, acquired by experience, becomes instinctive in birds, in
+the following passage: "It is well known that in newly-discovered lands
+not inhabited by man, birds are so devoid of fear as to allow themselves
+to be knocked over with sticks; but that, in the course of generations,
+they acquire such a dread of man as to fly on his approach: and that
+this dread is manifested by young as well as by old. Now unless this
+change be ascribed to the killing-off of the least fearful, and the
+preservation and multiplication of the most fearful which, considering
+the comparatively small number killed by man, is an inadequate cause, it
+must be ascribed to accumulated experience; and each experience must be
+held to have a share in producing it. We must conclude that in each bird
+that escapes with injuries inflicted by man, or is alarmed by the
+outcries of other members of the flock (gregarious creatures of any
+intelligence being necessarily more or less sympathetic), there is
+established an association of ideas between the human aspect and the
+pains, direct and in-direct, suffered from human agency. And we must
+further con-clude, that the state of consciousness which compels the
+bird to take flight, is at first nothing more than an ideal reproduction
+of those painful impressions which before followed man's approach; that
+such ideal reproduction becomes more vivid and more massive as the
+painful experiences, direct or sympathetic, increase; and that thus the
+emotion, in its incipient state, is nothing else than an aggregation of
+the revived pains before experience.
+
+"As, in the course of generations, the young birds of this race begin to
+display a fear of man before yet they have been injured by him, it is an
+unavoidable inference that the nervous system of the race has been
+organically modified by these experiences, we have no choice but to
+conclude, that when a young bird is led to fly, it is because the
+impression produced in its senses by the approaching man entails,
+through an incipiently reflex action, a partial excitement of all those
+nerves which in its ancestors had been excited under the like
+conditions; that this partial excitement has its accompanying painful
+consciousness, and that the vague painful consciousness thus arising
+constitutes emotion proper--_emotion undecomposable into specific
+experiences, and, therefore, seemingly homogeneous"_ (Essays, vol. i. p.
+320.)]
+
+It is comforting to know that the "unavoidable inference" is, after all,
+erroneous, and that the nervous system in birds has not yet been
+organically altered as a result of man's persecution; for in that case
+it would take long to undo the mischief, and we should be indeed far
+from that "better friendship" with the children of the air which many of
+us would like to see.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS.
+
+
+Under this heading I have put together several notes from my journals on
+subjects which have no connection with each other, except that they
+relate chiefly to the parental instincts of some animals I have
+observed, and to the instincts of the young at a very early period of
+life.
+
+While taking bats one day in December, I captured a female of our common
+Buenos Ayrean species (Molossus bonariensis), with her two young
+attached to her, so large that it seemed incredible she should be able
+to fly and take insects with such a weight to drag her down. The young
+were about a third less in size than the mother, so that she had to
+carry a weight greatly exceeding that of her own body. They were
+fastened to her breast and belly, one on each side, as when first born;
+and, possibly, the young bat does not change its position, or move, like
+the young developed opossum, to other parts of the body, until mature
+enough to begin an independent life. On forcibly separating them from
+their parent, I found that they were not yet able to fly, but when set
+free fluttered feebly to the ground. This bat certainly appeared more
+burdened with its young than any animal I had ever observed. I have seen
+an old female opossum (Didelphys azarae) with eleven young, large as old
+rats--the mother being less than a cat in size--all clinging to various
+parts of her body; yet able to climb swiftly and with the greatest
+agility in the higher branches of a tree. The actual weight was in this
+case relatively much greater than in that of the female bat: but then
+the opossum never quitted its hold on the tree, and it also supplemented
+its hand-like feet, furnished with crooked claws, with its teeth and
+long prehensile tail. The poor bat had to seek its living in the empty
+air, pursuing its prey with the swiftness of a swallow, and it seemed
+wonderful to me that she should have been able to carry about that great
+burden with her one pair of wings, and withal to be active enough to
+supply herself and her young with food.
+
+In the end I released her, and saw her fly away and disappear among the
+trees, after which I put back the two young bats in the place I had
+taken them from, among the thick-clustering foliage of a small acacia
+tree. When set free they began to work their way upwards through the
+leaves and slender twigs in the most adroit manner, catching a twig with
+their teeth, then embracing a whole cluster of leaves with their wings,
+just as a person would take up a quantity of loose clothes and hold them
+tight by pressing them against the chest. The body would then emerge
+above the clasped leaves, and a higher twig would be caught by the
+teeth; and so on successively, until they had got as high as they
+wished, when they proceeded to hook themselves to a twig and assume the
+inverted position side by side; after which, one drew in its head and
+went to sleep, while the other began licking the end of its wing, where
+my finger and thumb had pressed the delicate membrane. Later in the day
+I attempted to feed them with small insects, but they rejected my
+friendly attentions in the most unmistakable manner, snapping viciously
+at me every time I approached them. In the evening, I stationed myself
+close to the tree, and presently had the satisfaction of seeing the
+mother return, flying straight to the spot where I had taken her, and in
+a few moments she was away again and over the trees with her twins.
+
+Assuming that these two young bats had, before I found them, existed
+like parasites clinging to the parent, their adroit actions when
+liberated, and their angry demonstrations at my approach, were very
+astonishing; for in all other mammals born in a perfectly helpless
+state, like rodents, weasels, edentates, and even marsupials, the
+instincts of self-preservation are gradually developed after the period
+of activity begins, when the mother leads them out, and they play with
+her and Avith each other. In the bat the instincts must ripen to
+perfection without exercise or training, and while the animal exists as
+passively as a fruit on its stem.
+
+I have observed that the helpless young of some of the mammals I have
+just mentioned seem at first to have no instinctive understanding of the
+language of alarm and fear in the parent, as all young-birds have, even
+before their eyes are open. Nor is it necessary that they should have
+such an instinct, since, in most cases, they are well concealed in
+kennels or other safe places; but when, through some accident, they are
+exposed, the want of such an instinct makes the task of protecting them
+doubly hard for the parent. I once surprised a weasel (Galictis barbara)
+in the act of removing her young, or conducting them, rather; and when
+she was forced to quit them, although still keeping close by, and
+uttering the most piercing cries of anger and solicitude, the young
+continued piteously crying out in their shrill voices and moving about
+in circles, without making the slightest attempt to escape, or to
+conceal themselves, as young birds do.
+
+Some field mice breed on the surface of the ground in ill-constructed
+nests, and their young are certainly the most helpless things in nature.
+It is possible that where this dangerous habit exists, the parent has
+some admirable complex instincts to safeguard her young, in addition to
+the ordinary instincts of most animals of this kind. This idea was
+suggested to me by the action of a female mouse which I witnessed by
+chance. While walking in a field of stubble one day in autumn, near
+Buenos Ayres, I suddenly heard, issuing from near my feet, a chorus of
+shrill squealing voices--the familiar excessively sharp little needles
+of sound emitted by young, blind and naked mice, when they are disturbed
+or in pain. Looking down, I saw close to my foot a nest of them--there
+were nine in all, wriggling about and squealing; for the parent,
+frightened at my step, had just sprung from them, overturning in her
+hurry to escape the slight loosely-felted dome of fine grass and
+thistledown which had covered them. I saw her running away, but after
+going six or seven yards she stopped, and, turning partly round so as to
+watch me, waited in fear and trembling. I remained perfectly
+motionless--a sure way to allay fear and suspicion in any wild
+creature,--and in a few moments she returned, but with the utmost
+caution, frequently pausing to start and tremble, and masking her
+approach with corn stumps and little inequalities in the surface of the
+ground, until, reaching the nest, she took one of the young in her
+mouth, and ran rapidly away to a distance of eight or nine yards and
+concealed it in a tuft of dry grass.
+
+Leaving it, she returned a second time, in the same cautious manner, and
+taking another, ran with it to the same spot, and concealed it along
+with the first. It was curious that the first young mouse had continued
+squealing after being hidden by the mother, for I could hear it
+distinctly, the air being very still, but when the second mouse had been
+placed with it, the squealing ceased. A third time the old mouse came,
+and then instead of going to the same spot, as I had expected, she ran
+off in an opposite direction and disappeared among the dry weeds; a
+fourth was carried to the same place as the third; and in this way they
+were all removed to a distance of some yards from the nest, and placed
+in couples, until the last and odd one remained. In due time she came
+for it, and ran away with it in a new direction, and was soon out of
+sight; and although I waited fully ten minutes, she did not return; nor
+could I afterwards find any of the young mice when I looked for them, or
+even hear them squeal.
+
+I have frequently observed newly-born lambs on the pampas, and have
+never failed to be surprised at the extreme imbecility they display in
+their actions; although this may be due partly to inherited degeneracy
+caused by domestication. This imbecile condition continues for two,
+sometimes for three days, during which time the lamb apparently acts
+purely from instincts, which are far from perfect; but after that,
+experience and its dam teach it a better way. When born its first
+impulse is to struggle up on to its feet; its second to suck, but here
+it does not discriminate like the newly-hatched bird that picks up its
+proper food, or it does not know what to suck. It will take into its
+mouth whatever comes near, in most cases a tuft of wool on its dam's
+neck; and at this it will continue sucking for an indefinite time. It is
+highly probable that the strong-smelling secretion of the sheep's udder
+attracts the lamb at length to that part; and that without something of
+the kind to guide it, in many cases it would actually starve without
+finding the teats. I have often seen lambs many hours after birth still
+confining their attention to the most accessible locks of wool on the
+neck or fore legs of the dams, and believe that in such cases the long
+time it took them to find the source of nourishment arose from a
+defective sense of smell. Its next important instinct, which comes into
+play from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels it to follow after
+any object receding from it, and, on the other hand, to run from
+anything approaching it. If the dam turns round and approaches it from
+even a very short distance, it will start back and run from her in fear,
+and will not understand her voice when she bleats to it: at the same
+time it will confidently follow after a man, dog, horse, or any other
+animal moving from it. A very common experience on the pampas, in the
+sheep-country, is to see a lamb start up from sleep and follow the
+rider, running along close to the heels of the horse. This is
+distressing to a merciful man, tor he cannot shake the little simpleton
+off, and if he rides on, no matter how fast, it will keep up him, or
+keep him in sight, for half a mile or a mile, and never recover its dam.
+The gaucho, who is not merciful, frequently saves himself all trouble
+and delay by knocking it senseless with a blow of his whip-handle, and
+without checking his horse. I have seen a lamb, about two days old,
+start up from sleep, and immediately start off in pursuit of a puff ball
+about as big as a man's head, carried past it over the smooth turf by
+the wind, and chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until the
+dry ball was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse grass. This
+blundering instiuct is quickly laid aside when the lamb has learned to
+distinguish its dam from other objects, and its dam's voice from other
+sounds. When four or five days old it will start from sleep, but instead
+of rushing blindly away after any receding object, it first looks about
+it, and will then recognize and run to its dam.
+
+I have often been struck with the superiority of the pampa or
+creolla--the old native breed of sheep--in the greater vigour of the
+young when born over the improved European varieties. The pampa descends
+to us from the first sheep introduced into La Plata about three
+centuries ago, and is a tall, gaunt bony animal, with lean dry flesh,
+like venison, and long straight wool, like goats' hair. In their
+struggle for existence in a country subject to sudden great changes of
+temperature, to drought, and failure of grass, they have in a great
+measure lost the qualities which make the sheep valuable to man as a
+food and wool-producing animal; but on the other hand they have to some
+extent recovered the vigour of a wild animal, being hardy enough to
+exist without any shelter, and requiring from their master man only
+protection from the larger carnivores. They are keen-scented, swift of
+foot and Wonderfully active, and thrive where other breeds would quickly
+starve. I have often seen a lamb dropped on the frosty ground in
+bitterly cold windy weather in midwinter, and in less than five seconds
+struggle to its feet, and seem as vigorous as any day-old lamb of other
+breeds. The dam, impatient at the short delay, and not waiting to give
+it suck, has then started off at a brisk trot after the flock, scattered
+and galloping before the wind like huanacos rather than sheep, with the
+lamb, scarcely a minute in the world, running freely at her side.
+Notwithstanding its great vigour it has been proved that the pampa sheep
+has not so far outgrown the domestic taint as to be able to maintain its
+own existence when left entirely to itself. During the first half of
+this century, when cattle-breeding began to be profitable, and wool was
+not worth the trouble of shearing, and the gaucho workman would not eat
+mutton when beef was to be had, some of the estancieros on the southern
+pampas determined to get rid of their sheep, which were of no value to
+them; and many flocks were driven a distance out and lost in the wilds.
+Out of many thousands thus turned loose to shift for themselves, not one
+pair survived to propagate a new race of feral sheep; in a short time
+pumas, wild dogs, and other beasts of prey, had destroyed them all. The
+sterling qualities of the pampa sheep had their value in other times; at
+present the improved kinds are alone considered worth having, and the
+original sheep of the country is now rapidly disappearing, though still
+found in remote and poor districts, especially in the province of
+Cordova; and probably before long it will become extinct, together with
+the curious pug-nosed cow of the pampas.
+
+I have had frequent opportunities of observing the young, from one to
+three days old, of the Cervus campestris--the common deer of the pampas,
+and the perfection of its instincts at that tender age seem very
+wonderful in a ruminant. When the doe with, fawn is approached by a
+horseman, even when accompanied with dogs, she stands perfectly
+motionless, gazing fixedly at the enemy, the fawn motionless at her
+side; and suddenly, as if at a preconcerted signal, the fawn rushes
+directly away from her at its utmost speed; and going to a distance of
+six hundred to a thousand yards conceals itself in a hollow in the
+ground or among the long grass, lying down very close with neck
+stretched out horizontally, and will thus remain until sought by the
+dam. When very young if found in its hiding-place it will allow itself
+to be taken, making no further effort to escape. After the fawn has run
+away the doe still maintains her statuesque attitude, as if resolved to
+await the onset, and only when the dogs are close to her she also rushes
+away, but invariably in a direction as nearly opposite to that taken by
+the fawn as possible. At first she runs slowly, with a limping gait, and
+frequently pausing, as if to entice her enemies on, like a partridge,
+duck or plover when driven from its young; but as they begin to press
+her more closely her speed increases, becoming greater the further she
+succeeds in leading them from the starting-point.
+
+The alarm-cry of this deer is a peculiar whistling bark, a low but
+far-reaching sound; but when approaching a doe with young I have never
+been able to hear it, nor have I seen any movement on the part of the
+doe. Yet it is clear that in some mysterious way she inspires the fawn
+with sudden violent fear; while the fawn, on its side, instead of being
+affected like the young in other mammals, and sticking closer to its
+mother, acts in a contrary way, and runs from her.
+
+Of the birds I am acquainted with, the beautiful jacana (Parra jacana)
+appears to come into the world with its faculties and powers in the most
+advanced state. It is, in fact, ready to begin active life from the very
+moment of leaving the shell, as I once accidentally observed. I found a
+nest on a small mound of earth in a shallow lagoon, containing four
+eggs, with the shells already chipped by the birds in them. Two yards
+from the small nest mound there was a second mound covered with coarse
+grass. I got off my horse to examine the nest, and the old birds,
+excited beyond measure, fluttered round me close by pouring out their
+shrill rapidly-reiterated cries in an unbroken stream, sounding very
+much like a policeman's rattle. While I was looking closely at one of
+the eggs lying on the palm of my hand, all at once the cracked shell
+parted, and at the same moment the young bird leaped from my hand and
+fell into the water. I am quite sure that the young bird's sudden escape
+from the shell and my hand was the result of a violent effort on its
+part to free itself; and it was doubtless inspired to make the effort by
+the loud persistent screaming of the parent birds, which it heard while
+in the shell. Stooping to pick it up to save it from perishing, I soon
+saw that my assistance was not required, for immediately on dropping
+into the water, it put out its neck, and with the body nearly submerged,
+like a wounded duck trying to escape observation, it swam rapidly to the
+second small mound I have mentioned, and, escaping from the water,
+concealed itself in the grass, lying close and perfectly motionless like
+a young plover.
+
+In the case of the pampa or creolla sheep, I have shown that during its
+long, rough life in La Plata, this variety has in some measure recovered
+the natural vigour and ability to maintain existence in adverse
+circumstances of its wild ancestors. As much can be said of the creolla
+fowl of the pampas; and some observations of mine on the habits of this
+variety will perhaps serve to throw light on a vexed question of Natural
+History--namely, the cackling of the hen after laying, an instinct which
+has been described as "useless" and "disadvantageous." In fowls that
+live unconfined, and which are allowed to lay where they like, the
+instinct, as we know it, is certainly detrimental, since egg-eating dogs
+and pigs soon learn the cause of the outcry, and acquire a habit of
+rushing off to find the egg when they hear it. The question then arises:
+Does the wild jungle fowl possess the same pernicious instinct?
+
+The creolla is no doubt the descendant of the fowl originally introduced
+about three centuries ago by the first colonists in La Plata, and has
+probably not only been uncrossed with any other improved variety, such
+as are now fast taking its place, and has lived a much freer life than
+is usual with the fowl in Europe. It is a rather small, lean, extremely
+active bird, lays about a dozen eggs, and hatches them all, and is of a
+yellowish red colour--a hue which is common, I believe, in the old
+barn-door fowl of England. The creolla fowl is strong on the wing, and
+much more carnivorous and rapacious in habits than other breeds; mice,
+frogs, and small snakes are eagerly hunted and devoured by it. At my
+home on the pampas a number of these fowls were kept, and were allowed
+to range freely about the plantation, which was large, and the adjacent
+grounds, where there were thickets of giant cardoon thistle, red-weed,
+thorn apple, &c. They always nested at a distance from the house, and it
+was almost impossible ever to find their eggs, on account of the extreme
+circumspection they observed in going to and from their nests; and when
+they succeeded in escaping foxes, skunks, weasels, and opossums, which,
+strange to say, they often did, they would rear their chickens away out
+of sight and hearing of the house, and only bring them home when winter
+deprived them of their leafy covering and made food scarce. During the
+summer, in my rambles about the plantation, T would occasionally
+surprise one of these half-wild hens with her brood; her distracted
+screams and motions would then cause her chicks to scatter and vanish in
+all directions, and, until the supposed danger was past, they would lie
+as close and well-concealed as young partridges. These fowls in summer
+always lived in small parties, each party composed of one cock and as
+many hens as he could collect--usually three or four. Each family
+occupied its own feeding ground, where it would pass a greater portion
+of each day. The hen would nest at a considerable distance from the
+feeding ground, sometimes as far as four or five hundred yards away.
+After laying an egg she would quit the nest, not walking from it as
+other fowls do, but flying, the flight extending to a distance of from
+fifteen to about fifty yards; after which, still keeping silence, she
+would walk or run, until, arrived at the feeding ground, she would begin
+to cackle. At once the cock, if within hearing, would utter a responsive
+cackle, whereupon she would run to him and cackle no more. Frequently
+the cackling call-note would not be uttered more than two or three
+times, sometimes only once, and in a much lower tone than in fowls of
+other breeds.
+
+If we may assume that these fowls, in their long, semi-independent
+existence in La Plata, have reverted to the original instincts of the
+wild Gallus bankiva, we can see here how advantageous the cackling
+instinct must be in enabling the hen in dense tropical jungles to rejoin
+the flock after laying an egg. If there are egg-eating animals in the
+jungle intelligent enough to discover the meaning of such a short,
+subdued cackling call, they would still be unable to find the nest by
+going back on the bird's scent, since she flies from the nest in the
+first place; and the wild bird probably flies further than the creolla
+hen of La Plata. The clamorous cackling of our fowls would appear then
+to be nothing more than a perversion of a very useful instinct.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE MEPHITIC SKUNK.
+
+
+It might possibly give the reader some faint conception of the odious
+character of this creature (for adjectives are weak to describo it) when
+I say that, in talking to strangers from abroad, I have never thought it
+necessary to speak of sunstroke, jaguars, or the assassin's knife, but
+have never omitted to warn them of the skunk, minutely describing its
+habits and personal appearance.
+
+I knew an Englishman who, on taking a first gallop across the pampas,
+saw one, and, quickly dismounting, hurled himself bodily on to it to
+effect its capture. Poor man! he did not know that the little animal is
+never unwilling to be caught. Men have been blinded for ever by a
+discharge of the fiery liquid full in their faces. On a mucous membrane
+it burns like sulphuric acid, say the unfortunates who have had the
+experience. How does nature protect the skunk itself from the injurious
+effects of its potent fluid? I have not unfrequently found individuals
+stone-blind, sometimes moving so briskly about that the blindness must
+have been of long standing--very possibly in some cases an accidental
+drop discharged by the animal itself has caused the loss of sight. When
+coming to close quarters with a skunk, by covering up the face, one's
+clothes only are ruined. But this is not all one has to fear from an
+encounter; the worst is that effluvium, after which crushed garlic is
+lavender, which tortures the olfactory nerves, and appears to pervade
+the whole system like a pestilent ether, nauseating one until
+sea-sickness seems almost a pleasant sensation in comparison.
+
+To those who know the skunk only from reputation, my words might seem
+too strong; many, however, who have come to close quarters with the
+little animal will think them ridiculously weak. And consider what must
+the feelings be of one who has had the following experience--not an
+uncommon experience on the pampas. There is to be a dance at a
+neighbouring house a few miles away; he has been looking forward to it,
+and, dressing himself with due care, mounts his horse and sets out full
+of joyous anticipations. It is a dark windy evening, but there is a
+convenient bridle-path through the dense thicket of giant thistles, and
+striking it he puts his horse into a swinging gallop. Unhappily the path
+is already occupied by a skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, in
+obedience to the promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get out
+of it, until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kicked
+football into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as high as
+his knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider, after coming out
+into the open, dismounts and walks away twenty yards from his animal,
+and literally _smells_ himself all over, and with a feeling of profound
+relief pronounces himself Not the minutest drop of the diabolical spray
+has touched his dancing shoes! Springing into the saddle he proceeds to
+his journey's end, is warmly welcomed by his host, and speedily
+forgetting his slight misadventure, mingles with a happy crowd of
+friends. In a little while people begin exchanging whispers and
+significant glances; men are seen smiling at nothing in particular; the
+hostess wears a clouded face; the ladies cough and put their scented
+handkerchiefs to their noses, and presently they begin to feel faint and
+retire from the room. Our hero begins to notice that there is something
+wrong, and presently discovers its cause; he, unhappily, has been the
+last person in the room to remark that familiar but most abominable
+odour, rising like a deadly exhalation from the floor, conquering all
+other odours, and every moment becoming more powerful. A drop _has_
+touched his shoe after all; and fearing to be found out, and edging
+towards the door, he makes his escape, and is speedily riding home
+again; knowing full well that his sudden and early departure from the
+scene will be quickly discovered and set down to the right cause.
+
+In that not always trustworthy book _The Natural History of Chili,_
+Molina tells us how they deal with the animal in the trans-Andine
+regions. "When one appears," he says, "some of the company begiu by
+caressing it, until an opportunity offers for one of them to seize it by
+the tail. In this position the muscles become contracted, the animal is
+unable to eject its fluid, and is quickly despatched." One might just as
+well talk of caressing a cobra de capello; yet this laughable fiction
+finds believers all over South and North America. Professor Baird
+gravely introduces it into his great work on the mammalia. I was once
+talking about animals in a rancho, when a person present (an Argentine
+officer) told that, while visiting an Indian encampment, he had asked
+the savages how they contrived to kill skunks without making even a life
+in the desert intolerable. A grave old Cacique informed him that the
+secret was to go boldly up to the animal, take it by the tail, and
+despatch it; for, he said, when you fear it not at all, then it respects
+your courage and dies like a lamb--sweetly. The officer, continuing his
+story, said that on quitting the Indian camp he started a skunk, and,
+glad of an opportunity to test the truth of what he had heard,
+dismounted and proceeded to put the Indian plan in practice. Here the
+story abruptly ended, and when I eagerly demanded to hear the sequel,
+the amateur hunter of furs lit a cigarette and vacantly watched the
+ascending smoke. The Indians aro grave jokers, they seldom smile; and
+this old traditional skunk-joke, which has run the length of a
+continent, finding its way into many wise books, is their revenge on a
+superior race.
+
+I have shot a great many eagles, and occasionally a carancho (Polyborus
+tharus), with the plumage smelling strongly of skunk, which shows that
+these birds, pressed by hunger, often commit the fearful mistake of
+attacking the animal. My friend Mr. Ernest Gibson, of Buenos Ayres, in a
+communication to the _Ibis,_ describes an encounter he actually
+witnessed between a carancho and a skunk. Riding home one afternoon, he
+spied a skunk "shuffling along in the erratic manner usual to that
+odoriferous quadruped;" following it at a very short distance was an
+eagle-vulture, evidently bent on mischief. Every time the bird came near
+the bushy tail rose menacingly; then the carancho would fall behind,
+and, after a few moments' hesitation, follow on again. At length,
+growing bolder, it sprung forward, seizing the threatening tail with its
+claw, but immediately after "began staggering about with dishevelled
+plumage, tearful eyes, and a profoundly woe-begone expression on its
+vulture face. The skunk, after turning and regarding its victim with an
+I-told-you-so look for a few moments, trotted unconcernedly off."
+
+I was told in Patagonia by a man named Molinos, who was frequently
+employed by the Government as guide to expeditions in the desert, that
+everywhere throughout that country the skunk is abundant. Some years ago
+he was sent with two other men to find and treat with an Indian chief
+whose whereabouts were not known. Far in the interior Molinos was
+overtaken by a severe winter, his horses died of thirst and fatigue, and
+during the three bitterest months of the year he kept himself and his
+followers alive by eating the flesh of skunks, the only wild animal that
+never failed them. No doubt, on those vast sterile plains where the
+skunk abounds, and goes about by day and by night careless of enemies,
+the terrible nature of its defensive weapon is the first lesson
+experience teaches to every young eagle, fox, wild cat, and puma.
+
+Dogs kill skunks when made to do so, but it is not a sport they delight
+in. One moonlight night, at home, I went out to where the dogs, twelve
+in number, were sleeping: while I stood there a skunk appeared and
+deliberately came towards me, passing through the dogs where they lay,
+and one by one as he passed them they rose up, and, with their tails
+between their legs, skulked off. When made to kill skunks often they
+become seasoned; but always perform the loathsome task expeditiously,
+then rush away with frothing mouths to rub their faces in the wet clay
+and rid themselves of the fiery sensation. At one time I possessed only
+one dog that could be made to face a skunk, and as the little robbers
+were very plentiful, and continually coining about the house in their
+usual open, bold way, it was rather hard for the poor brute. This dog
+detested them quite as strongly as the others, only he was more
+obedient, faithful, and brave. Whenever I bade him attack one of them
+he would come close up to me and look up into my face with piteous
+pleading eyes, then, finding that he was not to be let off from the
+repulsive task, he would charge upon the doomed animal with a blind fury
+wonderful to see. Seizing it between his teeth, he would shake it madly,
+crushing its bones, then hurl it several feet from him, only to rush
+again and again upon it to repeat the operation, doubtless with a
+Caligula-like wish in his frantic breast that all the skunks on the
+globe had but one backbone.
+
+I was once on a visit to a sheep-farming brother, far away on the
+southern frontier of Buenos Ayres, and amongst the dogs I found there
+was one most interesting creature, He was a great, lumbering, stupid,
+good-tempered brute, so greedy that when you offered him a piece of meat
+he would swallow half your arm, and so obedient that at a word he would
+dash himself against the horns of a bull, and face death and danger in
+any shape. But, my brother told me, he would not face a skunk--he would
+die first. One day I took him out and found a skunk, and for upwards of
+half an hour I sat on my horse vainly cheering on my cowardly follower,
+and urging him to battle. The very sight of the enemy gave him a fit of
+the shivers; and when the irascible little enemy began to advance
+against us, going through the performance by means of which he generally
+puts his foes to flight without resorting to malodorous
+measures--stamping his little feet in rage, jumping up, spluttering and
+hissing and flourishing his brush like a warlike banner above his
+head--then hardly could I restrain my dog from turning tail and flying
+home in abject terror. My cruel persistence was rewarded at last.
+Continued shouts, cheers, and hand-clappings began to stir the brute to
+a kind of frenzy. Torn by conflicting emotions, he began to revolve
+about the skunk at a lumbering gallop, barking, howling, and bristling
+up his hair; and at last, shutting his eyes, and with a yell of
+desperation, he charged. I fully expected to see the enemy torn to
+pieces in a few seconds, but when the dog was still four or five feet
+from him the fatal discharge came, and he dropped down as if shot dead.
+For some time he lay on the earth perfectly motionless, watched and
+gently bedewed by the victorious skunk; then he got up and crept whining
+away. Gradually he quickened his pace, finally breaking into a frantic
+run. In vain I followed him, shouting at the top of my lungs; he stayed
+not to listen, and very speedily vanished from sight--a white speck on
+the vast level plain. At noon on the following day he made his
+appearance, gaunt and befouled with mud, staggering forward like a
+galvanized skeleton. Too worn out even to eat, he flung himself down,
+and for hours lay like a dead thing, sleeping off the effects of those
+few drops of perfume.
+
+Dogs, I concluded, like men, have their idiosyncrasies; but I had gained
+my point, and proved once more--if any proof were needed--the truth of
+that noble panegyric of Bacon's on our faithful servant and companion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+MIMICRY AND WARNING COLOURS IN GRASSHOPPERS.
+
+
+There is in La Plata a large handsome grasshopper (Zoniopoda tarsata),
+the habits of which in its larva and imago stages are in strange
+contrast, like those in certain lepidoptera, in which the caterpillars
+form societies and act in concert. The adult has a greenish protective
+colouring, brown and green banded thighs, bright red hind wings, seen
+only during flight. It is solitary and excessively shy in its habits,
+living always in concealment among the dense foliage near the surface of
+the ground. The yonng are intensely black, like grasshoppers cut out of
+jet or ebony, and gregarious in habit, living in bands of forty or fifty
+to three or four hundred; and so little shy, that they may sometimes be
+taken up by handfuls before they begin to scatter in alarm. Their
+gregarious habits and blackness--of all hues in nature the most obvious
+to the sight--would alone be enough to make them the most conspicuous of
+insects; but they have still other habits which appear as if specially
+designed to bring them more prominently into notice. Thus, they all keep
+so close together at all times as to have their bodies actually
+touching, and when travelling, move so slowly that the laziest snail
+might easily overtake and pass one of their bands, and even disappear
+beyond their limited horizon in a very short time.
+
+They often select an exposed weed to feed on, clustering together on its
+summit above the surrounding verdure, an exceedingly conspicuous object
+to every eye in the neighbourhood. They also frequently change their
+feeding-ground; at such times they deliberately cross wide roads and
+other open spaces, barren of grass, where, moving so slowly that they
+scarcely seem to move at all, they look at a distance like a piece of
+black velvet lying on the ground. Thus in every imaginable way they
+expose themselves and invite attack; yet, in spite of it all, I have
+never detected birds preying on them, and I have sometimes kept one of
+these black societies under observation near my house for several days,
+watching them at intervals, in places where the trees overhead were the
+resort of Icterine and tyrant birds, Guira cuckoos, and other species,
+all great hunters after grasshoppers. A young grasshopper is, moreover,
+a morsel that seldom comes amiss to any bird, whether insect or seed
+eater; and, as a rule, it is extremely shy, nimble, and inconspicuous.
+It seems clear that, although the young Zoniopoda does not mimic in its
+form any black protected insect, it nevertheless owes its safety to its
+blackness, together with the habit it possesses of exposing itself in so
+open and bold a manner. Blackness is so common in large protected
+insects, as, for instance, in the un-palatable leaf-cutting ants,
+scorpions, mygale spiders, wasps, and other dangerous kinds, that it is
+manifestly a "warning colour," the most universal and best known in
+nature; and the grasshopper, I believe, furthermore mimics the fearless
+demeanour of the protected or venomous species, which birds and other
+insect-eaters know and respect. It might be supposed that the young
+Zoniopoda is itself unpalatable; but this is scarcely probable, for when
+the deceptive black mask is once dropped, the excessive shyness, love of
+concealment, and protective colouring of the insect show that it is much
+sought after by birds.
+
+While setting this down as an undoubted case of "mimicry," although it
+differs in some respects from all other cases I have seen reported, I
+cannot help remarking that this most useful word appears to be in some
+danger of losing the meaning originally attached to it in zoology. There
+are now very few cases of an accidental resemblance found between two
+species in nature which are not set down by someone to "mimicry," some
+in which even the wildest imagination might well fail to see any
+possible benefit to the supposed mimic. In cases where the outward
+resemblance of some feeble animal to a widely different and
+well-protected species, or to some object like a leaf or stick, and
+where such resemblance is manifestly advantageous and has reacted on and
+modified the life habits, it is conceivable that slight spontaneous
+variations in the structure and colouring of the unprotected species
+have been taken advantage of by the principle of natural selection, and
+a case of "mimicry" set up, to become more and more perfect in time, as
+successive casual variations in the same direction increased the
+resemblance.
+
+The stick-insect is perhaps the most perfect example where resemblance
+to an inanimate object has been the result aimed at, so to speak, by
+nature; the resemblance of the volucella fly to the humble-bee, on which
+it is parasitical, is the most familiar example of one species growing
+like another to its own advantage, since only by means of its deceptive
+likeness to the humble-bee is it able to penetrate into the nest with
+impunity. These two cases, with others of a similar character, were
+first called cases of "mimicry" by Kirby and Spence, in their
+ever-delightful _Introduction to Entomology--_an old book, but,
+curiously enough in these days of popular treatises on all matters of
+the kind, still the only general work on insects in the English language
+which one who is not an entomologist can read with pleasure.
+
+A second case of mimicry not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen in
+another grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa of
+Thun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and thorax
+chocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen steel-blue or
+purple, a colour I have not seen in any other insects of this family.
+The fore wings have a protective colouring; the hind wings are bright
+red. When at rest, with the red and purple tints concealed, it is only a
+very pretty grasshopper, but the instant it takes wing it becomes the
+fac-simile of a very common wasp of the genus Pepris. These wasps vary
+greatly in size, some being as large as the hornet; they are solitary,
+and feed on the honey of flowers and on fruit, and, besides being
+furnished with stings like other wasps--though their sting is nok so
+venomous as in other genera--they also, when angry, emit a most
+abominable odour, and are thus doubly protected against their enemies.
+Their excessive tameness, slow flight, and indolent motions serve to
+show that they are not accustomed to be interfered with. All these
+strong-smelling wasps have steel-blue or purple bodies, and bright red
+wings. So exactly does the Rhomalea grasshopper mimic the Pepris when
+flying, that I have been deceived scores of times. I have even seen it
+on the leaves, and, after it has flown and settled once more, I have
+gone to look at it again, to make sure that my eyes had not deceived me.
+It is curious to see how this resemblance has reacted on and modified
+the habits of the grasshopper. It is a great flyer, and far more aerial
+in its habits than any other insect I am acquainted with in this family,
+living always in trees, instead of on or near the surface of the ground.
+It is abundant in orchards and plantations round Buenos Ayres, where its
+long and peculiarly soft, breezy note may be heard all summer. If the
+ancient Athenians possessed so charming an insect as this, their great
+regard for the grasshopper was not strange: I only wish that the
+"Athenians of South America," as my fellow-townsmen sometimes call
+themselves in moments of exaltation, had a feeling of the samo kind--the
+regard which does _not_ impale its object on a pin--for the pretty
+light-hearted songster of their groves and gardens.
+
+When taken in the hand, it has the habit, common to most grasshoppers,
+of pouring out an inky fluid from its mouth; only the discharge is
+unusually copious in this species. It has another habit in defending
+itself which is very curious. When captured it instantly curls its body
+round, as a wasp does to sting. The suddenness of this action has more
+than once caused me to drop an insect I had taken, actually thinking for
+the moment that I had taken hold of a wasp. Whether birds would be
+deceived and made to drop it or not is a question it would not be easy
+to settle; but the instinct certainly looks like 'one of a series of
+small adaptations, all tending to make the resemblance to a wasp more
+complete and effective.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+DRAGON-FLY STORMS.
+
+
+One of the most curious things I have encountered in my observations on
+animal life relates to a habit of the larger species of dragon-flies
+inhabiting the Pampas and Patagonia. Dragon-flies are abundant
+throughout the country wherever there is water. There are several
+species, all more or less brilliantly coloured. The kinds that excited
+my wonder, from their habits, are twice as large as the common widely
+distributed insects, being three inches to four inches in length, and as
+a rule they are sober-coloured, although there is one species--the
+largest among them--entirely of a brilliant scarlet. This kind is,
+however, exceedingly rare. All the different kinds (of the large
+dragon-flies) when travelling associate together, and occasionally, in a
+flight composed of countless thousands, one of these brilliant-hued
+individuals will catch the eye, appearing as conspicuous among the
+others as a poppy or scarlet geranium growing alone in an otherwise
+flowerless field. The most common species--and in some cases the entire
+flight seems to be composed of this kind only--is the Aeschna
+bonariensis Raml, the prevailing colour of which is pale blue. But the
+really wonderful thing about them all alike is, that they appear only
+when flying before the southwest wind, called _pampero_--the wind that
+blows from the interior of the pampas. The pampero is a dry, cold wind,
+exceedingly violent. It bursts on the plains very suddenly, and usually
+lasts only a short time, sometimes not more than ten minutes; it comes
+irregularly, and at all seasons of the year, but is most frequent in the
+hot season, and after exceptionally sultry weather. It is in summer and
+autumn that the large dragon-flies appear; not _with_ the wind, but--and
+this is the most curious part of the matter--in advance of it; and
+inasmuch as these insects are not seen in the country at other times,
+and frequently appear in seasons of prolonged drought, when all the
+marshes and watercourses for many hundreds of miles are dry, they must
+of course traverse immense distances, flying before the wind at a speed
+of seventy or eighty miles an hour. On some occasions they appear almost
+simultaneously with the wind, going by like a flash, and instantly
+disappearing from sight. You have scarcely time to see them before the
+wind strikes you. As a rule, however, they make their appearance from
+five to fifteen minutes before the wind strikes; and when they are in
+great numbers the air, to a height of ten or twelve feet above the
+surface of the ground, is all at once seen to be full of them, rushing
+past with extraordinary velocity in a north-easterly direction. In very
+oppressive weather, and when the swiftly advancing pampero brings no
+moving mountains of mingled cloud and dust, and is consequently not
+expected, the sudden apparition of the dragon-fly is a most welcome one,
+for then an immediate burst of cold wind is confidently looked for. In
+the expressive vernacular of the gauchos the large dragon-fly is called
+_hijo del pampero_--son of the south-west wind.
+
+It is clear that these great and frequent dragonfly movements are not
+explicable on any current hypothesis regarding the annual migrations of
+birds, the occasional migrations of butterflies, or the migrations of
+some mammals, like the reindeer and buffalo of Arctic America, which,
+according to Rae and other observers, perform long journeys north and
+south at regular seasons, "from a sense of polarity." Neither this
+hypothetical sense in animals, nor "historical memory" will account for
+the dragon-fly storms, as the phenomenon of the pampas might be called,
+since the insects do not pass and repass between "breeding and
+subsistence areas," but all journey in a north-easterly direction; and
+of the countless millions flying like thistledown before the great
+pampero wind, not one solitary traveller ever returns.
+
+The cause of the flight is probably dynamical, affecting the insects
+with a sudden panic, and compelling them to rush away before the
+approaching tempest. The mystery is that they should fly from the wind
+before it reaches them, and yet travel in the same direction with it.
+When they pass over the level, treeless country, not one insect lags
+behind, or permits the wind to overtake it; but, on arriving at a wood
+or large plantation they swarm into it, as if seeking shelter from some
+swift-pursuing enemy, and on such occasions they sometimes remain
+clinging to the trees while the wind spends its force. This is
+particularly the case when the wind blows up at a late hour of the day;
+then, on the following morning, the dragon-flies are seen clustering to
+the foliage in such numbers that many trees are covered with them, a
+large tree often appearing as if hung with curtains of some brown
+glistening material, too thick to show the green leaves beneath.
+
+In Patagonia, where the phenomenon of dragon-fly storms is also known,
+an Englishman residing at the Rio Negro related to me the following
+occurrence which he witnessed there. A race meeting was being held near
+the town of El Carmen, on a high exposed piece of ground, when, shortly
+before sunset, a violent pampero wind came up, laden with dense
+dust-clouds. A few moments before the storm broke, the air all at once
+became obscured with a prodigious cloud of dragon-flies. About a hundred
+men, most of them on horseback, were congregated on the course at the
+time, and the insects, instead of rushing by in their usual way, settled
+on the people in such quantities that men and horses were quickly
+covered with clinging masses of them. My informant said--and this agrees
+with my own observation--that he was greatly impressed by the appearance
+of terror shown by the insects; they clung to him as if for dear life,
+so that he had the greatest difficulty in ridding himself of them.
+
+Weissenborn, in London's _Magazine of Natural History_ (N. S. vol. iii.)
+describes a great migration of dragon-flies which he witnessed in
+Germany in 1839, and also mentions a similar phenomenon occurring in
+1816, and extending over a large portion of Europe. But in these cases
+the movement took place at the end of May, and the insects travelled due
+south; their migrations were therefore similar to those of birds and
+butterflies, and were probably due to the same cause. I have been unable
+to find any mention of a phenomenon resembling the one with which we are
+so familiar on the pampas, and which, strangely enough, has not been
+recorded by any European naturalists who have travelled there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS.
+
+
+There cannot be a doubt that some animals possess an instinctive
+knowledge of their enemies--or, at all events, of some of their
+enemies--though I do not believe that this faculty is so common as many
+naturalists imagine. The most striking example I am acquainted with is
+seen in gnats or mosquitoes, and in the minute South American sandflies
+(Simulia), when a dragon-fly appears in a place where they are holding
+their aerial pastimes. The sudden appearance of a ghost among human
+revellers could not produce a greater panic. I have spoken in the last
+chapter of periodical storms or waves of dragon-flies in the Plata
+region, and mentioned incidentally that the appearance of these insects
+is most welcome in oppressively hot weather, since they are known to
+come just in advance of a rush of cool wind. In La Plata we also look
+for the dragon-fly, and rejoice at its coming, for another reason. We
+know that the presence of this noble insect will cause the clouds of
+stinging gnats and flies, which make life a burden, to vanish like
+smoke.
+
+When a flight of dragon-flies passes over the country many remain along
+the route, as I have said, sheltering themselves wherever trees occur;
+and, after the storm blows over, these strangers and stragglers remain
+for some days hawking for prey in the neighbourhood. It is curious to
+note that they do not show any disposition to seek for watercourses. It
+may be that they feel lost in a strange region, or that the panic they
+have suffered, in their long flight before the wind, has unsettled their
+instincts; for it is certain that they do not, like the dragon-fly in
+Mrs. Browning's poem, "return to dream upon the river." They lead
+instead a kind of vagabond existence, hanging about the plantations, and
+roaming over the surrounding plains. It is then remarked that gnats and
+sand-flies apparently cease to exist, even in places where they have
+been most abundant. They have not been devoured by the dragon-flies,
+which are perhaps very few in number; they have simply got out of the
+way, and will remain in close concealment until their enemies take their
+departure, or have all been devoured by martins, tyrant birds, and the
+big robber-flies or devil's dykes--no name is bad enough for them--of
+the family Asilidaa. During these peaceful gnatless days, if a person
+thrusts himself into the bushes or herbage in some dark sheltered place,
+he will soon begin to hear the thin familiar sounds, as of "horns of
+elf-land faintly blowing"; and presently, from the ground and the under
+surface of every leaf, the ghost-like withered little starvelings will
+appear in scores and in hundreds to settle on him, fear not having
+blunted their keen appetites.
+
+When riding over the pampas on a hot still day, with a pertinacious
+cloud of gnats or sandflies hovering just above my head and keeping me
+company for miles, I have always devoutly wished for a stray dragon-fly
+to show himself. Frequently the wish has been fulfilled, the dragon-fly,
+apparently "sagacious of his quarry from afar," sweeping straight at his
+prey, and instantly, as if by miracle, the stinging rain has ceased and
+the noxious cloud vanished from overhead, to be re-formed no more. This
+has always seemed very extraordinary to me; for in other matters gnats
+do not appear to possess even that proverbial small dose of intellect
+for which we give most insects credit. Before the advent of the
+dragon-fly it has perhaps happened that I have been vigorously striking
+at them, making it very unpleasant for them, and also killing and
+disabling many hundreds--a larger number than the most voracious
+dragon-fly could devour in the course of a whole day; and yet, after
+brushing and beating them off until my arms have ached with the
+exertion, they have continued to rush blindly on their fate, exhibiting
+not the faintest symptom of fear. I suppose that for centuries
+mosquitoes have, in this way, been brushed and beaten away with hands
+and with tails, without learning caution. It is not in their knowledge
+that there are hands and tails. A large animal is simply a field on
+which they confidently settle to feed, sounding shrill flourishes on
+their little trumpets to show how fearless they are. But the dragon-fly
+is very ancient on the earth, and if, during the Devonian epoch, when it
+existed, it preyed on some blood-sucking insect from which or Culicidae
+have come, then these stupid little insects have certainly had ample
+time in which to learn well at least one lesson.
