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 YORKD. APPLETON AND COMPANY1895

PREFACE. 

The plan I have followed in this work has been to sift and arrange thefacts I have gathered concerning the habits of the animals best known tome, preserving those only, which, in my judgment, appeared worthrecording. In some instances a variety of subjects have linkedthemselves together in my mind, and have been grouped under one heading;consequently the scope of the book is not indicated by the list ofcontents: 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 thisdescription. I am conscious that the one I have made choice of displaysa lack of originality; also, that this kind of title has been usedhitherto 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 Historyof a district so well known, and often described as the southern portionof La Plata, which has a temperate climate, and where nature is neitherexuberant nor grand, a personal narrative would have seemed superfluous. 

The greater portion of the matter contained in this volume has alreadyseen the light in the form of papers contributed to the _Field, _ withother journals that treat of Natural History; and to the monthlymagazines:--_Longmans', The Nineteenth Century, The Gentleman'sMagazine, _ and others: I am indebted to the Editors and Proprietors ofthese periodicals for kindly allowing me to make use of this material. 

Of all animals, birds have perhaps afforded me most pleasure; but mostof the fresh knowledge I have collected in this department is containedin a larger work _(Argentine Ornithology), _ of which Dr. P. L. Sclateris part author. As I have not gone over any of the subjects dealt within that work, bird-life has not received more than a fair share ofattention 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 changesnow going on in the plants and animals of all the temperate regions ofthe globe colonized by Europeans. These changes, if taken merely asevidence of material progress, must be a matter of rejoicing to thosewho are satisfied, and more than satisfied, with our system ofcivilization, or method of outwitting Nature by the removal of allchecks on the undue increase of our own species. To one who finds acharm in things as they exist in the unconquered provinces of Nature'sdominions, and who, not being over-anxious to reach the end of hisjourney, is content to perform it on horseback, or in a waggon drawn bybullocks, it is permissible to lament the altered aspect of the earth'ssurface, together with the disappearance of numberless noble andbeautiful forms, both of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. For hecannot find it in his heart to love the forms by which they arereplaced; these are cultivated and domesticated, and have only becomeuseful to man at the cost of that grace and spirit which freedom andwildness give. In numbers they are many--twenty-five millions of sheepin this district, fifty millions in that, a hundred millions in athird--but how few are the species in place of those destroyed? and whenthe owner of many sheep and much wheat desires variety--for he possessesthis instinctive desire, albeit in conflict with and overborne by theperverted instinct of destruction--what is there left to him, beyond hisvery own, except the weeds that spring up in his fields under all skies, ringing him round with old-world monotonous forms, as tenacious of theirundesired union with him as the rats and cockroaches that inhabit hishouse?

We hear most frequently of North America, New Zealand, and Australia inthis connection; but nowhere on the globe has civilization "writtenstrange defeatures" more markedly than on that great area of levelcountry called by English writers _the pampas_, but by the Spanish moreappropriately _La Pampa_--from the Quichua word signifying open space orcountry--since it forms in most part one continuous plain, extending onits eastern border from the river Parana, in latitude 32 degrees, to thePatagonian formation on the river Colorado, and comprising about twohundred thousand square miles of humid, grassy country. 

This district has been colonized by Europeans since the middle of thesixteenth century; but down to within a very few years ago immigrationwas on too limited a scale to make any very great change; and, speakingonly of the pampean country, the conquered territory was a long, thinly-settled strip, purely pastoral, and the Indians, with theirprimitive mode of warfare, were able to keep back the invaders from thegreater portion of their ancestral hunting-grounds. Not twenty yearsago a ride of two hundred miles, starting from the capital city, Buenos Ayres, was enough to place one well beyond the furthestsouth-western frontier outpost. In 1879 the Argentine Governmentdetermined to rid the country of the aborigines, or, at all events, tobreak their hostile and predatory spirit once for all; with the resultthat the entire area of the grassy pampas, with a great portion ofthe sterile pampas and Patagonia, has been made available to theemigrant. There is no longer anything to deter the starvelingsof the Old World from possessing themselves of this new land ofpromise, flowing, like Australia, with milk and tallow, if not withhoney; any emasculated migrant from a Genoese or Neapolitanslum is now competent to "fight the wilderness" out there, with hiseight-shilling fowling-piece and the implements of his trade. Thebarbarians no longer exist to frighten his soul with dreadful war cries;they have moved away to another more remote and shadowy region, calledin their own language _Alhuemapu_, and not known to geographers. Forthe results so long and ardently wished for have swiftly followed onGeneral Roca's military expedition; and the changes witnessed during thelast decade on the pampas exceed in magnitude those which had beenpreviously effected by three centuries of occupation. 

In view of this wave of change now rapidly sweeping away the oldorder, with whatever beauty and grace it possessed, it might not seeminopportune at the present moment to give a rapid sketch, from the fieldnaturalist's point of view, of the great plain, as it existed before theagencies introduced by European colonists had done their work, and as itstill exists in its remoter parts. 

The humid, grassy, pampean country extends, roughly speaking, half-wayfrom the Atlantic Ocean and the Plata and Paraná rivers to the Andes, and passes gradually into the "Monte Formation, " or _sterile pampa_--asandy, more or less barren district, producing a dry, harsh, ligneousvegetation, 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 extendssouthwards down into Patagonia. Scientists have not yet been able toexplain why the pampas, with a humid climate, and a soil exceedinglyrich, have produced nothing but grass, while the dry, sterileterritories on their north, west, and south borders have an arborescentvegetation. Darwin's conjecture that the extreme violence of the_pampero, _ or south-west wind, prevented trees from growing, is nowproved to have been ill-founded since the introduction of the Eucalyptusglobulus; for this noble tree attains to an extraordinary height on thepampas, and exhibits there a luxuriance of foliage never seen inAustralia. 

To this level area--my "parish of Selborne, " or, at all events, a goodlyportion of it--with the sea on one hand, and on the other thepractically infinite expanse of grassy desert--another sea, not "in vastfluctuations fixed, " but in comparative calm--I should like to conductthe reader in imagination: a country all the easier to be imagined onaccount 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, _ aptlysays:--"At sea, a person's eye being six feet above the surface of thewater, his horizon is two miles and four-fifths distant. In like manner, the more level the plain, the more nearly does the horizon approachwithin these narrow limits; and this, in my opinion, entirely destroysthe grandeur which one would have imagined that a vast plain would havepossessed. "

I remember my first experience of a hill, after having been always shutwithin "these narrow limits. " It was one of the range of sierras nearCape Corrientes, and not above eight hundred feet high; yet, when I hadgained the summit, I was amazed at the vastness of the earth, as itappeared to me from that modest elevation. Persons born and bred on thepampas, when they first visit a mountainous district, frequentlyexperience a sensation as of "a ball in the throat" which seems toprevent free respiration. 

In most places the rich, dry soil is occupied by a coarse grass, threeor four feet high, growing in large tussocks, and all the year round ofa deep green; a few slender herbs and trefoils, with long, twiningstems, maintain a frail existence among the tussocks; but the stronggrass crowds out most plants, and scarcely a flower relieves its uniformeverlasting verdure. There are patches, sometimes large areas, where itdoes not grow, and these are carpeted by small creeping herbs of alivelier green, and are gay in spring with flowers, chiefly of thecomposite 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 smallflowers; but altogether the flora of the pampas is the poorest inspecies of any fertile district on the globe. On moist clayey groundflourishes the stately pampa grass, Gynerium argenteum, the spears ofwhich often attain a height of eight or nine feet. I have ridden throughmany leagues of this grass with the feathery spikes high as my head, andoften higher. It would be impossible for me to give anything like anadequate 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 asadly decaying, draggled look at all times, and to my mind, is oftenpositively ugly with its dense withering mass of coarse leaves, droopingon the ground, and bundle of spikes, always of the same dead white ordirty cream-colour. Now colour--the various ethereal tints that give ablush to its cloud-like purity--is one of the chief beauties of thisgrass on its native soil; and travellers who have galloped across thepampas at a season of the year when the spikes are dead, and white aspaper or parchment, have certainly missed its greatest charm. The plantis social, and in some places where scarcely any other kind exists itcovers 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 somegulls, to purple and violaceous. At no time does it look so perfect asin the evening, before and after sunset, when the softened light impartsa mistiness to the crowding plumes, and the traveller cannot helpfancying that the tints, which then seem richest, are caught from thelevel rays of the sun, or reflected from the coloured vapours of theafterglow. 

The last occasion on which I saw the pampa grass in its full beauty wasat the close of a bright day in March, ending in one of those perfectsunsets seen only in the wilderness, where no lines of house or hedgemar the enchanting disorder of nature, and the earth and sky tints arein harmony. I had been travelling all day with one companion, and fortwo hours we had ridden through the matchless grass, which spread awayfor miles on every side, the myriads of white spears, touched withvaried colour, blending in the distance and appearing almost like thesurface of a cloud. Hearing a swishing sound behind us, we turnedsharply round, and saw, not forty yards away in our rear, a party offive mounted Indians, coming swiftly towards us: but at the very momentwe saw them their animals came to a dead halt, and at the same instantthe five riders leaped up, and stood erect on their horses' backs. Satisfied that they had no intention of attacking us, and were onlylooking out for strayed horses, we continued watching them for sometime, as they stood gazing away over the plain in different directions, motionless and silent, like bronze men on strange horse-shaped pedestalsof dark stone; so dark in their copper skins and long black hair, against the far-off ethereal sky, flushed with amber light; and at theirfeet, and all around, the cloud of white and faintly-blushing plumes. That farewell scene was printed very vividly on my memory, but cannot beshown to another, nor could it be even if a Ruskin's pen or a Turner'spencil were mine; for the flight of the sea-mew is not more impossibleto 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 beenspoiled by man. 

At other hours and seasons the general aspect of the plain ismonotonous, and in spite of the unobstructed view, and the unfailingverdure and sunshine, somewhat melancholy, although never sombre: anddoubtless the depressed and melancholy feeling the pampa inspires inthose who are unfamiliar with it is due in a great measure to thepaucity of life, and to the profound silence. The wind, as may well beimagined on that extensive level area, is seldom at rest; there, as inthe forest, it is a "bard of many breathings, " and the strings itbreathes upon give out an endless variety of sorrowful sounds, from thesharp fitful sibilations of the dry wiry grasses on the barren places, to the long mysterious moans that swell and die in the tall polishedrushes of the marsh. It is also curious to note that with a fewexceptions the resident birds are comparatively very silent, even thosebelonging to groups which elsewhere are highly loquacious. The reason ofthis is not far to seek. In woods and thickets, where birds aboundmost, they are continually losing sight of each other, and are onlyprevented from scattering by calling often; while the muffling effect onsound of the close foliage, to' which may be added a spirit of emulationwhere many voices are heard, incites most species, especially those thatare social, to exert their voices to the utmost pitch in singing, calling, and screaming. On the open pampas, birds, which are notcompelled to live concealed on the surface, can see each other at longdistances, and perpetual calling is not needful: moreover, in that stillatmosphere sound travels far. As a rule their voices are strangelysubdued; nature's silence has infected them, and they have become silentby habit. This is not the case with aquatic species, which are nearlyall migrants from noisier regions, and mass themselves in lagoons andmarshes, where they are all loquacious together. It is also noteworthythat the subdued bird-voices, some of which are exceedingly sweet andexpressive, and the notes of many of the insects and batrachians have agreat resemblance, and seem to be in accord with the aeolian tones ofthe wind in reeds and grasses: a stranger to the pampas, even anaturalist accustomed to a different fauna, will often find it hard todistinguish between bird, frog, and insect voices. 

The mammalia is poor in species, and with the single exception of thewell-known vizcacha (Lagostomus trichodactylus), there is not one ofwhich it can truly be said that it is in any special way the product ofthe pampas, or, in other words, that its instincts are better suited tothe conditions of the pampas than to those of other districts. As afact, this large rodent inhabits a vast extent of country, north, west, and south of the true pampas, but nowhere is he so thoroughly on hisnative heath as on the great grassy plain. There, to some extent, heeven makes his own conditions, like the beaver. He lives in a smallcommunity of twenty or thirty members, in a village of deep-chamberedburrows, all with their pit-like entrances closely grouped together; andas the village endures for ever, or for an indefinite time, the earthconstantly being brought up forms a mound thirty or forty feet indiameter; and this protects the habitation from floods on low or levelground. Again, he is not swift of foot, and all rapacious beasts are hisenemies; he also loves to feed on tender succulent herbs and grasses, toseek 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 himselffrom this danger by making a clearing all round his abode, on which asmooth turf is formed; and here the animals feed and have their eveningpastimes in comparative security: for when an enemy approaches, he iseasily seen; the note of alarm is sounded, and the whole companyscuttles away to their refuge. In districts having a different soil andvegetation, as in Patagonia, the vizcachas' curious, unique instinctsare of no special advantage, which makes it seem probable that they havebeen formed on the pampas. 

How marvellous a thing it seems that the two species of mammalians--thebeaver and the vizcacha--that most nearly simulate men's intelligentactions in their social organizing instincts, and their habitations, which are made to endure, should belong to an order so low down as theRodents! And in the case of the latter species, it adds to the marvelwhen we find that the vizcacha, according to Water-house, is the lowestof the order in its marsupial affinities. 

The vizcacha is the most common rodent on the pampas, and the Rodentorder is represented by the largest number of species. The finest is theso-called Patagonian hare--Dolichotis patagonica--a beautiful animaltwice as large as a hare, with ears shorter and more rounded, and legsrelatively much longer. The fur is grey and chestnut brown. It isdiurnal in its habits, lives in kennels, and is usually met with inpairs, or small flocks. It is better suited to a sterile country likePatagonia than to the grassy humid plain; nevertheless it was foundthroughout the whole of the pampas; but in a country where the wisdom ofa Sir William Harcourt was never needed to slip the leash, this king ofthe Rodentia is now nearly extinct. 

A common rodent is the coypú--Myiopotamus coypú--yellowish in colourwith bright red incisors; a rat in shape, and as large as an otter. Itis aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where there are no banks itmakes a platform nest among the rushes. Of an evening they are all outswimming and playing in the water, conversing together in their strangetones, which sound like the moans and cries of wounded and sufferingmen; and among them the mother-coypú is seen with her progeny, numberingeight or nine, with as many on her back as she can accommodate, whilethe others swim after her, crying for a ride. 

With reference to this animal, which, as we have seen, is prolific, astrange thing once happened in Buenos Ayres. The coypú was much moreabundant fifty years ago than now, and its skin, which has a fine furunder the long coarse hair, was largely exported to Europe. About thattime the Dictator Rosas issued a decree prohibiting the hunting of thecoypú. The result was that the animals increased and multipliedexceedingly, and, abandoning their aquatic habits, they becameterrestrial and migratory, and swarmed everywhere in search of food. Suddenly a mysterious malady fell on them, from which they quicklyperished, and became almost extinct. 

What a blessed thing it would be for poor rabbit-worried Australia if asimilar 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 thetoo-numerous sheep! And who knows what mysterious, unheard-ofretributions that revengeful deity Nature may not be meditating in hersecret heart for the loss of her wild four-footed children slain bysettlers, 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-colouredlittle creature, with a low gurgling language, like running babblingwaters; in habits resembling its domestic pied relation the guinea pig. It loves to run on clean ground, and on the pampas makes littlerat-roads all about its hiding-place, which little roads tell a story tothe fox, and such like; therefore the little cavy's habits, and thehabits of all cavies, I fancy, are not so well suited to the humidgrassy region as to other districts, with sterile ground to run and playupon, and thickets in which to hide. 

A more interesting animal is the Ctenomys magellanica, a little lessthan the rat in size, with a shorter tail, pale grey fur, and redincisors. It is called _tuco-tuco_ from its voice, and _oculto_ from itshabits; for it is a dweller underground, and requires a loose, sandysoil in which, like the mole, it may _swim_ beneath the surface. Consequently the pampa, with its heavy, moist mould, is not the tuco'sproper place; nevertheless, wherever there is a stretch of sandy soil, or a range of dunes, there it is found living; not seen, but heard; forall day long and all night sounds its voice, resonant and loud, like asuccession of blows from a hammer; as if a company of gnomes weretoiling far down underfoot, beating on their anvils, first with strongmeasured strokes, then with lighter and faster, and with a swing andrhythm as if the little men were beating in time to some rude chantunheard above the surface. How came these isolated colonies of a speciesso subterranean in habits, and requiring a sandy soil to move in, so farfrom their proper district--that sterile country from which they areseparated by wide, unsuitable areas? They cannot perform long overlandjourneys like the rat. Perhaps the dunes have travelled, carrying theirlittle 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 betterable to thrive than its spotted rival. Versatile in its preying habits, its presence on the pampa is not surprising; but probably only anextreme abundance of large mammalian prey, which has not existed inrecent times, could have, tempted an animal of the river andforest-loving habits of the jaguar to colonize this cold, treeless, andcomparatively waterless desert. There are two other important cats. Thegrass-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 wouldseem to indicate, is an intruder from wooded districts north of thepampas. 

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 moreinteresting and extremely rare; it is called _aguará, _ its nearest allybeing the _aguará-guazú, _ the Canis jubatus or maned wolf ofnaturalists, found north of the pampean district. The aguará is smallerand has no mane; it is like the dingo in size, but slimmer and with asharper nose, and lias a much brighter red colour. At night when campingout I have heard its dismal screams, but the screamer was sought invain; while from the gauchos of the frontier I could only learn that itis a harmless, shy, solitary animal, that ever flies to remoter wildsfrom 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, withlong, bright red hair. Those who love dead animals may have them in anynumber by digging with a. Spade in that vast sepulchre of the pampas, where perished the hosts of antiquity. I love the living that are abovethe 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-lookingweasels, intensely black in colour, and grey on the back and flat crown. One, the Galictis barbara, is a large bold animal that hunts incompanies; and when these long-bodied creatures sit up erect, glaringwith beady eyes, grinning and chattering at the passer-by, they looklike little friars in black robes and grey cowls; but the expression ontheir round faces is malignant and bloodthirsty beyond anything innature, and it would perhaps be more decent to liken them to devilsrather than to humans. 

On the pampas there is, strictly speaking, only one ruminant, the Cervuscampestris, which is common. The most curious thing about this animal isthat the male emits a rank, musky odour, so powerful that when the windblows from it the effluvium comes in nauseating gusts to the nostrilsfrom a distance exceeding two miles. It is really astonishing that onlyone small ruminant should be found on this immense grassy area, soadmirably suited to herbivorous quadrupeds, a portion of which at thepresent moment affords sufficient pasture to eighty millions of sheep, cattle, and horses. In La Plata the author of _The Mammoth and theFlood_ 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 truncatedChlamydophorus, is a dweller in the sand-dunes of Mendoza, and has nevercolonized the grassy pampas. The Tatusia hybrida, called "little mule"from the length of its ears, and the Dasypus tricinctus, which, whendisturbed, rolls itself into a ball, the wedge-shaped head andwedge-shaped tail admirably fitting into the deep-cut shell side byside; and the _quirquincho_ (Dasypus minutus), all inhabit the pampa, are diurnal, and feed exclusively on insects, chiefly ants. Wherever thecountry becomes settled, these three disappear, owing to the dulness oftheir senses, especially that of sight, and to the diurnal habit, whichwas an advantage to them, and enabled them to survive when rapaciousanimals, which are mostly nocturnal, were their only enemies. Thefourth, and most important, is the hairy armadillo, with habits whichare in strange contrast to those of its perishing congeners, and whichseem to mock many hard-and-fast rules concerning animal life. It isomnivorous, and will thrive on anything from grass to flesh, found deadand in all stages of decay, or captured by means of its own strategy. Furthermore, its habits change to suit its conditions: thus, wherenocturnal carnivores are its enemies, it is diurnal; but where manappears as a chief persecutor, it becomes nocturnal. It is much huntedfor its flesh, dogs being trained for the purpose; yet it actuallybecomes more abundant as population increases in any district; and, ifversatility in habits or adaptiveness can be taken as a measure ofintelligence, this poor armadillo, a survival of the past, so old on theearth as to have existed contemporaneously with the giant glyptodon, isthe superior of the large-brained cats and canines. 

To finish with the mammalia, there are two interesting opossums, both ofthe genus Didelphys, but in habits as wide apart as cat from otter. Oneof these marsupials appears so much at home on the plains that I almostregret having said that the vizcacha alone gives us the idea of being inits habits the _product_ of the pampas. This animal--Didelphyscrassicaudata--has a long slender, wedge-, shaped head and body, admirably adapted for pushing through the thick grass and rushes; for itis both terrestrial and aquatic, therefore well suited to inhabit low, level plains liable to be flooded. On dry land its habits are similar tothose of a weasel; in lagoons, where it dives and swims with great ease, it constructs a globular nest suspended from the rushes. The fur issoft, of a rich yellow, reddish above, and on the sides and undersurfaces varying in some parts to orange, in others exhibiting beautifulcopper and terra-cotta tints. These lovely tints and the metallic lustresoon fade from the fur, otherwise this animal would be much sought afterin the interests of those who love to decorate themselves with thespoils of beautiful dead animals--beast and bird. The other opossum isthe black and white Didelphys azarae; and it is indeed strange to findthis animal on the pampas, although its presence there is not somysterious as that of the tuco-tuco. It shuffles along slowly andawkwardly on the ground, but is a great traveller nevertheless. Tschudimet it mountaineering on the Andes at an enormous altitude, and, true toits lawless nature, it confronted me in Patagonia, where the books sayno marsupial dwells. In every way it is adapted to an arboreal life, yetit is everywhere found on the level country, far removed from theconditions which one would imagine to be necessary to its existence. Forhow many thousands of years has this marsupial been a dweller on theplain, all its best faculties unexercised, its beautiful grasping handspressed to the ground, and its prehensile tail dragged like an idle ropebehind it! Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will take to it asreadily as a duck to water, or an armadillo to earth, climbing up thetrunk and about the branches with a monkey-like agility. How reluctantNature seems in some cases to undo her own work! How long she willallow a specialized organ, with the correlated instinct, to rest withoutuse, yet ready to flash forth on the instant, bright and keen-edged, asin the ancient days of strife, ages past, before peace came to dwell onearth!

The avi-fauna is relatively much richer than the mammalia, owing to thelarge number of aquatic species, most of which are migratory with their"breeding" or "subsistence-areas" on the pampas. In more senses than onethey constitute a "floating population, " and their habits have in no waybeen modified by the conditions of the country. The order, includingstorks, ibises, herons, spoonbills, and flamingoes, counts abouteighteen species; and the most noteworthy birds in it are two greatibises nearly as large as turkeys, with mighty resonant voices. The duckorder is very rich, numbering at least twenty species, including twobeautiful upland geese, winter visitors from Magellanic lands, and twoswans, the lovely black-necked, and the pure white with rosy bill. Ofrails, or ralline birds, there are ten or twelve, ranging from a smallspotted creature no bigger than a thrush to some large majestic birds. One is the courlan, called "crazy widow" from its mourning plumage andlong melancholy screams, which on still evenings may be heard a leagueaway. Another is the graceful variegated _ypicaha, _ fond of socialgatherings, where the birds perform a dance and make the desolatemarshes resound with their insane humanlike voices. A smaller kind, Porphyriops melanops, has a night-cry like a burst of shrill hystericallaughter, 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 aquaticspecies, the most important is the spur-winged crested screamer; a noblebird as large as a swan, yet its favourite pastime is to soar upwardsuntil it loses itself to sight in the blue ether, whenca it pours forthits resounding choral notes, which reach the distant earth clarified, and with a rhythmic swell and fall as of chiming bells. It also sings bynight, "counting the hours, " the gauchos say, and where they havecongregated together in tens of thousands the mighty roar of theircombined voices produces an astonishingly grand effect. 

The largest aquatic order is that of the Limicolse--snipes, plover, andtheir allies--which has about twenty-five species. The vociferousspur-winged lapwing; the beautiful black and white stilt; a true snipe, and a painted snipe, are, strictly speaking, the only residents; and itis astonishing to find, that, of the five-and-twenty species, at leastthirteen are visitors from North America, several of them having theirbreeding-places quite away in the Arctic regions. This is one of thosefacts concerning the annual migration of birds which almost staggerbelief; for among them are species with widely different habits, upland, marsh and sea-shore birds, and in their great biannual journey they passthrough a variety of climates, visiting many countries where theconditions seem suited to their requirements. Nevertheless, inSeptember, and even as early as August, they begin to arrive on thepampas, 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 theGreenlander listened in June, now to the gaucho herdsman on the greenplains of La Plata, then to the wild Indian in his remote village; andsoon, further south, to the houseless huanaco-hunter in the greywilderness of Patagonia. 

Here is a puzzle for ornithologists. In summer on the pampas we have agodwit--Limosa hudsonica; in March it goes north to breed; later in theseason flocks of the same species arrive from the south to winter on thepampas. And besides this godwit, there are several other North Americanspecies, which have colonies in the southern hemi-spere, with a reversedmigration and breeding season. Why do these southern birds winter so farsouth? Do they really breed in Patagonia? If so, their migration is anextremely limited one compared with that of the northern birds--seven oreight hundred miles, on the outside, in one case, against almost as manythousands of miles in the other. Considering that some species whichmigrate as far south as Patagonia breed in the Arctic regions as farnorth as latitude 82 degrees, and probably higher still, it would bestrange indeed if none of the birds which winter in Patagonia and on thepampas were summer visitors to that great austral continent, which hasan estimated area twice as large as that of Europe, and a climate milderthan the arctic one. The migrants would have about six hundred miles ofsea to cross from Tierra del Fuego; but we know that the golden ploverand other species, which sometimes touch at the Bermudas whentravelling, fly much further than that without resting. The fact that acommon Argentine titlark, a non-migrant and a weak flyer, has been metwith at the South Shetland Islands, close to the antarctic continent, shows that the journey may be easily accomplished by birds with strongflight; and that even the winter climate of that unknown land is not toosevere to allow an accidental colonist, like this small delicate bird, to survive. The godwit, already mentioned, has been observed in flocksat the Falkland Islands in May, that is, three months after the samespecies had taken its autumal departure from the neighbouring mainland. Can it be believed that these late visitors to the Falklands werebreeders in Patagonia, and had migrated east to winter in so bleak aregion? It is far more probable that they came from the south. Officersof sailing ships beating round Cape Horn might be able to settle thisquestion definitely by looking out, and listening at night, for flightsof birds, travelling north from about the first week in January to theend of February; and in September and October travelling south. Probablynot fewer than a dozen species of the plover order are breeders on thegreat austral continent; also other aquatic birds--ducks and geese; andmany Passerine birds, chiefly of the Tyrant family. 

Should the long projected Australasian expedition to the South Polarregions ever be carried to a successful issue, there will probably beimportant results for ornithology, in spite of the astounding theorywhich has found a recent advocate in Canon Tristram, that all lifeoriginated at the North Pole, whence it spread over the globe, but neversucceeded in crossing the deep sea surrounding the antarctic continent, which has consequently remained till now desolate, "a giant ash (andice) of death. " Nor is it unlikely that animals of a higher class thanbirds exist there; and the discovery of new mammalians, differing intype from those we know, would certainly be glad tidings to moststudents of nature. 

Land birds on the pampas are few in species and in numbers. This may beaccounted for by the absence of trees and other elevations on whichbirds prefer to roost and nest; and by the scarcity of food. Insects arefew in dry situations; and the large perennial grasses, which occupymost of the ground, yield a miserable yearly harvest of a few minuteseeds; so that this district is a poor one both for soft and hard billedbirds. Hawks of several genera, in moderate numbers, are there, butgenerally keep to the marshes. Eagles and vultures are somewhatunworthily represented by carrion-hawks (Polyborinae); the lordlycarancho, almost eagle-like in size, black and crested, with a verylarge, pale blue, hooked beak--his battle axe: and his humble followerand jackal, the brown and harrier-like chimango. These nest on theground, are versatile in their habits, carrion-eaters, also killers ontheir own account, and, like wild dogs, sometimes hunt in bands, whichgives them an advantage. They are the unfailing attendants of allflesh-hunters, human or feline; and also furiously pursue and persecuteall eagles and true vultures that venture on that great sea of grass, towander thereafter, for ever lost and harried, "the Hagars and Ishmaelsof their kind. "

The owls are few and all of wide-ranging species. The most common is theburrowing-owl, found in both Americas. Not a retiring owl this, but allday long, in cold and in heat, it stands exposed at the mouth of itskennel, or on the vizcacha's mound, staring at the passer-by with anexpression of grave surprise and reprehension in its round yellow eyes;male and female invariably together, standing stiff and erect, almosttouching--of all birds that pair for life the most Darby and Joan like. 

Of the remaining land birds, numbering about forty species, a few thatare most attractive on account of their beauty, engaging habits, orlarge size, may be mentioned here. On the southern portion of the pampasthe military starling (Sturnella) is found, and looks like the Europeanstarling, with the added beauty of a scarlet breast: among residentpampas birds the only one with a touch of brilliant colouring. It has apleasing, careless song, uttered on the wing, and in winter congregatesin great flocks, to travel slowly northwards over the plains. When thustravelling the birds observe a kind of order, and the flock feedingalong the ground shows a very extended front--a representation inbird-life of the "thin red line"--and advances by the hindmost birdsconstantly flying over the others and alighting in the front ranks. 

Among the tyrant-birds are several species of the beautiful wing-bandedgenus, snow-white in colour, with black on the wings and tail: these areextremely graceful birds, and strong flyers, and in desert places, whereman seldom intrudes, they gather to follow the traveller, calling toeach other with low whistling notes, and in the distance look like whiteflowers as they perch on the topmost stems of the tall bending grasses. 

The most characteristic pampean birds are the tinamous--calledpartridges in the vernacular--the rufous tinamou, large as a fowl, andthe spotted tinamou, which is about the size of the English partridge. Their habits are identical: both lay eggs of a beautiful wine-purplecolour, and in both species the young acquire the adult plumage andpower of flight when very small, and fly better than the adults. Theyhave small heads, slender curved beaks, unfeathered legs and feet, andare tailless; the plumage is deep yellowish, marked with black and brownabove. They live concealed, skulking like rails through the tall grass, fly reluctantly, and when driven up, their flight is exceedingly noisyand violent, the bird soon exhausting itself. They are solitary, butmany live in proximity, frequently calling to each other with softplaintive voices. The evening call-notes of the larger bird areflute-like in character, and singularly sweet and expressive. 

The last figure to be introduced into this sketch--which is not acatalogue--is that of the Rhea. Glyptodon, Toxodon, Mylodon, Megatherium, have passed away, leaving no descendants, and only pigmyrepresentatives if any; but among the feathered inhabitants of the pampathe grand archaic ostrich of America survives from a time when therewere also giants among the avians. Vain as such efforts usually are, onecannot help trying to imagine something of the past history of thismajestic bird, before man came to lead the long chase now about to endso mournfully. Its fleetness, great staying powers, and beautifulstrategy when hunted, make it seem probable that it was not withoutpursuers, other than the felines, among its ancient enemies, long-windedand tenacious of their quarry; and these were perhaps of a type stillrepresented by the wolf or hound-like aguará and aguara-guazú. It mightbe supposed that when almost all the larger forms, both mammal and bird, were overtaken by destruction, and when the existing rhea was on theverge of extinction, these long-legged swift canines changed theirhabits and lost their bold spirit, degenerating at last into hunters ofsmall birds and mammals, on which they are said to live. 

The rhea possesses a unique habit, which is a puzzle to us, although itprobably once had some significance--namely, that of running, whenhunted, with one wing raised vertically, like a great sail--a veritable"ship of the wilderness. " In every way it is adapted to the conditionsof the pampas in a far greater degree than other pampean birds, onlyexcepting the rufous and spotted tinamous. Its commanding stature givesit a wide horizon; and its dim, pale, bluish-grey colour assimilates tothat of the haze, and renders it invisible at even a moderate distance. Its large form fades out of sight mysteriously, and the hunter strainshis eyes in vain to distinguish it on the blue expanse. Its figure andcarriage have a quaint majestic grace, somewhat unavian in character, and peculiar to itself. There are few more strangely fascinating sightsin nature than that of the old black-necked cock bird, standing withraised agitated wings among the tall plumed grasses, and callingtogether his scattered hens with hollow boomings and long mysterioussuspira-tions, as if a wind blowing high up in the void sky had found avoice. Rhea-hunting with the bolas, on a horse possessing both speed andendurance, and trained to follow the bird in all his quick doublings, isunquestionably 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 ofrational beings; moreover, in this unique method of hunting the ostrichthe capture depends on a preparedness for all the shifts . And suddenchanges of course practised by the bird when closely followed, which islike instinct or intuition; and, finally, in a dexterity in casting thebolas at the right moment, with a certain aim, which no amount ofpractice can give to those who are not to the manner born. 

This 'wild mirth of the desert, ' which the gaucho has known for the lastthree centuries, is now passing away, for the rhea's fleetness can nolonger avail him. He may scorn the horse and his rider, what time helifts himself up, but the cowardly murderous methods of science, and asystematic war of extermination, have left him no chance. And with therhea go the flamingo, antique and splendid; and the swans in theirbridal plumage; and the rufous tinamou--sweet and mournful melodist ofthe eventide; and the noble crested screamer, that clarion-voicedwatch-bird of the night in the wilderness. Those, and the other largeavians, together with the finest of the mammalians, will shortly be lostto the pampas utterly as the great bustard is to England, and as thewild turkey and bison and many other species will shortly be lost toNorth America. What a wail there would be in the world if a suddendestruction were to fall on the accumulated art-treasures of theNational Gallery, and the marbles in the British Museum, and thecontents of the King's Library--the old prints and' mediaevalilluminations! And these are only the work of human hands andbrains--impressions of individual genius on perishable material, immortal only in the sense that the silken cocoon of the dead moth isso, because they continue to exist and shine when the artist's hands andbrain are dust:--and man has the long day of life before him in which todo again things like these, and better than these, if there is any truthin evolution. But the forms of life in the two higher vertebrate classesare Nature's most perfect work; and the life of even a single species isof incalculably greater value to mankind, for what it teaches and wouldcontinue to teach, than all the chiselled marbles and painted canvasesthe world contains; though doubtless there are many persons who aredevoted to art, but blind to some things greater than art, who will setme down as a Philistine for saying so. And, above all others, we shouldprotect and hold sacred those types, Nature's masterpieces, which arefirst singled out for destruction on account of their size, orsplendour, or rarity, and that false detestable glory which is accordedto their most successful slayers. In ancient times the spirit of lifeshone brightest in these; and when others that shared the earth withthem were taken by death they were left, being more worthy ofperpetuation. Like immortal flowers they have drifted down to us on theocean of time, and their strangeness and beauty bring to ourimaginations a dream and a picture of that unknown world, immeasurablyfar removed, where man was not: and when they perish, something ofgladness goes out from nature, and the sunshine loses something of itsbrightness. Nor does their loss affect us and our times only. Thespecies now being exterminated, not only in South America but everywhereon the globe, are, so far as we know, untouched by decadence. They arelinks in a chain, and branches on the tree of life, with their roots ina past inconceivably remote; and but for our action they would continueto flourish, reaching outward to an equally distant future, blossominginto higher and more beautiful forms, and gladdening innumerablegenerations of our descendants. But we think nothing of all this: wemust give full scope to our passion for taking life, though by so doingwe "ruin the great work of time;" not in the sense in which the poetused those words, but in one truer, and wider, and infinitely sadder. Only when this sporting rage has spent itself, when there are no longerany animals of the larger kinds remaining, the loss we are nowinflicting on this our heritage, in which we have a life-interest only, will be rightly appreciated. It is hardly to be supposed or hoped thatposterity will feel satisfied with our monographs of extinct species, and the few crumbling bones and faded feathers, which may possiblysurvive half a dozen centuries in some happily-placed museum. On thecontrary, such dreary mementoes will only serve to remind them of theirloss; and if they remember us at all, it will only be to hate ourmemory, and our age--this enlightened, scientific, humanitarian age, which should have for a motto "Let us slay all noble and beautifulthings, for tomorrow we die. "

CHAPTER II. 

THE PUMA, OB LION OF AMERICA. 

The Puma has been singularly unfortunate in its biographers. Formerly itoften happened that writers were led away by isolated and highlyexaggerated incidents to attribute very shining qualities to theirfavourite animals; the lion of the Old World thus came to be regarded asbrave and I magnanimous above all beasts of the field--the Bayard of thefour-footed kind, a reputation which these prosaic and sceptical timeshave not suffered it to keep. Precisely the contrary has happened withthe puma of literature; for, although to those personally acquaintedwith the habits of this lesser lion of the New World it is known topossess a marvellous courage and daring, it is neverthelessalways spoken of in books of natural history as the most pusillanimousof the larger carnivores. It does not attack man, and Azara is perfectlycorrect when he affirms that it never hurts, or threatens to hurt, manor child, even when it finds them sleeping. This, however, is not a fullstatement of the facts; the puma will not even defend itself againstman. How natural, then, to conclude that it is too timid to attack ahuman being, or to defend itself, but scarcely philosophical; for eventhe most cowardly carnivores we know--dogs and hyaenas, forinstance--will readily attack a disabled or sleeping man when pressed byhunger; and when driven to desperation no animal is too small or toofeeble to make a show of resistance. In such a case "even the armadillodefends itself, " as the gaucho proverb says. Besides, the conclusion isin contradiction to many other well-known facts. Putting-aside thepuma's passivity in the presence of man, it is a bold hunter thatinvariably prefers large to small game; in desert places killingpeccary, tapir, ostrich, deer, huanaco, &c. , all powerful, well-armed, or swift animals. Huanaco skeletons seen in Patagonia almost invariablyhave the neck dislocated, showing that the puma was the executioner. Those only who have hunted the huanaco on the sterile plains andmountains it inhabits know how wary, keen-scented, and fleet of foot itis. I once spent several weeks with a surveying party in a districtwhere pumas were very abundant, and saw not less than half a dozen deerevery day, freshly killed in most cases, and all with dislocated necks. Where prey is scarce and difficult to capture, the puma, aftersatisfying 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 aportion of the breast had been eaten, and in many cases the flesh hadnot been touched, the captor having satisfied itself with sucking theblood. It struck me very forcibly that the puma of the desert pampas is, among mammals, like the peregrine falcon of the same district amongbirds; for there this wide-ranging raptor only attacks comparativelylarge birds, and, after fastidiously picking a meal from the flesh ofthe head and neck, abandons the untouched body to the polybori and otherhawks of the more ignoble sort. 

In pastoral districts the puma is very destructive to the largerdomestic animals, and has an extraordinary fondness for horseflesh. Thiswas first noticed by Molina, whose _Natural History of Chili_ waswritten a century and a half ago. In Patagonia I heard on all sides thatit was extremely difficult to breed horses, as the colts were mostlykilled by the pumas. A native told me that on one occasion, whiledriving his horses home through the thicket, a puma sprang out of thebushes on to a colt following behind the troop, killing it before hiseyes and not more than six yards from his horse's head. In thisinstance, my informant said, the puma alighted directly on the colt'sback, with one fore foot grasping its bosom, while with the other itseized 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 deadbefore it touched the ground. 

Naturalists have thought it strange that the horse, once commonthroughout America, should have become extinct over a continentapparently 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 inmany places horses ran wild and multiplied to an amazing extent, butthis happened, I believe, only in districts where the puma was scarce orhad already been driven out by man. My own experience is that on thedesert pampas wild horses are exceedingly scarce, and from all accountsit is the same throughout Patagonia. 

Next to horseflesh, sheep is preferred, and where the puma can come at aflock, he will not trouble himself to attack horned cattle. In Patagoniaespecially I found this to be the case. I resided for some time at anestancia close to the town of El Carmen, on the Rio Negro, which duringmy stay was infested by a very bold and cunning puma. To protect thesheep from his attacks an enclosure was made of upright willow-polesfifteen feet long, while the gate, by which he would have to enter, wasclose to the house and nearly six feet high. In spite of thedifficulties thus put in the way, and of the presence of several largedogs, also of the watch we kept in the hope of shooting him, everycloudy night he came, and after killing one or more sheep got safelyaway. 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 inthe gloom as he flitted about knocking the sheep over, when suddenly heleaped clear over my head and made his escape, the bullets I sent afterhim in the dark failing to hit him. Yet at this place twelve or fourteencalves, belonging to the milch cows, were every night shut into a smallbrushwood pen, at a distance from the house where the enemy could easilyhave destroyed every one of them. When I expressed surprise at thisarrangement, the owner said that the puma was not fond of calves' flesh, and came only for the sheep. Frequently after his nocturnal visits wefound, by tracing his footprints in the loose sand, that he had actuallyused the calves' pen as a place of concealment while waiting to make hisattack on the sheep. 

The puma often kills full-grown cows and horses, but exhibits a stillgreater daring when attacking the jaguar, the largest of Americancarnivores, although, compared with its swift, agile enemy, as heavy asa rhinoceros. Azara states that it is generally believed in La Plata andParaguay that the puma attacks and conquers the jaguar; but he did notcredit what he heard, which was not strange, since he had already setthe puma down as a cowardly animal, because it does not attempt to harmman or child. Nevertheless, it is well known that where the two speciesinhabit the same district they are at enmity, the puma being thepersistent persecutor of the jaguar, following and harassing it as atyrant-bird harasses an eagle or hawk, moving about it with suchrapidity as to confuse it, and, when an opportunity occurs, springingupon its back and inflicting terrible wounds with teeth and claws. Jaguars with scarred backs are frequently killed, and others, not longescaped from their tormentors, have been found so greatly lacerated thatthey were easily overcome by the hunters. 

In Kingsley's American _Standard Natural History_, it is stated that thepuma in North California has a feud with the grizzly bear similar tothat of the southern animal with the jaguar. In its encounter with thegrizzly it is said to be always the victor; and this is borne out by thefinding of the bodies of bears, which have evidently perished in thestruggle. 

How strange that this most cunning, bold, and bloodthirsty of theFelidae, the persecutor of the jaguar and the scourge of the ruminantsin the regions it inhabits, able to kill its prey with the celerity of arifle 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 isnotorious that it is there perfectly safe for even a small child to goout 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: itwill not, as a rule, even defend itself against man, although in somerare instances it has been known to do so. 

The mysterious, gentle instinct of this ungentle species, which causesthe gauchos of the pampas to name it man's friend--"amigo delcristiano"--has been persistently ignored by all travellers andnaturalists who have mentioned the puma. They have thus made it a veryincongruous creature, strong enough to kill a horse, yet so cowardlywithal that it invariably flies from a human being--even from a sleepingchild! Possibly its real reputation was known to some of those who havospoken about it; if so, they attributed what they heard to the love ofthe marvellous and the romantic, natural to the non-scientific mind; orelse preferred not to import into their writings matter which has sogreat a likeness to fable, and might have the effect of imperillingtheir reputation for sober-mindedness. 

It is, however, possible that the singular instinct of tho southernpuma, which is unique among animals in a state of nature, is notpossessed by the entire species, ranging as it does over a hundreddegrees of latitude, from British North America to Tierra del Fuego. Thewidely different conditions of life in the various regions it inhabitsmust necessarily have caused some divergence. Concerning its habits inthe dense forests of the Amazonian region, where it must have developedspecial instincts suited to its semi-arboreal life, scarcely anythinghas been recorded. Everyone is, however, familiar with the dreadedcougar, catamount, or panther--sometimes called "painter"--of NorthAmerican literature, thrilling descriptions of encounters with thisimaginary man-eating monster being freely scattered through thebackwoods or border romances, many of them written by authors who havethe reputation of being true to nature. It may be true that this cougarof a cold climate did occasionally attack man, or, as it is oftenstated, follow him in the forest with the intention of springing on himunawares; but on this point nothing definite will ever be known, as thepioneers hunters of the past were only anxious to shoot cougar and notto study its instinct and disposition. It is now many years sinceAudubon and Bachman wrote, "This animal, which has excited so muchterror in the minds of the ignorant and timid, has been nearlyexterminated in all the Atlantic States, and we do not recollect asingle well-authenticated instance where any hunter's life fell asacrifice in a cougar hunt. " It might be added, I believe, that noauthentic instance has been recorded of the puma making an unprovokedattack on any human being. In South America also the traveller in thewilderness is sometimes followed by a puma; but he would certainly bevery much surprised if told that it follows with the intention ofspringing on him unawares and devouring his flesh, I have spoken of the comparative ease with which the puma overcomes evenlarge animals, comparing it in this respect with the peregrine falcon;but all predacious species are liable to frequent failures, sometimes tofatal mishaps, and even the cunning, swift-killing puma is no exception. Its attacks are successfully resisted by the ass, which does not, likethe horse, lose his presence of mind, but when assaulted thrusts hishead well down between its fore-legs and kicks violently until the enemyis thrown or driven off. Pigs, when in large herds, also safely defy thepuma, massing themselves together for defence in their well-knownmanner, and presenting a serried line of tusks to the aggressor. Duringmy stay in Patagonia a puma met its fate in a manner so singular thatthe incident caused considerable sensation among the settlers on the RioNegro at the time. A man named Linares, the chief of the tame Indianssettled in the neighbourhood of El Carmen, while riding near the riverhad his curiosity aroused by the appearance and behaviour of a young cowstanding alone in the grass, her head, armed with long and exceedinglysharp horns, much raised, and watching his approach in a manner whichbetokened a state of dangerous excitement. She had recently dropped hercalf, and he at once conjectured that it had been attacked, and perhapskilled, by some animal of prey. To satisfy himself on this point hebegan to search for it, and while thus engaged the cow repeatedlycharged him with the greatest fury. Presently he discovered the calflying 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 woundsof large teeth, and the puma had been killed by the cow. When he saw ithe 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 otheranimal. His opinion was that it had come down from the hills in astarving condition, and having sprung upon the calf, the taste of bloodhad made it for a moment careless of its own safety, and during thatmoment the infuriated cow had charged, and driving one of her long sharphorns into some vital part, killed it instantly. 

The puma is, with the exception of some monkeys, the most playful animalin existence. The young of all the Felidae spend a large portion oftheir time in characteristic gambols; the adults, however, acquire agrave and dignified demeanour, only the female playing on occasions withher offspring; but this she always does with a certain formality ofmanner, as if the relaxation were indulged in not spontaneously, but forthe 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 grimthan 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 fightingmock battles or playing at hide-and-seek with imaginary companions, andlying in wait and putting all its wonderful strategy in practice tocapture a passing butterfly. Azara kept a young male for four months, which spent its whole time playing with the slaves. This animal, hesays, would not refuse any food offered to it; but when not hungry itwould 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 onepuma kept as a pet, and this animal, in seven or eight years had nevershown a trace of ill-temper. When approached, he would lie down, purringloudly, and twist himself about a person's legs, begging to be caressed. A string or handkerchief drawn about was sufficient to keep him in ahappy state of excitement for an hour; and when one person was tired ofplaying 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 thaton one occasion, when travelling in the neighbourhood of CapeCorrientes, his horse died under him, and he was compelled to continuehis journey on foot, burdened with his heavy native horse-gear. At nighthe made his bed under the shelter of a rock, on the slope of a stonysierra; a bright moon was shining, and about nine o'clock in the eveningfour pumas appeared, two adults with their two half-grown young. Notfeeling the least alarm at their presence, he did not stir; and after awhile they began to gambol together close to him, concealing themselvesfrom each other among the rocks, just as kittens do, and frequentlywhile pursuing one another leaping over him. He continued watching themuntil 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 SouthAmerica he had taken kindly to the semi-barbarous life of the gauchos, and had imbibed all their peculiar notions, one of which is that humanlife is not worth very much. "What does it matter?" they often say, andshrug their shoulders, when told of a comrade's death; "so manybeautiful horses die!" I asked him if he had ever killed a puma, and hereplied 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 apuma was found. It sat up with its back against a stone, and did notmove even when his companion threw the noose of his lasso over its neck. My informant then dismounted, and, drawing his knife, advanced to killit: still the puma made no attempt to free itself from the lasso, but itseemed to know, he said, what was coming, for it began to tremble, thetears ran from its eyes, and it whined in the most pitiful manner. Hekilled it as it sat there unresisting before him, but afteraccomplishing the deed felt that he had committed a murder. It was theonly thing ho had ever done in his life, he added, which filled him withremorse when he remembered it. This I thought a rather startlingdeclaration, as I knew that he had killed several individuals of his ownspecies in duels, fought with knives, in the fashion of the gauchos. 

All who have killed or witnessed the killing of the puma--and I havequestioned scores of hunters on this point--agree that it resigns itselfin this unresisting, pathetic manner to death at the hands of man. Claudio Gay, in his _Natural History of Chili, _ says, "When attacked byman its energy and daring at once forsake it, and it becomes a weak, inoffensive animal, and trembling, and uttering piteous moans, andshedding abundant tears, it seems to implore compassion from a generousenemy. " The enemy is not often generous; but many gauchos have assuredme, when speaking on this subject, that although they kill the pumareadily to protect their domestic animals, they consider it an evilthing to take its life in desert places, where it is man's only friendamong the wild animals. 

When the hunter is accompanied by dogs, then the puma, instead ofdrooping and shedding tears, is roused to a sublime rage: its hairstands erect; its eyes shine like balls of green flame; it spits andsnarls like a furious torn cat. The hunter's presence seems at suchtimes to be ignored altogether, its whole attention being given to thedogs and its rage directed against them. In Patagonia a sheep-farmingScotchman, with whom I spent some days, showed me the skulls of fivepumas which he had shot in the vicinity of his ranche. One was of anexceptionally large individual, and I here relate what he told me of hisencounter with this animal, as it shows just how the puma almostinvariably behaves when attacked by man and dogs. He was out on footwith his flock, when the dogs discovered the animal concealed among thebushes. He had left his gun at home, and having no weapon, and findingthat the dogs dared not attack it where it sat in a defiant attitudewith its back against a thorny bush, he looked about and found a largedry stick, and going boldly up to it tried to stun it with a violentblow on the head. But though it never looked at him, its fiery eyesgazing steadily at the dogs all the time, he could not hit it, for witha quick side movement it avoided every blow. The small heed the pumapaid him, and the apparent ease with which it avoided his best-aimedblows, only served to rouse his spirit, and at length striking withincreased force his stick came to the ground and was broken to pieces. For some moments he now stood within two yards of the animal perfectlydefenceless and not knowing what to do. Suddenly it sprang past him, actually brushing against his arm with its side, and began pursuing thedogs round and round among the bushes. In the end my informant's partnerappeared on the scene with his rifle, and the puma was shot. 

In encounters of this kind the most curious thing is that the pumasteadfastly refuses to recognize an enemy in man, although it finds himacting in concert with its hated canine foe, about whose hostileintentions 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 ofthe puma in a wild beast show in this country. The animal was taken outof its cage and led about the grounds by its keeper, followed by a largenumber of spectators. Suddenly it was struck motionless by some objectin the crowd, at which it gazed steadily with a look of intenseexcitement; then springing violently away it dragged the chain from thekeeper's hand and dashed in among the people, who immediately fledscreaming in all directions. Their fears were, however, idle, the objectof 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, affectionatepets, and are gentle towards all human beings, but very seldom overcometheir instinctive animosity towards the dog. 

