Part 20

On this view the resemblance is a mere chance one. The cuckoo is not an ass in a lion’s skin, but an ass that looks very like a lion. His lion-like shape was not forced upon him by natural selection. A variety of causes probably contributed to it. It was not until the resemblance had arisen and become very striking that it was directly affected by natural selection.

I am far from saying that the above is a correct explanation of the nigritude: it is all pure hypothesis. Even if it be correct, we are really very little further than we were before towards an explanation of the colours and shape of either the king-crow or the drongo cuckoo.

Why did these birds tend to grow black feathers rather than red, green, or blue ones?

This is a question which “stumps” us all.

THE EMERALD MEROPS

If I have a favourite bird it is the little green bee-eater (Merops viridis). There is no winged thing more beautiful or more alluring. More showy birds exist, more striking, more gorgeous, more magnificent creatures. With such the bee-eater does not compete. Its beauty is of another order. It is that of the moon rather than of the sun, of the violet rather than of the rose. The exquisite shades of its plumage cannot be fully appreciated unless minutely inspected. Every feather is a triumph of colouring. No description can do the bird justice. To say that its general hue is the fresh, soft green of grass in England after an April shower, that the head is covered with burnished gold, that the tail is tinted with olive, that a black collarette adorns the breast, that the bill is black, that a streak of that colour runs from the base of the beak, backwards, through the eye, which is fiery red, that the feathers below this streak are of the purest turquoise-blue, as are the feathers of the throat—to say all this is to convey no idea of the hundred shades of these colours, or the manner in which they harmonise and pass one into another. Nor is it easy for words to do justice to the shape of the bird; even a photograph fails to express the elegance of its carriage and the perfection of its proportions. Were I to string together all the superlatives that I know, I should scarcely convey an adequate impression of the grace of its movements. I can but try to make the bird recognisable, so that the reader may see its beauties for himself.

He should look out for a little green bird with a black beak, slender and curved, and a tail of which the two middle feathers are very attenuated and project a couple of inches as two black bristles beyond the other caudal feathers. The bird should be looked for on a telegraph wire or the bare branch of a tree, for the habits of bee-eaters are those of fly-catchers. The larger species prey upon bees, hence the popular name, but I doubt whether the little Merops viridis tackles an insect so large as a bee. It feeds upon smaller flying things, which it captures on the wing. As it rests on its perch its bright eyes are always on the look out for passing insects. When one comes into view, the bird sallies forth. Very beautiful is it as it sails on outstretched wings. The under surface of these is reddish bronze, so that their possessor seems to become alternately green and gold as the sun’s rays fall on the upper or lower surface of its pinions. Its long mandibles close upon its prey with a snap sufficiently loud to be audible from a distance of five or six yards. This one may frequently hear, for bee-eaters are not shy birds. They will permit a human being to approach quite near to them, as though they knew that the fulness of their beauty was apparent only on close inspection.

The little green bee-eater utters what Jerdon calls “a rather pleasant rolling whistling note,” which, if it cannot be dignified by the name of song, adds considerably to the general attractiveness of the bird. Bee-eaters are, alas! not very abundant in Madras, but, if looked for, may be seen on most days in winter. The Adyar Club grounds seem to be their favourite resort. When driving into the club at sunset I have often surprised a little company of them taking a dust bath in the middle of the road. The bath over, the little creatures take to their wings and enjoy a final flight before retiring for the night.

Bee-eaters are, I think, migratory birds. It is true that they are found all the year round in many parts of India, but such places appear to be the winter quarters of some individuals and the summer residences of others. There is an exodus of bee-eaters from Calcutta about March. A similar event occurs in Madras, although in the latter place the birds are seen all the year round, a few remaining to breed. In Lahore, on the other hand, the birds arrive in March, and, having reared their young, leave in September.

The nest is a circular hole excavated by the bird, usually in a sandbank, sometimes in a mud partition between two fields. I saw a nest in Lahore in one of the artificial bunkers on the golf links. Major C. T. Bingham states that in 1873, when the musketry instruction of his regiment was being carried on at Allahabad, he observed several nest holes of this species in the face of the butts. The birds seemed utterly regardless of the bullets that every now and then buried themselves with a loud thud in the earth close beside them. Colonel Butler gives an account of a bee-eater nesting in an artificial mudbank, about a foot high, that marked the limits of the badminton court in the Artillery Mess compound at Deesa. One of the birds invariably sat upon the badminton net when people were not playing, and at other times on a tree close by, while its mate was sitting on the eggs. As I have already said, bee-eaters are not afflicted with shyness.