+
+There is not in all organic nature, to my mind, any instance of wasted
+energy comparable in magnitude with the mosquito's thirst for blood, and
+the instincts and elaborate blood-pumping apparatus with which it is
+related. The amount of pollen given off by some wind-fertilized
+trees--so great in some places that it covers hundreds of square miles
+of earth and water with a film of yellow dust---strikes us as an amazing
+waste of material on the part of nature; but in these cases we readily
+see that this excessive prodigality is necessary to continue the
+species, and that a sufficient number of flowers would not be
+impregnated unless the entire trees were bathed for days in the
+fertilizing cloud, in which only one out of many millions of floating
+particles can ever hit the mark. The mosquito is able to procreate
+without ever satisfying its ravenous appetite for blood. To swell its
+grey thread-like abdomen to a coral bead is a delight to the insect, but
+not necessary to its existence, like food and water to ours; it is the
+great prize in the lottery of life, which few can ever succeed in
+drawing. In a hot summer, when one has ridden perhaps for half a day
+over a low-lying or wet district, through an atmosphere literally
+obscured with a fog of mosquitoes, this fact strikes the mind very
+forcibly, for in such places it frequently is the case that mammals do
+not exist, or are exceedingly rare. In Europe it is different. There, as
+Reaumur said, possibly one gnat in every hundred may be able to gratify
+its appetite for blood; but of the gnats in many districts in South
+America it would be nearer the mark to say that only one in a hundred
+millions can ever do so.
+
+Curtis discovered that only the female mosquito bites or sucks blood,
+the male being without tongue or mandibles; and he asks, What, then,
+does the male feed on? He conjectures that it feeds on flowers; but, had
+he visited some swampy places in hot countries, where flowers are few
+and the insects more numerous than the sands on the seashore, he would
+most probably have said that the males subsist on decaying vegetable
+matter and moisture of slime. It is, however, more important to know
+what the female subsists on. We know that she thirsts for warm mammalian
+blood, that she seeks it with avidity, and is provided with an admirable
+organ for its extraction--only, unfortunately for her, she does not get
+it, or, at all events, the few happy individuals that do get it are
+swamped in the infinite multitude of those that are doomed by nature to
+total abstinence.
+
+I should like to know whether this belief of Curtis, shared by Westwood
+and other distinguished entomologists, but originally put forward merely
+as a conjecture, has ever been tested by careful observation and
+experiment. If not, then it is strange that it should have crept into
+many important works, where it is stated not as a mere guess, but as an
+established fact. Thus, Van Beneden, in his work on parasites, while
+classing female mosquitoes with his "miserable wretches," yet says, "If
+blood fails them, they live, like the males, on the juices of flowers."
+If this be so, it is quite certain that the juices fail to satisfy them;
+and that, like Dr. Tanner, who was ravenously hungry during his forty
+days' fast, in spite of his frequent sips of water, the mosquito still
+craves for something better than a cool vegetarian diet. I cannot help
+thinking, though the idea may seem fanciful, that mosquitoes feed on
+nothing. We know that the ephemerae take no refreshment in the imago
+state, the mouth being aborted or atrophied in these short-lived
+creatures; but we also know that they belong to an exceedingly ancient
+tribe, and possibly, after the earth had ceased to produce their proper
+nourishment there came in their history a long hungry period, which did
+not kill them, but lasted until their feeding instincts became obsolete,
+the mouth lost its use, and their life in its perfect state dwindled to
+its present length.
+
+In any case, how unsatisfactory is the mosquitoes' existence, and what a
+curious position they occupy in nature! Let us suppose that, owing to
+some great change in the conditions of the earth, rapacious birds were
+no longer able to capture prey, and that, by a corresponding change in
+their organizations, they were able to subsist on the air they breathed,
+with perhaps an occasional green leaf and a sip of water, and yet
+retained the old craving for solid food, and the old predatory instincts
+and powers undiminished; they would be in the position of mosquitoes in
+the imago state. And if then fifty or a hundred individuals were to
+succeed every year in capturing something and making one hearty meal,
+these few fortunate diners would bear about the same proportion to all
+the raptors on the globe as the mosquitoes that succeed in sucking blood
+to their unsuccessful fellows. In the case of the hawks, the effect of
+the few meals on the entire rapacious family or order would certainly be
+_nil;_ and it is impossible to believe for a moment that the
+comparatively infinitesimal amount of blood sucked by mosquitoes can.
+serve to invigorate the species. The wonder is that the machinery, which
+accomplishes nothing, should continue in such perfect working order.
+
+When we consider the insect's delicate organ, so admirably fitted for
+the purpose to which it is applied, it becomes difficult to believe that
+it could have been so perfected except in a condition of things utterly
+unlike the present. There must have been a time when mosquitoes found
+their proper nourishment, and when warm mammalian blood was as necessary
+to their existence as honey is to that of the bee, or insect food to the
+dragon-fly.
+
+This applies to many blood-sucking insects besides mosquitoes, and with
+special force to the tick tribes (Ixodes), which swarm throughout
+Central and South America; for in these degraded spiders the whole body
+has been manifestly modified to fit it for a parasitical life; while the
+habits of the insect during its blind, helpless, waiting existence on
+trees, and its sudden great development when it succeeds in attaching
+itself to an animal body, also point irresistibly to the same
+conclusion. In the sunny uplands they act (writes Captain Burton) like
+the mosquitoes of the hot, humid Beiramar. "The nuisance is general; it
+seems to be in the air; every blade of grass has its colony; clusters of
+hundreds adhere to the twigs; myriads are found in the bush clumps. Lean
+and flat when growing to the leaves, the tick catches man or beast
+brushing by, fattens rapidly, and, at the end-of a week's good living,
+drops off, _plena cruoris."_ When on trees, Belt says, they
+instinctively place themselves on the extreme tips of leaves and shoots,
+with their hind legs stretching out, each foot armed with two hooks or
+claws, with which to lay hold of any animal brushing by. During this
+wretched, incom-plete existence (from which, in most cases, it is never
+destined to emerge), its greatest length is about one-fourth of an inch;
+but where it fastens itself to an animal the abdomen increases to a
+globe as big as a medium-sized Barcelona nut. Being silvery-grey or
+white in colour, it becomes, when thus distended, very conspicuous on
+any dark surface. I have frequently seen black, smooth-haired dogs with
+their coats, turned into a perfect garden of these white spider-flowers
+or mushrooms. The white globe is leathery, and nothing can injure it;
+and the poor beast cannot rub, bite, or scratch it off, as it is
+anchored to his flesh by eight sets of hooks and a triangle of teeth.
+
+The ticks inhabiting regions rich in bird and insect life, but with few
+mammals, are in the same condition as mosquitoes, as far as the supply
+of blood goes; and, like the mosquitoes, they are compelled and able to
+exist without the nourishment best suited to them. They are nature's
+miserable castaways, parasitical tribes lost in a great dry wilderness
+where no blood is; and every marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hunger
+gnawing its vitals, and every forest tick, blindly feeling with its
+grappling-irons for the beast that never brushes by, seems to tell us of
+a world peopled with gigantic forms, mammalian and reptilian, which once
+afforded abundant pasture to the parasite, and which the parasite
+perhaps assisted to overthrow.
+
+It is almost necessary to transport oneself to the vast tick-infested
+wilderness of the New World to appreciate the full significance of a
+passage in Belt's _Naturalist in Nicaragua,_ in which it is suggested
+that man's hairless condition was perhaps brought about by natural
+selection in tropical regions, where he was greatly troubled with
+parasites of this kind. It is certain that if in such a country as
+Brazil he possessed a hairy coat, affording cover to the tick and
+enabling it to get a footing on the body, his condition would be a very
+sad one. Savages abhor hairs on the body, and even pluck them off their
+faces. This seems like a survival of an ancient habit acquired when the
+whole body was clothed with hair; and if primitive man ever possessed
+such a habit, nature only followed his lead in giving him a hairless
+offspring.
+
+Is it not also probable that the small amount of mammalian life in South
+America, and the aquatic habits of nearly all the large animals in the
+warmer districts, is due to the persecutions of the tick?
+
+The only way in which a large animal can rid itself of the pest is by
+going into the water or wallowing in the mud; and this perhaps accounts
+for the more or less aquatic habits of the jaguar, aguará-guazú, the
+large Cervus paluclosus, tapir, capybara, and peccary. Monkeys, which
+are most abundant, are a notable exception; but these animals have the
+habit of attending to each other's skins, and spend a great deal of
+their time in picking off the parasites. But how do birds escape the
+ticks, since these parasites do not confine their attacks to any one
+class of aninials, but attach themselves impartially to any living thing
+coming within reach of their hooks, from snake to man? My own
+observations bearing on this point refer less to the Ixodes than to the
+minute bete-rouge, which is excessively abundant in the Plata district,
+where it is known as _bicho colorado,_ and in size and habits resembles
+the English Leptus autumnalis. It is so small that, notwithstanding its
+bright scarlet colour, it can only be discerned by bringing the eye
+close to it; and being, moreover, exceedingly active and abundant in all
+shady places in summer--making life a misery to careless human
+beings--it must be very much more dangerous to birds than the larger
+sedentary Ixodes. The bete-rouge invariably lodges beneath the wings of
+birds, where the loose scanty plumage affords easy access to the skin.
+Domestic birds suffer a great deal from its persecutions, and their.
+young, if allowed to run about in shady places, die of the irritation.
+Wild birds, however, seem to be very little troubled, and most of those
+I have examined have been almost entirely free from parasites. Probably
+they are much more sensitive than the domestic birds, and able to feel
+and pick off the insects with their beaks before they have penetrated
+into the skin. I believe they are also able to protect themselves in
+another way, namely, by preventing the parasites from reaching their
+bodies at all. I was out under the trees one day with a pet oven-bird
+(Furnarius rufus), which had full liberty to range about at will, and
+noticed that at short intervals it went through the motions of picking
+something from its toes or legs, though I could see nothing on them. At
+length I approached my eyes to within a few inches of the bird's feet,
+and discovered that the large dry branch on which it stood was covered
+with a multitude of parasites, all running rapidly about like foraging
+ants, and whenever one came to the bird's feet it at once ran up the
+leg. Every time this happened, so far as I could see, the bird felt it.
+and quickly and deftly picked it off with the point of its bill. It
+seemed very astonishing that the horny covering of the toes and legs
+should be so exquisitely sensitive, for the insects are so small and
+light that they cannot be felt on the hand, even when a score of them
+are running over it; but the fact is as I have stated, and it is highly
+probable, I think, that most wild birds keep themselves free from these
+little torments in the same way.
+
+Some observations of mine on a species of Orni-thomyia--a fly
+parasitical on birds--might possibly be of use in considering the
+question of the anomalous position in nature of insects possessing the
+instincts and aptitudes of parasites, and organs manifestly modified to
+suit a parasitical mode of life, yet compelled and able to exist free,
+feeding, perhaps, on vegetable juices, or, like the ephemerae, on
+nothing at all. For it must be borne in mind that I do not assert that
+these "occasional" or "accidental" parasites, as some one calls them,
+explaining nothing, do not feed on such juices. I do not know what they
+feed on. I only know that the joyful alacrity with which gnats and
+stinging flies of all kinds abandon the leaves, supposed to afford them
+pasture, to attack a warm-blooded animal, serves to show how strong the
+impulse is, and how ineradicable the instinct, which must have had an
+origin. Perhaps the habits of the bird-fly I have mentioned will serve
+to show how, in some cases, the free life of some blood-sucking flies
+and other insects might have originated.
+
+Kirby and Spence, in their _Introduction,_ mention that one or two
+species of Ornithomyia have been observed flying about and alighting on
+men; and in one case the fly extracted blood and was caught, the species
+being thus placed beyond doubt. This circumstance led the authors to
+believe that the insect, when the bird it is parasitical on dies,
+takes to flight and migrates from body to body, occasionally tasting
+blood until, coming to the right body--to wit, that of a bird, or of a
+particular species of bird--it once more establishes itself permanently
+in the plumage. I fancy that the insect sometimes leads a freer life and
+ranges much more than the authors imagined; and I refer to Kirby and
+Spence, with apologies to those who regard the _Introduction_ as out of
+date, only because I am not aware that we have any later observations on
+the subject.
+
+There is in La Plata a small very common Dendrocolaptine bird--Anumbius
+acuticaudatus--much infested by an Ornithomyia, a pretty, pale insect,
+half the size of a house-fly, and elegantly striped with green. It is a
+very large parasite for so small a bird, yet so cunning and alert is it,
+and so swiftly is it able to swim through the plumage, that the bird is
+unable to rid itself of so undesirable a companion. The bird lives with
+its mate all the year round, much of the time with its grown-up young,
+in its nest--a large structure, in which so much building-material is
+used that the bird is called in the vernacular Leñatero, or
+Firewood-gatherer. On warm bright days without wind, during the absence
+of the birds, I have frequently seen a company of from half a dozen to a
+dozen or fifteen of the parasitical fly wheeling about in the air above
+the nest, hovering and gambolling together, just like house-flies in a
+room in summer; but always on the appearance of the birds, returning
+from their feeding-ground, they would instantly drop down and disappear
+into the nest. How curious this instinct seems! The fly regards the
+bird, which affords it the warmth and food essential to life, as its
+only deadly enemy; and with an inherited wisdom, like that of the
+mosquito with regard to the dragon-fly, or of the horse-fly with regard
+to the Monedula wasp, vanishes like smoke from its presence, and only
+approaches the bird secretly from a place of concealment.
+
+The parasitical habit tends inevitably to degrade the species acquiring
+it, dulling its senses and faculties, especially those of sight and
+locomotion; but the Ornithomyia seems an exception, its dependent life
+having had a contrary effect; the extreme sensitiveness, keenness of
+sight, and quickness of the bird having reacted on the insect, giving it
+a subtlety in its habits and motions almost without a parallel even
+among free insects. A man with a blood-sucking flat-bodied flying
+squirrel, concealing itself among his clothing and gliding and dodging
+all over his body with so much artifice and rapidity as to defeat all
+efforts made to capturo it or knock it off, would be a case parallel to
+that of the bird-fly on the small bird. It might be supposed that the
+Firewood-gatherer, like some ants that keep domestic pets, makes a pet
+of the fly; for it is a very pretty insect, barred with green, and with
+rainbow reflections on its wings--and birds are believed by some
+theorists to possess aesthetic tastes; but the discomfort of having such
+a vampire on the body would, I imagine, be too great to allow a kindly
+instinct of that nature to grow up. Moreover, I have on several
+occasions seen the bird making frantic efforts to capture one of the
+flies, which had incautiously flown up from the nest at the wrong
+moment. Bird and fly seem to know each other wonderfully well.
+
+Here, then, we have a parasitical insect specialized in the highest
+degree, yet retaining all its pristine faculties unimpaired, its love of
+liberty, and of associating in numbers together for sportive exercises,
+and well able to take care of itself during its free intervals. And
+probably when thrown on the world, as when nests are blown down, or the
+birds get killed, or change their quarters, as they often do, it is able
+to exist for some time without avian blood. Let us then imagine some of
+these orphaned colonies, unable to find birds, but through a slight
+change in habits or organization able to exist in the imago state
+without sucking blood until they laid their eggs; and succeeding
+generations, still better able to stand the altered conditions of life
+until they become practically independent (like gnats), multiplying
+greatly, and disporting themselves in clouds over forests, yet still
+retaining the old hunger for blood and the power to draw it, and ready
+at any moment to return to the ancestral habit. It might be said that if
+such a result were possible it would have occurred, but that we find no
+insect like the Ornithomyia existing independently. With the bird-fly it
+has not occurred, as far as we know; but in the past history of some
+independent parasites it is possible that something similar to the
+imaginary case I have sketched may have taken place. The bush-tick is a
+more highly specialized, certainly a more degraded, creature than the
+bird-fly, and the very fact of its existence seems to show that it is
+possible for even the lowest of the fallen race of parasites to start
+afresh in life under new conditions, and to reascend in the scale of
+being, although still bearing about it the marks of former degeneracy.
+
+The connection between the flea and the mammal it feeds on is even less
+close than that which exists between the Ornithomyia and bird. The fact
+that fleas are so common and universal--for in all lands we have them,
+like the poor, always with us; and that they are found on all mammals,
+from the king of beasts to the small modest mouse--seems to show a great
+amount of variability and adaptiveness, as well as a very high
+antiquity. It has often been reported that fleas have been found hopping
+on the ground in desert places, where they could not have been dropped
+by man or beast; and it has been assumed that these "independent" fleas
+must, like gnats and ticks, subsist on vegetable juices. There is no
+doubt that they are able to exist and propagate for one or two years
+after being deprived of their proper aliment; houses shut up for a year
+or longer are sometimes found infested with them; possibly in the
+absence of "vegetable juices" they flourish on dust. I have never
+detected them hopping on the ground in uninhabited places, although I
+once found them in Patagonia, in a hamlet which had been attacked and
+depopulated by the Indians about twenty months before my visit. On
+entering one of the deserted huts I found the floor literally swarming
+with fleas, and in less than ten seconds my legs, to the height of my
+knees, were almost black with their numbers. This proves that they are
+able toincrease greatly for a period without blood; but I doubt that
+they can go on existing and increasing for an indefinite time; perhaps
+their true position, with regard to the parasitical habit, is midway
+between that of the strict parasite which never leaves the body, and
+that of independent parasites like the Culex and the Ixodes, and all
+those which are able to exist free for ever, and are parasitical only
+when the opportunity offers.
+
+Entomologists regard the flea as a degraded fly. Certainly it is very
+much more degraded than the bird-borne Ornithomyia, with its subtle
+motions and instinct, its power of flight and social pastimes. The poor
+pulex has lost every trace of wings; nevertheless, in its fallen
+condition it has developed some remarkable qualities and saltatory
+powers, which give it a lower kind of glory; and, compared with another
+parasite with which it shares the human species, it is almost a noble
+insect. Darwin has some remarks about the smallness of the brain of an
+ant, assuming that this insect possesses a very high intelligence, but I
+doubt very much that the ant, which moves in a groove, is mentally the
+superior of the unsocial flea. The last is certainly the most teachable;
+and if fleas were generally domesticated and made pets of, probably
+there would be as many stories about their marvellous intelligence and
+fidelity to man as we now hear about our over-praised "friend" the dog.
+
+With regard to size, the flea probably started on its downward course as
+a comparatively large insect, probably larger than the Ornithomyia. That
+insect has been able to maintain its existence, without dwindling like
+the Leptus into a mere speck, through the great modification in organs
+and instinct, which adapt it so beautifully to the feathery element in
+which it moves. The bush-tick, wingless from the beginning, and
+diverging in another direction, has probably been greatly increased in
+size by its parasitical habit; this seems proven by the fact, that as
+long as it is parasitical on nothing it remains small, but when able to
+fasten itself to an animal it rapidly developes to a great size. Again,
+the big globe of its abdomen is coriaceous and elastic, and is probably
+as devoid of sensation as a ball of india-rubber. The insect, being made
+fast by hooks and teeth to its victim, all efforts to remove it only
+increase the pain it causes; and animals that know it well do not
+attempt to rub, scratch, or bite it off, therefore the great size and
+the conspicuous colour of the tick are positive advantages to it. The
+flea, without the subtlety and highly-specialized organs of the
+Ornithomyia, or the stick-fast powers and leathery body of the Ixodes,
+can only escape its vigilant enemies by making itself invisible; hence
+every variation, i.e. increase in jumping-power and diminished bulk,
+tending towards this result, has been taken advantage of by natural
+selection.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS.
+
+
+Two humble-bees, Bombus thoracicus and B. violaceus, are found on the
+pampas; the first, with a primrose yellow thorax, and the extremity of
+the abdomen bright rufous, slightly resembles the English B. terrestris;
+the rarer species, which is a trifle smaller than the first, is of a
+uniform intense black, the body having the appearance of velvet, the
+wings being of a deep violaceous blue.
+
+A census of the humble-bees in any garden or field always shows that the
+yellow bees outnumber the black in the proportion of about seven to one;
+and I have also found their nests for many years in the same proportion;
+about seven nests of the yellow to one nest of the black species. In
+habits they are almost identical, and when two species so closely allied
+are found inhabiting the same locality, it is only reasonable to infer
+that one possesses some advantage over the other, and that the least
+favoured species will eventually disappear. In this case, where one so
+greatly outnumbers the other, it might be thought that the rarer species
+is dying out, or that, on the contrary, it is a new-comer destined to
+supplant the older more numerous species. Yet, during the twenty years I
+have observed them, there has occurred no change in their relative
+positions; though both have greatly increased in numbers during that
+time, owing to the spread of cultivation. And yet it would scarcely be
+too much to expect some marked change in a period so long as that, even
+through the slow-working agency of natural selection; for it is not as
+if there had been an exact balance of power between them. In the same
+period of time I have seen several species, once common, almost or quite
+disappear, while others, very low down as to numbers, have been exalted
+to the first rank. In insect life especially, these changes have been
+numerous, rapid, and widespread.
+
+In the district where, as a boy, I chased and caught tinamous, and also
+chased ostriches, but failed to catch them, the continued presence of
+our two humble-bees, sucking the same flowers and making their nests in
+the same situations, has remained a puzzle to my mind.
+
+The site of the nest is usually a slight depression in the soil in the
+shelter of a cardoon bush. The bees deepen the hollow by burrowing in
+the earth; and when the spring foliage sheltering it withers up, they
+construct a dome-shaped covering of small sticks, thorns, and leaves
+bitten into extremely minute pieces. They sometimes take possession of a
+small hole or cavity in the ground, and save themselves the labour of
+excavation.
+
+Their architecture closely resembles that of B. terrestris. They make
+rudely-shaped oval honey-cells, varying from half an inch to an inch and
+a half in length, the smaller ones being the first made; later in the
+season the old cocoons are utilized for storing honey. The wax is
+chocolate-coloured, and almost the only difference I can find in the
+economy of the two species is that the black bee uses a large quantity
+of wax in plastering the interior of its nest. The egg-cell of the
+yellow bee always contains from twelve to sixteen eggs; that of the
+black bee from ten to fourteen; and the eggs of this species are the
+largest though the bee is smallest. At the entrance on the edge of the
+mound one bee is usually stationed, and, when approached, it hums a
+shrill challenge, and throws itself into a menacing attitude. The sting
+is exceedingly painful.
+
+One summer I was so fortunate as to discover two nests of the two kinds
+within twelve yards of each other, and I resolved to watch them very
+carefully, in order to see whether the two species ever came into
+collision, as sometimes happens with ants of different species living
+close together. Several times I saw a yellow bee leave its own nest and
+hover round or settle on the neighbouring one, upon which the sentinel
+black bee would attack and drive it off. One day, while watching, I was
+delighted to see a yellow bee actually enter its neighbour's nest, the
+sentinel being off duty. In about five minutes' time it came out again
+and flew away unmolested. I concluded from this that humble-bees, like
+their relations of the hive, occasionally plunder each other's sweets.
+On another occasion I found a black bee dead at the entrance of the
+yellow bees' nest; doubtless this individual had been caught in the act
+of stealing honey, and, after it had been stung to death, it had been
+dragged out and left there as a warning to others with like felonious
+intentions.
+
+There is one striking difference between the two species. The yellow bee
+is inodorous; the black bee, when angry and attacking, emits an
+exceedingly powerful odour: curiously enough, this smell is identical in
+character with that made when angry by all the wasps of the South
+American genus Pepris--dark blue wasps with red wings. This odour at
+first produces a stinging sensation on the nerve of smell, but when
+inhaled in large measure becomes very nauseating. On one occasion, while
+I was opening a nest, several of the bees buzzing round my head and
+thrusting their stings through the veil I wore for protection, gave out
+so pungent a smell that I found it unendurable, and was compelled to
+retreat.
+
+It seems strange that a species armed with a venomous sting and
+possessing the fierce courage of the humble-bee should also have this
+repulsive odour for a protection. It is, in fact, as incongruous as it
+would be were our soldiers provided with guns and swords first, and
+after with phials of assafoatida to be uncorked in the face of an enemy.
+
+Why, or how, animals came to be possessed of the power of emitting
+pestiferous odours is a mystery; we only see that natural selection has,
+in some mstances, chiefly among insects, taken advantage of it to
+furnish some of the weaker, more unprotected species with a means of
+escape from their enemies. The most stinking example I know is that of a
+large hairy caterpillar I have found on dry wood in Patagonia, and
+which, when touched, emits an intensely nauseous effluvium. Happily it
+is very volatile, but while it lasts it is even more detestable than
+that of the skunk.
+
+The skunk itself offers perhaps the one instance amongst the higher
+vertebrates of an animal in which all the original instincts of
+self-preservation have died out, giving place to this lower kind of
+protection. All the other members of the family it belongs to are
+cunning, swift of foot, and, when overtaken, fierce-tempered and well
+able to defend themselves with their powerful well-armed jaws.
+
+For some occult reason they are provided with a gland charged with a
+malodorous secretion; and out of this mysterious liquor Nature has
+elaborated the skunk's inglorious weapon. The skunk alone when attacked
+makes no attempt to escape or to defend itself by biting; but, thrown by
+its agitation into a violent convulsion, involuntarily discharges its
+foetid liquor into the face of an opponent. When this animal had once
+ceased to use so good a weapon as its teeth in defending itself,
+degenerating at the same time into a slow-moving creature, without fear
+and without cunning, the strength and vileness of its odour would be
+continually increased by the cumulative process of natural selection:
+and how effective the protection has become is shown by the abundance of
+the species throughout the whole American continent. It is lucky for
+mankind--especially for naturalists and sportsmen--that other species
+have not been improved in the same direction.
+
+But what can we say of the common deer of the pampas (Cervus
+campestris), the male of which gives out an effluvium quite as
+far-reaching although not so abominable in character as that of the
+Mephitis? It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human nostril when the
+perfumer of the wilderness is not even in sight. Yet it is not a
+protection; on the contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling
+white plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a direct disadvantage,
+informing all enemies for leagues around of its whereabouts. It is not,
+therefore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer are never very
+abundant; the only wonder is that, like the ancient horse of America,
+they have not become extinct.
+
+The gauchos of the pampas, however, give _a reason_ for the powerful
+smell of the male deer; and, after some hesitation, I have determined to
+set it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, as he thinks
+proper. I neither believe nor disbelieve it; for although I do not put
+great faith in gaucho natural history, my own observations have not
+infrequently confirmed statements of theirs, which a sceptical person
+would have regarded as wild indeed. To give one instance: I heard a
+gaucho relate that while out riding he had been pursued for a
+considerable distance by a large spider; his hearers laughed at him for
+a romancer; but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, both when on
+foot and on horseback, by a large wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I
+did not join in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of C. campestris
+is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just as pyrethrum powder is to most
+insects, and even go so far as to describe its effect as fatal to them;
+according to this, the smell is therefore a protection to the deer. In
+places where venomous snakes are extremely abundant, as in the Sierra
+district on the southern pampas of Buenos Ayres, the gaucho frequently
+ties a strip of the male deer's skin, which retains its powerful odour
+for an indefinite time, round the neck of a valuable horse as a
+protection. It is certain that domestic animals are frequently lost here
+through snake-bites. The most common poisonous species--the
+Craspedo-cephalus alternatus, called _Vivora de la Cruz_ in the
+vernacular--has neither bright colour nor warning rattle to keep off
+heavy hoofs, and is moreover of so sluggish a temperament that it will
+allow itself to be trodden on before stirring, with the result that its
+fangs are not infrequently struck into the nose or foot of browsing
+beast. Considering, then, the conditions in which C. campestris is
+placed--and it might also be supposed that venomous snakes have in past
+times been much more numerous than they are now--it is not impossible to
+believe that the powerful smell it emits has been made protective,
+especially when we see in other species how repulsive odours have been
+turned to account by the principle of natural selection.
+
+After all, perhaps the wild naturalist of the pampas knows what he is
+about when he ties a strip of deer-skin to the neck of his steed and
+turns him loose to graze among the snakes.
+
+The gaucho also affirms that the deer cherishes a wonderful animosity
+against snakes; that it becomes greatly excited when it sees one, and
+proceeds at once to destroy it; _they say,_ by running round and round
+it in a circle, emitting its violent smell in larger measure, until the
+snake dies of suffocation. It is hard to believe that the effect can be
+so great; but that the deer is a snake hater and killer is certainly
+true: in North America, Ceylon, and other districts deer have been
+observed excitedly leaping on serpents, and killing them with their
+sharp cutting hoofs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+A NOBLE WASP.
+
+_(Monedula punctata.)_
+
+
+Naturalists, like kings and emperors, have their favourites, and as my
+zoological sympathies, which are wider than my knowledge, embrace all
+classes of beings, there are of course several insects for which I have
+a special regard; a few in each of the principal orders. My chief
+favourite among the hymenopteras is the one representative of the
+curious genus Monedula known in La Plata. It is handsome and has
+original habits, but it is specially interesting to me for another
+reason: I can remember the time when it was extremely rare on the
+pampas, so rare that in boyhood the sight of one used to be a great
+event to me; and I have watched its rapid increase year by year till it
+has come to be one of our commonest species. Its singular habits and
+intelligence give it a still better claim to notice. It is a big, showy,
+loud-buzzing insect, with pink head and legs, wings with brown
+reflections, and body encircled with alternate bands of black and pale
+gold, and has a preference for large composite flowers, on the honey of
+which it feeds. Its young is, however, an insect-eater; but the Monedula
+does not, like other burrowing or sand wasps, put away a store of
+insects or spiders, partially paralyzed, as a provision for the grub
+till it reaches the pupa state; it actually supplies the grub with
+fresh-caught insects as long as food is required, killing the prey it
+captures outright, and bringing it in to its young; so that its habits,
+in this particular, are more bird- than wasp-like.
+
+The wasp lays its solitary egg at the extremity of a hole it excavates
+for itself on a bare hard piece of ground, and many holes are usually
+found close together. When the grub--for I have never been able to find
+more than one in a hole--has come out from the egg, the parent begins to
+bring in insects, carefully filling up the mouth of the hole with loose
+earth after every visit. Without this precaution, which entails a vast
+amount of labour, I do not believe one grub out of every fifty would
+survive, so overrun are these barren spots of ground used as
+breeding-places with hunting spiders, ants, and tiger-beetles. The grub
+is a voracious eater, but the diligent mother brings in as much as it
+can devour. I have often found as many as six or seven insects,
+apparently fresh killed, and not yet touched by the pampered little
+glutton, coiled up in the midst of them waiting for an appetite.
+
+The Monedula is an adroit fly-catcher, for though it kills numbers of
+fire-flies and other insects, flies are always preferred, possibly
+because they are so little encumbered with wings, and are also more
+easily devoured. It occasionally captures insects on the wing, but the
+more usual method is to pounce down on its prey when it is at rest. At
+one time, before I had learnt their habits, I used frequently to be
+startled by two or three or more of these wasps rushing towards my face,
+and continuing hovering before it, loudly buzzing, attending me in my
+walks about the fields. The reason of this curious proceeding is that
+the Monedula preys largely on stinging flies, having learnt from
+experience that the stinging fly will generally neglect its own safety
+when it has once fastened on a good spot to draw blood from. When a man
+or horse stands perfectly motionless the wasps take no notice, but the
+moment any movement is made of hand, tail, or stamping hoof, they rush
+to the rescue, expecting to find a stinging fly. On the other hand, the
+horse has learnt to know and value this fly-scourge, and will stand very
+quietly with half a dozen loud Avasps hovering in an alarming manner
+close to his head, well knowing that every fly that settles on him will
+be instantly snatched away, and that the boisterous Monedula is a better
+protection even than the tail--which, by the way, the horse wears very
+long in Buenos Ayres.
+
+I have, in conclusion, to relate an incident I onco witnessed, and which
+does not show the Monedula in a very amiable light. I was leaning over a
+gate watching one of these wasps feeding on a sunflower. A small
+leaf-cutting bee was hurrying about with its shrill busy hum in the
+vicinity, and in due time came to the sunflower and settled on it. The
+Monedula became irritated, possibly at the shrill voice and bustling
+manner of its neighbour, and, after watching it for a few moments on the
+flower, deliberately rushed at and drove it off. The leaf-cutter quickly
+returned, however--for bees are always extremely averse to leaving a
+flower unexplored--but was again driven away with threats and
+demonstrations on the part of the Monedula. The little thing went off
+and sunned itself on a leaf for a time, then returned to the flower,
+only to be instantly ejected again. Other attempts were made, but the
+big wasp now kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, and
+would not allow it to come within several inches of the flower without
+throwing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee retired to
+sun itself once more, apparently determined to wait for the big tyrant
+to go away; but the other seemed to know what was wanted, and spitefully
+made up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter then gave up the
+contest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it hovered, hawk-like, above
+the Monedula for a moment, then pounced down on its back, and clung
+there, furiously biting, until its animosity was thoroughly appeased;
+then it flew off, leaving the other master of the field certainly, but
+greatly discomposed, and perhaps seriously injured about the base of the
+wings. I was rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for a
+leaf-cutting bee can use its teeth as deftly as a tailor can his shears.
+
+Doubtless to bees, as to men, revenge is sweeter than honey. But, in the
+face of mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale of
+organization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything so
+intelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "which
+implies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the person
+(or bee) offended?" According to Bain _(Mental and Moral Science)_ only
+the highest animals--stags and bulls he mentions-can be credited with
+the developed form of anger, which, he describes as an excitement caused
+by pain, reaching the centres of activity, and containing an impulse
+knowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if man
+only is meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel of
+gunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the breast of
+nearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high according to Bain,
+though I myself should place him nearly on a level mentally with the
+majority of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable of
+a wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag can
+manifestly have no associations, personal or political, for the bull,
+shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another instance of
+misdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar .as that of the bull
+and red rag, is used as an illustration by one of the prophets: "My
+heritage is unto me as a speckled bird; the birds round, about are
+against it." I have frequently seen the birds of a thicket gather round
+some singularly marked accidental visitor, and finally drive him with
+great anger from the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in a
+little here, since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured or
+marked, might be looked on as a bird of prey.
+
+The flesh-fly laying its eggs on the carrion-flower is only a striking
+instance of the mistakes all instincts are liable to, never more
+markedly than in the inherited tendency to fits of frenzied excitement:
+the feeling is frequently excited by the wrong object, and explodes at
+inopportune moments.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+NATURE'S NIGHT LIGHTS.
+
+_(Remarks about Fireflies and other matters.)_
+
+
+It was formerly supposed that the light of the firefly (in any family
+possessing the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks of
+other insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirby
+and Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all the
+attention it would receive from modern entomologists: just at present
+any observer who lived in the pre-Darwin days is regarded as one of the
+ancients. The reasons given for the notion or theory in the celebrated
+_Introduction to Entomology_ were not conclusive; nevertheless it was
+not an improbable supposition of the authors'; while the theory which
+has taken its place in recent zoological writings seems in every way
+even less satisfactory.
+
+Let us first examine the antiquated theory, as it must now be called. By
+bringing a raptorial insect and a firefly together, we find that the
+flashing light of the latter does actually scare away the former, and is
+therefore, for the moment, a protection as effectual as the camp-fire
+the traveller lights in a district abounding with beasts of prey.
+Notwithstanding this fact, and assuming that we have here the whole
+reason of the existence of the light-emitting power, a study of the
+firefly's habits compels us to believe that the insect would be just as
+well off without the power as with it. Probably it experiences some
+pleasure in emitting flashes of light during its evening pastimes, but
+this could scarcely be considered an advantage in its struggle for
+existence, and it certainly does not account for the possession of the
+faculty.
+
+About the habits of Pyrophorus, the large tropical firefly which has the
+seat of its luminosity on the upper surface of the thorax, nothing
+definite appears to be known; but it has been said that this instinct is
+altogether nocturnal. The Pyrophorus is only found in the sub-tropical
+portion of the Argentine country, and I have never met with it. With the
+widely-separated Cratomorphus, and the tortoise-shaped Aspisoma, which
+emit the light from the abdomen, I am familiar; one species of
+Cratomorphus--a long slender insect with yellow wing-cases marked with
+two parallel black lines--is "the firefly" known to every one and
+excessively abundant in the southern countries of La Plata. This insect
+is strictly diurnal in its habits--as much so, in fact, as diurnal
+butterflies. They are seen flying about, wooing their mates, and feeding
+on composite and umbelliferous flowers at all hours of the day, and are
+as active as wasps during the full glare of noon. Birds do not feed on
+them, owing to the disagreeable odour, resembling that of phosphorus,
+they emit, and probably because they are to be uneatable; but their
+insect enemies are not so squeamish, and devour them readily, just as
+they also do the blister-fly, which one would imagine a morsel fitted to
+disagree with any stomach. One of their enemies is the Monedula wasp;
+another, a fly, of the rapacious Asilidas family; and this fly is also a
+wasp in appearance, having a purple body and bright red wings, like a
+Pepris, and this mimetic resemblance doubtless serves it as a protection
+against birds. A majority of raptorial insects are, however, nocturnal,
+and from all these enemies that go about under cover of night, the
+firefly, as Kirby and Spence rightly conjectured, protects itself, or
+rather is involuntarily protected, by means of its frequent flashing
+light. We are thus forced to the conclusion that, while the common house
+fly and many other diurnal insects spend a considerable portion of the
+daylight in purely sportive exercises, the firefly, possessing in its
+light a protection from nocturnal enemies, puts off its pastimes until
+the evening; then, when its carnival of two or three hours' duration is
+over, retires also to rest, putting out its candle, and so exposing
+itself to the dangers which surround other diurnal species during the
+hours of darkness. I have spoken of the firefly's pastimes advisedly,
+for I have really never been able to detect it doing anything in the
+evening beyond flitting aimlessly about, like house flies in a room,
+hovering and revolving in company by the hour, apparently for amusement.
+Thus, the more closely we look at the facts, the more unsatisfactory
+does the explanation seem. That the firefly should have become possessed
+of so elaborate a machinery, producing incidentally such splendid
+results, merely as a protection against one set of enemies for a portion
+only of the period during which they are active, is altogether
+incredible.
+
+The current theory, which we owe to Belt, is a prettier one. Certain
+insects (also certain Batrachians, reptiles, &c.) are unpalatable to the
+rapacious kinds; it is therefore a direct advantage to these unpalatable
+species to be distinguishable from all the persecuted, and the more
+conspicuous and well-known they are, the less likely are they to be
+mistaken by birds, insectivorous mammals, &c., for eatable kinds and
+caught or injured. Hence we find that many such species have acquired
+for their protection very brilliant or strongly-contrasted
+colours--warning colours--which insect-eaters come to know.
+
+The firefly, a soft-bodied, slow-flying insect, is easily caught and
+injured, but it is not fit for food, and, therefore, says the theory,
+lest it should be injured or killed by mistake, it has a fiery spark to
+warn enemies---birds, bats, and rapacious insects--that it is uneatable.
+
+The theory of warning colours is an excellent one, but it has been
+pushed too far. We have seen that one of the most common fireflies is
+diurnal in habits, or, at any rate, that it performs all the important
+business of its life by day, when it has neither bright colour nor light
+to warn its bird enemies; and out of every hundred species of
+insect-eating birds at least ninety-nine are diurnal. Raptorial insects,
+as I have said, feed freely on fireflies, so that the supposed warning
+is not for them, and it would be hard to believe that the magnificent
+display made by luminous insects is useful only in preventing accidental
+injuries to them from a few crepuscular bats and goatsuckers. And to
+believe even this we should first have to assume that bats and
+goatsuckers are differently constituted from all other creatures; for in
+other animals--insects, birds, and mammalians--the appearance of fire by
+night seems to confuse and frighten, but it certainly cannot be said to
+_warn,_ in the sense in which that word is used when we speak of the
+brilliant colours of some butterflies, or even of the gestures of some
+venomous snakes, and of the sounds they emit.
+
+Thus we can see that, while the old theory of Kirby and Spence had some
+facts to support it, the one now in vogue is purely fanciful. Until some
+better suggestion is made, it would perhaps be as well to consider the
+luminous organ as having "no very close and direct relation to present
+habits of life." About their present habits, however, especially their
+crepuscular habits, there is yet much to learn. One thing I have
+observed in them has always seemed very strange to me. Occasionally an
+individual insect is seen shining with a very large and steady light, or
+with a light which very gradually decreases and increases in power, and
+at such times it is less active than at others, remaining for long
+intervals motionless on the leaves, or moving with a very slow flight.
+In South America a firefly displaying this abnormal splendour is said to
+be dying, and it is easy to imagine how such a notion originated. The
+belief is, however, erroneous, for sometimes, on very rare occasions,
+all the insects in one place are simultaneously affected in the same
+way, and at such times they mass themselves together in myriads, as if
+for migration, or for some other great purpose. Mr. Bigg-Wither, in
+South Brazil, and D'Albertis, in New Guinea, noticed these firefly
+gatherings; I also once had the rare good fortune to witness a
+phenomenon of the kind on a very grand scale. Riding on the pampas one
+dark evening an hour after sunset, and passing from high ground
+overgrown with giant thistles to a low plain covered with long grass,
+bordering a stream of water, I found it all ablaze with myriads of
+fireflies. I noticed that all the insects gave out an exceptionally
+large, brilliant light, which shone almost steadily. The long grass was
+thickly studded with them, while they literally swarmed in the air, all
+moving up the valley with a singularly slow and languid flight. When I
+galloped down into this river of phosphorescent fire, my horse plunged
+and snorted with alarm. I succeeded at length in quieting him, and then
+rode slowly through, compelled to keep my mouth and eyes closed, so
+thickly did the insects rain on to my face. The air was laden with the
+sickening phosphorous smell they emit, but when I had once got free of
+the broad fiery zone, stretching away on either hand for miles along the
+moist valley, I stood still and gazed back for some time on a scene the
+most wonderful and enchanting I have ever witnessed.
+
+The fascinating and confusing effect which the appearance of fire at
+night has on animals is a most interesting subject; and although it is
+not probable that anything very fresh remains to be said about it, I am
+tempted to add here the results of my own experience.
+
+When travelling by night, I have frequently been struck with the
+behaviour of my horse at the sight of natural fire, or appearance of
+fire, always so different from that caused by the sight of fire
+artificially created. The steady gleam from the open window or door of a
+distant house, or even the unsteady wind-tossed flame of some lonely
+camp-fire, has only served to rouse a fresh spirit in him and the desire
+to reach it; whereas those infrequent displays of fire which nature
+exhibits, such as lightning, or the ignis fatuus, or even a cloud of
+fireflies, has always produced a disquieting effect. Experience has
+evidently taught the domestic horse to distinguish a light kindled by
+man from all others; and, knowing its character, he is just as well able
+as his rider to go towards it without experiencing that confusion of
+mind caused by a glare in the darkness, the origin and nature of which
+is a mystery. The artificially-lighted fire is to the horse only the
+possible goal of the journey, and is associated with the thought of rest
+and food. Wild animals, as a rule, at any rate in thinly-settled
+districts, do not know the meaning of any fire; it only excites
+curiosity and fear in them; and they are most disturbed at the sight of
+fires made by man, which are brighter and steadier than most natural
+fires. We can understand this sensation in animals, since we ourselves
+experience a similar one (although in a less degree and not associated
+with fear) in the effect which mere brightness has on us, both by day
+and night.
+
+On riding across the monotonous grey Patagonian uplands, where often for
+hours one sees not the faintest tinge of bright colour, the intense
+glowing crimson of a cactus-fruit, or the broad shining white bosom of
+the Patagonian eagle-buzzard (Buteo erythronotus), perched on the summit
+of a distant bush, has had a strangely fascinating effect on me, so that
+I have been unable to take my eyes off it as long as it continued before
+me. Or in passing through extensive desolate marshes, the dazzling white
+plumage of a stationary egret has exercised the same attraction. At
+night we experience the sensation in a greater degree, when the silver
+sheen of the moon makes a broad path on the water; or when a meteor
+leaves a glowing track across the sky; while a still more familiar
+instance is seen in the powerful attraction on the sight of glowing
+embers in a darkened room. The mere brightness, or vividness of the
+contrast, fascinates the mind; but the effect on man is comparatively
+weak, owing to his fiery education and to his familiarity with brilliant
+dyes artificially obtained from nature. How strong this attraction of
+mere brightness, even where there is no mystery about it, is to wild
+animals is shown by birds of prey almost invariably singling out white
+or bright-plumaged birds for attack where bright and sober-coloured
+kinds are mingled together. By night the attraction is immeasurably
+greater than by day, and the light of a fire steadily gazed at quickly
+confuses the mind. The fires which, travellers make for their protection
+actually serve to attract the beasts of prey, but the confusion and fear
+caused by the bright glare makes it safe for the traveller to lie down
+and sleep in the light. Mammals do not lose their heads altogether,
+because they are walking on firm ground where muscular exertion and an
+exercise of judgment are necessary at every step; whereas birds floating
+buoyantly and with little effort through the air are quickly bewildered.