One of the very few authentic instances I have met with of this animaldefending itself against a human being was related to me at a place onthe pampas called Saladillo. At the time of my visit there jaguars andpumas were very abundant and extremely destructive to the cattle andhorses. Sheep it had not yet been considered worth while to introduce, but immense herds of pigs were kept at every estancia, these animalsbeing able to protect themselves. One gaucho had so repeatedlydistinguished himself by his boldness and dexterity in killing jaguarsthat he was by general consent made the leader of every tiger-hunt. Oneday the comandante of the district got twelve or fourteen men together, the tiger-slayer among them, and started in search of a jaguar which hadbeen seen that morning in the neighbourhood of his estancia. The animalwas eventually found and surrounded, and as it was crouching among someclumps of tall pampas grass, where throwing a lasso over its neck wouldbe a somewhat difficult and dangerous operation, all gave way to thefamous hunter, who at once uncoiled his lasso and proceeded in aleisurely manner to form the loop. While thus engaged he made themistake of allowing his horse, which had grown restive, to turn asidefrom the hunted animal. The jaguar, instantly taking advantage of theoversight, burst from its cover and sprang first on to the haunches ofthe horse, then seizing the hunter by his poncho dragged him to theearth, and would no doubt have quickly despatched him if a lasso, thrownby one of the other men, had not closed round its neck at this criticalmoment. It was quickly dragged off, and eventually killed. But thediscomfited hunter did not stay to assist at the finish. He arose fromthe ground unharmed, but in a violent passion and blaspheming horribly, for he knew that his reputation, which he priced above everything, hadsuffered a great blow, and that he would be mercilessly ridiculed by hisassociates. Getting on his horse he rode away by himself from the sceneof his misadventure. Of what happened to him on his homeward ride therewere no witnesses; but his own account was as follows, and inasmuch asit told against his own prowess it was readily believed: Before riding aleague, and while his bosom was still burning with rage, a puma startedup from the long grass in his path, but made no attempt to run away; itmerely sat up, he said, and looked at him in a provokingly fearlessmanner. To slay this animal with his knife, and so revenge himself on itfor the defeat he had just suffered, was his first thought. He alightedand secured his horse by tying its fore feet together, then, drawing hislong, heavy knife, rushed at the puma. Still it did not stir. Raisinghis weapon he struck with a force which would have split the animal'sskull open if the blow had fallen where it was intended to fall, butwith a quick movement the puma avoided it, and at the same time lifted afoot 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 andeyeing its fallen foe for a few seconds it trotted quietly away. Thewounded man succeeded in getting on to his horse and reaching his home. The hanging flesh was restored to its place and the ghastly rents sewnup, and in the end he recovered: but he was disfigured for life; histemper also completely changed; he became morose and morbidly sensitiveto the ridicule of his neighbours, and he never again ventured to jointhem in their hunting expeditions. I inquired of the comandante, and ofothers, whether any case had come to their knowledge in that district inwhich the puma had shown anything beyond a mere passive friendlinesstowards man; in reply they related the following incident, which hadoccurred at the Saladillo a few years before my visit: The men all wentout one day beyond the frontier to form a _cerco, _ as it is called, tohunt ostriches and other game. The hunters, numbering about thirty, spread themselves round in a vast ring and, advancing towards thecentre, drove the animals before them. During the excitement of thechase which followed, while they were all engaged in preventing theostriches, deer, &c. , from doubling back and escaping, it was notnoticed that one of the hunters had disappeared; his horse, however, returned to its home during the evening, and on the next morning a freshhunt for the lost man was organized. He was eventually found lying onthe ground with a broken leg, where he had been thrown at the beginningof the hunt. He related that about an hour after it had become dark apuma appeared and sat near him, but did not seem to notice him. After awhile it became restless, frequently going away and returning, andfinally 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 upfor lost. By raising himself on his elbow he was able to see the outlineof the beast crouching near him, but its face was turned from him, andit appeared to be intently watching some object on which it was about tospring. Presently it crept out of sight, then he heard snarlings andgrowlings and the sharp yell of a puma, and he knew that the two beastswere fighting. Before morning he saw the jaguar several times, but thepuma 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 Iheard it, for I had already met with many anecdotes of a similar naturein various parts of the country, some of them vastly more interestingthan the one I have just narrated; only I did not get them at firsthand, and am consequently not able to vouch for their accuracy; but inthis case it seemed to me that there was really no room for doubt. Allthat I had previously heard had compelled me to believe that the pumareally does possess a unique instinct of friendliness for man, theorigin of which, like that of many other well-known instincts ofanimals, must remain a mystery. The fact that the puma never makes anunprovoked attack on a human being, or eats human flesh, and that itrefuses, except in some very rare cases, even to defend itself, does notseem really less wonderful in an animal of its bold and sanguinarytemper thau that it should follow the traveller in the wilderness, orcome near him when he lies sleeping or disabled, and even occasionallydefend 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 tobelieve, I think, that the human form or countenance, or the odour ofthe human body, may also have the effect on the puma of suspending itspredatory instincts and inspiring it with a gentleness towards man, which we are only accustomed to see in our domesticated carnivores or inferal animals towards those of their own species. Wolves, when pressedwith hunger, will sometimes devour a fellow wolf; as a rule, however, rapacious animals will starve to death rather than prey on one of theirown kind, nor is it a common thing for them to attack other speciespossessing instincts similar to their own. The puma, we have seen, violently attacks other large carnivores, not to feed on them, butmerely to satisfy its animosity; and, while respecting man, it is, within the tropics, a great hunter and eater of monkeys, which of allanimals most resemble men. We can only conclude with Humboldt that thereis something mysterious in the hatreds and affections of animals. 

The view here taken of the puma's character imparts, I think, a freshinterest to some things concerning the species, which have appeared inhistorical and other works, and which I propose to discuss briefly inthis place. 

There is a remarkable passage in Byron's _Narrative of the loss of theWager, _ which was quoted by Admiral Fitzroy in his _Voyage of theBeagle, _ to prove that tho puma inhabits Tierra del Fuego and theadjacent islands; no other large beast of prey being known in that partof America. "I heard, " he says, "a growling close by me, which made methink it advisable to retire as soon as possible: the woods were, sogloomy I could see nothing; but, as I retired, this noise followed meclose till I got out of them. Some of our men did assure me that theyhad seen a very large beast in the woods. . . I proposed to four of thepeople to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from thebell tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam, which I haddiscovered in a walk that way on our first landing. This we covered towindward with seaweed; and, lighting a fire, laid ourselves down inhopes of finding a remedy for our hunger in sleep; but we had not longcomposed ourselves before one of our company was disturbed by theblowing of some animal at his face; and, upon opening his eyes, was nota little astonished to see by the glimmering of the fire, a large beaststanding over him. He had presence of mind enough to snatch a brand fromthe fire, which was now very low, and thrust it at the nose of thoanimal, which thereupon made off. . . . In the morning we were not alittle anxious to know how our companions had fared; and this anxietywas 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 thepeople in the tent with the circumstances of our story, we found thatthey had been visited by the same unwelcome guest. "

Mr. Andrew Murray, in his work on the Geographical Distribution ofMammals, gives the Straits of Magellan as the extreme southern limit ofthe puma's range, and in discussing the above passage from Byron hewrites: "This reference, however, gives no support to the notion of theanimal alluded to having been a puma. . . . The description of thefootprints 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. Thecreature which had disturbed them was, doubtless, one of the harmlessdomestic dogs of the natives. "

The assurance that the bold hardy adventurer and his men suffered afalse alarm, and were thrown into a great state of excitement at theappearance of one of the wretched domestic dogs of the Fuegians, withwhich they were familiar, comes charmingly, it must be said, from acloset naturalist, who surveys the world of savage beasts from hisLondon study. He apparently forgets that Commodore Byron lived in a timewhen the painful accuracy and excessive minuteness we are accustomed towas not expected from a writer, whenever he happened to touch on anymatters connected with zoology. 

This kind of criticism, which seizes on a slight inaccuracy in onepassage, and totally ignores an important statement in another--as, forinstance, that of the "great beast" seen in the woods--might be extendedto other portions of the book, and Byron's entire narrative made toappear as purely a work of the imagination as Peter Wilkin's adventuresin 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 thepampas. He writes: "The following event, most extraordinary if true, issaid to have occurred in this forest to a mahogany-cutter, who had beenout marking trees. As he was returning to his hut, he suddenly felt asoft 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 ofhis legs, and glided round him, turning up its fierce eyes as if withlaughter. Horror-stricken and with faltering steps he kept on, and theterrible animal still circled about, now rolling over, and now touchinghim with a paw like a cat playing with a mouse. At last the suspensebecame too great, and with a loud shout he struck desperately at thecreature with his axe. It bounded on one side and crouched snarling andshowing 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 thebeast vanished into the thick bushes. "

Now, after allowing for exaggeration, if there is no foundation forstories of this character, it is really a very wonderful coincidencethat they should be met with in countries so widely separated asPatagonia and Central America. Pumas, doubtless, are scarce inGuatemala; and, as in other places where they have met with nothing butpersecution from man, they are shy of him; but had this adventureoccurred on the pampas, where they are better known, the personconcerned in it would not have said that the puma played with him as acat 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 tospring on him. 

In Clavigero's _History of Lower California, _ it is related that a veryextraordinary state of things was discovered to exist in that country bythe first missionaries who settled there at the end of the seventeenthcentury, and which was actually owing to the pumas. The author says thatthere were no bears or tigers (jaguars); these had most probably beendriven out by their old enemies; but the pumas had increased to aprodigious extent, so that the whole peninsula was overrun by them; andthis was owing to the superstitious regard in which they were held bythe natives, who not only did not kill them, but never ventured todisturb them in any way. The Indians were actually to some extentdependent on the puma's success in hunting for their subsistence; theywatched the movements of the vultures in order to discover the spot inwhich the remains of any animal it had captured had been left by thepuma, and whenever the birds were seen circling about persistently overone place, they hastened to take possession of the carcass, discoveredin this way. The domestic animals, imported by the missionaries, werequickly destroyed by the virtual masters of the country, and againstthese enemies the Jesuits preached a crusade in vain: for although theIndians readily embraced Christianity and were baptized, they were notto be shaken in their notions concerning the sacred _Chimbicá, _ as thepuma was called. The missions languished in consequence; the priestsexisted in a state of semi-starvation, depending on provisions sent tothem at long intervals from the distant Mexican settlements; and formany years all their efforts to raise the savages from their miserablecondition were thrown away. At length, in 1701, the mission of Loretowas taken charge of by one Padre Ugarte, described by Clavigero as aperson of indomitable energy, and great physical strength and courage, atrue muscular Christian, who occasionally varied his method ofinstruction by administering corporal chastisements to his hearers whenthey laughed at his doctrines, or at the mistakes he made in theirlanguage, while preaching to them. Ugarte, like his predecessors, couldnot move the Indians to hunt the puma, but he was a man of action, witha wholesome belief in the efficacy of example, and his opportunity cameat last. 

One day, while riding in the wood, he saw at a distance a puma walkingdeliberately towards him. Alighting from his mule, he took up a largestone and advanced to meet the animal, and when sufficiently near hurledthe missile with such precision and force that he knocked ifc downsenseless. After killing it, he found that the heaviest part of his taskremained, as it was necessary for the success of his project to carrythe beast, still warm and bleeding, to the Indian village; but mow hismule steadfastly refused to approach it. Father Ugarte was not, however, to be defeated, and partly by stratagem, partly by force, hefinally succeeded in getting the puma on to the mule's back, after whichhe rode in triumph to the settlement. The Indians at first thought itall a trick of their priest, who was so anxious to involve them in aconflict with the pumas, and standing at a distance they began jeeringat him, and exclaiming that he had found the animal dead! But when theywere induced to approach, and saw that it was still warm and bleeding, they were astonished beyond measure, and began to watch the priestnarrowly, thinking that he would presently drop down and die in sight ofthem all. It was their belief that death would quickly overtake theslayer of a puma. As this did not happen, the priest gained a greatinfluence over them, and in the end they were persuaded to turn theirweapons against the Chimbicá. 

Clavigero has nothing to say concerning the origin of this Californiansuperstition; but with some knowledge of the puma's character, it is notdifficult to imagine what it may have been. No doubt these savages hadbeen very well acquainted from ancient times with the animal's instinctof friendliness toward man, and its extreme hatred of other carnivores, which prey on the human species; and finding it ranged on their side, asit were, in the hard struggle of life in the desert, they were inducedto 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 asuperstition as that of the Californians. 

I shall, in conclusion, relate here the story of Maldonada, which is notgenerally known, although familiar to Buenos Ayreans as the story ofLady Godiva's ride through Coventry is to the people of that town. Thecase of Maldonada is circumstantially narrated by Rui Diaz de Guzman, inhis history of the colonization of the Plata: he was a person high inauthority in the young colonies, and is regarded by students of SouthAmerican history as an accurate and sober-minded chronicler of theevents of his own times. He relates that in the year 1536 the settlersat Buenos Ayres, having exhausted their provisions, and being compelledby hostile Indians to keep within their pallisades, were reduced to theverge of starvation. The Governor Mendoza went off to seek help from theother colonies up the river, deputing his authority to one Captain Ruiz, who, according to all accounts, displayed an excessively tyrannous andtruculent disposition while in power. The people were finally reduced toa ration of sis ounces of flour per day for each person; but as theflour was putrid and only made them ill, they were forced to live on anysmall animals they could capture, including snakes, frogs and toads. Some horrible details are given by Rui Diaz, and other writers; one, DelBarco Centenera, affirms that of two thousand persons in the towneighteen hundred perished of hunger. During this unhappy time, beasts ofprey in large numbers were attracted to the settlement by the effluviumof the corpses, buried just outside the pallisades; and this made thecondition of the survivors more miserable still, since they couldventure into the neighbouring woods only at the risk of a violent death. Nevertheless, many did so venture, and among these was the young womanMaldonada, who, losing herself in the forest, strayed to a distance, andwas eventually found by a party of Indians, and carried by them to theirvillage. 

Some months later, Captain Ruiz discovered her whereabouts, andpersuaded the savages to bring her to the settlement; then, accusing herof having gone to the Indian village in order to betray the colony, hecondemned her to be devoured by wild beasts. She was taken to a wood ata 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 tothe spot, expecting to find her bones picked clean by the beasts, butwere greatly astonished to find Maldonada still alive, without hurt orscratch. She told them that a puma had come to her aid, and had kept ather side, defending her life against all the other beasts thatapproached her. She was instantly released, and taken back to the town, her deliverance through the action of the puma probably being looked onas direct interposition of Providence to save her. 

Rui Diaz concludes with the following paragraph, in which he affirmsthat he knew the woman Maldonada, which may be taken as proof that shewas among the few that survived the first disastrous settlement andlived on to more fortunate times: his pious pun on her name would belost in a translation:--"De esta manera quedo libre la que ofrecieron alas fieras: la cual mujer yo la conoci, y la llamaban la Maldonada, quemas bien se le podia llamar la BIENDONADA; pues por este suceso se ha dever no haber merecido el castigo á que la ofrecieron. "

If such a thing were to happen now, in any portion of southern SouthAmerica, where the puma's disposition is best known, it would not belooked on as a miracle, as it was, and that unavoidably, in the case ofMaldonada. 

CHAPTER III. 

A WAVE OF LIFE, For many years, while living in my own home on the pampas, I kept ajournal, in which all my daily observations on the habits of animals andkindred matters were carefully noted. Turning back to 1872-3, I find myjottings for that season contain a history of one of those waves oflife--for I can think of no better name for the phenomenon inquestion--that are of such frequent occurrence in thinly-settledregions, though in countries like England, seen very rarely, and on avery limited scale. An exceptionally bounteous season, the accidentalmitigation of a check, or other favourable circumstance, often causes anincrease so sudden and inordinate of small prolific species, that whenwe actually witness it we are no longer surprised at the notionprevalent amongst the common people that mice, frogs, crickets, &c. , areoccasionally rained down from the clouds. 

In the summer of 1872-3 we had plenty of sunshine, with frequentshowers; so that the hot months brought no dearth of wild flowers, as inmost years. The abundance of flowers resulted in a wonderful increase ofhumble bees. I have never known them so plentiful before; in and aboutthe plantation adjoining my house I found, during the season, no fewerthan seventeen nests. 

The season was also favourable for mice; that is, of course, favourablefor the time being, unfavourable in the long run, since the short-lived, undue preponderance of a species is invariably followed by a long periodof undue depression. These prolific little creatures were soon soabundant that the dogs subsisted almost exclusively on them; the fowlsalso, from incessantly pursuing and killing them, became quite rapaciousin their manner; whilst the sulphur tyrant-birds (Pitangus) and theGuira 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 theirwild congeners, and slinking from the sight of man--even of a formerfireside companion--with a shy secrecy in their motions, an apparentaffectation of fear, almost ludicrous to see. Foxes, weasels, andopossums fared sumptuously. Even for the common armadillo (Dasypusvillosus) it was a season of affluence, for this creature is very adroitin capturing mice. This fact might seem surprising to anyone who marksthe uncouth figure, toothless gums, and the motions--anything but lightand graceful--of the armadillo and perhaps fancying that, to be adexterous mouser, an animal should bear some resemblance in habits andstructure to the felidas. But animals, like men, are compelled to adaptthemselves to their surroundings; new habits are acquired, and the exactco-relation between habit and structure is seldom maintained. 

I kept an armadillo at this time, and good cheer and the sedentary lifehe led in captivity made him excessively fat; but the mousing exploitsof even this individual were most interesting. Occasionally I took himinto the fields to give him a taste of liberty, though at such times Ialways took the precaution to keep hold of a cord fastened to one of hishind legs; for as often as he came to a kennel of one of his wildfellows, he would attempt to escape into it. He invariably travelledwith an ungainly trotting gait, carrying his nose, beagle-like, close tothe ground. His sense of smell was exceedingly acute, and when near hisprey he became agitated, and quickened his motions, pausing frequentlyto sniff the earth, till, discovering the exact spot where the mouselurked, he would stop and creep cautiously to it; then, after slowlyraising himself to a sitting posture, spring suddenly forwards, throwinghis body like a trap over the mouse, or nest of mice, concealed beneaththe grass. 

A curious instance of intelligence in a cat was brought to my notice atthis time by one of my neighbours, a native. His children had made thediscovery that some excitement and fun was to be had by placing a longhollow stalk of the giant thistle with a mouse in it--and every hollowstalk at this time had one for a tenant--before a cat, and then watchingher movements. Smelling her prey, she would spring at one end of thestalk--the end towards which the mouse would be moving at the same time, but would catch nothing, for the mouse, instead of running out, wouldturn 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 along time, an exhibition of the cleverness and the stupidity ofinstinct, both of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several catsat the house, and all acted in the same way except one. When a stalk wasplaced before this cat, instead of becoming excited like the others, itwent quickly to one end and smelt' at the opening, then, satisfied thatits prey was inside, it deliberately bit a long piece out of the stalkwith its teeth, then another strip, and so on progressively, until theentire stick had been opened up to within six or eight inches of thefurther end, when the mouse came out and was caught. Every stalk placedbefore this cat was demolished in the same businesslike way; but theother cats, though they were made to look on while the stick was beingbroken 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. Theyhad also come to assist at the general feast. 

Remembering the opinion of Mr. E. Newman, quoted by Darwin, thattwo-thirds of the humble bees in England are annually destroyed by mice, I determined to continue observing these insects, in order to ascertainwhether the same thing occurred on the pampas. I carefully revisited allthe nests I had found, and was amazed at the rapid disappearance of allthe bees. I was quite convinced that the mice had devoured or driventhem out, for the weather was still warm, and flowers and fruit on whichhumble bees feed were very abundant. 

After cold weather set in the storks went away, probably on account ofthe scarcity of water, for the owls remained. So numerous were theyduring the winter, that any evening after sunset I could count forty orfifty individuals hovering over the trees about my house. Unfortunatelythey did not confine their attentions to the mice, but becamedestructive to the birds as well. I frequently watched them at dusk, beating about the trees and bushes in a systematic manner, often a dozenor more of them wheeling together about one tree, like so many mothsabout a candle, and one occasionally dashing through the branches untila pigeon--usually the Zenaida maculata--or other bird was scared fromits 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 theywere making amongst the ovenbirds (Furnarius rufus--a species for whichI have a regard and affection almost superstitious), so I began to shootthe marauders. Very soon, however, I found it was impossible to protectmy little favourites. Night after night the owls mustered in their usualnumbers, so rapidly were the gaps I made in their ranks refilled. I grewsick of the cruel war in which I had so hopelessly joined, and resolved, not without pain, to let things take their course. A singularcircumstance was that the owls began to breed in the middle of winter. The field-labourers and boys found many nests with eggs and young birdsin the neighbourhood. I saw one nest in July, our coldest month, withthree half-grown young birds in it. They were excessively fat, and, though it was noon-day, had their crops full. There were three mice andtwo young cavies (Cavia australis) lying untouched in the nest. 

The short-eared owl is of a wandering disposition, ard performs longjourneys at all seasons of the year in search of districts where food isabundant; and perhaps these winter-breeders came from a region wherescarcity of prey, or some such cause, had prevented them from nesting attheir usual time in summer. 

The gradual increase or decrease continually going on in many speciesabout us is little remarked; but the sudden infrequent appearance invast numbers of large and comparatively rare species is regarded by mostpeople as a very wonderful phenomenon, not easily explained. On thepampas, whenever grasshoppers, mice, frogs or crickets becomeexcessively abundant we confidently look for the appearance ofmultitudes of the birds that prey on them. However obvious may be thecause of the first phenomenon--the sudden inordinate increase during afavourable year of a species always prolific--the attendant one alwayscreates astonishment: For how, it is asked, do these largo birds, seldomseen at other times, receive information in the distant regions theyinhabit of an abundance of food in any particular locality? Years haveperhaps passed during which, scarcely an individual of these kinds hasbeen seen: all at once armies of the majestic white storks are seenconspicuously marching about the plain in all directions; while thenight air resounds with the solemn hootings of innumerable owls. It isplain that these birds have been drawn from over an immense area to onespot; and the question is how have they been drawn?

Many large birds possessing great powers of flight are, when notoccupied with the business of propagation, incessantly wandering fromplace to place in search of food. They are not, as a rule, regularmigrants, for their wanderings begin and end irrespective of seasons, and where they find abundance they remain the whole year. They fly at avery great height, and traverse immense distances. When the favouritefood of any one of these species is plentiful in any particular regionall the individuals that discover it remain, and attract to them all oftheir kind passing overhead. This happens on the pampas with the stork, the short-eared owl, the hooded gull and the dominican or black-backedgull--the leading species among the feathered nomads: a few first appearlike harbingers; these are presently joined by new comers inconsiderable numbers, and before long they are in myriads. Inconceivablenumbers of birds are, doubtless, in these regions, continually passingover us unseen. It was once a subject of very great wonder to me thatflocks of black-necked swans should almost always appear flying byimmediately after a shower of rain, even when none had been visible fora long time before, and when they must have come from a very greatdistance. When the reason at length occurred to me, I felt very muchdisgusted 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 greaterdistance than during fair weather; the sun shining on its intense whiteplumage against the dark background of a rain-cloud making itexceedingly conspicuous. The fact that swans are almost always seenafter rain shows only that they are almost always passing. 

Whenever we are visited by a dust-storm on the pampas myriads of hoodedgulls--Larus macnlipen-nis--appear flying before the dark dust-cloud, even when not a gull has been seen for months. Dust-storms are of rareoccurrence, and come only after a long drought, and, the water-coursesbeing all dry, the gulls cannot have been living in the region overwhich the storm passes. Yet in seasons of drought gulls must becontinually passing by at a great height, seeing but not seen, exceptwhen driven together and forced towards the earth by the fury of thestorm. 

By August (1873) the owls had vanished, and they had, indeed, good causefor leaving. The winter had been one of continued drought; the dry grassand herbage of the preceding year had been consumed by the cattle andwild animals, or had turned to dust, and with the disappearance of theirfood and cover the mice had ceased to be. The famine-stricken catssneaked back to the house. It was pitiful to see the little burrowingowls; for these birds, not having the powerful wings and prescientinstincts of the vagrant Otus brachyotus, are compelled to face thepoverty from which the others escape. Just as abundance had before madethe domestic cats wild, scarcity now made the burrowing owls tame andfearless of man. They were so reduced as scarcely to be able to fly, andhung about the houses all day long on the look-out for some stray morselof food. I have frequently seen one alight and advance within two orthree yards of the door-step, probably attracted by the smell of roastedmeat. The weather continued dry until late in spring, so reducing thesheep and cattle that incredible numbers perished during a month of coldand rainy weather that followed the drought. 

How clearly we can see in all this that the tendency to multiplyrapidly, so advantageous in normal seasons, becomes almost fatal to aspecies in seasons of exceptional abundance. Cover and food withoutlimit enabled the mice to increase at such an amazing rate that thelesser checks interposed by predatory species were for a whileinappreciable. 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 residentswas shortly added multitudes of wandering birds coming from distantregions. No sooner had the herbage perished, depriving the littlevictims of cover and food, than the effects of the war became apparent. In autumn the earth so teemed with them that one could scarcely walkanywhere without treading on mice; while out of every hollow weed-stalklying on the ground dozens could be shaken; but so rapidly had theydevoured, by the trained army of persecutors, that in spring it was hardto find a survivor, even in the barns and houses. The fact that speciestend to increase in a geometrical ratio makes these great and suddenchanges frequent in many regions of the earth; but it is not often theypresent themselves so vividly as in the foregoing instance, for here, scene after scene in one of Nature's silent passionless tragedies opensbefore us, countless myriads of highly organized beings rising intoexistence only to perish almost immediately, scarcely a hard-pressedremnant 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 arare weapon. There are also many animals in which teeth and claws arenot suited to inflict injury, or in which the proper instincts andcourage to use and develop them are wanted; and these would seem, to bein a very defenceless condition. Defenceless they are in one sense, butas a fact they are no worse off than the well-armed species, havingeither a protective colouring or a greater swiftness or cunning toassist them in escaping from their enemies. And there are also many ofthese practically toothless and clawless species which have yet beenprovided with other organs and means of offence and defence out ofNature's curious armoury, and concerning a few of these species Ipropose to speak in this place. 

Probably such distinctive weapons as horns, spurs, tusks and spineswould be much more common in nature if the conditions of life alwaysremained the same. But these things are long in fashioning; meanwhile, conditions are changing; climate, soil, vegetation vary; foes and rivalsdiminish or increase; the old go, and others with different weapons anda new strategy take their place; and just as a skilful man "fighting thewilderness" fashions a plough from a hunting-knife, turns his implementsinto weapons of war, and for everything he possesses discovers a usenever contemplated by its maker, so does Nature--only with an ingenuityexceeding that of man--use the means she has to meet all contingencies, and enable her creatures, seemingly so ill-provided, to maintain theirfight for life. Natural selection, like an angry man, can make a weaponof anything; and, using the word in this wide sense, the mucoussecretions the huanaco discharges into the face of an adversary, and thepestilential drops "distilled" by the skunk, are weapons, and may be aseffectual in defensive warfare as spines, fangs and tushes. 

I do not know of a more striking instance in the animal kingdom ofadaptation of structure to habit than is afforded by the hairyarmadillo--Dasypus villosus. He appears to us, roughly speaking, toresemble an ant-eater saddled with a dish cover; yet this creature, withthe cunning Avhich Nature has given it to supplement all deficiencies, has discovered in its bony encumbrance a highly efficient weapon ofoffence. Most other edentates are diurnal and almost exclusivelyinsectivorous, some feeding only on ants; they have unchangeable habits, very limited intelligence, and vanish before civilization. The hairyarmadillo alone has struck out a line for itself. Like its fastdisappearing congeners, it is an insect-eater still, but does not likethem seek its food on the surface and in the ant-hill only; all kinds ofinsects are preyed on, and by means of its keen scent it discovers wormsand larvae several inches beneath the surface. Its method of takingworms and grubs resembles that of probing birds, for it throws up noearth, but forces its sharp snout and wedge-shaped head down to therequired 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 ithas found a rich hunting-ground, the earth is seen pitted with hundredsof these neat symmetrical bores. It is also an enemy to ground-nestingbirds, being fond of eggs and fledglings; and when unable to captureprey 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 asthe flesh lasts. Failing animal food, it subsists on vegetable diet; andI have frequently found their stomachs stuffed with clover, and, stranger still, with the large, hard grains of the maize, swallowedentire. 

It is not, therefore, strange that at all seasons, and even when otheranimals are starving, the hairy armadillo is always fat and vigorous. Inthe desert it is diurnal; but where man appears it becomes more and morenocturnal, and in populous districts does not go abroad until long afterdark. Yet when a district becomes thickly settled it increases innumbers; so readily does it adapt itself to new conditions. It is not tobe 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 "UncleRemus" type, representing it as a versatile creature, exceedinglyfertile in expedients, and duping its sworn friend the fox in variousways, just as "Brer Rabbit" serves the fox in the North American fables. 

The hairy armadillo will, doubtless, long survive all the otherarmadillos, and on this account alone it will have an ever-increasinginterest for the naturalist. I have elsewhere described how it capturesmice; when preying on snakes it proceeds in another manner. A friend ofmine, a careful observer, who was engaged in cattle-breeding amongst thestony sierras near Cape Corrientes, described to me an encounter hewitnessed between an armadillo and a poisonous snake. While seated onthe 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, ahairy armadillo appeared trotting directly towards it. Apparently thesnake perceived and feared its approach, for it quickly uncoiled itselfand began gliding away. Instantly the armadillo rushed on to it, and, squatting close down, began swaying its body backward and forward with aregular 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, andwhen its enemy drew off, it was dead and very much mangled. Thearmadillo at once began its meal, taking the tail in its mouth andslowly progressing towards the head; but when about a third of the snakestill remained it seemed satisfied, and, leaving that portion, trottedaway. 

Altogether, in its rapacious and varied habits this armadillo appears tohave some points of resemblance with the hedgehog; and possibly, likethe little European mammal it resembles, it is not harmed by the bite ofvenomous 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 itsvictim, occasionally dealing it a blow with its cruel claws. The enemiesof the snake are legion. Burrowing owls feed largely on them; so doherons and storks, killing them with a blow of their javelin beaks, andswallowing them entire. The sulphur tyrant-bird picks up the young snakeby the tail, and, flying to a branch or stone, uses it like a flail tillits life is battered out. The bird is highly commended in consequence, reminding one of very ancient words: "Happy shall he be that taketh thylittle ones and dasheth them against the stones. " In arraying such avariety of enemies against the snake, nature has made ample amends forhaving endowed it with deadly weapons. Besides, the power possessed byvenomous snakes only seems to us disproportionate; it is not really so, except in occasional individual encounters. Venomous snakes are alwaysgreatly outnumbered by non-venomous ones in the same district; at anyrate this is the case on the pampas. The greater activity of the lattercounts for more in the result than the deadly weapons of the former. 

The large teguexin lizard of the pampas, called iguana by the countrypeople, is a notable snake-killer. Snakes have in fact, no moreformidable enemy, for he is quick to see, and swift to overtake them. Heis practically invulnerable, and deals them sudden death with hispowerful tail. The gauchos say that dogs attacking the iguana aresometimes known to have their legs broken, and I do not doubt it. Afriend of mine was out riding one day after his cattle, and havingattached one end of his lasso to the saddle, He let it trail on theground. 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 soonerhad he passed it, than it raised its head, and fixed its attention onthe forty feet of lasso slowly trailing by. Suddenly it rushed after therope, and dealt it a succession of violent blows with its tail. When thewhole of the lasso, several yards of which had been pounded in vain, hadbeen dragged by, the lizard, with uplifted head, continued gazing afterit with the greatest astonishment. Never had such a wonderful snakecrossed its path before!

Molina, in his _Natural History of Chill, _ says the vizcacha uses itstail as a weapon; but then Molina is not always reliable. I haveobserved vizcachas all my life, and never detected them making use ofany weapon except their chisel teeth. The tail is certainly verycurious, being straight at the base, then curving up outwardly, andslightly 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 athick, naked, corneous skin; and, when the animal performs the curioussportive antics in which it occasionally indulges, it gives rapidloud-sounding blows on the ground with this part of the tail. Thepeculiar form of the tail also makes it a capital support, enabling thevizcacha to sit erect, with ease and security. 

The frog is a most timid, inoffensive creature, saving itself, whenpursued, by a series of saltatory feats unparalleled amongstvertebrates. Consequently, when I find a frog, I have no hesitation inplacing my hands upon it, and the cold sensation it gives one is theworse result I fear. It came to pass, however, that I once encountered afrog that was not like other frogs, for it possessed an instinct andweapons of offence which greatly astonished me. I was out snipe shootingone day when, peering into an old disused burrow, two or three feetdeep, I perceived a burly-looking frog sitting it. It was larger andstouter-looking than our common Rana, though like it in colour, and I atonce dropped on to my knees and set about its capture. Though it watchedme attentively, the frog remained perfectly motionless, and this greatlysurprised me. Before I was sufficiently near to make a grab, it sprangstraight at my hand, and, catching two of my fingers round with its forelegs, administered a hug so sudden and violent as to cause an acutesensation of pain; then, at the very instant I experienced this feeling, which made me start back quickly, it released its hold and bounded outand away. I flew after it, and barely managed to overtake it before itcould gain the water. Holding it firmly pressed behind the shoulders, itwas powerless to attack me, and I then noticed the enormous developmentof the muscles of the fore legs, usually small in frogs, bulging out inthis individual, like a second pair of thighs, and giving-it a strangelybold and formidable appearance. On holding my gun within its reach, itclasped the barrel with such energy as to bruise the skin of its breastand legs. After allowing it to partially exhaust itself in thesefruitless 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 frogdiffering in structure from all known species, and possessing a strangeunique instinct of self-preservation, I carried my captive home, intending to show it to Dr. Burmeister, the director of the NationalMuseum at Buenos Ayres-Unfortunately, after I had kept it some days, iteffected its escape by pushing up the glass cover of its box, and I havenever since met with another individual like it. That this singularfrog has it in its power to seriously injure an opponent is, of course, out of the question; but its unexpected attack must be of greatadvantage. The effect of the sudden opening of an umbrella in the faceof an angry bull gives, I think, only a faint idea of the astonishmentand confusion it must cause an adversary by its leap, quick aslightning, and the violent hug it administers; and in the confusion itfinds time to escape. I cannot for a moment believe that an instinct soadmirable, correlated as it is with the structure of the fore legs, canbe merely an individual variation; and I confidently expect that all Ihave said about my lost frog will some day be confirmed by others. Ranaluctator would be a good name for this species. 

The toad is a slow-moving creature that puts itself in the way ofpersecution; yet, strange to say, the acrid juice it exudes whenirritated is a surer protection to it than venomous fangs are to thedeadliest snake. Toads are, in fact, with a very few exceptions, onlyattacked and devoured by snakes, by lizards, and by their own venomousrelative, Ceratophrys ornata. Possibly the cold sluggish natures of allthese creatures protects them against the toad's secretion, which wouldbe poison to most warm-blooded animals, but I am not so sure that allfish enjoy a like immunity. I one day noticed a good-sized fish (bagras)floating, belly upmost, on the water. It had apparently just died, andhad such a glossy, well-nourished look about it, and appeared so full, Iwas curious to know the cause of its death. On opening it I found itsstomach quite filled with a very large toad it had swallowed. The toadlooked perfectly fresh, not even a faint discoloration of the skinshowing that the gastric juices had begun to take effect; the fish, infact, must have died immediately after swallowing the toad. The countrypeople in South America believe that the milky secretion exuded by thetoad possesses wonderful curative properties; it is their invariablespecific for shingles--a painful, dangerous malady common amongst them, and to cure it living toads are applied to the inflamed parb. I dare saylearned physicians would laugh at this cure, but then, if I mistake not, the learned have in past times laughed at other specifics used by thevulgar, but which now have honourable places in the pharmacopoeia--pepsine, for example. More than two centuries ago (very ancient timesfor South America) the gauchos were accustomed to take the lining of therhea's stomach, dried and powdered, for ailments caused by impaireddigestion; and the remedy is popular still. Science has gone over tothem, and the ostrich-hunter now makes a double profit, one from thefeathers, and the other from the dried stomachs which he supplies to thechemists of Buenos Ayres. Yet he was formerly told that to take thestomach of the ostrich to improve his digestion was as wild an idea asit would be to swallow birds' feathers in order to fly. 

I just now called Ceratophrys ornata venomous, though its teeth are notformed to inject poison into the veins, like serpents' teeth. It is asingular creature, known as _escuerzo_ in the vernacular, and thoughbeautiful in colour, is in form hideous beyond description. The skin isof a rich brilliant green, with chocolate-coloured patches, oval inform, and symmetrically disposed. The lips are bright yellow, thecavernous mouth pale flesh colour, the throat and under-surface dullwhite. The body is lumpy, and about the size of a large man's fist. Theeyes, placed on the summit of a disproportionately large head, areembedded in horn-like protuberances, capable of being elevated ordepressed at pleasure. When the creature is undisturbed, the eyes, whichare 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 alevel with the head, closing the eyes completely, and giving thecreature the appearance of being eyeless. The upper jaw is armed withminute teeth, and there are two teeth in the centre of the lower jaw, the remaining portions of the jaw being armed with two exceedinglysharp-edged bony plates. In place of a tongue, it has a round muscularprocess with a rough flat disc the size of a halfpenny. 

It is common all over the pampas, ranging as far south as the RioColorado in Patagonia. In the breeding season it congregates in pools, and one is then struck by their extraordinary vocal powers, which theyexercise by night. The performance in no way resembles the series ofpercussive sounds uttered by most batrachians. The notes it utters arelong, as of a wind instrument, not unmelodious, and so powerful as tomake themselves heard distinctly a mile off on still evenings. After theamorous period these toads retire to moist places and sit inactive, buried just deep enough to leave the broad green back on a level withthe surface, and it is then very difficult to detect them. In thisposition they wait for their prey--frogs, toads, birds, and smallmammals. Often they capture and attempt to swallow things too large forthem, a mistake often made by snakes. In very wet springs they sometimescome about houses and lie in wait for chickens and ducklings. Indisposition they are most truculent, savagely biting at anything thatcomes near them; and when they bite they hang on with the tenacity of abulldog, poisoning the blood with their glandular secretions. Whenteased, the creature swells itself out to such an extent one almostexpects to see him burst; he follows his tormentors about with slowawkward leaps, his vast mouth wide open, and uttering an incessant harshcroaking sound. A gaucho I knew was once bitten by one. He sat down onthe grass, and, dropping his hand at his side, had it seized, and onlyfreed himself by using his hunting knife to force the creature's mouthopen. He washed and bandaged the wound, and no bad result followed; butwhen the toad cannot be shaken off, then the result is different. Onesummer two horses were found dead on the plain near my home. One, whilelying down, had been seized by a fold in the skin near the belly; theother had been grasped by the nose while cropping grass. In bothinstances the vicious toad was found dead, with jaws tightly closed, still hanging to the dead horse. Perhaps they are sometimes incapable ofletting go at will, and like honey bees, destroy themselves in thesesavage attacks. 

CHAPTER V. 

FEAR IN BIRDS. 

The statement that birds instinctively fear man is frequently met within zoological works written since the _Origin of Species_ appeared; butalmost the only reason--absolutely the only plausible reason, all therest being mere supposition--given in support of such a notion is thatbirds in desert islands show at first no fear of man, but afterwards, finding him a dangerous neighbour, they become wild; and their youngalso grow up wild. It is thus assumed that the habit acquired by theformer has become hereditary in the latter--or, at all events, that intime it becomes hereditary. Instincts, which are few in number in anyspecies, and practically endure for ever, are not, presumably, acquiredwith such extraordinary facility. 

Birds become shy where persecuted, and the young, even when notdisturbed, learn a shy habit from the parents, and from other adultsthey associate with. I have found small birds shyer in desert places, where the human form was altogether strange to them, than inthickly-settled districts. Large birds are actually shyer than the smallones, although, to the civilized or shooting man they seem astonishinglytame where they have never been fired at. I have frequently walked quiteopenly to within twenty-five or thirty yards of a flock of flamingoeswithout alarming them. This, however, was when they were in the water, or on the opposite side of a stream. Having no experience of guns, theyfancied themselves secure as long as a strip of water separated themfrom the approaching object. When standing on dry land they would notallow so near an approach. Sparrows in England aro very much tamer thanthe sparrows I have observed in desert places, where they seldom see ahuman being. Nevertheless young sparrows in England are very much tamerthan old birds, as anyone may see for himself. During the past summer, while living near Kew Gardens, I watched the sparrows a great deal, andfed forty or fifty of them every day from a back window. The bread andseed was thrown on to a low roof just outside the window, and I noticedthat the young birds when first able to fly were always brought by theparents to this feeding place, and that after two or three visits theywould begin to come of their own accord. At such times they wouldventure quite close to me, showing as little suspicion as youngchickens. The adults, however, although so much less shy than birds ofother species, were extremely suspicious, snatching up the bread andflying 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 becomeinfected with fear. The lesson was taught them in a surprisingly shorttime; their suspicion was seen to increase day by day, and about a weeklater they were scarcely to be distinguished, in behaviour from theadults. It is plain that, with these little birds, fear of man is anassociate feeling, and that, unless it had been taught them, hispresence would trouble them as little as does that of horse, sheep, orcow. But how about the larger species, used as food, and which have hada longer and sadder experience of man's destructive power?

The rhea, or South American ostrich, philosophers tell us, is a veryancient bird on the earth; and from its great size and inability toescape by flight, and its excellence as food, especially to savages, whoprefer fat rank-flavoured flesh, it must have been systematicallypersecuted by man as long as, or longer than, any bird now existing onthe globe. If fear of man ever becomes hereditary in birds, we oughtcertainly to find some trace of such an instinct in this species. I havebeen unable to detect any, though I have observed scores of young rheasin captivity, taken before the parent bird had taught them what to fear. I also once kept a brood myself, captured just after they had hatchedout. With regard to food they were almost, or perhaps quite, independent, spending most of the time catching flies, grasshoppers, andother insects with surprising dexterity; but of the dangers encompassingthe young rhea they knew absolutely frothing. They would follow me aboutas if they took me for their parent; and, whenever I imitated the loudsnorting or rasping warning-call emitted the old bird in moments ofdanger, they would to me in the greatest terror, though no animal was insight, and, squatting at my feet, endeavour to conceal themselves bythrusting their heads and long necks up my trousers. If I had caused aperson to dress in white or yellow clothes for several consecutive days, and had then uttered the warning cry each time he showed himself to thebirds, I have no doubt that they would soon have acquired a habit ofrunning in terror from him, even without the warning cry, and that thefear of a person in white or yellow would have continued all theirlives. Up to within about twenty years ago, rheas were seldom or nevershot in La Plata and Patagonia, but were always hunted on horseback andcaught with the bolas. The sight of a mounted man would set them off atonce, while a person on foot could walk quite openly to within easyshooting distance of them; yet their fear of a horseman dates only twohundred years back--a very short time, when we consider that, before theIndian borrowed the horse from the invader, he must have systematicallypursued the rhea on foot for centuries. The rhea changed its habits whenthe hunter changed his, and now, if an _estanciero_ puts down ostrichhunting on his estate, in a very few years the birds, although wildbirds still, become as fearless and familiar as domestic animals. I haveknown old and ill-tempered males to become a perfect nuisance on someestancias, running after and attacking every person, whether on foot oron horseback, that ventured near them. An old instinct of a whole racecould not be thus readily lost here and there on isolated estateswherever a proprietor chose to protect his birds for half a dozen years. 

I suppose the Talegallus--the best-known brush-turkey--must be looked onas an exception to all other birds with regard to the point I amconsidering; for this abnormal form buries its eggs in the huge moundmade by the male, and troubles herself no more about them. When theyoung is fully developed it simply kicks the coffin to pieces in whichits mother interred it, and, burrowing its way up to the sunshine, enters on the pleasures and pains of an independent existence fromearliest infancy--that is, if a species born into the world in fullpossession of all the wisdom of the ancients, can be said ever to knowinfancy. At all events, from Mr. Bartlett's observations on the younghatched in the Zoological Gardens, it appears that they took no noticeof the old birds, but lived quite independently from the moment theycame out of the ground, even flying up into a tree and roostingseparately at night. I am not sure, however, that these observations arequite conclusive; for it is certain that captivity plays strange prankswith the instincts of some species, and it is just possible that in astate of nature the old birds exercise at first some slight parentalsupervision, and, like all other species, have a peculiar cry to warnthe young of the dangers to be avoided. If this is not so, then theyoung Talegallus must fly or hide with instinctive tear from everyliving thing that approaches it. I, at any rate, find it hard to believethat it has a knowledge, independent of experience, of the differenthabits of man and kangaroo, and dis-criminates at first sight betweenanimals that are dangerous to it and those that are not. Thisinteresting point will probably never be determined, as, most unhappily, the Australians are just now zealously engaged in exterminating theirmost wonderful bird for the sake of its miserable flesh; and with lessexcuse than the Maories could plead with regard to the moa, since theycannot deny that they have mutton and rabbit enough to satisfy hunger. 

Whether birds fear or have instinctive knowledge of any of their enemiesis a much larger question. Species that run freely on the ground fromthe time of quitting the shell know their proper food, and avoidwhatever is injurious. Have all young birds a similarly discriminatinginstinct with regard to their enemies? Darwin says, "Fear of anyparticular enemy is certainly an instinctive quality, as may be seen innestling birds. " Here, even man seems to be included among the enemiesfeared instinctively; and in another passage he says, "Young chickenshave lost, wholly from habit, that fear of the dog and cat which, nodoubt, was originally instinctive in them. " My own observations point toa contrary conclusion; and I may say that I have had unrivalledopportunities for studying the habits of young birds. 

Animals of all classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear fromany strange object approaching them. A piece of newspaper carriedaccidentally by the wind is as great an object of terror to aninexperienced young bird as a buzzard sweeping down with death in itstalons. Among birds not yet able to fly there are, however, some curiousexceptions; thus the young of most owls and pigeons are excited to angerrather than fear, and, puffing themselves up, snap and strike at anintruder with their beaks. Other fledglings simply shrink down in thenest or squat close on the ground, their fear, apparently, being inproportion to the suddenness with which the strange animal or objectcomes on them; but, if the deadliest enemy approaches with slow caution, as snakes do--and snakes must be very ancient enemies to birds--there isno fear or suspicion shown, even when the enemy is in full view andabout to strike. This, it will be understood, is when no warning-cry isuttered by the parent bird. This shrinking, and, in some cases, hidingfrom an object corning swiftly towards them, is the "wildness_"_ ofyoung birds, which, Darwin says again, is greater in wild than indomestic species. Of the extreme tameness of the young rhea I havealready spoken; I have also observed young tinamous, plovers, coots, &c. , hatched by fowls, and found them as incapable of distinguishingfriend from foe as the young of domestic birds. The only differencebetween 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 ifthis greater alertness and activity is what is meant by "wildness, " thenthe young of some wild birds--rhea, crested screamer, &c. --are actuallymuch tamer than our newly-hatched chickens and ducklings. 

To return to what may be seen in nestling birds, n very young, andbefore their education has begun, if quietly approached and touched, they open their bills and take food as readily from a man as from theparent bird. But if while being thus fed the parent returns and emitsthe warning note, they instantly cease their hunger-cries, close theirgaping mouths, and crouch down frightened in the nest. This fear causedby the parent bird's warning note begins to manifest itself even beforethe young are hatched--and my observations on this point refer toseveral species in three widely separated orders. When the littleprisoner is hammering at its shell, and uttering its feeble _peep, _ asif begging to be let out, if the warning note is uttered, even at aconsiderable distance, the strokes and complaining instantly cease, andthe chick will then remain quiescent in the shell for a long time, oruntil the parent, by a changed note, conveys to it an intimation thatthe danger is over. Another proof that the nestling has absolutely noinstinctive knowledge of particular enemies, but is taught to fear themby the parents, is to be found in the striking contrast between thehabits of parasitical and genuine young in the nest, and after they haveleft it, while still unable to find their own food. I have had noopportunities of observing the habits of the young cuckoo in Englandwith regard to this point, and do not know whether other observers havepaid any attention to the matter or not, but I am very familiar with themanners of the parasitical starling or cow-bird of South America. Thewarning cries of the foster parent have no effect on the young cow-birdat any time. Until they are able to fly they will readily devour wormsfrom the hand of a man, even when the old birds are hovering close byand screaming their danger notes, and while their own young, if theparasite has allowed any to survive in the nest, are crouching down inthe greatest fear. After the cow-bird has left the nest it is stillstupidly tame, and more than once I have seen one carried off from itselevated perch by a milvago hawk, when, if it had understood the warningcry of the foster parent, it would have dropped down into the bush orgrass and escaped. But as soon as the young cow-birds are able to shiftfor themselves, and begin to associate with their own kind, their habitschange, and they become suspicious and wild like other birds. 

On this point--the later period at which the parasitical young birdacquires fear of man--and also bearing on the whole subject underdiscussion, I shall add here some observations I once made on a dovehatched and reared by a pigeon at my home on the pampas. A very largeombú tree grew not far from the dove-cote, and some of the pigeons usedto make their nests on the lower horizontal branches. One summer a doveof the most common species, Zenaida maculata, in size a third less thanthe domestic pigeon, chanced to drop an egg in one of these nests, and ayoung 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 wasevident that this foster-young, though' with the pigeons, was not norever would be of them, for it could not take kiudly to their flippantflirty ways. Whenever a male approached it, and with guttural noises andstrange gestures made a pompous declaration of amorous feelings, thedove would strike vigorously at its undesirable lover, and drive himoff, 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, withinstinct tainted by domestication, were ignorant alike of its sex anddifferent species. Now, it chanced that my pigeons, never being fed andalways finding their own living on the plain like wild birds, were, although still domestic, not nearly so tame as pigeons usually are inEngland. They would not allow a person to approach within two or threeyards of them without flying, and if grain was thrown to them they wouldcome to it very suspiciously, or not at all. And, of course, the youngpigeons always acquired the exact degree of suspicion shown by theadults as soon as they were able to fly and consort with the others. Butthe foundling Zenaida did not know what their startled gestures andnotes of fear meant when a person approached too near, and as he sawnone of his own kind, he did not acquire their suspicious habit. On thecontrary, he was perfectly tame, although by parentage a wild bird, andshowed no more fear of a man than of a horse. Throughout the winter itremained with the pigeons, going afield every day with them, andreturning to the dove-cote; but as spring approached the slight tiewhich united him to them began to be loosened; their company grew lessand less congenial, and he began to lead a solitary life. But he did notgo to the trees yet. He came to the house, and his favourite perch wason the low overhanging roof of a vine-covered porch, just over the mainentrance. Here he would pass several hours every day, taking no noticeof the people passing in and out at all times; and when the weather grewwarm he would swell out his breast and coo mournfully by the hour forour pleasure. 

We can, no doubt, learn best by observing the behaviour of nestlings andyoung birds; nevertheless, I find much even in the confirmed habits ofadults to strengthen me in the belief that fear of particular enemies isin nearly all cases--for I will not say all--the result of experienceand tradition. 

Hawks are the most open, violent, and persistent enemies birds have; andit is really wonderful to see how well the persecuted kinds appear toknow the power for mischief possessed by different raptorial species, and how exactly the amount of alarm exhibited is in proportion to theextent of the danger to be apprehended. Some raptors never attack birds, others only occasionally; still others prey only on the young andfeeble; and, speaking of La Plata district, where I have observed hawks, from the milvago chimango--chiefly a carrion-eater--to the destructiveperegrine falcon, there is a very great variety of predatory habits, andall degrees of courage to be found; yet all these raptors are treateddifferently by species liable to be preyed on, and have just as muchrespect paid them as their strength and daring entitles them to, and nomore, So much discrimination must seem almost incredible to those whoare not very familiar with the manners of wild birds; I do not think itcould 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; andin regions where hawks are extremely abundant most of the birds would boin a constant state of trepidation. On the pampas the appearance of thecomparatively harmless chimango excites not the least alarm among smallbirds, yet at a distance it closely resembles a henharrier, and it alsoreadily attacks young, sick, and wounded birds; all others know howlittle they have to fear from it. When it appears unexpectedly, sweeping over a hedge or grove with a rapid flight, it is sometimesmistaken for a more dangerous species; there is then a little flutter ofalarm, some birds springing into the air, but in two or three seconds oftime they discover their mistake, and settle down quietly again, takingno further notice of the despised carrion-eater. On the other hand, Ihave frequently mistaken a harrier (Circus cinereus, in the brown stateof plumage) for a chimango, and have only discovered my mistake byseeing the commotion among the small birds. The harrier I havementioned, also the C. Macropterus, feed partly on small birds, whichthey flush from the ground and strike down with their claws. When theharrier appears moving along with a loitering flight near the surface, it is everywhere attended by a little whirlwind of alarm, small birdsscreaming or chirping excitedly and diving into the grass or bushes; butthe alarm does not spread far, and subsides as soon as the hawk haspassed on its way. Buzzards (Buteo and Urubitinga) are much more feared, and create a more widespread alarm, and they ars certainly moredestructive to birds than harriers. Another curious instance is that ofthe sociable hawk (Rostrhanrus sociabilis). This bird spends the summerand breeds in marshes in La Plata, and birds pay no attention to it, forit feeds exclusively on water-snails (Ampullaria). But when it visitswoods and plantations to roost, during migration, its appearance createsas much alarm as that of a true buzzard, which it closely resembles. Wood-birds, unaccustomed to see it, do not know its peculiar preyinghabits, and how little they need fear its presence. I may also mentionthat the birds of La Plata seem to fear the kite-like Elanus less thanother hawks, and I believe that its singular resemblance to the commongull of the district in its size, snowy-white plumage and manner offlight, has a deceptive effect on most species, and makes them so littlesuspicious 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 ofthat region before 1888. The consternation caused among birds by itsappearance is vastly greater than that produced by any of the raptors Ihave mentioned: and it is unquestionably very much more destructive tobirds, since it preys exclusively on them, and, as a rule, merely picksthe flesh from the head and neck, and leaves the untouched body to itsjackal, the carrion-hawk. When the peregrine appears speeding throughthe air in a straight line at a great height, the feathered world, asfar as one able to see, is thrown into the greatest commo-tion, allbirds, from the smallest up to species large as duck, ibis, and curlew, rushing about in the air as if distracted. When the falcon hasdisappeared in the sky, and the wave of terror attending its progresssubsides behind it, the birds still continue wild and excited for sometime, showing how deeply they have been moved; for, as a rule, fear isexceedingly transitory in its effects on animals, I must, before concluding this part of my subject, mention anotherraptor, also a true falcon, but differing from the peregrine in beingexclusively a marsh-hawk. In size it is nearly a third less than themale peregrine, which it resembles in its sharp wings and manner offlight, but its flight is much more rapid. The whole plumage, isuniformly of a dark grey colour. Unfortunately, though I have observedit not fewer than a hundred times, I have never been able to procure aspecimen, nor do I find that it is like any American falcon alreadydescribed; so that for the present it must remain nameless. Judgingsolely from the effect produced by the appearance of this hawk, it mustbe even more daring and destructive than its larger relation, theperegrine. It flies at a great height, and sometimes descends verticallyand with extraordinary velocity, the wings producing a sound like adeep-toned horn. The sound is doubtless produced at will, and iscertainly less advantageous to the hawk than to the birds it pursues. Nodoubt it can afford to despise the wing-power of its quarry; and I havesometimes thought that it takes a tyrannous delight in witnessing theconsternation caused by its hollow trumpeting sound. This may be only afancy, but some hawks do certainly take pleasure in pursuing andstriking birds when not seeking prey. The peregrine has been observed, Baird says, capturing birds, only to kill and drop them. Many of theFelidae, we know, evince a similar habit; only these prolong theirpleasure by practising a more refined and deliberate cruelty. 