Very soon after their arrival at Lahore the birds begin their courtship. At this period they seem to spend the major portion of the day in executing circular flights in the air. They shoot forth from their perch and rapidly ascend by flapping their wings, then they sail for a little on outstretched pinions and thus return to the perch.

Courtship soon gives place to the more serious business of nest construction. When a suitable spot has been found, the birds at once begin excavating, digging away at the earth with pick-like bill and holding on to the wall of the bank by their sharp claws until the hole they are making becomes sufficiently deep to afford a foothold. As the excavation grows deeper the bird throws backwards with its feet the sand it has loosened with its beak, sending it in little clouds out of the mouth of the hole. While one bird is at work its mate perches close by and gives vent to its twittering note. After working for about two minutes the bird has a rest and its partner takes a turn at excavation. Thus the work proceeds apace. Bee-eaters look spick and span, even when in the midst of this hard labour. The dry sand that envelops them, far from soiling their plumage, acts as a dust bath. When the hole, which is about two inches in diameter, has reached a length of some four feet, it is widened out into a circular chamber about twice the size of a cricket ball. In this three or four white eggs are laid. These have been well described as “little polished alabaster balls.” They are placed on the bare ground. Young bee-eaters lack the elongated bristle-like tail feathers of the adult birds. A very pleasing sight is that of a number of the youngsters sitting in a row on a telegraph wire receiving instruction in flying.

In conclusion, mention must be made of a near relative of the little bee-eater. I allude to the blue-tailed species (Merops philippinus), which also occurs in Madras. This is a larger and less beautiful edition of the green bee-eater. It is distinguishable by its size, the rusty colour of its throat, and its blue tail. It is usually found near water. He who shoots snipe in the paddy near Madras comes across numbers of these birds sitting on the low walls that divide up the fields. The habits of the blue-tailed bee-eater are those of its smaller cousin. Although its song is more powerful, it is a less attractive bird.

DO ANIMALS THINK?

Mr. John Burroughs contributed some time ago to Harper’s Magazine an article bearing the above title. The leading American naturalist is so weighty an authority that I feel chary about controverting any statement made by him; but I cannot believe that he is right when he boldly asserts that animals never think at all. I agree with Mr. Burroughs when he says “we are apt to speak of the lower animals in terms that we apply to our own kind.” There is undoubtedly a general tendency to give animals credit for much greater intelligence, far more considerable powers of reasoning, than they actually possess; in short, to put an anthropomorphic interpretation on their actions.

But it seems to me that Mr. Burroughs rushes to the other extreme. To deny to animals the power of thought is surely as opposed to facts as to credit them with almost human powers of reasoning. Says Mr. Burroughs: “Animals act with a certain grade of intelligence in the presence of things, but they carry away no concepts of those things as a man does, because they have no language. How could a crow tell his fellows of some future event or of some experience of the day? How could he tell them this thing is dangerous save by his actions in the presence of those things? Or how tell of a newly found food supply save by flying eagerly to it?”

Even if we admit that a crow is not able to recount the experiences of the day to his companion, it does not follow that the crow does not remember them, or cannot picture them in his mind. With regard to the last question, I have frequently seen a crow, at the sight of some food thrown out to him, caw loudly, and his friends, on hearing his cry, at once fly to the food.

Of course it is open to any one to assert that, in this case, the crow that discovers the food does not consciously call its companions; at the sight of its food it instinctively caws, and its companions obey the caw instinctively, without knowing why they do so. No one, however, who watches crows for long can help believing that they think. The fact that they hang about the kitchen every day at the time the cook pitches out the leavings seems inconsistent with the theory that birds cannot think. The crows obtained food at this place yesterday and the day before at a certain hour, and the fact that they are all on the look out for food to-day shows, not only that they possess a good memory, but that they are endowed with a certain amount of reasoning power.

Many animals have very good memories. Now, in order that an animal may remember a thing it must think. Its thoughts are of course not clothed in language as human thoughts are, but they nevertheless exist as mental pictures.