+Incredible numbers of migratory birds kill them-selves by dashing
+against the windows of lighthouses; on bright moonlight nights the
+voyagers are comparatively safe; but during dark cloudy weather the
+slaughter is very great; over six hundred birds were killed by striking
+a lighthouse in Central America in a single night. On insects the effect
+is the same as on the higher animals: on the ground they are attracted
+by the light, but keep, like wolves and tigers, at a safe distance from
+it; when rushing through the air and unable to keep their eyes from it
+they fly into it, or else revolve about it, until, coming too close,
+their wings are singed.
+
+I find that when I am on horseback, going at a swinging gallop, a bright
+light affects me far more powerfully than when I am trudging along on
+foot. A person mounted on a bicycle and speeding over a level plain on a
+dark night, with nothing to guide him except the idea of the direction
+in his mind, would be to some extent in the position of the migratory
+bird. An exceptionally brilliant ignis fatuus flying before him would
+affect him as the gleam of a lamp placed high above the surface affects
+the migrants: he would not be able to keep his eyes from it, but would
+quickly lose the sense of direction, and probably end his career much as
+the bird does, by breaking his machine and perhaps his bones against
+some unseen obstruction in the way.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+FACTS AND THOUGHTS ABOUT SPIDERS.
+
+
+Some time ago, while turning over a quantity of rubbish in a little-used
+room, I disturbed a large black spider. Rushing forth, just in time to
+save itself from destruction through the capsizing of a pile of books,
+it paused for one moment, took a swift comprehensive glance at the
+position, then scuttled away across the floor, and was lost in an
+obscure corner of the room. This incident served to remind me of a fact
+I was nearly forgetting, that England is not a spiderless country. A
+foreigner, however intelligent, coming from warmer regions, might very
+easily make that mistake. In Buenos Ayres, the land of my nativity,
+earth teems with these interesting little creatures. They abound in and
+on the water, they swarm in the grass and herbage, which everywhere
+glistens with the silvery veil they spin over it. Indeed it is scarcely
+an exaggeration to say that there is an atmosphere of spiders, for they
+are always floating about invisible in the air; their filmy threads are
+unfelt when they fly against you; and often enough you are not even
+aware of the little arrested aeronaut hurrying over your face with feet
+lighter than the lightest thistledown.
+
+It is somewhat strange that although, where other tribes of living
+creatures are concerned, I am something of a naturalist, spiders I have
+always observed and admired in a non-scientific spirit, and this must be
+my excuse for mentioning the habits of some spiders without giving their
+specific names--an omission always vexing to the severely-technical
+naturalist. They have ministered to the love of the beautiful, the
+grotesque, and the marvellous in me; but I have never _collected_ a
+spider, and if I wished to preserve one should not know how to do it. I
+have been "familiar with the face" of these monsters so long that I have
+even learnt to love them; and I believe that if Emerson rightly predicts
+that spiders are amongst the things to be expelled from earth by the
+perfected man of the future, then a great charm and element of interest
+will be lost to nature. Though loving them, I cannot, of course, feel
+the same degree of affection towards all the members of so various a
+family. The fairy gossamer, scarce seen, a creature of wind and
+sunshine; the gem-like Epeira in the centre of its Starry web; even the
+terrestrial Salticus, with its puma-like strategy, certainly appeal more
+to our aesthetic feelings than does the slow heavy Mygale, looking at a
+distance of twenty yards away, as he approaches you, like a gigantic
+cockroach mounted on stilts. The rash fury with which the female
+wolf-spider defends her young is very admirable; but the admiration she
+excites is mingled with other feelings when we remember that the brave
+mother proves to her consort a cruel and cannibal spouse.
+
+Possibly my affection for spiders is due in a great measure to the
+compassion I have always felt for them. Pity, 'tis said, is akin to
+love; and who can help experiencing that tender emotion that considers
+the heavy affliction nature has laid on the spiders in compensation for
+the paltry drop of venom with which she, unasked, endowed them! And
+here, of course, I am alluding to the wasps. These insects, with a
+refinement of cruelty, prefer not to kill their victims outright, but
+merely maim them, then house them in cells where the grubs can vivisect
+them at leisure. This is one of those revolting facts the fastidious
+soul cannot escape from in warm climates; for in and out of open windows
+and doors, all day long, all the summer through, comes the busy
+beautiful mason-wasp. A long body, wonderfully slim at the waist, bright
+yellow legs and thorax, and a dark crimson abdomen,--what object can be
+prettier to look at? But in her life this wasp is not beautiful. At
+home in summer they were the pests of my life, for nothing would serve
+to keep them out. One day, while we were seated at dinner, a clay nest,
+which a wasp had succeeded in completing unobserved, detached itself
+from the ceiling and fell with a crash on to the table, where it was
+shattered to pieces, scattering a shower of green half-living spiders
+round it. I shall never forget the feeling of intense repugnance I
+experienced at the sight, coupled with detestation of the pretty but
+cruel little architect. There is, amongst our wasps, even a more
+accomplished spider-scourge than the mason-wasp, and I will here give a
+brief account of its habits. On the grassy pampas, dry bare spots of
+soil are resorted to by a class of spiders that either make or take
+little holes in the ground to reside in, and from which they rush forth
+to seize their prey. They also frequently sit inside their dens and
+patiently wait there for the intrusion of some bungling insect. Now, in
+summer, to a dry spot of ground like this, comes a small wasp, scarcely
+longer than a blue-bottle fly, body and wings of a deep shining purplish
+blue colour, with only a white mark like a collar on the thorax. It
+flirts its blue wings, hurrying about here and there, and is extremely
+active, and of a slender graceful figure--the type of an assassin. It
+visits and explores every crack and hole in the ground, and, if you
+watch it attentively, you will at length see it, on arriving at a hole,
+give a little start backwards. It knows that a spider lies concealed
+within. Presently, having apparently matured a plan of attack, it
+disappears into the hole and remains there for some time. Then, just
+when you are beginning to think that the little blue explorer has been
+trapped, out it rushes, flying in terror, apparently, from the spider
+who issues close behind in hot pursuit; but, before they are three
+inches away from the hole, quick as lightning the wasp turns on its
+follower, and the two become locked together in a deadly embrace.
+Looking like one insect, they spin rapidly round for a few moments, then
+up springs the wasp--victorious. The wretched victim is not dead; its
+legs move a little, but its soft body is paralyzed, and lies collapsed,
+flabby, and powerless as a stranded jellyfish. And this is the
+invariable result of every such conflict. In other classes of beings,
+even the weakest hunted thing occasionally succeeds in inflicting pain
+on its persecutor, and the small trembling mouse, unable to save itself,
+can sometimes make the cat shriek with paiu; but there is no weak spot
+in the wasp's armour, no fatal error of judgment, not even an accident,
+ever to save the wretched victim from its fate. And now comes the most
+iniquitous part of the proceeding. When the wasp has sufficiently rested
+after the struggle, it deliberately drags the disabled spider back into
+its own hole, and, having packed it away at the extremity, lays an egg
+alongside of it, then, coming out again, gathers dust and rubbish with
+which it fills up and obliterates the hole; and, having thus concluded
+its Machiavellian task, it flies cheerfully off in quest of another
+victim.
+
+The extensive Epeira family supply the mason-wasps and other
+spider-killers with the majority of their victims. These spiders have
+soft, plump, succulent bodies like pats of butter; they inhabit trees
+and bushes chiefly, where their geometric webs-betray their whereabouts;
+they are timid, comparatively innocuous, and reluctant to quit the
+shelter of their green bower, made of a rolled-up leaf; so that there
+are many reasons why they should be persecuted. They exhibit a great
+variety of curious forms; many are also very richly coloured; but even
+their brightest hues--orange, silver, scarlet--have not been given
+without regard to the colouring of their surroundings. Green-leafed
+bushes arc frequented by vividly green Epeiras, but the imitative
+resemblance does not quite end here. The green spider's method of
+escape, when the bush is roughly shaken, is to drop itself down on the
+earth, where it lies simulating death. In falling, it drops just as a
+green leaf would drop, that is, not quite so rapidly as a round, solid
+body like a beetle or spider. Now in the bushes there is another Epeira,
+in size and form like the last, but differing in colour; for instead of
+a vivid green, it is of a faded yellowish white--the exact hue of a
+dead, dried-up leaf. This spider, when it lets itself drop--for it has
+the same protective habit as the other--falls not so rapidly as a green
+freshly broken off leaf or as the green spider would fall, but with a
+slower motion, precisely like a leaf withered up till it has become
+almost light as a feather. It is not difficult to imagine how this comes
+about: either a thicker line, or a greater stiffness or tenacity of the
+viscid fluid composing the web and attached to the point the spider
+drops from, causes one to fall slower than the other. But how many
+tentative variations in the stiffness of the web material must there
+have been before the precise degree was attained enabling the two
+distinct species, differing in colour, to complete their resemblance to
+falling leaves--a fresh green leaf in one case and a dead, withered leaf
+in the other!
+
+The Tetragnatha--a genus of the Epeira family, and known also in
+England--are small spiders found on the margin of streams. Their bodies
+are slender, oblong, and resembling a canoe in shape; and when they sit
+lengthwise on a stem or blade of grass, their long, hair-like legs
+arranged straight before and behind them, it is difficult to detect
+them, so closely do they resemble a discoloured stripe on the herbage. A
+species of Tetragnatha with a curious modification of structure abounds
+on the pampas. The long leg of this spider is no thicker than a bristle
+from a pig's back, but at the extremity it is flattened and broad,
+giving it a striking resemblance to an oar. These spiders are only found
+in herbage overhanging the borders of streams: they are very numerous,
+and, having a pugnacious temper, are incessantly quarrelling; and it
+frequently happens that in these encounters, or where they are pursuing
+each other through the leaves, they drop into the water below. I
+believe, in fact, that they often drop themselves purposely into it as
+the readiest means of escape when hard pressed. When this happens, the
+advantage of the modified structure of the legs is seen. The fallen
+spider, sitting boat-like on the surface, throws out its long legs, and,
+dipping the broad ends into the water, literally rows itself rapidly to
+land.
+
+The gossamer-spider, most spiritual of living things, of which there are
+numerous species, some extremely beautiful in colouring and markings, is
+the most numerous of our spiders. Only when the declining sun flings a
+broad track of shiny silver light on the plain does one get some faint
+conception of the unnumbered millions of these buoyant little creatures
+busy weaving their gauzy veil over the earth and floating unseen, like
+an ethereal vital dust, in the atmosphere.
+
+This spider carries within its diminutive abdomen a secret which will
+possibly serve to vex subtle intellects for a long time to come; for it
+is hard to believe that merely by mechanical force, even aided by
+currents of air, a creature half as big as a barley grain can
+instantaneously snoot out filaments twenty or thirty inches long, and by
+means of which it floats itself in the air.
+
+Naturalists are now giving a great deal of attention to the migrations
+of birds in different parts of the world: might not insect and spider
+migrations be included with advantage to science in their observations?
+The common notion is that the gossamer makes use of its unique method of
+locomotion, only to shift its quarters, impelled by want of food or
+unfavourable conditions--perhaps only by a roving disposition. I believe
+that besides these incessant flittings about from place to place
+throughout the summer the gossamer-spiders have great periodical
+migrations which are, as a rule, in-visible, since a single floating web
+cannot be remarked, and each individual rises and floats away by itself
+from its own locality when influenced by the instinct. When great
+numbers of spiders rise up simultaneously over a large area, then,
+sometimes, the movement forces itself on our attention; for at such
+times the whole sky may be filled with visible masses of floating web.
+All the great movements of gossamers I have observed have occurred in
+the autumn, or, at any rate, several weeks after the summer solstice;
+and, like the migrations of birds at the same season of the year, have
+been in a northerly direction. I do not assert or believe that the
+migratory instinct in the gossamer is universal. In a moist island, like
+England, for instance, where the condition of the atmosphere is seldom
+favourable, and where the little voyagers would often be blown by
+adverse winds to perish far out at sea, it is difficult to believe that
+such migrations take place. But where they inhabit a vast area of land,
+as in South America, extending without interruption from the equator to
+the cold Magellanic regions, and where there is a long autumn of dry,
+hot weather, then such an instinct as migration might have been
+developed. For this is not a faculty merely of a few birds: the impulse
+to migrate at certain seasons affects birds, insects, and even mammals.
+In a few birds only is it highly developed, but the elementary feeling,
+out of which the wonderful habit of the swallow has grown, exists widely
+throughout animated nature. On the continent of Europe it also seems
+probable that a great autumnal movement of these spiders takes place;
+although, I must confess, I have no grounds for this statement, except
+that the floating gossamer is called in Germany "Der fliegender
+Summer"--the flying or departing summer.
+
+I have stated that all migrations of gossamers I have witnessed have
+been in the autumn; excepting in one instance, these flights occurred
+when the weather was still hot and dry. The exceptionally late migration
+was on March 22--a full month after the departure of martins,
+humming-birds, flycatchers, and most other true bird-migrants. It struck
+me as being so remarkable, and seems to lend so much force to the idea I
+have suggested, that I wish to give here an exact copy of the entries
+made at the time and on the spot in my notebook.
+
+"March 22. This afternoon, while I was out shooting, the
+gossamer-spiders presented an appearance quite new to me. Walking along
+a stream (the Conchitas, near Buenos Ayres), I noticed a broad white
+line skirting the low wet ground. This I found was caused by gossamer
+web lying in such quantities over the earth as almost to hide the grass
+ad thistles under it. The white zone was about twenty yards wide, and
+outside it only a few scattered webs were visible on the grass; its
+exact length I did not ascertain, but followed it for about two miles
+without finding the end. The spiders were so numerous that they
+continually baulked one another in their efforts to rise in the air. As
+soon as one threw out its lines they would become entangled with those
+of another spider, lanced out at the same moment; both spiders would
+immediately seem to know the cause of the trouble, for as soon as their
+lines fouled they would rush angrily towards each other, each trying to
+drive the other from the elevation. Notwithstanding these difficulties,
+numbers were continually floating off on the breeze which blew from the
+south.
+
+"I noticed three distinct species: one with a round scarlet body;
+another, velvet black, with large square cephalothorax and small pointed
+abdomen; the third and most abundant kind were of different shades of
+olive green, and varied greatly in size, the largest being fully a
+quarter of an inch in length. Apparently these spiders had been driven
+up from the low ground along the stream where it was wet, and had
+congregated along the borders of the dry ground in readiness to migrate.
+
+"25th. Went again to visit the spiders, scarcely expecting to find them,
+as, since first seeing them, we have had much wind and rain. To my
+surprise I found them in greatly increased numbers: on the tops of
+cardoons, posts, and other elevated situations they were literally lying
+together in heaps. Most of them were large and of the olive-coloured
+species; their size had probably prevented them from getting away
+earlier, but they were now floating off in great numbers, the weather
+being calm and tolerably dry. To-day I noticed a new species with a grey
+body, elegantly striped with black, and pink legs--a very pretty spider.
+
+"26th. Went again to-day and found that the whole vast army of
+gossamers, with the exception of a few stragglers sitting on posts and
+dry stalks, had vanished. They had taken advantage of the short spell of
+fine weather we are now having, after an unusually wet and boisterous
+autumn, to make their escape."
+
+Here it seemed to me that a conjunction of circumstances--first, the
+unfavourable season preventing migration at the proper time, and
+secondly, the strip of valley out of which the spiders had been driven
+to the higher ground till they were massed together--only served to make
+visible and evident that a vast annual migration takes place which we
+have only to look closely for to discover.
+
+One of the most original spiders in Buenos Ayres--mentally original, I
+mean--is a species of Pholcus; a quiet, inoffensive creature found in
+houses, and so abundant that they literally swarm where they are not
+frequently swept away from ceilings and obscure corners. Certainly it
+seems a poor spider after the dynamical and migratory gossamer; but it
+happens, curiously enough, that a study of the habits of this dusty
+domestic creature leads us incidentally into the realms of fable and
+romance. It is remarkable for the extreme length of its legs, and
+resembles in colour and general appearance a crane fly, but is double
+the size of that insect. It has a singular method of protecting itself:
+when attacked or approached even, gathering its feet together and
+fastening them to the centre of its web, it swings itself round and
+round with the velocity of a whirligig, so that it appears like a mist
+on the web, offering no point for an enemy to strike at. "When a fly is
+captured the spider approaches it cautiously and spins a web round it,
+continually narrowing the circle it describes, until the victim is
+inclosed in a cocoon-like covering. This is a common method with
+spiders; but the intelligence--for I can call it by no other word--of
+the Pholcus has supplemented this instinctive procedure with a very
+curious and unique habit. The Pholcus, in spite of its size, is a weak
+creature, possessing little venom to despatch its prey with, so that it
+makes a long and laborious task of killing a fly. A fly when caught in
+a web is a noisy creature, and it thus happens that when the
+Daddylonglegs--as Anglo-Argentines have dubbed this species--succeeds in
+snaring a captive the shrill outrageous cries of the victim are heard
+for a long time--often for ten or twelve minutes. This noise greatly
+excites other spiders in the vicinity, and presently they are seen
+quitting their webs and flurrying to the scene of conflict. Sometimes
+the captor is driven off, and then the strongest or most daring spider
+carries away the fly. But where a large colony are allowed to continue
+for a long time in undisturbed possession of a ceiling, when one has
+caught a fly he proceeds rapidly to throw a covering of web over it,
+then, cutting it away, drops it down and lets it hang suspended by a
+line at a distance of two or three feet from the ceiling. The other
+spiders arrive on the scene, and after a short investigation retreat to
+their own webs, and when the coast is clear our spider proceeds to draw
+up the captive fly, which is by this time exhausted with its struggles."
+
+Now, I have repeatedly remarked that all spiders, when the shrill
+humming of an insect caught in a web is heard near them, become
+agitated, like the Pholcus, and will, in the same way, quit their own
+webs and hurry to the point the sound proceeds from. This fact convinced
+me many years ago that spiders are attracted by the sound of musical
+instruments, such as violins, concertinas, guitars, &c., simply because
+the sound produces the same effect on them as the shrill buzzing of a
+captive fly. I have frequently seen spiders come down walls or from
+ceilings, attracted by the sound of a guitar, softly played; and by
+gently touching metal strings, stretched on a piece of wood, I have
+succeeded in attracting spiders on to the strings, within two or three
+inches of my fingers; and I always noticed that the spiders seemed to be
+eagerly searching for something which they evidently expected to find
+there, moving about in an excited manner and looking very hungry and
+fierce. I have no doubt that Pelisson's historical spider in the
+Bastille came down in a mood and with a manner just as ferocious when
+the prisoner called it with musical sounds to be fed.
+
+The spiders I have spoken of up till now are timid, inoffensive
+creatures, chiefly of the Epeira family; but there are many others
+exceedingly high-spirited and, like some of the most touchy
+hymenopteras, always prepared to "greatly quarrel" over matters of
+little moment. The Mygales, of which we have several species, are not to
+be treated with contempt. One is extremely abundant on the pampas, the
+Mygale fusca, a veritable monster, covered with dark brown hair, and
+called in the vernacular _aranea peluda_--hairy spider. In the hot
+month of December these spiders take to roaming about on the open plain,
+and are then everywhere seen travelling in a straight line with a slow
+even pace. They are very great in attitudes, and when one is approached
+it immediately throws itself back, like a pugilist preparing for an
+encounter, and stands up so erect on its four hind feet that the under
+surface of its body is displayed. Humble-bees are commonly supposed to
+carry the palm in attitudinizing; and it is wonderful to see the
+grotesque motions of these irascible insects when their nest is
+approached, elevating their abdomens and two or three legs at a time, so
+that they resemble a troupe of acrobats balancing themselves on their
+heads or hands, and kicking their legs about in the air. And to impress
+the intruder with the dangerous significance of this display they hum a
+shrill warning or challenge, and stab at the air with their naked
+stings, from which limpid drops of venom are seen to exude. These
+threatening gestures probably have an effect. In the case of the hairy
+spider, I do not think any creature, however stupid, could mistake its
+meaning when it stands suddenly up, a figure horribly grotesque; then,
+dropping down on all eights, charges violently forwards. Their long,
+shiny black, sickle-shaped falces are dangerous weapons. I knew a native
+woman who had been bitten on the leg, and who, after fourteen years,
+still suffered at intervals acute pains in the limb.
+
+The king of the spiders on the pampas is, however, not a Mygale, but a
+Lycosa of extraordinary size, light grey in colour, with a black ring
+round its middle. It is active and swift, and irritable to such a degree
+that one can scarcely help thinking that in this species nature has
+overshot her mark.
+
+When a person passes near one--say, within three or four yards of its
+lurking-place--it starts up and gives chase, and will often follow for a
+distance of thirty or forty yards. I came once very nearly being bitten
+by one of these savage creatures Riding at an easy trot over the dry
+grass, I suddenly observed a spider pursuing me, leaping swiftly along
+and keeping up with my beast. I aimed a blow with my whip, and the point
+of the lash struck the ground close to it, when it instantly leaped upon
+and ran up the lash, and was actually within three or four inches of my
+hand when I flung the whip from me.
+
+The gauchos have a very quaint ballad which tells that the city of
+Cordova was once invaded by an army of monstrous spiders, and that the
+townspeople went out with beating drums and flags flying to repel the
+invasion, and that after firing several volleys they were forced to turn
+and fly for their lives. I have no doubt that a sudden great increase of
+the man-chasing spiders, in a year exceptionally favourable to them,
+suggested this fable to some rhyming satirist of the town.
+
+In conclusion of this part of my subject, I will describe a single
+combat of a very terrible nature I once witnessed between two little
+spiders belong-ing to the same species. One had a small web against a
+wall, and of this web the other coveted possession. After vainly trying
+by a series of strategic movements to drive out the lawful owner, it
+rushed on to the web, and the two envenomed httle duellists closed in
+mortal combat. They did nothing so vulgar and natural as to make use of
+their falces, and never once actually touched each other, but the fight
+was none the less deadly. Rapidly revolving about, or leaping over, or
+passing under, each other, each endeavoured to impede or entangle his
+adversary, and the dexterity with which each avoided the cunningly
+thrown snare, trying at the same time to entangle its opponent, was
+wonderful to see. At length, after this equal battle had raged for some
+time, one of the combatants made some fatal mistake, and for a moment
+there occurred a break in his motions; instantly the other perceived his
+advantage, and began leaping backwards and forwards across his
+struggling adversary with such rapidity as to confuse the sight,
+producing the appearance of two spiders attacking a third one lying
+between them. He then changed his tactics, and began revolving round and
+round his prisoner, and very soon the poor vanquished wretch--the
+aggressor, let us hope, in the interests of justice--was closely wrapped
+in a silvery cocoon, which, unlike the cocoon the caterpillar weaves for
+itself, was also its winding-sheet.
+
+In the foregoing pages I have thrown together some of the most salient
+facts I have noted; but the spider-world still remains to me a
+wonderland of which I know comparatively nothing. Nor is any very
+intimate knowledge of spiders to be got from books, though numberless
+lists of new species are constantly being printed; for they have not yet
+had, like the social bees and ants, many loving and patient chroniclers
+of their ways. The Hubens and Lubbocks have been many; the Moggridges
+few. But even a very slight study of these most versatile and
+accomplished of nature's children gives rise to some interesting
+reflections. One fact that strikes the mind very forcibly is the
+world-wide distribution of groups of species possessing highly developed
+instincts. One is the zebra-striped Salticus, with its unique
+strategy--that is to say, unique amongst spiders. It is said that the
+Australian savage approaches a kangaroo in the open by getting up in
+sight of its prey and standing perfectly motionless till he is regarded
+as an inanimate object, and every time the animal's attention wanders
+advancing a step or two until sufficiently near to hurl his spear. The
+Salticus approaches a fly in the same manner, till near enough to make
+its spring. Another is the Trapdoor spider. Another the Dolomedes, that
+runs over the surface of the water in pursuit of its prey, and dives
+down to escape from its enemies; and, strangest of all, the Argyroneta,
+that has its luminous dwelling at the bottom of streams; and just as a
+mason carries bricks and mortar to its building, so does this spider
+carry down bubbles of air from the surface to enlarge its mysterious
+house, in which it lays its eggs and rears its young. Community of
+descent must be supposed of species having such curious and complex
+instincts; but how came these feeble creatures, unable to transport
+themselves over seas and continents like the aerial gossamer, to be so
+widely distributed, and inhabiting regions with such different
+conditions? This can only be attributed to the enormous antiquity of the
+species, and of this antiquity the earliness in which the instinct
+manifests itself in the young spiders is taken as evidence.
+
+A more important matter, the intelligence of spiders, has not yet
+received the attention it deserves. The question of insect
+intelligence--naturalists are agreed that insects do possess
+intelligence--is an extremely difficult one; probably some of our
+conclusions on this matter will have to be reconsidered. For instance,
+we regard the Order Hymenoptera as the most intelligent because most of
+the social insects are included in it; but it has not yet been proved,
+probably never will be proved, that the social instincts resulted from
+intelligence which has "lapsed." Whether ants and bees were more
+intelligent than other insects during the early stages of their organic
+societies or not, it will hardly be disputed by any naturalist who has
+observed insects for long that many solitary species display more
+intelligence in their actions than those that live in communities.
+
+The nature of the spider's food and the difficulties in the way of
+providing for their wants impose on them a life of solitude: hunger,
+perpetual watchfulness, and the sense of danger have given them a
+character of mixed ferocity and timidity. But these very conditions,
+which have made it impossible for them to form societies like some
+insects and progress to a state of things resembling civilization in
+men, have served to develop the mind that is in a spider, making of him
+a very clever barbarian-The spider's only weapon of defence---his
+falces--are as poor a protection against the assaults of his insect foes
+as are teeth and finger-nails in man employed against wolves, bears, and
+tigers. And the spider is here even worse off than man, since his
+enemies are winged and able to sweep down instantly on him from above;
+they are also protected with an invulnerable shield, and are armedwith
+deadly stings. Like man, also, the spider has a soft, unprotected body,
+while his muscular strength, compared with that of the insects he has to
+contend with, is almost _nil._ His position in nature then, with
+relation to his enemies, is like that of man; only the spider has this
+disadvantage, that he cannot combine with others for protection. That he
+does protect himself and maintains his place in nature is due, not to
+special instincts, which are utterly insufficient, but to the
+intelligence which supplements them. At the same time this superior
+cunning is closely related with, and probably results indirectly from,
+the web he is provided with, and which is almost of the nature of an
+artificial aid. Let us take the imaginary case of a man-like monkey, or
+of an arboreal man, born with a cord of great length attached to his
+waist, which could be either dragged after him or carried in a coil.
+After many accidents, experience would eventually teach him to put it to
+some use; practice would make him more and more skilful in handling it,
+and, indirectly, it would be the means of developing his latent mental
+faculties. He would begin by using it, as the monkey does its prehensile
+tail, to swing himself from branch to branch, and finally, to escape
+from an enemy or in pursuit of his prey, he would be able by means of
+his cord to drop himself with safety from the tallest trees, or fly down
+the steepest precipices. He would coil up his cord to make a bed to lie
+on, and also use it for binding branches together when building himself
+a refuge. In a close fight, he would endeavour to entangle an adversary,
+and at last he would learn to make a snare with it to capture his prey.
+To all these, and to a hundred other uses, the spider has put his web.
+And when we see him spread his beautiful geometric snare, held by lines
+fixed to widely separated points, while he sits concealed in his
+web-lined retreat amongst the leaves where every touch on the
+far-reaching structure is telegraphed to him by the communicating line
+faithfully as if a nerve had been touched, we must admire the wonderful
+perfection to which he has attained in the use of his cord. By these
+means he is able to conquer creatures too swift and strong for him, and
+make them his prey. When we see him repairing damages, weighting his
+light fabric in windy weather with pebbles or sticks, as a fisher
+weights his net, and cutting loose a captive whose great strength
+threatens the destruction of the web, then we begin to suspect that he
+has, above his special instinct, a reason that guides, modifies, and in
+many ways supplements it. It is not, however, only on these great
+occasions, when the end is sought by unusual means, that spiders show
+their intelligence; for even these things might be considered by some as
+merely parts of one great complex instinct; but at all times, in all
+things, the observer who watches them closely cannot fail to be
+convinced that they possess a guiding principle which is not mere
+instinct. What the stick or stone was to primitive man, when he had made
+the discovery that by holding it in his hand he greatly increased the
+force of his blow, the possession of a web has been to the spider in
+developing that spark of intellect which it possesses in common with all
+animal organisms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE DEATH-FEIGNING INSTINCT.
+
+
+Most people are familiar with the phenomenon of "death-feigning,"
+commonly seen in coleopterous insects, and in many spiders. This highly
+curious instinct is also possessed by some vertebrates. In insects it is
+probably due to temporary paralysis occasioned by sudden concussion, for
+when beetles alight abruptly, though voluntarily, they assume that
+appearance of death, which lasts for a few moments. Some species,
+indeed, are so highly sensitive that the slightest touch, or even a
+sudden menace, will instantly throw them into this motionless,
+death-simulating condition. Curiously enough, the same causes which
+produce this trance in slow-moving species, like those of Scarabseus for
+example, have a precisely contrary effect on species endowed with great
+activity. Rapacious beetles, when disturbed, scuttle quickly out of
+sight, and some water-beetles spin about the surface, in circles or
+zigzag lines, so rapidly as to confuse the eye. Our common long-legged
+spiders (Pholcus) when approached draw their feet together in the middle
+of the web, and spin the body round with such velocity as to resemble a
+whirligig.
+
+Certain mammals and birds also possess the death-simulating instinct,
+though it is hardly possible to believe that the action springs from the
+same immediate cause in vertebrates and in insects. In the latter it
+appears to be a purely physical instinct, the direct result of an
+extraneous cause, and resembling the motions of a plant. In mammals and
+birds it is evident that violent emotion, and not the rough handling
+experienced, is the final cause of the swoon.
+
+Passing over venomous snakes, skunks, and a few other species in which
+the presence of danger excites only anger, fear has a powerful, and in
+some cases a disabling, effect on animals; and it is this paralyzing
+effect of fear on which the death-feigning instinct, found only in a few
+widely-separated species, has probably been built up by the slow
+cumulative process of natural selection.
+
+I have met with some curious instances of the paralyzing effect of fear.
+I was told by some hunters in an outlying district of the pampas of its
+effect on a jaguar they started, and which took refuge in a dense clump
+of dry reeds. Though they could see it, it was impossible to throw the
+lasso over its head, and, after vainly trying to dislodge it, they at
+length set fire to the reeds. Still it refused to stir, but lay with
+head erect, fiercely glaring at them through the flames. Finally it
+disappeared from sight in the black smoke; and when the fire had burnt
+itself out, it was found, dead and charred, in the same spot.
+
+On the pampas the gauchos frequently take the black-necked swan by
+frightening it. When the birds are feeding or resting on the grass, two
+or three men or boys on horseback go quietly to leeward of the flock,
+and when opposite to it suddenly wheel and charge it at full speed,
+uttering loud shouts, by which the birds are thrown into such terror
+that they are incapable of flying, and are quickly despatched.
+
+I have also seen gaucho boys catch the Silver-bill (Lichenops
+perspicillata) by hurling a stick or stone at the bird, then rushing at
+it, when it sits perfectly still, disabled by fear, and allows itself to
+be taken. I myself once succeeded in taking a small bird of another
+species in the same way.
+
+Amongst mammals our common fox (Canis azarae), and one of the opossums
+(Didelphys azarae), are strangely subject to the death-simulating swoon.
+For it does indeed seem strange that animals so powerful, fierce, and
+able to inflict such terrible injury with their teeth should also
+possess this safeguard, apparently more suited to weak inactive
+creatures that cannot resist or escape from an enemy and to animals very
+low down in the scale of being. When a fox is caught in a trap or run
+down by dogs he fights savagely at first, but by-and-by relaxes his
+efforts, drops on the ground, and apparently yields up the ghost. The
+deception is so well carried out, that dogs are constantly taken in by
+it, and no one, not previously acquainted with this clever trickery of
+nature, but would at once pronounce the creature dead, and worthy of
+some praise for having perished in so brave a spirit. Now, when in this
+condition of feigning death, I am quite sure that the animal does not
+altogether lose consciousness. It is exceedingly difficult to discover
+any evidence of life in the opossum; but when one withdraws a little way
+from the feigning fox, and watches him very attentively, a slight
+opening of the eye may be detected; and, finally, when left to himself,
+he does not recover and start up like an animal that has been stunned,
+but slowly and cautiously raises his head first, and only gets up when
+his foes are at a safe distance. Yet I have seen gauchos, who are very
+cruel to animals, practise the most barbarous experiments on a captive
+fox without being able to rouse it into exhibiting any sign of life.
+This has greatly puzzled me, since, if death-feigning is simply a
+cunning habit, the animal could not suffer itself to be mutilated
+without wincing. I can only believe that the fox, though not insensible,
+as its behaviour on being left to itself appears to prove, yet has its
+body thrown by extreme terror into that benumbed condition which
+simulates death, and during which it is unable to feel the tortures
+practised on it.
+
+The swoon sometimes actually takes place before the animal has been
+touched, and even when the exciting cause is at a considerable distance.
+I was once riding with a gaucho, when we saw, on the open level ground
+before us, a fox, not yet fully grown, standing still and watching our
+approach. All at once it dropped, and when we came up to the spot it was
+lying stretched out, with eyes closed, and apparently dead. Before
+passing on my companion, who said it was not the first time he had seen
+such a thing, lashed it vigorously with his whip for some moments, but
+without producing the slightest effect.
+
+The death-feigning instinct is possessed in a very marked degree by the
+spotted tinamou or common partridge of the pampas (Nothura maculosa).
+When captured, after a few violent struggles to escape, it drops its
+head, gasps two or three times, and to all appearances dies. If, when
+you have seen this, you release your hold, the eyes open instantly, and,
+with startling suddenness and a noise of wings, it is up and away, and
+beyond your reach for ever. Possibly, while your grasp is on the bird it
+does actually become insensible, though its recovery from that condition
+is almost instantaneous. Birds when captured do sometimes die in the
+hand, purely from terror. The tinamou is excessively timid, and
+sometimes when birds of this species are chased--for gaucho boys
+frequently run them down on horseback--and when they find no burrows or
+thickets to escape into, they actually drop down dead on the plain.
+Probably, when they feign death in their captor's hand, they are in
+reality very near to death.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+HUMMING-BIRDS.
+
+
+Humming-birds are perhaps the very loveliest things in nature, and many
+celebrated writers have exhausted their descriptive powers in vain
+efforts to picture them to the imagination. The temptation was certainly
+great, after describing the rich setting of tropical foliage and flower,
+to speak at length of the wonderful gem contained within it; but they
+would in this case have been wise to imitate that modest novel-writer
+who introduced a blank space on the page where the description of his
+matchless heroine should have appeared. After all that has been written,
+the first sight of a living humming-bird, so unlike in its beauty all
+other beautiful things, comes like a revelation to the mind. To give any
+true conception of it by means of mere word-painting is not more
+impossible than it would be to bottle up a supply of the "living
+sunbeams" themselves, and convey them across the Atlantic to scatter
+them in a sparkling shower over the face of England.
+
+Doubtless many who have never seen them in a state of nature imagine
+that a tolerably correct idea of their appearance can be gained from
+Gould's colossal monograph. The pictures there, however, only represent
+dead humming-birds. A dead robin is, for purposes of bird-portraiture,
+as good as a live robin; the same may be said of even many
+brilliant-plumaged species less aerial in their habits than
+humming-birds. In butterflies the whole beauty is seldom seen until the
+insect is dead, or, at any rate, captive. It was not when Wallace saw
+the Ornithoptera croesus flying about, but only when he held it in his
+hands, and opened its glorious wings, that the sight of its beauty
+overcame him so powerfully. The special kind of beauty which makes the
+first sight of a humming-bird a revelation depends on the swift singular
+motions as much as on the intense gem-like and metallic brilliancy of
+the plumage.
+
+The minute exquisite form, when the bird hovers on misty wings, probing
+the flowers with its coral spear, the fan-like tail expanded, and
+poising motionless, exhibits the feathers shot with many hues; and the
+next moment vanishes, or all but vanishes, then reappears at another
+flower only to vanish again, and so on successively, showing its
+splendours not continuously, but like the intermitted flashes of the
+firefly--this forms a picture of airy grace and loveliness that baffles
+description. All this glory disappears when the bird is dead, and even
+when it alights to rest on a bough. Sitting still, it looks like an
+exceedingly attenuated kingfisher, without the pretty plumage of that
+bird, but retaining its stiff artificial manner. No artist has been so
+bold as to attempt to depict the bird as it actually appears, when
+balanced before a flower the swift motion of the wings obliterates their
+form, making them seem like a mist encircling the body; yet it is
+precisely this formless cloud on which the glittering body hangs
+suspended, which contributes most to give the humming-bird its wonderful
+sprite-like or extra-natural appearance. How strange, then, to find
+bird-painters persisting in their efforts to show the humming-bird
+flying! When they draw it stiff and upright on its perch the picture is
+honest, if ugly; the more ambitious representation is a delusion and a
+mockery.
+
+Coming to the actual colouring--the changeful tints that glow with such
+intensity on the scale-like feathers, it is curious to find that Gould
+seems to have thought that all difficulties here had been successfully
+overcome. The "new process" he spoke so confidently about might no doubt
+be used with advantage in reproducing the coarser metallic reflections
+on a black plumage, such as we see in the corvine birds; but the
+glittering garment of the humming-bird, like the silvery lace woven by
+the Epeira, gemmed with dew and touched with rainbow-coloured light, has
+never been and never can be imitated by art.
+
+On this subject one of the latest observers of humming-birds, Mr.
+Everard im Thurn, in his work on British Guiana, has the following
+passage:--"Hardly more than one point of colour is in reality ever
+visible in any one humming-bird at one and the same time, for each point
+only shows its peculiar and glittering colour when the light falls upon
+it from a particular direction. A true representation of one of these
+birds would show it in somewhat sombre colours, except just at the one
+point which, when the bird is in the position chosen for representation,
+meets the light at the requisite angle, and that point alone should be
+shown in full brilliance of colour. A flowery shrub is sometimes seen
+surrounded by a cloud of humming-birds, all of one species, and each, of
+course, in a different position. If someone would draw such a scene as
+that, showing a different detail of colour in each bird, according to
+its position, then some idea of the actual appearance of the bird might
+be given to one who had never seen an example."
+
+It is hardly to be expected that anyone will carry out the above
+suggestion, and produce a monograph with pages ten or fifteen feet wide
+by eighteen feet long, each one showing a cloud of humming-birds of one
+species flitting about a flowery bush; but even in such a picture as
+that would be, the birds, suspended on unlovely angular projections
+instead of "hazy semicircles of indistinctness," and each with an
+immovable fleck of brightness on the otherwise sombre plumage, would be
+as unlike living humming-birds as anything in the older monographs.
+
+Whether the glittering iridescent tints and singular ornaments for which
+this family is famous result from the cumulative process of conscious or
+voluntary sexual selection, as Darwin thought, or are merely the outcome
+of a superabundant vitality, as Dr. A. R.. Wallace so strongly
+maintains, is a question which science has not yet answered
+satisfactorily. The tendency to or habit of varying in the direction of
+rich colouring and beautiful or fantastic ornament, might, for all we
+know to the contrary, have descended to humming-birds from some
+diminutive, curiously-shaped, bright-tinted, flying reptile of arboreal
+habits that lived in some far-off epoch in the world's history. It is
+not, at all events, maintained by anyone that _all_ birds sprang
+originally from one reptilian stock; and the true position of
+humming-birds in a natural classification has not yet been settled, for
+no intermediate forms exist connecting them with any other group, To the
+ordinary mind they appear utterly unlike all other feathered creatures,
+and as much entitled to stand apart as, for instance, the pigeon and
+ostrich families. It has been maintained by some writers that they are
+anatomically related to the swifts, although the differences separating
+the two families appear so great as almost to stagger belief in this
+notion. Now, however, the very latest authority on this subject, Dr.
+Schufeldt, has come to the conclusion that swifts are only greatly
+modified Passeres, and that the humming-birds should form an order by
+themselves.
+
+Leaving this question, and regarding them simply with the ornithological
+eye that does not see far below the surface of things, when we have
+sufficiently admired the unique beauty and marvellous velocity of
+humming-birds, there is little more to be said about them. They are
+lovely to the eye--indescribably so; and it is not strange that Gould
+wrote rapturously of the time when he was at length "permitted to revel
+in the delight of seeing the humming-bird in a state of nature." The
+feeling, he wrote, which animated him with regard to these most
+wonderful works of creation it was impossible to describe, and could
+only be appreciated by those who have made natural history a study, and
+who "pursue the investigations of her charming mysteries with ardour and
+delight." This we can understand; but to what an astonishing degree the
+feeling was carried in him, when, after remarking that enthusiasm and
+excitement with regard to most things in life become lessened and
+eventually deadened by time in most of us, he was able to add, "not
+so, however, I believe, with those who take up the study of the Family
+of Humming-birds!" It can only be supposed that he regarded natural
+history principally as a "science of dead animals--a _necrology_," and
+collected humming-birds just as others collect Roman coins, birds' eggs,
+old weapons, or blue china, their zeal in the pursuit and faith in its
+importance increasing with the growth of their treasures, until they at
+last come to believe that though all the enthusiasms and excitements
+which give a zest to the lives of other men fade and perish with time,
+it is not so with their particular pursuit. The more rational kind of
+pleasure experienced by the ornithologist in studying habits and
+disposition no doubt results in a great measure from the fact that the
+actions of the feathered people have a savour of intelligence in them.
+Whatever his theory or conviction about the origin of instincts may
+happen to be, or even if he has no convictions on the subject, it must
+nevertheless seem plain to him that intelligence is, after all, in most
+cases, the guiding principle of life, supplementing and modifying habits
+to bring them into closer harmony with the environment, and enlivening
+every day with countless little acts which result from judgment and
+experience, and form no part of the inherited complex instincts. The
+longer he observes any one species or individual, the more does he find
+in it to reward his attention; this is not the case, however, with
+humming-birds, which possess the avian body but do not rank mentally
+with birds. The pleasure one takes in their beauty soon evaporates, and
+is succeeded by no fresh interest, so monotonous and mechanical are all
+their actions; and we accordingly find that those who are most familiar
+with them from personal observation have very little to say about them.
+A score of hummingbirds, of as many distinct species, are less to the
+student of habits than one little brown-plurnaged bird haunting his
+garden or the rush-bed of a neighbouring stream; and, doubtless, for a
+reason similar to that which makes a lovely human face uninformed by
+intellect seem less permanently attractive than many a homelier
+countenance. He grows tired of seeing the feathered fairies perpetually
+weaving their aerial ballet-dance about the flowers, and finds it a
+relief to watch the little finch or wren or flycatcher of shy temper and
+obscure protective colouring. Perhaps it possesses a graceful form and
+melodious voice to give it aesthetic value, but even without such
+accessories he can observe it day by day with increasing interest and
+pleasure; and it only adds piquancy to the feeling to know that the
+little bird also watches him with a certain amount of intelligent
+curiosity and a great deal of suspicion, and that it studiously
+endeavours to conceal from him all the little secrets its life which he
+is bent on discovering.