The sudden appearance overhead of this hawk produces an effect wonderfulto witness. I have frequently seen all the inhabitants of a marsh struckwith panic, acting as if demented, and suddenly grown careless to allother dangers; and on such occasions I have looked up confident ofseeing the sharp-winged death, suspended above them in the sky. Allbirds that happen to be on the wing drop down as if shot into the reedsor water; ducks away from the margin stretch out their neckshorizontally and drag their bodies, as if wounded, into closer cover;not one bird is found bold enough to rise up and wheel about themarauder--a usual proceeding in the case of other hawks; while, at everysudden stoop the falcon makes, threatening to dash down on his prey, alow cry of terror rises from the birds beneath; a sound expressive of anemotion so contagious that it quickly runs like a murmur all over themarsh, as if a gust of wind had swept moaning through, the rushes. Aslong as the falcon hangs overhead, always at a height of about fortyyards, threatening at intervals to dash down, this murmuring sound, madeup of many hundreds of individual cries, is heard swelling and dyingaway, and occasionally, when he drops lower than usual, rising to asharp scream of terror. 

Sometimes when I have been riding over marshy ground, one of these hawkshas placed himself directly over my head, within fifteen or twenty yardsof me; and it has perhaps acquired the habit of following a horseman inthis way in order to strike at any birds driven up. On one occasion myhorse almost trod on a couple of snipe squatting terrified in the shortgrass. The instant they rose the hawk struck at one, the end of his wingviolently smiting my cheek as he stooped, and striking at the snipe on alevel with the knees of my horse. The snipe escaped by diving under thebridle, and immediately dropped down on the other side of me, and thehawk, rising up, flew away. 

To return. I think I am justified in believing that fear of hawks, likefear of men, is, in very nearly all cases, the result of experience andtradition. Nevertheless, I think it probable that in some species whichhave always lived in the open, continually exposed to attack, and whichare preferred as food by raptors, such as duck, snipe, and plover, thefear of the falcon may be an inherited habit. Among passerine birds I amalso inclined to think that swallows show inherited fear of hawks. Swallows and humming-birds have least to fear from raptors; yet, whilehumming-birds readily pursue and tease hawks, thinking as little of themas of pigeons or herons, swallows everywhere manifest the greatestterror at the approach of a true falcon; and they also fear other birdsof prey, though in a much less degree. It has been said that theEuropean hobby occasionally catches swal-lows on the wing, but thisseems a rare and exceptional habit, and in South America I have neverseen any bird of prey attempt the pursuit of a swallow. The questionthen arises, how did this unnecessary fear, so universal in swallows, originate? Can it be a survival of a far past--a time when somewide-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 thefear of man, acquired by experience, becomes instinctive in birds, inthe following passage: "It is well known that in newly-discovered landsnot inhabited by man, birds are so devoid of fear as to allow themselvesto 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 thatthis dread is manifested by young as well as by old. Now unless thischange be ascribed to the killing-off of the least fearful, and thepreservation and multiplication of the most fearful which, consideringthe comparatively small number killed by man, is an inadequate cause, itmust be ascribed to accumulated experience; and each experience must beheld to have a share in producing it. We must conclude that in each birdthat escapes with injuries inflicted by man, or is alarmed by theoutcries of other members of the flock (gregarious creatures of anyintelligence being necessarily more or less sympathetic), there isestablished an association of ideas between the human aspect and thepains, direct and in-direct, suffered from human agency. And we mustfurther con-clude, that the state of consciousness which compels thebird to take flight, is at first nothing more than an ideal reproductionof those painful impressions which before followed man's approach; thatsuch ideal reproduction becomes more vivid and more massive as thepainful experiences, direct or sympathetic, increase; and that thus theemotion, in its incipient state, is nothing else than an aggregation ofthe revived pains before experience. 

"As, in the course of generations, the young birds of this race begin todisplay a fear of man before yet they have been injured by him, it is anunavoidable inference that the nervous system of the race has beenorganically modified by these experiences, we have no choice but toconclude, that when a young bird is led to fly, it is because theimpression produced in its senses by the approaching man entails, through an incipiently reflex action, a partial excitement of all thosenerves which in its ancestors had been excited under the likeconditions; that this partial excitement has its accompanying painfulconsciousness, and that the vague painful consciousness thus arisingconstitutes emotion proper--_emotion undecomposable into specificexperiences, 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 beenorganically altered as a result of man's persecution; for in that caseit would take long to undo the mischief, and we should be indeed farfrom that "better friendship" with the children of the air which many ofus would like to see. 

CHAPTER VI. 

PARENTAL AND EARLY INSTINCTS. 

Under this heading I have put together several notes from my journals onsubjects which have no connection with each other, except that theyrelate chiefly to the parental instincts of some animals I haveobserved, and to the instincts of the young at a very early period oflife. 

While taking bats one day in December, I captured a female of our commonBuenos Ayrean species (Molossus bonariensis), with her two youngattached to her, so large that it seemed incredible she should be ableto fly and take insects with such a weight to drag her down. The youngwere about a third less in size than the mother, so that she had tocarry a weight greatly exceeding that of her own body. They werefastened 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, likethe young developed opossum, to other parts of the body, until matureenough to begin an independent life. On forcibly separating them fromtheir parent, I found that they were not yet able to fly, but when setfree fluttered feebly to the ground. This bat certainly appeared moreburdened with its young than any animal I had ever observed. I have seenan old female opossum (Didelphys azarae) with eleven young, large as oldrats--the mother being less than a cat in size--all clinging to variousparts of her body; yet able to climb swiftly and with the greatestagility in the higher branches of a tree. The actual weight was in thiscase relatively much greater than in that of the female bat: but thenthe opossum never quitted its hold on the tree, and it also supplementedits hand-like feet, furnished with crooked claws, with its teeth andlong prehensile tail. The poor bat had to seek its living in the emptyair, pursuing its prey with the swiftness of a swallow, and it seemedwonderful to me that she should have been able to carry about that greatburden with her one pair of wings, and withal to be active enough tosupply herself and her young with food. 

In the end I released her, and saw her fly away and disappear among thetrees, after which I put back the two young bats in the place I hadtaken them from, among the thick-clustering foliage of a small acaciatree. When set free they began to work their way upwards through theleaves and slender twigs in the most adroit manner, catching a twig withtheir 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 themtight by pressing them against the chest. The body would then emergeabove the clasped leaves, and a higher twig would be caught by theteeth; and so on successively, until they had got as high as theywished, when they proceeded to hook themselves to a twig and assume theinverted position side by side; after which, one drew in its head andwent to sleep, while the other began licking the end of its wing, wheremy finger and thumb had pressed the delicate membrane. Later in the dayI attempted to feed them with small insects, but they rejected myfriendly attentions in the most unmistakable manner, snapping viciouslyat me every time I approached them. In the evening, I stationed myselfclose to the tree, and presently had the satisfaction of seeing themother return, flying straight to the spot where I had taken her, and ina few moments she was away again and over the trees with her twins. 

Assuming that these two young bats had, before I found them, existedlike parasites clinging to the parent, their adroit actions whenliberated, and their angry demonstrations at my approach, were veryastonishing; for in all other mammals born in a perfectly helplessstate, like rodents, weasels, edentates, and even marsupials, theinstincts of self-preservation are gradually developed after the periodof activity begins, when the mother leads them out, and they play withher and Avith each other. In the bat the instincts must ripen toperfection without exercise or training, and while the animal exists aspassively as a fruit on its stem. 

I have observed that the helpless young of some of the mammals I havejust mentioned seem at first to have no instinctive understanding of thelanguage of alarm and fear in the parent, as all young-birds have, evenbefore their eyes are open. Nor is it necessary that they should havesuch an instinct, since, in most cases, they are well concealed inkennels or other safe places; but when, through some accident, they areexposed, the want of such an instinct makes the task of protecting themdoubly hard for the parent. I once surprised a weasel (Galictis barbara)in the act of removing her young, or conducting them, rather; and whenshe was forced to quit them, although still keeping close by, anduttering the most piercing cries of anger and solicitude, the youngcontinued piteously crying out in their shrill voices and moving aboutin circles, without making the slightest attempt to escape, or toconceal themselves, as young birds do. 

Some field mice breed on the surface of the ground in ill-constructednests, and their young are certainly the most helpless things in nature. It is possible that where this dangerous habit exists, the parent hassome admirable complex instincts to safeguard her young, in addition tothe ordinary instincts of most animals of this kind. This idea wassuggested to me by the action of a female mouse which I witnessed bychance. While walking in a field of stubble one day in autumn, nearBuenos Ayres, I suddenly heard, issuing from near my feet, a chorus ofshrill squealing voices--the familiar excessively sharp little needlesof sound emitted by young, blind and naked mice, when they are disturbedor in pain. Looking down, I saw close to my foot a nest of them--therewere nine in all, wriggling about and squealing; for the parent, frightened at my step, had just sprung from them, overturning in herhurry to escape the slight loosely-felted dome of fine grass andthistledown which had covered them. I saw her running away, but aftergoing six or seven yards she stopped, and, turning partly round so as towatch me, waited in fear and trembling. I remained perfectlymotionless--a sure way to allay fear and suspicion in any wildcreature, --and in a few moments she returned, but with the utmostcaution, frequently pausing to start and tremble, and masking herapproach with corn stumps and little inequalities in the surface of theground, until, reaching the nest, she took one of the young in hermouth, and ran rapidly away to a distance of eight or nine yards andconcealed it in a tuft of dry grass. 

Leaving it, she returned a second time, in the same cautious manner, andtaking another, ran with it to the same spot, and concealed it alongwith the first. It was curious that the first young mouse had continuedsquealing after being hidden by the mother, for I could hear itdistinctly, the air being very still, but when the second mouse had beenplaced 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 ranoff in an opposite direction and disappeared among the dry weeds; afourth was carried to the same place as the third; and in this way theywere all removed to a distance of some yards from the nest, and placedin couples, until the last and odd one remained. In due time she camefor it, and ran away with it in a new direction, and was soon out ofsight; and although I waited fully ten minutes, she did not return; norcould I afterwards find any of the young mice when I looked for them, oreven hear them squeal. 

I have frequently observed newly-born lambs on the pampas, and havenever failed to be surprised at the extreme imbecility they display intheir actions; although this may be due partly to inherited degeneracycaused by domestication. This imbecile condition continues for two, sometimes for three days, during which time the lamb apparently actspurely from instincts, which are far from perfect; but after that, experience and its dam teach it a better way. When born its firstimpulse is to struggle up on to its feet; its second to suck, but hereit does not discriminate like the newly-hatched bird that picks up itsproper food, or it does not know what to suck. It will take into itsmouth whatever comes near, in most cases a tuft of wool on its dam'sneck; and at this it will continue sucking for an indefinite time. It ishighly probable that the strong-smelling secretion of the sheep's udderattracts the lamb at length to that part; and that without something ofthe kind to guide it, in many cases it would actually starve withoutfinding the teats. I have often seen lambs many hours after birth stillconfining their attention to the most accessible locks of wool on theneck or fore legs of the dams, and believe that in such cases the longtime it took them to find the source of nourishment arose from adefective sense of smell. Its next important instinct, which comes intoplay from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels it to follow afterany object receding from it, and, on the other hand, to run fromanything approaching it. If the dam turns round and approaches it fromeven 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 sametime it will confidently follow after a man, dog, horse, or any otheranimal moving from it. A very common experience on the pampas, in thesheep-country, is to see a lamb start up from sleep and follow therider, running along close to the heels of the horse. This isdistressing to a merciful man, tor he cannot shake the little simpletonoff, and if he rides on, no matter how fast, it will keep up him, orkeep 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 troubleand delay by knocking it senseless with a blow of his whip-handle, andwithout 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 ballabout as big as a man's head, carried past it over the smooth turf bythe wind, and chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until thedry ball was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse grass. Thisblundering instiuct is quickly laid aside when the lamb has learned todistinguish its dam from other objects, and its dam's voice from othersounds. When four or five days old it will start from sleep, but insteadof rushing blindly away after any receding object, it first looks aboutit, and will then recognize and run to its dam. 

I have often been struck with the superiority of the pampa orcreolla--the old native breed of sheep--in the greater vigour of theyoung when born over the improved European varieties. The pampa descendsto us from the first sheep introduced into La Plata about threecenturies ago, and is a tall, gaunt bony animal, with lean dry flesh, like venison, and long straight wool, like goats' hair. In theirstruggle for existence in a country subject to sudden great changes oftemperature, to drought, and failure of grass, they have in a greatmeasure lost the qualities which make the sheep valuable to man as afood and wool-producing animal; but on the other hand they have to someextent recovered the vigour of a wild animal, being hardy enough toexist without any shelter, and requiring from their master man onlyprotection from the larger carnivores. They are keen-scented, swift offoot and Wonderfully active, and thrive where other breeds would quicklystarve. I have often seen a lamb dropped on the frosty ground inbitterly cold windy weather in midwinter, and in less than five secondsstruggle to its feet, and seem as vigorous as any day-old lamb of otherbreeds. The dam, impatient at the short delay, and not waiting to giveit suck, has then started off at a brisk trot after the flock, scatteredand galloping before the wind like huanacos rather than sheep, with thelamb, scarcely a minute in the world, running freely at her side. Notwithstanding its great vigour it has been proved that the pampa sheephas not so far outgrown the domestic taint as to be able to maintain itsown existence when left entirely to itself. During the first half ofthis century, when cattle-breeding began to be profitable, and wool wasnot worth the trouble of shearing, and the gaucho workman would not eatmutton when beef was to be had, some of the estancieros on the southernpampas determined to get rid of their sheep, which were of no value tothem; 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 onepair survived to propagate a new race of feral sheep; in a short timepumas, wild dogs, and other beasts of prey, had destroyed them all. Thesterling qualities of the pampa sheep had their value in other times; atpresent the improved kinds are alone considered worth having, and theoriginal sheep of the country is now rapidly disappearing, though stillfound in remote and poor districts, especially in the province ofCordova; and probably before long it will become extinct, together withthe curious pug-nosed cow of the pampas. 

I have had frequent opportunities of observing the young, from one tothree days old, of the Cervus campestris--the common deer of the pampas, and the perfection of its instincts at that tender age seem verywonderful in a ruminant. When the doe with, fawn is approached by ahorseman, even when accompanied with dogs, she stands perfectlymotionless, gazing fixedly at the enemy, the fawn motionless at herside; and suddenly, as if at a preconcerted signal, the fawn rushesdirectly away from her at its utmost speed; and going to a distance ofsix hundred to a thousand yards conceals itself in a hollow in theground or among the long grass, lying down very close with neckstretched out horizontally, and will thus remain until sought by thedam. When very young if found in its hiding-place it will allow itselfto be taken, making no further effort to escape. After the fawn has runaway the doe still maintains her statuesque attitude, as if resolved toawait the onset, and only when the dogs are close to her she also rushesaway, but invariably in a direction as nearly opposite to that taken bythe fawn as possible. At first she runs slowly, with a limping gait, andfrequently pausing, as if to entice her enemies on, like a partridge, duck or plover when driven from its young; but as they begin to pressher more closely her speed increases, becoming greater the further shesucceeds in leading them from the starting-point. 

The alarm-cry of this deer is a peculiar whistling bark, a low butfar-reaching sound; but when approaching a doe with young I have neverbeen able to hear it, nor have I seen any movement on the part of thedoe. Yet it is clear that in some mysterious way she inspires the fawnwith sudden violent fear; while the fawn, on its side, instead of beingaffected like the young in other mammals, and sticking closer to itsmother, 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 mostadvanced state. It is, in fact, ready to begin active life from the verymoment of leaving the shell, as I once accidentally observed. I found anest on a small mound of earth in a shallow lagoon, containing foureggs, with the shells already chipped by the birds in them. Two yardsfrom the small nest mound there was a second mound covered with coarsegrass. I got off my horse to examine the nest, and the old birds, excited beyond measure, fluttered round me close by pouring out theirshrill rapidly-reiterated cries in an unbroken stream, sounding verymuch like a policeman's rattle. While I was looking closely at one ofthe eggs lying on the palm of my hand, all at once the cracked shellparted, and at the same moment the young bird leaped from my hand andfell into the water. I am quite sure that the young bird's sudden escapefrom the shell and my hand was the result of a violent effort on itspart to free itself; and it was doubtless inspired to make the effort bythe loud persistent screaming of the parent birds, which it heard whilein the shell. Stooping to pick it up to save it from perishing, I soonsaw that my assistance was not required, for immediately on droppinginto 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 thesecond small mound I have mentioned, and, escaping from the water, concealed itself in the grass, lying close and perfectly motionless likea young plover. 

In the case of the pampa or creolla sheep, I have shown that during itslong, rough life in La Plata, this variety has in some measure recoveredthe natural vigour and ability to maintain existence in adversecircumstances of its wild ancestors. As much can be said of the creollafowl of the pampas; and some observations of mine on the habits of thisvariety will perhaps serve to throw light on a vexed question of NaturalHistory--namely, the cackling of the hen after laying, an instinct whichhas been described as "useless" and "disadvantageous. " In fowls thatlive unconfined, and which are allowed to lay where they like, theinstinct, as we know it, is certainly detrimental, since egg-eating dogsand pigs soon learn the cause of the outcry, and acquire a habit ofrushing 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 introducedabout three centuries ago by the first colonists in La Plata, and hasprobably not only been uncrossed with any other improved variety, suchas are now fast taking its place, and has lived a much freer life thanis usual with the fowl in Europe. It is a rather small, lean, extremelyactive bird, lays about a dozen eggs, and hatches them all, and is of ayellowish red colour--a hue which is common, I believe, in the oldbarn-door fowl of England. The creolla fowl is strong on the wing, andmuch more carnivorous and rapacious in habits than other breeds; mice, frogs, and small snakes are eagerly hunted and devoured by it. At myhome on the pampas a number of these fowls were kept, and were allowedto range freely about the plantation, which was large, and the adjacentgrounds, where there were thickets of giant cardoon thistle, red-weed, thorn apple, &c. They always nested at a distance from the house, and itwas almost impossible ever to find their eggs, on account of the extremecircumspection they observed in going to and from their nests; and whenthey succeeded in escaping foxes, skunks, weasels, and opossums, which, strange to say, they often did, they would rear their chickens away outof sight and hearing of the house, and only bring them home when winterdeprived them of their leafy covering and made food scarce. During thesummer, in my rambles about the plantation, T would occasionallysurprise one of these half-wild hens with her brood; her distractedscreams and motions would then cause her chicks to scatter and vanish inall directions, and, until the supposed danger was past, they would lieas close and well-concealed as young partridges. These fowls in summeralways lived in small parties, each party composed of one cock and asmany hens as he could collect--usually three or four. Each familyoccupied its own feeding ground, where it would pass a greater portionof each day. The hen would nest at a considerable distance from thefeeding ground, sometimes as far as four or five hundred yards away. After laying an egg she would quit the nest, not walking from it asother fowls do, but flying, the flight extending to a distance of fromfifteen to about fifty yards; after which, still keeping silence, shewould walk or run, until, arrived at the feeding ground, she would beginto cackle. At once the cock, if within hearing, would utter a responsivecackle, whereupon she would run to him and cackle no more. Frequentlythe cackling call-note would not be uttered more than two or threetimes, sometimes only once, and in a much lower tone than in fowls ofother breeds. 

If we may assume that these fowls, in their long, semi-independentexistence in La Plata, have reverted to the original instincts of thewild Gallus bankiva, we can see here how advantageous the cacklinginstinct must be in enabling the hen in dense tropical jungles to rejointhe flock after laying an egg. If there are egg-eating animals in thejungle intelligent enough to discover the meaning of such a short, subdued cackling call, they would still be unable to find the nest bygoing back on the bird's scent, since she flies from the nest in thefirst place; and the wild bird probably flies further than the creollahen of La Plata. The clamorous cackling of our fowls would appear thento 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 odiouscharacter of this creature (for adjectives are weak to describo it) whenI say that, in talking to strangers from abroad, I have never thought itnecessary to speak of sunstroke, jaguars, or the assassin's knife, buthave never omitted to warn them of the skunk, minutely describing itshabits 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 toeffect its capture. Poor man! he did not know that the little animal isnever unwilling to be caught. Men have been blinded for ever by adischarge of the fiery liquid full in their faces. On a mucous membraneit burns like sulphuric acid, say the unfortunates who have had theexperience. How does nature protect the skunk itself from the injuriouseffects of its potent fluid? I have not unfrequently found individualsstone-blind, sometimes moving so briskly about that the blindness musthave been of long standing--very possibly in some cases an accidentaldrop discharged by the animal itself has caused the loss of sight. Whencoming to close quarters with a skunk, by covering up the face, one'sclothes only are ruined. But this is not all one has to fear from anencounter; the worst is that effluvium, after which crushed garlic islavender, which tortures the olfactory nerves, and appears to pervadethe whole system like a pestilent ether, nauseating one untilsea-sickness seems almost a pleasant sensation in comparison. 

To those who know the skunk only from reputation, my words might seemtoo strong; many, however, who have come to close quarters with thelittle animal will think them ridiculously weak. And consider what mustthe feelings be of one who has had the following experience--not anuncommon experience on the pampas. There is to be a dance at aneighbouring house a few miles away; he has been looking forward to it, and, dressing himself with due care, mounts his horse and sets out fullof joyous anticipations. It is a dark windy evening, but there is aconvenient bridle-path through the dense thicket of giant thistles, andstriking it he puts his horse into a swinging gallop. Unhappily the pathis already occupied by a skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, inobedience to the promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get outof it, until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kickedfootball into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as high ashis knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider, after coming outinto the open, dismounts and walks away twenty yards from his animal, and literally _smells_ himself all over, and with a feeling of profoundrelief pronounces himself Not the minutest drop of the diabolical sprayhas touched his dancing shoes! Springing into the saddle he proceeds tohis journey's end, is warmly welcomed by his host, and speedilyforgetting his slight misadventure, mingles with a happy crowd offriends. In a little while people begin exchanging whispers andsignificant glances; men are seen smiling at nothing in particular; thehostess wears a clouded face; the ladies cough and put their scentedhandkerchiefs to their noses, and presently they begin to feel faint andretire from the room. Our hero begins to notice that there is somethingwrong, and presently discovers its cause; he, unhappily, has been thelast person in the room to remark that familiar but most abominableodour, rising like a deadly exhalation from the floor, conquering allother odours, and every moment becoming more powerful. A drop _has_touched his shoe after all; and fearing to be found out, and edgingtowards the door, he makes his escape, and is speedily riding homeagain; knowing full well that his sudden and early departure from thescene 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-Andineregions. "When one appears, " he says, "some of the company begiu bycaressing it, until an opportunity offers for one of them to seize it bythe tail. In this position the muscles become contracted, the animal isunable to eject its fluid, and is quickly despatched. " One might just aswell talk of caressing a cobra de capello; yet this laughable fictionfinds believers all over South and North America. Professor Bairdgravely introduces it into his great work on the mammalia. I was oncetalking about animals in a rancho, when a person present (an Argentineofficer) told that, while visiting an Indian encampment, he had askedthe savages how they contrived to kill skunks without making even a lifein the desert intolerable. A grave old Cacique informed him that thesecret was to go boldly up to the animal, take it by the tail, anddespatch it; for, he said, when you fear it not at all, then it respectsyour courage and dies like a lamb--sweetly. The officer, continuing hisstory, 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 thestory abruptly ended, and when I eagerly demanded to hear the sequel, the amateur hunter of furs lit a cigarette and vacantly watched theascending smoke. The Indians aro grave jokers, they seldom smile; andthis old traditional skunk-joke, which has run the length of acontinent, finding its way into many wise books, is their revenge on asuperior race. 

I have shot a great many eagles, and occasionally a carancho (Polyborustharus), with the plumage smelling strongly of skunk, which shows thatthese birds, pressed by hunger, often commit the fearful mistake ofattacking the animal. My friend Mr. Ernest Gibson, of Buenos Ayres, in acommunication to the _Ibis, _ describes an encounter he actuallywitnessed between a carancho and a skunk. Riding home one afternoon, hespied a skunk "shuffling along in the erratic manner usual to thatodoriferous quadruped;" following it at a very short distance was aneagle-vulture, evidently bent on mischief. Every time the bird came nearthe 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 itsclaw, but immediately after "began staggering about with dishevelledplumage, tearful eyes, and a profoundly woe-begone expression on itsvulture face. The skunk, after turning and regarding its victim with anI-told-you-so look for a few moments, trotted unconcernedly off. "

I was told in Patagonia by a man named Molinos, who was frequentlyemployed by the Government as guide to expeditions in the desert, thateverywhere throughout that country the skunk is abundant. Some years agohe was sent with two other men to find and treat with an Indian chiefwhose whereabouts were not known. Far in the interior Molinos wasovertaken by a severe winter, his horses died of thirst and fatigue, andduring the three bitterest months of the year he kept himself and hisfollowers alive by eating the flesh of skunks, the only wild animal thatnever failed them. No doubt, on those vast sterile plains where theskunk abounds, and goes about by day and by night careless of enemies, the terrible nature of its defensive weapon is the first lessonexperience 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 delightin. One moonlight night, at home, I went out to where the dogs, twelvein number, were sleeping: while I stood there a skunk appeared anddeliberately came towards me, passing through the dogs where they lay, and one by one as he passed them they rose up, and, with their tailsbetween their legs, skulked off. When made to kill skunks often theybecome seasoned; but always perform the loathsome task expeditiously, then rush away with frothing mouths to rub their faces in the wet clayand rid themselves of the fiery sensation. At one time I possessed onlyone dog that could be made to face a skunk, and as the little robberswere very plentiful, and continually coining about the house in theirusual open, bold way, it was rather hard for the poor brute. This dogdetested them quite as strongly as the others, only he was moreobedient, faithful, and brave. Whenever I bade him attack one of themhe would come close up to me and look up into my face with piteouspleading eyes, then, finding that he was not to be let off from therepulsive task, he would charge upon the doomed animal with a blind furywonderful to see. Seizing it between his teeth, he would shake it madly, crushing its bones, then hurl it several feet from him, only to rushagain and again upon it to repeat the operation, doubtless with aCaligula-like wish in his frantic breast that all the skunks on theglobe had but one backbone. 

I was once on a visit to a sheep-farming brother, far away on thesouthern frontier of Buenos Ayres, and amongst the dogs I found therewas one most interesting creature, He was a great, lumbering, stupid, good-tempered brute, so greedy that when you offered him a piece of meathe would swallow half your arm, and so obedient that at a word he woulddash himself against the horns of a bull, and face death and danger inany shape. But, my brother told me, he would not face a skunk--he woulddie first. One day I took him out and found a skunk, and for upwards ofhalf 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 ofthe shivers; and when the irascible little enemy began to advanceagainst us, going through the performance by means of which he generallyputs his foes to flight without resorting to malodorousmeasures--stamping his little feet in rage, jumping up, spluttering andhissing and flourishing his brush like a warlike banner above hishead--then hardly could I restrain my dog from turning tail and flyinghome in abject terror. My cruel persistence was rewarded at last. Continued shouts, cheers, and hand-clappings began to stir the brute toa kind of frenzy. Torn by conflicting emotions, he began to revolveabout the skunk at a lumbering gallop, barking, howling, and bristlingup his hair; and at last, shutting his eyes, and with a yell ofdesperation, he charged. I fully expected to see the enemy torn topieces in a few seconds, but when the dog was still four or five feetfrom him the fatal discharge came, and he dropped down as if shot dead. For some time he lay on the earth perfectly motionless, watched andgently bedewed by the victorious skunk; then he got up and crept whiningaway. Gradually he quickened his pace, finally breaking into a franticrun. In vain I followed him, shouting at the top of my lungs; he stayednot to listen, and very speedily vanished from sight--a white speck onthe vast level plain. At noon on the following day he made hisappearance, gaunt and befouled with mud, staggering forward like agalvanized skeleton. Too worn out even to eat, he flung himself down, and for hours lay like a dead thing, sleeping off the effects of thosefew drops of perfume. 

Dogs, I concluded, like men, have their idiosyncrasies; but I had gainedmy point, and proved once more--if any proof were needed--the truth ofthat 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 strangecontrast, like those in certain lepidoptera, in which the caterpillarsform societies and act in concert. The adult has a greenish protectivecolouring, brown and green banded thighs, bright red hind wings, seenonly during flight. It is solitary and excessively shy in its habits, living always in concealment among the dense foliage near the surface ofthe ground. The yonng are intensely black, like grasshoppers cut out ofjet or ebony, and gregarious in habit, living in bands of forty or fiftyto three or four hundred; and so little shy, that they may sometimes betaken up by handfuls before they begin to scatter in alarm. Theirgregarious habits and blackness--of all hues in nature the most obviousto the sight--would alone be enough to make them the most conspicuous ofinsects; but they have still other habits which appear as if speciallydesigned to bring them more prominently into notice. Thus, they all keepso close together at all times as to have their bodies actuallytouching, and when travelling, move so slowly that the laziest snailmight easily overtake and pass one of their bands, and even disappearbeyond their limited horizon in a very short time. 

They often select an exposed weed to feed on, clustering together on itssummit above the surrounding verdure, an exceedingly conspicuous objectto every eye in the neighbourhood. They also frequently change theirfeeding-ground; at such times they deliberately cross wide roads andother open spaces, barren of grass, where, moving so slowly that theyscarcely seem to move at all, they look at a distance like a piece ofblack velvet lying on the ground. Thus in every imaginable way theyexpose themselves and invite attack; yet, in spite of it all, I havenever detected birds preying on them, and I have sometimes kept one ofthese black societies under observation near my house for several days, watching them at intervals, in places where the trees overhead were theresort 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 seedeater; and, as a rule, it is extremely shy, nimble, and inconspicuous. It seems clear that, although the young Zoniopoda does not mimic in itsform any black protected insect, it nevertheless owes its safety to itsblackness, together with the habit it possesses of exposing itself in soopen and bold a manner. Blackness is so common in large protectedinsects, as, for instance, in the un-palatable leaf-cutting ants, scorpions, mygale spiders, wasps, and other dangerous kinds, that it ismanifestly a "warning colour, " the most universal and best known innature; and the grasshopper, I believe, furthermore mimics the fearlessdemeanour of the protected or venomous species, which birds and otherinsect-eaters know and respect. It might be supposed that the youngZoniopoda is itself unpalatable; but this is scarcely probable, for whenthe deceptive black mask is once dropped, the excessive shyness, love ofconcealment, and protective colouring of the insect show that it is muchsought after by birds. 

While setting this down as an undoubted case of "mimicry, " although itdiffers in some respects from all other cases I have seen reported, Icannot help remarking that this most useful word appears to be in somedanger of losing the meaning originally attached to it in zoology. Thereare now very few cases of an accidental resemblance found between twospecies in nature which are not set down by someone to "mimicry, " somein which even the wildest imagination might well fail to see anypossible benefit to the supposed mimic. In cases where the outwardresemblance of some feeble animal to a widely different andwell-protected species, or to some object like a leaf or stick, andwhere such resemblance is manifestly advantageous and has reacted on andmodified the life habits, it is conceivable that slight spontaneousvariations in the structure and colouring of the unprotected specieshave been taken advantage of by the principle of natural selection, anda case of "mimicry" set up, to become more and more perfect in time, assuccessive casual variations in the same direction increased theresemblance. 

The stick-insect is perhaps the most perfect example where resemblanceto an inanimate object has been the result aimed at, so to speak, bynature; the resemblance of the volucella fly to the humble-bee, on whichit is parasitical, is the most familiar example of one species growinglike another to its own advantage, since only by means of its deceptivelikeness to the humble-bee is it able to penetrate into the nest withimpunity. These two cases, with others of a similar character, werefirst called cases of "mimicry" by Kirby and Spence, in theirever-delightful _Introduction to Entomology--_an old book, but, curiously enough in these days of popular treatises on all matters ofthe kind, still the only general work on insects in the English languagewhich one who is not an entomologist can read with pleasure. 

A second case of mimicry not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen inanother grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa ofThun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and thoraxchocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen steel-blue orpurple, a colour I have not seen in any other insects of this family. The fore wings have a protective colouring; the hind wings are brightred. When at rest, with the red and purple tints concealed, it is only avery pretty grasshopper, but the instant it takes wing it becomes thefac-simile of a very common wasp of the genus Pepris. These wasps varygreatly in size, some being as large as the hornet; they are solitary, and feed on the honey of flowers and on fruit, and, besides beingfurnished with stings like other wasps--though their sting is nok sovenomous as in other genera--they also, when angry, emit a mostabominable odour, and are thus doubly protected against their enemies. Their excessive tameness, slow flight, and indolent motions serve toshow that they are not accustomed to be interfered with. All thesestrong-smelling wasps have steel-blue or purple bodies, and bright redwings. So exactly does the Rhomalea grasshopper mimic the Pepris whenflying, that I have been deceived scores of times. I have even seen iton the leaves, and, after it has flown and settled once more, I havegone 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 modifiedthe habits of the grasshopper. It is a great flyer, and far more aerialin 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 itslong and peculiarly soft, breezy note may be heard all summer. If theancient Athenians possessed so charming an insect as this, their greatregard for the grasshopper was not strange: I only wish that the"Athenians of South America, " as my fellow-townsmen sometimes callthemselves in moments of exaltation, had a feeling of the samo kind--theregard which does _not_ impale its object on a pin--for the prettylight-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 isunusually copious in this species. It has another habit in defendingitself which is very curious. When captured it instantly curls its bodyround, as a wasp does to sting. The suddenness of this action has morethan once caused me to drop an insect I had taken, actually thinking forthe moment that I had taken hold of a wasp. Whether birds would bedeceived and made to drop it or not is a question it would not be easyto settle; but the instinct certainly looks like 'one of a series ofsmall adaptations, all tending to make the resemblance to a wasp morecomplete and effective. 

CHAPTER IX. 

DRAGON-FLY STORMS. 

One of the most curious things I have encountered in my observations onanimal life relates to a habit of the larger species of dragon-fliesinhabiting the Pampas and Patagonia. Dragon-flies are abundantthroughout the country wherever there is water. There are severalspecies, all more or less brilliantly coloured. The kinds that excitedmy wonder, from their habits, are twice as large as the common widelydistributed insects, being three inches to four inches in length, and asa rule they are sober-coloured, although there is one species--thelargest among them--entirely of a brilliant scarlet. This kind is, however, exceedingly rare. All the different kinds (of the largedragon-flies) when travelling associate together, and occasionally, in aflight composed of countless thousands, one of these brilliant-huedindividuals will catch the eye, appearing as conspicuous among theothers as a poppy or scarlet geranium growing alone in an otherwiseflowerless field. The most common species--and in some cases the entireflight seems to be composed of this kind only--is the Aeschnabonariensis Raml, the prevailing colour of which is pale blue. But thereally wonderful thing about them all alike is, that they appear onlywhen flying before the southwest wind, called _pampero_--the wind thatblows from the interior of the pampas. The pampero is a dry, cold wind, exceedingly violent. It bursts on the plains very suddenly, and usuallylasts only a short time, sometimes not more than ten minutes; it comesirregularly, and at all seasons of the year, but is most frequent in thehot season, and after exceptionally sultry weather. It is in summer andautumn that the large dragon-flies appear; not _with_ the wind, but--andthis is the most curious part of the matter--in advance of it; andinasmuch as these insects are not seen in the country at other times, and frequently appear in seasons of prolonged drought, when all themarshes and watercourses for many hundreds of miles are dry, they mustof course traverse immense distances, flying before the wind at a speedof seventy or eighty miles an hour. On some occasions they appear almostsimultaneously with the wind, going by like a flash, and instantlydisappearing from sight. You have scarcely time to see them before thewind strikes you. As a rule, however, they make their appearance fromfive to fifteen minutes before the wind strikes; and when they are ingreat numbers the air, to a height of ten or twelve feet above thesurface of the ground, is all at once seen to be full of them, rushingpast with extraordinary velocity in a north-easterly direction. In veryoppressive weather, and when the swiftly advancing pampero brings nomoving mountains of mingled cloud and dust, and is consequently notexpected, the sudden apparition of the dragon-fly is a most welcome one, for then an immediate burst of cold wind is confidently looked for. Inthe 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 notexplicable on any current hypothesis regarding the annual migrations ofbirds, the occasional migrations of butterflies, or the migrations ofsome mammals, like the reindeer and buffalo of Arctic America, which, according to Rae and other observers, perform long journeys north andsouth at regular seasons, "from a sense of polarity. " Neither thishypothetical sense in animals, nor "historical memory" will account forthe dragon-fly storms, as the phenomenon of the pampas might be called, since the insects do not pass and repass between "breeding andsubsistence areas, " but all journey in a north-easterly direction; andof the countless millions flying like thistledown before the greatpampero wind, not one solitary traveller ever returns. 

The cause of the flight is probably dynamical, affecting the insectswith a sudden panic, and compelling them to rush away before theapproaching tempest. The mystery is that they should fly from the windbefore it reaches them, and yet travel in the same direction with it. When they pass over the level, treeless country, not one insect lagsbehind, or permits the wind to overtake it; but, on arriving at a woodor large plantation they swarm into it, as if seeking shelter from someswift-pursuing enemy, and on such occasions they sometimes remainclinging to the trees while the wind spends its force. This isparticularly 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 tothe foliage in such numbers that many trees are covered with them, alarge tree often appearing as if hung with curtains of some brownglistening 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 followingoccurrence which he witnessed there. A race meeting was being held nearthe town of El Carmen, on a high exposed piece of ground, when, shortlybefore sunset, a violent pampero wind came up, laden with densedust-clouds. A few moments before the storm broke, the air all at oncebecame obscured with a prodigious cloud of dragon-flies. About a hundredmen, most of them on horseback, were congregated on the course at thetime, and the insects, instead of rushing by in their usual way, settledon the people in such quantities that men and horses were quicklycovered with clinging masses of them. My informant said--and this agreeswith my own observation--that he was greatly impressed by the appearanceof 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 inGermany in 1839, and also mentions a similar phenomenon occurring in1816, and extending over a large portion of Europe. But in these casesthe movement took place at the end of May, and the insects travelled duesouth; their migrations were therefore similar to those of birds andbutterflies, and were probably due to the same cause. I have been unableto find any mention of a phenomenon resembling the one with which we areso familiar on the pampas, and which, strangely enough, has not beenrecorded by any European naturalists who have travelled there. 

CHAPTER X. 

MOSQUITOES AND PARASITE PROBLEMS. 

There cannot be a doubt that some animals possess an instinctiveknowledge of their enemies--or, at all events, of some of theirenemies--though I do not believe that this faculty is so common as manynaturalists imagine. The most striking example I am acquainted with isseen in gnats or mosquitoes, and in the minute South American sandflies(Simulia), when a dragon-fly appears in a place where they are holdingtheir aerial pastimes. The sudden appearance of a ghost among humanrevellers could not produce a greater panic. I have spoken in the lastchapter of periodical storms or waves of dragon-flies in the Plataregion, and mentioned incidentally that the appearance of these insectsis most welcome in oppressively hot weather, since they are known tocome just in advance of a rush of cool wind. In La Plata we also lookfor the dragon-fly, and rejoice at its coming, for another reason. Weknow that the presence of this noble insect will cause the clouds ofstinging gnats and flies, which make life a burden, to vanish likesmoke. 

When a flight of dragon-flies passes over the country many remain alongthe route, as I have said, sheltering themselves wherever trees occur;and, after the storm blows over, these strangers and stragglers remainfor some days hawking for prey in the neighbourhood. It is curious tonote that they do not show any disposition to seek for watercourses. Itmay be that they feel lost in a strange region, or that the panic theyhave suffered, in their long flight before the wind, has unsettled theirinstincts; for it is certain that they do not, like the dragon-fly inMrs. Browning's poem, "return to dream upon the river. " They leadinstead a kind of vagabond existence, hanging about the plantations, androaming over the surrounding plains. It is then remarked that gnats andsand-flies apparently cease to exist, even in places where they havebeen most abundant. They have not been devoured by the dragon-flies, which are perhaps very few in number; they have simply got out of theway, and will remain in close concealment until their enemies take theirdeparture, or have all been devoured by martins, tyrant birds, and thebig robber-flies or devil's dykes--no name is bad enough for them--ofthe family Asilidaa. During these peaceful gnatless days, if a personthrusts himself into the bushes or herbage in some dark sheltered place, he will soon begin to hear the thin familiar sounds, as of "horns ofelf-land faintly blowing"; and presently, from the ground and the undersurface of every leaf, the ghost-like withered little starvelings willappear in scores and in hundreds to settle on him, fear not havingblunted their keen appetites. 

When riding over the pampas on a hot still day, with a pertinaciouscloud of gnats or sandflies hovering just above my head and keeping mecompany for miles, I have always devoutly wished for a stray dragon-flyto show himself. Frequently the wish has been fulfilled, the dragon-fly, apparently "sagacious of his quarry from afar, " sweeping straight at hisprey, and instantly, as if by miracle, the stinging rain has ceased andthe noxious cloud vanished from overhead, to be re-formed no more. Thishas always seemed very extraordinary to me; for in other matters gnatsdo not appear to possess even that proverbial small dose of intellectfor which we give most insects credit. Before the advent of thedragon-fly it has perhaps happened that I have been vigorously strikingat them, making it very unpleasant for them, and also killing anddisabling many hundreds--a larger number than the most voraciousdragon-fly could devour in the course of a whole day; and yet, afterbrushing and beating them off until my arms have ached with theexertion, they have continued to rush blindly on their fate, exhibitingnot the faintest symptom of fear. I suppose that for centuriesmosquitoes have, in this way, been brushed and beaten away with handsand with tails, without learning caution. It is not in their knowledgethat there are hands and tails. A large animal is simply a field onwhich they confidently settle to feed, sounding shrill flourishes ontheir little trumpets to show how fearless they are. But the dragon-flyis very ancient on the earth, and if, during the Devonian epoch, when itexisted, it preyed on some blood-sucking insect from which or Culicidaehave come, then these stupid little insects have certainly had ampletime in which to learn well at least one lesson. 

There is not in all organic nature, to my mind, any instance of wastedenergy comparable in magnitude with the mosquito's thirst for blood, andthe instincts and elaborate blood-pumping apparatus with which it isrelated. The amount of pollen given off by some wind-fertilizedtrees--so great in some places that it covers hundreds of square milesof earth and water with a film of yellow dust---strikes us as an amazingwaste of material on the part of nature; but in these cases we readilysee that this excessive prodigality is necessary to continue thespecies, and that a sufficient number of flowers would not beimpregnated unless the entire trees were bathed for days in thefertilizing cloud, in which only one out of many millions of floatingparticles can ever hit the mark. The mosquito is able to procreatewithout ever satisfying its ravenous appetite for blood. To swell itsgrey thread-like abdomen to a coral bead is a delight to the insect, butnot necessary to its existence, like food and water to ours; it is thegreat prize in the lottery of life, which few can ever succeed indrawing. In a hot summer, when one has ridden perhaps for half a dayover a low-lying or wet district, through an atmosphere literallyobscured with a fog of mosquitoes, this fact strikes the mind veryforcibly, for in such places it frequently is the case that mammals donot exist, or are exceedingly rare. In Europe it is different. There, asReaumur said, possibly one gnat in every hundred may be able to gratifyits appetite for blood; but of the gnats in many districts in SouthAmerica it would be nearer the mark to say that only one in a hundredmillions 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, hadhe visited some swampy places in hot countries, where flowers are fewand the insects more numerous than the sands on the seashore, he wouldmost probably have said that the males subsist on decaying vegetablematter and moisture of slime. It is, however, more important to knowwhat the female subsists on. We know that she thirsts for warm mammalianblood, that she seeks it with avidity, and is provided with an admirableorgan for its extraction--only, unfortunately for her, she does not getit, or, at all events, the few happy individuals that do get it areswamped in the infinite multitude of those that are doomed by nature tototal abstinence. 

I should like to know whether this belief of Curtis, shared by Westwoodand other distinguished entomologists, but originally put forward merelyas a conjecture, has ever been tested by careful observation andexperiment. If not, then it is strange that it should have crept intomany important works, where it is stated not as a mere guess, but as anestablished fact. Thus, Van Beneden, in his work on parasites, whileclassing female mosquitoes with his "miserable wretches, " yet says, "Ifblood 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 fortydays' fast, in spite of his frequent sips of water, the mosquito stillcraves for something better than a cool vegetarian diet. I cannot helpthinking, though the idea may seem fanciful, that mosquitoes feed onnothing. We know that the ephemerae take no refreshment in the imagostate, the mouth being aborted or atrophied in these short-livedcreatures; but we also know that they belong to an exceedingly ancienttribe, and possibly, after the earth had ceased to produce their propernourishment there came in their history a long hungry period, which didnot kill them, but lasted until their feeding instincts became obsolete, the mouth lost its use, and their life in its perfect state dwindled toits present length. 

In any case, how unsatisfactory is the mosquitoes' existence, and what acurious position they occupy in nature! Let us suppose that, owing tosome great change in the conditions of the earth, rapacious birds wereno longer able to capture prey, and that, by a corresponding change intheir organizations, they were able to subsist on the air they breathed, with perhaps an occasional green leaf and a sip of water, and yetretained the old craving for solid food, and the old predatory instinctsand powers undiminished; they would be in the position of mosquitoes inthe imago state. And if then fifty or a hundred individuals were tosucceed every year in capturing something and making one hearty meal, these few fortunate diners would bear about the same proportion to allthe raptors on the globe as the mosquitoes that succeed in sucking bloodto their unsuccessful fellows. In the case of the hawks, the effect ofthe few meals on the entire rapacious family or order would certainly be_nil;_ and it is impossible to believe for a moment that thecomparatively infinitesimal amount of blood sucked by mosquitoes can. Serve to invigorate the species. The wonder is that the machinery, whichaccomplishes nothing, should continue in such perfect working order. 

When we consider the insect's delicate organ, so admirably fitted forthe purpose to which it is applied, it becomes difficult to believe thatit could have been so perfected except in a condition of things utterlyunlike the present. There must have been a time when mosquitoes foundtheir proper nourishment, and when warm mammalian blood was as necessaryto their existence as honey is to that of the bee, or insect food to thedragon-fly. 

This applies to many blood-sucking insects besides mosquitoes, and withspecial force to the tick tribes (Ixodes), which swarm throughoutCentral and South America; for in these degraded spiders the whole bodyhas been manifestly modified to fit it for a parasitical life; while thehabits of the insect during its blind, helpless, waiting existence ontrees, and its sudden great development when it succeeds in attachingitself to an animal body, also point irresistibly to the sameconclusion. In the sunny uplands they act (writes Captain Burton) likethe mosquitoes of the hot, humid Beiramar. "The nuisance is general; itseems to be in the air; every blade of grass has its colony; clusters ofhundreds adhere to the twigs; myriads are found in the bush clumps. Leanand flat when growing to the leaves, the tick catches man or beastbrushing by, fattens rapidly, and, at the end-of a week's good living, drops off, _plena cruoris. "_ When on trees, Belt says, theyinstinctively place themselves on the extreme tips of leaves and shoots, with their hind legs stretching out, each foot armed with two hooks orclaws, with which to lay hold of any animal brushing by. During thiswretched, incom-plete existence (from which, in most cases, it is neverdestined to emerge), its greatest length is about one-fourth of an inch;but where it fastens itself to an animal the abdomen increases to aglobe as big as a medium-sized Barcelona nut. Being silvery-grey orwhite in colour, it becomes, when thus distended, very conspicuous onany dark surface. I have frequently seen black, smooth-haired dogs withtheir coats, turned into a perfect garden of these white spider-flowersor mushrooms. The white globe is leathery, and nothing can injure it;and the poor beast cannot rub, bite, or scratch it off, as it isanchored 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 fewmammals, are in the same condition as mosquitoes, as far as the supplyof blood goes; and, like the mosquitoes, they are compelled and able toexist without the nourishment best suited to them. They are nature'smiserable castaways, parasitical tribes lost in a great dry wildernesswhere no blood is; and every marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hungergnawing its vitals, and every forest tick, blindly feeling with itsgrappling-irons for the beast that never brushes by, seems to tell us ofa world peopled with gigantic forms, mammalian and reptilian, which onceafforded abundant pasture to the parasite, and which the parasiteperhaps assisted to overthrow. 

It is almost necessary to transport oneself to the vast tick-infestedwilderness of the New World to appreciate the full significance of apassage in Belt's _Naturalist in Nicaragua, _ in which it is suggestedthat man's hairless condition was perhaps brought about by naturalselection in tropical regions, where he was greatly troubled withparasites of this kind. It is certain that if in such a country asBrazil he possessed a hairy coat, affording cover to the tick andenabling it to get a footing on the body, his condition would be a verysad one. Savages abhor hairs on the body, and even pluck them off theirfaces. This seems like a survival of an ancient habit acquired when thewhole body was clothed with hair; and if primitive man ever possessedsuch a habit, nature only followed his lead in giving him a hairlessoffspring. 

Is it not also probable that the small amount of mammalian life in SouthAmerica, and the aquatic habits of nearly all the large animals in thewarmer districts, is due to the persecutions of the tick?

The only way in which a large animal can rid itself of the pest is bygoing into the water or wallowing in the mud; and this perhaps accountsfor the more or less aquatic habits of the jaguar, aguará-guazú, thelarge Cervus paluclosus, tapir, capybara, and peccary. Monkeys, whichare most abundant, are a notable exception; but these animals have thehabit of attending to each other's skins, and spend a great deal oftheir time in picking off the parasites. But how do birds escape theticks, since these parasites do not confine their attacks to any oneclass of aninials, but attach themselves impartially to any living thingcoming within reach of their hooks, from snake to man? My ownobservations bearing on this point refer less to the Ixodes than to theminute bete-rouge, which is excessively abundant in the Plata district, where it is known as _bicho colorado, _ and in size and habits resemblesthe English Leptus autumnalis. It is so small that, notwithstanding itsbright scarlet colour, it can only be discerned by bringing the eyeclose to it; and being, moreover, exceedingly active and abundant in allshady places in summer--making life a misery to careless humanbeings--it must be very much more dangerous to birds than the largersedentary Ixodes. The bete-rouge invariably lodges beneath the wings ofbirds, 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 thoseI have examined have been almost entirely free from parasites. Probablythey are much more sensitive than the domestic birds, and able to feeland pick off the insects with their beaks before they have penetratedinto the skin. I believe they are also able to protect themselves inanother way, namely, by preventing the parasites from reaching theirbodies 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, andnoticed that at short intervals it went through the motions of pickingsomething from its toes or legs, though I could see nothing on them. Atlength 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 coveredwith a multitude of parasites, all running rapidly about like foragingants, and whenever one came to the bird's feet it at once ran up theleg. 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. Itseemed very astonishing that the horny covering of the toes and legsshould be so exquisitely sensitive, for the insects are so small andlight that they cannot be felt on the hand, even when a score of themare running over it; but the fact is as I have stated, and it is highlyprobable, I think, that most wild birds keep themselves free from theselittle torments in the same way. 

Some observations of mine on a species of Orni-thomyia--a flyparasitical on birds--might possibly be of use in considering thequestion of the anomalous position in nature of insects possessing theinstincts and aptitudes of parasites, and organs manifestly modified tosuit a parasitical mode of life, yet compelled and able to exist free, feeding, perhaps, on vegetable juices, or, like the ephemerae, onnothing at all. For it must be borne in mind that I do not assert thatthese "occasional" or "accidental" parasites, as some one calls them, explaining nothing, do not feed on such juices. I do not know what theyfeed on. I only know that the joyful alacrity with which gnats andstinging flies of all kinds abandon the leaves, supposed to afford thempasture, to attack a warm-blooded animal, serves to show how strong theimpulse is, and how ineradicable the instinct, which must have had anorigin. Perhaps the habits of the bird-fly I have mentioned will serveto show how, in some cases, the free life of some blood-sucking fliesand other insects might have originated. 