According to Professor Thorndike, the psychic life of an animal is “most like what we feel when our consciousness contains little thought about anything, when we feel the sense impressions in their first intention, so to speak, when we feel our own body and the impulses we give to it (or that outward objects give to it). Sometimes one gets this animal consciousness; while in swimming, for example. One feels the water, the sky, the birds above, but with no thoughts about them, or memories of how they looked at other times, or æsthetic judgments about their beauty. One feels no ‘ideas’ about what movements he will make, but feels himself make them, feels his body throughout. Self-consciousness dies away. The meanings and values and connections of things die away. One feels sense-impressions, has impulses, feels the movements he makes; that is all.”

This is probably a good description of the state of mind of a dog when he is basking in the sunlight; he is thinking of nothing. But he hears the shrill cry of a squirrel—this at once recalls to him the image of the little rodent and past shikar. In a moment the dog is on the alert; he is now thinking of the squirrel, and his instinct and inclinations teach him to give chase to it. Or he hears a footstep; he recognises it as that of his master, sees that the latter is wearing a topi, and at once pictures up a run in the compound with his master. But his owner chains him up. The dog looks wistfully at his master’s retreating figure and pulls at his chain; it is surely absurd to say that the dog is not thinking. The picture of a scamper beside his master rises up before him, and he feels sad because he knows that the scamper is not likely to become a fait accompli.

Again, you have been accustomed to throw a stick for your dog to run after and carry back to you. You are out walking accompanied by your dog; he espies a stick lying on the ground; at once images of previous enjoyable runs after the stick rise up in his mind; he picks up the stick and brings it to you, drops it at your feet and looks up at you. You pretend to take no notice. The dog then picks up the stick and rubs it against your legs. To believe that the dog while acting thus does not think, that he is merely obeying an inborn instinct, is surely a misinterpretation of facts. Animals have but limited reasoning powers, and their thoughts are not our thoughts, they are not clothed in language, they are merely mental pictures, called up either subjectively, as when a dog barks while dreaming, or objectively by some sight or scent, but nevertheless such sensations are thoughts.

While maintaining that the higher animals can and do think, I am ready to admit that a great many of their actions which are apparently guided by reason are in reality purely instinctive. Thus the building of a nest by a bird must, at any rate on the first occasion, be a purely instinctive action. The creature cannot know what it is doing. Nor can it have any thoughts on the matter; it suddenly becomes an automaton, a machine, acting thoughtlessly and instinctively.

Some internal force which is irresistible compels it to seek twigs and weave them into a nest. The bird has no time to stop and think what it is doing, nor does it wish to, for it enjoys nest building. It is, of course, impossible for a human being to understand the frame of mind of a bird when building its first nest. The only approach to it that we ever experience is when we are suddenly seized with an impulse to do something unusual, and we obey the impulse and are afterwards surprised at ourselves.

There is a story told of a wealthy man who had been out hunting and was returning home tired and thirsty. He dismounted at a farm-house, went inside and asked for a drink. While this was being obtained he noticed a lot of valuable old china on the dresser: seized by a sudden impulse, he knocked it all down, piece by piece, with his riding whip. His hostess on her return with the drink looked surprised. The hunting man smiled, asked her to name the value she set on the china, sat down and, there and then, wrote out a cheque for the amount.

It always seems to me that when a bird begins for the first time to collect materials for a nest she must act impulsively, without thinking what she is doing. Just as the hunting man was seized with a sudden desire to smash the crockery with his whip, so is she suddenly impelled to collect twigs and build a nest.

Another instinctive act which is apparently purposeful is the feigning of injury by a parent bird when an enemy approaches its young. Superficial observation of this action leads the observer to imagine that the mother bird behaves thus with deliberate intent to deceive, that in so doing she consciously endeavours to distract attention while her young ones are betaking themselves to cover. As a matter of fact, the bird will behave in precisely the same way if she have eggs instead of young ones. This has, of course, the effect of drawing attention to the eggs, and proves that the action is instinctive and not the result of reasoning.

Most people have remarked the cautious manner in which many birds approach the nest when they are aware that they are being watched. This has the appearance of a highly intelligent act. It is, however, nothing of the kind.