+
+It has frequently been remarked that humming birds are more like insects
+than birds in disposition. Some species, on quitting their perch,
+perform wide bee-like circles about the tree before shooting away in a
+straight line. Their aimless attacks on other species approaching or
+passing near them, even on large birds like hawks and pigeons, is a
+habit they have in common with many solitary wood-boring bees. They
+also, like dragon-flies and other insects, attack each other when they
+come together while feeding; and in this case their action strangely
+resembles that of a couple of butterflies, as they revolve about each
+other and rise vertically to a great height in the air. Again, like
+insects, they are undisturbed at the presence of man while feeding, or
+even when engaged in building and incubation; and like various solitary
+bees, wasps, &c., they frequently come close to a person walking or
+standing, to hover suspended in the air within a few inches of his face;
+and if then struck at they often, insect-like, return to circle round
+his head. All other birds, even those which display the least
+versatility, and in districts where man is seldom seen, show as much
+caution as curiosity in his presence; they recognize in the upright
+unfamiliar form a living being and a possible enemy. Mr. Whiteley, who
+observed humming-birds in Peru, says it is an amusing sight to watch the
+Lesbia nuna attempting to pass to a distant spot in a straight line
+during a high wind, which, acting on the long tail feathers, carries it
+quite away from the point aimed at. Insects presenting a large surface
+to the wind are always blown from their course in the same way, for even
+in the most windy districts they never appear to learn to guide
+themselves; and I have often seen a butterfly endeavouring to reach an
+isolated flower blown from it a dozen times before it finally succeeded
+or gave up the contest. Birds when shaping their course, unless young
+and inexperienced, always make allowance for the force of the wind.
+Humming-birds often fly into open rooms, impelled apparently by a
+fearless curiosity, and may then be chased about until they drop
+exhausted or are beaten down and caught, and, as Gould says, "if then
+taken into the hand, they almost immediately feed on any sweet, or pump
+up any liquid that may be offered to them, without betraying either fear
+or resentment at the previous treatment." Wasps and bees taken in the
+same way endeavour to sting their captor, as most people know from
+experience, nor do they cease struggling violently to free themselves;
+but the dragon-fly is like the humming-bird, and is no sooner caught
+after much ill-treatment, than it will greedily devour as many flies and
+mosquitoes as one likes to offer it. Only in beings very low in the
+scale of nature do we see the instinct of self-preservation in this
+extremely simple condition, unmixed with reason or feeling, and so
+transient in its effects. The same insensibility to danger is seen when
+humming-birds are captured and confined in a room, and when, before a
+day is over, they will flutter about their captor's face and even take
+nectar from his lips.
+
+Some observers have thought that hummingbirds come nearest to
+humble-bees in their actions. I do not think so. Mr. Bates writes: "They
+do not proceed in that methodical manner which bees follow, taking the
+flowers seriatim, but skip about from one part of a tree to another in
+the most capricious manner." I have observed humble-bees a great deal,
+and feel convinced that they arc among the most highly intelligent of
+the social hymenoptera. Humming-birds, to my mind, have a much closer
+resemblance to the solitary wood-boring bees and to dragon-flies. It
+must also be borne in mind that insects have very little time in which
+to acquire experience, and that a large portion of their life, in the
+imago state, is taken up with the complex business of reproduction.
+
+The Trochilidae, although confined to one continent, promise to exceed
+all other families--even the cosmopolitan finches and warblers--in
+number of species. At present over five hundred are known, or as many as
+all the species of birds in Europe together; and good reasons exist for
+believing that very many more--not less perhaps than one or two hundred
+species--yet remain to be discovered. The most prolific region, and
+where humming-birds are most highly developed, is known to be West
+Brazil and the eastern slopes of the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. This
+is precisely the least known portion of South America; the few
+naturalists and collectors who have reached it have returned laden with
+spoil, to tell us of a region surpassing all others in the
+superabundance and beauty of its bird life. Nothing, however, which can
+be said concerning these vast unexplored areas of tropical mountain and
+forest so forcibly impresses us with the idea of the unknown riches
+contained in them as the story of the Loddigesia mirabilis. This is
+perhaps the most wonderful humming-bird known, and no one who had not
+previously seen it figured could possibly form an idea of what it is
+like from a mere description. An outline sketch of it would probably be
+taken by most people as a fantastic design representing a bird-form in
+combination with leaves, in size and shape resembling poplar leaves, but
+on leaf-stalks of an impossible length, curving and crossing each other
+so as to form geometrical figures unlike anything in nature. Yet this
+bird (a single specimen) was obtained in Peru half a century ago, and
+for upwards of twenty years after its discovery Gould tried to obtain
+others, offering as much as fifty pounds for one; but no second specimen
+ever gladdened his eyes, nor was anything more heard of it until
+Stolzmann refound it in the year 1880.
+
+The addition of many new species to the long list would, however, be a
+matter of small interest, unless fresh facts concerning their habits and
+structure were at the same time brought to light; but we can scarcely
+expect that the as yet unknown species will supply any link connecting
+the Trochilidae with other existing families of birds. The eventual
+conclusion will perhaps be that this family has come down independently
+from an exceedingly remote past, and with scarcely any modification.
+While within certain very narrow limits humming-birds vary more than
+other families, outside of these limits they appear relatively
+stationary; and, conversely, other birds exhibit least variability in
+the one direction in which humming-birds vary excessively. On account of
+a trivial difference in habit they have sometimes been separated in two
+sub-families: the Phaethornithinae, found in shady tropical forests; and
+the Trochilinae, comprising humming-birds which inhabit open sunny
+places--and to this division they mostly belong. In both of these purely
+arbitrary groups, however, the aerial habits and manner of feeding
+poised in the air are identical, although the birds living in shady
+forests, where flowers are scarce, obtain their food principally from
+the under surfaces of leaves. In their procreant habits the uniformity
+is also very great. In all cases the nest is small, deep, cup-shaped, or
+conical, composed of soft felted materials, and lined inside with
+vegetable down. The eggs are white, and never exceed two in number.
+Broadly speaking, they resemble each other as closely in habits as in
+structure; the greatest differences in habit in the most widely
+separated genera being no greater than may be found in two wrens or
+sparrows of the same genus.
+
+This persistence of character in humming-birds, both as regards
+structure and habit, seems the more remarkable when we consider their
+very wide distribution over a continent so varied in its conditions, and
+where they range from the lowest levels to the limit of perpetual snow
+on the Andes, and from the tropics to the wintry Magellanic district;
+also that a majority of genera inhabit very circumscribed areas--these
+facts, as Dr. Wallace remarks, clearly pointing to a very high
+antiquity.
+
+It is perhaps a law of nature that when a species (or group) fits itself
+to a place not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to no
+opposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so great a
+perfection as to be able easily to overcome all opposition, the
+character eventually loses its original plasticity, or tendency to vary,
+since improvement in such a case would be superfluous, and becomes, so
+to speak, crystallized in that form which continues thereafter
+unaltered. It is, at any rate, clear that while all other birds rub
+together in the struggle for existence, the humming-bird, owing to its
+aerial life and peculiar manner of seeking its food, is absolutely
+untouched by this kind of warfare, and is accordingly as far removed
+from all competition with other birds as the solitary savage is removed
+from the struggle of life affecting and modifying men in crowded
+communities. The lower kind of competition affecting hummingbirds, that
+with insects and, within the family, of species with species, has
+probably only served to intensify their unique characteristics, and,
+perhaps, to lower their intelligence.
+
+Not only are they removed from that indirect struggle for existence
+which acts so powerfully on other families, but they are also, by their
+habits and the unequalled velocity of their flight, placed out of reach
+of that direct war waged on all other small birds by the rapacious
+kinds--birds, mammals, and reptiles. One result of this immunity is that
+humming-birds are excessively numerous, albeit such slow breeders; for,
+as we have seen, they only lay two eggs, and not only so, but the second
+egg is often dropped so long after incubation has begun in the first
+that only one is really hatched. Yet Belt expressed the opinion that in
+Nicaragua, where he observed humming-birds, they out-numbered all the
+other birds together. Considering how abundant birds of all kinds are in
+that district, and that most of them have a protective colouring and lay
+several eggs, it would be impossible to accept such a statement unless
+we believed that humming-birds have, practically, no enemies.
+
+Another result of their immunity from persecution is the splendid
+colouring and strange and beautiful feather ornaments distinguishing
+them above all other birds; and excessive variation in this direction is
+due, it seems to me, to the very causes which serve to check variation
+in all other directions. In their plumage, as Martin long ago wrote,
+nature has strained at every variety of effect and revelled in an
+infinitude of modifications. How wonderful their garb is, with colours
+so varied, so intense, yet seemingly so evanescent!--the glittering
+mantle of powdered gold; the emerald green that changes to velvet black;
+ruby reds and luminous scarlets; dull bronze that brightens and burns
+like polished brass, and pale neutral tints that kindle to rose and
+lilac-coloured flame. And to the glory of prismatic colouring are added
+feather decorations, such as the racket-plumes and downy muffs of
+Spathura, the crest and frills of Lophornis, the sapphire gorget burning
+on the snow-white breast of Oreotrochilus, the fiery tail of Cometes,
+and, amongst grotesque forms, the long pointed crest-feathers,
+representing horns, and flowing-white beard adorning the piebald
+goat-like face of Oxypogon.
+
+Excessive variation in this direction is checked in nearly all other
+birds by the need of a protective colouring, few kinds so greatly
+excelling in strength and activity as to be able to maintain their
+existence without it. Bright feathers constitute a double danger, for
+not only do they render their possessor conspicuous, but, just as the
+butterfly chooses the gayest flower, so do hawks deliberately single out
+from many obscure birds the one with brilliant plumage; but the
+rapacious kinds do not waste their energies in the vain pursuit of
+hummingbirds. These are in the position of neutrals, free to range at
+will amidst the combatants, insulting all alike, and flaunting their
+splendid colours with impunity. They are nature's favourites, endowed
+with faculties bordering on the miraculous, and all other kinds, gentle
+or fierce, ask only to be left alone by them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE CRESTED SCREAMER.
+
+_(Chalina chavarria.)_
+
+
+Amongst the feathered notables from all parts of the world found
+gathered at the Zoological Gardens in London is the Crested Screamer
+from South America. It is in many respects a very singular species, and
+its large size, great strength, and majestic demeanour, with the
+surprising docility and intelligence it displays when domesticated, give
+it a character amongst birds somewhat like that of the elephant amongst
+mammals. Briefly and roughly to describe it: in size it is like a swan,
+in shape like a lapwing, only with a powerful curved gallinaceous beak.
+It is adorned with a long pointed crest and a black neck-ring, the
+plumage being otherwise of a pale slaty blue, while the legs and the
+naked skin about the eyes are bright red. On each wing, in both sexes,
+there are two formidable spurs; the first one, on the second joint, is
+an inch and a half long, nearly straight, triangular, and exceedingly
+sharp; the second spur, on the last joint, being smaller, broad, and
+curved, and roughly resembling in shape and size a lion's claw. There is
+another stinking peculiarity. The skin is _emphysematous_--that is,
+bloated and yielding to pressure. It crackles when touched, and the
+surface, when the feathers are removed, presents a swollen bubbly
+appearance; for under the skin there is a layer of air-bubbles extending
+over the whole body and even down the legs under the horny tesselated
+skin to the toes, the legs thus having a somewhat massive appearance.
+
+And now just a few words about the position of the screamer in
+systematic zoology. It is placed in the Family Palamedeidae, which
+contains only three species, but about the Order it belongs to there is
+much disagreement. It was formerly classed with the rails, and in
+popular books of Natural History still keeps its place with them. "Now
+the rail-tribe," says Professor Parker, speaking on this very matter,
+"has for a long time been burdened (on paper) with a very false army
+list. Everything alive that has had the misfortune to be possessed of
+large unwieldy feet has been added to this feeble-minded cowardly group,
+until it has become a mixed multitude with discordant voices and with
+manners and customs having no consonance or relation." He takes the
+screamer from the rail-tribe and classes it with the geese (as also does
+Professor Huxley), and concludes his study with these words:--"Amongst
+living birds there is not one possessing characters of higher interest,
+none that I am acquainted with come nearer, in some important points, to
+the lizard; and there are parts of the organization which make it very
+probable that it is one of the nearest living relations of the
+marvellous _Archaeopteryx_"--an intermediate form between birds and
+reptiles belonging to the Upper Jurassic period.
+
+The screamer's right to dwell with the geese has not been left
+unchallenged. The late Professor Garrod finds that "from considerations
+of pterylosis, visceral anatomy, myology, and osteology the screamer
+cannot be placed along with the Anserine birds." He finds that in some
+points it resembles the ostrich and rhea, and concludes: "It seems
+therefore to me that, summing these results, the screamer must have
+sprung from the primary avian stock as an independent offshoot at much
+the same time as did most of the other important families." This time,
+he further tells us, was when there occurred a general break-up of the
+ancient terrestrial bird-type, when the acquisition of wings brought
+many intruders into domains already occupied, calling forth a new
+struggle for existence, and bringing out many special qualities by means
+of natural selection.
+
+With this archaeological question I have little to do, and only quote
+the above great authorities to show that the screamer appears to be
+nearly the last descendant of an exceedingly ancient family, with little
+or no relationship to other existing families, and that its pedigree has
+been hopelessly lost in the night of an incalculable antiquity. I have
+only to speak of the bird as a part of the visible world and as it
+appears to the non-scientific lover of nature; for, curiously enough,
+while anatomists nave been laboriously seeking for the screamer's
+affinities in that "biological field which is as wide as the earth and
+deep as the sea," travellers and ornithologists have told us almost
+nothing about its strange character and habits.
+
+Though dressed with Quaker-like sobriety, and without the elegance of
+form distinguishing the swan or peacock, this bird yet appeals to the
+aesthetic feelings in man more than any species I am acquainted with.
+Voice is one of its strong points, as one might readily infer from the
+name: nevertheless the name is not an appropriate one, for though the
+bird certainly does scream, and that louder than the peacock, its scream
+is only a powerful note of alarm uttered occasionally, while the notes
+uttered at intervals in the night, or in the day-time, when it soars
+upwards like the lark of some far-off imaginary epoch in the world's
+history when all tilings, larks included, were on a gigantic scale, are.
+properly speaking, singing notes and in quality utterly unlike screams.
+Sometimes when walking across Regent's Park I bear the resounding cries
+of the bird confined there attempting to sing; above the concert of
+cranes, the screams of eagles and macaws, the howling of dogs and wolves
+and the muffled roar of lions, one can hear it all over the park. But
+those loud notes only sadden me. Exile and captivity have taken all
+joyousness from the noble singer, and a moist climate has made him
+hoarse; the long clear strains are no more, and he hurries through his
+series of confused shrieks as quickly as possible, as if ashamed of the
+performance. A lark singing high up in a sunny sky and a lark singing in
+a small cage hanging against a shady wall in a London street produce
+very different effects; and the spluttering medley of shrill and harsh
+sounds from the street singer scarcely seems to proceed from the same
+kind of bird as that matchless melody filling the blue heavens. There is
+even a greater difference in the notes of the crested screamer when
+heard in Regent's Park and when heard on the pampas, where the bird
+soars upwards until its bulky body disappears from sight, and from that
+vast elevation pours down a perpetual rain of jubilant sound.
+
+_Screamer_ being a misnomer, I prefer to call the bird by its vernacular
+name of _chajá,_ or _chakar_, a more convenient spelling.
+
+With the chakar the sexes are faithful, even in very large flocks the
+birds all being ranged in couples. When one bird begins to sing its
+partner immediately joins, but with notes entirely different in quality.
+Both birds have some short deep notes, the other notes of the female
+being long powerful notes with a trill in them; but over them sounds the
+clear piercing voice of the male, ringing forth at the close with great
+strength and purity. The song produces the effect of harmony, but,
+comparing it with human singing, it is less like a _duo_ than a
+_terzetto_ composed of bass, contralto, and soprano.
+
+At certain times, in districts favourable to them, the chakars often
+assemble in immense flocks, thousands of individuals being sometimes
+seen congregated together, and in these gatherings the birds frequently
+all sing in concert. They invariably--though without rising--sing at
+intervals during the night, "counting the hours," as the gauchos say;
+the first song being at about nine o'clock, the second at midnight, and
+the third just before dawn, but the hours vary in different districts.
+
+I was once travelling with a party of gauchos when, about midnight, it
+being intensely dark, a couple of chakars broke out singing right ahead
+of us, thus letting us know that we were approaching a watercourse,
+where we intended refreshing our horses. We found it nearly dry, and
+when we rode down to the rill of water meandering over the broad dry bed
+of the river, a flock of about a thousand chakars set up a perfect roar
+of alarm notes, all screaming together, with intervals of silence after;
+then they rose up with a mighty rush of wings. They settled down again a
+few hundred yards off, and all together burst forth in one of their
+grand midnight songs, making the plains echo for miles around.
+
+There is something strangely impressive in these spontaneous outbursts
+of a melody so powerful from one of these large flocks, and though
+accustomed to hear these birds from childhood, I have often been
+astonished at some new effect produced by a large multitude singing
+under certain conditions. Travelling alone one summer day, I carne at
+noon to a lake on the pampas called Kakel--a sheet of water narrow
+enough for one to see across. Chakars in countless numbers were gathered
+along its shores, but they were all ranged in well-defined flocks,
+averaging about five hundred birds in each flock. These flocks seemed to
+extend all round the lake, and had probably been driven by the drought
+from all the plains around to this spot. Presently one flock near me
+began singing, and continued their powerful chant for three or four
+minutes; when they ceased the next flock took up the strains, and after
+it the next, and so on until the notes of the flocks on the opposite
+shore came floating strong and clear across the water--then passed away,
+growing fainter and fainter, until once more the sound approached me
+travelling round to my side again. The effect was very curious, and I
+was astonished at the orderly way with which each flock waited its turn
+to sing, instead of a general outburst taking place after the first
+flock had given the signal. On another occasion I was still more
+impressed, for here the largest number of birds I have ever found
+congregated at one place all sung together. This was on the southern
+pampas, at a place called Gualicho, where I had ridden for an hour
+before sunset over a marshy plain where there was still much standing
+water in the rushy pools, though it was at the height of the dry season.
+This whole plain was covered with an endless flock of chakars, not in
+close order, but scattered about in pairs and small groups. In this
+desolate spot I found a small rancho inhabited by a gaucho and his
+family, and I spent the night with them. The birds were all about the
+house, apparently as tame as the domestic fowls, and when I went out to
+look for a spot for my horse to feed on, they would not fly away from
+me, but merely moved, a few steps out of my path About nine o'clock we
+were eating supper in the rancho when suddenly the entire multitude of
+birds covering the marsh for miles around burst forth into a tremendous
+evening song. It is impossible to describe the effect of this mighty
+rush of sound; but let the reader try to imagine half-a-million voices,
+each far more powerful than that one which makes itself heard all over
+Regent's Park, bursting forth on the silent atmosphere of that dark
+lonely plain. One peculiarity was that in this mighty noise, which
+sounded louder than the sea thundering on a rocky coast, I seemed to be
+able to distinguish hundreds, even thousands, of individual voices.
+Forgetting my supper, I sat motionless and overcome with astonishment,
+while the air, and even the frail rancho, seemed to be trembling in that
+tempest of sound. When it ceased my host remarked with a smile, "We are
+accustomed to this, señor--every evening we have this concert." It was a
+concert well worth riding a hundred miles to hear. But the chakar
+country is just now in a transitional state, and the precise conditions
+which made it possible for birds so large in size to form such immense
+congregations are rapidly passing away. In desert places, the bird
+subsists chiefly on leaves and seeds of aquatic plants; but when the
+vast level area of the pampas was settled by man, the ancient stiff
+grass-vegetation gave place to the soft clovers and grasses of Europe,
+and to this new food the birds took very kindly. Other circumstances
+also favoured their increase. They were never persecuted, for the
+natives do not eat them, though they are really very good--the flesh
+being something like wild goose in flavour. A _higher_ civilization is
+changing all this: the country is becoming rapidly overrun with
+emigrants, especially by Italians, the pitiless enemies of all
+bird-life.
+
+The chakars, like the skylark, love to soar upwards when singing, and at
+such times when they have risen till their dark bulky bodies appear like
+floating specks on the blue sky, or until they disappear from sight
+altogether, the notes become wonderfully etherealized by distance to a
+soft silvery sound, and it is then very delightful to listen to them.
+
+It seems strange that so ponderous a fowl with only six feet and a half
+spread of wings should possess a power of soaring equal to that of
+vultures and eagles. Even the vulture with its marvellous wing power
+soars chiefly from necessity, and when its crop is full finds no
+pleasure in "scaling the heavens by invisible stairs." The chakar leaves
+its grass-plot after feeding and soars purely for recreation, taking so
+much pleasure in its aerial exercises that in bright warm weather, in
+winter and spring, it spends a great part of the day in the upper
+regions of the air. On the earth its air is grave and its motions
+measured and majestic, and it rises with immense labour, the wings
+producing a sound like a high wind. But as the bird mounts higher,
+sweeping round as it ascends, just as vultures and eagles do, it
+gradually appears to become more buoyant, describing each succeeding
+circle with increasing grace. I can only account for this magnificent
+flight, beginning so laboriously, by supposing that the bubble space
+under the skin becomes inflated with an air lighter than atmospheric
+air, enabling a body so heavy with wings disproportionately short to
+float with such ease and evident enjoyment at the vast heights to which
+the bird ascends. The heavenward flight of a large bird is always a
+magnificent spectacle; that of the chakar is peculiarly fascinating on
+account of the resounding notes it sings while soaring, and in which the
+bird seems to exult in its sublime power and freedom.
+
+I was once very much surprised at the behaviour of a couple of chakars
+during a thunderstorm. On a still sultry day in summer I was standing
+watching masses of black cloud coming rapidly over the sky, while a
+hundred yards from me stood the two birds also apparently watching the
+approaching storm with interest. Presently the edge of the cloud touched
+the sun, and a twilight gloom fell on the earth. The very moment the sun
+disappeared the birds rose up and soon began singing their long'
+resounding notes, though it was loudly thundering at the time, while
+vivid flashes of lightning lit the black cloud overhead at short
+intervals. I watched their flight and listened to their notes, till
+suddenly as they made a wide sweep upwards they disappeared in the
+cloud, and at the same moment their voices became muffled, and seemed to
+come from an immense distance. The cloud continued emitting sharp
+flashes of lightning, but the birds never reappeared, and after six or
+seven minutes once more their notes sounded loud and clear above the
+muttering thunder. I suppose they had passed through the cloud into the
+clear atmosphere above it, but I was extremely surprised at their
+fearlessness; for as a rule when soaring birds see a storm coming they
+get out of its way, flying before it or stooping to the earth to seek
+shelter of some kind, for most living things appear to have a wholesome
+dread of thunder and lightning.
+
+When taken young the chakar becomes very tame and attached to man,
+showing no inclination to go back to a wild life. There was one kept at
+an estancia called Mangrullos, on the western frontier of Buenos Ayres,
+and the people of the house gave me a very curious account of it. The
+bird was a male, and had been reared by a soldier's wife at a frontier
+outpost called La Esperanza, about twenty-five miles from Mangrullos.
+Four years before I saw the bird the Indians had invaded the frontier,
+destroying the Esperanza settlement and all the estancias for some
+leagues around. For some weeks after the invasion the chakar wandered
+about the country, visiting all the ruined estancias, apparently in
+quest of human beings, and on arriving at Mangrullos, which had not been
+burnt and was still inhabited, it settled down at ones and never
+afterwards showed any disposition to go away. It was extremely tame,
+associating by day with the poultry, and going to roost with them at
+night OH a high perch, probably for the sake of companionship, for in a
+wild state the bird roosts on the ground. It was friendly towards all
+the members of the household except one, a peon, and against this person
+from the first the bird always displayed the greatest antipathy,
+threatening him with its wings, puffing itself out, and hissing like an
+angry goose. The man had a swarthy, beardless face, and it was
+conjectured that the chakar associated him in its mind with the savages
+who had destroyed its early home.
+
+Close to the house there was a lagoon, never dry, which was frequently
+visited by flocks of wild chakars. Whenever a flock appeared the tame
+bird would go out to join them; and though the chakars are mild-tempered
+birds and very rarely quarrel, albeit so well provided with formidable
+weapons, they invariably attacked the visitor with great fury, chasing
+him back to the house, and not ceasing their persecutions till the
+poultry-yard was reached. They appeared to regard this tame bird that
+dwelt with man as a kind of renegade, and hated him accordingly.
+
+Before he had been long at the estancia it began to be noticed that he
+followed the broods of young chickens about very assiduously, apparently
+taking great interest in their welfare, and even trying to entice them
+to follow him. A few newly-hatched chickens were at length offered to
+him as an experiment, and he immediately took charge of them with every
+token of satisfaction, conducting them about in search of food and
+imitating all the actions of a hen. Finding him so good a nurse, large
+broods were given to him, and the more the foster-chickens were the
+better he seemed pleased. It was very curious to see this big bird with
+thirty or forty little animated balls of yellow cotton following him
+about, while he moved majestically along, setting down his feet with the
+greatest care not to tread on them, and swelling himself up with jealous
+anger at the approach of a cat or dog.
+
+The intelligence, docility, and attachment to man displayed by the
+chakar in a domestic state, with perhaps other latent aptitudes only
+waiting to be developed by artificial selection, seem to make this
+species one peculiarly suited for man's protection, without which it
+must inevitably perish. It is sad to reflect that all our domestic
+animals have descended to us from those ancient times which we are
+accustomed to regard as dark or barbarous, while the effect of our
+modern so-called humane civilization has been purely destructive to
+animal life. Not one type do we rescue from the carnage going on at an
+ever-increasing rate over all the globe. To Australia and America, North
+and South, we look in vain for new domestic species, while even from
+Africa, with its numerous fine mammalian forms, and where England has
+been the conquering colonizing power for nearly a century, we take
+nothing. Even the sterling qualities of the elephant, the unique beauty
+of the zebra, appeal to us in vain. We are only teaching the tribes of
+that vast continent to exterminate a hundred noble species they would
+not tame. With grief and shame, even with dismay, we call to mind that
+our country is now a stupendous manufactory of destructive engines,
+which we are rapidly placing in the hands of all the savage and
+semi-savage peoples of the earth, thus ensuring the speedy destruction
+of all the finest types in the animal kingdom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE WOODHEWER FAMILY.
+
+_(Dendrocolaptidae.)_
+
+
+The South American Tree-creepers, or Woodhewers, as they are sometimes
+called, although confined exclusively to one continent, their range
+extending from Southern Mexico to the Magellanic islands, form one of
+the largest families of the order Passeres; no fewer than about two
+hundred and ninety species (referable to about forty-six genera) having
+been already described. As they are mostly small, inconspicuous,
+thicket-frequenting birds, shy and fond of concealment to excess, it is
+only reasonable to suppose that our list of this family is more
+incomplete than of any other family of birds known. Thus, in the
+southern Plata and north Pata-gonian districts, supposed to be
+exhausted, where my observations have been made, and where, owing to the
+open nature of the country, birds are more easily remarked than in the
+forests and marshes of the tropical region, I have made notes on the
+habits of five species, of which I did not preserve specimens, and
+which, as far as I know, have never been described and named. Probably
+long before the whole of South America has been "exhausted," there will
+be not less than four to five hundred Dendrocolaptine species known. And
+yet with the exception of that dry husk of knowledge, concerning size,
+form and colouration, which classifiers and cataloguers obtain from
+specimens, very little indeed--scarcely anything, in fact--is known
+about the Tree-creepers; and it would not be too much to say that there
+are many comparatively obscure and uninteresting species in Europe, any
+one of which has a larger literature than the entire Tree-creeper
+family. No separate work about these birds has seen the light, even in
+these days of monographs; but the reason of this comparative neglect is
+not far to seek. In the absence of any knowledge, except of the most
+fragmentary kind, of the life-habits of exotic species, the
+monograph-makers of the Old World naturally take up only the most
+important groups--i.e. the groups which most readily attract the
+traveller's eye with their gay conspicuous colouring, and which have
+acquired a wide celebrity. We thus have a succession of splendid and
+expensive works dealing separately with such groups as woodpeckers,
+trogons, humming-birds, tanagers, king-fishers, and birds of paradise;
+for with these, even if there be nothing to record beyond the usual
+dreary details and technicalities concerning geographical distribution,
+variations in size and markings of different species, &c., the little
+interest of the letter-press is compensated for in the accompanying
+plates, which are now produced on a scale of magnitude, and with so
+great a degree of perfection, as regards brilliant colouring, spirited
+attitudes and general fidelity to nature, that leaves little further
+improvement in this direction to be looked for. The Tree-creepers, being
+without the inferior charm of bright colour, offer no attraction to the
+bird-painter, whose share in the work of the pictorial monograph is, of
+course, all-important. Yet even the very slight knowledge we possess of
+this family is enough to show that in many respects it is one richly
+endowed, possessing characters of greater interest to the student of the
+instincts and mental faculties of birds, than any of |the gaily-tinted
+families I have mentioned.
+
+There is, in the Dendrocolaptidae, a splendid harvest for future
+observers of the habits of South American birds: some faint idea of its
+richness may perhaps be gathered from the small collection of the most
+salient facts known to us about them I have brought together and put in
+order in this place. And I am here departing a little from the plan
+usually observed in this book, which is chiefly occupied with matters of
+personal knowledge, seasoned with a little speculation; but in this case
+I have thought it best to supplement my own observations with those of
+others [Footnote: Azara; D'Orbigny; Darwin; Bridges; Frazer; Leotaud;
+Gaumer; Wallace; Bates; Cunningham; Stolzmann; Jelski; Durnford; Gibson;
+Burrows; Doering; White, &c.] who have collected and observed birds in
+South America, so as to give as comprehensive a survey of the family as
+I could.
+
+It is strange to find a Passerine family, numerous as the Tree-creepers,
+uniformly of one colour, or nearly so; for, with few exceptions, these
+birds have a brown plumage, without a particle of bright colour. But
+although they possess no brilliant or metallic tints, in some species,
+as we shall see, there are tints approaching to brightness.
+Notwithstanding this family likeness in colour, any person, not an
+ornithologist, looking at a collection of specimens comprising many
+genera, would hear with surprise and almost incredulity that they all
+belonged to one family, so great is the diversity exhibited in their
+structure. In size they vary from species smaller than the
+golden-crested wren to others larger than the woodcock; but the
+differences in size are as nothing compared with those shown in the form
+of the beak. Between the minute, straight, conical, tit-like beaks of
+the Laptasthenura--a tit in appearance and habits--and the extravagantly
+long, sword-shaped bill of Nasica, or the excessively attenuated,
+sickle-shaped organ in Xiphorynchus, the divergence is amazing, compared
+with what is found in other families; while between these two extremes
+there is a heterogeneous assemblage of birds with beaks like creepers,
+nuthatches, finches, tyrant-birds, woodpeckers, crows, and even curlews
+and ibises. In legs, feet and tails, there are corresponding
+differences. There are tails of all lengths and all forms; soft and
+stiff, square, acuminated, broad and fan-like, narrow and spine-like,
+and many as in the woodpeckers, and used as in that bird to support the
+body in climbing. An extremely curious modification is found in
+Sittosoma: the tail-feathers in this genus are long and graduated, and
+the shafts, projecting beyond the webs at the ends, curve downwards and
+form stiff hooks. Concerning the habits of these birds, it has only been
+reported that they climb on the trunks of trees: probably they are able
+to run vertically up or down with equal facility, and even to suspend
+themselves by their feather-hooks when engaged in dislodging insects.
+Another curious variation is found in Sylviothorhynchus, a small
+wren-like bird and the only member known of the genus, with a tail
+resembling that of the lyre-bird, the extravagantly long feathers being
+so narrow as to appear almost like shafts destitute of webs. This tail
+appears to be purely ornamental.
+
+This extreme variety in structure indicates a corresponding diversity in
+habits; and, assuming it to be a true doctrine that habits vary first
+and structure afterwards, anyone might infer from a study of their forms
+alone that these birds possess a singular plasticity, or tendency to
+vary, in their habits--or, in other words, that they are exceptionally
+intelligent; and that such a conclusion would be right I believe a study
+of their habits will serve to show.
+
+The same species is often found to differ in its manner of life in
+different localities. Some species of Xenops and Magarornis, like
+woodpeckers, climb vertically on tree-trunks in search of insect prey,
+but also, like tits, explore the smaller twigs and foliage at the
+extremity of the branches; so that the whole tree, from its root to its
+topmost foliage, is hunted over by them. The Sclerurus, although an
+inhabitant of the darkest forest, and provided with sharply-curved
+claws, never seeks its food on trees, but exclusively on the ground,
+among the decaying fallen leaves; but, strangely enough, when alarmed it
+flies to the trunk of the nearest tree, to which it clings in a vertical
+position, and, remaining silent and motionless, escapes observation by
+means of its dark protective colour. The Drymornis, a large bird, with
+feet and tail like a woodpecker, climbs on tree-trunks to seek its food;
+but also possesses the widely-different habit of resorting to the open
+plain, especially after a shower, to feed on larvae and earthworms,
+extracting them from a depth of three or four inches beneath the surface
+with its immense curved probing beak.
+
+Again, when we consider a large number of species of different groups,
+we find that there is not with the Tree-creepers, as with most families,
+any special habit or manner of life linking them together; but that, on
+the contrary, different genera, and, very frequently, different species
+belonging to one genus, possess habits peculiarly their own. In other
+families, even where the divergence is greatest, what may be taken as
+the original or ancestral habit is seldom or never quite obsolete in any
+of the members. This we see, for instance, in the woodpeckers, some of
+which have acquired the habit of seeking their food exclusively on the
+ground in open places, and even of nesting in the banks of streams. Yet
+all these wanderers, even those which have been structurally modified in
+accordance with their altered way of life, retain the primitive habit of
+clinging vertically to the trunks of trees, although the habit has lost
+its use. With the tyrant birds--a family showing an extraordinary amount
+of variation--it is the same; for the most divergent kinds are
+frequently seen reverting to the family habit of perching on an
+elevation, from which to make forays after passing insects, returning
+after each capture to the same stand. The thrushes, ranging all over the
+globe, afford another striking example. Without speaking of their
+nesting habits, their relationship appears in their love of fruit, in
+their gait, flight, statuesque attitudes, and abrupt motions.
+
+With the numerous Dendrocolaptine groups, so widely separated and
+apparently unrelated, it would be difficult indeed to say which, of
+their most striking habits is the ancestral one. Many of the smaller
+species live in trees or bushes, and in their habits resemble tits,
+warblers, wrens, and other kinds that subsist on small caterpillars,
+spiders, &c., gleaned from the leaves and smaller twigs. The Anumbius
+nests on trees, but feeds exclusively on the ground in open places;
+while other ground-feeders seek their food among dead leaves in dense
+gloomy forests. Coryphistera resembles the lark and pipit in its habits;
+Cinclodes, the wagtail; Geobates a Saxicola; Limnornis lives in reed
+beds growing in the water; Henicornis in reed beds growing out of the
+water; and many other ground species exist concealed in the grass on dry
+plains; Homorus seeks its food by digging in the loose soil and dead
+leaves about the roots of trees; while Geo-sitta, Furnarius, and
+Upercerthia obtain a livelihood chiefly by probing in the soil. It would
+not be possible within the present limits to mention in detail all the
+different modes of life of those species or groups which do not possess
+the tree-creeping habit; after them comes a long array of genera in
+which this habit is ingrained, and in which the greatly modified feet
+and claws are suited to a climbing existence. As these genera comprise
+the largest half of the family, also the largest birds in it, we might
+expect to find in the tree-creeping the parental habit of the
+Dendrocolaptidae, and that from these tropical forest groups have sprung
+the widely-diverging thicket, ground, marsh, sea-beach, and
+rock-frequenting groups. It happens, however, that these birds resemble
+each other only in their climbing feet; in the form of their beaks they
+are as wide apart as are nuthatches, woodpeckers, crows, and curlews.
+They also differ markedly in the manner of seeking their food. Some dig
+like woodpeckers in decayed wood; others probe only in soft rotten wood;
+while the humming-bird-billed Xiphorhynchus, with a beak too long and
+slender for probing, explores the interior of deep holes in the trunks
+to draw out nocturnal insects, spiders, and centipedes from their
+concealment. Xiphoco-laptes uses its sword-like beak as a lever,
+thrusting it under and forcing up the loose bark; while Dendrornis, with
+its stout corvine beak, tears the bark off.
+
+In the nesting habits the diversity is greatest. Some ground species
+excavate in the earth like kingfishers, only with greater skill, making
+cylindrical burrows often four to five feet deep, and terminating in a
+round chamber. Others build a massive oven-shaped structure of clay on a
+branch or other elevated site. Many of those that creep on trees nest in
+holes in the wood. The marsh-frequenting kinds attach spherical or oval
+domed nests to the reeds; and in some cases woven grass and clay are so
+ingeniously combined that the structure, while light as a basket, is
+perfectly impervious to the wet and practically indestructible. The most
+curious nests, however, are the large stick structures on trees and
+bushes, in the building and repairing of which the birds are in many
+cases employed more or less constantly all the year round. These stick
+nests vary greatly in form, size, and in other respects. Some have a
+spiral passage-way leading from the entrance to the nest cavity, and the
+cavity is in many cases only large enough to accommodate the bird; but
+in the gigantic structure of Homorus gutturalis it is so large that, if
+the upper half of the nest or dome were removed, a condor could
+comfortably hatch her eggs and rear her young in it. This nest is
+spherical. The allied Homorus lophotis builds a nest equally large, but
+with a small cavity for the eggs inside, and outwardly resembling a
+gigantic powder-flask, lying horizontally among the lower branches of a
+spreading tree. Pracellodomtis sibila-trix, a bird in size like the
+English house sparrow, also makes a huge nest, and places it on the
+twigs at the terminal end of a horizontal branch from twelve to fifteen
+feet above the ground; but when finished, the weight of the structure
+bears down the branch-end to within one or two feet of the surface. Mr.
+Barrows, who describes this nest, says: "When other branches of the same
+tree are similarly loaded, and other trees close at hand bear the same
+kind of fruit, the result is very picturesque." Synallaxis phryganophila
+makes a stick nest about a foot in depth, and from the top a tubular
+passage, formed of slender twigs interlaced, runs down the entire length
+of the nest, like a rain-pipe on the wall of a house, and then becoming
+external slopes upward, ending at a distance of two to three feet from
+the nest. Throughout South America there are several varieties of these
+fruit-and-stem or watering-pot shaped nests; they are not, however, all
+built by birds of one genus, while in the genus Synallaxis many species
+have no tubular passageways attached to their nests. One species--erythro
+thorax--in Yucatan, makes so large a nest of sticks, that the
+natives do not believe that so small a bird can be the builder. They say
+that when the _tzapatan_ begins to sing, all the birds in the forest
+repair to it, each one carrying a stick to add to the structure; only
+one, a tyrant-bird, brings two sticks, one for itself and one for the
+_urubú_ or vulture, that bird being considered too large, heavy, and
+ignorant of architecture to assist personally in the work.
+
+In the southern part of South America, where scattered thorn trees grow
+on a dry soil, these big nests are most abundant. "There are plains,"
+Mr. Barrows writes, "within two miles of the centre of this town
+(Concepcion, Argentine Republic), where I have stood and counted, from
+one point within a radius of twenty rods, over two hundred of these
+curious nests, varying in size from that of a small pumpkin to more than
+the volume of a barrel. Often a single tree will contain half a dozen
+nests or more; and, not unfrequently, the nests of several different
+species are seen crowding each other out of shape on the same bush or
+tree."
+
+It would be a mistake to think that the widely different nesting habits
+I have mentioned are found in different genera. I have just spoken of
+the big stick nests, with or without passage-ways, of the Synallaxes,
+yet the nest of one member of this group is simply a small straight tube
+of woven grass, the aperture only large enough to admit the finger, and
+open at both ends, so that the bird can pass in and out without turning
+round. Another species scoops a circular hollow in the soil, and builds
+over it a dome of fine woven grass. It should be mentioned that the
+nesting habits of only about fifteen out of the sixty-five species
+comprised in this genus are known to us. In the genus Furnarius the
+oven-shaped clay structure is known to be made by three species; a
+fourth builds a nest of sticks in a tree; a fifth burrows in the side of
+a bank, like a kingfisher.
+
+The explanation of the most striking features of the Dendrocolaptidae,
+their monotonous brown plumage, diversity of structure, versatile
+habits, and the marvellous development of the nest-making instinct which
+they exhibit is to be found, it appears to me, in the fact that they are
+the most defenceless of birds. They are timid, unresisting creatures,
+without strength or weapons; their movements arc less quick and vigorous
+than those of other kinds, and their flight is exceedingly feeble. The
+arboreal species flit at intervals from one tree to another; those that
+frequent thickets refuse to leave their chosen shelter; while those
+inhabiting grassy plains or marshes study concealment, and, when forced
+to rise, flutter away just above the surface, like flying-fish
+frightened from the water, and, when they have gone thirty or forty
+yards, dip into the grass or reeds again. Their life is thus one of
+perpetual danger in a far greater degree than with other passerine
+families, such as warblers, tyrants, finches, thrushes, &c.; while an
+exclusively insect diet, laboriously extracted from secret places, and
+inability to change their climate, contribute to make their existence a
+hard one. It has been with these birds as with human beings, bred in
+"misfortune's school," and subjected to keen competition. One of their
+most striking characteristics is a methodical, plodding, almost painful
+diligence of manner while seeking their food, so that when viewed side
+by side with other species, rejoicing in a gayer plumage and stronger
+flight, they seem like sober labourers that never rest among holiday
+people bent only on enjoyment. That they are able not only to maintain
+their existence, but to rise to the position of a dominant family, is
+due to an intelligence and adaptiveness exceeding that of other kinds,
+and which has been strengthened, and perhaps directly results from the
+hard conditions of their life.
+
+How great their adaptiveness and variability must be when we find that
+every portion of the South American continent is occupied by them; for
+there is really no climate, and no kind of soil or vegetation, which
+does not possess its appropriate species, modified in colour, form, and
+habits to suit the surrounding conditions. In the tropical region, so
+rich in bird life of all kinds, in forest, marsh, and savanna, they are
+everywhere abundant--food is plentiful there; but when we go to higher
+elevations avd cold sterile deserts, where their companion families of
+the tropics dwindle away and disappear, the creepers are still present,
+for they are evidently able to exist where other kinds would starve. On
+the stony plateaus of the Andes, and on the most barren spots in
+Patagonia, where no other bird is seen, there are small species of
+Synallaxis, which, in their obscure colour and motions on the ground,
+resemble mice rather than birds; indeed, the Quichua name for one of
+these Synallaxes is _ukatchtuka,_ or mouse-bird. How different is the
+life habit here from what we see in the tropical groups--the large birds
+with immense beaks, that run vertically on the trunks of the great
+forest trees!
+
+At the extreme southern extremity of the South American continent we
+find several species of Cin-clodes, seeking a subsistence like
+sandpipers on the beach; they also fly out to sea, and run about on the
+floating kelp, exploring the fronds for the small marine animals on
+which they live. In the dreary forests of Tierra del Fuego another
+creeper, Uxyurus, is by far the commonest bird. "Whether high up or low
+down, in the most gloomy, wet, and scarcely penetrable ravines," says
+Darwin, "this little bird is to be met with;" and Dr. Cunningham also
+relates that in these wintry, savage woods he was always attended in his
+walks by parties of these little creepers, which assembled to follow him
+out of curiosity.
+
+To birds placed at so great a disadvantage, by a feeble flight and other
+adverse circumstances, in the race of life bright colours would
+certainly prove fatal. It is true that brown is not in itself a
+protective colour, and the clear, almost silky browns and bright
+chestnut tints in several species are certainly not protective; but
+these species are sufficiently protected in other ways, and can afford
+to be without a strictly adaptive colour, so long as they are not
+conspicuous. In a majority of cases, however, the colour is undoubtedly
+protective, the brown hue being of a shade that assimilates very closely
+to the surroundings. There are pale yellowish browns, lined and mottled,
+in species living amidst a sere, scanty vegetation; earthy browns, in
+those frequenting open sterile or stony places; while the species that
+creep on trees in forests are dark brown in colour, and in many cases
+the feathers are mottled in such a manner as to make them curiously
+resemble the bark of a tree. The genera Lochmias and Sclerurus are the
+darkest, the plumage in these birds being nearly or quite black, washed
+or tinged with rhubarb yellow. Their black plumage would render them
+conspicuous in the sunshine, but they pass their lives in dense tropical
+forests, where the sun at noon sheds only a gloomy twilight.