Kirby and Spence, in their _Introduction, _ mention that one or twospecies of Ornithomyia have been observed flying about and alighting onmen; and in one case the fly extracted blood and was caught, the speciesbeing thus placed beyond doubt. This circumstance led the authors tobelieve that the insect, when the bird it is parasitical on dies, takes to flight and migrates from body to body, occasionally tastingblood until, coming to the right body--to wit, that of a bird, or of aparticular species of bird--it once more establishes itself permanentlyin the plumage. I fancy that the insect sometimes leads a freer life andranges much more than the authors imagined; and I refer to Kirby andSpence, with apologies to those who regard the _Introduction_ as out ofdate, only because I am not aware that we have any later observations onthe subject. 

There is in La Plata a small very common Dendrocolaptine bird--Anumbiusacuticaudatus--much infested by an Ornithomyia, a pretty, pale insect, half the size of a house-fly, and elegantly striped with green. It is avery 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 isunable to rid itself of so undesirable a companion. The bird lives withits 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 isused that the bird is called in the vernacular Leñatero, orFirewood-gatherer. On warm bright days without wind, during the absenceof the birds, I have frequently seen a company of from half a dozen to adozen or fifteen of the parasitical fly wheeling about in the air abovethe nest, hovering and gambolling together, just like house-flies in aroom in summer; but always on the appearance of the birds, returningfrom their feeding-ground, they would instantly drop down and disappearinto the nest. How curious this instinct seems! The fly regards thebird, which affords it the warmth and food essential to life, as itsonly deadly enemy; and with an inherited wisdom, like that of themosquito with regard to the dragon-fly, or of the horse-fly with regardto the Monedula wasp, vanishes like smoke from its presence, and onlyapproaches the bird secretly from a place of concealment. 

The parasitical habit tends inevitably to degrade the species acquiringit, dulling its senses and faculties, especially those of sight andlocomotion; but the Ornithomyia seems an exception, its dependent lifehaving had a contrary effect; the extreme sensitiveness, keenness ofsight, and quickness of the bird having reacted on the insect, giving ita subtlety in its habits and motions almost without a parallel evenamong free insects. A man with a blood-sucking flat-bodied flyingsquirrel, concealing itself among his clothing and gliding and dodgingall over his body with so much artifice and rapidity as to defeat allefforts made to capturo it or knock it off, would be a case parallel tothat of the bird-fly on the small bird. It might be supposed that theFirewood-gatherer, like some ants that keep domestic pets, makes a petof the fly; for it is a very pretty insect, barred with green, and withrainbow reflections on its wings--and birds are believed by sometheorists to possess aesthetic tastes; but the discomfort of having sucha vampire on the body would, I imagine, be too great to allow a kindlyinstinct of that nature to grow up. Moreover, I have on severaloccasions seen the bird making frantic efforts to capture one of theflies, which had incautiously flown up from the nest at the wrongmoment. Bird and fly seem to know each other wonderfully well. 

Here, then, we have a parasitical insect specialized in the highestdegree, yet retaining all its pristine faculties unimpaired, its love ofliberty, and of associating in numbers together for sportive exercises, and well able to take care of itself during its free intervals. Andprobably when thrown on the world, as when nests are blown down, or thebirds get killed, or change their quarters, as they often do, it is ableto exist for some time without avian blood. Let us then imagine some ofthese orphaned colonies, unable to find birds, but through a slightchange in habits or organization able to exist in the imago statewithout sucking blood until they laid their eggs; and succeedinggenerations, still better able to stand the altered conditions of lifeuntil they become practically independent (like gnats), multiplyinggreatly, and disporting themselves in clouds over forests, yet stillretaining the old hunger for blood and the power to draw it, and readyat any moment to return to the ancestral habit. It might be said that ifsuch a result were possible it would have occurred, but that we find noinsect like the Ornithomyia existing independently. With the bird-fly ithas not occurred, as far as we know; but in the past history of someindependent parasites it is possible that something similar to theimaginary case I have sketched may have taken place. The bush-tick is amore highly specialized, certainly a more degraded, creature than thebird-fly, and the very fact of its existence seems to show that it ispossible for even the lowest of the fallen race of parasites to startafresh in life under new conditions, and to reascend in the scale ofbeing, although still bearing about it the marks of former degeneracy. 

The connection between the flea and the mammal it feeds on is even lessclose than that which exists between the Ornithomyia and bird. The factthat 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 greatamount of variability and adaptiveness, as well as a very highantiquity. It has often been reported that fleas have been found hoppingon the ground in desert places, where they could not have been droppedby man or beast; and it has been assumed that these "independent" fleasmust, like gnats and ticks, subsist on vegetable juices. There is nodoubt that they are able to exist and propagate for one or two yearsafter being deprived of their proper aliment; houses shut up for a yearor longer are sometimes found infested with them; possibly in theabsence of "vegetable juices" they flourish on dust. I have neverdetected them hopping on the ground in uninhabited places, although Ionce found them in Patagonia, in a hamlet which had been attacked anddepopulated by the Indians about twenty months before my visit. Onentering one of the deserted huts I found the floor literally swarmingwith fleas, and in less than ten seconds my legs, to the height of myknees, were almost black with their numbers. This proves that they areable toincrease greatly for a period without blood; but I doubt thatthey can go on existing and increasing for an indefinite time; perhapstheir true position, with regard to the parasitical habit, is midwaybetween that of the strict parasite which never leaves the body, andthat of independent parasites like the Culex and the Ixodes, and allthose which are able to exist free for ever, and are parasitical onlywhen the opportunity offers. 

Entomologists regard the flea as a degraded fly. Certainly it is verymuch more degraded than the bird-borne Ornithomyia, with its subtlemotions and instinct, its power of flight and social pastimes. The poorpulex has lost every trace of wings; nevertheless, in its fallencondition it has developed some remarkable qualities and saltatorypowers, which give it a lower kind of glory; and, compared with anotherparasite with which it shares the human species, it is almost a nobleinsect. Darwin has some remarks about the smallness of the brain of anant, assuming that this insect possesses a very high intelligence, but Idoubt very much that the ant, which moves in a groove, is mentally thesuperior of the unsocial flea. The last is certainly the most teachable;and if fleas were generally domesticated and made pets of, probablythere would be as many stories about their marvellous intelligence andfidelity 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 asa comparatively large insect, probably larger than the Ornithomyia. Thatinsect has been able to maintain its existence, without dwindling likethe Leptus into a mere speck, through the great modification in organsand instinct, which adapt it so beautifully to the feathery element inwhich it moves. The bush-tick, wingless from the beginning, anddiverging in another direction, has probably been greatly increased insize by its parasitical habit; this seems proven by the fact, that aslong as it is parasitical on nothing it remains small, but when able tofasten itself to an animal it rapidly developes to a great size. Again, the big globe of its abdomen is coriaceous and elastic, and is probablyas devoid of sensation as a ball of india-rubber. The insect, being madefast by hooks and teeth to its victim, all efforts to remove it onlyincrease the pain it causes; and animals that know it well do notattempt to rub, scratch, or bite it off, therefore the great size andthe conspicuous colour of the tick are positive advantages to it. Theflea, without the subtlety and highly-specialized organs of theOrnithomyia, or the stick-fast powers and leathery body of the Ixodes, can only escape its vigilant enemies by making itself invisible; henceevery variation, i. E. Increase in jumping-power and diminished bulk, tending towards this result, has been taken advantage of by naturalselection. 

CHAPTER XI

HUMBLE-BEES AND OTHER MATTERS. 

Two humble-bees, Bombus thoracicus and B. Violaceus, are found on thepampas; the first, with a primrose yellow thorax, and the extremity ofthe abdomen bright rufous, slightly resembles the English B. Terrestris;the rarer species, which is a trifle smaller than the first, is of auniform intense black, the body having the appearance of velvet, thewings being of a deep violaceous blue. 

A census of the humble-bees in any garden or field always shows that theyellow 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. Inhabits they are almost identical, and when two species so closely alliedare found inhabiting the same locality, it is only reasonable to inferthat one possesses some advantage over the other, and that the leastfavoured species will eventually disappear. In this case, where one sogreatly outnumbers the other, it might be thought that the rarer speciesis dying out, or that, on the contrary, it is a new-comer destined tosupplant the older more numerous species. Yet, during the twenty years Ihave observed them, there has occurred no change in their relativepositions; though both have greatly increased in numbers during thattime, owing to the spread of cultivation. And yet it would scarcely betoo much to expect some marked change in a period so long as that, eventhrough the slow-working agency of natural selection; for it is not asif there had been an exact balance of power between them. In the sameperiod of time I have seen several species, once common, almost or quitedisappear, while others, very low down as to numbers, have been exaltedto the first rank. In insect life especially, these changes have beennumerous, rapid, and widespread. 

In the district where, as a boy, I chased and caught tinamous, and alsochased ostriches, but failed to catch them, the continued presence ofour two humble-bees, sucking the same flowers and making their nests inthe same situations, has remained a puzzle to my mind. 

The site of the nest is usually a slight depression in the soil in theshelter of a cardoon bush. The bees deepen the hollow by burrowing inthe earth; and when the spring foliage sheltering it withers up, theyconstruct a dome-shaped covering of small sticks, thorns, and leavesbitten into extremely minute pieces. They sometimes take possession of asmall hole or cavity in the ground, and save themselves the labour ofexcavation. 

Their architecture closely resembles that of B. Terrestris. They makerudely-shaped oval honey-cells, varying from half an inch to an inch anda half in length, the smaller ones being the first made; later in theseason the old cocoons are utilized for storing honey. The wax ischocolate-coloured, and almost the only difference I can find in theeconomy of the two species is that the black bee uses a large quantityof wax in plastering the interior of its nest. The egg-cell of theyellow bee always contains from twelve to sixteen eggs; that of theblack bee from ten to fourteen; and the eggs of this species are thelargest though the bee is smallest. At the entrance on the edge of themound one bee is usually stationed, and, when approached, it hums ashrill challenge, and throws itself into a menacing attitude. The stingis exceedingly painful. 

One summer I was so fortunate as to discover two nests of the two kindswithin twelve yards of each other, and I resolved to watch them verycarefully, in order to see whether the two species ever came intocollision, as sometimes happens with ants of different species livingclose together. Several times I saw a yellow bee leave its own nest andhover round or settle on the neighbouring one, upon which the sentinelblack bee would attack and drive it off. One day, while watching, I wasdelighted to see a yellow bee actually enter its neighbour's nest, thesentinel being off duty. In about five minutes' time it came out againand flew away unmolested. I concluded from this that humble-bees, liketheir relations of the hive, occasionally plunder each other's sweets. On another occasion I found a black bee dead at the entrance of theyellow bees' nest; doubtless this individual had been caught in the actof stealing honey, and, after it had been stung to death, it had beendragged out and left there as a warning to others with like feloniousintentions. 

There is one striking difference between the two species. The yellow beeis inodorous; the black bee, when angry and attacking, emits anexceedingly powerful odour: curiously enough, this smell is identical incharacter with that made when angry by all the wasps of the SouthAmerican genus Pepris--dark blue wasps with red wings. This odour atfirst produces a stinging sensation on the nerve of smell, but wheninhaled in large measure becomes very nauseating. On one occasion, whileI was opening a nest, several of the bees buzzing round my head andthrusting their stings through the veil I wore for protection, gave outso pungent a smell that I found it unendurable, and was compelled toretreat. 

It seems strange that a species armed with a venomous sting andpossessing the fierce courage of the humble-bee should also have thisrepulsive odour for a protection. It is, in fact, as incongruous as itwould be were our soldiers provided with guns and swords first, andafter 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 emittingpestiferous odours is a mystery; we only see that natural selection has, in some mstances, chiefly among insects, taken advantage of it tofurnish some of the weaker, more unprotected species with a means ofescape from their enemies. The most stinking example I know is that of alarge hairy caterpillar I have found on dry wood in Patagonia, andwhich, when touched, emits an intensely nauseous effluvium. Happily itis very volatile, but while it lasts it is even more detestable thanthat of the skunk. 

The skunk itself offers perhaps the one instance amongst the highervertebrates of an animal in which all the original instincts ofself-preservation have died out, giving place to this lower kind ofprotection. All the other members of the family it belongs to arecunning, swift of foot, and, when overtaken, fierce-tempered and wellable to defend themselves with their powerful well-armed jaws. 

For some occult reason they are provided with a gland charged with amalodorous secretion; and out of this mysterious liquor Nature haselaborated the skunk's inglorious weapon. The skunk alone when attackedmakes no attempt to escape or to defend itself by biting; but, thrown byits agitation into a violent convulsion, involuntarily discharges itsfoetid liquor into the face of an opponent. When this animal had onceceased to use so good a weapon as its teeth in defending itself, degenerating at the same time into a slow-moving creature, without fearand without cunning, the strength and vileness of its odour would becontinually increased by the cumulative process of natural selection:and how effective the protection has become is shown by the abundance ofthe species throughout the whole American continent. It is lucky formankind--especially for naturalists and sportsmen--that other specieshave not been improved in the same direction. 

But what can we say of the common deer of the pampas (Cervuscampestris), the male of which gives out an effluvium quite asfar-reaching although not so abominable in character as that of theMephitis? It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human nostril when theperfumer of the wilderness is not even in sight. Yet it is not aprotection; on the contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzlingwhite 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 veryabundant; 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 powerfulsmell of the male deer; and, after some hesitation, I have determined toset it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, as he thinksproper. I neither believe nor disbelieve it; for although I do not putgreat faith in gaucho natural history, my own observations have notinfrequently confirmed statements of theirs, which a sceptical personwould have regarded as wild indeed. To give one instance: I heard agaucho relate that while out riding he had been pursued for aconsiderable distance by a large spider; his hearers laughed at him fora romancer; but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, both when onfoot and on horseback, by a large wolf-spider, common on the pampas, Idid not join in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of C. Campestrisis abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just as pyrethrum powder is to mostinsects, 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. Inplaces where venomous snakes are extremely abundant, as in the Sierradistrict on the southern pampas of Buenos Ayres, the gaucho frequentlyties a strip of the male deer's skin, which retains its powerful odourfor an indefinite time, round the neck of a valuable horse as aprotection. It is certain that domestic animals are frequently lost herethrough snake-bites. The most common poisonous species--theCraspedo-cephalus alternatus, called _Vivora de la Cruz_ in thevernacular--has neither bright colour nor warning rattle to keep offheavy hoofs, and is moreover of so sluggish a temperament that it willallow itself to be trodden on before stirring, with the result that itsfangs are not infrequently struck into the nose or foot of browsingbeast. Considering, then, the conditions in which C. Campestris isplaced--and it might also be supposed that venomous snakes have in pasttimes been much more numerous than they are now--it is not impossible tobelieve that the powerful smell it emits has been made protective, especially when we see in other species how repulsive odours have beenturned to account by the principle of natural selection. 

After all, perhaps the wild naturalist of the pampas knows what he isabout when he ties a strip of deer-skin to the neck of his steed andturns him loose to graze among the snakes. 

The gaucho also affirms that the deer cherishes a wonderful animosityagainst snakes; that it becomes greatly excited when it sees one, andproceeds at once to destroy it; _they say, _ by running round and roundit in a circle, emitting its violent smell in larger measure, until thesnake dies of suffocation. It is hard to believe that the effect can beso great; but that the deer is a snake hater and killer is certainlytrue: in North America, Ceylon, and other districts deer have beenobserved excitedly leaping on serpents, and killing them with theirsharp cutting hoofs. 

CHAPTER XII. 

A NOBLE WASP. 

_(Monedula punctata. )_

Naturalists, like kings and emperors, have their favourites, and as myzoological sympathies, which are wider than my knowledge, embrace allclasses of beings, there are of course several insects for which I havea special regard; a few in each of the principal orders. My chieffavourite among the hymenopteras is the one representative of thecurious genus Monedula known in La Plata. It is handsome and hasoriginal habits, but it is specially interesting to me for anotherreason: I can remember the time when it was extremely rare on thepampas, so rare that in boyhood the sight of one used to be a greatevent to me; and I have watched its rapid increase year by year till ithas come to be one of our commonest species. Its singular habits andintelligence give it a still better claim to notice. It is a big, showy, loud-buzzing insect, with pink head and legs, wings with brownreflections, and body encircled with alternate bands of black and palegold, and has a preference for large composite flowers, on the honey ofwhich it feeds. Its young is, however, an insect-eater; but the Moneduladoes not, like other burrowing or sand wasps, put away a store ofinsects or spiders, partially paralyzed, as a provision for the grubtill it reaches the pupa state; it actually supplies the grub withfresh-caught insects as long as food is required, killing the prey itcaptures 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 excavatesfor itself on a bare hard piece of ground, and many holes are usuallyfound close together. When the grub--for I have never been able to findmore than one in a hole--has come out from the egg, the parent begins tobring in insects, carefully filling up the mouth of the hole with looseearth after every visit. Without this precaution, which entails a vastamount of labour, I do not believe one grub out of every fifty wouldsurvive, so overrun are these barren spots of ground used asbreeding-places with hunting spiders, ants, and tiger-beetles. The grubis a voracious eater, but the diligent mother brings in as much as itcan devour. I have often found as many as six or seven insects, apparently fresh killed, and not yet touched by the pampered littleglutton, coiled up in the midst of them waiting for an appetite. 

The Monedula is an adroit fly-catcher, for though it kills numbers offire-flies and other insects, flies are always preferred, possiblybecause they are so little encumbered with wings, and are also moreeasily devoured. It occasionally captures insects on the wing, but themore usual method is to pounce down on its prey when it is at rest. Atone time, before I had learnt their habits, I used frequently to bestartled by two or three or more of these wasps rushing towards my face, and continuing hovering before it, loudly buzzing, attending me in mywalks about the fields. The reason of this curious proceeding is thatthe Monedula preys largely on stinging flies, having learnt fromexperience that the stinging fly will generally neglect its own safetywhen it has once fastened on a good spot to draw blood from. When a manor horse stands perfectly motionless the wasps take no notice, but themoment any movement is made of hand, tail, or stamping hoof, they rushto the rescue, expecting to find a stinging fly. On the other hand, thehorse has learnt to know and value this fly-scourge, and will stand veryquietly with half a dozen loud Avasps hovering in an alarming mannerclose to his head, well knowing that every fly that settles on him willbe instantly snatched away, and that the boisterous Monedula is a betterprotection even than the tail--which, by the way, the horse wears verylong in Buenos Ayres. 

I have, in conclusion, to relate an incident I onco witnessed, and whichdoes not show the Monedula in a very amiable light. I was leaning over agate watching one of these wasps feeding on a sunflower. A smallleaf-cutting bee was hurrying about with its shrill busy hum in thevicinity, and in due time came to the sunflower and settled on it. TheMonedula became irritated, possibly at the shrill voice and bustlingmanner of its neighbour, and, after watching it for a few moments on theflower, deliberately rushed at and drove it off. The leaf-cutter quicklyreturned, however--for bees are always extremely averse to leaving aflower unexplored--but was again driven away with threats anddemonstrations on the part of the Monedula. The little thing went offand sunned itself on a leaf for a time, then returned to the flower, only to be instantly ejected again. Other attempts were made, but thebig wasp now kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, andwould not allow it to come within several inches of the flower withoutthrowing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee retired tosun itself once more, apparently determined to wait for the big tyrantto go away; but the other seemed to know what was wanted, and spitefullymade up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter then gave up thecontest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it hovered, hawk-like, abovethe Monedula for a moment, then pounced down on its back, and clungthere, furiously biting, until its animosity was thoroughly appeased;then it flew off, leaving the other master of the field certainly, butgreatly discomposed, and perhaps seriously injured about the base of thewings. I was rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for aleaf-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 theface of mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale oforganization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything sointelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "whichimplies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the person(or bee) offended?" According to Bain _(Mental and Moral Science)_ onlythe highest animals--stags and bulls he mentions-can be credited withthe developed form of anger, which, he describes as an excitement causedby pain, reaching the centres of activity, and containing an impulseknowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if manonly is meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel ofgunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the breast ofnearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high according to Bain, though I myself should place him nearly on a level mentally with themajority of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable ofa wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag canmanifestly have no associations, personal or political, for the bull, shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another instance ofmisdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar . As that of the bulland red rag, is used as an illustration by one of the prophets: "Myheritage is unto me as a speckled bird; the birds round, about areagainst it. " I have frequently seen the birds of a thicket gather roundsome singularly marked accidental visitor, and finally drive him withgreat anger from the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in alittle here, since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured ormarked, might be looked on as a bird of prey. 

The flesh-fly laying its eggs on the carrion-flower is only a strikinginstance of the mistakes all instincts are liable to, never moremarkedly than in the inherited tendency to fits of frenzied excitement:the feeling is frequently excited by the wrong object, and explodes atinopportune 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 familypossessing the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks ofother insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirbyand Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all theattention it would receive from modern entomologists: just at presentany observer who lived in the pre-Darwin days is regarded as one of theancients. The reasons given for the notion or theory in the celebrated_Introduction to Entomology_ were not conclusive; nevertheless it wasnot an improbable supposition of the authors'; while the theory whichhas taken its place in recent zoological writings seems in every wayeven less satisfactory. 

Let us first examine the antiquated theory, as it must now be called. Bybringing a raptorial insect and a firefly together, we find that theflashing light of the latter does actually scare away the former, and istherefore, for the moment, a protection as effectual as the camp-firethe traveller lights in a district abounding with beasts of prey. Notwithstanding this fact, and assuming that we have here the wholereason of the existence of the light-emitting power, a study of thefirefly's habits compels us to believe that the insect would be just aswell off without the power as with it. Probably it experiences somepleasure in emitting flashes of light during its evening pastimes, butthis could scarcely be considered an advantage in its struggle forexistence, and it certainly does not account for the possession of thefaculty. 

About the habits of Pyrophorus, the large tropical firefly which has theseat of its luminosity on the upper surface of the thorax, nothingdefinite appears to be known; but it has been said that this instinct isaltogether nocturnal. The Pyrophorus is only found in the sub-tropicalportion of the Argentine country, and I have never met with it. With thewidely-separated Cratomorphus, and the tortoise-shaped Aspisoma, whichemit the light from the abdomen, I am familiar; one species ofCratomorphus--a long slender insect with yellow wing-cases marked withtwo parallel black lines--is "the firefly" known to every one andexcessively abundant in the southern countries of La Plata. This insectis strictly diurnal in its habits--as much so, in fact, as diurnalbutterflies. They are seen flying about, wooing their mates, and feedingon composite and umbelliferous flowers at all hours of the day, and areas active as wasps during the full glare of noon. Birds do not feed onthem, owing to the disagreeable odour, resembling that of phosphorus, they emit, and probably because they are to be uneatable; but theirinsect enemies are not so squeamish, and devour them readily, just asthey also do the blister-fly, which one would imagine a morsel fitted todisagree with any stomach. One of their enemies is the Monedula wasp;another, a fly, of the rapacious Asilidas family; and this fly is also awasp in appearance, having a purple body and bright red wings, like aPepris, and this mimetic resemblance doubtless serves it as a protectionagainst birds. A majority of raptorial insects are, however, nocturnal, and from all these enemies that go about under cover of night, thefirefly, as Kirby and Spence rightly conjectured, protects itself, orrather is involuntarily protected, by means of its frequent flashinglight. We are thus forced to the conclusion that, while the common housefly and many other diurnal insects spend a considerable portion of thedaylight in purely sportive exercises, the firefly, possessing in itslight a protection from nocturnal enemies, puts off its pastimes untilthe evening; then, when its carnival of two or three hours' duration isover, retires also to rest, putting out its candle, and so exposingitself to the dangers which surround other diurnal species during thehours of darkness. I have spoken of the firefly's pastimes advisedly, for I have really never been able to detect it doing anything in theevening 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 unsatisfactorydoes the explanation seem. That the firefly should have become possessedof so elaborate a machinery, producing incidentally such splendidresults, merely as a protection against one set of enemies for a portiononly of the period during which they are active, is altogetherincredible. 

The current theory, which we owe to Belt, is a prettier one. Certaininsects (also certain Batrachians, reptiles, &c. ) are unpalatable to therapacious kinds; it is therefore a direct advantage to these unpalatablespecies to be distinguishable from all the persecuted, and the moreconspicuous and well-known they are, the less likely are they to bemistaken by birds, insectivorous mammals, &c. , for eatable kinds andcaught or injured. Hence we find that many such species have acquiredfor their protection very brilliant or strongly-contrastedcolours--warning colours--which insect-eaters come to know. 

The firefly, a soft-bodied, slow-flying insect, is easily caught andinjured, 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 towarn enemies---birds, bats, and rapacious insects--that it is uneatable. 

The theory of warning colours is an excellent one, but it has beenpushed too far. We have seen that one of the most common fireflies isdiurnal in habits, or, at any rate, that it performs all the importantbusiness of its life by day, when it has neither bright colour nor lightto warn its bird enemies; and out of every hundred species ofinsect-eating birds at least ninety-nine are diurnal. Raptorial insects, as I have said, feed freely on fireflies, so that the supposed warningis not for them, and it would be hard to believe that the magnificentdisplay made by luminous insects is useful only in preventing accidentalinjuries to them from a few crepuscular bats and goatsuckers. And tobelieve even this we should first have to assume that bats andgoatsuckers are differently constituted from all other creatures; for inother animals--insects, birds, and mammalians--the appearance of fire bynight 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 thebrilliant colours of some butterflies, or even of the gestures of somevenomous snakes, and of the sounds they emit. 

Thus we can see that, while the old theory of Kirby and Spence had somefacts to support it, the one now in vogue is purely fanciful. Until somebetter suggestion is made, it would perhaps be as well to consider theluminous organ as having "no very close and direct relation to presenthabits of life. " About their present habits, however, especially theircrepuscular habits, there is yet much to learn. One thing I haveobserved in them has always seemed very strange to me. Occasionally anindividual insect is seen shining with a very large and steady light, orwith a light which very gradually decreases and increases in power, andat such times it is less active than at others, remaining for longintervals motionless on the leaves, or moving with a very slow flight. In South America a firefly displaying this abnormal splendour is said tobe dying, and it is easy to imagine how such a notion originated. Thebelief is, however, erroneous, for sometimes, on very rare occasions, all the insects in one place are simultaneously affected in the sameway, and at such times they mass themselves together in myriads, as iffor migration, or for some other great purpose. Mr. Bigg-Wither, inSouth Brazil, and D'Albertis, in New Guinea, noticed these fireflygatherings; I also once had the rare good fortune to witness aphenomenon of the kind on a very grand scale. Riding on the pampas onedark evening an hour after sunset, and passing from high groundovergrown with giant thistles to a low plain covered with long grass, bordering a stream of water, I found it all ablaze with myriads offireflies. I noticed that all the insects gave out an exceptionallylarge, brilliant light, which shone almost steadily. The long grass wasthickly studded with them, while they literally swarmed in the air, allmoving up the valley with a singularly slow and languid flight. When Igalloped down into this river of phosphorescent fire, my horse plungedand snorted with alarm. I succeeded at length in quieting him, and thenrode slowly through, compelled to keep my mouth and eyes closed, sothickly did the insects rain on to my face. The air was laden with thesickening phosphorous smell they emit, but when I had once got free ofthe broad fiery zone, stretching away on either hand for miles along themoist valley, I stood still and gazed back for some time on a scene themost wonderful and enchanting I have ever witnessed. 

The fascinating and confusing effect which the appearance of fire atnight has on animals is a most interesting subject; and although it isnot probable that anything very fresh remains to be said about it, I amtempted to add here the results of my own experience. 

When travelling by night, I have frequently been struck with thebehaviour of my horse at the sight of natural fire, or appearance offire, always so different from that caused by the sight of fireartificially created. The steady gleam from the open window or door of adistant house, or even the unsteady wind-tossed flame of some lonelycamp-fire, has only served to rouse a fresh spirit in him and the desireto reach it; whereas those infrequent displays of fire which natureexhibits, such as lightning, or the ignis fatuus, or even a cloud offireflies, has always produced a disquieting effect. Experience hasevidently taught the domestic horse to distinguish a light kindled byman from all others; and, knowing its character, he is just as well ableas his rider to go towards it without experiencing that confusion ofmind caused by a glare in the darkness, the origin and nature of whichis a mystery. The artificially-lighted fire is to the horse only thepossible goal of the journey, and is associated with the thought of restand food. Wild animals, as a rule, at any rate in thinly-settleddistricts, do not know the meaning of any fire; it only excitescuriosity and fear in them; and they are most disturbed at the sight offires made by man, which are brighter and steadier than most naturalfires. We can understand this sensation in animals, since we ourselvesexperience a similar one (although in a less degree and not associatedwith fear) in the effect which mere brightness has on us, both by dayand night. 

On riding across the monotonous grey Patagonian uplands, where often forhours one sees not the faintest tinge of bright colour, the intenseglowing crimson of a cactus-fruit, or the broad shining white bosom ofthe Patagonian eagle-buzzard (Buteo erythronotus), perched on the summitof a distant bush, has had a strangely fascinating effect on me, so thatI have been unable to take my eyes off it as long as it continued beforeme. Or in passing through extensive desolate marshes, the dazzling whiteplumage of a stationary egret has exercised the same attraction. Atnight we experience the sensation in a greater degree, when the silversheen of the moon makes a broad path on the water; or when a meteorleaves a glowing track across the sky; while a still more familiarinstance is seen in the powerful attraction on the sight of glowingembers in a darkened room. The mere brightness, or vividness of thecontrast, fascinates the mind; but the effect on man is comparativelyweak, owing to his fiery education and to his familiarity with brilliantdyes artificially obtained from nature. How strong this attraction ofmere brightness, even where there is no mystery about it, is to wildanimals is shown by birds of prey almost invariably singling out whiteor bright-plumaged birds for attack where bright and sober-colouredkinds are mingled together. By night the attraction is immeasurablygreater than by day, and the light of a fire steadily gazed at quicklyconfuses the mind. The fires which, travellers make for their protectionactually serve to attract the beasts of prey, but the confusion and fearcaused by the bright glare makes it safe for the traveller to lie downand sleep in the light. Mammals do not lose their heads altogether, because they are walking on firm ground where muscular exertion and anexercise of judgment are necessary at every step; whereas birds floatingbuoyantly and with little effort through the air are quickly bewildered. Incredible numbers of migratory birds kill them-selves by dashingagainst the windows of lighthouses; on bright moonlight nights thevoyagers are comparatively safe; but during dark cloudy weather theslaughter is very great; over six hundred birds were killed by strikinga lighthouse in Central America in a single night. On insects the effectis the same as on the higher animals: on the ground they are attractedby the light, but keep, like wolves and tigers, at a safe distance fromit; when rushing through the air and unable to keep their eyes from itthey 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 brightlight affects me far more powerfully than when I am trudging along onfoot. A person mounted on a bicycle and speeding over a level plain on adark night, with nothing to guide him except the idea of the directionin his mind, would be to some extent in the position of the migratorybird. An exceptionally brilliant ignis fatuus flying before him wouldaffect him as the gleam of a lamp placed high above the surface affectsthe migrants: he would not be able to keep his eyes from it, but wouldquickly lose the sense of direction, and probably end his career much asthe bird does, by breaking his machine and perhaps his bones againstsome 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-usedroom, I disturbed a large black spider. Rushing forth, just in time tosave itself from destruction through the capsizing of a pile of books, it paused for one moment, took a swift comprehensive glance at theposition, then scuttled away across the floor, and was lost in anobscure corner of the room. This incident served to remind me of a factI was nearly forgetting, that England is not a spiderless country. Aforeigner, however intelligent, coming from warmer regions, might veryeasily make that mistake. In Buenos Ayres, the land of my nativity, earth teems with these interesting little creatures. They abound in andon the water, they swarm in the grass and herbage, which everywhereglistens with the silvery veil they spin over it. Indeed it is scarcelyan exaggeration to say that there is an atmosphere of spiders, for theyare always floating about invisible in the air; their filmy threads areunfelt when they fly against you; and often enough you are not evenaware of the little arrested aeronaut hurrying over your face with feetlighter than the lightest thistledown. 

It is somewhat strange that although, where other tribes of livingcreatures are concerned, I am something of a naturalist, spiders I havealways observed and admired in a non-scientific spirit, and this must bemy excuse for mentioning the habits of some spiders without giving theirspecific names--an omission always vexing to the severely-technicalnaturalist. They have ministered to the love of the beautiful, thegrotesque, and the marvellous in me; but I have never _collected_ aspider, and if I wished to preserve one should not know how to do it. Ihave been "familiar with the face" of these monsters so long that I haveeven learnt to love them; and I believe that if Emerson rightly predictsthat spiders are amongst the things to be expelled from earth by theperfected man of the future, then a great charm and element of interestwill be lost to nature. Though loving them, I cannot, of course, feelthe same degree of affection towards all the members of so various afamily. The fairy gossamer, scarce seen, a creature of wind andsunshine; the gem-like Epeira in the centre of its Starry web; even theterrestrial Salticus, with its puma-like strategy, certainly appeal moreto our aesthetic feelings than does the slow heavy Mygale, looking at adistance of twenty yards away, as he approaches you, like a giganticcockroach mounted on stilts. The rash fury with which the femalewolf-spider defends her young is very admirable; but the admiration sheexcites is mingled with other feelings when we remember that the bravemother proves to her consort a cruel and cannibal spouse. 

Possibly my affection for spiders is due in a great measure to thecompassion I have always felt for them. Pity, 'tis said, is akin tolove; and who can help experiencing that tender emotion that considersthe heavy affliction nature has laid on the spiders in compensation forthe paltry drop of venom with which she, unasked, endowed them! Andhere, of course, I am alluding to the wasps. These insects, with arefinement of cruelty, prefer not to kill their victims outright, butmerely maim them, then house them in cells where the grubs can vivisectthem at leisure. This is one of those revolting facts the fastidioussoul cannot escape from in warm climates; for in and out of open windowsand doors, all day long, all the summer through, comes the busybeautiful mason-wasp. A long body, wonderfully slim at the waist, brightyellow legs and thorax, and a dark crimson abdomen, --what object can beprettier to look at? But in her life this wasp is not beautiful. Athome in summer they were the pests of my life, for nothing would serveto keep them out. One day, while we were seated at dinner, a clay nest, which a wasp had succeeded in completing unobserved, detached itselffrom the ceiling and fell with a crash on to the table, where it wasshattered to pieces, scattering a shower of green half-living spidersround it. I shall never forget the feeling of intense repugnance Iexperienced at the sight, coupled with detestation of the pretty butcruel little architect. There is, amongst our wasps, even a moreaccomplished spider-scourge than the mason-wasp, and I will here give abrief account of its habits. On the grassy pampas, dry bare spots ofsoil are resorted to by a class of spiders that either make or takelittle holes in the ground to reside in, and from which they rush forthto seize their prey. They also frequently sit inside their dens andpatiently wait there for the intrusion of some bungling insect. Now, insummer, to a dry spot of ground like this, comes a small wasp, scarcelylonger than a blue-bottle fly, body and wings of a deep shining purplishblue colour, with only a white mark like a collar on the thorax. Itflirts its blue wings, hurrying about here and there, and is extremelyactive, and of a slender graceful figure--the type of an assassin. Itvisits and explores every crack and hole in the ground, and, if youwatch it attentively, you will at length see it, on arriving at a hole, give a little start backwards. It knows that a spider lies concealedwithin. Presently, having apparently matured a plan of attack, itdisappears into the hole and remains there for some time. Then, justwhen you are beginning to think that the little blue explorer has beentrapped, out it rushes, flying in terror, apparently, from the spiderwho issues close behind in hot pursuit; but, before they are threeinches away from the hole, quick as lightning the wasp turns on itsfollower, and the two become locked together in a deadly embrace. Looking like one insect, they spin rapidly round for a few moments, thenup springs the wasp--victorious. The wretched victim is not dead; itslegs move a little, but its soft body is paralyzed, and lies collapsed, flabby, and powerless as a stranded jellyfish. And this is theinvariable result of every such conflict. In other classes of beings, even the weakest hunted thing occasionally succeeds in inflicting painon its persecutor, and the small trembling mouse, unable to save itself, can sometimes make the cat shriek with paiu; but there is no weak spotin 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 mostiniquitous part of the proceeding. When the wasp has sufficiently restedafter the struggle, it deliberately drags the disabled spider back intoits own hole, and, having packed it away at the extremity, lays an eggalongside of it, then, coming out again, gathers dust and rubbish withwhich it fills up and obliterates the hole; and, having thus concludedits Machiavellian task, it flies cheerfully off in quest of anothervictim. 

The extensive Epeira family supply the mason-wasps and otherspider-killers with the majority of their victims. These spiders havesoft, plump, succulent bodies like pats of butter; they inhabit treesand bushes chiefly, where their geometric webs-betray their whereabouts;they are timid, comparatively innocuous, and reluctant to quit theshelter of their green bower, made of a rolled-up leaf; so that thereare many reasons why they should be persecuted. They exhibit a greatvariety of curious forms; many are also very richly coloured; but eventheir brightest hues--orange, silver, scarlet--have not been givenwithout regard to the colouring of their surroundings. Green-leafedbushes arc frequented by vividly green Epeiras, but the imitativeresemblance does not quite end here. The green spider's method ofescape, when the bush is roughly shaken, is to drop itself down on theearth, where it lies simulating death. In falling, it drops just as agreen leaf would drop, that is, not quite so rapidly as a round, solidbody 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 ofa vivid green, it is of a faded yellowish white--the exact hue of adead, dried-up leaf. This spider, when it lets itself drop--for it hasthe same protective habit as the other--falls not so rapidly as a greenfreshly broken off leaf or as the green spider would fall, but with aslower motion, precisely like a leaf withered up till it has becomealmost light as a feather. It is not difficult to imagine how this comesabout: either a thicker line, or a greater stiffness or tenacity of theviscid fluid composing the web and attached to the point the spiderdrops from, causes one to fall slower than the other. But how manytentative variations in the stiffness of the web material must therehave been before the precise degree was attained enabling the twodistinct species, differing in colour, to complete their resemblance tofalling leaves--a fresh green leaf in one case and a dead, withered leafin the other!

The Tetragnatha--a genus of the Epeira family, and known also inEngland--are small spiders found on the margin of streams. Their bodiesare slender, oblong, and resembling a canoe in shape; and when they sitlengthwise on a stem or blade of grass, their long, hair-like legsarranged straight before and behind them, it is difficult to detectthem, so closely do they resemble a discoloured stripe on the herbage. Aspecies of Tetragnatha with a curious modification of structure aboundson the pampas. The long leg of this spider is no thicker than a bristlefrom 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 foundin herbage overhanging the borders of streams: they are very numerous, and, having a pugnacious temper, are incessantly quarrelling; and itfrequently happens that in these encounters, or where they are pursuingeach other through the leaves, they drop into the water below. Ibelieve, in fact, that they often drop themselves purposely into it asthe readiest means of escape when hard pressed. When this happens, theadvantage of the modified structure of the legs is seen. The fallenspider, sitting boat-like on the surface, throws out its long legs, and, dipping the broad ends into the water, literally rows itself rapidly toland. 

The gossamer-spider, most spiritual of living things, of which there arenumerous species, some extremely beautiful in colouring and markings, isthe most numerous of our spiders. Only when the declining sun flings abroad track of shiny silver light on the plain does one get some faintconception of the unnumbered millions of these buoyant little creaturesbusy weaving their gauzy veil over the earth and floating unseen, likean ethereal vital dust, in the atmosphere. 

This spider carries within its diminutive abdomen a secret which willpossibly serve to vex subtle intellects for a long time to come; for itis hard to believe that merely by mechanical force, even aided bycurrents of air, a creature half as big as a barley grain caninstantaneously snoot out filaments twenty or thirty inches long, and bymeans of which it floats itself in the air. 

Naturalists are now giving a great deal of attention to the migrationsof birds in different parts of the world: might not insect and spidermigrations be included with advantage to science in their observations?The common notion is that the gossamer makes use of its unique method oflocomotion, only to shift its quarters, impelled by want of food orunfavourable conditions--perhaps only by a roving disposition. I believethat besides these incessant flittings about from place to placethroughout the summer the gossamer-spiders have great periodicalmigrations which are, as a rule, in-visible, since a single floating webcannot be remarked, and each individual rises and floats away by itselffrom its own locality when influenced by the instinct. When greatnumbers of spiders rise up simultaneously over a large area, then, sometimes, the movement forces itself on our attention; for at suchtimes the whole sky may be filled with visible masses of floating web. All the great movements of gossamers I have observed have occurred inthe autumn, or, at any rate, several weeks after the summer solstice;and, like the migrations of birds at the same season of the year, havebeen in a northerly direction. I do not assert or believe that themigratory instinct in the gossamer is universal. In a moist island, likeEngland, for instance, where the condition of the atmosphere is seldomfavourable, and where the little voyagers would often be blown byadverse winds to perish far out at sea, it is difficult to believe thatsuch migrations take place. But where they inhabit a vast area of land, as in South America, extending without interruption from the equator tothe cold Magellanic regions, and where there is a long autumn of dry, hot weather, then such an instinct as migration might have beendeveloped. For this is not a faculty merely of a few birds: the impulseto 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 widelythroughout animated nature. On the continent of Europe it also seemsprobable that a great autumnal movement of these spiders takes place;although, I must confess, I have no grounds for this statement, exceptthat the floating gossamer is called in Germany "Der fliegenderSummer"--the flying or departing summer. 

I have stated that all migrations of gossamers I have witnessed havebeen in the autumn; excepting in one instance, these flights occurredwhen the weather was still hot and dry. The exceptionally late migrationwas on March 22--a full month after the departure of martins, humming-birds, flycatchers, and most other true bird-migrants. It struckme as being so remarkable, and seems to lend so much force to the idea Ihave suggested, that I wish to give here an exact copy of the entriesmade at the time and on the spot in my notebook. 

"March 22. This afternoon, while I was out shooting, thegossamer-spiders presented an appearance quite new to me. Walking alonga stream (the Conchitas, near Buenos Ayres), I noticed a broad whiteline skirting the low wet ground. This I found was caused by gossamerweb lying in such quantities over the earth as almost to hide the grassad thistles under it. The white zone was about twenty yards wide, andoutside it only a few scattered webs were visible on the grass; itsexact length I did not ascertain, but followed it for about two mileswithout finding the end. The spiders were so numerous that theycontinually baulked one another in their efforts to rise in the air. Assoon as one threw out its lines they would become entangled with thoseof another spider, lanced out at the same moment; both spiders wouldimmediately seem to know the cause of the trouble, for as soon as theirlines fouled they would rush angrily towards each other, each trying todrive the other from the elevation. Notwithstanding these difficulties, numbers were continually floating off on the breeze which blew from thesouth. 

"I noticed three distinct species: one with a round scarlet body;another, velvet black, with large square cephalothorax and small pointedabdomen; the third and most abundant kind were of different shades ofolive green, and varied greatly in size, the largest being fully aquarter of an inch in length. Apparently these spiders had been drivenup from the low ground along the stream where it was wet, and hadcongregated 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 mysurprise I found them in greatly increased numbers: on the tops ofcardoons, posts, and other elevated situations they were literally lyingtogether in heaps. Most of them were large and of the olive-colouredspecies; their size had probably prevented them from getting awayearlier, but they were now floating off in great numbers, the weatherbeing calm and tolerably dry. To-day I noticed a new species with a greybody, elegantly striped with black, and pink legs--a very pretty spider. 

"26th. Went again to-day and found that the whole vast army ofgossamers, with the exception of a few stragglers sitting on posts anddry stalks, had vanished. They had taken advantage of the short spell offine weather we are now having, after an unusually wet and boisterousautumn, to make their escape. "

Here it seemed to me that a conjunction of circumstances--first, theunfavourable season preventing migration at the proper time, andsecondly, the strip of valley out of which the spiders had been drivento the higher ground till they were massed together--only served to makevisible and evident that a vast annual migration takes place which wehave only to look closely for to discover. 

One of the most original spiders in Buenos Ayres--mentally original, Imean--is a species of Pholcus; a quiet, inoffensive creature found inhouses, and so abundant that they literally swarm where they are notfrequently swept away from ceilings and obscure corners. Certainly itseems a poor spider after the dynamical and migratory gossamer; but ithappens, curiously enough, that a study of the habits of this dustydomestic creature leads us incidentally into the realms of fable andromance. It is remarkable for the extreme length of its legs, andresembles in colour and general appearance a crane fly, but is doublethe size of that insect. It has a singular method of protecting itself:when attacked or approached even, gathering its feet together andfastening them to the centre of its web, it swings itself round andround with the velocity of a whirligig, so that it appears like a miston the web, offering no point for an enemy to strike at. "When a fly iscaptured the spider approaches it cautiously and spins a web round it, continually narrowing the circle it describes, until the victim isinclosed in a cocoon-like covering. This is a common method withspiders; but the intelligence--for I can call it by no other word--ofthe Pholcus has supplemented this instinctive procedure with a verycurious and unique habit. The Pholcus, in spite of its size, is a weakcreature, possessing little venom to despatch its prey with, so that itmakes a long and laborious task of killing a fly. A fly when caught ina web is a noisy creature, and it thus happens that when theDaddylonglegs--as Anglo-Argentines have dubbed this species--succeeds insnaring a captive the shrill outrageous cries of the victim are heardfor a long time--often for ten or twelve minutes. This noise greatlyexcites other spiders in the vicinity, and presently they are seenquitting their webs and flurrying to the scene of conflict. Sometimesthe captor is driven off, and then the strongest or most daring spidercarries away the fly. But where a large colony are allowed to continuefor a long time in undisturbed possession of a ceiling, when one hascaught 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 aline at a distance of two or three feet from the ceiling. The otherspiders arrive on the scene, and after a short investigation retreat totheir own webs, and when the coast is clear our spider proceeds to drawup the captive fly, which is by this time exhausted with its struggles. "

Now, I have repeatedly remarked that all spiders, when the shrillhumming of an insect caught in a web is heard near them, becomeagitated, like the Pholcus, and will, in the same way, quit their ownwebs and hurry to the point the sound proceeds from. This fact convincedme many years ago that spiders are attracted by the sound of musicalinstruments, such as violins, concertinas, guitars, &c. , simply becausethe sound produces the same effect on them as the shrill buzzing of acaptive fly. I have frequently seen spiders come down walls or fromceilings, attracted by the sound of a guitar, softly played; and bygently touching metal strings, stretched on a piece of wood, I havesucceeded in attracting spiders on to the strings, within two or threeinches of my fingers; and I always noticed that the spiders seemed to beeagerly searching for something which they evidently expected to findthere, moving about in an excited manner and looking very hungry andfierce. I have no doubt that Pelisson's historical spider in theBastille came down in a mood and with a manner just as ferocious whenthe prisoner called it with musical sounds to be fed. 

The spiders I have spoken of up till now are timid, inoffensivecreatures, chiefly of the Epeira family; but there are many othersexceedingly high-spirited and, like some of the most touchyhymenopteras, always prepared to "greatly quarrel" over matters oflittle moment. The Mygales, of which we have several species, are not tobe treated with contempt. One is extremely abundant on the pampas, theMygale fusca, a veritable monster, covered with dark brown hair, andcalled in the vernacular _aranea peluda_--hairy spider. In the hotmonth of December these spiders take to roaming about on the open plain, and are then everywhere seen travelling in a straight line with a sloweven pace. They are very great in attitudes, and when one is approachedit immediately throws itself back, like a pugilist preparing for anencounter, and stands up so erect on its four hind feet that the undersurface of its body is displayed. Humble-bees are commonly supposed tocarry the palm in attitudinizing; and it is wonderful to see thegrotesque motions of these irascible insects when their nest isapproached, elevating their abdomens and two or three legs at a time, sothat they resemble a troupe of acrobats balancing themselves on theirheads or hands, and kicking their legs about in the air. And to impressthe intruder with the dangerous significance of this display they hum ashrill warning or challenge, and stab at the air with their nakedstings, from which limpid drops of venom are seen to exude. Thesethreatening gestures probably have an effect. In the case of the hairyspider, I do not think any creature, however stupid, could mistake itsmeaning 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 nativewoman 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 aLycosa of extraordinary size, light grey in colour, with a black ringround its middle. It is active and swift, and irritable to such a degreethat one can scarcely help thinking that in this species nature hasovershot her mark. 

When a person passes near one--say, within three or four yards of itslurking-place--it starts up and gives chase, and will often follow for adistance of thirty or forty yards. I came once very nearly being bittenby one of these savage creatures Riding at an easy trot over the drygrass, I suddenly observed a spider pursuing me, leaping swiftly alongand keeping up with my beast. I aimed a blow with my whip, and the pointof the lash struck the ground close to it, when it instantly leaped uponand ran up the lash, and was actually within three or four inches of myhand when I flung the whip from me. 

The gauchos have a very quaint ballad which tells that the city ofCordova was once invaded by an army of monstrous spiders, and that thetownspeople went out with beating drums and flags flying to repel theinvasion, and that after firing several volleys they were forced to turnand fly for their lives. I have no doubt that a sudden great increase ofthe 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 singlecombat of a very terrible nature I once witnessed between two littlespiders belong-ing to the same species. One had a small web against awall, and of this web the other coveted possession. After vainly tryingby a series of strategic movements to drive out the lawful owner, itrushed on to the web, and the two envenomed httle duellists closed inmortal combat. They did nothing so vulgar and natural as to make use oftheir falces, and never once actually touched each other, but the fightwas none the less deadly. Rapidly revolving about, or leaping over, orpassing under, each other, each endeavoured to impede or entangle hisadversary, and the dexterity with which each avoided the cunninglythrown snare, trying at the same time to entangle its opponent, waswonderful to see. At length, after this equal battle had raged for sometime, one of the combatants made some fatal mistake, and for a momentthere occurred a break in his motions; instantly the other perceived hisadvantage, and began leaping backwards and forwards across hisstruggling adversary with such rapidity as to confuse the sight, producing the appearance of two spiders attacking a third one lyingbetween them. He then changed his tactics, and began revolving round andround his prisoner, and very soon the poor vanquished wretch--theaggressor, let us hope, in the interests of justice--was closely wrappedin a silvery cocoon, which, unlike the cocoon the caterpillar weaves foritself, was also its winding-sheet. 

In the foregoing pages I have thrown together some of the most salientfacts I have noted; but the spider-world still remains to me awonderland of which I know comparatively nothing. Nor is any veryintimate knowledge of spiders to be got from books, though numberlesslists of new species are constantly being printed; for they have not yethad, like the social bees and ants, many loving and patient chroniclersof their ways. The Hubens and Lubbocks have been many; the Moggridgesfew. But even a very slight study of these most versatile andaccomplished of nature's children gives rise to some interestingreflections. One fact that strikes the mind very forcibly is theworld-wide distribution of groups of species possessing highly developedinstincts. One is the zebra-striped Salticus, with its uniquestrategy--that is to say, unique amongst spiders. It is said that theAustralian savage approaches a kangaroo in the open by getting up insight of its prey and standing perfectly motionless till he is regardedas an inanimate object, and every time the animal's attention wandersadvancing a step or two until sufficiently near to hurl his spear. TheSalticus approaches a fly in the same manner, till near enough to makeits spring. Another is the Trapdoor spider. Another the Dolomedes, thatruns over the surface of the water in pursuit of its prey, and divesdown to escape from its enemies; and, strangest of all, the Argyroneta, that has its luminous dwelling at the bottom of streams; and just as amason carries bricks and mortar to its building, so does this spidercarry down bubbles of air from the surface to enlarge its mysterioushouse, in which it lays its eggs and rears its young. Community ofdescent must be supposed of species having such curious and complexinstincts; but how came these feeble creatures, unable to transportthemselves over seas and continents like the aerial gossamer, to be sowidely distributed, and inhabiting regions with such differentconditions? This can only be attributed to the enormous antiquity of thespecies, and of this antiquity the earliness in which the instinctmanifests itself in the young spiders is taken as evidence. 

A more important matter, the intelligence of spiders, has not yetreceived the attention it deserves. The question of insectintelligence--naturalists are agreed that insects do possessintelligence--is an extremely difficult one; probably some of ourconclusions on this matter will have to be reconsidered. For instance, we regard the Order Hymenoptera as the most intelligent because most ofthe social insects are included in it; but it has not yet been proved, probably never will be proved, that the social instincts resulted fromintelligence which has "lapsed. " Whether ants and bees were moreintelligent than other insects during the early stages of their organicsocieties or not, it will hardly be disputed by any naturalist who hasobserved insects for long that many solitary species display moreintelligence in their actions than those that live in communities. 