+
+If "colour is ever tending to increase and to appear where it is
+absent," as Dr. Wallace believes, then we ought to find it varying in
+the direction of greater brightness in some species in a family so
+numerous and variable as the Dendrocolaptidae, however feeble and in
+need of a protective colouring these birds may be in a majority of
+pases. And this in effect we do find. In many of the dark-plumaged
+species that live in perpetual shade some parts are a very bright
+chestnut; while in a few that live in such close concealment as to be
+almost independent of protective colouring, the lower plumage has become
+pure white. A large number of species have a bright or nearly bright
+guiar spot. This is most remarkable in Synallaxis phryganophila, the
+chin being sulphur-yellow, beneath which is a spot of velvet-black, and
+on either side a white patch, the throat thus having three strongly
+contrasted colours, arranged in four divisions. The presence of this
+bright throat spot in so many species cannot very well be attributed to
+voluntary sexual selection, although believers in that theory are of
+course at liberty to imagine that when engaged in courtship, the male
+bird, or rather male and female both, as both sexes possess the spot,
+hold up their heads vertically to exhibit it. Perhaps it would be safer
+to look on it as a mere casual variation, which, like the exquisitely
+pencilled feathers and delicate tints on the concealed sides and under
+surfaces of the wings of many species possessing outwardly an obscure
+protective colouring, is neither injurious nor beneficial in any way,
+either to the birds or to the theory. It is more than probable, however,
+that in such small feeble-winged, persecuted birds, this spot of colour
+would prove highly dangerous on any conspicuous part of the body. In
+some of the more vigorous, active species, we can see a tendency towards
+a brighter colouring on large, exposed surfaces. In Auto-malus the tail
+is bright satiny rufous; in Pseudo-colaptes the entire under surface is
+rufous of a peculiar vivid tint, verging on orange or red; in Magarornis
+the bosom is black, and beautifully ornamented with small leaf-shaped
+spots of a delicate straw-colour. There are several other very pretty
+birds in this homely family; but the finest of all is Thripodectes
+flammulatus, the whole body being tortoise-shell colour, the wings and
+tail bright chesnut. The powerful tanager-like beak of this species
+seems also to show that it has diverged from its timid shade-loving
+congeners in another direction by becoming a seed and fruit eater.
+
+Probably the sober and generally protective colouring of the
+tree-creepers, even with the variability and adaptiveness displayed in
+their habits superadded, would be insufficient to preserve such feeble
+birds in the struggle of life without the further advantage derived from
+their wonderful nests. It has been said of domed nests that they are a
+danger rather than a protection, owing to their large size, which makes
+it easy for carnivorous species that prey on eggs and young birds to
+find them; while small open nests are usually well concealed. This may
+be the case with covered nests made of soft materials, loosely put
+together; but it cannot be said of the solid structure the tree-creeper
+bnilds, and which, as often as not, the bird erects in the most
+conspicuous place it can find, as if, writes Azara, it desired all the
+world to admire its work. The annual destruction of adult birds is very
+great--more than double that, I believe, which takes place in other
+passerine families. Their eggs and young are, however, practically safe
+in their great elaborate nests or deep burrows, and, as a rule, they lay
+more eggs than other kinds, the full complement being seldom less than
+five in the species I am acquainted with, while some lay as many as
+nine. Their nests are also made so as to keep out a greater pest than
+their carnivorous or egg-devouring enemies--namely, the parasitical
+starlings (Molo-thrus), which are found throughout South America, and
+are excessively abundant and destructive to birds' nests in some
+districts. In most cases, in the big, strong-domed nest or deep burrow,
+all the eggs are hatched and all the young reared, the thinning, out
+process commencing only after the brood has been led forth into a world
+beset with perils. With other families, on the contrary, the greatest
+amount of destruction falls on the eggs or fledglings. I have frequently
+kept a dozen or twenty pairs of different species--warblers, finches,
+tyrants, starlings, &c.--under observation during the breeding season,
+and have found that in some cases no young-were reared at all; in other
+cases one or two young; while, as often as not, the young actually
+reared were only parasitical starlings after all.
+
+I have still to speak of the voice of the tree-creepers, an important
+point in the study of these birds; for, though not accounted singers,
+some species emit remarkable sounds; moreover, language in birds is
+closely related to the social instinct. They seem to be rather solitary
+than gregarious; and this seems only natural in birds so timid,
+weak-winged, and hard pressed. It would also be natural to conclude from
+what has been said concerning their habits that they are comparatively
+silent; for, as a rule, vigorous social birds are loquacious and
+loud-voiced, while shy solitary kinds preservo silence, except in the
+love season. Nevertheless the creepers are loquacious and have loud
+resonant voices; this fact, however, does not really contradict a
+well-known principle, for the birds possess the social disposition in an
+eminent degree, only the social habit is kept down in them by the
+conditions of a life which makes solitude necessary. Thus, a large
+proportion of species are found to pair for life; and the only
+reasonable explanation of this habit in birds--one which is not very
+common in the mammalia--is that such species possess the social temper
+or feeling, and live in pairs only because they cannot afford to live in
+flocks. Strictly gregarious species pair only for the breeding season.
+In the creepers the attachment between the birds thus mated for life is
+very great, and, as Azara truly says of Anumbius, so fond of each
+other's society are these birds, that when one incubates the other sits
+at the entrance to the nest, and when one carries food to its young the
+other accompanies it, even if it has found nothing to cany. In these
+species that live in pairs, when the two birds are separated they are
+perpetually calling to each other, showing how impatient of solitude
+they are; while even from the more solitary kind, a high-pitched
+call-note is constantly heard in the woods, for these birds, debarred
+from associating together, satisfy their instinct by conversing with one
+another over long distances.
+
+The foregoing remarks apply to the Dendrocolap-tidae throughout the
+temperate countries of South America--the birds inhabiting extensive
+grassy plains and marshes, and districts with a scanty or scattered tree
+and bush vegetation. In the forest areas of the hotter regions it is
+different; there the birds form large gatherings or "wandering bands,"
+composed of all the different species found in each district, associated
+with birds of other families--wood-peckers, tyrant-birds, bush shrikes,
+and many others. These miscellaneous gatherings are not of rare
+occurrence, but out of the breeding season are formed daily, the birds
+beginning to assemble at about nine or ten o'clock in the morning,
+their number increasing through the day until it reaches its maximum
+between two and four o'clock in the afternoon, after which it begins to
+diminish, each bird going off to its customary shelter or
+dwelling-place. Mr. Bates, who first described these wandering bands,
+says that he could always find the particular band belonging to a
+district any day he wished, for when he failed to meet with it in one
+part of the forest he would try other paths, until he eventually found
+it. The great Amazonian forests, he tells us, appear strangely silent
+and devoid of bird life, and it is possible to ramble about for whole
+days without seeing or hearing birds. But now and then the surrounding
+trees and bushes appear suddenly swarming with them. "The bustling
+crowd loses no time, and, always moving in concert, each bird is
+occupied on its own account in searching bark, or leaf, or twig. In a
+few moments the host is gone, and the forest path remains deserted and
+silent as before." Stolzmann, who observed them in Peru, says that the
+sound caused by the busy crowd searching through the foliage, and the
+falling of dead leaves and twigs, resembles that produced by a shower of
+rain. The Indians of the Amazons, Mr. Bates writes, have a curious
+belief to explain these bird armies; they say that the Papa-uira,
+supposed to be a small grey bird, fascinates all the others, and leads
+them on a weary perpetual dance through the forest. It seems very
+wonderful that birds, at other times solitary, should thus combine daily
+in large numbers, including in their bands scores of widely different
+species, and in size ranging from those no larger than a wren to others
+as big as a magpie. It is certainly very advantageous to them. As Belt
+remarks, they play into each other's hands; for while the larger
+creepers explore the trunks of big trees, others run over the branches
+and cling to the lesser twigs, so that every tree in their route, from
+its roots to the topmost foliage, is thoroughly examined, and every
+spider and caterpillar taken, while the winged insects, driven from
+their lurking-places, are seized where they settle, or caught flying by
+the tyrant birds.
+
+I have observed the wandering bands only in Patagonia, where they are on
+a very small scale compared with those of the tropical forests. In the
+Patagonia thickets the small tit-like creeper, Laptas-thenura, is the
+prime mover; and after a considerable number of these have gathered,
+creepers of other species and genera unite with them, and finally the
+band, as it moves through the thickets, draws to itself other
+kinds--flycatchers, finches, &c.--many of the birds running or hopping
+on the ground to search for insects in the loose soil or under dead
+leaves, while others explore the thorny bushes. My observations of these
+small bands lead me to believe that everywhere in South America the
+Dendrocolaptidae are the first in combining to act in concert, and that
+the birds of other families follow their march and associate with them,
+knowing from experience that a rich harvest may be thus reaped. In the
+same way birds of various kinds follow the movements of a column of
+hunting ants, to catch the insects flying up from the earth to escape
+from their enemies; swallows also learn to keep company with the
+traveller on horseback, and, crossing and recrossing just before the
+hoofs, they catch the small twilight moths driven up from the grass.
+
+To return to the subject of voice. The tree-creepers do not possess
+melodious, or at any rate mellow notes, although in so numerous a family
+there is great variety of tone, ranging from a small reedy voice like
+the faint stridulation of a grasshopper, to the resounding,
+laughter-like, screaming concerts of Homorus, which may be heard
+distinctly two miles away. As a rule, the notes are loud ringing calls;
+and in many species the cry, rapidly reiterated, resembles a peal of
+laughter. With scarcely an exception, they possess no set song; but in
+most species that live always in pairs there are loud, vehement,
+gratulatory notes uttered by the two birds in concert when they meet
+after a brief separation. This habit they possess in common with birds
+of other families, as, for instance, the tyrants; but, in some creepers,
+out of this confused outburst of joyous sound has been developed a.
+musical performance very curious, and perhaps unique among birds. On
+meeting, the male and female, standing close together and facing each
+other, utter their clear ringing concert, one emitting loud single
+measured notes, while the notes of its fellow are rapid, rhythmical
+triplets; their voices have a joyous character, and seem to accord, thus
+producing a kind of harmony. This manner of singing is perhaps most
+perfect in the oven-bird, Furnarias, and it is very curious that the
+young birds, when only partially fledged, are constantly heard in the
+nest or oven apparently practising these duets in the intervals when the
+parents are absent; single measured notes, triplets, and long concluding
+trills are all repeated with wonderful fidelity, although these notes
+are in character utterly unlike the hunger cry, which is like that of
+other fledglings. I cannot help thinking that this fact of the young
+birds beginning to sing like the adults, while still confined in their
+dark cradle, is one of very considerable significance, especially when
+we consider the singular character of the performance; and that it might
+even be found to throw some light on the obscure question of the
+comparative antiquity of the different and widely separated
+Dendrocolaptine groups. It is a doctrine in evolutionary science that
+the early maturing of instincts in the young indicates a high antiquity
+for the species or group; and there is no reason why this principle
+should not be extended, in the case of birds at any rate, to language.
+It is true that Daines Barrington's notion that young song-birds learn
+to sing only by imitating the adults still holds its ground; and Darwin
+gives it his approval in his _Descent of Man._ It is perhaps one of
+those doctrines which are partially true, or which do not contain the
+whole truth; and it is possible to believe that, while many singing
+birds do so learn their songs, or acquire a greater proficiency in them
+from hearing the adults, in other species the song comes instinctively,
+and is, like other instincts and habits, purely an "inherited memory."
+
+The case of a species in another order of birds--Crypturi--strikes me as
+being similar to this of the oven-bird, and seems to lend some force to
+the suggestion I have made concerning the early development of voice in
+the young.
+
+Birds peculiar to South America are said by anatomists to be less
+specialized, lower, more ancient, than the birds of the northern
+continents, and among those which are considered lowest and most ancient
+are the Tinamous (rail and partridge like in their habits), birds that
+lead a solitary, retiring life, and in most cases have sweet melancholy
+voices. Rhynchotus rufescens, a bird the size of a fowl, inhabiting the
+pampas, is perhaps the sweetest-voiced, and sings with great frequency.
+Its song or call is heard oftenest towards the evening, and is composed
+of five modulated notes, flute-like in character, very expressive, and
+uttered by many individuals answering each other as they sit far apart
+concealed in the grass. As we might have expected, the faculties and
+instincts of the young of this species mature at a very early period;
+when extremely small, they abandon their parents to shift for themselves
+in solitude; and when not more than one-fourth the size they eventually
+attain, they acquire the adult plumage and are able to fly as well as an
+old bird. I observed a young bird of this species, less than a quail in
+size, at a house on the pampas, and was told that it had been taken from
+the nest when just breaking the shell; it had, therefore, never seen or
+heard the parent birds. Yet this small chick, every day at the approach
+of evening, would retire to the darkest corner of the dining room, and,
+concealed under a piece of furniture, would continue uttering its
+evening song for an hour or longer at short intervals, and rendering it
+so perfectly that I was greatly surprised to hear it; for a thrush or
+other songster at the same period of life, when attempting to sing, only
+produces a chirping sound.
+
+The early singing of the oven-bird fledgling is important, owing to the
+fact that the group it belongs to comprises the least specialized forms
+in the family. They are strong-legged, square-tailed, terrestrial birds,
+generally able to perch, have probing beaks, and build the most perfect
+mud or stick nests, or burrow in the ground. In the numerous
+tree-creeping groups, which, seem as unrelated to the oven-bird as the
+woodpecker is to the hoopoe, we find a score of wonderfully different
+forms of beak; but many of them retain the probing character, and are
+actually used to probe in rotten wood on trees, and to explore the holes
+and deep crevices in the trunk. We have also seen that some of these
+tree-creepers revert to the ancestral habit (if I may so call it) of
+seeking their food by probing in the soil. In others, like Dendrornis,
+in which the beak has lost this character, and is used to dig in the
+wood or to strip off the bark, it has not been highly specialized, and,
+compared with the woodpecker's beak, is a very imperfect organ,
+considering the purpose for which it is used. Yet, on the principle that
+"similar functional requirements frequently lead to the development of
+similar structures in animals which are otherwise very distinct"--as we
+see in the tubular tongue in honey-eaters and humming birds--we might
+have expected to find in the Dendrocolaptidae a better imitation of the
+woodpecker in so variable an organ as the beak, if not in the tongue.
+
+Probably the oven-birds, and their nearest relations--generalized,
+hardy, builders of strong nests, and prolific--represent the parental
+form; and when birds of this type had spread over the entire continent
+they became in different districts frequenters of marshes, forests,
+thickets and savannas. With altered life-habits the numerous divergent
+forms originated; some, like Xiphorynchus, retaining a probing beak in a
+wonderfully modified form, attenuated in an extreme degree, and bent
+like a sickle; others diverging more in the direction of nuthatches and
+woodpeckers.
+
+This sketch of the Dendrocolaptidae, necessarily slight and imperfect,
+is based on a knowledge of the habits of about sixty species, belonging
+to twenty-eight genera: from personal observation I am acquainted with
+less than thirty species. It is astonishing to find how little has been
+written about these most interesting birds in South America. One
+tree-creeper only, Furnarius rufus, the oven-bird _par excellence,_ has
+been mentioned, on account of its wonderful architecture, in almost
+every general work of natural history published during the present
+century; yet the oven-bird does not surpass, or even equal in interest,
+many others in this family of nearly three hundred members.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+
+In reading books of Natural History we meet with numerous instances of
+birds possessing the habit of assembling together, in many cases always
+at the same spot, to indulge in antics and dancing performances, with or
+without the accompaniment of music, vocal or instrumental; and by
+instrumental music is here meant all sounds other than vocal made
+habitually and during the more or less orderly performances; as, for
+instance, drumming and tapping noises; smiting of wings; and humming,
+whip-cracking, fan-shutting, grinding, scraping, and horn-blowing
+sounds, produced as a rule by the quills.
+
+There are human dances, in which only one person performs at a time, the
+rest of the company looking on; and some birds, in widely separated
+genera, have dances of this kind. A striking example is the Rupicola, or
+cock of-the-rock, of tropical South America. A mossy level spot of earth
+surrounded by bushes is selected for a dancing-place, and kept well
+cleared of sticks and stones; round this area the birds assemble, when a
+cock-bird, with vivid orange-scarlet crest and plumage, steps into it,
+and, with spreading wings and tail, begins a series of movements as if
+dancing a minuet; finally, carried away with excitement, he leaps and
+gyrates in the most astonishing manner, until, becoming exhausted, he
+retires, and another bird takes his place.
+
+In other species all the birds in a company unite in the set
+performances, and seem to obey an impulse which affects them
+simultaneously and in the same degree; but sometimes one bird prompts
+the others and takes a principal part. One of the most curious instances
+I have come across in reading is contained in Mr. Bigg-Wither's
+_Pioneering in South Brazil._ He relates that one morning in the dense
+forest his attention was roused by the unwonted sound of a bird
+singing--songsters being rare in that district. His men, immediately
+they caught the sound, invited him to follow them, hinting that he would
+probably witness a very curious sight. Cautiously making their way
+through the dense undergrowth, they finally came in sight of a small
+stony spot of ground, at the end of a tiny glade; and on this spot, some
+on the stone and some on the shrubs, were assembled a number of little
+birds, about the size of tom-tits, with lovely blue plumage and red
+top-knots. One was perched quite still on a twig, singing merrily, while
+the others were keeping time with wings and feet in a kind of dance, and
+all twittering an accompaniment. He watched them for some time, and was
+satisfied that they were having a ball and concert, and thoroughly
+enjoying themselves; they then became alarmed, and the performance
+abruptly terminated, the birds all going off in different directions.
+The natives told him that these little creatures were known as the
+"dancing birds."
+
+This species was probably solitary, except when assembling for the
+purpose of display; but in a majority of cases, especially in the
+Passerine order, the solitary species performs its antics alone, or with
+no witness but its mate. Azara, describing a small finch, which he aptly
+named _Oscilador,_ says that early and late in the day it mounts up
+vertically to a moderate height; then, flies off to a, distance of
+twenty yards, describing a perfect curve in its passage; turning, it
+flies back over the imaginary line it has traced, and so on repeatedly,
+appearing like a pendulum swung in space by an invisible thread.
+
+Those who seek to know the cause and origin of this kind of display and
+of song in animals are referred to Darwin's _Descent of Man_ for an
+explanation. The greater part of that work is occupied with a laborious
+argument intended to prove that the love-feeling inspires the animals
+engaged in these exhibitions, and that sexual selection, or the
+voluntary selection of mates by the females, is the final cause of all
+set musical and dancing performances, as well as of bright and
+harmonious colouring, and of ornaments.
+
+The theory, with regard to birds is, that in the love-season, when the
+males are excited and engage in courtship, the females do not fall to
+the strongest and most active, nor to those that are first in the field;
+but that in a large number of species they are endowed with a faculty
+corresponding to the aesthetic feeling or taste in man, and deliberately
+select males for their superiority in some aesthetic quality, such as
+graceful or fantastic motions, melody of voice, brilliancy of colour, or
+perfection of ornaments. Doubtless all birds were originally
+plain-coloured, without ornaments and without melody, and it is assumed
+that so it would always have been in many cases but for the action of
+this principle, which, like natural selection, has gone on accumulating
+countless small variations, tending to give a greater lustre to the
+species in each case, and resulting in all that we most admire in the
+animal world--the Rupicola's flame-coloured mantle, the peacock's crest
+and starry train, the joyous melody of the lark, and the pretty or
+fantastic dancing performances of birds.
+
+My experience is that mammals and birds, with few exceptions--probably
+there are really no exceptions--possess the habit of indulging
+frequently in more or less regular or set performances, with or without
+sound, or composed of sound exclusively; and that these performances,
+which in many animals are only discordant cries and choruses,
+and uncouth, irregular motions, in the more aerial, graceful, and
+melodious kinds take immeasurably higher, more complex, and more
+beautiful forms. Among the mammalians the instinct appears
+almost universal; but their displays are, as a rule, less admirable than
+those seen in birds. There are some kinds, it is true, like the
+squirrels and monkeys, of arboreal habits, almost birdlike in their
+restless energy, and in the swiftness and certitude of their motions, in
+which the slightest impulse can be instantly expressed in graceful or
+fantastic action; others, like the Chinchillidae family, have greatly
+developed vocal organs, and resemble birds in loquacity; but mammals
+generally, compared with birds, are slow and heavy, and not so readily
+moved to exhibitions of the kind I am discussing.
+
+The terrestrial dances, often very elaborate, of heavy birds, like those
+of the gallinaceous kind, are represented in the more volatile species
+by performances in the air, and these are very much more beautiful;
+while a very large number of birds--hawks, vultures, swifts, swallows,
+nightjars, storks, ibises, spoonbills, and gulls--circle about in the
+air, singly or in flocks. Sometimes, in serene weather, they rise to a
+vast altitude, and float about in one spot for an hour or longer at a
+stretch, showing a faint bird-cloud in the blue, that does not change
+its form, nor grow lighter and denser like a flock of starlings; but in
+the seeming confusion there is perfect order, and amidst many hundreds
+each swift- or slow-gliding figure keeps its proper distance with such
+exactitude that no two ever touch, even with the extremity of the
+long-wings, flapping or motionless:--such a multitude, and such
+miraculous precision in the endless curving motions of all the members
+of it, that the spectator can lie for an hour on his back without
+weariness watching this mystic cloud-dance in the empyrean.
+
+The black-faced ibis of Patagonia, a bird nearly as large as a turkey,
+indulges in a curious mad performance, usually in the evening when
+feeding-time is over. The birds of a flock, while winging their way to
+the roosting-place, all at once seem possessed with frenzy,
+simultaneously dashing downwards with amazing violence, doubling about
+in the most eccentric manner; and when close to the surface rising again
+to repeat the action, all the while making the air palpitate for miles
+around with their hard, metallic cries. Other ibises, also birds of
+other genera, have similar aerial performances.
+
+The displays of most ducks known to me take the form of mock fights on
+the water; one exception is the handsome and loquacious whistling
+widgeon of La Plata, which has a pretty aerial performance. A dozen or
+twenty birds rise up until they appear like small specks in the sky, and
+sometimes disappear from sight altogether; and at that great altitude
+they continue hovering in one spot, often for an hour or longer,
+alternately closing and separating; the fine, bright, whistling notes
+and flourishes of the male curiously harmonizing with the grave,
+measured notes of the female; and every time they close they slap each
+other on the wings so smartly that the sound can be distinctly heard,
+like applauding hand-claps, even after the birds have ceased to be
+visible.
+
+The rails, active, sprightly birds with powerful and varied voices, are
+great performers; but owing to the nature of the ground they inhabit and
+to their shy, suspicious character, it is not easy to observe their
+antics. The finest of the Platan rails is the ypecaha, a beautiful,
+active bird about the size of the fowl. A number of ypecahas have their
+assembling place on a small area of smooth, level ground, just above the
+water, and hemmed in by dense rush beds. First, one bird among the
+rushes emits a powerful cry, thrice repeated; and this is a note of
+invitation, quickly responded to by other birds from all sides as they
+hurriedly repair to the usual place. In a few moments they appear, to
+the number of a dozen or twenty, bursting from the rushes and running
+into the open space, and instantly beginning the performance. This is a
+tremendous screaming concert. The screams they utter have a certain
+resemblance to the human voice, exerted to its utmost pitch and
+expressive of extreme terror, frenzy, and despair. A long, piercing
+shriek, astonishing for its vehemence and power, is succeeded by a lower
+note, as if in the first the creature had well nigh exhausted itself:
+this double scream is repeated several times, and followed by other
+sounds, resembling, as they rise and fall, half smothered cries of pains
+and moans of anguish. Suddenly the unearthly shrieks are renewed in all
+their power. While screaming the birds rush from side to side, as if
+possessed with madness, the wings spread and vibrating, the long-beak
+wide open and raised vertically. This exhibition lasts three or four
+minntes, after which the assembly peacefully breaks up.
+
+The singular wattled, wing-spurred, and long-, toed jacana has a
+remarkable performance, which seems specially designed to bring out the
+concealed beauty of the silky, greenish-golden wing-quills-The birds go
+singly or in pairs, and a dozen or fifteen individuals may be found in a
+marshy place feeding within sight of each other. Occasionally, in
+response to a note of invitation, they all in a moment leave off feeding
+and fly to one spot, and, forming a close cluster, and emitting short,
+excited, rapidly repeated notes, display their wings, like beautiful
+flags grouped loosely together: some hold the wings up vertically and
+motionless; others, half open and vibrating rapidly, while still others
+wave them up and down with a slow, measured motion.
+
+In the ypecaha and jacana displays both sexes take part. A stranger
+performance is that of the spur-winged lapwing of the same region--a
+species resembling the lapwing of Europe, but a third larger, brighter
+coloured, and armed with spurs. The lapwing display, called by the
+natives its "dance," or "serious dance"--by which they mean square
+dance--requires three birds for its performance, and is, so far as I
+know, unique in this respect. The birds are so fond of it that they
+indulge in it all the year round, and at frequent intervals during the
+day, also on moonlight nights. If a person watches any two birds for
+some time--for they live in pairs--he will see another lapwing, one of a
+neighbouring couple, rise up and fly to them, leaving his own mate to
+guard their chosen ground; and instead of resenting this visit as an
+unwarranted intrusion on their domain, as they would certainly resent
+the approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it with notes and
+signs of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place themselves
+behind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid march, uttering
+resonant drumming notes in time with their movements; the notes of the
+pair behind being emitted in a stream, like a drum-roll, while the
+leader utters loud single notes at regular intervals. The march ceases;
+the leader elevates his wings and stands erect and motionless, still
+uttering loud notes; while the other two, with puffed-out plumage and
+standing exactly abreast stoop forward and downward until the tips of
+their beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their rhythmical voices to a
+murmur, remain for some time in this posture. The performance is then
+over and the visitor goes back to his own ground and mate, to receive a
+visitor himself later on.
+
+In the Passerine order, not the least remarkable displays are witnessed
+in birds that are not accounted songsters, as they do not possess the
+highly developed vocal organ confined to the suborder Oscines. The
+tyrant-birds, which represent in South America the fly-catchers of the
+Old World, all have displays of some kind; in a vast majority of cases
+these are simply joyous, excited duets between male and female, composed
+of impetuous and more or less confused notes and screams, accompanied
+with beating of wings and other gestures. In some species choruses take
+the place of duets, while in others entirely different forms of display
+have been developed. In one group--Cnipolegus--the male indulges in
+solitary antics, while the silent, modest-coloured female keeps in
+hiding. Thus, the male of Cnipolegus Hudsoni, an intensely
+black-plumaged species with a concealed white wing-band, takes his stand
+on a dead twig on the summit of a bush. At intervals he leaves his
+perch, displaying the intense white on the quills, and producing, as the
+wings are thrown open and shut alternately, the effect of successive
+flashes of light. Then suddenly the bird begins revolving in the air
+about its perch, like a moth wheeling round and close to the flame of a
+candle, emitting a series of sharp clicks and making a loud humming with
+the wings. While performing this aerial waltz the black and white on the
+quills mix, the wings appearing like a grey mist encircling the body.
+The fantastic dance over, the bird drops suddenly on to its perch again;
+and, until moved to another display, remains as stiff and motionless as
+a bird carved out of jet.
+
+The performance of the scissors-tail, another tyrant-bird, is also
+remarkable. This species is grey and white, with black head and tail and
+a crocus-yellow crest. On the wing it looks like a large swallow, but
+with the two outer tail-feathers a foot long. The scissors-tails always
+live in pairs, but at sunset several pairs assemble, the birds calling
+excitedly to each other; they then mount upwards, like rockets, to a
+great height in the anand, after wheeling about for a few moments,
+pro-cipitate themselves downwards with amazing violence in a wild
+zigzag, opening and shutting the long tail-feathers like a pair of
+shears, and producing loud whirring sounds, as of clocks being wound
+rapidly up, with a slight pause after each turn of the key. This aerial
+dance over, they alight in separate couples on the tree tops, each
+couple joining in a kind of duet of rapidly repeated, castanet-like
+sounds.
+
+The displays of the wood-hewers, or Dendrocolap-tidae, another extensive
+family, resemble those of the tyrant-birds in being chiefly duets, male
+and female singing excitedly in piercing or resonant voices, and with
+much action. The habit varies somewhat in the cachalote, a Patagonian
+species of the genus Homorus, about the size of the missel-thrush. Old
+and young birds live in a family together, and at intervals, on any fine
+day, they engage in a grand screaming contest, which may be heard
+distinctly at a distance of a mile and a half. One bird mounts on to a
+bush and calls, and instantly all the others hurry to the spot, and
+burst out into a chorus of piercing cries that sound like peals and
+shrieks of insane laughter. After the chorus, they all pursue each other
+wildly about among the bushes for some minutes.
+
+In some groups the usual duet-like performances have developed into a
+kind of harmonious singing, which is very curious and pleasant to hear.
+This is pre-eminently the case with the oven-birds, as D'Orbigney first
+remarked. Thus, in the red oven-bird, the first bird, on the appearance
+of its mate flying to join it, begins to emit loud, measured notes, and
+sometimes a continuous trill, somewhat metallic in sound; but
+immediately on the other bird striking in this introductory passage is
+changed to triplets, strongly accented on the first note, in a _tempo
+vivace;_ while the second bird utters loud single notes in the same
+time. While thus singing they stand facing each other, necks
+outstretched and tails expanded, the wings of the first bird vibrating
+rapidly to the rapid utterance, while those of the second bird beat
+measured time. The finale consists of three or four notes, uttered by
+the second bird alone, strong and clear, in an ascending scale, the last
+very piercing.
+
+In the melodists proper the displays, in a majority of cases, are
+exclusively vocal, the singer sitting still on his perch. In the
+Troupials, a family of starling-like birds numbering about one hundred
+and forty species, there are many that accompany singing with pretty or
+grotesque antics. The male screaming cow-bird of La Plata, when perched,
+emits a hollow-sounding internal note that swells at the end into a
+sharp metallic ring, almost bell-like: this is uttered with wings and
+tail spread and depressed, the whole plumage being puffed out as in a
+strutting turkey-cock, while the bird hops briskly up and down on its
+perch as if dancing. The bell-like note of the male is followed by an
+impetuous scream from the female, and the dance ends. Another species,
+the common Argentine cow-bird of La Plata, when courting puffs out his
+glossy rich violet plumage, and, with wings vibrating, emits a
+succession of deep internal notes, followed by a set song in clear,
+ringing tones; and then, suddenly taking wing, he flies straight away,
+close to the surface, fluttering like a moth, and at a distance of
+twenty to thirty yards turns and flies in a wide circle round the
+female, singing loudly all the time, hedging her in with melody as it
+were.
+
+Many songsters in widely different families possess the habit of soaring
+and falling alternately while singing, and in some cases all the aerial
+postures and movements, the swift or slow descent, vertical, often, with
+oscillations, or in a spiral, and sometimes with a succession of smooth
+oblique lapses, seem to have an admirable correspondence with the
+changing and falling voice--melody and motion being united in a more
+intimate and beautiful way than in the most perfect and poetic forms of
+human dancing.
+
+One of the soaring singers is a small yellow field-finch of La
+Plata--Sycalis luteola; and this species, like some others, changes the
+form of its display with the seasons. It lives in immense flocks, and
+during the cold season it has, like most finches, only aerial pastimes,
+the birds wheeling about in a cloud, pursuing each other with lively
+chirpings. In August, when the trees begin to blossom, the flock betakes
+itself to a plantation, and, sitting on the branches, the birds sing in
+a concert of innumerable voices, producing a great volume of sound, as
+of a high wind when heard at a distance. Heard near, it is a great mass
+of melody; not a confused tangle of musical sounds as when a host of
+Troupials sing in concert, but the notes, although numberless, seem to
+flow smoothly and separately, producing an effect on the ear similar to
+that which rain does on the sight, when the sun shines on and lightens
+up the myriads of falling drops all falling one way. In this manner the
+birds sing for hours, without intermission, every day. Then the passion
+of love infects them; the pleasant choir breaks up, and its ten thousand
+members scatter wide over the surrounding fields and pasture lands.
+During courtship the male has a feeble, sketchy music, but his singing
+is then accompanied with very charming love antics. His circlings about
+the hen-bird; his numberless advances and retreats, and little soarings
+above her when his voice swells with importunate passion; his fluttering
+lapses back to earth, where he lies prone with outspread, tremulous
+wings, a suppliant at her feet, his languishing voice meanwhile dying
+down to lispings--all these apt and graceful motions seem to express the
+very sickness of the heart. But the melody during this emotional period
+is nothing. After the business of pairing and nest-building is over, his
+musical displays take a new and finer form. He sits perched on a stalk
+above the grass, and at intervals soars up forty or fifty yards high;
+rising, he utters a series of long melodious notes; then he descends in
+a graceful spiral, the set of the motionless wings giving him the
+appearance of a slowly-falling parachute; the voice then also falls, the
+notes coming lower, sweeter, and more expressive until he reaches the
+surface. After alighting the song continues, the strains becoming
+longer, thinner, and clearer, until they dwindle to the finest threads
+of sound and faintest tinklings, as from a cithern touched by fairy
+fingers. The great charm of the song is in this slow gradation from the
+somewhat throaty notes emitted by the bird when ascendino-to the
+excessively attenuated sounds at the close.
+
+In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one species more--the
+white-banded mocking-bird of Patagonia, which greatly excels all other
+songsters known to me in the copiousness, variety and brilliant
+character of its music. Concealed in the foliage this bird will sing by
+the half-hour, reproducing with miraculous fidelity the more or less
+melodious set songs of a score of species--a strange and beautiful
+performance; but wonderful as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceases
+to admire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, as if to show by
+contrast his unapproachable superiority, bursts into his own divine
+song, uttered with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, but
+greatly exceeding, that of the skylark "singing at heaven's gate;" the
+notes issuing in a continuous torrent; the voice so brilliant and
+infinitely varied, that if "rivalry and emulation" have as large a place
+in feathered breasts as some imagine all that hear this surpassing
+melody might well languish ever after in silent despair.
+
+In a vast majority of the finest musical performances the same notes are
+uttered in the same order, and after an interval the song is repeated
+without any variation: and it seems impossible that we could in any
+other way have such beautiful contrasts and harmonious lights and
+shades--the whole song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played in
+tune." This seeming impossibility is accomplished in the mocking-bird's
+song: the notes never come in the same order again and again, but, as if
+inspired, in a changed order, with variations and new sounds: and here
+again it has some resemblance to the skylark's song, and might be
+described as the lark's song with endless variations and brightened and
+spiritualized in a degree that cannot be imagined.
+
+This mocking-bird is one of those species that accompany music with
+appropriate motions. And just as its song is, so to speak, inspired and
+an im-provization, unlike any song the bird has ever uttered, so its
+motions all have the same character of spontaneity, and follow no order,
+and yet have a grace and passion and a perfect harmony with the music
+unparalleled among birds possessing a similar habit. While singing he
+passes from bush to bush, sometimes delaying a few moments on and at
+others just touching the summits, and at times sinking out of sight in
+the foliage: then, in an access of rapture, soaring vertically to a
+height of a hundred feet, with measured wing-beats, like those of a
+heron: or, mounting suddenly in a wild, hurried zigzag, then slowly
+circling downwards, to sit at last with tail outspread fanwise, and
+vans, glistening white in the sunshine, expanded and vibrating, or waved
+languidly up and down, with, a motion like that of some broad-winged
+butterfly at rest on a flower.
+
+I wish now to put this question: What relation that we can see or
+imagine to the passion of love and the business of courtship, have these
+dancing and vocal performances in nine cases out of ten? In such cases,
+for instance, as that of the scissors-tail tyrant-bird, and its
+pyrotechnic evening displays, when a number of couples leave their nests
+containing eggs and young to join in a wild aerial dance: the mad
+exhibitions of ypecahas and ibises, and the jacanas' beautiful
+exhibition of grouped wings: the triplet dances of the spur-winged
+lapwing, to perform which two birds already mated are compelled to call
+in a third bird to complete the set: the harmonious duets of the
+oven-birds, and the duets and choruses of nearly all the wood-hewers,
+and the wing-slapping aerial displays of the whistling widgeons--will it
+be seriously contended that the female of this species makes choice of
+the male able to administer the most vigorous and artistic slaps?
+
+The believer in the theory would put all these cases lightly aside, to
+cite that of the male cow-bird practising antics before the female and
+drawing a wide circle of melody round her; or that of the jet-black,
+automaton-like, dancing tyrant-bird; and concerning this species he
+would probably say that the plain-plumaged female went about unseen,
+critically watching the dancing of different males, to discover the most
+excellent performer according to the traditional standard. And this was,
+in substance, what Darwin did. There are many species in which the male,
+singly or with others, practises antics or sings during the love-season
+before the female; and when all such cases, or rather those that are
+most striking and bizarre, are brought together, and when it is
+gratuitously asserted that the females _do_ choose the males that show
+off in the best manner or that sing best, a case for sexual selection
+seems to be made out. How unfair the argument is, based on these
+carefully selected cases gathered from all regions of the globe, and
+often not properly reported, is seen when we turn from the book to
+nature and closely consider the habits and actions of all the species
+inhabiting any _one_ district. We see then that such cases as those
+described and made so much of in the _Descent of Man,_ and cases like
+those mentioned in this chapter, are not essentially different in
+character, but are manifestations of one instinct, which appears to be
+almost universal among the animals. The explanation I have to offer lies
+very much on the surface and is very simple indeed, and, like that of
+Dr. Wallace with regard [Footnote: It is curious to find that Dr.
+Wallace's idea about colour has been independently hit upon by Ruskin.
+Of stones he writes in _Frondes Agrestis_:--"I have often had occasion
+to allude to the apparent connection of brilliancy of colour with vigour
+of life and purity of substance. This is pre-eminently the case in the
+mineral kingdom. The perfection with which the particles of any
+substance unite in crystallization, corresponds in that kingdom to the
+vital power in organic nature."] to colour and ornaments covers the
+whole of the facts. We see that the inferior animals, when the
+conditions of life are favourable, are subject to periodical fits of
+gladness affecting them powerfully and standing out in vivid contrast to
+their ordinary temper. And we know what this feeling is--this periodic
+intense elation which even civilized man occasionally experiences when
+in perfect health, more especially when young. There are moments when
+he is mad with joy, when he cannot keep still, when his impulse is to
+sing and shout aloud and laugh at nothing, to run and leap and exert
+himself in some extravagant way. Among the heavier mammalians the
+feeling is manifested in loud noises, bellowings and screamings, and in
+lumbering, uncouth motions--throwing up of heels, pretended panics, and
+ponderous mock battles.
+
+In smaller and livelier animals, with greater celerity and certitude in
+their motions, the feeling shows itself in more regular and often in
+more complex ways. Thus, Felidae when young, and, in very agile,
+sprightly species like the Puma, throughout life, simulate all the
+actions of an animal hunting its prey--sudden, intense excitement of
+discovery, concealment, gradual advance, masked by intervening objects,
+with intervals of watching, when they crouch motionless, the eyes
+flashing and tail waved from side to side; finally, the rush and spring,
+when the playfellow is captured, rolled over on his back and worried to
+imaginary death. Other species of the most diverse kinds, in which voice
+is greatly developed, join in noisy concerts and choruses; many of the
+cats may be mentioned, also dogs and foxes, capybaras and other
+loquacious rodents; and in the howling monkeys this kind of performance
+rises to the sublime uproar of the tropical forest at eventide.
+
+Birds are more subject to this universal joyous instinct than mammals,
+and there are times when some species are constantly overflowing with
+it; and as they are so much freer than mammals, more buoyant and
+graceful in action, more loquacious, and have voices so much finer,
+their gladness shows itself in a greater variety of ways, with more
+regular and beautiful motions, and with melody. But every species, or
+group of species, has its own inherited form or style of performance;
+and, however rude and irregular this may be, as in the case of the
+pretended stampedes and fights of wild cattle, that is the form in which
+the feeling will always be expressed. If all men, at some exceedingly
+remote period in their history, had agreed to express the common glad
+impulse, which they now express in such an infinite variety of ways or
+do not express at all, by dancing a minuet, and minuet-dancing had at
+last come to be instinctive, and taken to spontaneously by children at
+an early period, just as they take to walking "on their hind legs,"
+man's case would be like that of the inferior animals.
+
+I was one day watching a flock of plovers, quietly feeding on the
+ground, when, in a moment, all the birds were seized by a joyous
+madness, and each one, after making a vigorous peck at his nearest
+neighbour, began running wildly about, each trying in passing to peck
+other birds, while seeking by means of quick doublings to escape being
+pecked in turn. This species always expresses its glad impulse in the
+same way; but how different in form is this simple game of
+touch-who-touch-can from the triplet dances of the spur-winged lapwings,
+with their drumming music, pompous gestures, and military precision of
+movement! How different also from the aerial performance of another bird
+of the same family--the Brazilian stilt--in which one is pursued by the
+others, mounting upwards in a wild, eccentric flight until they are all
+but lost to view; and back to earth again, and then, skywards once more;
+the pursued bird when overtaken giving place to another individual, and
+the pursuing pack making the air ring with their melodious barking
+cries! How different again are all these from the aerial pastimes of the
+snipe, in which the bird, in its violent descent, is able to produce
+such wonderful, far-reaching sounds with its tail-feathers! The snipe,
+as a rule, is a solitary bird, and, like the oscillating finch mentioned
+early in this paper, is content to practise its pastimes without a
+witness. In the gregarious kinds all perform together: for this feeling,
+like fear, is eminently contagious, and the sight of one bird mad with
+joy will quickly make the whole flock mad. There are also species that
+always live in pairs, like the scissors-tails already mentioned, that
+periodically assemble in numbers for the purpose of display. The crested
+screamer, a very large bird, may also be mentioned: male and female sing
+somewhat harmoniously together, with voices of almost unparalleled
+power: but these birds also congregate in large numbers, and a thousand
+couples, or even several thousands, may be assembled together: and, at
+intervals, both by day and night, all sing in concert, their combined
+voices producing a thunderous melody which seems to shake the earth. As
+a rule, however, birds that live always in pairs do not assemble for the
+purpose of display, but the joyous instinct is expressed by duet-like
+performances between male and female. Thus, in the three South American
+Passerine families, the tyrant-birds, wood-hewers, and ant-thrushes,
+numbering together between eight and nine hundred species, a very large
+majority appear to have displays of this description.
+
+In my own experience, in cases where the male and female together, or
+assembled with others, take equal parts in the set displays, the sexes
+arc similar, or differ little; but where the female takes no part in the
+displays the superiority of the male in brightness of colour is very
+marked. One or two instances bearing on this point may be given.
+
+A scarlet-breasted troupial of La Plata perches conspicuously on a tall
+plant in afield, and at intervals soars up vertically, singing, and, at
+the highest ascending point, flight and song end in a kind of aerial
+somersault and vocal flourish at the same moment. Meanwhile, the
+dull-plumaged female is not seen and not heard: for not even a skulking
+crake lives in closer seclusion under the herbage--so widely have the
+sexes diverged in this species. Is the female, then, without an instinct
+so common r--has she no sudden fits of irrepressible gladness?
+Doubtless she has them, and manifests them down in her place of
+concealment in lively chirpings and quick motions--the simple, primitive
+form in which gladness is expressed in the class of birds. In the
+various species of the genus Cnipolegus, already mentioned, the
+difference in the sexes is just as great as in the case of the troupial:
+the solitary, intensely black, statuesque male has, we have seen, a set
+and highly fantastic performance; but on more than one occasion I have
+seen four or five females of one species meet together and have a little
+simple performance all to themselves--in form a kind of lively mock
+fight.
+
+It might be objected that when a bird takes its stand and repeats a set
+finished song at intervals for an hour at a stretch, remaining quietly
+perched, such a performance appears to be different in character from
+the irregular and simple displays which are unmistakably caused by a
+sudden glad impulse. But we are familiar with the truth that in organic
+nature great things result from small beginnings--a common flower, and
+our own bony skulls, to say nothing of the matter contained within them,
+are proofs of it. Only a limited number of species sing in a highly
+finished manner. Looking at many species, we find every gradation, every
+shade, from the simple joyous chirp and cry to the most perfect melody.
+Even in a single branch of the true vocalists we may see it--from the
+chirping bunting, and noisy but tuneless sparrow, to linnet and
+goldfinch and canary. Not only do a large majority of species show the
+singing instinct, or form of display, in a primitive, undeveloped state,
+but in that state it continues to show itself in the young of many birds
+in which melody is most highly developed in the adult. And where the
+development has been solely in the male the female never rises above
+that early stage; in her lively chirpings and little mock fights and
+chases, and other simple forms which gladness takes in birds, as well as
+in her plainer plumage, and absence of ornament, she represents the
+species at some remote period. And as with song so with antics and all
+set performances aerial or terrestrial, from those of the whale and the
+elephant to those of the smallest insect.
+
+Another point remains to be noticed, and that is the greater frequency
+and fulness in displays of all kinds, including song, during the love
+season. And here Dr. Wallace's colour and ornament theory helps us to an
+explanation. At the season of courtship, when the conditions of life are
+most favourable vitality is at its maximum, and naturally it is then
+that the proficiency in all kinds of dancing-antics, aerial and
+terrestrial, appears greatest, and that melody attains its highest
+perfection. This applies chiefly to birds, but even among birds there
+are exceptions, as we have seen in the case of the field-finch, Sycalis
+luteola. The love-excitement is doubtless pleasurable to them, and it
+takes the form in which keenly pleasurable emotions are habitually
+expressed, although not infrequently with variations due to the greater
+intensity of the feeling. In some migrants the males arrive before the
+females, and no sooner have they recovered from the effects of their
+journey than they burst out into rapturous singing; these are not
+love-strains, since the females have not yet arrived, and pairing-time
+is perhaps a mouth distant; their singing merely expresses their
+overflowing gladness. The forest at that season is vocal, not only with
+the fine melody of the true songsters, but with hoarse cawings, piercing
+cries, shrill duets, noisy choruses, drummings, boomings, trills,
+wood-tappings--every sound with which different species express the glad
+impulse; and birds like the parrot that only exert their powerful voices
+in screamings--because "they can do no other"--then scream their
+loudest. When courtship begins it has in many cases the effect of
+increasing the beauty of the performance, giving added sweetness, verve,
+and brilliance to the song, and freedom and grace to the gestures and
+motions. But, as I have said, there are exceptions. Thus, some birds
+that are good melodists at other times sing in a feeble, disjointed
+manner during courtship. In Patagonia I found that several of the birds
+with good voices--one a mocking bird--were, like the robin at home,
+autumn and winter songsters.
+
+The argument has been stated very binefly: but little would be gained by
+the mere multiplication of instances, since, however many, they would bo
+selected instances--from a single district, it is true, while those in
+the _Descent of Man_ were brought together from an immeasurably wider
+field; but the principle is the same in both cases, and to what I have
+written it may be objected that, if, instead of twenty-five, I had given
+a hundred cases, taking them as they came, they might have shown a
+larger proportion of instances like that of the cow-bird, in which the
+male has a set performance practised only during the love-season and in
+the presence of the female.
+
+It is, no doubt, true that all collections of facts relating to animal
+life present nature to us somewhat as a "fantastic realm"--unavoidably
+so, in a measure, since the writing would be too bulky, or too dry, or
+too something inconvenient, if we did not take only the most prominent
+facts that come before us, remove them from their places, where alone
+they can be seen in their proper relations to numerous other less
+prominent facts, and rearrange them patch work-wise to make up our
+literature. But I am convinced that any student of the subject who will
+cast aside his books--supposing that they have not already bred a habit
+in his mind of seeing only "in accordance with verbal statement"--and go
+directly to nature to note the actions of animals for himself--actions
+which, in many cases, appear to lose all significance when set down in
+writing--the result of such independent investigation will be a
+conviction that conscious sexual selection on the part of the female is
+not the cause of music and dancing performances in birds, nor of the
+brighter colours and ornaments that distinguish the male. It is true
+that the females of some species, both in the vertebrate and insect
+kingdoms, do exercise a preference; but in a vast majority of species
+the male takes the female he finds, or that he is able to win from other
+competitors; and if we go to the reptile class we find that in the
+ophidian order, which excels in variety and richness of colour, there is
+no such thing as preferential mating; and if we go to the insect class,
+we find that in butterflies, which surpass all creatures in their
+glorious beauty, the female gives herself up to the embrace of the first
+male that appears, or else is captured by the strongest male, just as
+she might be by a mantis or some other rapacious insect.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+BIOGRAPHY OF THE VIZCACHA.
+
+_(Lagostomus Trichodactylus.)_
+
+
+The vizcacha is perhaps the most characteristic of the South American
+Rodentia, [Footnote: "According to Mr. Waterhouse, of all rodents the
+vizcacha is most nearly related to marsupials; but in the points in
+which it approaches this order its relations are general, that is, not
+to any one marsupial species more than to another. As these points of
+affinity are believed to be real and not merely adaptive, they must be
+due in accordance with our view to inheritance from a common progenitor.
+Therefore wo must suppose either that all rodents, including the
+vizcacha, branched off from some ancient marsupial, which will naturally
+have been more or less intermediate in character with respect to all
+existing marsupials; or, that both lodents and marsupials branched off
+from a common progenitor. ... On either view we must suppose that the
+vizcacha has retained, by inheritance, more of the characters of its
+ancient progenitor than have other rodents."--DARWIN; _Origin of
+Species._] while its habits, in some respects, are more interesting than
+those of any other rodent known: it is, moreover, the most common mammal
+we have on the pampas; and all these considerations have induced me to
+write a very full account of its customs. It is necessary to add that
+since the following pages were written at my home on the pampas a great
+war of extermination has been waged against this animal by the
+landowners, which has been more fortunate in its results--or unfortunate
+if one's sympathies are with the vizcacha--than the war of the
+Australians against their imported rodent--the smaller and more prolific
+rabbit.
+
+The vizcachas on the pampas of Buenos Ayres live in societies, usually
+numbering twenty or thirty members. The village, which is called
+Vizcachera, is composed of a dozen or fifteen burrows or mouths; for one
+entrance often serves for two or more distinct holes. Often, where the
+ground is soft, there are twenty or thirty or more burrows in an old
+vizcachera; but on stony, or "tosca" soil even an old one may have no
+more than four or five burrows. They are deep wide-mouthed holes, placed
+very close together, the entire village covering an area of from one
+hundred to two hundred square feet of ground.
+
+The burrows vary greatly in extent; and usually in a vizcachera there
+are several that, at a distance of from four to six feet from the
+entrance, open into large circular chambers. From these chambers other
+burrows diverge in all directions, some running horizontally, others
+obliquely downwards to a maximum depth of six feet from the surface:
+some of these burrows or galleries communicate with those of other
+burrows. A vast amount of loose earth is thus brought up, and forms a
+very irregular mound, fifteen to thirty inches above the surrounding
+level.
+
+It will afford some conception of the numbers of these vizcacheras on
+the settled pampas when I say that, in some directions, a person might
+ride five hundred miles and never advance half a mile without seeing one
+or more of them. In districts where, as far as the eye can see, the
+plains are as level and smooth as a bowling-green, especially in winter
+when the grass is close-cropped, and where the rough giant-thistle has
+not sprung up, these mounds appear like brown or dark spots on a green
+surface. They are the only irregularities that occur to catch the eye,
+and consequently form an important feature in the scenery. In some
+places they are so near together that a person on horseback may count a
+hundred of them from one point of view.
+
+The sites of which the vizcacha invariably makes choice to work on, as
+well as his manner of burrow-ing, adapt him peculiarly to live and
+thrive on the open pampas. Other burrowing species seem always to fix
+upon some spot where there is a bank or a sudden depression in the soil,
+or where there is rank herbage, or a bush or tree, about the roots of
+which to begin their kennel. They are averse to commence digging on a
+clear level surface, either because it is not easy for them where they
+have nothing to rest their foreheads against while scratching, or
+because they possess a wary instinct that impels them to place the body
+in concealment whilst working on the surface, thus securing the
+concealment of the burrow after it is made. Certain it is that where
+large hedges have been planted on the pampas, multitudes of opossums,
+weasels, skunks, armadillos, &c., come and make their burrows beneath
+them; and where there are no hedges or trees, all these species make
+their kennels under bushes of the perennial thistle, or where there is a
+shelter of some kind. The vizcacha, on the contrary, chooses an open
+level spot, the cleanest he can find to burrow on. The first thing that
+strikes the observer when viewing the vizcachera closely is the enormous
+size of the entrance of the burrows, or, at least, of several of the
+central ones in the mound; for there are usually several smaller outside
+burrows. The pit-like opening to some of these principal burrows is
+often four to six feet across the mouth, and sometimes deep enough for a
+tall man to stand up waist-deep in. How these large entrances can be
+made on a level surface may be seen when the first burrow or burrows of
+an incipient vizcachera are formed. It is not possible to tell what
+induces a vizcacha to be the founder of a new community; for they
+increase very slowly, and furthermore are extremely fond of each other's
+society; and it is invariably one individual that leaves his native
+village to found a new and independent one. If it were to have better
+pasture at hand, then he would certainly remove to a considerable
+distance; but he merely goes from forty to fifty or sixty yards off to
+begin his work. Thus it is that in desert places, where these animals
+are rare, a solitary vizcachera is never seen; but there are always
+several close together, though there may be no others on the surrounding
+plain for leagues. When the vizcacha has made his habitation, it is but
+a single burrow, with only himself for an inhabitant, perhaps for many
+months. Sooner or later, however, others join him: and these will be the
+parents of innumerable generations; for they construct no temporary
+lodging-place, as do the armadillos and other species, but their
+posterity continues in the quiet possession of the habitations
+bequeathed to it; how long, it is impossible to say. Old men who have
+lived all their lives in one district remember that many of the
+vizcacheras around them existed when they were children. It is
+invariably a male that begins a new village, and makes his burrow in the
+following manner, though he does not always observe the same method. He
+works very straight into the earth, digging a hole twelve or fourteen
+inches wide, but not so deep, at an angle of about 25 degrees with the
+surface. But after he has progressed inwards a few feet, the vizcacha is
+no longer satisfied with merely scattering away the loose earth he
+fetches up, but cleans it away so far in a straight line from the
+entrance, and scratches so much on this line (apparently to make the
+slope gentler), that he soon forms a trench a foot or more in depth, and
+often three or four feet in length. Its use is, as I have inferred, to
+facilitate the conveying of the loose earth as far as possible from the
+entrance of the burrow. But after a while the animal is unwilling that
+it should accumulate even at the end of this long passage; he therefore
+proceeds to make two additional trenches, that form an acute, sometimes
+a right angle, converging into the first, so that when the whole is
+completed it takes the form of a capital Y.
+
+These trenches are continually deepened and lengthened as the burrow
+progresses, the angular segment of earth between them, scratched away,
+until by degrees it has been entirely conveyed off, and in its place is
+the one deep great unsymmetrical mouth I have already described. There
+are soils that will not admit of the animals working in this manner.
+Where there are large cakes of "tosca" near the surface, as in many
+localities on the southern pampas, the vizcacha makes its burrow as best
+he can, and without the regular trenches. In earths that crumble much,
+sand or gravel, he also works under great disadvantages.
+
+The burrows are made best in the black and red moulds of the pampas; but
+even in such soils the entrances of many burrows are made differently.
+In some the central trench is wanting, or is so short that there appear
+but two passages converging directly into the burrow; or these two
+trenches may be so curved inwards as to form the segment of a circle.
+Many other forms may also be noticed, but usually they appear to be only
+modifications of the most common Y-shaped system.
+
+As I have remarked that its manner of burrowing has peculiarly adapted
+the vizcacha to the pampas, it may be asked what particular advantage a
+species that makes a wide-mouthed burrow possesses over those that
+excavate in the usual way. On a declivity, or at the base of rocks or
+trees, there would be none; but on the perfectly level and shelterless
+pampas, the durability of the burrow, a circumstance favourable to the
+animal's preservation, is owing altogether to its being made in this
+way, and to several barrows being made together. The two outer trenches
+diverge so widely from the mouth that half the earth brought out is cast
+behind instead of before it, thus creating a mound of equal height about
+the entrance, by which it is secured from water during great rainfalls,
+while the cattle avoid treading over the great pit-like entrances. But
+the burrows of the dolichotis, armadillo, and other species, when made
+on perfectly level ground, are soon trod on and broken in by cattle; in
+summer they are choked up with dust and rubbish; and, the loose earth
+having all been thrown up together in a heap on one side, there is no
+barrier to the water which in eveiy great rainfall flows in and
+obliterates the kennel, drowning or driving out the tenant.
+
+I have been minute in describing the habitations of the vizcacha, as I
+esteem the subject of prime importance in considering the zoology of
+this portion of America. The vizcacha does not benefit himself alone by
+his perhaps unique style of burrowing; but this habit has proved
+advantageous to several other species, and has been so favourable to two
+of our birds that they are among the most common species found here,
+whereas without these burrows they would have been exceedingly rare,
+since the natural banks in which they breed are scarcely found anywhere
+on the pampas. I refer to the Minera (Geositta cunicularia), which makes
+its breeding-holes in the bank-like sides of the vizcacha's burrow, and
+to the little swallow (Atticora cyanoleuca) which breeds in these
+excavations when forsaken by the Minera. Few old vizcacheras are seen
+without some of these little parasitical burrows in them.
+
+Birds are not the only beings in this way related to the vizcachas: the
+fox and the weasel of the pampas live almost altogether in them. Several
+insects also frequent these burrows that are seldom found anywhere else.
+Of these the most interesting are:--a large predacious nocturnal bug,
+shining black, with red wings; a nocturnal Cicindela, a beautiful
+insect, with dark green striated wing-cases and pale red legs; also
+several diminutive wingless wasps. Of the last I have counted six
+species, most of them marked with strongly contrasted colours, black,
+red, and white. There are also other wasps that prey on the spiders
+found on the vizcachera. All these and others are so numerous on the
+mounds that dozens of them might there be collected any summer day; but
+if sought for in other situations they are exceedingly rare. If the dry
+mound of soft earth which the vizcacha elevates amidst a waste of humid,
+close-growing grass is not absolutely necessary to the existence of all
+these species, it supplies them with at least one favourable condition,
+and without doubt thereby greatly increases their numbers: they, too,
+whether predacious or preyed on, have so many relations with other
+outside species, and these again with still others, that it would be no
+mere fancy to say that probably hundreds of species are either directly
+or indirectly affected in their struggle for existence by the
+vizcacheras so abundantly sprinkled over the pampas.
+
+In winter the vizcachas seldom leave their burrows till dark, but in
+summer come out before sunset; and the vizcachera is then a truly
+interesting spectacle. Usually one of the old males first appears, and
+sits on some prominent place on the mound, apparently in no haste to
+begin his evening meal. When approached from the front he stirs not, but
+eyes the intruder with a bold indifferent stare. If the person passes to
+one side, he deigns not to turn his head.
+
+Other vizcachas soon begin to appear, each one quietly taking up his
+station at his burrow's mouth, the females, known by their greatly
+inferior size and lighter grey colour, sitting upright on their
+haunches, as if to command a better view, and indicating by divers
+sounds and gestures that fear and curiosity struggles in them for
+mastery; for they are always wilder and sprightlier in their motions
+than the males. With eyes fixed on the intruder, at intervals they dodge
+the head, emitting at the same time an internal note with great
+vehemence; and suddenly, as the danger comes nearer, they plunge
+simultaneously, with a startled cry, into their burrows. But in some
+curiosity is the strongest emotion; for, in spite of their fellow's
+contagious example, and already half down the entrance, again they start
+up to scrutinize the stranger, and will then often permit him to walk
+within five or six paces of them.
+
+Standing on the mound there is frequently a pair of burrowing owls
+(Pholeoptynx cunicularia). These birds generally make their own burrows
+to breed in, or sometimes take possession of one of the lesser outside
+burrows of the village; but their favourite residence, when not engaged
+in tending their eggs or young, is on the vizcachera. Here a pair will
+sit all day; and I have often remarked a couple close together on the
+edge of the burrow; and when the vizcacha came out in the evening,
+though but a hand's breadth from them, they did not stir, nor did he
+notice them, so accustomed are these creatures to each other. Usually a
+couple of the little burrowing Geositta are also present. They are
+lively creatures, running with great rapidity about the mound and bare
+space that surrounds it, suddenly stopping and jerking their tails in a
+slow deliberate manner, and occasionally uttering their cry, a trill, or
+series of quick short clear notes, resembling somewhat the shrill
+excessive laughter of a child. Among the grave, stationary vizcachas, of
+which they take no heed, perhaps half a dozen or more little swallows
+(Atticora cyanoleuca) are seen, now clinging altogether to the bank-like
+entrance of a burrow, now hovering over it in a moth-like manner, as if
+uncertain where to alight, and anon sweeping about in circles, but never
+ceasing their low and sorrowful notes.
+
+The vizcachera with all its incongruous inhabitants thus collected upon
+it is to a stranger one of the most novel sights the pampas afford.
+
+The vizcacha appears to be a rather common species over all the
+extensive Argentine territory; but they are so exceedingly abundant on
+the pampas inhabited by man, and comparatively so rare in the desert
+places I have been in, that I was at first much surprised at finding
+them so unequally distributed. I have also mentioned that the vizcacha
+is a tame familiar creature. This is in the pastoral districts, where
+they are never disturbed; but in wild regions, where he is scarce, he is
+exceedingly wary, coming forth long after dark, and plunging into his
+burrow on the slightest alarm, so that it is a rare thing to get a sight
+of him. The reason is evident enough; in desert regions the vizcacha has
+several deadly enemies in the larger rapacious mammals. Of these the
+puma or lion (Felis concolor) is the most numerous, as it is also the
+swiftest, most subtle, and most voracious; for, as regards these traits,
+the jaguar (F. onca) is an inferior animal. To the insatiable bloody
+appetite of this creature nothing comes amiss; he takes the male ostrich
+by surprise, and slays that wariest of wild things on his nest; He
+captures little birds with the dexterity of a cat, and hunts for diurnal
+armadillos; he comes unawares upon the deer and huanaco, and, springing
+like lightning on them, dislocates their necks before their bodies touch
+the earth. Often after he has thus slain them, he leaves their bodies
+untouched for the Polyborus and vulture to feast on, so great a delight
+does he take in destroying life. The vizcacha falls an easy victim to
+this subtle creature; and it is not to be wondered at that it becomes
+wild to excess, and rare in regions hunted over by such an enemy, even
+when all other conditions are favourable to its increase. But as soon
+as these wild regions are settled by man the pumas are exterminated, and
+the sole remaining foe of the vizcacha is the fox, comparatively an
+insignificant one.
+
+The fox takes up his residence in a vizcachera, and succeeds, after
+some quarrelling (manifested in snarls, growls, and other subterranean
+warlike sounds), in ejecting the rightful owners of one of the burrows,
+which forthwith becomes his. Certainly the vizcachas are not much
+injured by being compelled to relinquish the use of one of their kennels
+for a season or permanently; for, if the locality suits him, the fox
+remains with them always. Soon they grow accustomed to the unwelcome
+stranger; he is quiet and unassuming in demeanour, and often in the
+evening sits on the mound in their company, until they regard him with
+the same indifference they do the burrowing owl. But in spring, when the
+young vizcachas are large enough to leave their cells, then the fox
+makes them his prey; and if it is a bitch fox, with a family of eight or
+nine young to provide for, she will grow so bold as to hunt her helpless
+quarry from hole to hole, and do battle with the old ones, and carry off
+the young in spite of them, so that all the young animals in the village
+are eventually destroyed. Often when the young foxes are large enough to
+follow their mother, the whole family takes leave of the vizcachera
+where such cruel havoc has been made to settle in another, there to
+continue their depredations. But the fox has ever a relentless foe in
+man, and meets with no end of bitter persecutions; it is consequently
+much more abundant in desert or thinly settled districts than in such as
+are populous, so that in these the check the vizcachas receive from the
+foxes is not appreciable.
+
+The abundance of cattle on the pampas has made it unnecessary to use the
+vizcacha as an article of food. His skin is of no value; therefore man,
+the destroyer of his enemies, has hitherto been the greatest benefactor
+of his species. Thus they have been permitted to multiply and spread
+themselves to an amazing extent, so that the half-domestic cattle on the
+pampas are not nearly so familiar with man, or so fearless of his
+presence as are the vizcachas. It is not that they do him no injury, but
+because they do it indirectly, that they have so long enjoyed immunity
+from persecution. It is amusing to see the sheep-farmer, the greatest
+sufferer from the vizcachas, regarding them with such indifference as to
+permit them to swarm on his "run," and burrow within a stone's throw of
+his dwelling with impunity, and yet going a distance from home to
+persecute with unreasonable animosity a fox, skunk, or opossum on
+account of the small annual loss it inflicts on the poultry-yard. That
+the vizcacha has comparatively no adverse conditions to war with
+wherever man is settled is evident when we consider its very slow rate
+of increase, and yet see them in such incalculable numbers. The female
+has but one litter in the year of two young, sometimes of three. She
+becomes pregnant late in April, and brings forth in September; the
+period of gestation is, I think, rather less than five months.
+
+The vizcacha is about two years growing. A full-sized male measures to
+the root of the tail twenty-two inches, and weighs from fourteen to
+fifteen pounds; the female is nineteen inches in length, and her
+greatest weight nine pounds. Probably it is a long-lived, and certainly
+it is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green substance to eat it
+never drinks water; but after a long summer drought, when for months it
+has subsisted on bits of dried thistle-stalks and old withered grass, if
+a shower falls it will come out of its burrows even at noonday and drink
+eagerly from the pools. It has been erroneously stated that vizcachas
+subsist on roots. Their food is grass and seeds; but they may also
+sometimes eat roots, as the ground is occasionally seen scratched up
+about the burrows. In March, when the stalks of the perennial cardoon or
+Castile thistle (Cynara cardunculus) are dry, the vizcachas fell them by
+gnawing about their roots, and afterwards tear to pieces the great dry
+flower-heads to get the seeds imbedded deeply in them, of which they
+seem very fond. Large patches of thistle are often found served thus,
+the ground about them literally white with the silvery bristles they
+have scattered. This cutting down tall plants to get the seeds at the
+top seems very like an act of pure intelligence; but the fact is, the
+vizcachas cut down every tall plant they can. I have seen whole acres of
+maize destroyed by them, yet the plants cut down were left untouched. If
+posts be put into the ground within range of their nightly rambles they
+will gnaw till they have felled them, unless of a wood hard enough to
+resist their chisel-like incisors.
+
+The strongest instinct of this animal is to clear the ground thoroughly
+about its burrows; and it is this destructive habit that makes it
+necessary for cultivators of the soil to destroy all the vizcachas in or
+near their fields. On the uninhabited pampas, where the long grasses
+grow, I have often admired the vizcachera; for it is there the centre of
+a clean space, often of half an acre in extent, on which there is an
+even close-shaven turf: this clearing is surrounded by the usual rough
+growth of herbs and giant grasses. In such situations this habit of
+clearing the ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affords
+them a comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, and
+over which they can fly to their burrows without meeting any
+obstruction, on the slightest alarm.
+
+Of course the instinct continues to operate where it is no longer of any
+advantage. In summer, when the thistles are green, even when growing
+near the burrows, and the giant thistle (Carduus mariana) springs up
+most luxuriantly right on the mound, the vizcachas will not touch them,
+either disliking the strong astringent sap, or repelled by the thorns
+with which they are armed. As soon as they dry, and the thorns become
+brittle, they are levelled; afterwards, when the animal begins to drag
+them about and cut them up, as his custom is, he accidentally discovers
+and feasts on the seed: for vizcachas are fond of exercising their teeth
+on hard substances, such as sticks and bones, just as cats are of
+"sharpening their claws" on trees.
+
+Another remarkable habit of the vizcacha, that of dragging to and
+heaping about the mouth of his burrow every stalk he cuts down, and
+every portable object that by dint of great strength he can carry, has
+been mentioned by Azara, Darwin, and others. On the level plains it is a
+useful habit; for as the vizcachas are continually deepening and
+widening their burrows, the earth thrown out soon covers up these
+materials, and so assists in raising the mound. On the Buenos-Ayrean
+pampas numbers of vizcacheras would annually be destroyed by water in
+the great sudden rainfalls were the mounds loss high. But this is only
+an advantage when the animals inhabit a perfectly level country subject
+to flooding rains; for where the surface is unequal they invariably
+prefer high to low ground to burrow on, and are thus secured from
+destruction by water; yet the instinct is as strong in such situations
+as on the level plains. The most that can be said of a habit apparently
+so obscure in its origin and uses is, that it appears to be part of the
+instinct of clearing the ground about the village. Every tall stalk the
+vizcacha cuts down, every portable object he finds, must be removed to
+make the surface clean and smooth; but while encumbered with it he does
+not proceed further from his burrows, but invariably re-tires towards
+them, and so deposits it upon the mound. So well known is this habit,
+that whatever article is lost by night--whip, pistol, or knife--the
+loser next morning visits the vizcacheras in the vicinity, quite sure of
+finding it there. People also visit the vizcacheras to pick up sticks
+for firewood.
+
+The vizcachas are cleanly in their habits; and the fur, though it has a
+strong earthy smell, is kept exceedingly neat. The hind leg and foot
+afford a very beautiful instance of adaptation. Propped by the hard
+curved tail, they sit up erect, and as firmly on the long horny disks on
+the undersides of the hind legs as a man stands on his feet. Most to be
+admired, on the middle toe the skin thickens into a round cushion, in
+which the curved teeth-like bristles are set; nicely graduated in
+length, so that "each particular hair" may come into contact with the
+skin when the animal scratches or combs itself. As to the uses of this
+appendage there can be no difference of opinion, as there is about the
+serrated claw in birds. It is quite obvious that the animal cannot
+scratch himself with his hind paw (as all mammals do) without making use
+of this natural comb. Then the entire foot is modified, so that this
+comb shall be well protected, and yet not be hindered from performing
+its office: thus the inner toe is pressed close to the middle one, and
+so depressed that it comes under the cushion of skin, and cannot
+possibly get before the bristles, or interfere their coming against the
+skin in scratching, as certainly be the case if this toe were free as
+outer one.
+
+Again, the vizcachas appear to form the deep trenches before the burrows
+by scratching the earth violently backwards with the hind claws. Now
+these straight, sharp, dagger-shaped claws, and especially the middle
+one, are so long that the vizcacha is able to perform all this rough
+work without the bristles coming into contact with the ground, and so
+getting worn by the friction. The Tehuelcho Indians in Patagonia comb
+their hair with a brush-comb very much like that on the vizcacha's toe,
+but in their case it does not properly fulfil its office, or else the
+savages make little use of it. Vizcachas have a remarkable way of
+dusting themselves: the animal suddenly throws himself on his back, and,
+bringing over his hind legs towards his head, depresses them till his
+feet touch the ground. In this strange posture he scratches up the earth
+with great rapidity, raising a little cloud of dust, then rights himself
+with a jerk, and, after an interval, repeats the dusting. Usually they
+scratch a hole in the ground to deposit their excrements in. Whilst
+opening one of the outside burrows that had no communication with the
+others, I once discovered a vast deposit of their dung (so great that it
+must have been accumulating for years) at the extremity. To ascertain
+whether this be a constant, or only a casual habit, it would be
+necessary to open up entirely a vast number of vizcacheras. When a
+vizcacha dies in his burrow the carcass is, after some days, dragged out
+and left upon the mound.
+
+The language of the vizcacha is wonderful for its variety. When the male
+is feeding he frequently pauses to utter a succession of loud,
+percussive, and somewhat jarring cries; these he utters in a leisurely
+manner, and immediately after goes on feeding. Often he utters this cry
+in a low grunting tone. One of his commonest expressions sounds like the
+violent hawking of a man clearing his throat. At other times he bursts
+into piercing tones that may be heard a mile off, beginning like the
+excited and quick-repeated squeals of a young pig, and growing longer,
+more attenuated, and quavering towards the end. After retiring alarmed
+into the burrows, he repeats at intervals a deep internal moan. All
+these, and many other indescribable guttural, sighing, shrill, and deep
+tones, are varied a thousand ways in strength and intonation, according
+to the age, sex, or emotions of the individual; and I doubt if there is
+in the world any other four-footed thing so loquacious, or with a
+dialect so extensive. I take great pleasure in going to some spot where
+they are abundant, and sitting quietly to listen to them; for they are
+holding a perpetual discussion, all night long, which the presence of a
+human being will not interrupt.
+
+At night, when the vizcachas are all out feeding, in places where they
+are very abundant (and in some districts they literally swarm) any very
+loud and sudden sound, as the report of a gun, or a clap of unexpected
+thunder, will produce a most extraordinary effect. No sooner has the
+report broken on the stillness of night than a perfect storm of cries
+bursts forth over the surrounding country. After eight or nine seconds
+there is in the storm a momentary hill or pause; and then it breaks
+forth again, apparently louder than before. There is so much difference
+in the tones of different animals that the cries of individuals close at
+hand may be distinguished amidst the roar of blended voices coming from
+a distance. It sounds as if thousands and tens of thousands of them
+were striving to express every emotion at the highest pitch of their
+voices; so that the effect is indescribable, and fills a stranger with
+astonishment. Should a gun be fired off several times, their cries
+become less each time; and after the third or fourth time it produces no
+effect. They have a peculiar, sharp, sudden, "far-darting" alarm-note
+when a dog is spied, that is repeated by all that hear it, and produces
+an instantaneous panic, sending every vizcacha flying to his burrow.
+
+But though they manifest such a terror of dogs when out feeding at night
+(for the slowest dog can overtake them), in the evening, when sitting
+upon their mounds, they treat them with tantalizing contempt. If the dog
+is a novice, the instant he spies the animal he rushes violently at it;
+the vizcacha waits the charge with imperturbable calmness till his enemy
+is within one or two yards, and then disappears into the burrow. After
+having been foiled in this way many times, the dog resorts to stratagem:
+he crouches down as if transformed for the nonce into a Felis, and
+steals on with wonderfully slow and cautious steps, his hair bristling,
+tail hanging, and eyes intent on his motionless intended victim; when
+within seven or eight yards he makes a sudden rush, but invariably with
+the same dis-appointing result. The persistence with which the dogs go
+on hoping against hope in this unprofitable game, in which they always
+act the stupid part, is highly amusing, and is very interesting to the
+naturalist; for it shows that the native dogs on .the pampas have
+developed a very remarkable instinct, and one that might be perfected by
+artificial selection; but dogs with the hunting habits of the cat would,
+I think, be of little use to man. When it is required to train dogs to
+hunt the nocturnal armadillo (Dasypus villosus), then this deep-rooted
+(and, it might be added, hereditary) passion for vizcachas is
+excessively annoying, and it is often necessary to administer hundreds
+of blows and rebukes before a dog is induced to track an armadillo
+without leaving the scent every few moments to make futile grabs at his
+old enemies.
+
+The following instance will show how little suspicion of man the
+vizcachas have. A few years ago I went out shooting them on three
+consecutive evenings. I worked in a circle, constantly revisiting the
+same burrows, never going a greater distance from home than could be
+walked in four or five minutes. During the three evenings I shot sixty
+vizcachas dead; and probably as many more escaped badly wounded into
+their burrows; for they are hard to kill, and however badly wounded, if
+sitting near the burrow when struck, are almost certain to escape into
+it. But on the third evening I found them no wilder, and killed about as
+many as on the first. After this I gave up shooting them in disgust; it
+was dull sport, and to exterminate or frighten them away with a gun
+seemed an impossibility.
+
+It is a very unusual thing to eat the vizcacha, most people, and
+especially the gauchos, having a silly unaccountable prejudice against
+their flesh. I have found it very good, and while engaged writing this
+chapter have dined on it served up in various ways. The young animals
+are rather insipid, the old males tough, but the mature females are
+excellent--the flesh being tender, exceedingly white, fragrant to the
+nostrils, and with a very delicate game-flavour.
+
+Within the last ten years so much new land has been brought under
+cultivation that farmers have been compelled to destroy incredible
+numbers of vizcachas: many large "estancieros" (cattle-breeders) have
+followed the example set by the grain-growers, and have had them
+exterminated on their estates. Now all that Azara, on hearsay, tells
+about the vizcachas perishing in their burrows, when these are covered
+up, but that they can support life thus buried for a period of ten or
+twelve days, and that during that time animals will come from other
+villages and disinter them, unless frightened off with dogs, is strictly
+true. Country workmen are so well acquainted with these facts that they
+frequently undertake to destroy all the vizcacheras on an estate for so
+paltry a sum as ten-pence in English money for each one, and yet will
+make double the money at this work than they can at any other. By day
+they partly open up, then cover up the burrows with a great quantity of
+earth, and by night go round with dogs to drive away the vizcachas from
+the still open burrows that come to dig out their buried friends. After
+all the vizcacheras on an estate have been thus served, the workmen are
+usually bound by previous agreement to keep guard over them for a space
+of eight or ten days before they receive their hire: for the animals
+covered up are then supposed to be all dead. Some of these men I have
+talked with have assured me that living vizcachas have been found after
+fourteen days--a proof of their great endurance. There is nothing
+strange, I think, in the mere fact of the vizcacha being unable to work
+his way out when thus buried alive; for, for all I know to the contrary,
+other species may, when their burrows are well covered up, perish in the
+same manner; but it certainly is remarkable that other vizcachas should
+come from a distance to dig out those that are buried alive. In this
+good office they are exceedingly zealous; and I have frequently
+surprised them after sunrise, at a considerable distance from their own
+burrows, diligently scratching at those that had been covered up. The
+vizcachas are fond of each other's society, and live peaceably together;
+but their goodwill is not restricted to the members of their own little
+community; it extends to the whole species, so that as soon as night
+comes many animals leave their own and go to visit the adjacent
+villages. If one approaches a vizcachera at night, usually some of the
+vizcachas on it scamper off to distant burrows: these are neighbours
+merely come to pay a friendly visit. This intercourse is so frequent
+that little straight paths are formed from one vizcachera to another.
+The extreme attachment between members of different communities makes it
+appear less strange that they should assist each other: either the
+desire to see, as usual, their buried neighbours becomes intense enough
+to impel them to work their way to them; or cries of distress from the
+prisoners reach and incite them to attempt their deliverance. Many
+social species are thus powerfully affected by cries of distress from
+one of their fellows; and some will attempt a rescue in the face of
+great danger--the weasel and the peccary for example.
+
+Mild and sociable as the vizcachas are towards each other, each one is
+exceedingly jealous of any intrusion into his particular burrow, and
+indeed always resents such a breach of discipline with the utmost fury.
+Several individuals may reside in the compartments of the same burrow;
+but beyond themselves not even their next-door neighbour is permitted to
+enter; their hospitality ends where it begins, at the entrance. It is
+difficult to compel a vizcacha to enter a burrow not his own; even when
+hotly pursued by dogs they often refuse to do so. When driven into one,
+the instant their enemies retire a little space they rush out of it, as
+if they thought the hiding-place but little less dangerous than the open
+plain. I have frequently seen vizcachas, chased into the wrong burrows,
+summarily ejected by those inside: and sometimes they make their escape
+only after being well bitten for their offence.
+
+I have now stated the most interesting facts I have collected concerning
+the vizcacha: when others rewrite its history they doubtless will,
+according to the opportunities of observation they enjoy, be able to
+make some additions to it, but probably none of great consequence. I
+have observed this species in Patagonia and Buenos Ayres only; and as I
+have found that its habits are considerably modified by circumstances in
+the different localities where I have met with it, I am sure that other
+variations will occur in the more distant regions, where the conditions
+vary.
+
+The most remarkable thing to be said about the vizcacha is, that
+although regarded by Mr. Waterhouse, and others who have studied its
+affinities, as one of the lowest of the rodents, exhibiting strong
+Marsupial characters, the living animal appears to be more intelligent
+than other rodents, not of South America only, but also of those of a
+higher type in other continents. A parallel case is, perhaps, to be
+found in the hairy armadillo, an extremely versatile and intelligent
+animal, although only an edentate. And among birds the ypecaha--a large
+La Plata rail--might also be mentioned as an example of what ought not
+to be; for it is a bold and intelligent bird, more than a match for the
+fowl, both in courage and in cunning; and yet it is one of the family
+which Professor Parker--from the point of view of the
+anatomist--characterizes as a "feeble-minded, cowardly group."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+THE DYING HUANACO.
+
+
+Lest any one should misread the title to this chapter, I hasten to say
+that the huanaco, or guanaco as it is often spelt, is not a perishing
+species; nor, as things are, is it likely to perish soon, despite the
+fact that civilized men, Britons especially, are now enthusiastically
+engaged in the extermination of all the nobler mammalians:--a very
+glorious crusade, the triumphant conclusion of which will doubtless be
+witnessed by the succeeding generation, more favoured in this respect
+than ours. The huanaco, happily for it, exists in a barren, desolate
+region, in its greatest part waterless and uninhabitable to human
+beings; and the chapter-heading refers to a singular instinct of the
+dying animals, in very many cases allowed, by the exceptional conditions
+in which they are placed, to die naturally.
+
+And first, a few words about its place in nature and general habits. The
+huanaco is a small camel--small, that is, compared with its existing
+relation--without a hump, and, unlike the camel of the Old World,
+non-specializad; doubtless it is a very ancient animal on the earth, and
+for all we know to the contrary, may have existed contemporaneously with
+some of the earliest known representatives of the camel type, whose
+remains occur in the lower and upper miocene deposits--Poebrotherium,
+Protolabis, Procamelus, Pliauchenia, and Macrauchenia. It ranges from
+Tierra del Fuego and the adjacent islands, northwards over the whole of
+Patagonia, and along the Andes into Peru and Bolivia. On the great
+mountain chain it is both a wild and a domestic animal, since the llama,
+the beast of burden of the ancient Peruvians, is no doubt only a
+variety: but as man's slave it has changed so greatly from the original
+form that some naturalists have regarded the llama as a distinct
+species, which, like the camel of the East, exists only in a domestic
+state. It has had time enough to vary, as it is more than probable that
+the tamed and useful animal was inherited by the children of the sun
+from races and nations that came before them: and how far back Andean
+civilization extends may be inferred from the belief expressed by the
+famous American archaeologist, Squiers, that the ruined city of
+Tiahuanaco, in the vicinity of Lake Titicaca, is as old as Thebes and
+the Pyramids.
+
+It is, however, with the wild animal, the huanaco, that I am concerned.
+A full-grown male measures seven to eight feet in length, and four feet
+high to the shoulder; it is well clothed in a coat of thick woolly hair,
+of a pale reddish colour, Longest and palest on the under parts. In
+appearance it is very unlike the camel, in spite of the long legs and
+neck; in its finely-shaped head and long ears, and its proud and
+graceful carriage, it resembles an antelope rather than its huge and,
+from an aesthetic point of view, deformed Asiatic relation. In habits it
+is gregarious, and is usually seen in small herds, but herds numbering
+several hundreds or even a thousand are occasionally met with on the
+stony, desolate plateaus of Southern Patagonia; but the huanaco is able
+to thrive and grow fat where almost any other herbivore would starve.
+While the herd feeds one animal acts as sentinel, stationed on the
+hillside, and on the appearance of danger utters a shrill neigh of
+alarm, and instantly all take to flight. But although excessively shy
+and wary they are also very inquisitive, and have enough intelligence to
+know that a single horseman can do them no harm, for they will not only
+approach to look closely at him, but will sometimes follow him for
+miles. They are also excitable, and at times indulge in strange freaks.
+Darwin writes:--"On the mountains of Tierra del Fuego I have more than
+once seen a huanaco, on being approached, not only neigh and squeal, but
+prance and leap about in a most ridiculous manner, apparently in
+defiance as a challenge." And Captain King relates that while sailing
+into Port Desire he witnessed a chase of a huanaco after a fox, both
+animals evidently going at their greatest speed, so that they soon
+passed out of sight. I have known some tame huanacos, and in that state
+they make amusing intelligent pets, fond of being caressed, but often so
+frolicsome and mischievous as to be a nuisance to their master. It is
+well known that at the southern extremity of Patagonia the huanacos have
+a dying place, a spot to which all individuals inhabiting the
+surrounding plains repair at the approach of death to deposit their
+bones. Darwin and Fitzroy first recorded this strange instinct in their
+personal narratives, and their observations have since been fully
+confirmed by others. The best known of these dying or burial-places are
+on the banks of the Santa Cruz and Gallegos rivers, where the river
+valleys are covered with dense primeval thickets of bushes and trees of
+stunted growth; there the ground is covered with the bones of countless
+dead generations. "The animals," says Darwin, "in most cases must have
+crawled, before dying, beneath and among the bushes." A strange instinct
+in a creature so preeminently social in its habits; a dweller all its
+life long on the open, barren plateaus and mountain sides! What a
+subject for a painter! The grey wilderness of dwarf thorn trees, aged
+and grotesque and scanty-leaved, nourished for a thousand years on the
+bones that whiten the stony ground at their roots; the interior lit
+faintly with the rays of the departing sun, chill and grey, and silent
+and motionless--the huanacos' Golgotha. In the long centuries,
+stretching back into a dim immeasurable past, so many of this race have
+journeyed hither from the mountain and the plain to suffer the sharp
+pang of death, that, to the imagination, something of it all seems to
+have passed into that hushed and mournful nature. And now one more, the
+latest pilgrim, has come, all his little strength spent in his struggle
+to penetrate the close thicket; looking old and gaunt and ghostly in the
+twilight; with long ragged hair; staring into the gloom out of
+death-dimmed sunken eyes. England has one artist who might show it to us
+on canvas, who would be able to catch the feeling of such a scene--of
+that mysterious, passionless tragedy of nature--I refer to J. M. Swan,
+the painter of the "Prodigal Son" and the "Lioness Defending her Cubs."
+
+To his account of the animal's dying place and instinct, Darwin adds: "I
+do not at all understand the reason of this, but I may observe that the
+wounded huanacos at the Santa Cruz invariably walked towards the river."
+
+It would, no doubt, be rash to affirm of any instinct that it is
+absolutely unique; but, putting aside some doubtful reports about a
+custom of the Asiatic elephant, which may have originated in the account
+of Sindbad the Sailor's discovery of an elephant's burial place, we have
+no knowledge of an instinct similar to that of the huanaco in any other
+animal. So far as we know, it stands alone and apart, with nothing in
+the actions of other species leading up, or suggesting any family
+likeness to it. But what chiefly attracts the mind to it is its
+strangeness. It looks, in fact, less like an instinct of one of the
+inferior creatures than the superstitious observance of human beings,
+who have knowledge of death, and believe in a continued existence after
+dissolution; of a triba that in past times had conceived the idea that
+the liberated spirit is only able to find its way to its future abode by
+starting at death from the ancient dying-place of the tribe or family,
+and thence moving westward, or skyward, or underground, over the
+well-worn immemorial track, invisible to material eyes.
+
+But, although alone among animal instincts-in its strange and useless
+purpose--for it is as absolutely useless to the species or race as to
+the dying individual--it is not the only useless instinct we know of:
+there are many others, both simple and complex; and of such instincts we
+believe, with good reason, that they once played an important part in
+the life of the species, and were only rendered useless by changes in
+the condition of life, or in the organism, or in both. In other words,
+when the special conditions that gave them value no longer existed, the
+correlated and perfect instinct was not, in these cases, eradicated, but
+remained, in abeyance and still capable of being called into activity by
+a new and false stimulus simulating the old and true. Viewed in this
+way, the huanaco's instinct might be regarded as something remaining to
+the animal from a remote past, not altogether unaffected by time
+perhaps; and like some ceremonial usage among men that has long ceased
+to have any significance, or like a fragment of ancient history, or a
+tradition, which in the course of time has received some new and false
+interpretation. The false interpretation, to continue the metaphor, is,
+in this case, that the _purpose_ of the animal in going to a certain
+spot, to which it has probably never previously resorted, is to die
+there. A false interpretation, because, in the first place, it is
+incredible that an instinct of no advantage to the species, in its
+struggle for existence and predominance should arise and become
+permanent; and, in the second place, it is equally incredible that it
+could ever have been to the advantage of the species or race to, have a
+dying place. We must, then, suppose that there is in the sensations
+preceding death, when death comes slowly, some resemblance to the
+sensations experienced by the animal at a period when its curious
+instinct first took form and crystallized; these would be painful
+sensations that threatened life; and freedom from them, and safety to
+the animal, would only exist in a certain well-remembered spot. Further,
+we might assume that it was at first only the memory of a few
+individuals that caused the animals to seek the place of safety; that a
+habit was thus formed; that in time this traditional habit became
+instinctive, so that the animals, old and young, made their way
+unerringly to the place of refuge whenever the old danger returned. And
+such an instinct, slowly matured and made perfect to enable this animal
+to escape extinction during periods of great danger to mammalian life,
+lasting hundreds or even thousands of years, and destructive of
+numberless other species less hardy and adaptive than the generalized
+huanaco, might well continue to exist, to be occasionally called into
+life by a false stimulus, for many centuries after it had ceased to be
+of any advantage.
+
+Once we accept this explanation as probable--namely, that the huanaco,
+in withdrawing from the herd to drop down and die in the ancient dying
+ground, is in reality only seeking an historically remembered place of
+refuge, and not of death--the action of the animal loses much of its
+mysterious character; we come on to firm ground, and find that we are no
+longer considering an instinct absolutely unique, with no action or
+instinct in any other animal leading up or suggesting any family
+likeness to it, as I said before. We find, in fact, that there is at
+least one very important and very well-known instinct in another class
+of creatures, which has a strong resemblance to that of the huanaco, as
+I have interpreted it, and which may even serve to throw a side light on
+the origin of the huanaco's instinct. I refer to a habit of some
+ophidians, in temperate and cold countries, of returning annually to
+hybernate in the saine den.