The nature of the spider's food and the difficulties in the way ofproviding for their wants impose on them a life of solitude: hunger, perpetual watchfulness, and the sense of danger have given them acharacter of mixed ferocity and timidity. But these very conditions, which have made it impossible for them to form societies like someinsects and progress to a state of things resembling civilization inmen, have served to develop the mind that is in a spider, making of hima very clever barbarian-The spider's only weapon of defence---hisfalces--are as poor a protection against the assaults of his insect foesas are teeth and finger-nails in man employed against wolves, bears, andtigers. And the spider is here even worse off than man, since hisenemies are winged and able to sweep down instantly on him from above;they are also protected with an invulnerable shield, and are armedwithdeadly stings. Like man, also, the spider has a soft, unprotected body, while his muscular strength, compared with that of the insects he has tocontend with, is almost _nil. _ His position in nature then, withrelation to his enemies, is like that of man; only the spider has thisdisadvantage, that he cannot combine with others for protection. That hedoes protect himself and maintains his place in nature is due, not tospecial instincts, which are utterly insufficient, but to theintelligence which supplements them. At the same time this superiorcunning is closely related with, and probably results indirectly from, the web he is provided with, and which is almost of the nature of anartificial aid. Let us take the imaginary case of a man-like monkey, orof an arboreal man, born with a cord of great length attached to hiswaist, which could be either dragged after him or carried in a coil. After many accidents, experience would eventually teach him to put it tosome use; practice would make him more and more skilful in handling it, and, indirectly, it would be the means of developing his latent mentalfaculties. He would begin by using it, as the monkey does its prehensiletail, to swing himself from branch to branch, and finally, to escapefrom an enemy or in pursuit of his prey, he would be able by means ofhis cord to drop himself with safety from the tallest trees, or fly downthe steepest precipices. He would coil up his cord to make a bed to lieon, and also use it for binding branches together when building himselfa 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 linesfixed to widely separated points, while he sits concealed in hisweb-lined retreat amongst the leaves where every touch on thefar-reaching structure is telegraphed to him by the communicating linefaithfully as if a nerve had been touched, we must admire the wonderfulperfection to which he has attained in the use of his cord. By thesemeans he is able to conquer creatures too swift and strong for him, andmake them his prey. When we see him repairing damages, weighting hislight fabric in windy weather with pebbles or sticks, as a fisherweights his net, and cutting loose a captive whose great strengththreatens the destruction of the web, then we begin to suspect that hehas, above his special instinct, a reason that guides, modifies, and inmany ways supplements it. It is not, however, only on these greatoccasions, when the end is sought by unusual means, that spiders showtheir intelligence; for even these things might be considered by some asmerely parts of one great complex instinct; but at all times, in allthings, the observer who watches them closely cannot fail to beconvinced that they possess a guiding principle which is not mereinstinct. What the stick or stone was to primitive man, when he had madethe discovery that by holding it in his hand he greatly increased theforce of his blow, the possession of a web has been to the spider indeveloping that spark of intellect which it possesses in common with allanimal 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 highlycurious instinct is also possessed by some vertebrates. In insects it isprobably due to temporary paralysis occasioned by sudden concussion, forwhen beetles alight abruptly, though voluntarily, they assume thatappearance of death, which lasts for a few moments. Some species, indeed, are so highly sensitive that the slightest touch, or even asudden menace, will instantly throw them into this motionless, death-simulating condition. Curiously enough, the same causes whichproduce this trance in slow-moving species, like those of Scarabseus forexample, have a precisely contrary effect on species endowed with greatactivity. Rapacious beetles, when disturbed, scuttle quickly out ofsight, and some water-beetles spin about the surface, in circles orzigzag lines, so rapidly as to confuse the eye. Our common long-leggedspiders (Pholcus) when approached draw their feet together in the middleof the web, and spin the body round with such velocity as to resemble awhirligig. 

Certain mammals and birds also possess the death-simulating instinct, though it is hardly possible to believe that the action springs from thesame immediate cause in vertebrates and in insects. In the latter itappears to be a purely physical instinct, the direct result of anextraneous cause, and resembling the motions of a plant. In mammals andbirds it is evident that violent emotion, and not the rough handlingexperienced, is the final cause of the swoon. 

Passing over venomous snakes, skunks, and a few other species in whichthe presence of danger excites only anger, fear has a powerful, and insome cases a disabling, effect on animals; and it is this paralyzingeffect of fear on which the death-feigning instinct, found only in a fewwidely-separated species, has probably been built up by the slowcumulative 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 itseffect on a jaguar they started, and which took refuge in a dense clumpof dry reeds. Though they could see it, it was impossible to throw thelasso over its head, and, after vainly trying to dislodge it, they atlength set fire to the reeds. Still it refused to stir, but lay withhead erect, fiercely glaring at them through the flames. Finally itdisappeared from sight in the black smoke; and when the fire had burntitself out, it was found, dead and charred, in the same spot. 

On the pampas the gauchos frequently take the black-necked swan byfrightening it. When the birds are feeding or resting on the grass, twoor 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 terrorthat they are incapable of flying, and are quickly despatched. 

I have also seen gaucho boys catch the Silver-bill (Lichenopsperspicillata) by hurling a stick or stone at the bird, then rushing atit, when it sits perfectly still, disabled by fear, and allows itself tobe taken. I myself once succeeded in taking a small bird of anotherspecies 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, andable to inflict such terrible injury with their teeth should alsopossess this safeguard, apparently more suited to weak inactivecreatures that cannot resist or escape from an enemy and to animals verylow down in the scale of being. When a fox is caught in a trap or rundown by dogs he fights savagely at first, but by-and-by relaxes hisefforts, drops on the ground, and apparently yields up the ghost. Thedeception is so well carried out, that dogs are constantly taken in byit, and no one, not previously acquainted with this clever trickery ofnature, but would at once pronounce the creature dead, and worthy ofsome praise for having perished in so brave a spirit. Now, when in thiscondition of feigning death, I am quite sure that the animal does notaltogether lose consciousness. It is exceedingly difficult to discoverany evidence of life in the opossum; but when one withdraws a little wayfrom the feigning fox, and watches him very attentively, a slightopening 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 whenhis foes are at a safe distance. Yet I have seen gauchos, who are verycruel to animals, practise the most barbarous experiments on a captivefox without being able to rouse it into exhibiting any sign of life. This has greatly puzzled me, since, if death-feigning is simply acunning habit, the animal could not suffer itself to be mutilatedwithout wincing. I can only believe that the fox, though not insensible, as its behaviour on being left to itself appears to prove, yet has itsbody thrown by extreme terror into that benumbed condition whichsimulates death, and during which it is unable to feel the torturespractised on it. 

The swoon sometimes actually takes place before the animal has beentouched, 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 groundbefore us, a fox, not yet fully grown, standing still and watching ourapproach. All at once it dropped, and when we came up to the spot it waslying stretched out, with eyes closed, and apparently dead. Beforepassing on my companion, who said it was not the first time he had seensuch a thing, lashed it vigorously with his whip for some moments, butwithout producing the slightest effect. 

The death-feigning instinct is possessed in a very marked degree by thespotted tinamou or common partridge of the pampas (Nothura maculosa). When captured, after a few violent struggles to escape, it drops itshead, gasps two or three times, and to all appearances dies. If, whenyou 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, andbeyond your reach for ever. Possibly, while your grasp is on the bird itdoes actually become insensible, though its recovery from that conditionis almost instantaneous. Birds when captured do sometimes die in thehand, purely from terror. The tinamou is excessively timid, andsometimes when birds of this species are chased--for gaucho boysfrequently run them down on horseback--and when they find no burrows orthickets to escape into, they actually drop down dead on the plain. Probably, when they feign death in their captor's hand, they are inreality very near to death. 

CHAPTER XVI. 

HUMMING-BIRDS. 

Humming-birds are perhaps the very loveliest things in nature, and manycelebrated writers have exhausted their descriptive powers in vainefforts to picture them to the imagination. The temptation was certainlygreat, after describing the rich setting of tropical foliage and flower, to speak at length of the wonderful gem contained within it; but theywould in this case have been wise to imitate that modest novel-writerwho introduced a blank space on the page where the description of hismatchless heroine should have appeared. After all that has been written, the first sight of a living humming-bird, so unlike in its beauty allother beautiful things, comes like a revelation to the mind. To give anytrue conception of it by means of mere word-painting is not moreimpossible than it would be to bottle up a supply of the "livingsunbeams" themselves, and convey them across the Atlantic to scatterthem in a sparkling shower over the face of England. 

Doubtless many who have never seen them in a state of nature imaginethat a tolerably correct idea of their appearance can be gained fromGould's colossal monograph. The pictures there, however, only representdead humming-birds. A dead robin is, for purposes of bird-portraiture, as good as a live robin; the same may be said of even manybrilliant-plumaged species less aerial in their habits thanhumming-birds. In butterflies the whole beauty is seldom seen until theinsect is dead, or, at any rate, captive. It was not when Wallace sawthe Ornithoptera croesus flying about, but only when he held it in hishands, and opened its glorious wings, that the sight of its beautyovercame him so powerfully. The special kind of beauty which makes thefirst sight of a humming-bird a revelation depends on the swift singularmotions as much as on the intense gem-like and metallic brilliancy ofthe plumage. 

The minute exquisite form, when the bird hovers on misty wings, probingthe flowers with its coral spear, the fan-like tail expanded, andpoising motionless, exhibits the feathers shot with many hues; and thenext moment vanishes, or all but vanishes, then reappears at anotherflower only to vanish again, and so on successively, showing itssplendours not continuously, but like the intermitted flashes of thefirefly--this forms a picture of airy grace and loveliness that bafflesdescription. All this glory disappears when the bird is dead, and evenwhen it alights to rest on a bough. Sitting still, it looks like anexceedingly attenuated kingfisher, without the pretty plumage of thatbird, but retaining its stiff artificial manner. No artist has been sobold as to attempt to depict the bird as it actually appears, whenbalanced before a flower the swift motion of the wings obliterates theirform, making them seem like a mist encircling the body; yet it isprecisely this formless cloud on which the glittering body hangssuspended, which contributes most to give the humming-bird its wonderfulsprite-like or extra-natural appearance. How strange, then, to findbird-painters persisting in their efforts to show the humming-birdflying! When they draw it stiff and upright on its perch the picture ishonest, if ugly; the more ambitious representation is a delusion and amockery. 

Coming to the actual colouring--the changeful tints that glow with suchintensity on the scale-like feathers, it is curious to find that Gouldseems to have thought that all difficulties here had been successfullyovercome. The "new process" he spoke so confidently about might no doubtbe used with advantage in reproducing the coarser metallic reflectionson a black plumage, such as we see in the corvine birds; but theglittering garment of the humming-bird, like the silvery lace woven bythe Epeira, gemmed with dew and touched with rainbow-coloured light, hasnever 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 followingpassage:--"Hardly more than one point of colour is in reality evervisible in any one humming-bird at one and the same time, for each pointonly shows its peculiar and glittering colour when the light falls uponit from a particular direction. A true representation of one of thesebirds would show it in somewhat sombre colours, except just at the onepoint which, when the bird is in the position chosen for representation, meets the light at the requisite angle, and that point alone should beshown in full brilliance of colour. A flowery shrub is sometimes seensurrounded by a cloud of humming-birds, all of one species, and each, ofcourse, in a different position. If someone would draw such a scene asthat, showing a different detail of colour in each bird, according toits position, then some idea of the actual appearance of the bird mightbe given to one who had never seen an example. "

It is hardly to be expected that anyone will carry out the abovesuggestion, and produce a monograph with pages ten or fifteen feet wideby eighteen feet long, each one showing a cloud of humming-birds of onespecies flitting about a flowery bush; but even in such a picture asthat would be, the birds, suspended on unlovely angular projectionsinstead of "hazy semicircles of indistinctness, " and each with animmovable fleck of brightness on the otherwise sombre plumage, would beas unlike living humming-birds as anything in the older monographs. 

Whether the glittering iridescent tints and singular ornaments for whichthis family is famous result from the cumulative process of conscious orvoluntary sexual selection, as Darwin thought, or are merely the outcomeof a superabundant vitality, as Dr. A. R. . Wallace so stronglymaintains, is a question which science has not yet answeredsatisfactorily. The tendency to or habit of varying in the direction ofrich colouring and beautiful or fantastic ornament, might, for all weknow to the contrary, have descended to humming-birds from somediminutive, curiously-shaped, bright-tinted, flying reptile of arborealhabits that lived in some far-off epoch in the world's history. It isnot, at all events, maintained by anyone that _all_ birds sprangoriginally from one reptilian stock; and the true position ofhumming-birds in a natural classification has not yet been settled, forno intermediate forms exist connecting them with any other group, To theordinary mind they appear utterly unlike all other feathered creatures, and as much entitled to stand apart as, for instance, the pigeon andostrich families. It has been maintained by some writers that they areanatomically related to the swifts, although the differences separatingthe two families appear so great as almost to stagger belief in thisnotion. Now, however, the very latest authority on this subject, Dr. Schufeldt, has come to the conclusion that swifts are only greatlymodified Passeres, and that the humming-birds should form an order bythemselves. 

Leaving this question, and regarding them simply with the ornithologicaleye that does not see far below the surface of things, when we havesufficiently admired the unique beauty and marvellous velocity ofhumming-birds, there is little more to be said about them. They arelovely to the eye--indescribably so; and it is not strange that Gouldwrote rapturously of the time when he was at length "permitted to revelin the delight of seeing the humming-bird in a state of nature. " Thefeeling, he wrote, which animated him with regard to these mostwonderful works of creation it was impossible to describe, and couldonly be appreciated by those who have made natural history a study, andwho "pursue the investigations of her charming mysteries with ardour anddelight. " This we can understand; but to what an astonishing degree thefeeling was carried in him, when, after remarking that enthusiasm andexcitement with regard to most things in life become lessened andeventually deadened by time in most of us, he was able to add, "notso, however, I believe, with those who take up the study of the Familyof Humming-birds!" It can only be supposed that he regarded naturalhistory principally as a "science of dead animals--a _necrology_, " andcollected humming-birds just as others collect Roman coins, birds' eggs, old weapons, or blue china, their zeal in the pursuit and faith in itsimportance increasing with the growth of their treasures, until they atlast come to believe that though all the enthusiasms and excitementswhich 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 ofpleasure experienced by the ornithologist in studying habits anddisposition no doubt results in a great measure from the fact that theactions of the feathered people have a savour of intelligence in them. Whatever his theory or conviction about the origin of instincts mayhappen to be, or even if he has no convictions on the subject, it mustnevertheless seem plain to him that intelligence is, after all, in mostcases, the guiding principle of life, supplementing and modifying habitsto bring them into closer harmony with the environment, and enliveningevery day with countless little acts which result from judgment andexperience, and form no part of the inherited complex instincts. Thelonger he observes any one species or individual, the more does he findin it to reward his attention; this is not the case, however, withhumming-birds, which possess the avian body but do not rank mentallywith birds. The pleasure one takes in their beauty soon evaporates, andis succeeded by no fresh interest, so monotonous and mechanical are alltheir actions; and we accordingly find that those who are most familiarwith them from personal observation have very little to say about them. A score of hummingbirds, of as many distinct species, are less to thestudent of habits than one little brown-plurnaged bird haunting hisgarden or the rush-bed of a neighbouring stream; and, doubtless, for areason similar to that which makes a lovely human face uninformed byintellect seem less permanently attractive than many a homeliercountenance. He grows tired of seeing the feathered fairies perpetuallyweaving their aerial ballet-dance about the flowers, and finds it arelief to watch the little finch or wren or flycatcher of shy temper andobscure protective colouring. Perhaps it possesses a graceful form andmelodious voice to give it aesthetic value, but even without suchaccessories he can observe it day by day with increasing interest andpleasure; and it only adds piquancy to the feeling to know that thelittle bird also watches him with a certain amount of intelligentcuriosity and a great deal of suspicion, and that it studiouslyendeavours to conceal from him all the little secrets its life which heis bent on discovering. 

It has frequently been remarked that humming birds are more like insectsthan birds in disposition. Some species, on quitting their perch, perform wide bee-like circles about the tree before shooting away in astraight line. Their aimless attacks on other species approaching orpassing near them, even on large birds like hawks and pigeons, is ahabit they have in common with many solitary wood-boring bees. Theyalso, like dragon-flies and other insects, attack each other when theycome together while feeding; and in this case their action strangelyresembles that of a couple of butterflies, as they revolve about eachother and rise vertically to a great height in the air. Again, likeinsects, they are undisturbed at the presence of man while feeding, oreven when engaged in building and incubation; and like various solitarybees, wasps, &c. , they frequently come close to a person walking orstanding, 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 roundhis head. All other birds, even those which display the leastversatility, and in districts where man is seldom seen, show as muchcaution as curiosity in his presence; they recognize in the uprightunfamiliar form a living being and a possible enemy. Mr. Whiteley, whoobserved humming-birds in Peru, says it is an amusing sight to watch theLesbia nuna attempting to pass to a distant spot in a straight lineduring a high wind, which, acting on the long tail feathers, carries itquite away from the point aimed at. Insects presenting a large surfaceto the wind are always blown from their course in the same way, for evenin the most windy districts they never appear to learn to guidethemselves; and I have often seen a butterfly endeavouring to reach anisolated flower blown from it a dozen times before it finally succeededor gave up the contest. Birds when shaping their course, unless youngand inexperienced, always make allowance for the force of the wind. Humming-birds often fly into open rooms, impelled apparently by afearless curiosity, and may then be chased about until they dropexhausted or are beaten down and caught, and, as Gould says, "if thentaken into the hand, they almost immediately feed on any sweet, or pumpup any liquid that may be offered to them, without betraying either fearor resentment at the previous treatment. " Wasps and bees taken in thesame way endeavour to sting their captor, as most people know fromexperience, nor do they cease struggling violently to free themselves;but the dragon-fly is like the humming-bird, and is no sooner caughtafter much ill-treatment, than it will greedily devour as many flies andmosquitoes as one likes to offer it. Only in beings very low in thescale of nature do we see the instinct of self-preservation in thisextremely simple condition, unmixed with reason or feeling, and sotransient in its effects. The same insensibility to danger is seen whenhumming-birds are captured and confined in a room, and when, before aday is over, they will flutter about their captor's face and even takenectar from his lips. 

Some observers have thought that hummingbirds come nearest tohumble-bees in their actions. I do not think so. Mr. Bates writes: "Theydo not proceed in that methodical manner which bees follow, taking theflowers seriatim, but skip about from one part of a tree to another inthe most capricious manner. " I have observed humble-bees a great deal, and feel convinced that they arc among the most highly intelligent ofthe social hymenoptera. Humming-birds, to my mind, have a much closerresemblance to the solitary wood-boring bees and to dragon-flies. Itmust also be borne in mind that insects have very little time in whichto acquire experience, and that a large portion of their life, in theimago state, is taken up with the complex business of reproduction. 

The Trochilidae, although confined to one continent, promise to exceedall other families--even the cosmopolitan finches and warblers--innumber of species. At present over five hundred are known, or as many asall the species of birds in Europe together; and good reasons exist forbelieving that very many more--not less perhaps than one or two hundredspecies--yet remain to be discovered. The most prolific region, andwhere humming-birds are most highly developed, is known to be WestBrazil and the eastern slopes of the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. Thisis precisely the least known portion of South America; the fewnaturalists and collectors who have reached it have returned laden withspoil, to tell us of a region surpassing all others in thesuperabundance and beauty of its bird life. Nothing, however, which canbe said concerning these vast unexplored areas of tropical mountain andforest so forcibly impresses us with the idea of the unknown richescontained in them as the story of the Loddigesia mirabilis. This isperhaps the most wonderful humming-bird known, and no one who had notpreviously seen it figured could possibly form an idea of what it islike from a mere description. An outline sketch of it would probably betaken by most people as a fantastic design representing a bird-form incombination with leaves, in size and shape resembling poplar leaves, buton leaf-stalks of an impossible length, curving and crossing each otherso as to form geometrical figures unlike anything in nature. Yet thisbird (a single specimen) was obtained in Peru half a century ago, andfor upwards of twenty years after its discovery Gould tried to obtainothers, offering as much as fifty pounds for one; but no second specimenever gladdened his eyes, nor was anything more heard of it untilStolzmann refound it in the year 1880. 

The addition of many new species to the long list would, however, be amatter of small interest, unless fresh facts concerning their habits andstructure were at the same time brought to light; but we can scarcelyexpect that the as yet unknown species will supply any link connectingthe Trochilidae with other existing families of birds. The eventualconclusion will perhaps be that this family has come down independentlyfrom an exceedingly remote past, and with scarcely any modification. While within certain very narrow limits humming-birds vary more thanother families, outside of these limits they appear relativelystationary; and, conversely, other birds exhibit least variability inthe one direction in which humming-birds vary excessively. On account ofa trivial difference in habit they have sometimes been separated in twosub-families: the Phaethornithinae, found in shady tropical forests; andthe Trochilinae, comprising humming-birds which inhabit open sunnyplaces--and to this division they mostly belong. In both of these purelyarbitrary groups, however, the aerial habits and manner of feedingpoised in the air are identical, although the birds living in shadyforests, where flowers are scarce, obtain their food principally fromthe under surfaces of leaves. In their procreant habits the uniformityis also very great. In all cases the nest is small, deep, cup-shaped, orconical, composed of soft felted materials, and lined inside withvegetable down. The eggs are white, and never exceed two in number. Broadly speaking, they resemble each other as closely in habits as instructure; the greatest differences in habit in the most widelyseparated genera being no greater than may be found in two wrens orsparrows of the same genus. 

This persistence of character in humming-birds, both as regardsstructure and habit, seems the more remarkable when we consider theirvery wide distribution over a continent so varied in its conditions, andwhere they range from the lowest levels to the limit of perpetual snowon the Andes, and from the tropics to the wintry Magellanic district;also that a majority of genera inhabit very circumscribed areas--thesefacts, as Dr. Wallace remarks, clearly pointing to a very highantiquity. 

It is perhaps a law of nature that when a species (or group) fits itselfto a place not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to noopposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so great aperfection as to be able easily to overcome all opposition, thecharacter eventually loses its original plasticity, or tendency to vary, since improvement in such a case would be superfluous, and becomes, soto speak, crystallized in that form which continues thereafterunaltered. It is, at any rate, clear that while all other birds rubtogether in the struggle for existence, the humming-bird, owing to itsaerial life and peculiar manner of seeking its food, is absolutelyuntouched by this kind of warfare, and is accordingly as far removedfrom all competition with other birds as the solitary savage is removedfrom the struggle of life affecting and modifying men in crowdedcommunities. The lower kind of competition affecting hummingbirds, thatwith insects and, within the family, of species with species, hasprobably only served to intensify their unique characteristics, and, perhaps, to lower their intelligence. 

Not only are they removed from that indirect struggle for existencewhich acts so powerfully on other families, but they are also, by theirhabits and the unequalled velocity of their flight, placed out of reachof that direct war waged on all other small birds by the rapaciouskinds--birds, mammals, and reptiles. One result of this immunity is thathumming-birds are excessively numerous, albeit such slow breeders; for, as we have seen, they only lay two eggs, and not only so, but the secondegg is often dropped so long after incubation has begun in the firstthat only one is really hatched. Yet Belt expressed the opinion that inNicaragua, where he observed humming-birds, they out-numbered all theother birds together. Considering how abundant birds of all kinds are inthat district, and that most of them have a protective colouring and layseveral eggs, it would be impossible to accept such a statement unlesswe believed that humming-birds have, practically, no enemies. 

Another result of their immunity from persecution is the splendidcolouring and strange and beautiful feather ornaments distinguishingthem above all other birds; and excessive variation in this direction isdue, it seems to me, to the very causes which serve to check variationin all other directions. In their plumage, as Martin long ago wrote, nature has strained at every variety of effect and revelled in aninfinitude of modifications. How wonderful their garb is, with coloursso varied, so intense, yet seemingly so evanescent!--the glitteringmantle of powdered gold; the emerald green that changes to velvet black;ruby reds and luminous scarlets; dull bronze that brightens and burnslike polished brass, and pale neutral tints that kindle to rose andlilac-coloured flame. And to the glory of prismatic colouring are addedfeather decorations, such as the racket-plumes and downy muffs ofSpathura, the crest and frills of Lophornis, the sapphire gorget burningon 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 piebaldgoat-like face of Oxypogon. 

Excessive variation in this direction is checked in nearly all otherbirds by the need of a protective colouring, few kinds so greatlyexcelling in strength and activity as to be able to maintain theirexistence without it. Bright feathers constitute a double danger, fornot only do they render their possessor conspicuous, but, just as thebutterfly chooses the gayest flower, so do hawks deliberately single outfrom many obscure birds the one with brilliant plumage; but therapacious kinds do not waste their energies in the vain pursuit ofhummingbirds. These are in the position of neutrals, free to range atwill amidst the combatants, insulting all alike, and flaunting theirsplendid colours with impunity. They are nature's favourites, endowedwith faculties bordering on the miraculous, and all other kinds, gentleor 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 foundgathered at the Zoological Gardens in London is the Crested Screamerfrom South America. It is in many respects a very singular species, andits large size, great strength, and majestic demeanour, with thesurprising docility and intelligence it displays when domesticated, giveit a character amongst birds somewhat like that of the elephant amongstmammals. 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, theplumage being otherwise of a pale slaty blue, while the legs and thenaked 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, isan inch and a half long, nearly straight, triangular, and exceedinglysharp; the second spur, on the last joint, being smaller, broad, andcurved, and roughly resembling in shape and size a lion's claw. There isanother stinking peculiarity. The skin is _emphysematous_--that is, bloated and yielding to pressure. It crackles when touched, and thesurface, when the feathers are removed, presents a swollen bubblyappearance; for under the skin there is a layer of air-bubbles extendingover the whole body and even down the legs under the horny tesselatedskin to the toes, the legs thus having a somewhat massive appearance. 

And now just a few words about the position of the screamer insystematic zoology. It is placed in the Family Palamedeidae, whichcontains only three species, but about the Order it belongs to there ismuch disagreement. It was formerly classed with the rails, and inpopular books of Natural History still keeps its place with them. "Nowthe rail-tribe, " says Professor Parker, speaking on this very matter, "has for a long time been burdened (on paper) with a very false armylist. Everything alive that has had the misfortune to be possessed oflarge unwieldy feet has been added to this feeble-minded cowardly group, until it has become a mixed multitude with discordant voices and withmanners and customs having no consonance or relation. " He takes thescreamer from the rail-tribe and classes it with the geese (as also doesProfessor Huxley), and concludes his study with these words:--"Amongstliving birds there is not one possessing characters of higher interest, none that I am acquainted with come nearer, in some important points, tothe lizard; and there are parts of the organization which make it veryprobable that it is one of the nearest living relations of themarvellous _Archaeopteryx_"--an intermediate form between birds andreptiles belonging to the Upper Jurassic period. 

The screamer's right to dwell with the geese has not been leftunchallenged. The late Professor Garrod finds that "from considerationsof pterylosis, visceral anatomy, myology, and osteology the screamercannot be placed along with the Anserine birds. " He finds that in somepoints it resembles the ostrich and rhea, and concludes: "It seemstherefore to me that, summing these results, the screamer must havesprung from the primary avian stock as an independent offshoot at muchthe 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 theancient terrestrial bird-type, when the acquisition of wings broughtmany intruders into domains already occupied, calling forth a newstruggle for existence, and bringing out many special qualities by meansof natural selection. 

With this archaeological question I have little to do, and only quotethe above great authorities to show that the screamer appears to benearly the last descendant of an exceedingly ancient family, with littleor no relationship to other existing families, and that its pedigree hasbeen hopelessly lost in the night of an incalculable antiquity. I haveonly to speak of the bird as a part of the visible world and as itappears to the non-scientific lover of nature; for, curiously enough, while anatomists nave been laboriously seeking for the screamer'saffinities in that "biological field which is as wide as the earth anddeep as the sea, " travellers and ornithologists have told us almostnothing about its strange character and habits. 

Though dressed with Quaker-like sobriety, and without the elegance ofform distinguishing the swan or peacock, this bird yet appeals to theaesthetic feelings in man more than any species I am acquainted with. Voice is one of its strong points, as one might readily infer from thename: nevertheless the name is not an appropriate one, for though thebird certainly does scream, and that louder than the peacock, its screamis only a powerful note of alarm uttered occasionally, while the notesuttered at intervals in the night, or in the day-time, when it soarsupwards like the lark of some far-off imaginary epoch in the world'shistory 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 criesof the bird confined there attempting to sing; above the concert ofcranes, the screams of eagles and macaws, the howling of dogs and wolvesand the muffled roar of lions, one can hear it all over the park. Butthose loud notes only sadden me. Exile and captivity have taken alljoyousness from the noble singer, and a moist climate has made himhoarse; the long clear strains are no more, and he hurries through hisseries of confused shrieks as quickly as possible, as if ashamed of theperformance. A lark singing high up in a sunny sky and a lark singing ina small cage hanging against a shady wall in a London street producevery different effects; and the spluttering medley of shrill and harshsounds from the street singer scarcely seems to proceed from the samekind of bird as that matchless melody filling the blue heavens. There iseven a greater difference in the notes of the crested screamer whenheard in Regent's Park and when heard on the pampas, where the birdsoars upwards until its bulky body disappears from sight, and from thatvast elevation pours down a perpetual rain of jubilant sound. 

_Screamer_ being a misnomer, I prefer to call the bird by its vernacularname of _chajá, _ or _chakar_, a more convenient spelling. 

With the chakar the sexes are faithful, even in very large flocks thebirds all being ranged in couples. When one bird begins to sing itspartner immediately joins, but with notes entirely different in quality. Both birds have some short deep notes, the other notes of the femalebeing long powerful notes with a trill in them; but over them sounds theclear piercing voice of the male, ringing forth at the close with greatstrength 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 oftenassemble in immense flocks, thousands of individuals being sometimesseen congregated together, and in these gatherings the birds frequentlyall sing in concert. They invariably--though without rising--sing atintervals during the night, "counting the hours, " as the gauchos say;the first song being at about nine o'clock, the second at midnight, andthe third just before dawn, but the hours vary in different districts. 

I was once travelling with a party of gauchos when, about midnight, itbeing intensely dark, a couple of chakars broke out singing right aheadof us, thus letting us know that we were approaching a watercourse, where we intended refreshing our horses. We found it nearly dry, andwhen we rode down to the rill of water meandering over the broad dry bedof the river, a flock of about a thousand chakars set up a perfect roarof alarm notes, all screaming together, with intervals of silence after;then they rose up with a mighty rush of wings. They settled down again afew hundred yards off, and all together burst forth in one of theirgrand midnight songs, making the plains echo for miles around. 

There is something strangely impressive in these spontaneous outburstsof a melody so powerful from one of these large flocks, and thoughaccustomed to hear these birds from childhood, I have often beenastonished at some new effect produced by a large multitude singingunder certain conditions. Travelling alone one summer day, I carne atnoon to a lake on the pampas called Kakel--a sheet of water narrowenough for one to see across. Chakars in countless numbers were gatheredalong its shores, but they were all ranged in well-defined flocks, averaging about five hundred birds in each flock. These flocks seemed toextend all round the lake, and had probably been driven by the droughtfrom all the plains around to this spot. Presently one flock near mebegan singing, and continued their powerful chant for three or fourminutes; when they ceased the next flock took up the strains, and afterit the next, and so on until the notes of the flocks on the oppositeshore came floating strong and clear across the water--then passed away, growing fainter and fainter, until once more the sound approached metravelling round to my side again. The effect was very curious, and Iwas astonished at the orderly way with which each flock waited its turnto sing, instead of a general outburst taking place after the firstflock had given the signal. On another occasion I was still moreimpressed, for here the largest number of birds I have ever foundcongregated at one place all sung together. This was on the southernpampas, at a place called Gualicho, where I had ridden for an hourbefore sunset over a marshy plain where there was still much standingwater 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 inclose order, but scattered about in pairs and small groups. In thisdesolate spot I found a small rancho inhabited by a gaucho and hisfamily, and I spent the night with them. The birds were all about thehouse, apparently as tame as the domestic fowls, and when I went out tolook for a spot for my horse to feed on, they would not fly away fromme, but merely moved, a few steps out of my path About nine o'clock wewere eating supper in the rancho when suddenly the entire multitude ofbirds covering the marsh for miles around burst forth into a tremendousevening song. It is impossible to describe the effect of this mightyrush 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 overRegent's Park, bursting forth on the silent atmosphere of that darklonely plain. One peculiarity was that in this mighty noise, whichsounded louder than the sea thundering on a rocky coast, I seemed to beable 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 thattempest of sound. When it ceased my host remarked with a smile, "We areaccustomed to this, señor--every evening we have this concert. " It was aconcert well worth riding a hundred miles to hear. But the chakarcountry is just now in a transitional state, and the precise conditionswhich made it possible for birds so large in size to form such immensecongregations are rapidly passing away. In desert places, the birdsubsists chiefly on leaves and seeds of aquatic plants; but when thevast level area of the pampas was settled by man, the ancient stiffgrass-vegetation gave place to the soft clovers and grasses of Europe, and to this new food the birds took very kindly. Other circumstancesalso favoured their increase. They were never persecuted, for thenatives do not eat them, though they are really very good--the fleshbeing something like wild goose in flavour. A _higher_ civilization ischanging all this: the country is becoming rapidly overrun withemigrants, especially by Italians, the pitiless enemies of allbird-life. 

The chakars, like the skylark, love to soar upwards when singing, and atsuch times when they have risen till their dark bulky bodies appear likefloating specks on the blue sky, or until they disappear from sightaltogether, the notes become wonderfully etherealized by distance to asoft 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 halfspread of wings should possess a power of soaring equal to that ofvultures and eagles. Even the vulture with its marvellous wing powersoars chiefly from necessity, and when its crop is full finds nopleasure in "scaling the heavens by invisible stairs. " The chakar leavesits grass-plot after feeding and soars purely for recreation, taking somuch pleasure in its aerial exercises that in bright warm weather, inwinter and spring, it spends a great part of the day in the upperregions of the air. On the earth its air is grave and its motionsmeasured and majestic, and it rises with immense labour, the wingsproducing a sound like a high wind. But as the bird mounts higher, sweeping round as it ascends, just as vultures and eagles do, itgradually appears to become more buoyant, describing each succeedingcircle with increasing grace. I can only account for this magnificentflight, beginning so laboriously, by supposing that the bubble spaceunder the skin becomes inflated with an air lighter than atmosphericair, enabling a body so heavy with wings disproportionately short tofloat with such ease and evident enjoyment at the vast heights to whichthe bird ascends. The heavenward flight of a large bird is always amagnificent spectacle; that of the chakar is peculiarly fascinating onaccount of the resounding notes it sings while soaring, and in which thebird seems to exult in its sublime power and freedom. 

I was once very much surprised at the behaviour of a couple of chakarsduring a thunderstorm. On a still sultry day in summer I was standingwatching masses of black cloud coming rapidly over the sky, while ahundred yards from me stood the two birds also apparently watching theapproaching storm with interest. Presently the edge of the cloud touchedthe sun, and a twilight gloom fell on the earth. The very moment the sundisappeared the birds rose up and soon began singing their long'resounding notes, though it was loudly thundering at the time, whilevivid flashes of lightning lit the black cloud overhead at shortintervals. I watched their flight and listened to their notes, tillsuddenly as they made a wide sweep upwards they disappeared in thecloud, and at the same moment their voices became muffled, and seemed tocome from an immense distance. The cloud continued emitting sharpflashes of lightning, but the birds never reappeared, and after six orseven minutes once more their notes sounded loud and clear above themuttering thunder. I suppose they had passed through the cloud into theclear atmosphere above it, but I was extremely surprised at theirfearlessness; for as a rule when soaring birds see a storm coming theyget out of its way, flying before it or stooping to the earth to seekshelter of some kind, for most living things appear to have a wholesomedread 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 atan estancia called Mangrullos, on the western frontier of Buenos Ayres, and the people of the house gave me a very curious account of it. Thebird was a male, and had been reared by a soldier's wife at a frontieroutpost 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 someleagues around. For some weeks after the invasion the chakar wanderedabout the country, visiting all the ruined estancias, apparently inquest of human beings, and on arriving at Mangrullos, which had not beenburnt and was still inhabited, it settled down at ones and neverafterwards showed any disposition to go away. It was extremely tame, associating by day with the poultry, and going to roost with them atnight OH a high perch, probably for the sake of companionship, for in awild state the bird roosts on the ground. It was friendly towards allthe members of the household except one, a peon, and against this personfrom the first the bird always displayed the greatest antipathy, threatening him with its wings, puffing itself out, and hissing like anangry goose. The man had a swarthy, beardless face, and it wasconjectured that the chakar associated him in its mind with the savageswho had destroyed its early home. 

Close to the house there was a lagoon, never dry, which was frequentlyvisited by flocks of wild chakars. Whenever a flock appeared the tamebird would go out to join them; and though the chakars are mild-temperedbirds and very rarely quarrel, albeit so well provided with formidableweapons, they invariably attacked the visitor with great fury, chasinghim back to the house, and not ceasing their persecutions till thepoultry-yard was reached. They appeared to regard this tame bird thatdwelt 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 hefollowed the broods of young chickens about very assiduously, apparentlytaking great interest in their welfare, and even trying to entice themto follow him. A few newly-hatched chickens were at length offered tohim as an experiment, and he immediately took charge of them with everytoken of satisfaction, conducting them about in search of food andimitating all the actions of a hen. Finding him so good a nurse, largebroods were given to him, and the more the foster-chickens were thebetter he seemed pleased. It was very curious to see this big bird withthirty or forty little animated balls of yellow cotton following himabout, while he moved majestically along, setting down his feet with thegreatest care not to tread on them, and swelling himself up with jealousanger at the approach of a cat or dog. 

The intelligence, docility, and attachment to man displayed by thechakar in a domestic state, with perhaps other latent aptitudes onlywaiting to be developed by artificial selection, seem to make thisspecies one peculiarly suited for man's protection, without which itmust inevitably perish. It is sad to reflect that all our domesticanimals have descended to us from those ancient times which we areaccustomed to regard as dark or barbarous, while the effect of ourmodern so-called humane civilization has been purely destructive toanimal life. Not one type do we rescue from the carnage going on at anever-increasing rate over all the globe. To Australia and America, Northand South, we look in vain for new domestic species, while even fromAfrica, with its numerous fine mammalian forms, and where England hasbeen the conquering colonizing power for nearly a century, we takenothing. Even the sterling qualities of the elephant, the unique beautyof the zebra, appeal to us in vain. We are only teaching the tribes ofthat vast continent to exterminate a hundred noble species they wouldnot tame. With grief and shame, even with dismay, we call to mind thatour country is now a stupendous manufactory of destructive engines, which we are rapidly placing in the hands of all the savage andsemi-savage peoples of the earth, thus ensuring the speedy destructionof all the finest types in the animal kingdom. 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

THE WOODHEWER FAMILY. 

_(Dendrocolaptidae. )_

The South American Tree-creepers, or Woodhewers, as they are sometimescalled, although confined exclusively to one continent, their rangeextending from Southern Mexico to the Magellanic islands, form one ofthe largest families of the order Passeres; no fewer than about twohundred and ninety species (referable to about forty-six genera) havingbeen already described. As they are mostly small, inconspicuous, thicket-frequenting birds, shy and fond of concealment to excess, it isonly reasonable to suppose that our list of this family is moreincomplete than of any other family of birds known. Thus, in thesouthern Plata and north Pata-gonian districts, supposed to beexhausted, where my observations have been made, and where, owing to theopen nature of the country, birds are more easily remarked than in theforests and marshes of the tropical region, I have made notes on thehabits of five species, of which I did not preserve specimens, andwhich, as far as I know, have never been described and named. Probablylong before the whole of South America has been "exhausted, " there willbe not less than four to five hundred Dendrocolaptine species known. Andyet with the exception of that dry husk of knowledge, concerning size, form and colouration, which classifiers and cataloguers obtain fromspecimens, very little indeed--scarcely anything, in fact--is knownabout the Tree-creepers; and it would not be too much to say that thereare many comparatively obscure and uninteresting species in Europe, anyone of which has a larger literature than the entire Tree-creeperfamily. No separate work about these birds has seen the light, even inthese days of monographs; but the reason of this comparative neglect isnot far to seek. In the absence of any knowledge, except of the mostfragmentary kind, of the life-habits of exotic species, themonograph-makers of the Old World naturally take up only the mostimportant groups--i. E. The groups which most readily attract thetraveller's eye with their gay conspicuous colouring, and which haveacquired a wide celebrity. We thus have a succession of splendid andexpensive 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 usualdreary details and technicalities concerning geographical distribution, variations in size and markings of different species, &c. , the littleinterest of the letter-press is compensated for in the accompanyingplates, which are now produced on a scale of magnitude, and with sogreat a degree of perfection, as regards brilliant colouring, spiritedattitudes and general fidelity to nature, that leaves little furtherimprovement in this direction to be looked for. The Tree-creepers, beingwithout the inferior charm of bright colour, offer no attraction to thebird-painter, whose share in the work of the pictorial monograph is, ofcourse, all-important. Yet even the very slight knowledge we possess ofthis family is enough to show that in many respects it is one richlyendowed, possessing characters of greater interest to the student of theinstincts and mental faculties of birds, than any of |the gaily-tintedfamilies I have mentioned. 

There is, in the Dendrocolaptidae, a splendid harvest for futureobservers of the habits of South American birds: some faint idea of itsrichness may perhaps be gathered from the small collection of the mostsalient facts known to us about them I have brought together and put inorder in this place. And I am here departing a little from the planusually observed in this book, which is chiefly occupied with matters ofpersonal knowledge, seasoned with a little speculation; but in this caseI have thought it best to supplement my own observations with those ofothers [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 inSouth America, so as to give as comprehensive a survey of the family asI 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, thesebirds have a brown plumage, without a particle of bright colour. Butalthough 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 anornithologist, looking at a collection of specimens comprising manygenera, would hear with surprise and almost incredulity that they allbelonged to one family, so great is the diversity exhibited in theirstructure. In size they vary from species smaller than thegolden-crested wren to others larger than the woodcock; but thedifferences in size are as nothing compared with those shown in the formof the beak. Between the minute, straight, conical, tit-like beaks ofthe Laptasthenura--a tit in appearance and habits--and the extravagantlylong, sword-shaped bill of Nasica, or the excessively attenuated, sickle-shaped organ in Xiphorynchus, the divergence is amazing, comparedwith what is found in other families; while between these two extremesthere is a heterogeneous assemblage of birds with beaks like creepers, nuthatches, finches, tyrant-birds, woodpeckers, crows, and even curlewsand ibises. In legs, feet and tails, there are correspondingdifferences. There are tails of all lengths and all forms; soft andstiff, square, acuminated, broad and fan-like, narrow and spine-like, and many as in the woodpeckers, and used as in that bird to support thebody in climbing. An extremely curious modification is found inSittosoma: the tail-feathers in this genus are long and graduated, andthe shafts, projecting beyond the webs at the ends, curve downwards andform stiff hooks. Concerning the habits of these birds, it has only beenreported that they climb on the trunks of trees: probably they are ableto run vertically up or down with equal facility, and even to suspendthemselves by their feather-hooks when engaged in dislodging insects. Another curious variation is found in Sylviothorhynchus, a smallwren-like bird and the only member known of the genus, with a tailresembling that of the lyre-bird, the extravagantly long feathers beingso narrow as to appear almost like shafts destitute of webs. This tailappears to be purely ornamental. 

This extreme variety in structure indicates a corresponding diversity inhabits; and, assuming it to be a true doctrine that habits vary firstand structure afterwards, anyone might infer from a study of their formsalone that these birds possess a singular plasticity, or tendency tovary, in their habits--or, in other words, that they are exceptionallyintelligent; and that such a conclusion would be right I believe a studyof their habits will serve to show. 

The same species is often found to differ in its manner of life indifferent localities. Some species of Xenops and Magarornis, likewoodpeckers, climb vertically on tree-trunks in search of insect prey, but also, like tits, explore the smaller twigs and foliage at theextremity of the branches; so that the whole tree, from its root to itstopmost foliage, is hunted over by them. The Sclerurus, although aninhabitant of the darkest forest, and provided with sharply-curvedclaws, never seeks its food on trees, but exclusively on the ground, among the decaying fallen leaves; but, strangely enough, when alarmed itflies to the trunk of the nearest tree, to which it clings in a verticalposition, and, remaining silent and motionless, escapes observation bymeans of its dark protective colour. The Drymornis, a large bird, withfeet and tail like a woodpecker, climbs on tree-trunks to seek its food;but also possesses the widely-different habit of resorting to the openplain, especially after a shower, to feed on larvae and earthworms, extracting them from a depth of three or four inches beneath the surfacewith 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, onthe contrary, different genera, and, very frequently, different speciesbelonging to one genus, possess habits peculiarly their own. In otherfamilies, even where the divergence is greatest, what may be taken asthe original or ancestral habit is seldom or never quite obsolete in anyof the members. This we see, for instance, in the woodpeckers, some ofwhich have acquired the habit of seeking their food exclusively on theground in open places, and even of nesting in the banks of streams. Yetall these wanderers, even those which have been structurally modified inaccordance with their altered way of life, retain the primitive habit ofclinging vertically to the trunks of trees, although the habit has lostits use. With the tyrant birds--a family showing an extraordinary amountof variation--it is the same; for the most divergent kinds arefrequently seen reverting to the family habit of perching on anelevation, from which to make forays after passing insects, returningafter each capture to the same stand. The thrushes, ranging all over theglobe, afford another striking example. Without speaking of theirnesting habits, their relationship appears in their love of fruit, intheir gait, flight, statuesque attitudes, and abrupt motions. 

With the numerous Dendrocolaptine groups, so widely separated andapparently unrelated, it would be difficult indeed to say which, oftheir most striking habits is the ancestral one. Many of the smallerspecies 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 Anumbiusnests on trees, but feeds exclusively on the ground in open places;while other ground-feeders seek their food among dead leaves in densegloomy forests. Coryphistera resembles the lark and pipit in its habits;Cinclodes, the wagtail; Geobates a Saxicola; Limnornis lives in reedbeds growing in the water; Henicornis in reed beds growing out of thewater; and many other ground species exist concealed in the grass on dryplains; Homorus seeks its food by digging in the loose soil and deadleaves about the roots of trees; while Geo-sitta, Furnarius, andUpercerthia obtain a livelihood chiefly by probing in the soil. It wouldnot be possible within the present limits to mention in detail all thedifferent modes of life of those species or groups which do not possessthe tree-creeping habit; after them comes a long array of genera inwhich this habit is ingrained, and in which the greatly modified feetand claws are suited to a climbing existence. As these genera comprisethe largest half of the family, also the largest birds in it, we mightexpect to find in the tree-creeping the parental habit of theDendrocolaptidae, and that from these tropical forest groups have sprungthe widely-diverging thicket, ground, marsh, sea-beach, androck-frequenting groups. It happens, however, that these birds resembleeach other only in their climbing feet; in the form of their beaks theyare as wide apart as are nuthatches, woodpeckers, crows, and curlews. They also differ markedly in the manner of seeking their food. Some diglike woodpeckers in decayed wood; others probe only in soft rotten wood;while the humming-bird-billed Xiphorhynchus, with a beak too long andslender for probing, explores the interior of deep holes in the trunksto draw out nocturnal insects, spiders, and centipedes from theirconcealment. Xiphoco-laptes uses its sword-like beak as a lever, thrusting it under and forcing up the loose bark; while Dendrornis, withits stout corvine beak, tears the bark off. 

In the nesting habits the diversity is greatest. Some ground speciesexcavate in the earth like kingfishers, only with greater skill, makingcylindrical burrows often four to five feet deep, and terminating in around chamber. Others build a massive oven-shaped structure of clay on abranch or other elevated site. Many of those that creep on trees nest inholes in the wood. The marsh-frequenting kinds attach spherical or ovaldomed nests to the reeds; and in some cases woven grass and clay are soingeniously combined that the structure, while light as a basket, isperfectly impervious to the wet and practically indestructible. The mostcurious nests, however, are the large stick structures on trees andbushes, in the building and repairing of which the birds are in manycases employed more or less constantly all the year round. These sticknests vary greatly in form, size, and in other respects. Some have aspiral passage-way leading from the entrance to the nest cavity, and thecavity is in many cases only large enough to accommodate the bird; butin the gigantic structure of Homorus gutturalis it is so large that, ifthe upper half of the nest or dome were removed, a condor couldcomfortably hatch her eggs and rear her young in it. This nest isspherical. The allied Homorus lophotis builds a nest equally large, butwith a small cavity for the eggs inside, and outwardly resembling agigantic powder-flask, lying horizontally among the lower branches of aspreading tree. Pracellodomtis sibila-trix, a bird in size like theEnglish house sparrow, also makes a huge nest, and places it on thetwigs at the terminal end of a horizontal branch from twelve to fifteenfeet above the ground; but when finished, the weight of the structurebears 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 sametree are similarly loaded, and other trees close at hand bear the samekind of fruit, the result is very picturesque. " Synallaxis phryganophilamakes a stick nest about a foot in depth, and from the top a tubularpassage, formed of slender twigs interlaced, runs down the entire lengthof the nest, like a rain-pipe on the wall of a house, and then becomingexternal slopes upward, ending at a distance of two to three feet fromthe nest. Throughout South America there are several varieties of thesefruit-and-stem or watering-pot shaped nests; they are not, however, allbuilt by birds of one genus, while in the genus Synallaxis many specieshave no tubular passageways attached to their nests. One species--erythrothorax--in Yucatan, makes so large a nest of sticks, that thenatives do not believe that so small a bird can be the builder. They saythat when the _tzapatan_ begins to sing, all the birds in the forestrepair to it, each one carrying a stick to add to the structure; onlyone, a tyrant-bird, brings two sticks, one for itself and one for the_urubú_ or vulture, that bird being considered too large, heavy, andignorant of architecture to assist personally in the work. 

In the southern part of South America, where scattered thorn trees growon 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, fromone point within a radius of twenty rods, over two hundred of thesecurious nests, varying in size from that of a small pumpkin to more thanthe volume of a barrel. Often a single tree will contain half a dozennests or more; and, not unfrequently, the nests of several differentspecies are seen crowding each other out of shape on the same bush ortree. "

It would be a mistake to think that the widely different nesting habitsI have mentioned are found in different genera. I have just spoken ofthe 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 tubeof woven grass, the aperture only large enough to admit the finger, andopen at both ends, so that the bird can pass in and out without turninground. Another species scoops a circular hollow in the soil, and buildsover it a dome of fine woven grass. It should be mentioned that thenesting habits of only about fifteen out of the sixty-five speciescomprised in this genus are known to us. In the genus Furnarius theoven-shaped clay structure is known to be made by three species; afourth builds a nest of sticks in a tree; a fifth burrows in the side ofa bank, like a kingfisher. 

The explanation of the most striking features of the Dendrocolaptidae, their monotonous brown plumage, diversity of structure, versatilehabits, and the marvellous development of the nest-making instinct whichthey exhibit is to be found, it appears to me, in the fact that they arethe most defenceless of birds. They are timid, unresisting creatures, without strength or weapons; their movements arc less quick and vigorousthan those of other kinds, and their flight is exceedingly feeble. Thearboreal species flit at intervals from one tree to another; those thatfrequent thickets refuse to leave their chosen shelter; while thoseinhabiting grassy plains or marshes study concealment, and, when forcedto rise, flutter away just above the surface, like flying-fishfrightened from the water, and, when they have gone thirty or fortyyards, dip into the grass or reeds again. Their life is thus one ofperpetual danger in a far greater degree than with other passerinefamilies, such as warblers, tyrants, finches, thrushes, &c. ; while anexclusively insect diet, laboriously extracted from secret places, andinability to change their climate, contribute to make their existence ahard one. It has been with these birds as with human beings, bred in"misfortune's school, " and subjected to keen competition. One of theirmost striking characteristics is a methodical, plodding, almost painfuldiligence of manner while seeking their food, so that when viewed sideby side with other species, rejoicing in a gayer plumage and strongerflight, they seem like sober labourers that never rest among holidaypeople bent only on enjoyment. That they are able not only to maintaintheir existence, but to rise to the position of a dominant family, isdue to an intelligence and adaptiveness exceeding that of other kinds, and which has been strengthened, and perhaps directly results from thehard conditions of their life. 

How great their adaptiveness and variability must be when we find thatevery portion of the South American continent is occupied by them; forthere is really no climate, and no kind of soil or vegetation, whichdoes not possess its appropriate species, modified in colour, form, andhabits to suit the surrounding conditions. In the tropical region, sorich in bird life of all kinds, in forest, marsh, and savanna, they areeverywhere abundant--food is plentiful there; but when we go to higherelevations avd cold sterile deserts, where their companion families ofthe tropics dwindle away and disappear, the creepers are still present, for they are evidently able to exist where other kinds would starve. Onthe stony plateaus of the Andes, and on the most barren spots inPatagonia, where no other bird is seen, there are small species ofSynallaxis, which, in their obscure colour and motions on the ground, resemble mice rather than birds; indeed, the Quichua name for one ofthese Synallaxes is _ukatchtuka, _ or mouse-bird. How different is thelife habit here from what we see in the tropical groups--the large birdswith immense beaks, that run vertically on the trunks of the greatforest trees!

At the extreme southern extremity of the South American continent wefind several species of Cin-clodes, seeking a subsistence likesandpipers on the beach; they also fly out to sea, and run about on thefloating kelp, exploring the fronds for the small marine animals onwhich they live. In the dreary forests of Tierra del Fuego anothercreeper, Uxyurus, is by far the commonest bird. "Whether high up or lowdown, in the most gloomy, wet, and scarcely penetrable ravines, " saysDarwin, "this little bird is to be met with;" and Dr. Cunningham alsorelates that in these wintry, savage woods he was always attended in hiswalks by parties of these little creepers, which assembled to follow himout of curiosity. 

To birds placed at so great a disadvantage, by a feeble flight and otheradverse circumstances, in the race of life bright colours wouldcertainly prove fatal. It is true that brown is not in itself aprotective colour, and the clear, almost silky browns and brightchestnut tints in several species are certainly not protective; butthese species are sufficiently protected in other ways, and can affordto be without a strictly adaptive colour, so long as they are notconspicuous. In a majority of cases, however, the colour is undoubtedlyprotective, the brown hue being of a shade that assimilates very closelyto the surroundings. There are pale yellowish browns, lined and mottled, in species living amidst a sere, scanty vegetation; earthy browns, inthose frequenting open sterile or stony places; while the species thatcreep on trees in forests are dark brown in colour, and in many casesthe feathers are mottled in such a manner as to make them curiouslyresemble the bark of a tree. The genera Lochmias and Sclerurus are thedarkest, the plumage in these birds being nearly or quite black, washedor tinged with rhubarb yellow. Their black plumage would render themconspicuous in the sunshine, but they pass their lives in dense tropicalforests, where the sun at noon sheds only a gloomy twilight. 

If "colour is ever tending to increase and to appear where it isabsent, " as Dr. Wallace believes, then we ought to find it varying inthe direction of greater brightness in some species in a family sonumerous and variable as the Dendrocolaptidae, however feeble and inneed of a protective colouring these birds may be in a majority ofpases. And this in effect we do find. In many of the dark-plumagedspecies that live in perpetual shade some parts are a very brightchestnut; while in a few that live in such close concealment as to bealmost independent of protective colouring, the lower plumage has becomepure white. A large number of species have a bright or nearly brightguiar spot. This is most remarkable in Synallaxis phryganophila, thechin being sulphur-yellow, beneath which is a spot of velvet-black, andon either side a white patch, the throat thus having three stronglycontrasted colours, arranged in four divisions. The presence of thisbright throat spot in so many species cannot very well be attributed tovoluntary sexual selection, although believers in that theory are ofcourse at liberty to imagine that when engaged in courtship, the malebird, or rather male and female both, as both sexes possess the spot, hold up their heads vertically to exhibit it. Perhaps it would be saferto look on it as a mere casual variation, which, like the exquisitelypencilled feathers and delicate tints on the concealed sides and undersurfaces of the wings of many species possessing outwardly an obscureprotective 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 colourwould prove highly dangerous on any conspicuous part of the body. Insome of the more vigorous, active species, we can see a tendency towardsa brighter colouring on large, exposed surfaces. In Auto-malus the tailis bright satiny rufous; in Pseudo-colaptes the entire under surface isrufous of a peculiar vivid tint, verging on orange or red; in Magarornisthe bosom is black, and beautifully ornamented with small leaf-shapedspots of a delicate straw-colour. There are several other very prettybirds in this homely family; but the finest of all is Thripodectesflammulatus, the whole body being tortoise-shell colour, the wings andtail bright chesnut. The powerful tanager-like beak of this speciesseems also to show that it has diverged from its timid shade-lovingcongeners in another direction by becoming a seed and fruit eater. 

Probably the sober and generally protective colouring of thetree-creepers, even with the variability and adaptiveness displayed intheir habits superadded, would be insufficient to preserve such feeblebirds in the struggle of life without the further advantage derived fromtheir wonderful nests. It has been said of domed nests that they are adanger rather than a protection, owing to their large size, which makesit easy for carnivorous species that prey on eggs and young birds tofind them; while small open nests are usually well concealed. This maybe the case with covered nests made of soft materials, loosely puttogether; but it cannot be said of the solid structure the tree-creeperbnilds, and which, as often as not, the bird erects in the mostconspicuous place it can find, as if, writes Azara, it desired all theworld to admire its work. The annual destruction of adult birds is verygreat--more than double that, I believe, which takes place in otherpasserine families. Their eggs and young are, however, practically safein their great elaborate nests or deep burrows, and, as a rule, they laymore eggs than other kinds, the full complement being seldom less thanfive in the species I am acquainted with, while some lay as many asnine. Their nests are also made so as to keep out a greater pest thantheir carnivorous or egg-devouring enemies--namely, the parasiticalstarlings (Molo-thrus), which are found throughout South America, andare excessively abundant and destructive to birds' nests in somedistricts. In most cases, in the big, strong-domed nest or deep burrow, all the eggs are hatched and all the young reared, the thinning, outprocess commencing only after the brood has been led forth into a worldbeset with perils. With other families, on the contrary, the greatestamount of destruction falls on the eggs or fledglings. I have frequentlykept 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 othercases one or two young; while, as often as not, the young actuallyreared were only parasitical starlings after all. 

I have still to speak of the voice of the tree-creepers, an importantpoint in the study of these birds; for, though not accounted singers, some species emit remarkable sounds; moreover, language in birds isclosely related to the social instinct. They seem to be rather solitarythan gregarious; and this seems only natural in birds so timid, weak-winged, and hard pressed. It would also be natural to conclude fromwhat has been said concerning their habits that they are comparativelysilent; for, as a rule, vigorous social birds are loquacious andloud-voiced, while shy solitary kinds preservo silence, except in thelove season. Nevertheless the creepers are loquacious and have loudresonant voices; this fact, however, does not really contradict awell-known principle, for the birds possess the social disposition in aneminent degree, only the social habit is kept down in them by theconditions of a life which makes solitude necessary. Thus, a largeproportion of species are found to pair for life; and the onlyreasonable explanation of this habit in birds--one which is not verycommon in the mammalia--is that such species possess the social temperor feeling, and live in pairs only because they cannot afford to live inflocks. Strictly gregarious species pair only for the breeding season. In the creepers the attachment between the birds thus mated for life isvery great, and, as Azara truly says of Anumbius, so fond of eachother's society are these birds, that when one incubates the other sitsat the entrance to the nest, and when one carries food to its young theother accompanies it, even if it has found nothing to cany. In thesespecies that live in pairs, when the two birds are separated they areperpetually calling to each other, showing how impatient of solitudethey are; while even from the more solitary kind, a high-pitchedcall-note is constantly heard in the woods, for these birds, debarredfrom associating together, satisfy their instinct by conversing with oneanother over long distances. 

The foregoing remarks apply to the Dendrocolap-tidae throughout thetemperate countries of South America--the birds inhabiting extensivegrassy plains and marshes, and districts with a scanty or scattered treeand bush vegetation. In the forest areas of the hotter regions it isdifferent; there the birds form large gatherings or "wandering bands, "composed of all the different species found in each district, associatedwith birds of other families--wood-peckers, tyrant-birds, bush shrikes, and many others. These miscellaneous gatherings are not of rareoccurrence, but out of the breeding season are formed daily, the birdsbeginning to assemble at about nine or ten o'clock in the morning, their number increasing through the day until it reaches its maximumbetween two and four o'clock in the afternoon, after which it begins todiminish, each bird going off to its customary shelter ordwelling-place. Mr. Bates, who first described these wandering bands, says that he could always find the particular band belonging to adistrict any day he wished, for when he failed to meet with it in onepart of the forest he would try other paths, until he eventually foundit. The great Amazonian forests, he tells us, appear strangely silentand devoid of bird life, and it is possible to ramble about for wholedays without seeing or hearing birds. But now and then the surroundingtrees and bushes appear suddenly swarming with them. "The bustlingcrowd loses no time, and, always moving in concert, each bird isoccupied on its own account in searching bark, or leaf, or twig. In afew moments the host is gone, and the forest path remains deserted andsilent as before. " Stolzmann, who observed them in Peru, says that thesound caused by the busy crowd searching through the foliage, and thefalling of dead leaves and twigs, resembles that produced by a shower ofrain. The Indians of the Amazons, Mr. Bates writes, have a curiousbelief to explain these bird armies; they say that the Papa-uira, supposed to be a small grey bird, fascinates all the others, and leadsthem on a weary perpetual dance through the forest. It seems verywonderful that birds, at other times solitary, should thus combine dailyin large numbers, including in their bands scores of widely differentspecies, and in size ranging from those no larger than a wren to othersas big as a magpie. It is certainly very advantageous to them. As Beltremarks, they play into each other's hands; for while the largercreepers explore the trunks of big trees, others run over the branchesand cling to the lesser twigs, so that every tree in their route, fromits roots to the topmost foliage, is thoroughly examined, and everyspider and caterpillar taken, while the winged insects, driven fromtheir lurking-places, are seized where they settle, or caught flying bythe tyrant birds. 

I have observed the wandering bands only in Patagonia, where they are ona very small scale compared with those of the tropical forests. In thePatagonia thickets the small tit-like creeper, Laptas-thenura, is theprime mover; and after a considerable number of these have gathered, creepers of other species and genera unite with them, and finally theband, as it moves through the thickets, draws to itself otherkinds--flycatchers, finches, &c. --many of the birds running or hoppingon the ground to search for insects in the loose soil or under deadleaves, while others explore the thorny bushes. My observations of thesesmall bands lead me to believe that everywhere in South America theDendrocolaptidae are the first in combining to act in concert, and thatthe birds of other families follow their march and associate with them, knowing from experience that a rich harvest may be thus reaped. In thesame way birds of various kinds follow the movements of a column ofhunting ants, to catch the insects flying up from the earth to escapefrom their enemies; swallows also learn to keep company with thetraveller on horseback, and, crossing and recrossing just before thehoofs, they catch the small twilight moths driven up from the grass. 

To return to the subject of voice. The tree-creepers do not possessmelodious, or at any rate mellow notes, although in so numerous a familythere is great variety of tone, ranging from a small reedy voice likethe faint stridulation of a grasshopper, to the resounding, laughter-like, screaming concerts of Homorus, which may be hearddistinctly two miles away. As a rule, the notes are loud ringing calls;and in many species the cry, rapidly reiterated, resembles a peal oflaughter. With scarcely an exception, they possess no set song; but inmost species that live always in pairs there are loud, vehement, gratulatory notes uttered by the two birds in concert when they meetafter a brief separation. This habit they possess in common with birdsof 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. Onmeeting, the male and female, standing close together and facing eachother, utter their clear ringing concert, one emitting loud singlemeasured notes, while the notes of its fellow are rapid, rhythmicaltriplets; their voices have a joyous character, and seem to accord, thusproducing a kind of harmony. This manner of singing is perhaps mostperfect in the oven-bird, Furnarias, and it is very curious that theyoung birds, when only partially fledged, are constantly heard in thenest or oven apparently practising these duets in the intervals when theparents are absent; single measured notes, triplets, and long concludingtrills are all repeated with wonderful fidelity, although these notesare in character utterly unlike the hunger cry, which is like that ofother fledglings. I cannot help thinking that this fact of the youngbirds beginning to sing like the adults, while still confined in theirdark cradle, is one of very considerable significance, especially whenwe consider the singular character of the performance; and that it mighteven be found to throw some light on the obscure question of thecomparative antiquity of the different and widely separatedDendrocolaptine groups. It is a doctrine in evolutionary science thatthe early maturing of instincts in the young indicates a high antiquityfor the species or group; and there is no reason why this principleshould 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 learnto sing only by imitating the adults still holds its ground; and Darwingives it his approval in his _Descent of Man. _ It is perhaps one ofthose doctrines which are partially true, or which do not contain thewhole truth; and it is possible to believe that, while many singingbirds do so learn their songs, or acquire a greater proficiency in themfrom 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 asbeing similar to this of the oven-bird, and seems to lend some force tothe suggestion I have made concerning the early development of voice inthe young. 

Birds peculiar to South America are said by anatomists to be lessspecialized, lower, more ancient, than the birds of the northerncontinents, and among those which are considered lowest and most ancientare the Tinamous (rail and partridge like in their habits), birds thatlead a solitary, retiring life, and in most cases have sweet melancholyvoices. Rhynchotus rufescens, a bird the size of a fowl, inhabiting thepampas, is perhaps the sweetest-voiced, and sings with great frequency. Its song or call is heard oftenest towards the evening, and is composedof five modulated notes, flute-like in character, very expressive, anduttered by many individuals answering each other as they sit far apartconcealed in the grass. As we might have expected, the faculties andinstincts of the young of this species mature at a very early period;when extremely small, they abandon their parents to shift for themselvesin solitude; and when not more than one-fourth the size they eventuallyattain, they acquire the adult plumage and are able to fly as well as anold bird. I observed a young bird of this species, less than a quail insize, at a house on the pampas, and was told that it had been taken fromthe nest when just breaking the shell; it had, therefore, never seen orheard the parent birds. Yet this small chick, every day at the approachof evening, would retire to the darkest corner of the dining room, and, concealed under a piece of furniture, would continue uttering itsevening song for an hour or longer at short intervals, and rendering itso perfectly that I was greatly surprised to hear it; for a thrush orother songster at the same period of life, when attempting to sing, onlyproduces a chirping sound. 

The early singing of the oven-bird fledgling is important, owing to thefact that the group it belongs to comprises the least specialized formsin the family. They are strong-legged, square-tailed, terrestrial birds, generally able to perch, have probing beaks, and build the most perfectmud or stick nests, or burrow in the ground. In the numeroustree-creeping groups, which, seem as unrelated to the oven-bird as thewoodpecker is to the hoopoe, we find a score of wonderfully differentforms of beak; but many of them retain the probing character, and areactually used to probe in rotten wood on trees, and to explore the holesand deep crevices in the trunk. We have also seen that some of thesetree-creepers revert to the ancestral habit (if I may so call it) ofseeking 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 thewood 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 ofsimilar structures in animals which are otherwise very distinct"--as wesee in the tubular tongue in honey-eaters and humming birds--we mighthave expected to find in the Dendrocolaptidae a better imitation of thewoodpecker 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 parentalform; and when birds of this type had spread over the entire continentthey became in different districts frequenters of marshes, forests, thickets and savannas. With altered life-habits the numerous divergentforms originated; some, like Xiphorynchus, retaining a probing beak in awonderfully modified form, attenuated in an extreme degree, and bentlike a sickle; others diverging more in the direction of nuthatches andwoodpeckers. 

This sketch of the Dendrocolaptidae, necessarily slight and imperfect, is based on a knowledge of the habits of about sixty species, belongingto twenty-eight genera: from personal observation I am acquainted withless than thirty species. It is astonishing to find how little has beenwritten about these most interesting birds in South America. Onetree-creeper only, Furnarius rufus, the oven-bird _par excellence, _ hasbeen mentioned, on account of its wonderful architecture, in almostevery general work of natural history published during the presentcentury; 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 ofbirds possessing the habit of assembling together, in many cases alwaysat the same spot, to indulge in antics and dancing performances, with orwithout the accompaniment of music, vocal or instrumental; and byinstrumental music is here meant all sounds other than vocal madehabitually and during the more or less orderly performances; as, forinstance, drumming and tapping noises; smiting of wings; and humming, whip-cracking, fan-shutting, grinding, scraping, and horn-blowingsounds, produced as a rule by the quills. 

There are human dances, in which only one person performs at a time, therest of the company looking on; and some birds, in widely separatedgenera, have dances of this kind. A striking example is the Rupicola, orcock of-the-rock, of tropical South America. A mossy level spot of earthsurrounded by bushes is selected for a dancing-place, and kept wellcleared of sticks and stones; round this area the birds assemble, when acock-bird, with vivid orange-scarlet crest and plumage, steps into it, and, with spreading wings and tail, begins a series of movements as ifdancing a minuet; finally, carried away with excitement, he leaps andgyrates in the most astonishing manner, until, becoming exhausted, heretires, and another bird takes his place. 

In other species all the birds in a company unite in the setperformances, and seem to obey an impulse which affects themsimultaneously and in the same degree; but sometimes one bird promptsthe others and takes a principal part. One of the most curious instancesI have come across in reading is contained in Mr. Bigg-Wither's_Pioneering in South Brazil. _ He relates that one morning in the denseforest his attention was roused by the unwonted sound of a birdsinging--songsters being rare in that district. His men, immediatelythey caught the sound, invited him to follow them, hinting that he wouldprobably witness a very curious sight. Cautiously making their waythrough the dense undergrowth, they finally came in sight of a smallstony spot of ground, at the end of a tiny glade; and on this spot, someon the stone and some on the shrubs, were assembled a number of littlebirds, about the size of tom-tits, with lovely blue plumage and redtop-knots. One was perched quite still on a twig, singing merrily, whilethe others were keeping time with wings and feet in a kind of dance, andall twittering an accompaniment. He watched them for some time, and wassatisfied that they were having a ball and concert, and thoroughlyenjoying themselves; they then became alarmed, and the performanceabruptly 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 thepurpose of display; but in a majority of cases, especially in thePasserine order, the solitary species performs its antics alone, or withno witness but its mate. Azara, describing a small finch, which he aptlynamed _Oscilador, _ says that early and late in the day it mounts upvertically to a moderate height; then, flies off to a, distance oftwenty yards, describing a perfect curve in its passage; turning, itflies 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 andof song in animals are referred to Darwin's _Descent of Man_ for anexplanation. The greater part of that work is occupied with a laboriousargument intended to prove that the love-feeling inspires the animalsengaged in these exhibitions, and that sexual selection, or thevoluntary selection of mates by the females, is the final cause of allset musical and dancing performances, as well as of bright andharmonious colouring, and of ornaments. 

The theory, with regard to birds is, that in the love-season, when themales are excited and engage in courtship, the females do not fall tothe 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 facultycorresponding to the aesthetic feeling or taste in man, and deliberatelyselect males for their superiority in some aesthetic quality, such asgraceful or fantastic motions, melody of voice, brilliancy of colour, orperfection of ornaments. Doubtless all birds were originallyplain-coloured, without ornaments and without melody, and it is assumedthat so it would always have been in many cases but for the action ofthis principle, which, like natural selection, has gone on accumulatingcountless small variations, tending to give a greater lustre to thespecies in each case, and resulting in all that we most admire in theanimal world--the Rupicola's flame-coloured mantle, the peacock's crestand starry train, the joyous melody of the lark, and the pretty orfantastic dancing performances of birds. 

My experience is that mammals and birds, with few exceptions--probablythere are really no exceptions--possess the habit of indulgingfrequently in more or less regular or set performances, with or withoutsound, 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, andmelodious kinds take immeasurably higher, more complex, and morebeautiful forms. Among the mammalians the instinct appearsalmost universal; but their displays are, as a rule, less admirable thanthose seen in birds. There are some kinds, it is true, like thesquirrels and monkeys, of arboreal habits, almost birdlike in theirrestless energy, and in the swiftness and certitude of their motions, inwhich the slightest impulse can be instantly expressed in graceful orfantastic action; others, like the Chinchillidae family, have greatlydeveloped vocal organs, and resemble birds in loquacity; but mammalsgenerally, compared with birds, are slow and heavy, and not so readilymoved to exhibitions of the kind I am discussing. 

The terrestrial dances, often very elaborate, of heavy birds, like thoseof the gallinaceous kind, are represented in the more volatile speciesby 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 theair, singly or in flocks. Sometimes, in serene weather, they rise to avast altitude, and float about in one spot for an hour or longer at astretch, showing a faint bird-cloud in the blue, that does not changeits form, nor grow lighter and denser like a flock of starlings; but inthe seeming confusion there is perfect order, and amidst many hundredseach swift- or slow-gliding figure keeps its proper distance with suchexactitude that no two ever touch, even with the extremity of thelong-wings, flapping or motionless:--such a multitude, and suchmiraculous precision in the endless curving motions of all the membersof it, that the spectator can lie for an hour on his back withoutweariness 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 whenfeeding-time is over. The birds of a flock, while winging their way tothe roosting-place, all at once seem possessed with frenzy, simultaneously dashing downwards with amazing violence, doubling aboutin the most eccentric manner; and when close to the surface rising againto repeat the action, all the while making the air palpitate for milesaround with their hard, metallic cries. Other ibises, also birds ofother genera, have similar aerial performances. 

The displays of most ducks known to me take the form of mock fights onthe water; one exception is the handsome and loquacious whistlingwidgeon of La Plata, which has a pretty aerial performance. A dozen ortwenty birds rise up until they appear like small specks in the sky, andsometimes disappear from sight altogether; and at that great altitudethey continue hovering in one spot, often for an hour or longer, alternately closing and separating; the fine, bright, whistling notesand flourishes of the male curiously harmonizing with the grave, measured notes of the female; and every time they close they slap eachother on the wings so smartly that the sound can be distinctly heard, like applauding hand-claps, even after the birds have ceased to bevisible. 

The rails, active, sprightly birds with powerful and varied voices, aregreat performers; but owing to the nature of the ground they inhabit andto their shy, suspicious character, it is not easy to observe theirantics. The finest of the Platan rails is the ypecaha, a beautiful, active bird about the size of the fowl. A number of ypecahas have theirassembling place on a small area of smooth, level ground, just above thewater, and hemmed in by dense rush beds. First, one bird among therushes emits a powerful cry, thrice repeated; and this is a note ofinvitation, quickly responded to by other birds from all sides as theyhurriedly repair to the usual place. In a few moments they appear, tothe number of a dozen or twenty, bursting from the rushes and runninginto the open space, and instantly beginning the performance. This is atremendous screaming concert. The screams they utter have a certainresemblance to the human voice, exerted to its utmost pitch andexpressive of extreme terror, frenzy, and despair. A long, piercingshriek, astonishing for its vehemence and power, is succeeded by a lowernote, as if in the first the creature had well nigh exhausted itself:this double scream is repeated several times, and followed by othersounds, resembling, as they rise and fall, half smothered cries of painsand moans of anguish. Suddenly the unearthly shrieks are renewed in alltheir power. While screaming the birds rush from side to side, as ifpossessed with madness, the wings spread and vibrating, the long-beakwide open and raised vertically. This exhibition lasts three or fourminntes, after which the assembly peacefully breaks up. 

The singular wattled, wing-spurred, and long-, toed jacana has aremarkable performance, which seems specially designed to bring out theconcealed beauty of the silky, greenish-golden wing-quills-The birds gosingly or in pairs, and a dozen or fifteen individuals may be found in amarshy place feeding within sight of each other. Occasionally, inresponse to a note of invitation, they all in a moment leave off feedingand fly to one spot, and, forming a close cluster, and emitting short, excited, rapidly repeated notes, display their wings, like beautifulflags grouped loosely together: some hold the wings up vertically andmotionless; others, half open and vibrating rapidly, while still otherswave them up and down with a slow, measured motion. 

In the ypecaha and jacana displays both sexes take part. A strangerperformance is that of the spur-winged lapwing of the same region--aspecies resembling the lapwing of Europe, but a third larger, brightercoloured, and armed with spurs. The lapwing display, called by thenatives its "dance, " or "serious dance"--by which they mean squaredance--requires three birds for its performance, and is, so far as Iknow, unique in this respect. The birds are so fond of it that theyindulge in it all the year round, and at frequent intervals during theday, also on moonlight nights. If a person watches any two birds forsome time--for they live in pairs--he will see another lapwing, one of aneighbouring couple, rise up and fly to them, leaving his own mate toguard their chosen ground; and instead of resenting this visit as anunwarranted intrusion on their domain, as they would certainly resentthe approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it with notes andsigns of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place themselvesbehind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid march, utteringresonant drumming notes in time with their movements; the notes of thepair behind being emitted in a stream, like a drum-roll, while theleader utters loud single notes at regular intervals. The march ceases;the leader elevates his wings and stands erect and motionless, stilluttering loud notes; while the other two, with puffed-out plumage andstanding exactly abreast stoop forward and downward until the tips oftheir beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their rhythmical voices to amurmur, remain for some time in this posture. The performance is thenover and the visitor goes back to his own ground and mate, to receive avisitor himself later on. 

In the Passerine order, not the least remarkable displays are witnessedin birds that are not accounted songsters, as they do not possess thehighly developed vocal organ confined to the suborder Oscines. Thetyrant-birds, which represent in South America the fly-catchers of theOld World, all have displays of some kind; in a vast majority of casesthese are simply joyous, excited duets between male and female, composedof impetuous and more or less confused notes and screams, accompaniedwith beating of wings and other gestures. In some species choruses takethe place of duets, while in others entirely different forms of displayhave been developed. In one group--Cnipolegus--the male indulges insolitary antics, while the silent, modest-coloured female keeps inhiding. Thus, the male of Cnipolegus Hudsoni, an intenselyblack-plumaged species with a concealed white wing-band, takes his standon a dead twig on the summit of a bush. At intervals he leaves hisperch, displaying the intense white on the quills, and producing, as thewings are thrown open and shut alternately, the effect of successiveflashes of light. Then suddenly the bird begins revolving in the airabout its perch, like a moth wheeling round and close to the flame of acandle, emitting a series of sharp clicks and making a loud humming withthe wings. While performing this aerial waltz the black and white on thequills 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 asa bird carved out of jet. 

The performance of the scissors-tail, another tyrant-bird, is alsoremarkable. This species is grey and white, with black head and tail anda crocus-yellow crest. On the wing it looks like a large swallow, butwith the two outer tail-feathers a foot long. The scissors-tails alwayslive in pairs, but at sunset several pairs assemble, the birds callingexcitedly to each other; they then mount upwards, like rockets, to agreat height in the anand, after wheeling about for a few moments, pro-cipitate themselves downwards with amazing violence in a wildzigzag, opening and shutting the long tail-feathers like a pair ofshears, and producing loud whirring sounds, as of clocks being woundrapidly up, with a slight pause after each turn of the key. This aerialdance over, they alight in separate couples on the tree tops, eachcouple joining in a kind of duet of rapidly repeated, castanet-likesounds. 

The displays of the wood-hewers, or Dendrocolap-tidae, another extensivefamily, resemble those of the tyrant-birds in being chiefly duets, maleand female singing excitedly in piercing or resonant voices, and withmuch action. The habit varies somewhat in the cachalote, a Patagonianspecies of the genus Homorus, about the size of the missel-thrush. Oldand young birds live in a family together, and at intervals, on any fineday, they engage in a grand screaming contest, which may be hearddistinctly at a distance of a mile and a half. One bird mounts on to abush and calls, and instantly all the others hurry to the spot, andburst out into a chorus of piercing cries that sound like peals andshrieks of insane laughter. After the chorus, they all pursue each otherwildly about among the bushes for some minutes. 

In some groups the usual duet-like performances have developed into akind of harmonious singing, which is very curious and pleasant to hear. This is pre-eminently the case with the oven-birds, as D'Orbigney firstremarked. Thus, in the red oven-bird, the first bird, on the appearanceof its mate flying to join it, begins to emit loud, measured notes, andsometimes a continuous trill, somewhat metallic in sound; butimmediately on the other bird striking in this introductory passage ischanged to triplets, strongly accented on the first note, in a _tempovivace;_ while the second bird utters loud single notes in the sametime. While thus singing they stand facing each other, necksoutstretched and tails expanded, the wings of the first bird vibratingrapidly to the rapid utterance, while those of the second bird beatmeasured time. The finale consists of three or four notes, uttered bythe second bird alone, strong and clear, in an ascending scale, the lastvery piercing. 

In the melodists proper the displays, in a majority of cases, areexclusively vocal, the singer sitting still on his perch. In theTroupials, a family of starling-like birds numbering about one hundredand forty species, there are many that accompany singing with pretty orgrotesque antics. The male screaming cow-bird of La Plata, when perched, emits a hollow-sounding internal note that swells at the end into asharp metallic ring, almost bell-like: this is uttered with wings andtail spread and depressed, the whole plumage being puffed out as in astrutting turkey-cock, while the bird hops briskly up and down on itsperch as if dancing. The bell-like note of the male is followed by animpetuous scream from the female, and the dance ends. Another species, the common Argentine cow-bird of La Plata, when courting puffs out hisglossy rich violet plumage, and, with wings vibrating, emits asuccession 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 oftwenty to thirty yards turns and flies in a wide circle round thefemale, singing loudly all the time, hedging her in with melody as itwere. 

Many songsters in widely different families possess the habit of soaringand falling alternately while singing, and in some cases all the aerialpostures and movements, the swift or slow descent, vertical, often, withoscillations, or in a spiral, and sometimes with a succession of smoothoblique lapses, seem to have an admirable correspondence with thechanging and falling voice--melody and motion being united in a moreintimate and beautiful way than in the most perfect and poetic forms ofhuman dancing. 

One of the soaring singers is a small yellow field-finch of LaPlata--Sycalis luteola; and this species, like some others, changes theform of its display with the seasons. It lives in immense flocks, andduring the cold season it has, like most finches, only aerial pastimes, the birds wheeling about in a cloud, pursuing each other with livelychirpings. In August, when the trees begin to blossom, the flock betakesitself to a plantation, and, sitting on the branches, the birds sing ina concert of innumerable voices, producing a great volume of sound, asof a high wind when heard at a distance. Heard near, it is a great massof melody; not a confused tangle of musical sounds as when a host ofTroupials sing in concert, but the notes, although numberless, seem toflow smoothly and separately, producing an effect on the ear similar tothat which rain does on the sight, when the sun shines on and lightensup the myriads of falling drops all falling one way. In this manner thebirds sing for hours, without intermission, every day. Then the passionof love infects them; the pleasant choir breaks up, and its ten thousandmembers scatter wide over the surrounding fields and pasture lands. During courtship the male has a feeble, sketchy music, but his singingis then accompanied with very charming love antics. His circlings aboutthe hen-bird; his numberless advances and retreats, and little soaringsabove her when his voice swells with importunate passion; his flutteringlapses back to earth, where he lies prone with outspread, tremulouswings, a suppliant at her feet, his languishing voice meanwhile dyingdown to lispings--all these apt and graceful motions seem to express thevery sickness of the heart. But the melody during this emotional periodis nothing. After the business of pairing and nest-building is over, hismusical displays take a new and finer form. He sits perched on a stalkabove the grass, and at intervals soars up forty or fifty yards high;rising, he utters a series of long melodious notes; then he descends ina graceful spiral, the set of the motionless wings giving him theappearance of a slowly-falling parachute; the voice then also falls, thenotes coming lower, sweeter, and more expressive until he reaches thesurface. After alighting the song continues, the strains becominglonger, thinner, and clearer, until they dwindle to the finest threadsof sound and faintest tinklings, as from a cithern touched by fairyfingers. The great charm of the song is in this slow gradation from thesomewhat throaty notes emitted by the bird when ascendino-to theexcessively attenuated sounds at the close. 

In conclusion of this part I shall speak of one species more--thewhite-banded mocking-bird of Patagonia, which greatly excels all othersongsters known to me in the copiousness, variety and brilliantcharacter of its music. Concealed in the foliage this bird will sing bythe half-hour, reproducing with miraculous fidelity the more or lessmelodious set songs of a score of species--a strange and beautifulperformance; but wonderful as it seems while it lasts, one almost ceasesto admire this mimicking bird-art when the mocker, as if to show bycontrast his unapproachable superiority, bursts into his own divinesong, uttered with a power, abandon and joyousness resembling, butgreatly exceeding, that of the skylark "singing at heaven's gate;" thenotes issuing in a continuous torrent; the voice so brilliant andinfinitely varied, that if "rivalry and emulation" have as large a placein feathered breasts as some imagine all that hear this surpassingmelody might well languish ever after in silent despair. 

In a vast majority of the finest musical performances the same notes areuttered in the same order, and after an interval the song is repeatedwithout any variation: and it seems impossible that we could in anyother way have such beautiful contrasts and harmonious lights andshades--the whole song, so to speak, like a "melody sweetly played intune. " This seeming impossibility is accomplished in the mocking-bird'ssong: the notes never come in the same order again and again, but, as ifinspired, in a changed order, with variations and new sounds: and hereagain it has some resemblance to the skylark's song, and might bedescribed as the lark's song with endless variations and brightened andspiritualized in a degree that cannot be imagined. 

This mocking-bird is one of those species that accompany music withappropriate motions. And just as its song is, so to speak, inspired andan im-provization, unlike any song the bird has ever uttered, so itsmotions all have the same character of spontaneity, and follow no order, and yet have a grace and passion and a perfect harmony with the musicunparalleled among birds possessing a similar habit. While singing hepasses from bush to bush, sometimes delaying a few moments on and atothers just touching the summits, and at times sinking out of sight inthe foliage: then, in an access of rapture, soaring vertically to aheight of a hundred feet, with measured wing-beats, like those of aheron: or, mounting suddenly in a wild, hurried zigzag, then slowlycircling downwards, to sit at last with tail outspread fanwise, andvans, glistening white in the sunshine, expanded and vibrating, or wavedlanguidly up and down, with, a motion like that of some broad-wingedbutterfly at rest on a flower. 

I wish now to put this question: What relation that we can see orimagine to the passion of love and the business of courtship, have thesedancing and vocal performances in nine cases out of ten? In such cases, for instance, as that of the scissors-tail tyrant-bird, and itspyrotechnic evening displays, when a number of couples leave their nestscontaining eggs and young to join in a wild aerial dance: the madexhibitions of ypecahas and ibises, and the jacanas' beautifulexhibition of grouped wings: the triplet dances of the spur-wingedlapwing, to perform which two birds already mated are compelled to callin a third bird to complete the set: the harmonious duets of theoven-birds, and the duets and choruses of nearly all the wood-hewers, and the wing-slapping aerial displays of the whistling widgeons--will itbe seriously contended that the female of this species makes choice ofthe male able to administer the most vigorous and artistic slaps?

The believer in the theory would put all these cases lightly aside, tocite that of the male cow-bird practising antics before the female anddrawing a wide circle of melody round her; or that of the jet-black, automaton-like, dancing tyrant-bird; and concerning this species hewould probably say that the plain-plumaged female went about unseen, critically watching the dancing of different males, to discover the mostexcellent 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-seasonbefore the female; and when all such cases, or rather those that aremost striking and bizarre, are brought together, and when it isgratuitously asserted that the females _do_ choose the males that showoff in the best manner or that sing best, a case for sexual selectionseems to be made out. How unfair the argument is, based on thesecarefully selected cases gathered from all regions of the globe, andoften not properly reported, is seen when we turn from the book tonature and closely consider the habits and actions of all the speciesinhabiting any _one_ district. We see then that such cases as thosedescribed and made so much of in the _Descent of Man, _ and cases likethose mentioned in this chapter, are not essentially different incharacter, but are manifestations of one instinct, which appears to bealmost universal among the animals. The explanation I have to offer liesvery much on the surface and is very simple indeed, and, like that ofDr. 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 occasionto allude to the apparent connection of brilliancy of colour with vigourof life and purity of substance. This is pre-eminently the case in themineral kingdom. The perfection with which the particles of anysubstance unite in crystallization, corresponds in that kingdom to thevital power in organic nature. "] to colour and ornaments covers thewhole of the facts. We see that the inferior animals, when theconditions of life are favourable, are subject to periodical fits ofgladness affecting them powerfully and standing out in vivid contrast totheir ordinary temper. And we know what this feeling is--this periodicintense elation which even civilized man occasionally experiences whenin perfect health, more especially when young. There are moments whenhe is mad with joy, when he cannot keep still, when his impulse is tosing and shout aloud and laugh at nothing, to run and leap and exerthimself in some extravagant way. Among the heavier mammalians thefeeling is manifested in loud noises, bellowings and screamings, and inlumbering, uncouth motions--throwing up of heels, pretended panics, andponderous mock battles. 

In smaller and livelier animals, with greater celerity and certitude intheir motions, the feeling shows itself in more regular and often inmore complex ways. Thus, Felidae when young, and, in very agile, sprightly species like the Puma, throughout life, simulate all theactions of an animal hunting its prey--sudden, intense excitement ofdiscovery, concealment, gradual advance, masked by intervening objects, with intervals of watching, when they crouch motionless, the eyesflashing and tail waved from side to side; finally, the rush and spring, when the playfellow is captured, rolled over on his back and worried toimaginary death. Other species of the most diverse kinds, in which voiceis greatly developed, join in noisy concerts and choruses; many of thecats may be mentioned, also dogs and foxes, capybaras and otherloquacious rodents; and in the howling monkeys this kind of performancerises 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 withit; and as they are so much freer than mammals, more buoyant andgraceful in action, more loquacious, and have voices so much finer, their gladness shows itself in a greater variety of ways, with moreregular and beautiful motions, and with melody. But every species, orgroup of species, has its own inherited form or style of performance;and, however rude and irregular this may be, as in the case of thepretended stampedes and fights of wild cattle, that is the form in whichthe feeling will always be expressed. If all men, at some exceedinglyremote period in their history, had agreed to express the common gladimpulse, which they now express in such an infinite variety of ways ordo not express at all, by dancing a minuet, and minuet-dancing had atlast come to be instinctive, and taken to spontaneously by children atan 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 theground, when, in a moment, all the birds were seized by a joyousmadness, and each one, after making a vigorous peck at his nearestneighbour, began running wildly about, each trying in passing to peckother birds, while seeking by means of quick doublings to escape beingpecked in turn. This species always expresses its glad impulse in thesame way; but how different in form is this simple game oftouch-who-touch-can from the triplet dances of the spur-winged lapwings, with their drumming music, pompous gestures, and military precision ofmovement! How different also from the aerial performance of another birdof the same family--the Brazilian stilt--in which one is pursued by theothers, mounting upwards in a wild, eccentric flight until they are allbut lost to view; and back to earth again, and then, skywards once more;the pursued bird when overtaken giving place to another individual, andthe pursuing pack making the air ring with their melodious barkingcries! How different again are all these from the aerial pastimes of thesnipe, in which the bird, in its violent descent, is able to producesuch wonderful, far-reaching sounds with its tail-feathers! The snipe, as a rule, is a solitary bird, and, like the oscillating finch mentionedearly in this paper, is content to practise its pastimes without awitness. In the gregarious kinds all perform together: for this feeling, like fear, is eminently contagious, and the sight of one bird mad withjoy will quickly make the whole flock mad. There are also species thatalways live in pairs, like the scissors-tails already mentioned, thatperiodically assemble in numbers for the purpose of display. The crestedscreamer, a very large bird, may also be mentioned: male and female singsomewhat harmoniously together, with voices of almost unparalleledpower: but these birds also congregate in large numbers, and a thousandcouples, or even several thousands, may be assembled together: and, atintervals, both by day and night, all sing in concert, their combinedvoices producing a thunderous melody which seems to shake the earth. Asa rule, however, birds that live always in pairs do not assemble for thepurpose of display, but the joyous instinct is expressed by duet-likeperformances between male and female. Thus, in the three South AmericanPasserine families, the tyrant-birds, wood-hewers, and ant-thrushes, numbering together between eight and nine hundred species, a very largemajority appear to have displays of this description. 

In my own experience, in cases where the male and female together, orassembled with others, take equal parts in the set displays, the sexesarc similar, or differ little; but where the female takes no part in thedisplays the superiority of the male in brightness of colour is verymarked. One or two instances bearing on this point may be given. 

A scarlet-breasted troupial of La Plata perches conspicuously on a tallplant in afield, and at intervals soars up vertically, singing, and, atthe highest ascending point, flight and song end in a kind of aerialsomersault and vocal flourish at the same moment. Meanwhile, thedull-plumaged female is not seen and not heard: for not even a skulkingcrake lives in closer seclusion under the herbage--so widely have thesexes diverged in this species. Is the female, then, without an instinctso common r--has she no sudden fits of irrepressible gladness?Doubtless she has them, and manifests them down in her place ofconcealment in lively chirpings and quick motions--the simple, primitiveform in which gladness is expressed in the class of birds. In thevarious species of the genus Cnipolegus, already mentioned, thedifference 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 setand highly fantastic performance; but on more than one occasion I haveseen four or five females of one species meet together and have a littlesimple performance all to themselves--in form a kind of lively mockfight. 

It might be objected that when a bird takes its stand and repeats a setfinished song at intervals for an hour at a stretch, remaining quietlyperched, such a performance appears to be different in character fromthe irregular and simple displays which are unmistakably caused by asudden glad impulse. But we are familiar with the truth that in organicnature great things result from small beginnings--a common flower, andour 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 highlyfinished manner. Looking at many species, we find every gradation, everyshade, 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 thechirping bunting, and noisy but tuneless sparrow, to linnet andgoldfinch and canary. Not only do a large majority of species show thesinging instinct, or form of display, in a primitive, undeveloped state, but in that state it continues to show itself in the young of many birdsin which melody is most highly developed in the adult. And where thedevelopment has been solely in the male the female never rises abovethat early stage; in her lively chirpings and little mock fights andchases, and other simple forms which gladness takes in birds, as well asin her plainer plumage, and absence of ornament, she represents thespecies at some remote period. And as with song so with antics and allset performances aerial or terrestrial, from those of the whale and theelephant to those of the smallest insect. 

Another point remains to be noticed, and that is the greater frequencyand fulness in displays of all kinds, including song, during the loveseason. And here Dr. Wallace's colour and ornament theory helps us to anexplanation. At the season of courtship, when the conditions of life aremost favourable vitality is at its maximum, and naturally it is thenthat the proficiency in all kinds of dancing-antics, aerial andterrestrial, appears greatest, and that melody attains its highestperfection. This applies chiefly to birds, but even among birds thereare exceptions, as we have seen in the case of the field-finch, Sycalisluteola. The love-excitement is doubtless pleasurable to them, and ittakes the form in which keenly pleasurable emotions are habituallyexpressed, although not infrequently with variations due to the greaterintensity of the feeling. In some migrants the males arrive before thefemales, and no sooner have they recovered from the effects of theirjourney than they burst out into rapturous singing; these are notlove-strains, since the females have not yet arrived, and pairing-timeis perhaps a mouth distant; their singing merely expresses theiroverflowing gladness. The forest at that season is vocal, not only withthe fine melody of the true songsters, but with hoarse cawings, piercingcries, shrill duets, noisy choruses, drummings, boomings, trills, wood-tappings--every sound with which different species express the gladimpulse; and birds like the parrot that only exert their powerful voicesin screamings--because "they can do no other"--then scream theirloudest. When courtship begins it has in many cases the effect ofincreasing the beauty of the performance, giving added sweetness, verve, and brilliance to the song, and freedom and grace to the gestures andmotions. But, as I have said, there are exceptions. Thus, some birdsthat are good melodists at other times sing in a feeble, disjointedmanner during courtship. In Patagonia I found that several of the birdswith 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 bythe mere multiplication of instances, since, however many, they would boselected instances--from a single district, it is true, while those inthe _Descent of Man_ were brought together from an immeasurably widerfield; but the principle is the same in both cases, and to what I havewritten it may be objected that, if, instead of twenty-five, I had givena hundred cases, taking them as they came, they might have shown alarger proportion of instances like that of the cow-bird, in which themale has a set performance practised only during the love-season and inthe presence of the female. 

It is, no doubt, true that all collections of facts relating to animallife present nature to us somewhat as a "fantastic realm"--unavoidablyso, in a measure, since the writing would be too bulky, or too dry, ortoo something inconvenient, if we did not take only the most prominentfacts that come before us, remove them from their places, where alonethey can be seen in their proper relations to numerous other lessprominent facts, and rearrange them patch work-wise to make up ourliterature. But I am convinced that any student of the subject who willcast aside his books--supposing that they have not already bred a habitin his mind of seeing only "in accordance with verbal statement"--and godirectly to nature to note the actions of animals for himself--actionswhich, in many cases, appear to lose all significance when set down inwriting--the result of such independent investigation will be aconviction that conscious sexual selection on the part of the female isnot the cause of music and dancing performances in birds, nor of thebrighter colours and ornaments that distinguish the male. It is truethat the females of some species, both in the vertebrate and insectkingdoms, do exercise a preference; but in a vast majority of speciesthe male takes the female he finds, or that he is able to win from othercompetitors; and if we go to the reptile class we find that in theophidian order, which excels in variety and richness of colour, there isno such thing as preferential mating; and if we go to the insect class, we find that in butterflies, which surpass all creatures in theirglorious beauty, the female gives herself up to the embrace of the firstmale that appears, or else is captured by the strongest male, just asshe 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 AmericanRodentia, [Footnote: "According to Mr. Waterhouse, of all rodents thevizcacha is most nearly related to marsupials; but in the points inwhich it approaches this order its relations are general, that is, notto any one marsupial species more than to another. As these points ofaffinity are believed to be real and not merely adaptive, they must bedue in accordance with our view to inheritance from a common progenitor. Therefore wo must suppose either that all rodents, including thevizcacha, branched off from some ancient marsupial, which will naturallyhave been more or less intermediate in character with respect to allexisting marsupials; or, that both lodents and marsupials branched offfrom a common progenitor. . .. On either view we must suppose that thevizcacha has retained, by inheritance, more of the characters of itsancient progenitor than have other rodents. "--DARWIN; _Origin ofSpecies. _] while its habits, in some respects, are more interesting thanthose of any other rodent known: it is, moreover, the most common mammalwe have on the pampas; and all these considerations have induced me towrite a very full account of its customs. It is necessary to add thatsince the following pages were written at my home on the pampas a greatwar of extermination has been waged against this animal by thelandowners, which has been more fortunate in its results--or unfortunateif one's sympathies are with the vizcacha--than the war of theAustralians against their imported rodent--the smaller and more prolificrabbit. 

The vizcachas on the pampas of Buenos Ayres live in societies, usuallynumbering twenty or thirty members. The village, which is calledVizcachera, is composed of a dozen or fifteen burrows or mouths; for oneentrance often serves for two or more distinct holes. Often, where theground is soft, there are twenty or thirty or more burrows in an oldvizcachera; but on stony, or "tosca" soil even an old one may have nomore than four or five burrows. They are deep wide-mouthed holes, placedvery close together, the entire village covering an area of from onehundred to two hundred square feet of ground. 

The burrows vary greatly in extent; and usually in a vizcachera thereare several that, at a distance of from four to six feet from theentrance, open into large circular chambers. From these chambers otherburrows diverge in all directions, some running horizontally, othersobliquely downwards to a maximum depth of six feet from the surface:some of these burrows or galleries communicate with those of otherburrows. A vast amount of loose earth is thus brought up, and forms avery irregular mound, fifteen to thirty inches above the surroundinglevel. 

It will afford some conception of the numbers of these vizcacheras onthe settled pampas when I say that, in some directions, a person mightride five hundred miles and never advance half a mile without seeing oneor more of them. In districts where, as far as the eye can see, theplains are as level and smooth as a bowling-green, especially in winterwhen the grass is close-cropped, and where the rough giant-thistle hasnot sprung up, these mounds appear like brown or dark spots on a greensurface. They are the only irregularities that occur to catch the eye, and consequently form an important feature in the scenery. In someplaces they are so near together that a person on horseback may count ahundred of them from one point of view. 

The sites of which the vizcacha invariably makes choice to work on, aswell as his manner of burrow-ing, adapt him peculiarly to live andthrive on the open pampas. Other burrowing species seem always to fixupon 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 ofwhich to begin their kennel. They are averse to commence digging on aclear level surface, either because it is not easy for them where theyhave nothing to rest their foreheads against while scratching, orbecause they possess a wary instinct that impels them to place the bodyin concealment whilst working on the surface, thus securing theconcealment of the burrow after it is made. Certain it is that wherelarge hedges have been planted on the pampas, multitudes of opossums, weasels, skunks, armadillos, &c. , come and make their burrows beneaththem; and where there are no hedges or trees, all these species maketheir kennels under bushes of the perennial thistle, or where there is ashelter of some kind. The vizcacha, on the contrary, chooses an openlevel spot, the cleanest he can find to burrow on. The first thing thatstrikes the observer when viewing the vizcachera closely is the enormoussize of the entrance of the burrows, or, at least, of several of thecentral ones in the mound; for there are usually several smaller outsideburrows. The pit-like opening to some of these principal burrows isoften four to six feet across the mouth, and sometimes deep enough for atall man to stand up waist-deep in. How these large entrances can bemade on a level surface may be seen when the first burrow or burrows ofan incipient vizcachera are formed. It is not possible to tell whatinduces a vizcacha to be the founder of a new community; for theyincrease very slowly, and furthermore are extremely fond of each other'ssociety; and it is invariably one individual that leaves his nativevillage to found a new and independent one. If it were to have betterpasture at hand, then he would certainly remove to a considerabledistance; but he merely goes from forty to fifty or sixty yards off tobegin his work. Thus it is that in desert places, where these animalsare rare, a solitary vizcachera is never seen; but there are alwaysseveral close together, though there may be no others on the surroundingplain for leagues. When the vizcacha has made his habitation, it is buta single burrow, with only himself for an inhabitant, perhaps for manymonths. Sooner or later, however, others join him: and these will be theparents of innumerable generations; for they construct no temporarylodging-place, as do the armadillos and other species, but theirposterity continues in the quiet possession of the habitationsbequeathed to it; how long, it is impossible to say. Old men who havelived all their lives in one district remember that many of thevizcacheras around them existed when they were children. It isinvariably a male that begins a new village, and makes his burrow in thefollowing manner, though he does not always observe the same method. Heworks very straight into the earth, digging a hole twelve or fourteeninches wide, but not so deep, at an angle of about 25 degrees with thesurface. But after he has progressed inwards a few feet, the vizcacha isno longer satisfied with merely scattering away the loose earth hefetches up, but cleans it away so far in a straight line from theentrance, and scratches so much on this line (apparently to make theslope gentler), that he soon forms a trench a foot or more in depth, andoften three or four feet in length. Its use is, as I have inferred, tofacilitate the conveying of the loose earth as far as possible from theentrance of the burrow. But after a while the animal is unwilling thatit should accumulate even at the end of this long passage; he thereforeproceeds to make two additional trenches, that form an acute, sometimesa right angle, converging into the first, so that when the whole iscompleted it takes the form of a capital Y. 

These trenches are continually deepened and lengthened as the burrowprogresses, the angular segment of earth between them, scratched away, until by degrees it has been entirely conveyed off, and in its place isthe one deep great unsymmetrical mouth I have already described. Thereare soils that will not admit of the animals working in this manner. Where there are large cakes of "tosca" near the surface, as in manylocalities on the southern pampas, the vizcacha makes its burrow as besthe 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; buteven in such soils the entrances of many burrows are made differently. In some the central trench is wanting, or is so short that there appearbut two passages converging directly into the burrow; or these twotrenches 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 onlymodifications of the most common Y-shaped system. 

As I have remarked that its manner of burrowing has peculiarly adaptedthe vizcacha to the pampas, it may be asked what particular advantage aspecies that makes a wide-mouthed burrow possesses over those thatexcavate in the usual way. On a declivity, or at the base of rocks ortrees, there would be none; but on the perfectly level and shelterlesspampas, the durability of the burrow, a circumstance favourable to theanimal's preservation, is owing altogether to its being made in thisway, and to several barrows being made together. The two outer trenchesdiverge so widely from the mouth that half the earth brought out is castbehind instead of before it, thus creating a mound of equal height aboutthe entrance, by which it is secured from water during great rainfalls, while the cattle avoid treading over the great pit-like entrances. Butthe burrows of the dolichotis, armadillo, and other species, when madeon perfectly level ground, are soon trod on and broken in by cattle; insummer they are choked up with dust and rubbish; and, the loose earthhaving all been thrown up together in a heap on one side, there is nobarrier to the water which in eveiy great rainfall flows in andobliterates the kennel, drowning or driving out the tenant. 

I have been minute in describing the habitations of the vizcacha, as Iesteem the subject of prime importance in considering the zoology ofthis portion of America. The vizcacha does not benefit himself alone byhis perhaps unique style of burrowing; but this habit has provedadvantageous to several other species, and has been so favourable to twoof 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 anywhereon the pampas. I refer to the Minera (Geositta cunicularia), which makesits breeding-holes in the bank-like sides of the vizcacha's burrow, andto the little swallow (Atticora cyanoleuca) which breeds in theseexcavations when forsaken by the Minera. Few old vizcacheras are seenwithout some of these little parasitical burrows in them. 

Birds are not the only beings in this way related to the vizcachas: thefox and the weasel of the pampas live almost altogether in them. Severalinsects 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 beautifulinsect, with dark green striated wing-cases and pale red legs; alsoseveral diminutive wingless wasps. Of the last I have counted sixspecies, most of them marked with strongly contrasted colours, black, red, and white. There are also other wasps that prey on the spidersfound on the vizcachera. All these and others are so numerous on themounds that dozens of them might there be collected any summer day; butif sought for in other situations they are exceedingly rare. If the drymound of soft earth which the vizcacha elevates amidst a waste of humid, close-growing grass is not absolutely necessary to the existence of allthese 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 otheroutside species, and these again with still others, that it would be nomere fancy to say that probably hundreds of species are either directlyor indirectly affected in their struggle for existence by thevizcacheras so abundantly sprinkled over the pampas. 