+
+A typical instance is that of the rattlesnake in the colder parts of
+North America. On the approach of winter these reptiles go into hiding,
+and it has been observed that in some districts a very large number of
+individuals, hundreds, and even thousands, will repair from the
+surrounding country to the ancestral den. Here the serpents gather in a
+mass to remain in a wholly or semi-torpid condition until the return of
+spring brings them out again, to scatter abroad to their usual summer
+haunts. Clearly in this case the knowledge of the hyberna-ting den is
+not merely traditional--that is, handed down from generation to
+generation, through the young each year following the adults, and so
+forming the habit of repairing at certain seasons to a certain place;
+for the young serpent soon abandons its parent to lead an independent
+life; and on the approach of cold weather the hybernating den may be a
+long distance away, ten or twenty, or even thirty miles from the spot in
+which it was born. The annual return to the hybernating den is then a
+fixed unalterable instinct, like the autumnal migration of some birds to
+a warmer latitude. It is doubtless favourable to the serpents to
+hybernate in large numbers massed together; and the habit of resorting
+annually to the same spot once formed, we can imagine that the
+individuals--perhaps a single couple in the first place--frequenting
+some very deep, dry, and well-sheltered cavern, safe from enemies, would
+have a great advantage over others of their race; that they would be
+stronger and increase more, and spread during the summer months further
+and further from the cavern on all sides; and that the further afield
+they went the more would the instinct be perfected; since all the young
+serpents that did not have the instinct of returning unerringly to the
+ancestral refuge, and that, like the outsiders of their race, to put it
+in that way, merely crept into the first hole they found on the approach
+of the cold season, would be more liable to destruction. Probably most
+snakes get killed long before a natural decline sets in; to say that not
+one in a thousand dies of old age would probably be no exaggeration; but
+if they were as safe from enemies and accidents as some less prolific
+and more highly-organized animals, so that many would reach the natural
+term of life, and death came slowly, we can imagine that in such a
+heat-loving creature the failure of the vital powers would simulate the
+sensations caused by a falling temperature, and cause the old or sick
+serpent, even in midsummer, to creep instinctively away to the ancient
+refuge, where many a long life-killing frost had been safely tided over
+in the past.
+
+The huanaco has never been a hybernating animal; but we must assume
+that, like the crotalus of the north, he had formed a habit of
+congregating with his fellows at certain seasons at the same spot;
+further, that these were seasons of suffering to the animal--the
+suffering, or discomfort and danger, having in the first place given
+rise to the habit. Assuming again that the habit had existed so long as
+to become, like that of the reptile, a fixed, immutable instinct, a
+hereditary knowledge, so that the young huanacos, untaught by the
+adults, would go alone and unerringly to the meeting-place from any
+distance, it is but an easy step to the belief, that after the
+conditions had changed, and the refuges were no longer needed, this
+instinctive knowledge would still exist in them, and that they would
+take the old road when stimulated by the pain of a wound; or the
+miserable sensations experienced in disease or during the decay of the
+life-energy, when the senses grow dim, and the breath fails, and the
+blood is thin and cold.
+
+I presume that most persons who have observed animals a great deal have
+met with cases in which the animal has acted automatically, or
+instinctively, when the stimulus has been a false one. I will relate one
+such case, observed by myself, and which strikes me as being apposite to
+the question I am considering. It must be premised that this is an
+instance of an acquired habit; but this does not affect my argument,
+since I have all along assumed that the huanaco--a highly sagacious
+species in the highest class of vertebrates--first acquired a habit from
+experience of seeking a remembered refuge, and that such habit was the
+parent, as it were, or the first clay model, of the perfect and
+indestructible instinct that was to be.
+
+It is not an uncommon thing in the Argentino pampas--I have on two
+occasions witnessed it myself--for a riding-horse to come home, or to
+the gate of his owner's house, to die. I am speaking of riding-horses
+that are never doctored, nor treated mercifully; that look on their
+master as an enemy rather than a friend; horses that live out in the
+open, and have to be hunted to the corral or enclosure, or roughly
+captured with a lasso as they run, when their services are required. I
+retain a very vivid recollection of the first occasion of witnessing an
+action of this kind in a horse, although I was only a boy at the time.
+On going out one summer evening I saw one of the horses of the
+establishment standing unsaddled and unbridled leaning his head over the
+gate. Going to the spot, I stroked his nose, and then, turning to an old
+native who happened to be near, asked him what could be the meaning of
+such a thing. "I think he is going to die," he answered; "horses often
+come to the house to die." And next morning the poor beast was found
+lying dead not twenty yards from the gate; although he had not appeared
+ill when I stroked his nose on the previous evening; but when I saw him
+lying there dead, and remembered the old native's words, it seemed to me
+as marvellous and inexplicable that a horse should act in that way, as
+if some wild creature--a rhea, a fawn, or dolichotes--had come to exhale
+his last breath at the gates of his enemy and constant persecutor, man.
+
+I now believe that the sensations of sickness and approaching death in
+the riding-horse of the pampas resemble or similate the pains, so often
+experienced, of hunger, thirst and fatigue combined, together with the
+oppressive sensations caused by the ponderous native saddle, or recado,
+with its huge surcingle of raw hide drawn up so tightly as to hinder
+free respiration. The suffering animal remembers how at the last relief
+invariably came, when the twelve or fifteen hours' torture were over,
+the toil and the want, and when the great iron bridle and ponderous gear
+were removed, and he had freedom and food and drink and rest. At the
+gate or at the door of his master's house, the sudden relief had always
+come to him; and there does he sometimes go in his sickness, his fear
+overmastered by his suffering, to find it again.
+
+Discussing this question with a friend, who has a subtle mind and great
+experience of the horse in semi-barbarous countries, and of many other
+animals, wild and tame, in many regions of the globe, he put forward a
+different explanation of the action of the horse in coming home to die,
+which he thinks simpler and more probable than mine. It is, that a dying
+or ailing animal instinctively withdraws itself from its fellows--an
+action of self-preservation in the individual in opposition to the
+well-known instincts of the healthy animals, which impels the whole herd
+to turn upon and persecute the sickly member, thus destroying its
+chances of recovery. The desire of the suffering animal is not only to
+leave its fellows, but to get to some solitary place where they cannot
+follow, or would never find him, to escape at once from a great and
+pressing danger. But on the pastoral pampas, where horses are so
+numerous that on that level, treeless area they are always and
+everywhere visible, no hiding-place is discoverable. In such a case, the
+animal, goaded by its instinctive fear, turns to the one spot that
+horses avoid; and although that spot has hitherto been fearful to him,
+the old fear is forgotten in the present and far more vivid one; the
+vicinity of his master's house represents a solitary place to him, and
+he seeks it, just as the stricken deer seeks the interior of some close
+forest, oblivious for the time, in its anxiety to escape from the herd,
+of the dangers lurking in it, and which he formerly avoided.
+
+I have not set this explanation down merely because it does credit to my
+friend's ingenuity, but because it strikes me that it is the only
+alternative explanation that can be given of the animal's action in
+coming home to die. Another fact concerning the ill-tamed and
+barbarously treated horses of the pampas, which, to my mind, strengthens
+the view I have taken, remains to be mentioned. It is not an uncommon
+thing for one of these horses, after escaping, saddled and bridled, and
+wandering about for anight or night and day on the plains, to return of
+its own accord to the house. It is clear that in a case of this kind the
+animal comes home to seek relief. I have known one horse that always had
+to be hunted like a wild animal to be caught, and that invariably after
+being saddled tried to break loose, to return in this way to the gate
+after wandering about, saddled and bridled, for over twenty hours in
+uncomfortable freedom.
+
+The action of the riding-horse returning to a master he is accustomed to
+fly from, as from an enemy, to be released of saddle and bridle, is, no
+doubt more intelligent than that of the dying horse coming home to be
+relieved from his sufferings, but the motive is the same in both cases;
+at the gate the only pain the animal has ever experienced has invariably
+begun, and there it has ended, and when the spur of some new pain
+afflicts him--new and yet like the old--it is to the well-remembered
+hated gate that it urges him.
+
+To return to the huanaco. After tracing the dying instinct back to its
+hypothetical origin--namely, a habit acquired by the animal in some past
+period of seeking refuge from some kind of pain and danger at a certain
+spot, it is only natural to speculate a little further as to the nature
+of that danger and of the conditions the animal existed in.
+
+If the huanaco is as old on the earth as its antique generalized form
+have led naturalists to suppose, we can well believe that it has
+survived not only a great many lost mammalian types, but many changes in
+the conditions of its life. Let us then imagine that at some remote
+period a change took place in the climate of Patagonia, and that it
+became colder and colder, owing to some cause affecting only that
+portion of the antarctic region; such a cause, for instance, as a great
+accumulation of icebergs on the northern shores of the antarctic
+continent, extending century by century until a large portion of the now
+open sea became blocked up with solid ice. If the change was gradual and
+the snow became deeper each winter and lasted longer, an intelligent,
+gregarious, and exceedingly hardy and active animal like the huanaco,
+able to exist on the driest woody fibres, would stand the beat chance of
+maintaining its existence in such altered conditions, and would form new
+habits to meet the new danger. One would be that at the approach of a
+period of deep snow and deadly cold, all the herds frequenting one
+place would gather together at the most favourable spots in the river
+valleys, where the vegetation is dense and some food could be had while
+the surrounding country continued covered with deep snow. They would, in
+fact, make choice of exactly such localities as are now used for dying
+places. There they would be sheltered from the cutting-winds, the twigs
+and bark would supply them with food, the warmth from a great many
+individuals massed together would serve to keep the snow partially
+melted under foot, and would prevent their being smothered, while the
+stiff and closely interlaced branches would keep a roof of snow above
+them, and thus protected they would keep alive until the return of mild
+weather released them. In the course of many generations all weakly
+animals, and all in which the habit of seeking the refuge at the proper
+time was weak or uncertain in its action would perish, but their loss
+would be an advantage to the survivors.
+
+It is worthy of remark that it is only at the southern extremity of
+Patagonia that the huanacos have dying places. In Northern Patagonia,
+and on the Chilian and Peruvian Andes no such instinct has been
+observed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+My purpose in this paper is to discuss a group of curious and useless
+emotional instincts of social animals, which have not yet been properly
+explained. Excepting two of the number, placed first and last in the
+list, they are not related in their origin; consequently they are here
+grouped together arbitrarily, only for the reason that we are very
+familiar with them on account of their survival in our domestic animals,
+and because they are, as I have said, useless; also because they
+resemble each other, among the passions and actions of the lower
+animals, in their effect on our minds. This is in all cases unpleasant,
+and sometimes exceedingly painful, as when species that rank next to
+ourselves in their developed intelligence and organized societies, such
+as elephants, monkeys, dogs, and cattle, are seen under the domination
+of impulses, in some cases resembling insanity, and in others simulating
+the darkest passions of man.
+
+These instincts are:--
+
+(1) The excitement caused by the smell of blood, noticeable in horses
+and cattle among our domestic animals, and varying greatly in degree,
+from an emotion so slight as to be scarcely perceptible to the greatest
+extremes of rage or terror.
+
+(2) The angry excitement roused in some animals when a scarlet or
+bright-red cloth is shown to them. So well known is this apparently
+insane instinct in our cattle that it has given rise to a proverb and
+metaphor familiar in a variety of forms to everyone.
+
+(3) The persecution of a sick or weakly animal by its companions.
+
+(4) The sudden deadly fury that seizes on the herd or family at the
+sight of a companion in extreme distress. Herbivorous mammals at such
+times will trample and gore the distressed one to death. In the case of
+wolves, and other savage-tempered carnivorous species, the distressed
+fellow is frequently torn to pieces and devoured on the spot.
+
+To take the first two together. When we consider that blood is red; that
+the smell of it is, or may be, or has been, associated with that vivid
+hue in the animal's mind; that blood, seen and smelt is, or has been,
+associated with the sight of wounds and with cries of pain and rage or
+terror from the wounded or captive animal, there appears at first sight
+to be some reason for connecting these two instinctive passions as
+having the same origin--namely, terror and rage caused by the sight of a
+member of the herd struck down and bleeding, or struggling for life in
+the grasp of an enemy. I do not mean to say that such an image is
+actually present in the animal's mind, but that the inherited or
+instinctive passion is one in kind and in its working with the passion
+of the animal when experience and reason were its guides.
+
+But the more I consider the point the more am I inclined to regard these
+two instincts as separate in their origin, although I retain the belief
+that cattle and horses and several wild animals are violently excited by
+the smell of blood for the reason just given--namely, their inherited
+memory associates the smell of blood with the presence among them of
+some powerful enemy that threatens their life. To this point I shall
+return when dealing with the last and most painful of the instincts I am
+considering.
+
+The following incident will show how violently this blood passion
+sometimes affects cattle, when they are permitted to exist in a
+half-wild condition, as on the pampas. I was out with my gun one day, a
+few miles from home, when I came across a patch on the ground where the
+grass was pressed or trodden down and stained with blood. I concluded
+that some thievish gauchos had slaughtered a fat cow there on the
+previous night, and, to avoid detection, had somehow managed to carry
+the whole of it away on their horses. As I walked on, a herd of cattle,
+numbering about three hundred, appeared moving slowly on towards a small
+stream a mile away; they were travelling in a thin long line, and would
+pass the blood-stained spot at a distance of seven to eight hundred
+yards, but the wind from it would blow across their track. When the
+tainted wind struck the leaders of the herd they instantly stood still,
+raising their heads, then broke out into loud excited bellowings; and
+finally turning they started off at a fast trot, following up the scent
+in a straight line, until they arrived at the place where one of their
+kind had met its death. The contagion spread, and before long all the
+cattle were congregated on the fatal spot, and began moving round in a
+dense mass, bellowing continually.
+
+It may be remarked here that the animal has a peculiar language on
+occasions like this; it emits a succession of short bellowing cries,
+like excited exclamations, followed by a very loud cry, alternately
+sinking into a hoarse murmur, and rising to a kind of scream that grates
+harshly on the sense. Of the ordinary "cow-music" I am a great admirer,
+and take as much pleasure in it as in the cries and melody of birds and
+the sound of the wind in trees; but this performance of cattle excited
+by the smell of blood is most distressing to hear.
+
+The animals that had forced their way into the centre of the mass to the
+spot where the blood was, pawed the earth, and dug it up with their
+horns, and trampled each other down in their frantic excitement. It was
+terrible to see and hear them. The action of those on the border of the
+living mass in perpetually moving round in a circle with dolorous
+bellowings, was like that of the women in an Indian village when a
+warrior dies, and all night they shriek and howl with simulated grief,
+going round and round the dead man's hut in an endless procession.
+
+The "bull and red rag" instinct, as it may be called, comes next in
+order. It is a familiar fact that brightness in itself powerfully
+attracts most if not all animals. The higher mammalians are affected in
+the same way as birds and insects, although not in the same degree. This
+fact partly explains the rage of the bull. A scarlet flag fluttering in
+the wind or lying on the grass attracts his attention powerfully, as it
+does that of other animals; but though curious about the nature of the
+bright object, it does not anger him. His anger is excited--and this is
+the whole secret of the matter--when the colour is flaunted by a man;
+when it forces him to fix his attention on a man, i.e. an animal of
+another species that rules or drives him, and that he fears, but with
+only a slight fear, which may at any moment be overcome by his naturally
+bold aggressive disposition, Not only does the vivid colour compel him
+to fix his attention on the being that habitually interferes with his
+liberty, and is consequently regarded with unfriendly eyes, but it also
+produces the illusion on his mind that the man is near him, that he is
+approaching him in an aggressive manner: it is an insult, a challenge,
+which, being of so explosive a temper, he is not slow to accept.
+
+On the pampas I was once standing with some gauchos at the gate of a
+corral into which a herd of half-wild cattle had just been driven. One
+of the men, to show his courage and agility, got off his horse and
+boldly placed himself in the centre of the open gate. His action
+attracted the attention of one of the nearest cows, and lowering her
+horns she began watching him in a threatening manner. He then suddenly
+displayed the scarlet lining of his poncho, and instantly she charged
+him furiously: with a quick movement to one side he escaped her horns,
+and after we had driven her back, resumed his former position and
+challenged her again in the same way. The experiment was repeated not
+less than half a dozen times, and always with the same result. The
+cattle were all in a savage temper, and would have instantly charged him
+on his placing himself before them on foot without the display of
+scarlet cloth, but their fear of the mounted men, standing with lassos
+in their hand on either side of him, kept them in check. But whenever
+the attention of any one individual among them was forcibly drawn to him
+by the display of vivid colour, and fixed on him alone, the presence of
+the horsemen was forgotten and fear was swallowed by rage. It is a fact,
+I think, that most animals that exhibit angry excitement when a scarlet
+rag is flourished aggressively at them, are easily excited to anger at
+all times. Domestic geese and turkeys may be mentioned among birds: they
+do not fly at a grown person, but they will often fly at a child that
+challenges them in this way; and it is a fact that they do not at any
+time fear a child very much and will sometimes attack him without being
+challenged. I think that the probability of the view I have taken is
+increased by another fact--namely, that the sudden display of scarlet
+colour sometimes affects timid animals with an extreme fear, just as, on
+the other hand, it excites those that are bold and aggressive to anger.
+Domestic sheep, forinstance, that vary greatly in disposition in
+different races or breeds, and even in different individuals, may be
+affected in the two opposite ways, some exhibiting extreme terror and
+others only anger at a sudden display of scarlet colour by the shepherd
+or herder.
+
+The persecution of a sick animal by its companions comes next under
+consideration.
+
+It will have been remarked, with surprise by some readers, no doubt,
+that I have set down as two different instincts this persecution of a
+sick or weakly individual by its fellows, and the sudden deadly rage
+that sometimes impels the herd to turn upon and destroy a wounded or
+distressed companion. It is usual for writers on the instincts of
+animals to speak of them as one: and I presume that they regard this
+sudden deadly rage of several individuals against a companion as merely
+an extreme form of the common persecuting instinct or impulse. They are
+not really one, but are as distinct in origin and character as it is
+possible for any two instincts to be. The violent and fatal impulse
+starts simultaneously into life and action, and is contagious, affecting
+all the members of the herd like a sudden madness. The other is neither
+violent nor contagious: the persecution is intermittent: it is often
+confined to one or to a very few members of the herd, and seldom joined
+in by the chief member, the leader or head to whom all the others give
+way.
+
+Concerning this head of the herd, or flock, or pack, it is necessary to
+say something more. Some gregarious animals, particularly birds, live
+together in the most perfect peace and amity; and here no leader is
+required, because in their long association together as a species in
+flocks, they have attained to a oneness of mind, so to speak, which
+causes them to move or rest, and to act at all times harmoniously
+together, as if controlled and guided by an extrane-ous force. I may
+mention that the kindly instinct in animals, which is almost universal
+between male and female in the vertebrates, is most apparent in these
+harmoniously acting birds. Thus, in La Plata, I have remarked, in more
+than one species, that a lame or sick individual, unable to keop pace
+with the flock and find its food, has not only been waited for, but in
+some cases some of the flock have constantly attended it, keeping close
+to it both when flying and on the ground; and, I have no doubt, feeding
+it just as they would have fed their young.
+
+Naturally among such kinds no one member is of more consideration than
+another. But among mammals such equality and harmony is rare. The
+instinct of one and all is to lord it over the others, with the result
+that one more powerful or domineering gets the mastery, to keep it
+thereafter as long as he can. The lower animals are, in this respect,
+very much like us; and in all kinds that are at all fierce-tempered the
+mastery of one over all, and of a few under him over the others, is most
+salutary; indeed, it is inconceivable that they should be able to exist
+together under any other system.
+
+On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to
+keep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these
+animals a great deal, and presume that they are very much like feral
+dogs and wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but when
+a fight begins the head of the pack as a rule rushes to the spot,
+whereupon the fighters separate and march off in different directions,
+or else cast themselves down and deprecate their tyrant's wrath with
+abject gestures and whines. If the combatants are both strong and have
+worked themselves into a mad rage before their head puts in an
+appearance, it may go hard with him: they know him no longer, and all he
+can do is to join in the fray; then, if the fighters turn on him, he may
+be so injured that his power is gone, and the next best dog in the pack
+takes his place. The hottest contests are always between dogs that are
+well matched; neither will give place to the other, and so they fight it
+out; but from the foremost in strength and power down to the weakest
+there is a gradation of authority; each one knows just how far he can
+go, which companion he can bully when he is in a bad temper or wishes to
+assert himself, and to which he must humbly yield in his turn. In such a
+state the weakest one must always yield to all the others, and cast
+himself down, seeming to call himself a slave and worshipper of any
+other member of the pack that chooses to snarl at him, or command him to
+give up his bone with a good grace.
+
+This masterful or domineering temper, so common among social mammals, is
+the cause of the persecution of the sick and weakly. When an animal
+begins to ail he can no longer hold his own; he ceases to resent the
+occasional ill-natured attacks made on him; his non-combative condition
+is quickly discovered, and he at once drops down to a place below the
+lowest; it is common knowledge in the herd that he may be buffeted with
+impunity by all, even by those that have hitherto suffered buffets but
+have given none. But judging from my own observation, this persecution,
+is not, as a rule, severe, and is seldom fatal.
+
+It is often the case that a sick or injured animal withdraws and hides
+himself from the herd; the instinct of the "stricken deer" this might be
+called. But I do not think that we need assume that the ailing
+individual goes away to escape the danger of being ill-used by his
+companions. He is sick and drooping and consequently unfit to be with
+the healthy and vigorous; that is the simplest and probably the true
+explanation of his action; although in some cases he might be driven
+from them by persistent rough usage. However peaceably gregarious
+mammals may live together, and however fond of each other's company they
+may be, they do not, as a rule, treat each other gently. Furthermore,
+their games are exceedingly rough and require that they shall be in a
+vigorous state of health to escape injury. Horned animals have no
+buttons to the sharp weapons they prod and strike each other with in a
+sportive spirit. I have often witnessed the games of wild and half-wild
+horses with astonishment; for it seemed that broken bones must result
+from the sounding kicks they freely bestowed on one another. This
+roughness itself would be a sufficient cause for the action of the
+individual, sick and out of tune and untouched by the glad contagion of
+the others, in escaping from them; and to leave them would be to its
+advantage (and to that of the race) since, if not fatally injured or
+sick unto death, its chances of recovery to perfect health would be
+thereby greatly increased.
+
+It remains now to speak of that seemingly most cruel of instincts which
+stands last on my list. It is very common among gregarious animals that
+are at all combative in disposition, and still survives in our domestic
+cattle, although very rarely witnessed in England. My first experience
+of it was just before I had reached the age of five years. I was not at
+that early period trying to find out any of nature's secrets, but the
+scene I witnessed printed itself very vividly on my mind, so that I can
+recall it as well as if my years had been five-and-twenty; perhaps
+better. It was on a summer's evening, and I was out by myself at some
+distance from the house, playing about the high exposed roots of some
+old trees; on the other side of the trees the cattle, just returned from
+pasture, were gathered on the bare level ground. Hearing a great
+commotion among them, I climbed on to one of the high exposed roots,
+and, looking over, saw a cow on the ground, apparently unable to rise,
+moaning and bellowing in a distressed way, while a number of her
+companions were crowding round and goring her.
+
+What is the meaning of such an instinct? Darwin has but few words on the
+subject. "Can we believe," he says, in his posthumous _Essay on
+Instinct, "_when a wounded herbivorous animal returns to its own herd
+and is then attacked and gored, that this cruel and very common instinct
+is of any service to the species?" At the same time, he hints that such
+an instinct might in some circumstances be useful, and his hint has been
+developed into the current belief among naturalists on the subject. Here
+it is, in Dr. Romanes' words: "We may readily imagine that the instinct
+displayed by many herbivorous animals of goring sick and wounded
+companions, is really of use in countries where the presence of weak
+members in a herd is a source of danger to the herd from the prevalence
+of wild beasts." Here it is assumed that the sick are set upon and
+killed, but this is not the fact; sickness and decay from age or some
+other cause are slow things, and increase imperceptibly, so that the
+sight of a drooping member grows familiar to the herd, as does that of a
+member with some malformation, or unusual shade of colour, or altogether
+white, as in the case of an albino.
+
+Sick and weak members, as we have seen, while subject to some
+ill-treatment from their companions (only because they can be
+ill-treated with impunity), do not rouse the herd to a deadly animosity;
+the violent and fatal attack is often as not made on a member in perfect
+health and vigour and unwoundecl, although, owing to some accident, in
+great distress, and perhaps danger, at the moment.
+
+The instinct is, then, not only useless but actually detrimental; and,
+this being so, the action of the herd in destroying one of its members
+is not even to be regarded as an instinct proper, but rather as an
+aberration of an instinct, a blunder, into which animals sometimes fall
+when excited to action in unusual circumstances.
+
+The first thing that strikes us is that in these wild abnormal moments
+of social animals, they are acting in violent contradiction to the whole
+tenor of their lives; that in turning against a distressed fellow they
+oppose themselves to the law of their being, to the whole body of
+instincts, primary and secondary, and habits, which have made it
+possible for them to exist together in communities. It is, I think, by
+reflecting on the abnormal character of such an action that we are led
+to a true interpretation of this "dark saying of Nature."
+
+Every one is familiar with Bacon's famous passage about the dog, and the
+noble courage which that animal puts on when "maintained by a man; who
+is to him in place of a God, or _melior natura;_ which courage is
+manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a better
+nature than its own, could never attain." Not so. The dog is a social
+animal, and acts instinctively in concert with his fellows; and the
+courage he manifests is of the family, not the individual. In the
+domestic state the man he is accustomed to associate with and obey
+stands to him in the place of the controlling pack, and to his mind,
+which is canine and not human, _is_ the pack. A similar "noble courage,"
+greatly surpassing that exhibited on all other occasions, is displayed
+by an infinite number of mammals and birds of gregarious habits, when
+repelling the attacks of some powerful and dangerous enemy, or when they
+rush to the rescue of one of their captive fellows. Concerning this rage
+and desperate courage of social animals in the face of an enemy, we see
+(1) that it is excited by the distressed cries, or by the sight of a
+member of the herd or family dying from or struggling in the clutches of
+an enemy; (2) that it affects animals when a number af individuals are
+together, and is eminently contagious, like fear, that communicates
+itself, quick as lightning, from one to another until all are in a
+panic, and like the joyous emotion that impels the members of a herd or
+flock to rush simultaneously into play.
+
+Now, it is a pretty familiar fact that animals acting instinctively, as
+well as men acting intelligently, have at times their delusions and
+their illusions, and see things falsely, and are moved to action by a
+false stimulus to their own disadvantage. When the individuals of a herd
+or family are excited to a sudden deadly rage by the distressed cries of
+one of their fellows, or by the sight of its bleeding wounds and the
+smell of its blood, or when they see it frantically struggling on the
+ground, or in the cleft of a tree or rock, as if in the clutches of a
+powerful enemy, they do not turn on it to kill but to rescue it.
+
+In whatever way the rescuing instinct may have risen, whether simply
+through natural selection or, as is more probable, through an
+intelligent habit becoming fixed and hereditary, its effectiveness
+depends altogether on the emotion of overmastering rage excited in the
+animal--rage against a tangible visible enemy, or invisible, and excited
+by the cries or struggles of a suffering companion; clearly, then, it
+could not provide against the occasional rare accidents that animals
+meet with, which causes them to act precisely in the way they do when
+seized or struck down by an enemy. An illusion is the result of the
+emotion similar to the illusion produced by vivid expectation in
+ourselves, which has caused many a man to see in a friend and companion
+the adversary he looked to see, and to slay him in his false-seeing
+anger.
+
+An illusion just as great, leading to action equally violent, but
+ludicrous rather than painful to witness, may be seen in dogs, when
+encouraged by a man to the attack, and made by his cries and gestures to
+expect that some animal they are accustomed to hunt is about to be
+unearthed or overtaken; and if, when they are in this disposition, he
+cunningly exhibits and sets them on a dummy, made perhaps of old rags
+and leather and stuffed with straw, they will seize, worry, and tear it
+to pieces with the greatest fury, and without the faintest suspicion of
+its true character.
+
+That wild elephants will attack a distressed fellow seemed astonishing
+to Darwin, when he remembered the case of an elephant after escaping
+from a pit helping its fellow to escape also. But it is precisely the
+animals, high or low in the organic scale, that are social, and possess
+the instinct of helping each other, that will on occasions attack a
+fellow in misfortune--such an attack being no more than a blunder of the
+helping instinct.
+
+Felix de Azara records a rather cruel experiment on the temper of some
+tame rats confined in a cage. The person who kept them caught the tail
+of one of the animals and began sharply pinching it, keeping his hand
+concealed under the cage. Its cries of pain and struggles to free itself
+greatly excited the other rats; and after rushing wildly round for some
+moments they flew at their distressed companion, and fixing their teeth
+in its throat quickly dispatched it. In this case if the hand that held
+the tail had been visible and in the cage, the bites would undoubtedly
+have been inflicted on it; but no enemy was visible; yet the fury and
+impulse to attack an enemy was present in the animals. In such
+circumstances, the excitement must be discharged--the instinct obeyed,
+and in the absence of any other object of attack the illusion is
+produced and it discharges itself on the struggling companion. It is
+sometimes seen in dogs, when three or four or five are near together,
+that if one suddenly utters a howl or cry of pain, when no man is near
+it and no cause apparent, the others run to it, and seeing nothing, turn
+round and attack each other. Here the exciting cause--the cry for
+help--is not strong enough to produce the illusion which is sometimes
+fatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly thinks that the
+others, or one of the others, inflicted the injury, and his impulse is
+to take the part of the injured animal. If the cry for help--caused
+perhaps by a sudden cramp or the prick of a thorn--is not very sharp or
+intense, the other dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl at
+each other in a suspicious way.
+
+To go back to Azara's anecdote. Why, it may be asked--and this question
+has been put to me in conversation--if killing a distressed companion is
+of no advantage to the race, and if something must be attacked--why did
+not these rats in this instance attack the cage they were shut in, and
+bite at the woodwork and wires? Or, in the case related by Mr. Andrew
+Lang in _Longman's Magazine_ some time ago, in which the members of a
+herd of cattle in Scotland turned with sudden amazing fury on one of the
+cows that had got wedged between two rocks and was struggling with
+distressed bellowings to free itself--why did they not attack the
+prisoning rocks instead of goring their unfortunate comrade to death?
+For it is well known that animals will, on occasions, turn angrily upon
+and attack inanimate objects that cause them injury or hinder their
+freedom of action. And we know that this mythic faculty--the mind's
+projection of itself into visible nature--survives in ourselves, that
+there are exceptional moments in our lives when it comes back to us; no
+one, for instance, would be astonished to hear that any man, even a
+philosopher, had angrily kicked away or imprecated a stool or other
+inanimate object against which he had accidentally barked his shins. The
+answer is, that there is no connection between these two things--the
+universal mythic faculty of the mind, and that bold and violent instinct
+of social animals of rushing to the rescue of a stricken or distressed
+companion, which has a definite, a narrow, purpose--namely, to fall upon
+an enemy endowed not merely with the life and intelligence common to all
+things, including rocks, trees, and waters, but with animal form and
+motion.
+
+I had intended in this place to give other instances, observed in
+several widely-separated species, including monkeys; but it is not
+necessary, as I consider that all the facts, however varied, are covered
+by the theory I have suggested--even a fact I like the one mentioned in
+this chapter of cattle bellowing and madly digging up the ground where
+the blood of one of their kind had been spilt: also such a fact as that
+of wild cattle and other animals caught in a trap or enclosure attacking
+and destroying each other in their frenzy; and the fact that some
+fierce-tempered carnivorous mammals will devour the companion they have
+killed. It is an instinct of animals like wolves and peccaries to devour
+the enemy they have overcome and slain: thus, when the jaguar captures a
+peccary out of a drove, and does not quickly escape with his prize into
+a tree, he is instantly attacked and slain and then consumed, even to
+the skin and bones. This is the wolf's and the peccary's instinct; and
+the devouring of one of their own companions is an inevitable
+consequence of the mistake made in the first place of attacking and
+killing it. In no other circumstances, not even when starving, do they
+prey on their own species.
+
+If the explanation I have offered should seem a true or highly probable
+one, it will, I feel sure, prove acceptable to many lovers of animals,
+who, regarding tins seemingly ruthless instinct, not as an aberration
+but as in some vague way advantageous to animals in their struggle for
+existence, are yet unable to think of it without pain and horror;
+indeed, I know those who refuse to think of it at all, who would gladly
+disbelieve it if they could.
+
+It should be a relief to them to be able to look on it no longer as
+something ugly and hateful, a blot on nature, but as an illusion, a
+mistake, an unconscious crime, so to speak, that has for its motive the
+noblest passion that animals know--that sublime courage and daring which
+they exhibit in defence of a distressed companion. This fiery spirit in
+animals, which makes them forget their own safety, moves our hearts by
+its close resemblance to one of the most highly-prized human virtues;
+just as we are moved to intellectual admiration by the wonderful
+migratory instinct in birds that simulates some of the highest
+achievements of the mind of man. And we know that this beautiful
+instinct is also liable to mistakes--that many travellers leave us
+annually never to return. Such a mistake was undoubtedly the cause of
+the late visitation of Pallas' sand-grouse: owing perhaps to some
+unusual atmospheric or dynamic condition, or to some change in the
+nervous system of the birds, they deviated widely from their usual
+route, to scatter in countless thousands over the whole of Europe and
+perish slowly in climates not suited to them; while others, overpassing
+the cold strange continent, sped on over colder, stranger seas, to drop
+at last like aerolites, quenching their lives in the waves.
+
+Whether because it is true, as Professor Freeman and some others will
+have it, that humanity is a purely modern virtue; or because the
+doctrine of Darwin, by showing that we are related to other forms of
+life, that our best feelings have their roots low down in the temper and
+instincts of the social species, has brought us nearer in spirit to the
+inferior animals, it is certain that our regard for them has grown, and
+is growing, and that new facts and fresh inferences that make us think
+more highly of them are increasingly welcome.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+HORSE AND MAN.
+
+
+There is no mode of progression so delightful as riding on horseback.
+Walking, rowing, bicycling are pleasant exercises in their way, but the
+muscular exertion and constant exercise of judgment they call for occupy
+the mind partly to the exclusion of other things; so that a long walk
+may sometimes be only a long walk and nothing more. In riding
+we are not conscious of exertion, and as for that close observation and
+accurate discernment necessary in traversing the ground with speed and
+safety, it is left to the faithful servant that carries us. Pitfalls,
+hillocks, slippery places, the thousand little inequalities of the
+surface that have to be measured with infallible eye, these disturb us
+little. To fly or go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough and
+smooth alike, fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hills
+without climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearest
+approach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster bubbles
+and flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from the days of
+Montgolfier downwards have brought us no nearer to it. The aeronaut
+gasping for breath above the clouds offers only a sad spectacle of the
+imbecility of science and man's shattered hopes. To the free inhabitants
+of air we can only liken the mounted Arab, vanishing, hawklike, over the
+boundless desert.
+
+In riding there is always exhilarating motion; yet, if the scenery
+encountered be charming, you are apparently sitting still, while,
+river-like, it flows toward and past you, ever giving place to fresh
+visions of beauty. Above all, the mind is free, as when one lies idly on
+the grass gazing up into the sky. And, speaking of myself, there is even
+more than this immunity from any tax on the understanding such as we
+require in walking; the rhythmic motion, the sensation as of night,
+acting on the brain like a stimulus. That anyone should be able to think
+better lying, sitting, or standing, than when speeding along on
+horseback, is to me incomprehensible. This is doubtless due to early
+training and long use; for on those great pampas where I first saw the
+light and was taught at a tender age to ride, we come to look on man as
+a parasitical creature, fitted by nature to occupy the back of a horse,
+in which position only he has full and free use of all his faculties.
+Possibly the gaucho--the horseman of the pampas--is born with this idea
+in his brain; if so, it would only be reasonable to suppose that its
+correlative exists in a modification of structure. Certain it is that an
+intoxicated gaucho lifted on to the back of his horse is perfectly safe
+in his seat. The horse may do his best to rid himself of his burden; the
+rider's legs--or posterior arms as they might appropriately be
+called--retain their iron grip, notwithstanding the fuddled brain.
+
+The gaucho is more or less bow-legged; and, of course, the more crooked
+his legs are, the better for him in his struggle for existence. Off his
+horse his motions are awkward, like those of certain tardigrade mammals
+of arboreal habits when removed from their tree. He waddles in his walk;
+his hands feel for the reins; his toes turn inwards like a duck's. And
+here, perhaps, we can see why foreign travellers, judging him from their
+own standpoint, invariably bring against him the charge of laziness. On
+horseback he is of all men most active. His patient endurance under
+privations that would drive other men to despair, his laborious days and
+feats of horsemanship, the long journeys he performs without rest or
+food, seem to simple dwellers on the surface of the earth almost like
+miracles. Deprive him of his horse, and he can do nothing but sit on
+the ground cross-legged, or _en cuclillas_,--on his heels. You have, to
+use his own figurative language, cut off his feet.
+
+Darwin in his earlier years appears not to have possessed the power of
+reading men with that miraculous intelligence always distinguishing his
+researches concerning other and lower orders of beings. In the _Voyage
+of a Naturalist,_ speaking of this supposed indolence of the gauchos, he
+tells that in one place where workmen were in great request, seeing a
+poor gaucho sitting in a listless attitude, he asked him why he did not
+work. The man's answer was that _he was too poor to work!_ The
+philosopher was astonished and amused at the reply, but failed to
+understand it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of brief
+phrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned? The
+poor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been stolen--a thing
+of frequent occurrence in that country, or, perhaps, that some minion of
+the Government of the moment had seized them for the use of the State.
+
+To return to the starting point, the pleasures of riding do not flow
+exclusively from the agreeable sensations attendant on flight-like
+motion; there is also the knowledge, sweet in itself, that not a mere
+cunningly fashioned machine, like that fabled horse of brass "on which
+the Tartar king did ride," sustains us; but a something with life and
+thought, like ourselves, that feels what we feel, understands us, and
+keenly participates in our pleasures. Take, for example, the horse on
+which some quiet old country gentleman is accustomed to travel; how
+soberly and evenly he jogs along, picking his way over the ground. But
+let him fall into the hands of a lively youngster, and how soon he picks
+up a frisky spirit! Were horses less plastic, more the creatures of
+custom than they are, it would always be necessary, before buying one,
+to inquire into the disposition of its owner.
+
+When I was thirteen years old I was smitten with love for a horse I once
+saw--an untamable-looking brute, that rolled his eyes, turbulently,
+under a cloud of black mane tumbling over his forehead. I could not take
+my sight off this proud, beautiful creature, and I longed to possess him
+with a great longing. His owner--a worthless vagabond, as it
+happened--marked my enthusiastic admiration, and a day or two
+afterwards, having lost all his money at cards, he came to me, offering
+to sell me the horse. Having obtained my father's consent, I rushed off
+to the man with all the money I possessed--about thirty or thirty-five
+shillings, I believe. After some grumbling, and finding he could get no
+more, he accepted the money. My new possession filled me with unbounded
+delight, and I spent the time caressing him and leading him about the
+grounds in search of succulent grasses and choice leaves to feed him on.
+I am sure this horse understood and loved me, for, in spite of that
+savage look, which his eyes never quite lost, he always displayed a
+singular gentleness towards me. He never attempted to upset me, though
+he promptly threw--to my great delight, I must confess--anyone else who
+ventured to mount him. Probably the secret of his conduct was that he
+hated the whip. Of this individual, if not of the species, the
+celebrated description held true:--"The horse is a docile animal, but if
+you flog him he will not do so." After he had been mine a few days, I
+rode on him one morning to witness a cattle-marking on a neighbouring
+estate. I found thirty or forty gauchos on the ground engaged in
+catching and branding the cattle. It was rough, dangerous work, but
+apparently not rough enough to satisfy the men, so after branding an
+animal and releasing him from their lassos, several of the mounted
+gauchos would, purely for sport, endeavour to knock it down as it rushed
+away, by charging furiously on to it. As I sat there enjoying the fun,
+my horse stood very quietly under me, also eagerly watching the sport.
+At length a bull was released, and, smarting from the fiery torture,
+lowered his horns and rushed away towards the open plain. Three horsemen
+in succession shot out from the crowd, and charged the bull at full
+speed; one by one, by suddenly swerving his body round, he avoided them,
+and was escaping scot-free. At this moment my horse--possibly
+interpreting a casual touch of my hand on his neck, or some movement of
+my body, as a wish to join in the sport--suddenly sprang forward and
+charged on the flying bull like a thunderbolt, striking him full in the
+middle of his body, and hurling him with a tremendous shock to earth.
+The stricken beast rolled violently over, while my horse stood still as
+a stone watching him. Strange to say, I was not unseated, but,
+turning-round, galloped back, greeted by a shout of applause from the
+spectators--the only sound of that description I have ever had the
+privilege of listening to. They little knew that my horse had
+accomplished the perilous feat without his rider's guidance. No doubt he
+had been accustomed to do such things, and, perhaps, for the moment, had
+forgotten that he had passed into the hands of a new owner--one of
+tender years. He never voluntarily attempted an adventure of that kind
+again; he knew, I suppose, that he no longer carried on his back a
+reckless dare-devil, who valued not life. Poor Picáso! he was mine till
+he died. I have had scores of horses since, but never one I loved so
+well.
+
+With the gauchos the union between man and horse is not of so intimate a
+nature as with the Indians of the pampas. Horses are too cheap, where a
+man without shoes to his feet may possess a herd of them, for the
+closest kind of friendship to ripen. The Indian has also less
+individuality of character. The immutable nature of the conditions he is
+placed in, and his savage life, which is a perpetual chase, bring him
+nearer to the level of the beast he rides. And probably the acquired
+sagacity of the horse in the long co-partnership of centuries has become
+hereditary, and of the nature of an instinct. The Indian horse is more
+docile, he understands his master better; the slightest touch of the
+hand on his neck, which seems to have developed a marvellous
+sensitiveness, is sufficient to guide him. The gaucho labours to give
+his horse "a silken mouth," as he aptly calls it; the Indian's horse has
+it from birth. Occasionally the gaucho sleeps in the saddle; the Indian
+can die on his horse. During frontier warfare one hears at times of a
+dead warrior being found and removed with difficulty from the horse that
+carried him out of the fight, and about whose neck his rigid fingers
+were clasped in death. Even in the gaucho country, however, where, I
+grieve to confess, the horse is not deservedly esteemed, there are very
+remarkable instances of equine attachment and fidelity to man, and of a
+fellowship between horse and rider of the closest kind. One only I will
+relate.
+
+When Rosas, that man of "blood and iron," was Dictator of the Argentine
+country--a position which he held for a quarter of a centuiy--desertors
+from the army were inexorably shot when caught, as they generally were.
+But where my boyhood was spent there was a deserter, a man named Santa
+Anna, who for seven years, without ever leaving the neighbourhood of his
+home, succeeded in eluding his pursuers by means of the marvellous
+sagacity and watchful care exercised by his horse. When taking his rest
+on the plain--for he seldom slept under a roof--his faithful horse kept
+guard. At the first sight of mounted men on the horizon he would fly to
+his master, and, seizing his cloak between his teeth, rouse him with a
+vigorous shake. The hunted man would start up, and in a moment man and
+horse would vanish into one of the dense reed-beds abounding in the
+place, and where no man could follow. I have not space to tell more
+about this horse; but at last, in the fulness of time, when the figs
+were ripe--literally as well as figuratively, for it happened in the
+autumn of the year--the long tyrannous rule ended, and Santa Anna came
+out of the reed-beds, where he had lived his wild-animal life, to mix
+with his fellows. I knew him some years later. He was a rather
+heavy-looking man, with little to say, and his reputation for honesty
+was not good in the place; but I dare say there was something good in
+him.
+
+Students of nature are familiar with the modifying effects of new
+conditions on man and brute. Take, for example, the gaucho: he must
+every day traverse vast distances, see quickly, judge rapidly, be ready
+at all times to encounter hunger and fatigue, violent changes of
+temperature, great and sudden perils. These conditions have made him
+differ widely from the peasant of the Peninsula; he has the endurance
+and keen sight of a wolf, is fertile in expedients, quick in action,
+values human life not at all, and is in pain or defeat a Stoic.