In winter the vizcachas seldom leave their burrows till dark, but insummer come out before sunset; and the vizcachera is then a trulyinteresting spectacle. Usually one of the old males first appears, andsits on some prominent place on the mound, apparently in no haste tobegin his evening meal. When approached from the front he stirs not, buteyes the intruder with a bold indifferent stare. If the person passes toone side, he deigns not to turn his head. 

Other vizcachas soon begin to appear, each one quietly taking up hisstation at his burrow's mouth, the females, known by their greatlyinferior size and lighter grey colour, sitting upright on theirhaunches, as if to command a better view, and indicating by diverssounds and gestures that fear and curiosity struggles in them formastery; for they are always wilder and sprightlier in their motionsthan the males. With eyes fixed on the intruder, at intervals they dodgethe head, emitting at the same time an internal note with greatvehemence; and suddenly, as the danger comes nearer, they plungesimultaneously, with a startled cry, into their burrows. But in somecuriosity is the strongest emotion; for, in spite of their fellow'scontagious example, and already half down the entrance, again they startup to scrutinize the stranger, and will then often permit him to walkwithin 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 burrowsto breed in, or sometimes take possession of one of the lesser outsideburrows of the village; but their favourite residence, when not engagedin tending their eggs or young, is on the vizcachera. Here a pair willsit all day; and I have often remarked a couple close together on theedge 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 henotice them, so accustomed are these creatures to each other. Usually acouple of the little burrowing Geositta are also present. They arelively creatures, running with great rapidity about the mound and barespace that surrounds it, suddenly stopping and jerking their tails in aslow deliberate manner, and occasionally uttering their cry, a trill, orseries of quick short clear notes, resembling somewhat the shrillexcessive laughter of a child. Among the grave, stationary vizcachas, ofwhich they take no heed, perhaps half a dozen or more little swallows(Atticora cyanoleuca) are seen, now clinging altogether to the bank-likeentrance of a burrow, now hovering over it in a moth-like manner, as ifuncertain where to alight, and anon sweeping about in circles, but neverceasing their low and sorrowful notes. 

The vizcachera with all its incongruous inhabitants thus collected uponit is to a stranger one of the most novel sights the pampas afford. 

The vizcacha appears to be a rather common species over all theextensive Argentine territory; but they are so exceedingly abundant onthe pampas inhabited by man, and comparatively so rare in the desertplaces I have been in, that I was at first much surprised at findingthem so unequally distributed. I have also mentioned that the vizcachais a tame familiar creature. This is in the pastoral districts, wherethey are never disturbed; but in wild regions, where he is scarce, he isexceedingly wary, coming forth long after dark, and plunging into hisburrow on the slightest alarm, so that it is a rare thing to get a sightof him. The reason is evident enough; in desert regions the vizcacha hasseveral deadly enemies in the larger rapacious mammals. Of these thepuma or lion (Felis concolor) is the most numerous, as it is also theswiftest, most subtle, and most voracious; for, as regards these traits, the jaguar (F. Onca) is an inferior animal. To the insatiable bloodyappetite of this creature nothing comes amiss; he takes the male ostrichby surprise, and slays that wariest of wild things on his nest; Hecaptures little birds with the dexterity of a cat, and hunts for diurnalarmadillos; he comes unawares upon the deer and huanaco, and, springinglike lightning on them, dislocates their necks before their bodies touchthe earth. Often after he has thus slain them, he leaves their bodiesuntouched for the Polyborus and vulture to feast on, so great a delightdoes he take in destroying life. The vizcacha falls an easy victim tothis subtle creature; and it is not to be wondered at that it becomeswild to excess, and rare in regions hunted over by such an enemy, evenwhen all other conditions are favourable to its increase. But as soonas these wild regions are settled by man the pumas are exterminated, andthe sole remaining foe of the vizcacha is the fox, comparatively aninsignificant one. 

The fox takes up his residence in a vizcachera, and succeeds, aftersome quarrelling (manifested in snarls, growls, and other subterraneanwarlike sounds), in ejecting the rightful owners of one of the burrows, which forthwith becomes his. Certainly the vizcachas are not muchinjured by being compelled to relinquish the use of one of their kennelsfor a season or permanently; for, if the locality suits him, the foxremains with them always. Soon they grow accustomed to the unwelcomestranger; he is quiet and unassuming in demeanour, and often in theevening sits on the mound in their company, until they regard him withthe same indifference they do the burrowing owl. But in spring, when theyoung vizcachas are large enough to leave their cells, then the foxmakes them his prey; and if it is a bitch fox, with a family of eight ornine young to provide for, she will grow so bold as to hunt her helplessquarry from hole to hole, and do battle with the old ones, and carry offthe young in spite of them, so that all the young animals in the villageare eventually destroyed. Often when the young foxes are large enough tofollow their mother, the whole family takes leave of the vizcacherawhere such cruel havoc has been made to settle in another, there tocontinue their depredations. But the fox has ever a relentless foe inman, and meets with no end of bitter persecutions; it is consequentlymuch more abundant in desert or thinly settled districts than in such asare populous, so that in these the check the vizcachas receive from thefoxes is not appreciable. 

The abundance of cattle on the pampas has made it unnecessary to use thevizcacha as an article of food. His skin is of no value; therefore man, the destroyer of his enemies, has hitherto been the greatest benefactorof his species. Thus they have been permitted to multiply and spreadthemselves to an amazing extent, so that the half-domestic cattle on thepampas are not nearly so familiar with man, or so fearless of hispresence as are the vizcachas. It is not that they do him no injury, butbecause they do it indirectly, that they have so long enjoyed immunityfrom persecution. It is amusing to see the sheep-farmer, the greatestsufferer from the vizcachas, regarding them with such indifference as topermit them to swarm on his "run, " and burrow within a stone's throw ofhis dwelling with impunity, and yet going a distance from home topersecute with unreasonable animosity a fox, skunk, or opossum onaccount of the small annual loss it inflicts on the poultry-yard. Thatthe vizcacha has comparatively no adverse conditions to war withwherever man is settled is evident when we consider its very slow rateof increase, and yet see them in such incalculable numbers. The femalehas but one litter in the year of two young, sometimes of three. Shebecomes pregnant late in April, and brings forth in September; theperiod of gestation is, I think, rather less than five months. 

The vizcacha is about two years growing. A full-sized male measures tothe root of the tail twenty-two inches, and weighs from fourteen tofifteen pounds; the female is nineteen inches in length, and hergreatest weight nine pounds. Probably it is a long-lived, and certainlyit is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green substance to eat itnever drinks water; but after a long summer drought, when for months ithas subsisted on bits of dried thistle-stalks and old withered grass, ifa shower falls it will come out of its burrows even at noonday and drinkeagerly from the pools. It has been erroneously stated that vizcachassubsist on roots. Their food is grass and seeds; but they may alsosometimes eat roots, as the ground is occasionally seen scratched upabout the burrows. In March, when the stalks of the perennial cardoon orCastile thistle (Cynara cardunculus) are dry, the vizcachas fell them bygnawing about their roots, and afterwards tear to pieces the great dryflower-heads to get the seeds imbedded deeply in them, of which theyseem very fond. Large patches of thistle are often found served thus, the ground about them literally white with the silvery bristles theyhave scattered. This cutting down tall plants to get the seeds at thetop seems very like an act of pure intelligence; but the fact is, thevizcachas cut down every tall plant they can. I have seen whole acres ofmaize destroyed by them, yet the plants cut down were left untouched. Ifposts be put into the ground within range of their nightly rambles theywill gnaw till they have felled them, unless of a wood hard enough toresist their chisel-like incisors. 

The strongest instinct of this animal is to clear the ground thoroughlyabout its burrows; and it is this destructive habit that makes itnecessary for cultivators of the soil to destroy all the vizcachas in ornear their fields. On the uninhabited pampas, where the long grassesgrow, I have often admired the vizcachera; for it is there the centre ofa clean space, often of half an acre in extent, on which there is aneven close-shaven turf: this clearing is surrounded by the usual roughgrowth of herbs and giant grasses. In such situations this habit ofclearing the ground is eminently advantageous to them, as it affordsthem a comparatively safe spot to feed and disport themselves on, andover which they can fly to their burrows without meeting anyobstruction, on the slightest alarm. 

Of course the instinct continues to operate where it is no longer of anyadvantage. In summer, when the thistles are green, even when growingnear the burrows, and the giant thistle (Carduus mariana) springs upmost luxuriantly right on the mound, the vizcachas will not touch them, either disliking the strong astringent sap, or repelled by the thornswith which they are armed. As soon as they dry, and the thorns becomebrittle, they are levelled; afterwards, when the animal begins to dragthem about and cut them up, as his custom is, he accidentally discoversand feasts on the seed: for vizcachas are fond of exercising their teethon 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 andheaping about the mouth of his burrow every stalk he cuts down, andevery portable object that by dint of great strength he can carry, hasbeen mentioned by Azara, Darwin, and others. On the level plains it is auseful habit; for as the vizcachas are continually deepening andwidening their burrows, the earth thrown out soon covers up thesematerials, and so assists in raising the mound. On the Buenos-Ayreanpampas numbers of vizcacheras would annually be destroyed by water inthe great sudden rainfalls were the mounds loss high. But this is onlyan advantage when the animals inhabit a perfectly level country subjectto flooding rains; for where the surface is unequal they invariablyprefer high to low ground to burrow on, and are thus secured fromdestruction by water; yet the instinct is as strong in such situationsas on the level plains. The most that can be said of a habit apparentlyso obscure in its origin and uses is, that it appears to be part of theinstinct of clearing the ground about the village. Every tall stalk thevizcacha cuts down, every portable object he finds, must be removed tomake the surface clean and smooth; but while encumbered with it he doesnot proceed further from his burrows, but invariably re-tires towardsthem, and so deposits it upon the mound. So well known is this habit, that whatever article is lost by night--whip, pistol, or knife--theloser next morning visits the vizcacheras in the vicinity, quite sure offinding it there. People also visit the vizcacheras to pick up sticksfor firewood. 

The vizcachas are cleanly in their habits; and the fur, though it has astrong earthy smell, is kept exceedingly neat. The hind leg and footafford a very beautiful instance of adaptation. Propped by the hardcurved tail, they sit up erect, and as firmly on the long horny disks onthe undersides of the hind legs as a man stands on his feet. Most to beadmired, on the middle toe the skin thickens into a round cushion, inwhich the curved teeth-like bristles are set; nicely graduated inlength, so that "each particular hair" may come into contact with theskin when the animal scratches or combs itself. As to the uses of thisappendage there can be no difference of opinion, as there is about theserrated claw in birds. It is quite obvious that the animal cannotscratch himself with his hind paw (as all mammals do) without making useof this natural comb. Then the entire foot is modified, so that thiscomb shall be well protected, and yet not be hindered from performingits office: thus the inner toe is pressed close to the middle one, andso depressed that it comes under the cushion of skin, and cannotpossibly get before the bristles, or interfere their coming against theskin in scratching, as certainly be the case if this toe were free asouter one. 

Again, the vizcachas appear to form the deep trenches before the burrowsby scratching the earth violently backwards with the hind claws. Nowthese straight, sharp, dagger-shaped claws, and especially the middleone, are so long that the vizcacha is able to perform all this roughwork without the bristles coming into contact with the ground, and sogetting worn by the friction. The Tehuelcho Indians in Patagonia combtheir 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 thesavages make little use of it. Vizcachas have a remarkable way ofdusting themselves: the animal suddenly throws himself on his back, and, bringing over his hind legs towards his head, depresses them till hisfeet touch the ground. In this strange posture he scratches up the earthwith great rapidity, raising a little cloud of dust, then rights himselfwith a jerk, and, after an interval, repeats the dusting. Usually theyscratch a hole in the ground to deposit their excrements in. Whilstopening one of the outside burrows that had no communication with theothers, I once discovered a vast deposit of their dung (so great that itmust have been accumulating for years) at the extremity. To ascertainwhether this be a constant, or only a casual habit, it would benecessary to open up entirely a vast number of vizcacheras. When avizcacha dies in his burrow the carcass is, after some days, dragged outand left upon the mound. 

The language of the vizcacha is wonderful for its variety. When the maleis feeding he frequently pauses to utter a succession of loud, percussive, and somewhat jarring cries; these he utters in a leisurelymanner, and immediately after goes on feeding. Often he utters this cryin a low grunting tone. One of his commonest expressions sounds like theviolent hawking of a man clearing his throat. At other times he burstsinto piercing tones that may be heard a mile off, beginning like theexcited and quick-repeated squeals of a young pig, and growing longer, more attenuated, and quavering towards the end. After retiring alarmedinto the burrows, he repeats at intervals a deep internal moan. Allthese, and many other indescribable guttural, sighing, shrill, and deeptones, are varied a thousand ways in strength and intonation, accordingto the age, sex, or emotions of the individual; and I doubt if there isin the world any other four-footed thing so loquacious, or with adialect so extensive. I take great pleasure in going to some spot wherethey are abundant, and sitting quietly to listen to them; for they areholding a perpetual discussion, all night long, which the presence of ahuman being will not interrupt. 

At night, when the vizcachas are all out feeding, in places where theyare very abundant (and in some districts they literally swarm) any veryloud and sudden sound, as the report of a gun, or a clap of unexpectedthunder, will produce a most extraordinary effect. No sooner has thereport broken on the stillness of night than a perfect storm of criesbursts forth over the surrounding country. After eight or nine secondsthere is in the storm a momentary hill or pause; and then it breaksforth again, apparently louder than before. There is so much differencein the tones of different animals that the cries of individuals close athand may be distinguished amidst the roar of blended voices coming froma distance. It sounds as if thousands and tens of thousands of themwere striving to express every emotion at the highest pitch of theirvoices; so that the effect is indescribable, and fills a stranger withastonishment. Should a gun be fired off several times, their criesbecome less each time; and after the third or fourth time it produces noeffect. They have a peculiar, sharp, sudden, "far-darting" alarm-notewhen a dog is spied, that is repeated by all that hear it, and producesan 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 sittingupon their mounds, they treat them with tantalizing contempt. If the dogis a novice, the instant he spies the animal he rushes violently at it;the vizcacha waits the charge with imperturbable calmness till his enemyis within one or two yards, and then disappears into the burrow. Afterhaving been foiled in this way many times, the dog resorts to stratagem:he crouches down as if transformed for the nonce into a Felis, andsteals on with wonderfully slow and cautious steps, his hair bristling, tail hanging, and eyes intent on his motionless intended victim; whenwithin seven or eight yards he makes a sudden rush, but invariably withthe same dis-appointing result. The persistence with which the dogs goon hoping against hope in this unprofitable game, in which they alwaysact the stupid part, is highly amusing, and is very interesting to thenaturalist; for it shows that the native dogs on . The pampas havedeveloped a very remarkable instinct, and one that might be perfected byartificial 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 tohunt the nocturnal armadillo (Dasypus villosus), then this deep-rooted(and, it might be added, hereditary) passion for vizcachas isexcessively annoying, and it is often necessary to administer hundredsof blows and rebukes before a dog is induced to track an armadillowithout leaving the scent every few moments to make futile grabs at hisold enemies. 

The following instance will show how little suspicion of man thevizcachas have. A few years ago I went out shooting them on threeconsecutive evenings. I worked in a circle, constantly revisiting thesame burrows, never going a greater distance from home than could bewalked in four or five minutes. During the three evenings I shot sixtyvizcachas dead; and probably as many more escaped badly wounded intotheir burrows; for they are hard to kill, and however badly wounded, ifsitting near the burrow when struck, are almost certain to escape intoit. But on the third evening I found them no wilder, and killed about asmany as on the first. After this I gave up shooting them in disgust; itwas dull sport, and to exterminate or frighten them away with a gunseemed an impossibility. 

It is a very unusual thing to eat the vizcacha, most people, andespecially the gauchos, having a silly unaccountable prejudice againsttheir flesh. I have found it very good, and while engaged writing thischapter have dined on it served up in various ways. The young animalsare rather insipid, the old males tough, but the mature females areexcellent--the flesh being tender, exceedingly white, fragrant to thenostrils, and with a very delicate game-flavour. 

Within the last ten years so much new land has been brought undercultivation that farmers have been compelled to destroy incrediblenumbers of vizcachas: many large "estancieros" (cattle-breeders) havefollowed the example set by the grain-growers, and have had themexterminated on their estates. Now all that Azara, on hearsay, tellsabout the vizcachas perishing in their burrows, when these are coveredup, but that they can support life thus buried for a period of ten ortwelve days, and that during that time animals will come from othervillages and disinter them, unless frightened off with dogs, is strictlytrue. Country workmen are so well acquainted with these facts that theyfrequently undertake to destroy all the vizcacheras on an estate for sopaltry a sum as ten-pence in English money for each one, and yet willmake double the money at this work than they can at any other. By daythey partly open up, then cover up the burrows with a great quantity ofearth, and by night go round with dogs to drive away the vizcachas fromthe still open burrows that come to dig out their buried friends. Afterall the vizcacheras on an estate have been thus served, the workmen areusually bound by previous agreement to keep guard over them for a spaceof eight or ten days before they receive their hire: for the animalscovered up are then supposed to be all dead. Some of these men I havetalked with have assured me that living vizcachas have been found afterfourteen days--a proof of their great endurance. There is nothingstrange, I think, in the mere fact of the vizcacha being unable to workhis 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 thesame manner; but it certainly is remarkable that other vizcachas shouldcome from a distance to dig out those that are buried alive. In thisgood office they are exceedingly zealous; and I have frequentlysurprised them after sunrise, at a considerable distance from their ownburrows, diligently scratching at those that had been covered up. Thevizcachas are fond of each other's society, and live peaceably together;but their goodwill is not restricted to the members of their own littlecommunity; it extends to the whole species, so that as soon as nightcomes many animals leave their own and go to visit the adjacentvillages. If one approaches a vizcachera at night, usually some of thevizcachas on it scamper off to distant burrows: these are neighboursmerely come to pay a friendly visit. This intercourse is so frequentthat little straight paths are formed from one vizcachera to another. The extreme attachment between members of different communities makes itappear less strange that they should assist each other: either thedesire to see, as usual, their buried neighbours becomes intense enoughto impel them to work their way to them; or cries of distress from theprisoners reach and incite them to attempt their deliverance. Manysocial species are thus powerfully affected by cries of distress fromone of their fellows; and some will attempt a rescue in the face ofgreat danger--the weasel and the peccary for example. 

Mild and sociable as the vizcachas are towards each other, each one isexceedingly jealous of any intrusion into his particular burrow, andindeed 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 toenter; their hospitality ends where it begins, at the entrance. It isdifficult to compel a vizcacha to enter a burrow not his own; even whenhotly 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, asif they thought the hiding-place but little less dangerous than the openplain. I have frequently seen vizcachas, chased into the wrong burrows, summarily ejected by those inside: and sometimes they make their escapeonly after being well bitten for their offence. 

I have now stated the most interesting facts I have collected concerningthe vizcacha: when others rewrite its history they doubtless will, according to the opportunities of observation they enjoy, be able tomake some additions to it, but probably none of great consequence. Ihave observed this species in Patagonia and Buenos Ayres only; and as Ihave found that its habits are considerably modified by circumstances inthe different localities where I have met with it, I am sure that othervariations will occur in the more distant regions, where the conditionsvary. 

The most remarkable thing to be said about the vizcacha is, thatalthough regarded by Mr. Waterhouse, and others who have studied itsaffinities, as one of the lowest of the rodents, exhibiting strongMarsupial characters, the living animal appears to be more intelligentthan other rodents, not of South America only, but also of those of ahigher type in other continents. A parallel case is, perhaps, to befound in the hairy armadillo, an extremely versatile and intelligentanimal, although only an edentate. And among birds the ypecaha--a largeLa Plata rail--might also be mentioned as an example of what ought notto be; for it is a bold and intelligent bird, more than a match for thefowl, both in courage and in cunning; and yet it is one of the familywhich Professor Parker--from the point of view of theanatomist--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 saythat the huanaco, or guanaco as it is often spelt, is not a perishingspecies; nor, as things are, is it likely to perish soon, despite thefact that civilized men, Britons especially, are now enthusiasticallyengaged in the extermination of all the nobler mammalians:--a veryglorious crusade, the triumphant conclusion of which will doubtless bewitnessed by the succeeding generation, more favoured in this respectthan ours. The huanaco, happily for it, exists in a barren, desolateregion, in its greatest part waterless and uninhabitable to humanbeings; and the chapter-heading refers to a singular instinct of thedying animals, in very many cases allowed, by the exceptional conditionsin which they are placed, to die naturally. 

And first, a few words about its place in nature and general habits. Thehuanaco is a small camel--small, that is, compared with its existingrelation--without a hump, and, unlike the camel of the Old World, non-specializad; doubtless it is a very ancient animal on the earth, andfor all we know to the contrary, may have existed contemporaneously withsome of the earliest known representatives of the camel type, whoseremains occur in the lower and upper miocene deposits--Poebrotherium, Protolabis, Procamelus, Pliauchenia, and Macrauchenia. It ranges fromTierra del Fuego and the adjacent islands, northwards over the whole ofPatagonia, and along the Andes into Peru and Bolivia. On the greatmountain 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 avariety: but as man's slave it has changed so greatly from the originalform that some naturalists have regarded the llama as a distinctspecies, which, like the camel of the East, exists only in a domesticstate. It has had time enough to vary, as it is more than probable thatthe tamed and useful animal was inherited by the children of the sunfrom races and nations that came before them: and how far back Andeancivilization extends may be inferred from the belief expressed by thefamous American archaeologist, Squiers, that the ruined city ofTiahuanaco, in the vicinity of Lake Titicaca, is as old as Thebes andthe 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 feethigh 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. Inappearance it is very unlike the camel, in spite of the long legs andneck; in its finely-shaped head and long ears, and its proud andgraceful carriage, it resembles an antelope rather than its huge and, from an aesthetic point of view, deformed Asiatic relation. In habits itis gregarious, and is usually seen in small herds, but herds numberingseveral hundreds or even a thousand are occasionally met with on thestony, desolate plateaus of Southern Patagonia; but the huanaco is ableto thrive and grow fat where almost any other herbivore would starve. While the herd feeds one animal acts as sentinel, stationed on thehillside, and on the appearance of danger utters a shrill neigh ofalarm, and instantly all take to flight. But although excessively shyand wary they are also very inquisitive, and have enough intelligence toknow that a single horseman can do them no harm, for they will not onlyapproach to look closely at him, but will sometimes follow him formiles. They are also excitable, and at times indulge in strange freaks. Darwin writes:--"On the mountains of Tierra del Fuego I have more thanonce seen a huanaco, on being approached, not only neigh and squeal, butprance and leap about in a most ridiculous manner, apparently indefiance as a challenge. " And Captain King relates that while sailinginto Port Desire he witnessed a chase of a huanaco after a fox, bothanimals evidently going at their greatest speed, so that they soonpassed out of sight. I have known some tame huanacos, and in that statethey make amusing intelligent pets, fond of being caressed, but often sofrolicsome and mischievous as to be a nuisance to their master. It iswell known that at the southern extremity of Patagonia the huanacos havea dying place, a spot to which all individuals inhabiting thesurrounding plains repair at the approach of death to deposit theirbones. Darwin and Fitzroy first recorded this strange instinct in theirpersonal narratives, and their observations have since been fullyconfirmed by others. The best known of these dying or burial-places areon the banks of the Santa Cruz and Gallegos rivers, where the rivervalleys are covered with dense primeval thickets of bushes and trees ofstunted growth; there the ground is covered with the bones of countlessdead generations. "The animals, " says Darwin, "in most cases must havecrawled, before dying, beneath and among the bushes. " A strange instinctin a creature so preeminently social in its habits; a dweller all itslife long on the open, barren plateaus and mountain sides! What asubject for a painter! The grey wilderness of dwarf thorn trees, agedand grotesque and scanty-leaved, nourished for a thousand years on thebones that whiten the stony ground at their roots; the interior litfaintly with the rays of the departing sun, chill and grey, and silentand motionless--the huanacos' Golgotha. In the long centuries, stretching back into a dim immeasurable past, so many of this race havejourneyed hither from the mountain and the plain to suffer the sharppang of death, that, to the imagination, something of it all seems tohave passed into that hushed and mournful nature. And now one more, thelatest pilgrim, has come, all his little strength spent in his struggleto penetrate the close thicket; looking old and gaunt and ghostly in thetwilight; with long ragged hair; staring into the gloom out ofdeath-dimmed sunken eyes. England has one artist who might show it to uson canvas, who would be able to catch the feeling of such a scene--ofthat 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: "Ido not at all understand the reason of this, but I may observe that thewounded huanacos at the Santa Cruz invariably walked towards the river. "

It would, no doubt, be rash to affirm of any instinct that it isabsolutely unique; but, putting aside some doubtful reports about acustom of the Asiatic elephant, which may have originated in the accountof Sindbad the Sailor's discovery of an elephant's burial place, we haveno knowledge of an instinct similar to that of the huanaco in any otheranimal. So far as we know, it stands alone and apart, with nothing inthe actions of other species leading up, or suggesting any familylikeness to it. But what chiefly attracts the mind to it is itsstrangeness. It looks, in fact, less like an instinct of one of theinferior creatures than the superstitious observance of human beings, who have knowledge of death, and believe in a continued existence afterdissolution; of a triba that in past times had conceived the idea thatthe liberated spirit is only able to find its way to its future abode bystarting at death from the ancient dying-place of the tribe or family, and thence moving westward, or skyward, or underground, over thewell-worn immemorial track, invisible to material eyes. 

But, although alone among animal instincts-in its strange and uselesspurpose--for it is as absolutely useless to the species or race as tothe dying individual--it is not the only useless instinct we know of:there are many others, both simple and complex; and of such instincts webelieve, with good reason, that they once played an important part inthe life of the species, and were only rendered useless by changes inthe condition of life, or in the organism, or in both. In other words, when the special conditions that gave them value no longer existed, thecorrelated and perfect instinct was not, in these cases, eradicated, butremained, in abeyance and still capable of being called into activity bya new and false stimulus simulating the old and true. Viewed in thisway, the huanaco's instinct might be regarded as something remaining tothe animal from a remote past, not altogether unaffected by timeperhaps; and like some ceremonial usage among men that has long ceasedto have any significance, or like a fragment of ancient history, or atradition, which in the course of time has received some new and falseinterpretation. The false interpretation, to continue the metaphor, is, in this case, that the _purpose_ of the animal in going to a certainspot, to which it has probably never previously resorted, is to diethere. A false interpretation, because, in the first place, it isincredible that an instinct of no advantage to the species, in itsstruggle for existence and predominance should arise and becomepermanent; and, in the second place, it is equally incredible that itcould ever have been to the advantage of the species or race to, have adying place. We must, then, suppose that there is in the sensationspreceding death, when death comes slowly, some resemblance to thesensations experienced by the animal at a period when its curiousinstinct first took form and crystallized; these would be painfulsensations that threatened life; and freedom from them, and safety tothe animal, would only exist in a certain well-remembered spot. Further, we might assume that it was at first only the memory of a fewindividuals that caused the animals to seek the place of safety; that ahabit was thus formed; that in time this traditional habit becameinstinctive, so that the animals, old and young, made their wayunerringly to the place of refuge whenever the old danger returned. Andsuch an instinct, slowly matured and made perfect to enable this animalto escape extinction during periods of great danger to mammalian life, lasting hundreds or even thousands of years, and destructive ofnumberless other species less hardy and adaptive than the generalizedhuanaco, might well continue to exist, to be occasionally called intolife by a false stimulus, for many centuries after it had ceased to beof 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 dyingground, is in reality only seeking an historically remembered place ofrefuge, and not of death--the action of the animal loses much of itsmysterious character; we come on to firm ground, and find that we are nolonger considering an instinct absolutely unique, with no action orinstinct in any other animal leading up or suggesting any familylikeness to it, as I said before. We find, in fact, that there is atleast one very important and very well-known instinct in another classof creatures, which has a strong resemblance to that of the huanaco, asI have interpreted it, and which may even serve to throw a side light onthe origin of the huanaco's instinct. I refer to a habit of someophidians, in temperate and cold countries, of returning annually tohybernate in the saine den. 

A typical instance is that of the rattlesnake in the colder parts ofNorth America. On the approach of winter these reptiles go into hiding, and it has been observed that in some districts a very large number ofindividuals, hundreds, and even thousands, will repair from thesurrounding country to the ancestral den. Here the serpents gather in amass to remain in a wholly or semi-torpid condition until the return ofspring brings them out again, to scatter abroad to their usual summerhaunts. Clearly in this case the knowledge of the hyberna-ting den isnot merely traditional--that is, handed down from generation togeneration, through the young each year following the adults, and soforming the habit of repairing at certain seasons to a certain place;for the young serpent soon abandons its parent to lead an independentlife; and on the approach of cold weather the hybernating den may be along distance away, ten or twenty, or even thirty miles from the spot inwhich it was born. The annual return to the hybernating den is then afixed unalterable instinct, like the autumnal migration of some birds toa warmer latitude. It is doubtless favourable to the serpents tohybernate in large numbers massed together; and the habit of resortingannually to the same spot once formed, we can imagine that theindividuals--perhaps a single couple in the first place--frequentingsome very deep, dry, and well-sheltered cavern, safe from enemies, wouldhave a great advantage over others of their race; that they would bestronger and increase more, and spread during the summer months furtherand further from the cavern on all sides; and that the further afieldthey went the more would the instinct be perfected; since all the youngserpents that did not have the instinct of returning unerringly to theancestral refuge, and that, like the outsiders of their race, to put itin that way, merely crept into the first hole they found on the approachof the cold season, would be more liable to destruction. Probably mostsnakes get killed long before a natural decline sets in; to say that notone in a thousand dies of old age would probably be no exaggeration; butif they were as safe from enemies and accidents as some less prolificand more highly-organized animals, so that many would reach the naturalterm of life, and death came slowly, we can imagine that in such aheat-loving creature the failure of the vital powers would simulate thesensations caused by a falling temperature, and cause the old or sickserpent, even in midsummer, to creep instinctively away to the ancientrefuge, where many a long life-killing frost had been safely tided overin the past. 

The huanaco has never been a hybernating animal; but we must assumethat, like the crotalus of the north, he had formed a habit ofcongregating with his fellows at certain seasons at the same spot;further, that these were seasons of suffering to the animal--thesuffering, or discomfort and danger, having in the first place givenrise to the habit. Assuming again that the habit had existed so long asto become, like that of the reptile, a fixed, immutable instinct, ahereditary knowledge, so that the young huanacos, untaught by theadults, would go alone and unerringly to the meeting-place from anydistance, it is but an easy step to the belief, that after theconditions had changed, and the refuges were no longer needed, thisinstinctive knowledge would still exist in them, and that they wouldtake the old road when stimulated by the pain of a wound; or themiserable sensations experienced in disease or during the decay of thelife-energy, when the senses grow dim, and the breath fails, and theblood is thin and cold. 

I presume that most persons who have observed animals a great deal havemet with cases in which the animal has acted automatically, orinstinctively, when the stimulus has been a false one. I will relate onesuch case, observed by myself, and which strikes me as being apposite tothe question I am considering. It must be premised that this is aninstance of an acquired habit; but this does not affect my argument, since I have all along assumed that the huanaco--a highly sagaciousspecies in the highest class of vertebrates--first acquired a habit fromexperience of seeking a remembered refuge, and that such habit was theparent, as it were, or the first clay model, of the perfect andindestructible instinct that was to be. 

It is not an uncommon thing in the Argentino pampas--I have on twooccasions witnessed it myself--for a riding-horse to come home, or tothe gate of his owner's house, to die. I am speaking of riding-horsesthat are never doctored, nor treated mercifully; that look on theirmaster as an enemy rather than a friend; horses that live out in theopen, and have to be hunted to the corral or enclosure, or roughlycaptured with a lasso as they run, when their services are required. Iretain a very vivid recollection of the first occasion of witnessing anaction 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 theestablishment standing unsaddled and unbridled leaning his head over thegate. Going to the spot, I stroked his nose, and then, turning to an oldnative who happened to be near, asked him what could be the meaning ofsuch a thing. "I think he is going to die, " he answered; "horses oftencome to the house to die. " And next morning the poor beast was foundlying dead not twenty yards from the gate; although he had not appearedill when I stroked his nose on the previous evening; but when I saw himlying there dead, and remembered the old native's words, it seemed to meas marvellous and inexplicable that a horse should act in that way, asif some wild creature--a rhea, a fawn, or dolichotes--had come to exhalehis last breath at the gates of his enemy and constant persecutor, man. 

I now believe that the sensations of sickness and approaching death inthe riding-horse of the pampas resemble or similate the pains, so oftenexperienced, of hunger, thirst and fatigue combined, together with theoppressive sensations caused by the ponderous native saddle, or recado, with its huge surcingle of raw hide drawn up so tightly as to hinderfree respiration. The suffering animal remembers how at the last reliefinvariably came, when the twelve or fifteen hours' torture were over, the toil and the want, and when the great iron bridle and ponderous gearwere removed, and he had freedom and food and drink and rest. At thegate or at the door of his master's house, the sudden relief had alwayscome to him; and there does he sometimes go in his sickness, his fearovermastered by his suffering, to find it again. 

Discussing this question with a friend, who has a subtle mind and greatexperience of the horse in semi-barbarous countries, and of many otheranimals, wild and tame, in many regions of the globe, he put forward adifferent 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 dyingor ailing animal instinctively withdraws itself from its fellows--anaction of self-preservation in the individual in opposition to thewell-known instincts of the healthy animals, which impels the whole herdto turn upon and persecute the sickly member, thus destroying itschances of recovery. The desire of the suffering animal is not only toleave its fellows, but to get to some solitary place where they cannotfollow, or would never find him, to escape at once from a great andpressing danger. But on the pastoral pampas, where horses are sonumerous that on that level, treeless area they are always andeverywhere visible, no hiding-place is discoverable. In such a case, theanimal, goaded by its instinctive fear, turns to the one spot thathorses avoid; and although that spot has hitherto been fearful to him, the old fear is forgotten in the present and far more vivid one; thevicinity of his master's house represents a solitary place to him, andhe seeks it, just as the stricken deer seeks the interior of some closeforest, 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 myfriend's ingenuity, but because it strikes me that it is the onlyalternative explanation that can be given of the animal's action incoming home to die. Another fact concerning the ill-tamed andbarbarously treated horses of the pampas, which, to my mind, strengthensthe view I have taken, remains to be mentioned. It is not an uncommonthing for one of these horses, after escaping, saddled and bridled, andwandering about for anight or night and day on the plains, to return ofits own accord to the house. It is clear that in a case of this kind theanimal comes home to seek relief. I have known one horse that always hadto be hunted like a wild animal to be caught, and that invariably afterbeing saddled tried to break loose, to return in this way to the gateafter wandering about, saddled and bridled, for over twenty hours inuncomfortable freedom. 

The action of the riding-horse returning to a master he is accustomed tofly from, as from an enemy, to be released of saddle and bridle, is, nodoubt more intelligent than that of the dying horse coming home to berelieved from his sufferings, but the motive is the same in both cases;at the gate the only pain the animal has ever experienced has invariablybegun, and there it has ended, and when the spur of some new painafflicts him--new and yet like the old--it is to the well-rememberedhated gate that it urges him. 

To return to the huanaco. After tracing the dying instinct back to itshypothetical origin--namely, a habit acquired by the animal in some pastperiod of seeking refuge from some kind of pain and danger at a certainspot, it is only natural to speculate a little further as to the natureof that danger and of the conditions the animal existed in. 

If the huanaco is as old on the earth as its antique generalized formhave led naturalists to suppose, we can well believe that it hassurvived not only a great many lost mammalian types, but many changes inthe conditions of its life. Let us then imagine that at some remoteperiod a change took place in the climate of Patagonia, and that itbecame colder and colder, owing to some cause affecting only thatportion of the antarctic region; such a cause, for instance, as a greataccumulation of icebergs on the northern shores of the antarcticcontinent, extending century by century until a large portion of the nowopen sea became blocked up with solid ice. If the change was gradual andthe 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 ofmaintaining its existence in such altered conditions, and would form newhabits to meet the new danger. One would be that at the approach of aperiod of deep snow and deadly cold, all the herds frequenting oneplace would gather together at the most favourable spots in the rivervalleys, where the vegetation is dense and some food could be had whilethe surrounding country continued covered with deep snow. They would, infact, make choice of exactly such localities as are now used for dyingplaces. There they would be sheltered from the cutting-winds, the twigsand bark would supply them with food, the warmth from a great manyindividuals massed together would serve to keep the snow partiallymelted under foot, and would prevent their being smothered, while thestiff and closely interlaced branches would keep a roof of snow abovethem, and thus protected they would keep alive until the return of mildweather released them. In the course of many generations all weaklyanimals, and all in which the habit of seeking the refuge at the propertime was weak or uncertain in its action would perish, but their losswould be an advantage to the survivors. 

It is worthy of remark that it is only at the southern extremity ofPatagonia that the huanacos have dying places. In Northern Patagonia, and on the Chilian and Peruvian Andes no such instinct has beenobserved. 

CHAPTER XXII. 

THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE. 

My purpose in this paper is to discuss a group of curious and uselessemotional instincts of social animals, which have not yet been properlyexplained. Excepting two of the number, placed first and last in thelist, they are not related in their origin; consequently they are heregrouped together arbitrarily, only for the reason that we are veryfamiliar with them on account of their survival in our domestic animals, and because they are, as I have said, useless; also because theyresemble each other, among the passions and actions of the loweranimals, in their effect on our minds. This is in all cases unpleasant, and sometimes exceedingly painful, as when species that rank next toourselves in their developed intelligence and organized societies, suchas elephants, monkeys, dogs, and cattle, are seen under the dominationof impulses, in some cases resembling insanity, and in others simulatingthe darkest passions of man. 

These instincts are:--

(1) The excitement caused by the smell of blood, noticeable in horsesand cattle among our domestic animals, and varying greatly in degree, from an emotion so slight as to be scarcely perceptible to the greatestextremes of rage or terror. 

(2) The angry excitement roused in some animals when a scarlet orbright-red cloth is shown to them. So well known is this apparentlyinsane instinct in our cattle that it has given rise to a proverb andmetaphor 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 thesight of a companion in extreme distress. Herbivorous mammals at suchtimes will trample and gore the distressed one to death. In the case ofwolves, and other savage-tempered carnivorous species, the distressedfellow is frequently torn to pieces and devoured on the spot. 

To take the first two together. When we consider that blood is red; thatthe smell of it is, or may be, or has been, associated with that vividhue 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 orterror from the wounded or captive animal, there appears at first sightto be some reason for connecting these two instinctive passions ashaving the same origin--namely, terror and rage caused by the sight of amember of the herd struck down and bleeding, or struggling for life inthe grasp of an enemy. I do not mean to say that such an image isactually present in the animal's mind, but that the inherited orinstinctive passion is one in kind and in its working with the passionof the animal when experience and reason were its guides. 

But the more I consider the point the more am I inclined to regard thesetwo instincts as separate in their origin, although I retain the beliefthat cattle and horses and several wild animals are violently excited bythe smell of blood for the reason just given--namely, their inheritedmemory associates the smell of blood with the presence among them ofsome powerful enemy that threatens their life. To this point I shallreturn when dealing with the last and most painful of the instincts I amconsidering. 

The following incident will show how violently this blood passionsometimes affects cattle, when they are permitted to exist in ahalf-wild condition, as on the pampas. I was out with my gun one day, afew miles from home, when I came across a patch on the ground where thegrass was pressed or trodden down and stained with blood. I concludedthat some thievish gauchos had slaughtered a fat cow there on theprevious night, and, to avoid detection, had somehow managed to carrythe 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 smallstream a mile away; they were travelling in a thin long line, and wouldpass the blood-stained spot at a distance of seven to eight hundredyards, but the wind from it would blow across their track. When thetainted wind struck the leaders of the herd they instantly stood still, raising their heads, then broke out into loud excited bellowings; andfinally turning they started off at a fast trot, following up the scentin a straight line, until they arrived at the place where one of theirkind had met its death. The contagion spread, and before long all thecattle were congregated on the fatal spot, and began moving round in adense mass, bellowing continually. 

It may be remarked here that the animal has a peculiar language onoccasions like this; it emits a succession of short bellowing cries, like excited exclamations, followed by a very loud cry, alternatelysinking into a hoarse murmur, and rising to a kind of scream that gratesharshly 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 andthe sound of the wind in trees; but this performance of cattle excitedby the smell of blood is most distressing to hear. 

The animals that had forced their way into the centre of the mass to thespot where the blood was, pawed the earth, and dug it up with theirhorns, and trampled each other down in their frantic excitement. It wasterrible to see and hear them. The action of those on the border of theliving mass in perpetually moving round in a circle with dolorousbellowings, was like that of the women in an Indian village when awarrior 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 inorder. It is a familiar fact that brightness in itself powerfullyattracts most if not all animals. The higher mammalians are affected inthe same way as birds and insects, although not in the same degree. Thisfact partly explains the rage of the bull. A scarlet flag fluttering inthe wind or lying on the grass attracts his attention powerfully, as itdoes that of other animals; but though curious about the nature of thebright object, it does not anger him. His anger is excited--and this isthe 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 ofanother species that rules or drives him, and that he fears, but withonly a slight fear, which may at any moment be overcome by his naturallybold aggressive disposition, Not only does the vivid colour compel himto fix his attention on the being that habitually interferes with hisliberty, and is consequently regarded with unfriendly eyes, but it alsoproduces the illusion on his mind that the man is near him, that he isapproaching 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 acorral into which a herd of half-wild cattle had just been driven. Oneof the men, to show his courage and agility, got off his horse andboldly placed himself in the centre of the open gate. His actionattracted the attention of one of the nearest cows, and lowering herhorns she began watching him in a threatening manner. He then suddenlydisplayed the scarlet lining of his poncho, and instantly she chargedhim furiously: with a quick movement to one side he escaped her horns, and after we had driven her back, resumed his former position andchallenged her again in the same way. The experiment was repeated notless than half a dozen times, and always with the same result. Thecattle were all in a savage temper, and would have instantly charged himon his placing himself before them on foot without the display ofscarlet cloth, but their fear of the mounted men, standing with lassosin their hand on either side of him, kept them in check. But wheneverthe attention of any one individual among them was forcibly drawn to himby the display of vivid colour, and fixed on him alone, the presence ofthe horsemen was forgotten and fear was swallowed by rage. It is a fact, I think, that most animals that exhibit angry excitement when a scarletrag is flourished aggressively at them, are easily excited to anger atall times. Domestic geese and turkeys may be mentioned among birds: theydo not fly at a grown person, but they will often fly at a child thatchallenges them in this way; and it is a fact that they do not at anytime fear a child very much and will sometimes attack him without beingchallenged. I think that the probability of the view I have taken isincreased by another fact--namely, that the sudden display of scarletcolour sometimes affects timid animals with an extreme fear, just as, onthe other hand, it excites those that are bold and aggressive to anger. Domestic sheep, forinstance, that vary greatly in disposition indifferent races or breeds, and even in different individuals, may beaffected in the two opposite ways, some exhibiting extreme terror andothers only anger at a sudden display of scarlet colour by the shepherdor herder. 

The persecution of a sick animal by its companions comes next underconsideration. 

It will have been remarked, with surprise by some readers, no doubt, that I have set down as two different instincts this persecution of asick or weakly individual by its fellows, and the sudden deadly ragethat sometimes impels the herd to turn upon and destroy a wounded ordistressed companion. It is usual for writers on the instincts ofanimals to speak of them as one: and I presume that they regard thissudden deadly rage of several individuals against a companion as merelyan extreme form of the common persecuting instinct or impulse. They arenot really one, but are as distinct in origin and character as it ispossible for any two instincts to be. The violent and fatal impulsestarts simultaneously into life and action, and is contagious, affectingall the members of the herd like a sudden madness. The other is neitherviolent nor contagious: the persecution is intermittent: it is oftenconfined to one or to a very few members of the herd, and seldom joinedin by the chief member, the leader or head to whom all the others giveway. 

Concerning this head of the herd, or flock, or pack, it is necessary tosay something more. Some gregarious animals, particularly birds, livetogether in the most perfect peace and amity; and here no leader isrequired, because in their long association together as a species inflocks, they have attained to a oneness of mind, so to speak, whichcauses them to move or rest, and to act at all times harmoniouslytogether, as if controlled and guided by an extrane-ous force. I maymention that the kindly instinct in animals, which is almost universalbetween male and female in the vertebrates, is most apparent in theseharmoniously acting birds. Thus, in La Plata, I have remarked, in morethan one species, that a lame or sick individual, unable to keop pacewith the flock and find its food, has not only been waited for, but insome cases some of the flock have constantly attended it, keeping closeto it both when flying and on the ground; and, I have no doubt, feedingit just as they would have fed their young. 

Naturally among such kinds no one member is of more consideration thananother. But among mammals such equality and harmony is rare. Theinstinct of one and all is to lord it over the others, with the resultthat one more powerful or domineering gets the mastery, to keep itthereafter 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 themastery of one over all, and of a few under him over the others, is mostsalutary; indeed, it is inconceivable that they should be able to existtogether under any other system. 

On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual tokeep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed theseanimals a great deal, and presume that they are very much like feraldogs and wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but whena 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 withabject gestures and whines. If the combatants are both strong and haveworked themselves into a mad rage before their head puts in anappearance, it may go hard with him: they know him no longer, and all hecan do is to join in the fray; then, if the fighters turn on him, he maybe so injured that his power is gone, and the next best dog in the packtakes his place. The hottest contests are always between dogs that arewell matched; neither will give place to the other, and so they fight itout; but from the foremost in strength and power down to the weakestthere is a gradation of authority; each one knows just how far he cango, which companion he can bully when he is in a bad temper or wishes toassert himself, and to which he must humbly yield in his turn. In such astate the weakest one must always yield to all the others, and casthimself down, seeming to call himself a slave and worshipper of anyother member of the pack that chooses to snarl at him, or command him togive up his bone with a good grace. 

This masterful or domineering temper, so common among social mammals, isthe cause of the persecution of the sick and weakly. When an animalbegins to ail he can no longer hold his own; he ceases to resent theoccasional ill-natured attacks made on him; his non-combative conditionis quickly discovered, and he at once drops down to a place below thelowest; it is common knowledge in the herd that he may be buffeted withimpunity by all, even by those that have hitherto suffered buffets buthave 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 hideshimself from the herd; the instinct of the "stricken deer" this might becalled. But I do not think that we need assume that the ailingindividual goes away to escape the danger of being ill-used by hiscompanions. He is sick and drooping and consequently unfit to be withthe healthy and vigorous; that is the simplest and probably the trueexplanation of his action; although in some cases he might be drivenfrom them by persistent rough usage. However peaceably gregariousmammals may live together, and however fond of each other's company theymay be, they do not, as a rule, treat each other gently. Furthermore, their games are exceedingly rough and require that they shall be in avigorous state of health to escape injury. Horned animals have nobuttons to the sharp weapons they prod and strike each other with in asportive spirit. I have often witnessed the games of wild and half-wildhorses with astonishment; for it seemed that broken bones must resultfrom the sounding kicks they freely bestowed on one another. Thisroughness itself would be a sufficient cause for the action of theindividual, sick and out of tune and untouched by the glad contagion ofthe others, in escaping from them; and to leave them would be to itsadvantage (and to that of the race) since, if not fatally injured orsick unto death, its chances of recovery to perfect health would bethereby greatly increased. 

It remains now to speak of that seemingly most cruel of instincts whichstands last on my list. It is very common among gregarious animals thatare at all combative in disposition, and still survives in our domesticcattle, although very rarely witnessed in England. My first experienceof it was just before I had reached the age of five years. I was not atthat early period trying to find out any of nature's secrets, but thescene I witnessed printed itself very vividly on my mind, so that I canrecall it as well as if my years had been five-and-twenty; perhapsbetter. It was on a summer's evening, and I was out by myself at somedistance from the house, playing about the high exposed roots of someold trees; on the other side of the trees the cattle, just returned frompasture, were gathered on the bare level ground. Hearing a greatcommotion 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 hercompanions were crowding round and goring her. 

What is the meaning of such an instinct? Darwin has but few words on thesubject. "Can we believe, " he says, in his posthumous _Essay onInstinct, "_when a wounded herbivorous animal returns to its own herdand is then attacked and gored, that this cruel and very common instinctis of any service to the species?" At the same time, he hints that suchan instinct might in some circumstances be useful, and his hint has beendeveloped into the current belief among naturalists on the subject. Hereit is, in Dr. Romanes' words: "We may readily imagine that the instinctdisplayed by many herbivorous animals of goring sick and woundedcompanions, is really of use in countries where the presence of weakmembers in a herd is a source of danger to the herd from the prevalenceof wild beasts. " Here it is assumed that the sick are set upon andkilled, but this is not the fact; sickness and decay from age or someother cause are slow things, and increase imperceptibly, so that thesight of a drooping member grows familiar to the herd, as does that of amember with some malformation, or unusual shade of colour, or altogetherwhite, as in the case of an albino. 

Sick and weak members, as we have seen, while subject to someill-treatment from their companions (only because they can beill-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 perfecthealth and vigour and unwoundecl, although, owing to some accident, ingreat 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 membersis not even to be regarded as an instinct proper, but rather as anaberration of an instinct, a blunder, into which animals sometimes fallwhen excited to action in unusual circumstances. 

The first thing that strikes us is that in these wild abnormal momentsof social animals, they are acting in violent contradiction to the wholetenor of their lives; that in turning against a distressed fellow theyoppose themselves to the law of their being, to the whole body ofinstincts, primary and secondary, and habits, which have made itpossible for them to exist together in communities. It is, I think, byreflecting on the abnormal character of such an action that we are ledto a true interpretation of this "dark saying of Nature. "

Every one is familiar with Bacon's famous passage about the dog, and thenoble courage which that animal puts on when "maintained by a man; whois to him in place of a God, or _melior natura;_ which courage ismanifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of a betternature than its own, could never attain. " Not so. The dog is a socialanimal, and acts instinctively in concert with his fellows; and thecourage he manifests is of the family, not the individual. In thedomestic state the man he is accustomed to associate with and obeystands 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 displayedby an infinite number of mammals and birds of gregarious habits, whenrepelling the attacks of some powerful and dangerous enemy, or when theyrush to the rescue of one of their captive fellows. Concerning this rageand 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 amember of the herd or family dying from or struggling in the clutches ofan enemy; (2) that it affects animals when a number af individuals aretogether, and is eminently contagious, like fear, that communicatesitself, quick as lightning, from one to another until all are in apanic, and like the joyous emotion that impels the members of a herd orflock to rush simultaneously into play. 

Now, it is a pretty familiar fact that animals acting instinctively, aswell as men acting intelligently, have at times their delusions andtheir illusions, and see things falsely, and are moved to action by afalse stimulus to their own disadvantage. When the individuals of a herdor family are excited to a sudden deadly rage by the distressed cries ofone of their fellows, or by the sight of its bleeding wounds and thesmell of its blood, or when they see it frantically struggling on theground, or in the cleft of a tree or rock, as if in the clutches of apowerful enemy, they do not turn on it to kill but to rescue it. 

In whatever way the rescuing instinct may have risen, whether simplythrough natural selection or, as is more probable, through anintelligent habit becoming fixed and hereditary, its effectivenessdepends altogether on the emotion of overmastering rage excited in theanimal--rage against a tangible visible enemy, or invisible, and excitedby the cries or struggles of a suffering companion; clearly, then, itcould not provide against the occasional rare accidents that animalsmeet with, which causes them to act precisely in the way they do whenseized or struck down by an enemy. An illusion is the result of theemotion similar to the illusion produced by vivid expectation inourselves, which has caused many a man to see in a friend and companionthe adversary he looked to see, and to slay him in his false-seeinganger. 

An illusion just as great, leading to action equally violent, butludicrous rather than painful to witness, may be seen in dogs, whenencouraged by a man to the attack, and made by his cries and gestures toexpect that some animal they are accustomed to hunt is about to beunearthed or overtaken; and if, when they are in this disposition, hecunningly exhibits and sets them on a dummy, made perhaps of old ragsand leather and stuffed with straw, they will seize, worry, and tear itto pieces with the greatest fury, and without the faintest suspicion ofits true character. 

That wild elephants will attack a distressed fellow seemed astonishingto Darwin, when he remembered the case of an elephant after escapingfrom a pit helping its fellow to escape also. But it is precisely theanimals, high or low in the organic scale, that are social, and possessthe instinct of helping each other, that will on occasions attack afellow in misfortune--such an attack being no more than a blunder of thehelping instinct. 

Felix de Azara records a rather cruel experiment on the temper of sometame rats confined in a cage. The person who kept them caught the tailof one of the animals and began sharply pinching it, keeping his handconcealed under the cage. Its cries of pain and struggles to free itselfgreatly excited the other rats; and after rushing wildly round for somemoments they flew at their distressed companion, and fixing their teethin its throat quickly dispatched it. In this case if the hand that heldthe tail had been visible and in the cage, the bites would undoubtedlyhave been inflicted on it; but no enemy was visible; yet the fury andimpulse to attack an enemy was present in the animals. In suchcircumstances, the excitement must be discharged--the instinct obeyed, and in the absence of any other object of attack the illusion isproduced and it discharges itself on the struggling companion. It issometimes 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 nearit and no cause apparent, the others run to it, and seeing nothing, turnround and attack each other. Here the exciting cause--the cry forhelp--is not strong enough to produce the illusion which is sometimesfatal to the suffering member; but each dog mistakingly thinks that theothers, or one of the others, inflicted the injury, and his impulse isto take the part of the injured animal. If the cry for help--causedperhaps by a sudden cramp or the prick of a thorn--is not very sharp orintense, the other dogs will not attack, but merely look and growl ateach other in a suspicious way. 

To go back to Azara's anecdote. Why, it may be asked--and this questionhas been put to me in conversation--if killing a distressed companion isof no advantage to the race, and if something must be attacked--why didnot these rats in this instance attack the cage they were shut in, andbite at the woodwork and wires? Or, in the case related by Mr. AndrewLang in _Longman's Magazine_ some time ago, in which the members of aherd of cattle in Scotland turned with sudden amazing fury on one of thecows that had got wedged between two rocks and was struggling withdistressed bellowings to free itself--why did they not attack theprisoning rocks instead of goring their unfortunate comrade to death?For it is well known that animals will, on occasions, turn angrily uponand attack inanimate objects that cause them injury or hinder theirfreedom of action. And we know that this mythic faculty--the mind'sprojection of itself into visible nature--survives in ourselves, thatthere are exceptional moments in our lives when it comes back to us; noone, for instance, would be astonished to hear that any man, even aphilosopher, had angrily kicked away or imprecated a stool or otherinanimate object against which he had accidentally barked his shins. Theanswer is, that there is no connection between these two things--theuniversal mythic faculty of the mind, and that bold and violent instinctof social animals of rushing to the rescue of a stricken or distressedcompanion, which has a definite, a narrow, purpose--namely, to fall uponan enemy endowed not merely with the life and intelligence common to allthings, including rocks, trees, and waters, but with animal form andmotion. 

I had intended in this place to give other instances, observed inseveral widely-separated species, including monkeys; but it is notnecessary, as I consider that all the facts, however varied, are coveredby the theory I have suggested--even a fact I like the one mentioned inthis chapter of cattle bellowing and madly digging up the ground wherethe blood of one of their kind had been spilt: also such a fact as thatof wild cattle and other animals caught in a trap or enclosure attackingand destroying each other in their frenzy; and the fact that somefierce-tempered carnivorous mammals will devour the companion they havekilled. It is an instinct of animals like wolves and peccaries to devourthe enemy they have overcome and slain: thus, when the jaguar captures apeccary out of a drove, and does not quickly escape with his prize intoa tree, he is instantly attacked and slain and then consumed, even tothe skin and bones. This is the wolf's and the peccary's instinct; andthe devouring of one of their own companions is an inevitableconsequence of the mistake made in the first place of attacking andkilling it. In no other circumstances, not even when starving, do theyprey on their own species. 

If the explanation I have offered should seem a true or highly probableone, it will, I feel sure, prove acceptable to many lovers of animals, who, regarding tins seemingly ruthless instinct, not as an aberrationbut as in some vague way advantageous to animals in their struggle forexistence, 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 gladlydisbelieve it if they could. 

It should be a relief to them to be able to look on it no longer assomething ugly and hateful, a blot on nature, but as an illusion, amistake, an unconscious crime, so to speak, that has for its motive thenoblest passion that animals know--that sublime courage and daring whichthey exhibit in defence of a distressed companion. This fiery spirit inanimals, which makes them forget their own safety, moves our hearts byits close resemblance to one of the most highly-prized human virtues;just as we are moved to intellectual admiration by the wonderfulmigratory instinct in birds that simulates some of the highestachievements of the mind of man. And we know that this beautifulinstinct is also liable to mistakes--that many travellers leave usannually never to return. Such a mistake was undoubtedly the cause ofthe late visitation of Pallas' sand-grouse: owing perhaps to someunusual atmospheric or dynamic condition, or to some change in thenervous system of the birds, they deviated widely from their usualroute, to scatter in countless thousands over the whole of Europe andperish slowly in climates not suited to them; while others, overpassingthe cold strange continent, sped on over colder, stranger seas, to dropat last like aerolites, quenching their lives in the waves. 

Whether because it is true, as Professor Freeman and some others willhave it, that humanity is a purely modern virtue; or because thedoctrine of Darwin, by showing that we are related to other forms oflife, that our best feelings have their roots low down in the temper andinstincts of the social species, has brought us nearer in spirit to theinferior animals, it is certain that our regard for them has grown, andis growing, and that new facts and fresh inferences that make us thinkmore 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 themuscular exertion and constant exercise of judgment they call for occupythe mind partly to the exclusion of other things; so that a long walkmay sometimes be only a long walk and nothing more. In ridingwe are not conscious of exertion, and as for that close observation andaccurate discernment necessary in traversing the ground with speed andsafety, it is left to the faithful servant that carries us. Pitfalls, hillocks, slippery places, the thousand little inequalities of thesurface that have to be measured with infallible eye, these disturb uslittle. To fly or go slowly at will, to pass unshaken over rough andsmooth alike, fording rivers without being wet, and mounting hillswithout climbing, this is indeed unmixed delight. It is the nearestapproach to bird-life we seem capable of, since all the monster bubblesand flying fabrics that have been the sport of winds from the days ofMontgolfier downwards have brought us no nearer to it. The aeronautgasping for breath above the clouds offers only a sad spectacle of theimbecility of science and man's shattered hopes. To the free inhabitantsof air we can only liken the mounted Arab, vanishing, hawklike, over theboundless desert. 

In riding there is always exhilarating motion; yet, if the sceneryencountered be charming, you are apparently sitting still, while, river-like, it flows toward and past you, ever giving place to freshvisions of beauty. Above all, the mind is free, as when one lies idly onthe grass gazing up into the sky. And, speaking of myself, there is evenmore than this immunity from any tax on the understanding such as werequire in walking; the rhythmic motion, the sensation as of night, acting on the brain like a stimulus. That anyone should be able to thinkbetter lying, sitting, or standing, than when speeding along onhorseback, is to me incomprehensible. This is doubtless due to earlytraining and long use; for on those great pampas where I first saw thelight and was taught at a tender age to ride, we come to look on man asa 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 ideain his brain; if so, it would only be reasonable to suppose that itscorrelative exists in a modification of structure. Certain it is that anintoxicated gaucho lifted on to the back of his horse is perfectly safein his seat. The horse may do his best to rid himself of his burden; therider's legs--or posterior arms as they might appropriately becalled--retain their iron grip, notwithstanding the fuddled brain. 

The gaucho is more or less bow-legged; and, of course, the more crookedhis legs are, the better for him in his struggle for existence. Off hishorse his motions are awkward, like those of certain tardigrade mammalsof 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. Andhere, perhaps, we can see why foreign travellers, judging him from theirown standpoint, invariably bring against him the charge of laziness. Onhorseback he is of all men most active. His patient endurance underprivations that would drive other men to despair, his laborious days andfeats of horsemanship, the long journeys he performs without rest orfood, seem to simple dwellers on the surface of the earth almost likemiracles. Deprive him of his horse, and he can do nothing but sit onthe ground cross-legged, or _en cuclillas_, --on his heels. You have, touse his own figurative language, cut off his feet. 

Darwin in his earlier years appears not to have possessed the power ofreading men with that miraculous intelligence always distinguishing hisresearches concerning other and lower orders of beings. In the _Voyageof a Naturalist, _ speaking of this supposed indolence of the gauchos, hetells that in one place where workmen were in great request, seeing apoor gaucho sitting in a listless attitude, he asked him why he did notwork. The man's answer was that _he was too poor to work!_ Thephilosopher was astonished and amused at the reply, but failed tounderstand it. And yet, to one acquainted with these lovers of briefphrases, what more intelligible answer could have been returned? Thepoor fellow simply meant to say that his horses had been stolen--a thingof frequent occurrence in that country, or, perhaps, that some minion ofthe 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 flowexclusively from the agreeable sensations attendant on flight-likemotion; there is also the knowledge, sweet in itself, that not a merecunningly fashioned machine, like that fabled horse of brass "on whichthe Tartar king did ride, " sustains us; but a something with life andthought, like ourselves, that feels what we feel, understands us, andkeenly participates in our pleasures. Take, for example, the horse onwhich some quiet old country gentleman is accustomed to travel; howsoberly and evenly he jogs along, picking his way over the ground. Butlet him fall into the hands of a lively youngster, and how soon he picksup a frisky spirit! Were horses less plastic, more the creatures ofcustom 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 oncesaw--an untamable-looking brute, that rolled his eyes, turbulently, under a cloud of black mane tumbling over his forehead. I could not takemy sight off this proud, beautiful creature, and I longed to possess himwith a great longing. His owner--a worthless vagabond, as ithappened--marked my enthusiastic admiration, and a day or twoafterwards, having lost all his money at cards, he came to me, offeringto sell me the horse. Having obtained my father's consent, I rushed offto the man with all the money I possessed--about thirty or thirty-fiveshillings, I believe. After some grumbling, and finding he could get nomore, he accepted the money. My new possession filled me with unboundeddelight, and I spent the time caressing him and leading him about thegrounds 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 thatsavage look, which his eyes never quite lost, he always displayed asingular gentleness towards me. He never attempted to upset me, thoughhe promptly threw--to my great delight, I must confess--anyone else whoventured to mount him. Probably the secret of his conduct was that hehated the whip. Of this individual, if not of the species, thecelebrated description held true:--"The horse is a docile animal, but ifyou flog him he will not do so. " After he had been mine a few days, Irode on him one morning to witness a cattle-marking on a neighbouringestate. I found thirty or forty gauchos on the ground engaged incatching and branding the cattle. It was rough, dangerous work, butapparently not rough enough to satisfy the men, so after branding ananimal and releasing him from their lassos, several of the mountedgauchos would, purely for sport, endeavour to knock it down as it rushedaway, 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 horsemenin succession shot out from the crowd, and charged the bull at fullspeed; one by one, by suddenly swerving his body round, he avoided them, and was escaping scot-free. At this moment my horse--possiblyinterpreting a casual touch of my hand on his neck, or some movement ofmy body, as a wish to join in the sport--suddenly sprang forward andcharged on the flying bull like a thunderbolt, striking him full in themiddle of his body, and hurling him with a tremendous shock to earth. The stricken beast rolled violently over, while my horse stood still asa stone watching him. Strange to say, I was not unseated, but, turning-round, galloped back, greeted by a shout of applause from thespectators--the only sound of that description I have ever had theprivilege of listening to. They little knew that my horse hadaccomplished the perilous feat without his rider's guidance. No doubt hehad been accustomed to do such things, and, perhaps, for the moment, hadforgotten that he had passed into the hands of a new owner--one oftender years. He never voluntarily attempted an adventure of that kindagain; he knew, I suppose, that he no longer carried on his back areckless dare-devil, who valued not life. Poor Picáso! he was mine tillhe died. I have had scores of horses since, but never one I loved sowell. 

With the gauchos the union between man and horse is not of so intimate anature as with the Indians of the pampas. Horses are too cheap, where aman without shoes to his feet may possess a herd of them, for theclosest kind of friendship to ripen. The Indian has also lessindividuality of character. The immutable nature of the conditions he isplaced in, and his savage life, which is a perpetual chase, bring himnearer to the level of the beast he rides. And probably the acquiredsagacity of the horse in the long co-partnership of centuries has becomehereditary, and of the nature of an instinct. The Indian horse is moredocile, he understands his master better; the slightest touch of thehand on his neck, which seems to have developed a marvelloussensitiveness, is sufficient to guide him. The gaucho labours to givehis horse "a silken mouth, " as he aptly calls it; the Indian's horse hasit from birth. Occasionally the gaucho sleeps in the saddle; the Indiancan die on his horse. During frontier warfare one hears at times of adead warrior being found and removed with difficulty from the horse thatcarried him out of the fight, and about whose neck his rigid fingerswere clasped in death. Even in the gaucho country, however, where, Igrieve to confess, the horse is not deservedly esteemed, there are veryremarkable instances of equine attachment and fidelity to man, and of afellowship between horse and rider of the closest kind. One only I willrelate. 

When Rosas, that man of "blood and iron, " was Dictator of the Argentinecountry--a position which he held for a quarter of a centuiy--desertorsfrom the army were inexorably shot when caught, as they generally were. But where my boyhood was spent there was a deserter, a man named SantaAnna, who for seven years, without ever leaving the neighbourhood of hishome, succeeded in eluding his pursuers by means of the marvelloussagacity and watchful care exercised by his horse. When taking his reston the plain--for he seldom slept under a roof--his faithful horse keptguard. At the first sight of mounted men on the horizon he would fly tohis master, and, seizing his cloak between his teeth, rouse him with avigorous shake. The hunted man would start up, and in a moment man andhorse would vanish into one of the dense reed-beds abounding in theplace, and where no man could follow. I have not space to tell moreabout this horse; but at last, in the fulness of time, when the figswere ripe--literally as well as figuratively, for it happened in theautumn of the year--the long tyrannous rule ended, and Santa Anna cameout of the reed-beds, where he had lived his wild-animal life, to mixwith his fellows. I knew him some years later. He was a ratherheavy-looking man, with little to say, and his reputation for honestywas not good in the place; but I dare say there was something good inhim. 

Students of nature are familiar with the modifying effects of newconditions on man and brute. Take, for example, the gaucho: he mustevery day traverse vast distances, see quickly, judge rapidly, be readyat all times to encounter hunger and fatigue, violent changes oftemperature, great and sudden perils. These conditions have made himdiffer widely from the peasant of the Peninsula; he has the enduranceand 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. Hediffers as much from the English hunter, for instance, as one animal canwell differ from another of the same species. He never pounds the earthand wastes his energies in vain parade. He has not the dauntless couragethat performs such brilliant feats in the field, and that often as notattempts the impossible. In the chase he husbands all his strength, carrying his head low, and almost grazing the ground with his hoofs, sothat he is not a showy animal. Constant use, or the slow cumulativeprocess of natural selection, has served to develop a keenness of sensealmost preternatural. The vulture's eye, with all the advantage derivedfrom the vulture's vast elevation above the scene surveyed, is not sofar-reaching as the sense of smell in the pampa horse. A commonphenomenon on the pampas is a sudden migration of the horses of adistrict to some distant place. This occurs in seasons of drought, whengrass or water fails. The horses migrate to some district where, fromshowers having fallen or other circumstances, there is a better supplyof food and drink. A slight breeze blowing from the more favouredregion, which may be forty or fifty miles away, or even much further, isenough to start them off. Yet, during the scorching days of midsummer, very little moisture or smell of grass can possibly reach them from sucha distance. 

Another phenomenon, even more striking, is familiar to everyfrontiersman. For some reason, the gaucho horse manifests the greatestterror 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 ofexcitement and com-motion, sweeping like a great wave over the country;houses are in flames, families flying, cattle being driven at franticspeed to places of greater safety. Be this as it may, long before themarauders reach the settlement (often when they are still a whole day'sjourney from it) the horses take the alarm and come wildly flying in:the contagion quickly spreads to the horned cattle, and a generalstampede ensues. The gauchos maintain that the horses _smell_ theIndians. I believe they are right, for when passing a distant Indiancamp, from which the wind blew, the horses driven before me havesuddenly taken fright and run away, leading me a chase of many miles. The explanation that ostriches, deer, and other fleet animals driven inbefore the invaders might be the cause of the stampede cannot beaccepted, since the horses are familiar with the sight of these animalsflying from their gaucho hunters. 

There is a pretty fable of a cat and dog lying in a dark room, aptlyillustrating the fine senses of these two species. "Listen! I heard afeather 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 asthat, and a dog tracing his master's steps over the city pavement issupposed to be a feat no other animal can equal. No doubt the artificiallife a horse lives in England, giving so little play to many of his mostimportant faculties, has served to blunt them. He is a splendidcreature; but the noble bearing, the dash and reckless courage thatdistinguish him from the modest horse of the desert, have not beenacquired without a corresponding loss in other things. When ridden bynight the Indian horse--and sometimes the same habit is found in thegaucho's animal--drops his head lower and lower as the darknessincreases, with the danger arising from the presence of innumerablekennels concealed in the grass, until his nose sweeps the surface like afoxhound's. That this action is dictated by a powerful instinct ofself-preservation is plain; for, when I have attempted to forcibly dragthe animal's head up, he has answered such an experiment by taking thebit in his teeth, and violently pulling the reins out of my hand. Hismiraculous sense of smell measures the exact position of every hiddenkennel, every treacherous spot, and enables him to pass swiftly andsecurely over it. 

On the desert pampa the gaucho, for a reason that he knows, calls thepuma 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 dognaturally takes the foremost place in our affections. The very highestpraise yet given to this animal is probably to be found in Bacon's essayon Atheism. "For take an example of a dog, " he says, "and mark what agenerosity and courage he will put on when he finds himself maintainedby a man, who is to him in place of a god, or _melior natura, _ whichcourage is manifestly such as that creature, without the confidence of abetter nature than its own, could never attain!" Can we not say as muchof the horse? The very horses that fly terror-stricken from the smell ofan Indian will, when "maintained by a man, " readily charge into a wholehost of yelling savages. 

I once had a horse at home, born and bred on the place, so docile thatwhenever I required him I could go to him where the horses were atpasture, and, though they all galloped off at my approach, he wouldcalmly wait to be caught. Springing on to his back, I would go after theother 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 womenand children he was a favourite; he was also frequently used for farmwork, in or out of harness, and I could shoot from his back. In thepeach season he would roam about the plantation, getting the fruit, ofwhich he was very fond, by tugging at the lower branches of the treesand shaking it down in showers. One intensely dark night I was ridinghome on this horse. I came through a road with a wire fence on eachside, two miles in length, and when I had got nearly to the end of thisroad my horse suddenly stopped short, uttering a succession of loudterrified snorts. I could see nothing but the intense blackness of thenight before me and tried to encourage him to go on. Touching him onthe neck, I found his hair wet with the sudden profuse sweat of extremefear. The whip made no impression on him. He continued to back away, hiseyes apparently fixed on some object of horror just before him, while hetrembled to such a degree that I was shaken in the saddle. He attemptedseveral times to wheel round and run away, but I was determined not toyield to him, and continued the contest. Suddenly, when I was beginningto despair of getting home by that road, he sprang forward, andregularly charged the (to me) invisible object before him, and inanother moment, when he had apparently passed it, taking the bit betweenhis teeth he almost flew over the ground, never pausing till he broughtme to my own door. When I dismounted his terror seemed gone, but he hunghis head in a dejected manner, like a horse that has been under thesaddle all day. I have never witnessed another such instance of almostmaddening fear. His terror and apprehension were like what we canimagine a man experiencing at sight of a ghost in some dark solitaryplace. 

Yet he did not forcibly carry me away from it, as he might so easilyhave done; but, finding himself maintained by a "nature superior to hisown, " he preferred to face it. I have never met in the dog a morestriking example of this noblest kind of brute courage. The incident didnot impress me very much at the moment, but when I came to reflect thatmy sight was mere blindness compared with that of my horse, and that itwas not likely his imagination clothed any familiar natural object withfantastic terrors, it certainly did impress me very deeply. 

I am loth to finish with, my subject, in which, to express myself in themanner of the gauchos, I have passed over many matters, like good grassand fragrant herbs the galloping horse sniffs at but cannot stay totaste; and especially loth to conclude with this last incident, whichhas in it an element of gloom. I would rather first go back for a fewmoments to my original theme--the pleasures of riding, for the sake ofmentioning a species of pleasure my English reader has probably nevertasted or even heard of. When riding by night on the pampas, I used toenjoy lying back on my horse till my head and shoulders rested well onhis 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 isnecessary; and he must be made to go at a swift and smooth pace overlevel grassy ground. With these conditions the sensation is positivelydelightful. Nothing of earth is visible, only the vast circle of theheavens glittering with innumerable stars; the muffled sound of thehoofs on the soft sward becomes in fancy only the rushing of the wingsof our Pegasus, while the enchanting illusion that we are soaringthrough space possesses the mind. Unfortunately, however, this method ofriding is impracticable in England. And, even if people with enthusiasmenough could be found to put it in practice by importing swiftlight-footed Arabian or pampa horses, and careering about level parks ondark starry nights, probably a shout of derision would be raised againstso undignified a pastime. 

_Apropos_ of dignity, I will relate, in conclusion, an incident in myLondon life which may possibly interest psychologists. Some time ago inOxford Street I got on top of an omnibus travelling west. My mind waspreoccupied, I was anxious to get home, and, in an absent kind of way, Ibecame irritated at the painfully slow rate of progress. It was all anold familiar experience, the deep thought, lessening pace, andconsequent 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 ofthe difference between a swinging gallop and a walk. So, elevating myumbrella, I dealt the side of the omnibus a sounding blow, very much tothe astonishment of my fellow-passengers. So overgrown are we withusages, habits, tricks of thought and action springing from the soil weinhabit; 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 enthusiastwhose life is given to the study of precious stones, and whose soledelight is in the contemplation of their manifold beauty--if a strangershould 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 anyfamiliar stone, but differing as widely from all others as diamond fromopal or cat's-eye; and then, just when he is beginning to rejoice inthat strange exquisite loveliness, the hand should close and thestranger, with a mocking smile on his lips, go forth and disappear fromsight in the crowd. A feeling such as that would be is not unfrequentlyexperienced by the field naturalist whose favoured lot it is to live ina country not yet "thoroughly worked out, " with its every wildinhabitant scientifically named, accurately described, and skilfullyfigured in some colossal monograph. One swift glance of the practisedeye, ever eagerly searching for some new-thing, and he knows that hereat length is a form never previously seen by him; but his joy is perhapsonly for a few moments, and the prize is snatched from sight for ever. The lapidary might have some doubts; he might think that the strangerhad, after all, only mocked him with the sight of a wonderful artificialgem, and that a close examination would have proved its worthlessness;but the naturalist can have no doubts: if he is an enthusiast, wellacquainted with the fauna of his district, and has good eyesight, heknows that there is no mistake; for there it is, the new strange form, photographed by instantaneous process on his mind, and there it willremain, a tantalizing image, its sharp lines and fresh colouringunblurred by time. 

Walking in some open forest glade, he may look up just in time to see agreat strange butterfly--a blue Morpho, let us say, wandering in somefar country where this angel insect is unknown--passing athwart hisvision with careless, buoyant flight, the most sylph-like thing innature, and all blue and pure like its aerial home, but with a moredelicate and wonderful brilliance in its cerulean colour, giving suchunimaginable glory to its broad airy wings; and then, almost before hissoul has had time to feel its joy, it may soar away unloitering over thetall trees, to be seen no more. 

But the admiration, the delight, and the desire are equally great, andthe loss just as keenly felt, whether the strange species seen happensto be one surpassingly beautiful or not. Its newness is to thenaturalist its greatest attraction. How beautiful beyond all othersseems a certain small unnamed brown bird to my mind! So many years havepassed and its image has not yet grown dim; yet I saw it only for a fewmoments, when it hopped out from, the thick foliage and perched withintwo or three yards of me, not afraid, but only curious; and afterpeering at me first with one eye and then the other, and wiping itssmall dagger on a twig, it flew away and was seen no more. For many daysI sought for it, and for years waited its reappearance, and it was moreto me than ninety and nine birds which I had always known; yet it wasvery modest, dressed in a brown suit, very pale on the breast and whiteon the throat, and for distinction a straw-coloured stripe over theeye--that ribbon which Queen Nature bestows on so many of her featheredsubjects, in recognition, I suppose, of some small and common kind ofmerit. 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 littlebird that for a time made all others seem unbeautiful. 

Even a richer prize may come in sight for a brief period--one of thenobler mammalians, which are fewer in number, and bound to earth likeourselves, and therefore so much better known than the wanderingchildren of air. In. Some secluded spot, resting amidst luxuriantherbage or forest undergrowth, a slight rustling makes us start, and, lo! looking at us from the clustering leaves, a strange face; theleaf-like ears erect, the dark eyes round with astonishment, and thesharp black nose twitching and sniffing audibly, to take in theunfamiliar flavour of a human presence from the air, like the pursed-upand smacking lips of a wine-drinker tasting a new vintage. No soonerseen than gone, like a dream, a phantom, the quaint furry face to bethereafter only an image in memory. 

Sometimes the prize may be a very rich one, and actually within reach ofthe hand--challenging the hand, as it were, to grasp it, and yetpresently slip away to be seen no more, although it maybe sought for dayafter day, with a hungry longing comparable to that of some poor trampwho finds a gold doubloon in the forest, and just when he is beginningto realize all that it means to him drops it in the grass and cannotfind it again. There is not the faintest motion in the foliage, norustle of any dry leaf, and yet we know that something hasmoved--something has come or has gone; and, gazing fixedly at one spot, we suddenly see that it is still there, close to us, the pointedophidian head and long neck, not drawn back and threatening, but slopingforward, dark and polished as the green and purple weed-stems springingfrom marshy soil, and with an irregular chain of spots extending downthe side. Motionless, too, as the stems it is; but presently the tongue, crimson and glistening, darts out and flickers, like a small jet ofsmoke and flame, and is withdrawn; then the smooth serpent head dropsdown, and the thing is gone. 

How I saw and lost the noble wrestling frog has been recounted inChapter IV. : other tantalizing experiences of the same kind remain to betold in the present chapter, which is not intended for the severenaturalist, but rather for such readers as may like to hear somethingabout the pains and pleasures of the seeker as well as the result of theseeking. 

One of my earliest experiences of seeing and losing relates to ahumming-bird--a veritable "jewel of ornithology. " I was only a boy atthe time, but already pretty well acquainted with the birds of thedistrict I lived in, near La Plata River, and among them were threespecies of the hummingbird. One spring day I saw a fourth--a wonderfullittle thing, only half as big as the smallest of the other three--thewell-known Phaithornis splendens--and scarcely larger than a bumble-bee. I was within three feet of it as it sucked at the flowers, suspendedmotionless in the air, the wings appearing formless and mist-like fromtheir rapid vibratory motion, but the rest of the upper plumage was seendistinctly as anything can be seen. The head and neck and upper part ofthe back were emerald green, with the metallic glitter usually seen inthe burnished scale-like feathers of these small birds; the lower halfof 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 brilliantlittle stranger, always very near, and tried without success to captureit, after which, it disappeared from the plantation. Four years later Isaw 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 carpetedwith short grass, and nothing else grew there except a solitary stuntedcardoou thistle-bush with one flower on its central stem above thegrey-green artichoke-like leaves. The disc of the great thorny blossomwas as broad as that of a sunflower, purple in colour, delicatelyfrosted with white; on this flat disc several insects werefeeding--flies, fireflies, and small wasps--and I paused for a fewminutes in my walk to watch them. Suddenly a small misty object flewswiftly downwards past my face, and paused motionless in the air an inchor two above the rim of the flower. Once more my lost humming-bird, which I remembered so well! The exquisitely graceful form, half circledby the misty moth-like wings, the glittering green and velvet-blackmantle, and snow-white tail spread open like a fan--there it hung like abeautiful bird-shaped gem suspended by an invisible gossamer thread. One--two--three moments passed, while I gazed, trembling with rapturousexcitement, and then, before I had time to collect my faculties and makea forlorn attempt to capture it with my hat, away it flew, gliding soswiftly on the air that form and colour were instantly lost, and inappearance 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 eversaw of it. 

The case of this small "winged gem, " still wandering nameless in thewilds, reminds me of yet another bird seen and lost, also remarkable forits diminutive size. For years I looked for it, and when the wished-foropportunity came, and it was in my power to secure it, I refrained; andFate punished me by never permitting me to see it again. On severaloccasions while riding on the pampas I had caught glimpses of thisminute bird flitting up mothlike, with uncertain tremulous flight, andagain dipping into the weeds, tall grass, or thistles. Its plumage wasyellowish in hue, like sere dead herbage, and its extremely slender bodylooked longer and slimmer than it was, owing to the great length of itstail, or of the two middle tail-feathers. I knew that it was aSynallaxis--a genus of small birds of the Woodhewer family. Now, as Ihave said in a former chapter, these are wise little birds, moreinteresting--I had almost said more beautiful--in their wisdom, orwisdom-simulating instincts, than the quatzel in its resplendent green, or the cock-of-the-rock in its vivid scarlet and orange mantle. Wrensand mocking-birds have melody for their chief attraction, and the nameof each kind is, to our minds, also the name of a certain kind of sweetmusic; we think of swifts and swallows in connection with the mysteriousmigratory instinct; and humming-birds have a glittering mantle, and themiraculous motions necessary to display its ever-changing iridescentbeauty. In like manner, the homely Dendrocolaptidae possess the geniusfor building, and an account of one of these small birds without itsnest would be like a biography of Sir Christopher Wren that made nomention of his works. It was not strange then that when I saw this smallbird 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 birdsin the Southern Hemisphere, while cautiously picking my way through abed of eardoon bushes, the mysterious little creature flitted up andperched among the clustering leaves quite near to me. It uttered afeeble grasshopper-like chirp; and then a second individual, smaller, paler-coloured, and if possible shyer than the first, showed itself fortwo or three seconds, after which both birds dived once more intoconcealment. How glad I was to see them! for here they were, male andfemale, in a suitable spot in my own fields, where they evidently meantto breed. Every day after that I paid them one cautious visit, and bywaiting from five to fifteen minutes, standing motionless among thethistles, I always succeeded in getting them to show themselves for afew moments. I could easily have secured them then, but my wish was todiscover their nesting habits; and after watching for some days, I wasrewarded by finding their nest; then for three days more I watched itslowly progressing towards completion, and each time I approached it oneof the small birds would flit out to vanish into the herbage. Thestructure was about six inches long, and not more than two inches indiameter, and was placed horizontally on a broad stiff eardoon leaf, sheltered by other leaves above. It was made of the finest dry grassloosely woven, and formed a simple perfectly straight tube, open at bothends. The aperture was so small that I could only insert my littlefinger, and the bird could not, of course, have turned round in sonarrow a passage, and so always went in at one end and left by theother. On visiting the spot on the fourth day I found, to my intensechagrin, that the delicate fabric had been broken and thrown down bysome animal; also, that the birds had utterly vanished--for I soughtthem in vain, both there and in every weedy and thistly spot in theneighbourhood. The bird without the nest had seemed a useless thing topossess; now, for all my pains, I had only a wisp of fine dry grass inmy hand, and no bird. The shy, modest little creature, dwellingviolet-like amidst clustering leaves, and even when showing itself still"half-hidden from the eye, " was thereafter to be only a tantalizingimage in memory. Still, my case was not so hopeless as that of theimagined lapidary; for however rare a species may be, and near to itsfinal extinction, there must always be many individuals existing, and Iwas cheered by the thought that I might yet meet with one at some futuretime. And, even if this particular species was not to gladden my sightagain, there were others, scores and hundreds more, and at any moment Imight expect to see one shining, a living gem, on Nature's open extendedpalm. 

Sometimes it has happened that an animal would have been overlooked orpassed by with scant notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for somesingular action or habit which has instantly given it a strangeimportance, and made its possession desirable. 

I was once engaged in the arduous and monotonous task of driving a largenumber of sheep a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, inexcessively hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to travelling. Five or six gauchos were with me, and we were on the southern pampas ofBuenos Ayres, near to a long precipitous stony sierra which rose to aheight of five or six hundred feet above the plain. Who that hastravelled for eighteen days on a dead level in a broiling sun can resista hill? That sierra was more sublime to us than Conon-dagua, thanIllimani. 

Leaving the sheep, I rode to it with three of the men; aad aftersecuring 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 kindof parasite, is a very slow-moving creature, and I soon left my friendsfar behind. Coming to a place where ferns and flowering herbage grewthick, I began to hear all about me sounds of a character utterly unlikeany natural sound I was acquainted with--innumerable low clear voicestinkling or pealing like minute sweet-toned, resonant bells--for thesounds were purely metallic and perfectly bell-like. I was completelyringed round with the mysterious music, and as I walked it rose and sankrhythmically, keeping time to my steps. I stood still, and immediatelythe sounds ceased. I took a step forwards, and again the fairy-bellswere set ringing, as if at each step my foot touched a central meetingpoint of a thousand radiating threads, each thread attached to a peal oflittle bells hanging concealed among the herbage. I waited for mycompanions, and called their attention to the phenomenon, and to themalso it was a thing strange and perplexing. "It is the bell-snake!"cried one excitedly. This is the rattle-snake; but although at that timeI had no experience of this reptile, I knew that he was wrong. Yet hownatural the mistake! The Spanish name of "bell-snake" had made himimagine that the whirring sound of the vibrating rattles, resemblingmuffled cicada music, is really bell-like in character. Eventually wediscovered that the sound was made by grasshoppers; but they were seenonly to be lost, for I could not capture one, so excessively shy andcunning had the perpetual ringing of their own little tocsins made them. And presently I had to return to my muttons; and afterwards there was noopportunity of revisiting the spot to observe so singular a habit againand collect specimens. It was a very slender grasshopper, about an inchand a half long, of a uniform, tawny, protective colour--the colour ofan old dead leaf. It also possessed a protective habit common to mostgrasshoppers, of embracing a slender vertical stem with its four finefront legs, and moving cunningly round so as to keep the stem always infront of it to screen itself from sight. Only other grasshoppers aresilent when alarmed, and the silence and masking action are related, andtogether prevent the insect from being detected. But this particularspecies, or race, or colony, living on the sides of the isolated sierra, had acquired a contrary habit, resembling a habit of gregarious birdsand mammals. For this informing sound (unless it mimicked some_warning-sound, _ as of a rattlesnake, which it didn't) could notpossibly be beneficial to individuals living alone, as grasshoppersgenerally do, but, on the contrary, only detrimental; and such a habitwas therefore purely for the public good, and could only have arisen ina species that always lived in communities. 

On another occasion, in the middle of the hot season, I was travellingalone across-country in a locality which was new to me, a few leagueseast of La Plata River, in its widest part. About eleven o'clock in themorning I came to a low-lying level plain where the close-cropped grasswas vivid green, although elsewhere all over the country the vegetationwas scorched and dead, and dry as ashes. The ground being so favourable, I crossed this low plain at a swinging gallop, and in about thirtyminutes' time. In that half-hour I saw a vast number of snakes, all ofone kind, and a species new to me; but my anxiety to reach mydestination before the oppressive heat of the afternoon made me hurryon. So numerous were the snakes in that green place that frequently Ihad as many as a dozen in sight at one time. It looked to me like acoronelia--harmless colubrine snakes--but was more than twice as largeas 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 inlength, and the colour was dull yellow or tan, slightly lined andmottled with shades of brown. Among dead or partially withered grass andherbage they would have been undistinguishable at even a very shortdistance, but on the vivid green turf they were strangely conspicuous, some being plainly visible forty or fifty yards away; and not one wasseen coiled up. They were all lying motionless, stretched out fulllength, and looking like dark yellow or tan-coloured ribbons, thrown onto the grass. It was most unusual to see so many snakes together, although not surprising in the circumstances. The December heats haddried up all the watercourses and killed the vegetation, and made theearth hard and harsh as burnt bricks; and at such times snakes, especially the more active non-venomous kinds, will travel longdistances, in their slow way, in search of water. Those I saw during myride had probably been attracted by the moisture from a large area ofcountry; and although there was no water, the soft fresh grass must havebeen 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, Igot off and approached a large snake; but when I was quite twelve yardsfrom it, it lifted its head, and, turning deliberately round, camerather swiftly at me. I retreated, and it followed, until, springing onto my horse, I left it, greatly surprised at its action, and beginningto think that it must be venomous. As I rode on the feeling of surpriseincreased, conquering haste; and in the end, seeing more snakes, Idismounted and approached the largest, when exactly the same thingoccurred again, the snake rousing itself and coming angrily at me when Iwas still (considering the dull lethargic character of the deadliestkinds) at an absurd distance from it. Again and again I repeated theexperiment, with the same result. And at length I stunned one with ablow 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 thesame kind at my destination; but there were none, and very soon businesscalled me to a distant place, and I never met with this speciesafterwards. But when I rode away from that green spot, and was once moreon the higher, desolate, wind-swept plain surrounding it--a rustling seaof giant thistles, still erect, although dead, and red as rust, andfilling the hot blue sky with silvery down--it was with a very strangefeeling. The change from the green and living to the dead and dry anddusty 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 theserpents there were not like others--the mechanical coiled-up thing weknow, a mere bone-and-muscle man-trap, set by the elements, to springand strike when trodden on: but these had a high intelligence, a loftyspirit, and were filled with a noble rage and astonishment that anyother kind of creature, even a man, should venture there to disturbtheir sacred peace. It was a fancy, born of that sense of mystery whichthe unknown and the unusual in nature wakes in us--an obsolescentfeeling that still links us to the savage. But the simple fact waswonderful enough, and that has been set down simply and apart from allfancies. If the reader happens not to be a naturalist, it is right totell him that a naturalist cannot exaggerate consciously; and if he becapable of unconscious exaggeration, then ho is no naturalist. Heshould hasten "to join the innumerable caravan that moves" to thefantastic realms of romance. Looking at the simple fact scientifically, it was a case of mimicry--the harmless snake mimicking the fiercethreatening gestures and actions proper to some deadly kind. Only withthis difference: the venomous snake, of all deadly things in nature, isthe slowest to resentment, the most reluctant to enter into a quarrel;whereas in this species angry demonstrations were made when the intruderwas 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 toa singular variation in the human species. On this occasion I was againtravelling alone in a strange district on the southern frontier ofBuenos Ayres. On a bitterly cold midwinter day, shortly before noon, Iarrived, stiff and tired, at one of those pilgrims' rests on the pampas--a wayside _pulperia, _ or public house, where the traveller can procureanything he may require or desire, from a tumbler of Brazilian rum tomake glad his heart, to a poncho, or cloak of blue cloth with fluffyscarlet lining, to keep him warm o' nights; and, to speed him on hisway, a pair of cast-iron spurs weighing six pounds avoirdupois, withrowels eight inches in diameter, manufactured in this island for the useof barbarous men beyond the sea. The wretched mud-and-grass building wassurrounded by a foss crossed by a plank drawbridge; outside of theenclosure twelve or fourteen saddled horses were standing, and from theloud noise of talk and laughter in the bar I conjectured that a goodlycompany of rough frontiersmen were already making merry at that earlyhour. It was necessary for me to go in among them to see the proprietorof the place and ask permission to visit his kitchen in order to makemyself a "tin of coffee, " that being the refreshment I felt inclinedfor. When I went in and made my salutation, one man wheeled round squarebefore me, stared straight into my oyes, and in an exceedinglyhigh-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 hisexpense. I declined with thanks, and in accordance with gaucho etiquetteadded that I was prepared to pay for his liquor. It was then for him tosay that he had already been served and so let the matter drop, but hedid not do so: he screamed out in his wild animal voice that he wouldtake gin. I paid for his drink, and would, I think, have felt greatlysurprised at his strange insolent behaviour, so unlike that of theusually courteous gaucho, but this thing affected me not at all, soprofoundly had his singular appearance and voice impressed me; and forthe rest of the time I remained in the place I continued to watch himnarrowly. Professor Huxley has somewhere said, "A variation frequentlyoccurs, but those who notice it take no care about noting down theparticulars. " That is not a failing of mine, and this is what I noteddown while the man's appearance was still fresh in memory. He was aboutfive feet eleven inches in height--very tall for a gaucho--straight andathletic, with exceedingly broad shoulders, which made his round headlook small; long arms and huge hands. The round flat face, coarse blackhair, swarthy reddish colour, and smooth hairless cheeks seemed to showthat he had more Indian than Spanish blood in him, while his round blackeyes were even more like those of a rapacious animal in expression thanin the pure-blooded Indian. He also had the Indian or half-breed'smoustache, when that natural ornament is permitted to grow, and which iscomposed of thick bristles standing out like a cat's whiskers. The mouthwas the marvellous feature, for it was twice the size of an averagemouth, and the two lips were alike in thickness. This mouth did notsmile, 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 weredisplayed. The teeth were not as in other human beings--incisors, canines, and molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, eachtooth a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched itscompanion 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 heshowed them, which was very often, they were not set together as indogs, weasels, and other savage snarling animals, but apart, showing thewhole terrible serration in the huge red mouth. 

After getting his gin he joined in the boisterous conversation with theothers, and this gave me an opportunity of studying his face for severalminutes, all the time with a curious feeling that I had put myself intoa cage with a savage animal of horrible aspect, whose instincts wereutterly unknown to me, and were probably not very pleasant. It wasinteresting to note that whenever one of the others addressed himdirectly, or turned to him when speaking, it was with a curiousexpression, not of fear, but partly amusement and partly something elsewhich I could not fathom. Now, one might think that this was naturalenough purely on account of the man's extraordinary appearance. I do notthink that a sufficient explanation; for however strange a man'sappearance may be, his intimate friends and associates soon lose allsense of wonder at his strangeness, and even forget that he is unlikeothers. My belief is that this curiosity, or whatever it was they showedin their faces, was due to something in his character--a mentalstrangeness, showing itself at unexpected times, and which might flash, out at any moment to amuse or astonish them. There was certainly acorrespondence between the snarling action of the mouth and thedangerous form of the teeth, perfect as that in any snarling animal; andsuch animals, it should be remembered, snarl not only when angry andthreatening, but in their playful moods as well. Other and moreimportant correspondences or correlations might have existed; and thevoice was certainly unlike any human voice I have ever heard, whether inwhite, 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 insearch of the odorous kitchen, where there would be hot water forcoffee, or at all events cold water and a kettle, and materials formaking a fire--to wit, bones of dead cattle, "buffalo chips, " and rancidfat. 

I have never been worried with the wish, or ambition to be a head-hunterin the Dyak sense, but on this one occasion I did wish that it had beenpossible, without violating any law, or doing anything to afellow-creature which I should not like done to myself, to have obtainedpossession of this man's head, with its set of unique and terribleteeth. For how, in the name of Evolution, did he come by them, and byother physical peculiarities--the snarling habit and that high-pitchedanimal voice, for instance--which made him a being different fromothers--one separate and far apart? Was he, so admirably formed, socomplete and well-balanced, merely a freak of nature, to use anold-fashioned phrase--a sport, or spontaneous individual variation--anexperiment for a new human type, imagined by Nature in some past period, inconceivably long ago, but which she had only now, too late, found timeto carry out? Or rather was he like that little hairy maiden exhibitednot long ago in London, a reproduction of the past, the mystery calledreversion--a something in the life of a species like memory in the lifeof an individual, the memory which suddenly brings back to the old man'smind the image of his childhood? For no dream-monster in human form everappeared to me with so strange and terrible a face; and this was nodream but sober fact, for I saw and spoke with this man; and unless coldsteel has given him his quietus, or his own horse has crushed him, or amad bull sored him--all natural forms of death in that wild land--he isprobably still living and in the prime of life, and perhaps at this verymoment drinking gin at some astonished traveller's expense at that verybar where I met him. The old Palaeolithic man, judging from the fewremains we have of him, must have had an unspeakably savage and, to ourway of thinking, repulsive and horrible aspect, with his villainous lowreceding forehead, broad nose, great projecting upper jaw, andretreating chin; to meet such a man face to face in Piccadilly wouldfrighten a nervous person of the present time. But his teeth were notunlike our own, only very much larger and more powerful, and welladapted to their work of masticating the flesh, underdone and possiblyraw, of mammoth and rhinoceros. If, then, this living man recalls a typeof the past, it is of a remoter past, a more primitive man, the volumeof whose history is missing from the geological record. To speculate onsuch a subject seems idle and useless; and when I coveted possession ofthat head it was not because I thought that it might lead to any freshdiscovery. A lower motive inspired the feeling. I wished for it onlythat I might bring it over the sea, to drop it like a new apple ofdiscord, suited to the spirit of the times, among the anthropologistsand evolutionists generally of this old and learned world. Inscribed, ofcourse, "To the most learned, " but giving no locality and noparticulars. I wished to do that for the pleasure--not a very noble kindof pleasure, I allow--of witnessing from some safe hiding-place thestupendous strife that would have ensued--a battle more furious, lastingand fatal to many a brave knight of biology, than was ever yet foughtover any bone or bony fragment or fabric ever picked up, including thecelebrated cranium of the Neanderthal. 

APPENDIX. 

THE PUMA, OR LION OF AMERICA. 

The following passage occurs in an article on "The Naturalist in LaPlata, " by the late Professor Piomanes, which appeared in the_Nineteenth Century, _ May, 1893. After quoting the account of the puma'shabits and character given in the book, the writer says:--"I havereceived corroboration touching all these points from a gentleman who, when walking alone and unarmed on the skirts of a forest, was greatlyalarmed by a large puma coming out to meet him. Deeming it best not tostand, he advanced to meet the animal, which thereupon began to gambolaround his feet and rub against his legs, after the manner of anaffectionate cat. At first he thought these movements must have beenpreliminary to some peculiar mode of attack, and therefore he did notrespond, but walked quietly on, until the puma suddenly desisted andre-entered the forest. This gentleman says that, until the publicationof Mr. Hudson's book, he had always remained under the impression thatthat particular puma must have been insane. "

MUSIC AND DANCING IN NATURE. 

I have found among my papers the following mislaid note on the subjectof sportive displays of mammalians, which should have been used on page281, where the subject is briefly treated:--Most mammalians arecomparatively silent and live on the ground, and not having the power toescape easily, which birds have, and being more persecuted by man, theydo not often disport themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it isdifficult to watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence beingknown or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as wemight imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which I was, or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting themselves in amanner that took me completely by surprise. While out tinamou shootingone day in autumn, near my own home in La Plata, I spied a troop ofabout a dozen weasels racing madly about over a vizcacha village--themound and group of pit-like burrows inhabited by a community ofvizcachas. These weasels were of the large common species, Galictisbarbara, about the size of a cat; and were engaged in a pastimeresembling a complicated dance, and so absorbed were they on thatoccasion that they took no notice of me when I walked up to within nineor ten yards of them, and stood still to watch the performance. Theywere all swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doublingquickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and althoughapparently carried away with excitement, and crossing each other'stracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with so many changes ofdirection that I became confused when trying to keep any one animal inview, they never collided nor even came near enough to touch oneanother. The whole performance resembled, on a greatly magnified scaleand without its beautiful smoothness and lightning swiftness, thefantastic dance of small black water-beetles, frequently seen on thesurface of a pool or stream, during which the insects glide about in alimited area with such celerity as to appear like black curving linestraced by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross andintersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After watchingthe weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the mound, whereuponthe animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell into the burrows, butonly to reappear in a few seconds, thrusting up their long ebony-blacknecks and flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaringwith 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 arosethrough 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 thehabit 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 theground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not cover it withearth. The writer wished to know if any reader of the _Field_ had metwith a similar case. Some notes, which I contributed in reply to thisletter, bear on one of the subjects treated in the chapter on "strangeinstincts, " namely, the instinct of social animals to protect and shieldtheir fellows; and for this reason I have thought it best to reproducethem in this place. 

I remember on one occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, alarge and very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitchthat had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but henever left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the bodyaway, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not succeeding in theseattempts, he settled down by its side again, although it was evidentthat he was suffering greatly from thirst and heat. It was at last onlywith the greatest trouble that the people of the house succeeded ingetting the body away and burying it out of his sight. 

Another instance, more to the point, occurred at my own house on thepampas, 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 tofour or five pups. A peon was told to destroy them, and, waiting untilthe bitch was out of sight, he carried them off to the end of theorchard, some 400 or 500 yards from the house, and threw them into apool of water which was only two to three feet deep. The bitch passedthe rest of the day in rushing frantically about, searching for heryoung, and in the evening, a little after dark, actually succeeded infinding them, although they were lying at the bottom of the pool. Shegot them all out, and carried them, one by one, to another part of thegrounds, where she passed the night with them, uttering at intervals themost piercing cries. In the morning she carried them to still anotherspot, where there was a soft mould, and then dug a hole large and deepenough to bury them all, covering them over with the loose earth. Hertask done, she returned to the house to sleep all day, but when nightcame again the whole piteous performance was repeated: the pups were dugup, and she passed the long, piercingly cold night--for it was in thedepth of winter--trying to keep them warm, and uttering, as before, distressing cries. Yet a third time the whole thing was repeated; butafter the third night, when the dog came home to sleep, the dead pupswere taken out of the ground and buried at a distance. 

Such an action as this strikes one with astonishment only because wehave the custom of burying our dead, and are too ready at all times toregard the dog as human-like. But the explanation of the action in thiscase is to be found in the familiar fact that very many animals, including the dog, have the habit or instinct of burying or concealingthe thing they wish to leave in safety. Thus, the dog buries the bone itdoes not want to eat, and when hungry digs it up again. When a dogburies or hides the dead body of the she dog it was attached to, or theshe dog buries her dead young, it is with the same motive--namely, toconceal the animal that cannot be roused, and that it would not be safeto leave exposed, It is plain to all who observe their actions that the lower animals haveno comprehension of death. In the case of two animals that areaccustomed 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 lasttry to rouse it; but finding all attempts vain, it will at length goaway to seek companionship elsewhere. In cases where the attachment ismuch stronger, the dead body may he watched over for an indefiniteperiod. A brother of mine once related to me a very pathetic incidentwhich occurred at an estancia on the pampas where he was staying. Alarge portion of the land was a low, level, marshy plain, partlyovergrown with reeds and rushes; and one day, in this wilderness, alittle boy of eight or nine, from the estancia, lost himself. A smalldog, his invariable attendant, had gone out with him, but did notreturn. Seven days later the poor boy was found, at a great distancefrom the house, lying on the grass, where he had died of exhaustion. Thedog 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 hisinstinct of attachment overcame all others; he kept guard over hislittle master, who slept so soundly and so long, until he, too, slept inthe 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 atroop of soldiers during one of the civil wars in Uruguay. Suspectinghim of being a spy, or, at all events, an enemy, his captors cut histhroat, then rode away, calling to the dog to follow them; but theanimal refused to leave his dead master's side. Returning to the spot afew days later, they saw the body of the man they had killed surroundedby a large number of vultures, which the dog, in a frenzy of excitement, was occupied in keeping at a respectable distance. It was observed thatthe dog, after making one of his sallies, driving the birds away withfurious barkings, would set out at a run to a small stream not far fromthe spot; but when half way to it he would look back, and, seeing thevultures advancing once more to the corpse, would rush back to protectit. The soldiers watched him for some time with great interest, and oncemore they tried in vain to get him to follow them. Two days afterwardsthey revisited the spot, to find the dog lying dead by the side of hisdead 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 adead body, he is doubtless moved by the same instinct which leads him tosafeguard 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 theinstinct; and the blunder must be of very much less frequent occurrenceamong wild than among domestic animals. In a state of nature, when agregarious animal dies, he dies, as a rule, alone; his body is not seenby his former companions, and he is not missed. When he dies byviolence--which is the common fate--the body is carried off or devouredby the killer. This being the usual order, there is no instinct, exceptin a very few species, relating to the disposal of the dead amongmammals and other vertebrates, such as is found in ants and other socialinsects. There are a few mammalians that live together in smallcommunities, in a habitation made to last for many generations, in whichsuch an instinct would appear necessary, and it accordingly exists, butis very imperfect. This is the case with the vizcacha, the large rodentof the pampas, which lives with its fellows, to the number of twenty orthirty, 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 ofrubbish collected on it--but not until he has been dead a long time, andthere is nothing left of him but the dry bones held together by theskin. In that condition the other members of the community probablycease to look on him as one of their companions who has fallen into along sleep; he is no more than so much rubbish, which must be clearedout of an old disused burrow. Probably the beaver possesses some rudeinstinct similar to that of the vizcacha. 

_Apropos_ of animals burying their treasures (or connections) forsafety, it is worth mentioning that the skunk of the pampas occasionallyburies her young in the kennel, when hunger compels her to go outforaging. I had often heard of this habit of the female skunk from thegauchos, and one day had the rare good fortune to witness an animalengaged in obliterating her own kennel. The senses of the skunk are sodefective that one is able at times to approach very near to withoutalarming them. In this instance I sat on my horse at a distance oftwenty yards, and watched the animal at work, drawing in the loose earthwith her fore feet until the entrance to the kennel was filled up towithin three inches of the surface; then, dropping into the shallowcavity, she pressed the loose mould down with her nose. Her taskfinished, she trotted away, and the hollow in the soil, when I examinedit closely, looked only like the mouth of an ancient choked-up burrow. The young inhabit a circular chamber, lined with fine dry grass, at theend of a narrow passage from 3 ft. To 5 ft. Long, and no doubt have airenough to serve them until their parent returns; but I believe the skunkonly buries her young when they are very small.