+Unquestionably the horse he rides has also suffered a great change. He
+differs as much from the English hunter, for instance, as one animal can
+well differ from another of the same species. He never pounds the earth
+and wastes his energies in vain parade. He has not the dauntless courage
+that performs such brilliant feats in the field, and that often as not
+attempts the impossible. In the chase he husbands all his strength,
+carrying his head low, and almost grazing the ground with his hoofs, so
+that he is not a showy animal. Constant use, or the slow cumulative
+process of natural selection, has served to develop a keenness of sense
+almost preternatural. The vulture's eye, with all the advantage derived
+from the vulture's vast elevation above the scene surveyed, is not so
+far-reaching as the sense of smell in the pampa horse. A common
+phenomenon on the pampas is a sudden migration of the horses of a
+district to some distant place. This occurs in seasons of drought, when
+grass or water fails. The horses migrate to some district where, from
+showers having fallen or other circumstances, there is a better supply
+of food and drink. A slight breeze blowing from the more favoured
+region, which may be forty or fifty miles away, or even much further, is
+enough to start them off. Yet, during the scorching days of midsummer,
+very little moisture or smell of grass can possibly reach them from such
+a distance.
+
+Another phenomenon, even more striking, is familiar to every
+frontiersman. For some reason, the gaucho horse manifests the greatest
+terror at an Indian invasion. No doubt his fear is, in part at any rate,
+an associate feeling, the coming of the Indians being always a time of
+excitement and com-motion, sweeping like a great wave over the country;
+houses are in flames, families flying, cattle being driven at frantic
+speed to places of greater safety. Be this as it may, long before the
+marauders reach the settlement (often when they are still a whole day's
+journey from it) the horses take the alarm and come wildly flying in:
+the contagion quickly spreads to the horned cattle, and a general
+stampede ensues. The gauchos maintain that the horses _smell_ the
+Indians. I believe they are right, for when passing a distant Indian
+camp, from which the wind blew, the horses driven before me have
+suddenly taken fright and run away, leading me a chase of many miles.
+The explanation that ostriches, deer, and other fleet animals driven in
+before the invaders might be the cause of the stampede cannot be
+accepted, since the horses are familiar with the sight of these animals
+flying from their gaucho hunters.
+
+There is a pretty fable of a cat and dog lying in a dark room, aptly
+illustrating the fine senses of these two species. "Listen! I heard a
+feather drop!" said the dog. "Oh, no!" said the cat, "it was a, needle;
+I saw it." The horse is not commonly believed to have senses keen as
+that, and a dog tracing his master's steps over the city pavement is
+supposed to be a feat no other animal can equal. No doubt the artificial
+life a horse lives in England, giving so little play to many of his most
+important faculties, has served to blunt them. He is a splendid
+creature; but the noble bearing, the dash and reckless courage that
+distinguish him from the modest horse of the desert, have not been
+acquired without a corresponding loss in other things. When ridden by
+night the Indian horse--and sometimes the same habit is found in the
+gaucho's animal--drops his head lower and lower as the darkness
+increases, with the danger arising from the presence of innumerable
+kennels concealed in the grass, until his nose sweeps the surface like a
+foxhound's. That this action is dictated by a powerful instinct of
+self-preservation is plain; for, when I have attempted to forcibly drag
+the animal's head up, he has answered such an experiment by taking the
+bit in his teeth, and violently pulling the reins out of my hand. His
+miraculous sense of smell measures the exact position of every hidden
+kennel, every treacherous spot, and enables him to pass swiftly and
+securely over it.
+
+On the desert pampa the gaucho, for a reason that he knows, calls the
+puma the "friend of man." The Arab gives this designation to his horse;
+but in Europe, where we do not associate closely with the horse, the dog
+naturally takes the foremost place in our affections. The very highest
+praise yet given to this animal is probably to be found in Bacon's essay
+on Atheism. "For take an example of a dog," he says, "and mark what a
+generosity and courage he will put on when he finds himself maintained
+by a man, who is to him in place of a god, or _melior natura,_ which
+courage is manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a
+better nature than its own, could never attain!" Can we not say as much
+of the horse? The very horses that fly terror-stricken from the smell of
+an Indian will, when "maintained by a man," readily charge into a whole
+host of yelling savages.
+
+I once had a horse at home, born and bred on the place, so docile that
+whenever I required him I could go to him where the horses were at
+pasture, and, though they all galloped off at my approach, he would
+calmly wait to be caught. Springing on to his back, I would go after the
+other horses, or gallop home with only my hand on his neck to guide him.
+I did not often ride him, as he was slow and lazy, but with timid women
+and children he was a favourite; he was also frequently used for farm
+work, in or out of harness, and I could shoot from his back. In the
+peach season he would roam about the plantation, getting the fruit, of
+which he was very fond, by tugging at the lower branches of the trees
+and shaking it down in showers. One intensely dark night I was riding
+home on this horse. I came through a road with a wire fence on each
+side, two miles in length, and when I had got nearly to the end of this
+road my horse suddenly stopped short, uttering a succession of loud
+terrified snorts. I could see nothing but the intense blackness of the
+night before me and tried to encourage him to go on. Touching him on
+the neck, I found his hair wet with the sudden profuse sweat of extreme
+fear. The whip made no impression on him. He continued to back away, his
+eyes apparently fixed on some object of horror just before him, while he
+trembled to such a degree that I was shaken in the saddle. He attempted
+several times to wheel round and run away, but I was determined not to
+yield to him, and continued the contest. Suddenly, when I was beginning
+to despair of getting home by that road, he sprang forward, and
+regularly charged the (to me) invisible object before him, and in
+another moment, when he had apparently passed it, taking the bit between
+his teeth he almost flew over the ground, never pausing till he brought
+me to my own door. When I dismounted his terror seemed gone, but he hung
+his head in a dejected manner, like a horse that has been under the
+saddle all day. I have never witnessed another such instance of almost
+maddening fear. His terror and apprehension were like what we can
+imagine a man experiencing at sight of a ghost in some dark solitary
+place.
+
+Yet he did not forcibly carry me away from it, as he might so easily
+have done; but, finding himself maintained by a "nature superior to his
+own," he preferred to face it. I have never met in the dog a more
+striking example of this noblest kind of brute courage. The incident did
+not impress me very much at the moment, but when I came to reflect that
+my sight was mere blindness compared with that of my horse, and that it
+was not likely his imagination clothed any familiar natural object with
+fantastic terrors, it certainly did impress me very deeply.
+
+I am loth to finish with, my subject, in which, to express myself in the
+manner of the gauchos, I have passed over many matters, like good grass
+and fragrant herbs the galloping horse sniffs at but cannot stay to
+taste; and especially loth to conclude with this last incident, which
+has in it an element of gloom. I would rather first go back for a few
+moments to my original theme--the pleasures of riding, for the sake of
+mentioning a species of pleasure my English reader has probably never
+tasted or even heard of. When riding by night on the pampas, I used to
+enjoy lying back on my horse till my head and shoulders rested well on
+his back, my feet also being raised till they pressed against his neck;
+and in this position, which practice can make both safe and comfortable,
+gaze up into the starry sky. To enjoy this method of riding thoroughly,
+a sure-footed unshod horse with perfect confidence in his rider is
+necessary; and he must be made to go at a swift and smooth pace over
+level grassy ground. With these conditions the sensation is positively
+delightful. Nothing of earth is visible, only the vast circle of the
+heavens glittering with innumerable stars; the muffled sound of the
+hoofs on the soft sward becomes in fancy only the rushing of the wings
+of our Pegasus, while the enchanting illusion that we are soaring
+through space possesses the mind. Unfortunately, however, this method of
+riding is impracticable in England. And, even if people with enthusiasm
+enough could be found to put it in practice by importing swift
+light-footed Arabian or pampa horses, and careering about level parks on
+dark starry nights, probably a shout of derision would be raised against
+so undignified a pastime.
+
+_Apropos_ of dignity, I will relate, in conclusion, an incident in my
+London life which may possibly interest psychologists. Some time ago in
+Oxford Street I got on top of an omnibus travelling west. My mind was
+preoccupied, I was anxious to get home, and, in an absent kind of way, I
+became irritated at the painfully slow rate of progress. It was all an
+old familiar experience, the deep thought, lessening pace, and
+consequent irritation. The indolent brute I imagined myself riding was,
+as usual, taking advantage of his rider's abstraction; but I would soon
+"feelingly persuade" him that I was not so far gone as to lose sight of
+the difference between a swinging gallop and a walk. So, elevating my
+umbrella, I dealt the side of the omnibus a sounding blow, very much to
+the astonishment of my fellow-passengers. So overgrown are we with
+usages, habits, tricks of thought and action springing from the soil we
+inhabit; and when we have broken away and removed ourselves far from it,
+so long do the dead tendrils still cling to us!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV,
+
+SEEN AND LOST,
+
+
+We can imagine what the feelings of a lapidary would be--an enthusiast
+whose life is given to the study of precious stones, and whose sole
+delight is in the contemplation of their manifold beauty--if a stranger
+should come in to him, and, opening his hand, exhibit a new unknown gem,
+splendid as ruby or as sapphire, yet manifestly no mere variety of any
+familiar stone, but differing as widely from all others as diamond from
+opal or cat's-eye; and then, just when he is beginning to rejoice in
+that strange exquisite loveliness, the hand should close and the
+stranger, with a mocking smile on his lips, go forth and disappear from
+sight in the crowd. A feeling such as that would be is not unfrequently
+experienced by the field naturalist whose favoured lot it is to live in
+a country not yet "thoroughly worked out," with its every wild
+inhabitant scientifically named, accurately described, and skilfully
+figured in some colossal monograph. One swift glance of the practised
+eye, ever eagerly searching for some new-thing, and he knows that here
+at length is a form never previously seen by him; but his joy is perhaps
+only for a few moments, and the prize is snatched from sight for ever.
+The lapidary might have some doubts; he might think that the stranger
+had, after all, only mocked him with the sight of a wonderful artificial
+gem, and that a close examination would have proved its worthlessness;
+but the naturalist can have no doubts: if he is an enthusiast, well
+acquainted with the fauna of his district, and has good eyesight, he
+knows that there is no mistake; for there it is, the new strange form,
+photographed by instantaneous process on his mind, and there it will
+remain, a tantalizing image, its sharp lines and fresh colouring
+unblurred by time.
+
+Walking in some open forest glade, he may look up just in time to see a
+great strange butterfly--a blue Morpho, let us say, wandering in some
+far country where this angel insect is unknown--passing athwart his
+vision with careless, buoyant flight, the most sylph-like thing in
+nature, and all blue and pure like its aerial home, but with a more
+delicate and wonderful brilliance in its cerulean colour, giving such
+unimaginable glory to its broad airy wings; and then, almost before his
+soul has had time to feel its joy, it may soar away unloitering over the
+tall trees, to be seen no more.
+
+But the admiration, the delight, and the desire are equally great, and
+the loss just as keenly felt, whether the strange species seen happens
+to be one surpassingly beautiful or not. Its newness is to the
+naturalist its greatest attraction. How beautiful beyond all others
+seems a certain small unnamed brown bird to my mind! So many years have
+passed and its image has not yet grown dim; yet I saw it only for a few
+moments, when it hopped out from, the thick foliage and perched within
+two or three yards of me, not afraid, but only curious; and after
+peering at me first with one eye and then the other, and wiping its
+small dagger on a twig, it flew away and was seen no more. For many days
+I sought for it, and for years waited its reappearance, and it was more
+to me than ninety and nine birds which I had always known; yet it was
+very modest, dressed in a brown suit, very pale on the breast and white
+on the throat, and for distinction a straw-coloured stripe over the
+eye--that ribbon which Queen Nature bestows on so many of her feathered
+subjects, in recognition, I suppose, of some small and common kind of
+merit. If I should meet with it in a collection I should know it again;
+only, in that case it would look plain and homely to me--this little
+bird that for a time made all others seem unbeautiful.
+
+Even a richer prize may come in sight for a brief period--one of the
+nobler mammalians, which are fewer in number, and bound to earth like
+ourselves, and therefore so much better known than the wandering
+children of air. In. some secluded spot, resting amidst luxuriant
+herbage or forest undergrowth, a slight rustling makes us start, and,
+lo! looking at us from the clustering leaves, a strange face; the
+leaf-like ears erect, the dark eyes round with astonishment, and the
+sharp black nose twitching and sniffing audibly, to take in the
+unfamiliar flavour of a human presence from the air, like the pursed-up
+and smacking lips of a wine-drinker tasting a new vintage. No sooner
+seen than gone, like a dream, a phantom, the quaint furry face to be
+thereafter only an image in memory.
+
+Sometimes the prize may be a very rich one, and actually within reach of
+the hand--challenging the hand, as it were, to grasp it, and yet
+presently slip away to be seen no more, although it maybe sought for day
+after day, with a hungry longing comparable to that of some poor tramp
+who finds a gold doubloon in the forest, and just when he is beginning
+to realize all that it means to him drops it in the grass and cannot
+find it again. There is not the faintest motion in the foliage, no
+rustle of any dry leaf, and yet we know that something has
+moved--something has come or has gone; and, gazing fixedly at one spot,
+we suddenly see that it is still there, close to us, the pointed
+ophidian head and long neck, not drawn back and threatening, but sloping
+forward, dark and polished as the green and purple weed-stems springing
+from marshy soil, and with an irregular chain of spots extending down
+the side. Motionless, too, as the stems it is; but presently the tongue,
+crimson and glistening, darts out and flickers, like a small jet of
+smoke and flame, and is withdrawn; then the smooth serpent head drops
+down, and the thing is gone.
+
+How I saw and lost the noble wrestling frog has been recounted in
+Chapter IV.: other tantalizing experiences of the same kind remain to be
+told in the present chapter, which is not intended for the severe
+naturalist, but rather for such readers as may like to hear something
+about the pains and pleasures of the seeker as well as the result of the
+seeking.
+
+One of my earliest experiences of seeing and losing relates to a
+humming-bird--a veritable "jewel of ornithology." I was only a boy at
+the time, but already pretty well acquainted with the birds of the
+district I lived in, near La Plata River, and among them were three
+species of the hummingbird. One spring day I saw a fourth--a wonderful
+little thing, only half as big as the smallest of the other three--the
+well-known Phaithornis splendens--and scarcely larger than a bumble-bee.
+I was within three feet of it as it sucked at the flowers, suspended
+motionless in the air, the wings appearing formless and mist-like from
+their rapid vibratory motion, but the rest of the upper plumage was seen
+distinctly as anything can be seen. The head and neck and upper part of
+the back were emerald green, with the metallic glitter usually seen in
+the burnished scale-like feathers of these small birds; the lower half
+of the back was velvet-black; the tail and tail-coverts white as snow.
+On two other occasions, at intervals of a few days, I saw this brilliant
+little stranger, always very near, and tried without success to capture
+it, after which, it disappeared from the plantation. Four years later I
+saw it once again not far from the same place. It was late in summer,
+and I was out walking on the level plain where the ground was carpeted
+with short grass, and nothing else grew there except a solitary stunted
+cardoou thistle-bush with one flower on its central stem above the
+grey-green artichoke-like leaves. The disc of the great thorny blossom
+was as broad as that of a sunflower, purple in colour, delicately
+frosted with white; on this flat disc several insects were
+feeding--flies, fireflies, and small wasps--and I paused for a few
+minutes in my walk to watch them. Suddenly a small misty object flew
+swiftly downwards past my face, and paused motionless in the air an inch
+or two above the rim of the flower. Once more my lost humming-bird,
+which I remembered so well! The exquisitely graceful form, half circled
+by the misty moth-like wings, the glittering green and velvet-black
+mantle, and snow-white tail spread open like a fan--there it hung like a
+beautiful bird-shaped gem suspended by an invisible gossamer thread.
+One--two--three moments passed, while I gazed, trembling with rapturous
+excitement, and then, before I had time to collect my faculties and make
+a forlorn attempt to capture it with my hat, away it flew, gliding so
+swiftly on the air that form and colour were instantly lost, and in
+appearance it was only an obscure grey line traced rapidly along the,
+low sky and fading quickly out ol sight. And that was the last I ever
+saw of it.
+
+The case of this small "winged gem," still wandering nameless in the
+wilds, reminds me of yet another bird seen and lost, also remarkable for
+its diminutive size. For years I looked for it, and when the wished-for
+opportunity came, and it was in my power to secure it, I refrained; and
+Fate punished me by never permitting me to see it again. On several
+occasions while riding on the pampas I had caught glimpses of this
+minute bird flitting up mothlike, with uncertain tremulous flight, and
+again dipping into the weeds, tall grass, or thistles. Its plumage was
+yellowish in hue, like sere dead herbage, and its extremely slender body
+looked longer and slimmer than it was, owing to the great length of its
+tail, or of the two middle tail-feathers. I knew that it was a
+Synallaxis--a genus of small birds of the Woodhewer family. Now, as I
+have said in a former chapter, these are wise little birds, more
+interesting--I had almost said more beautiful--in their wisdom, or
+wisdom-simulating instincts, than the quatzel in its resplendent green,
+or the cock-of-the-rock in its vivid scarlet and orange mantle. Wrens
+and mocking-birds have melody for their chief attraction, and the name
+of each kind is, to our minds, also the name of a certain kind of sweet
+music; we think of swifts and swallows in connection with the mysterious
+migratory instinct; and humming-birds have a glittering mantle, and the
+miraculous motions necessary to display its ever-changing iridescent
+beauty. In like manner, the homely Dendrocolaptidae possess the genius
+for building, and an account of one of these small birds without its
+nest would be like a biography of Sir Christopher Wren that made no
+mention of his works. It was not strange then that when I saw this small
+bird the question rose to my mind, what kind of nest does it build?
+
+One morning in the month of October, the great breeding-time for birds
+in the Southern Hemisphere, while cautiously picking my way through a
+bed of eardoon bushes, the mysterious little creature flitted up and
+perched among the clustering leaves quite near to me. It uttered a
+feeble grasshopper-like chirp; and then a second individual, smaller,
+paler-coloured, and if possible shyer than the first, showed itself for
+two or three seconds, after which both birds dived once more into
+concealment. How glad I was to see them! for here they were, male and
+female, in a suitable spot in my own fields, where they evidently meant
+to breed. Every day after that I paid them one cautious visit, and by
+waiting from five to fifteen minutes, standing motionless among the
+thistles, I always succeeded in getting them to show themselves for a
+few moments. I could easily have secured them then, but my wish was to
+discover their nesting habits; and after watching for some days, I was
+rewarded by finding their nest; then for three days more I watched it
+slowly progressing towards completion, and each time I approached it one
+of the small birds would flit out to vanish into the herbage. The
+structure was about six inches long, and not more than two inches in
+diameter, and was placed horizontally on a broad stiff eardoon leaf,
+sheltered by other leaves above. It was made of the finest dry grass
+loosely woven, and formed a simple perfectly straight tube, open at both
+ends. The aperture was so small that I could only insert my little
+finger, and the bird could not, of course, have turned round in so
+narrow a passage, and so always went in at one end and left by the
+other. On visiting the spot on the fourth day I found, to my intense
+chagrin, that the delicate fabric had been broken and thrown down by
+some animal; also, that the birds had utterly vanished--for I sought
+them in vain, both there and in every weedy and thistly spot in the
+neighbourhood. The bird without the nest had seemed a useless thing to
+possess; now, for all my pains, I had only a wisp of fine dry grass in
+my hand, and no bird. The shy, modest little creature, dwelling
+violet-like amidst clustering leaves, and even when showing itself still
+"half-hidden from the eye," was thereafter to be only a tantalizing
+image in memory. Still, my case was not so hopeless as that of the
+imagined lapidary; for however rare a species may be, and near to its
+final extinction, there must always be many individuals existing, and I
+was cheered by the thought that I might yet meet with one at some future
+time. And, even if this particular species was not to gladden my sight
+again, there were others, scores and hundreds more, and at any moment I
+might expect to see one shining, a living gem, on Nature's open extended
+palm.
+
+Sometimes it has happened that an animal would have been overlooked or
+passed by with scant notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for some
+singular action or habit which has instantly given it a strange
+importance, and made its possession desirable.
+
+I was once engaged in the arduous and monotonous task of driving a large
+number of sheep a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, in
+excessively hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to travelling.
+Five or six gauchos were with me, and we were on the southern pampas of
+Buenos Ayres, near to a long precipitous stony sierra which rose to a
+height of five or six hundred feet above the plain. Who that has
+travelled for eighteen days on a dead level in a broiling sun can resist
+a hill? That sierra was more sublime to us than Conon-dagua, than
+Illimani.
+
+Leaving the sheep, I rode to it with three of the men; aad after
+securing our horses on the lower slope, we began our laborious ascent.
+Now the gaucho when taken from his horse, on which he lives like a kind
+of parasite, is a very slow-moving creature, and I soon left my friends
+far behind. Coming to a place where ferns and flowering herbage grew
+thick, I began to hear all about me sounds of a character utterly unlike
+any natural sound I was acquainted with--innumerable low clear voices
+tinkling or pealing like minute sweet-toned, resonant bells--for the
+sounds were purely metallic and perfectly bell-like. I was completely
+ringed round with the mysterious music, and as I walked it rose and sank
+rhythmically, keeping time to my steps. I stood still, and immediately
+the sounds ceased. I took a step forwards, and again the fairy-bells
+were set ringing, as if at each step my foot touched a central meeting
+point of a thousand radiating threads, each thread attached to a peal of
+little bells hanging concealed among the herbage. I waited for my
+companions, and called their attention to the phenomenon, and to them
+also it was a thing strange and perplexing. "It is the bell-snake!"
+cried one excitedly. This is the rattle-snake; but although at that time
+I had no experience of this reptile, I knew that he was wrong. Yet how
+natural the mistake! The Spanish name of "bell-snake" had made him
+imagine that the whirring sound of the vibrating rattles, resembling
+muffled cicada music, is really bell-like in character. Eventually we
+discovered that the sound was made by grasshoppers; but they were seen
+only to be lost, for I could not capture one, so excessively shy and
+cunning had the perpetual ringing of their own little tocsins made them.
+And presently I had to return to my muttons; and afterwards there was no
+opportunity of revisiting the spot to observe so singular a habit again
+and collect specimens. It was a very slender grasshopper, about an inch
+and a half long, of a uniform, tawny, protective colour--the colour of
+an old dead leaf. It also possessed a protective habit common to most
+grasshoppers, of embracing a slender vertical stem with its four fine
+front legs, and moving cunningly round so as to keep the stem always in
+front of it to screen itself from sight. Only other grasshoppers are
+silent when alarmed, and the silence and masking action are related, and
+together prevent the insect from being detected. But this particular
+species, or race, or colony, living on the sides of the isolated sierra,
+had acquired a contrary habit, resembling a habit of gregarious birds
+and mammals. For this informing sound (unless it mimicked some
+_warning-sound,_ as of a rattlesnake, which it didn't) could not
+possibly be beneficial to individuals living alone, as grasshoppers
+generally do, but, on the contrary, only detrimental; and such a habit
+was therefore purely for the public good, and could only have arisen in
+a species that always lived in communities.
+
+On another occasion, in the middle of the hot season, I was travelling
+alone across-country in a locality which was new to me, a few leagues
+east of La Plata River, in its widest part. About eleven o'clock in the
+morning I came to a low-lying level plain where the close-cropped grass
+was vivid green, although elsewhere all over the country the vegetation
+was scorched and dead, and dry as ashes. The ground being so favourable,
+I crossed this low plain at a swinging gallop, and in about thirty
+minutes' time. In that half-hour I saw a vast number of snakes, all of
+one kind, and a species new to me; but my anxiety to reach my
+destination before the oppressive heat of the afternoon made me hurry
+on. So numerous were the snakes in that green place that frequently I
+had as many as a dozen in sight at one time. It looked to me like a
+coronelia--harmless colubrine snakes--but was more than twice as large
+as either of the two species of that genus I was already familiar with.
+In size they varied greatly, ranging from two to fully five feet in
+length, and the colour was dull yellow or tan, slightly lined and
+mottled with shades of brown. Among dead or partially withered grass and
+herbage they would have been undistinguishable at even a very short
+distance, but on the vivid green turf they were strangely conspicuous,
+some being plainly visible forty or fifty yards away; and not one was
+seen coiled up. They were all lying motionless, stretched out full
+length, and looking like dark yellow or tan-coloured ribbons, thrown on
+to the grass. It was most unusual to see so many snakes together,
+although not surprising in the circumstances. The December heats had
+dried up all the watercourses and killed the vegetation, and made the
+earth hard and harsh as burnt bricks; and at such times snakes,
+especially the more active non-venomous kinds, will travel long
+distances, in their slow way, in search of water. Those I saw during my
+ride had probably been attracted by the moisture from a large area of
+country; and although there was no water, the soft fresh grass must have
+been grateful to them. Snakes are seen coiled up when they are at home;
+when travelling and far afield, they lie as a rule extended full length,
+even when resting--and they are generally resting. Pausing at length,
+before quitting this green plain, to give my horse a minute's rest, I
+got off and approached a large snake; but when I was quite twelve yards
+from it, it lifted its head, and, turning deliberately round, came
+rather swiftly at me. I retreated, and it followed, until, springing on
+to my horse, I left it, greatly surprised at its action, and beginning
+to think that it must be venomous. As I rode on the feeling of surprise
+increased, conquering haste; and in the end, seeing more snakes, I
+dismounted and approached the largest, when exactly the same thing
+occurred again, the snake rousing itself and coming angrily at me when I
+was still (considering the dull lethargic character of the deadliest
+kinds) at an absurd distance from it. Again and again I repeated the
+experiment, with the same result. And at length I stunned one with a
+blow of my whip to examine its mouth, but found no poison-fangs in it.
+
+I then resumed my journey, expecting to meet with more snakes of the
+same kind at my destination; but there were none, and very soon business
+called me to a distant place, and I never met with this species
+afterwards. But when I rode away from that green spot, and was once more
+on the higher, desolate, wind-swept plain surrounding it--a rustling sea
+of giant thistles, still erect, although dead, and red as rust, and
+filling the hot blue sky with silvery down--it was with a very strange
+feeling. The change from the green and living to the dead and dry and
+dusty was so great! There seemed to be something mysterious,
+extra-natural, in that low level plain, so green and fresh and snaky,
+where my horse's hoofs had made no sound--a place where no man dwelt,
+and no cattle pastured, and no wild bird folded its wing. And the
+serpents there were not like others--the mechanical coiled-up thing we
+know, a mere bone-and-muscle man-trap, set by the elements, to spring
+and strike when trodden on: but these had a high intelligence, a lofty
+spirit, and were filled with a noble rage and astonishment that any
+other kind of creature, even a man, should venture there to disturb
+their sacred peace. It was a fancy, born of that sense of mystery which
+the unknown and the unusual in nature wakes in us--an obsolescent
+feeling that still links us to the savage. But the simple fact was
+wonderful enough, and that has been set down simply and apart from all
+fancies. If the reader happens not to be a naturalist, it is right to
+tell him that a naturalist cannot exaggerate consciously; and if he be
+capable of unconscious exaggeration, then ho is no naturalist. He
+should hasten "to join the innumerable caravan that moves" to the
+fantastic realms of romance. Looking at the simple fact scientifically,
+it was a case of mimicry--the harmless snake mimicking the fierce
+threatening gestures and actions proper to some deadly kind. Only with
+this difference: the venomous snake, of all deadly things in nature, is
+the slowest to resentment, the most reluctant to enter into a quarrel;
+whereas in this species angry demonstrations were made when the intruder
+was yet far off, and before he had shown any hostile intentions.
+
+My last case--the last, that is, of the few I have selected--relates to
+a singular variation in the human species. On this occasion I was again
+travelling alone in a strange district on the southern frontier of
+Buenos Ayres. On a bitterly cold midwinter day, shortly before noon, I
+arrived, stiff and tired, at one of those pilgrims' rests on the pampas
+--a wayside _pulperia,_ or public house, where the traveller can procure
+anything he may require or desire, from a tumbler of Brazilian rum to
+make glad his heart, to a poncho, or cloak of blue cloth with fluffy
+scarlet lining, to keep him warm o' nights; and, to speed him on his
+way, a pair of cast-iron spurs weighing six pounds avoirdupois, with
+rowels eight inches in diameter, manufactured in this island for the use
+of barbarous men beyond the sea. The wretched mud-and-grass building was
+surrounded by a foss crossed by a plank drawbridge; outside of the
+enclosure twelve or fourteen saddled horses were standing, and from the
+loud noise of talk and laughter in the bar I conjectured that a goodly
+company of rough frontiersmen were already making merry at that early
+hour. It was necessary for me to go in among them to see the proprietor
+of the place and ask permission to visit his kitchen in order to make
+myself a "tin of coffee," that being the refreshment I felt inclined
+for. When I went in and made my salutation, one man wheeled round square
+before me, stared straight into my oyes, and in an exceedingly
+high-pitched reedy or screechy voice and a sing-song tone returned my
+"good morning," and bade me call for the liquid I loved best at his
+expense. I declined with thanks, and in accordance with gaucho etiquette
+added that I was prepared to pay for his liquor. It was then for him to
+say that he had already been served and so let the matter drop, but he
+did not do so: he screamed out in his wild animal voice that he would
+take gin. I paid for his drink, and would, I think, have felt greatly
+surprised at his strange insolent behaviour, so unlike that of the
+usually courteous gaucho, but this thing affected me not at all, so
+profoundly had his singular appearance and voice impressed me; and for
+the rest of the time I remained in the place I continued to watch him
+narrowly. Professor Huxley has somewhere said, "A variation frequently
+occurs, but those who notice it take no care about noting down the
+particulars." That is not a failing of mine, and this is what I noted
+down while the man's appearance was still fresh in memory. He was about
+five feet eleven inches in height--very tall for a gaucho--straight and
+athletic, with exceedingly broad shoulders, which made his round head
+look small; long arms and huge hands. The round flat face, coarse black
+hair, swarthy reddish colour, and smooth hairless cheeks seemed to show
+that he had more Indian than Spanish blood in him, while his round black
+eyes were even more like those of a rapacious animal in expression than
+in the pure-blooded Indian. He also had the Indian or half-breed's
+moustache, when that natural ornament is permitted to grow, and which is
+composed of thick bristles standing out like a cat's whiskers. The mouth
+was the marvellous feature, for it was twice the size of an average
+mouth, and the two lips were alike in thickness. This mouth did not
+smile, but snarled, both when he spoke and when he should have smiled;
+and when he snarled the wliolo of his teeth and a part of the gums were
+displayed. The teeth were not as in other human beings--incisors,
+canines, and molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, each
+tooth a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched its
+companion teeth, and with a point sharp as the sharpest-pointed dagger.
+They were like the teeth of a shark or crocodile. I noticed that when he
+showed them, which was very often, they were not set together as in
+dogs, weasels, and other savage snarling animals, but apart, showing the
+whole terrible serration in the huge red mouth.
+
+After getting his gin he joined in the boisterous conversation with the
+others, and this gave me an opportunity of studying his face for several
+minutes, all the time with a curious feeling that I had put myself into
+a cage with a savage animal of horrible aspect, whose instincts were
+utterly unknown to me, and were probably not very pleasant. It was
+interesting to note that whenever one of the others addressed him
+directly, or turned to him when speaking, it was with a curious
+expression, not of fear, but partly amusement and partly something else
+which I could not fathom. Now, one might think that this was natural
+enough purely on account of the man's extraordinary appearance. I do not
+think that a sufficient explanation; for however strange a man's
+appearance may be, his intimate friends and associates soon lose all
+sense of wonder at his strangeness, and even forget that he is unlike
+others. My belief is that this curiosity, or whatever it was they showed
+in their faces, was due to something in his character--a mental
+strangeness, showing itself at unexpected times, and which might flash,
+out at any moment to amuse or astonish them. There was certainly a
+correspondence between the snarling action of the mouth and the
+dangerous form of the teeth, perfect as that in any snarling animal; and
+such animals, it should be remembered, snarl not only when angry and
+threatening, but in their playful moods as well. Other and more
+important correspondences or correlations might have existed; and the
+voice was certainly unlike any human voice I have ever heard, whether in
+white, red, or black man. But the time I had for observation was short,
+the conversation revealed nothing further, and by-and-by I went away in
+search of the odorous kitchen, where there would be hot water for
+coffee, or at all events cold water and a kettle, and materials for
+making a fire--to wit, bones of dead cattle, "buffalo chips," and rancid
+fat.
+
+I have never been worried with the wish, or ambition to be a head-hunter
+in the Dyak sense, but on this one occasion I did wish that it had been
+possible, without violating any law, or doing anything to a
+fellow-creature which I should not like done to myself, to have obtained
+possession of this man's head, with its set of unique and terrible
+teeth. For how, in the name of Evolution, did he come by them, and by
+other physical peculiarities--the snarling habit and that high-pitched
+animal voice, for instance--which made him a being different from
+others--one separate and far apart? Was he, so admirably formed, so
+complete and well-balanced, merely a freak of nature, to use an
+old-fashioned phrase--a sport, or spontaneous individual variation--an
+experiment for a new human type, imagined by Nature in some past period,
+inconceivably long ago, but which she had only now, too late, found time
+to carry out? Or rather was he like that little hairy maiden exhibited
+not long ago in London, a reproduction of the past, the mystery called
+reversion--a something in the life of a species like memory in the life
+of an individual, the memory which suddenly brings back to the old man's
+mind the image of his childhood? For no dream-monster in human form ever
+appeared to me with so strange and terrible a face; and this was no
+dream but sober fact, for I saw and spoke with this man; and unless cold
+steel has given him his quietus, or his own horse has crushed him, or a
+mad bull sored him--all natural forms of death in that wild land--he is
+probably still living and in the prime of life, and perhaps at this very
+moment drinking gin at some astonished traveller's expense at that very
+bar where I met him. The old Palaeolithic man, judging from the few
+remains we have of him, must have had an unspeakably savage and, to our
+way of thinking, repulsive and horrible aspect, with his villainous low
+receding forehead, broad nose, great projecting upper jaw, and
+retreating chin; to meet such a man face to face in Piccadilly would
+frighten a nervous person of the present time. But his teeth were not
+unlike our own, only very much larger and more powerful, and well
+adapted to their work of masticating the flesh, underdone and possibly
+raw, of mammoth and rhinoceros. If, then, this living man recalls a type
+of the past, it is of a remoter past, a more primitive man, the volume
+of whose history is missing from the geological record. To speculate on
+such a subject seems idle and useless; and when I coveted possession of
+that head it was not because I thought that it might lead to any fresh
+discovery. A lower motive inspired the feeling. I wished for it only
+that I might bring it over the sea, to drop it like a new apple of
+discord, suited to the spirit of the times, among the anthropologists
+and evolutionists generally of this old and learned world. Inscribed, of
+course, "To the most learned," but giving no locality and no
+particulars. I wished to do that for the pleasure--not a very noble kind
+of pleasure, I allow--of witnessing from some safe hiding-place the
+stupendous strife that would have ensued--a battle more furious, lasting
+and fatal to many a brave knight of biology, than was ever yet fought
+over any bone or bony fragment or fabric ever picked up, including the
+celebrated cranium of the Neanderthal.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX.
+
+THE PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA.
+
+
+The following passage occurs in an article on "The Naturalist in La
+Plata," by the late Professor Piomanes, which appeared in the
+_Nineteenth Century,_ May, 1893. After quoting the account of the puma's
+habits and character given in the book, the writer says:--"I have
+received corroboration touching all these points from a gentleman who,
+when walking alone and unarmed on the skirts of a forest, was greatly
+alarmed by a large puma coming out to meet him. Deeming it best not to
+stand, he advanced to meet the animal, which thereupon began to gambol
+around his feet and rub against his legs, after the manner of an
+affectionate cat. At first he thought these movements must have been
+preliminary to some peculiar mode of attack, and therefore he did not
+respond, but walked quietly on, until the puma suddenly desisted and
+re-entered the forest. This gentleman says that, until the publication
+of Mr. Hudson's book, he had always remained under the impression that
+that particular puma must have been insane."
+
+MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE.
+
+I have found among my papers the following mislaid note on the subject
+of sportive displays of mammalians, which should have been used on page
+281, where the subject is briefly treated:--Most mammalians are
+comparatively silent and live on the ground, and not having the power to
+escape easily, which birds have, and being more persecuted by man, they
+do not often disport themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it is
+difficult to watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence being
+known or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as we
+might imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which I was,
+or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting themselves in a
+manner that took me completely by surprise. While out tinamou shooting
+one day in autumn, near my own home in La Plata, I spied a troop of
+about a dozen weasels racing madly about over a vizcacha village--the
+mound and group of pit-like burrows inhabited by a community of
+vizcachas. These weasels were of the large common species, Galictis
+barbara, about the size of a cat; and were engaged in a pastime
+resembling a complicated dance, and so absorbed were they on that
+occasion that they took no notice of me when I walked up to within nine
+or ten yards of them, and stood still to watch the performance. They
+were all swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doubling
+quickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and although
+apparently carried away with excitement, and crossing each other's
+tracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with so many changes of
+direction that I became confused when trying to keep any one animal in
+view, they never collided nor even came near enough to touch one
+another. The whole performance resembled, on a greatly magnified scale
+and without its beautiful smoothness and lightning swiftness, the
+fantastic dance of small black water-beetles, frequently seen on the
+surface of a pool or stream, during which the insects glide about in a
+limited area with such celerity as to appear like black curving lines
+traced by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross and
+intersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After watching
+the weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the mound, whereupon
+the animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell into the burrows, but
+only to reappear in a few seconds, thrusting up their long ebony-black
+necks and flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaring
+with fierce, beady eyes.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
+
+
+In November and December, 1893, a short correspondence appeared in the
+_Field_ on the curious subject of "Dogs burying their dead." It arose
+through a letter from a Mr. Gould, of Albany, Western Australia,
+relating the following incident:--
+
+A settler shot a bitch from a neighbouring estate that had formed the
+habit of coming on to his land to visit and play with his dog. The dog,
+finding his companion dead, was observed to dig a large hole in the
+ground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not cover it with
+earth. The writer wished to know if any reader of the _Field_ had met
+with a similar case. Some notes, which I contributed in reply to this
+letter, bear on one of the subjects treated in the chapter on "strange
+instincts," namely, the instinct of social animals to protect and shield
+their fellows; and for this reason I have thought it best to reproduce
+them in this place.
+
+I remember on one occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, a
+large and very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitch
+that had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but he
+never left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the body
+away, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not succeeding in these
+attempts, he settled down by its side again, although it was evident
+that he was suffering greatly from thirst and heat. It was at last only
+with the greatest trouble that the people of the house succeeded in
+getting the body away and burying it out of his sight.
+
+Another instance, more to the point, occurred at my own house on the
+pampas, and I was one of several persons who witnessed it. A small, red,
+long-haired bitch--a variety of the common native cur--gave birth to
+four or five pups. A peon was told to destroy them, and, waiting until
+the bitch was out of sight, he carried them off to the end of the
+orchard, some 400 or 500 yards from the house, and threw them into a
+pool of water which was only two to three feet deep. The bitch passed
+the rest of the day in rushing frantically about, searching for her
+young, and in the evening, a little after dark, actually succeeded in
+finding them, although they were lying at the bottom of the pool. She
+got them all out, and carried them, one by one, to another part of the
+grounds, where she passed the night with them, uttering at intervals the
+most piercing cries. In the morning she carried them to still another
+spot, where there was a soft mould, and then dug a hole large and deep
+enough to bury them all, covering them over with the loose earth. Her
+task done, she returned to the house to sleep all day, but when night
+came again the whole piteous performance was repeated: the pups were dug
+up, and she passed the long, piercingly cold night--for it was in the
+depth of winter--trying to keep them warm, and uttering, as before,
+distressing cries. Yet a third time the whole thing was repeated; but
+after the third night, when the dog came home to sleep, the dead pups
+were taken out of the ground and buried at a distance.
+
+Such an action as this strikes one with astonishment only because we
+have the custom of burying our dead, and are too ready at all times to
+regard the dog as human-like. But the explanation of the action in this
+case is to be found in the familiar fact that very many animals,
+including the dog, have the habit or instinct of burying or concealing
+the thing they wish to leave in safety. Thus, the dog buries the bone it
+does not want to eat, and when hungry digs it up again. When a dog
+buries or hides the dead body of the she dog it was attached to, or the
+she dog buries her dead young, it is with the same motive--namely, to
+conceal the animal that cannot be roused, and that it would not be safe
+to leave exposed,
+
+It is plain to all who observe their actions that the lower animals have
+no comprehension of death. In the case of two animals that are
+accustomed to play or to be much together, if one dies, or is killed,
+and its body left, the other will come to sniff at, touch, and at last
+try to rouse it; but finding all attempts vain, it will at length go
+away to seek companionship elsewhere. In cases where the attachment is
+much stronger, the dead body may he watched over for an indefinite
+period. A brother of mine once related to me a very pathetic incident
+which occurred at an estancia on the pampas where he was staying. A
+large portion of the land was a low, level, marshy plain, partly
+overgrown with reeds and rushes; and one day, in this wilderness, a
+little boy of eight or nine, from the estancia, lost himself. A small
+dog, his invariable attendant, had gone out with him, but did not
+return. Seven days later the poor boy was found, at a great distance
+from the house, lying on the grass, where he had died of exhaustion. The
+dog was lying coiled up at his side, and appeared to be sleeping; but,
+when spoken to, he did not stir, and was presently found to be dead too.
+The dog could have gone back at any moment to the estancia, but his
+instinct of attachment overcame all others; he kept guard over his
+little master, who slept so soundly and so long, until he, too, slept in
+the same way.
+
+A still more remarkable case of this kind was given in one of my books,
+of a gaucho, accompanied by his dog, who was chased and overtaken by a
+troop of soldiers during one of the civil wars in Uruguay. Suspecting
+him of being a spy, or, at all events, an enemy, his captors cut his
+throat, then rode away, calling to the dog to follow them; but the
+animal refused to leave his dead master's side. Returning to the spot a
+few days later, they saw the body of the man they had killed surrounded
+by a large number of vultures, which the dog, in a frenzy of excitement,
+was occupied in keeping at a respectable distance. It was observed that
+the dog, after making one of his sallies, driving the birds away with
+furious barkings, would set out at a run to a small stream not far from
+the spot; but when half way to it he would look back, and, seeing the
+vultures advancing once more to the corpse, would rush back to protect
+it. The soldiers watched him for some time with great interest, and once
+more they tried in vain to get him to follow them. Two days afterwards
+they revisited the spot, to find the dog lying dead by the side of his
+dead master. I had this story from the lips of one of the witnesses.
+
+In all such cases, whether the dog watches over, conceals, or buries a
+dead body, he is doubtless moved by the same instinct which leads him to
+safeguard the animal he is attached to--another dog or his human master.
+But, as the dead animal is past help, it is, of course, a blunder of the
+instinct; and the blunder must be of very much less frequent occurrence
+among wild than among domestic animals. In a state of nature, when a
+gregarious animal dies, he dies, as a rule, alone; his body is not seen
+by his former companions, and he is not missed. When he dies by
+violence--which is the common fate--the body is carried off or devoured
+by the killer. This being the usual order, there is no instinct, except
+in a very few species, relating to the disposal of the dead among
+mammals and other vertebrates, such as is found in ants and other social
+insects. There are a few mammalians that live together in small
+communities, in a habitation made to last for many generations, in which
+such an instinct would appear necessary, and it accordingly exists, but
+is very imperfect. This is the case with the vizcacha, the large rodent
+of the pampas, which lives with its fellows, to the number of twenty or
+thirty, in a cluster of huge burrows. When a vizcacha dies in a burrow,
+the body is dragged out and thrown on to the mound among the mass of
+rubbish collected on it--but not until he has been dead a long time, and
+there is nothing left of him but the dry bones held together by the
+skin. In that condition the other members of the community probably
+cease to look on him as one of their companions who has fallen into a
+long sleep; he is no more than so much rubbish, which must be cleared
+out of an old disused burrow. Probably the beaver possesses some rude
+instinct similar to that of the vizcacha.
+
+_Apropos_ of animals burying their treasures (or connections) for
+safety, it is worth mentioning that the skunk of the pampas occasionally
+buries her young in the kennel, when hunger compels her to go out
+foraging. I had often heard of this habit of the female skunk from the
+gauchos, and one day had the rare good fortune to witness an animal
+engaged in obliterating her own kennel. The senses of the skunk are so
+defective that one is able at times to approach very near to without
+alarming them. In this instance I sat on my horse at a distance of
+twenty yards, and watched the animal at work, drawing in the loose earth
+with her fore feet until the entrance to the kennel was filled up to
+within three inches of the surface; then, dropping into the shallow
+cavity, she pressed the loose mould down with her nose. Her task
+finished, she trotted away, and the hollow in the soil, when I examined
+it closely, looked only like the mouth of an ancient choked-up burrow.
+The young inhabit a circular chamber, lined with fine dry grass, at the
+end of a narrow passage from 3 ft. to 5 ft. long, and no doubt have air
+enough to serve them until their parent returns; but I believe the skunk
+only buries her young when they are very small.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Naturalist in La Plata, by W. H. Hudson
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