The Courtship of Animals

CHAPTER VI. Courtship Among Birds

COURTSHIP AMONG BIRDS

Generalities—Darwin v. Wallace—The Peacock in his Pride—The “Display” of the Peacock Pheasant—The Splendour of the Argus Pheasant and the Marvel of its Eyes—The Frill of the Amherst Pheasant—Birds of Paradise in the Toils of Love—Inflated Suitors-Ruffs and Reeves—Fearsome Weapons and their Uses—Birds which dance-Musical Birds—The Bird’s Voice-box—The “Lek” of the Capercaillie—Instruments of Percussion—The Curious Performance of the Woodpecker 92

CHAPTER VII. The Sexual Selection Theory As Applied to Birds

THE SEXUAL SELECTION THEORY AS APPLIED TO BIRDS

Where the Rôle of the Sexes is reversed—Polygamy and how it is brought about—Coloration and Courtship—Instinctive Actions—The Importance of Landed Possessions—The Meaning of “Display”—The Springs of “Behaviour”—A New Light on the Wild-duck—The “Display” of the Great-crested Grebe—Some Neglected Factors 134

CHAPTER VIII. Some “cold-Blooded” Lovers

SOME “COLD-BLOODED” LOVERS

The Courtship of the Crocodile—Amorous Lizards—Horned Chameleons—A Flagellating Terrapin—The Frog that would a-wooing go—Some Musical Frogs—Some marvellous instincts in Newts 161

CHAPTER IX. Love-Making Among the Fishes

LOVE-MAKING AMONG THE FISHES

Germinal variations—Fishes and Mate-hunting—Some Remarkable Sexual Differences displayed by the Teeth of “Rays”—The Double-eyed Fish—The Coloration of the Dragonet—Some Curious Facts about Salmon—The Strange Use of the Kidney in the Stickle-back—The Stickle-back and Parental Duties—Siamese Fighting-fish 175

CHAPTER X. Some of the “lower Orders”

SOME OF THE “LOWER ORDERS”

Butterflies and Moths, and the Coloration of their Wings—Female Choice and “Fine Feathers”—When Male Butterflies are Dominant—Sexual Selection among Butterflies—Abortive Experiments—Wallace and the Sexual Selection Theory—The Sense of Smell in Butterflies and Moths—Fragrant Butterflies—Wingless Moths and their Lures to Lovers—Methods of Pairing among Butterflies and Moths—More Experiments 185

CHAPTER XI. Beetles That “bluff”

BEETLES THAT “BLUFF”

The Coloration, and other Forms of Ornament in Beetles, and the Significance thereof in regard to the Sexual Selection Theory—The Courtship of Grasshoppers and their Kin—The Remarkable Ears of Locusts and Grasshoppers—The Field-cricket and the Katydid as Troubadours—The Wonderful Performances of the Cicadas—The Duels of Long-horned Locusts—Dragon flies—The May-flies’ “Dance of Death”—The Jaws of the Giant Alder-fly and their Strange Use—Some Curious Facts about Stone-flies 208

CHAPTER XII. Scorpions, Spiders and Crabs

SCORPIONS, SPIDERS AND CRABS

Musical Lovers among Spiders and Scorpions—Colour among Spiders, and its uses—The Spiders’ Dance of Death—Spiders and Conjugal Bliss—How Pairing is accomplished—Scorpions in Love—Musical Crabs—Quarrelsome Fiddler-crabs—Crabs and Courtship in the Deep Sea-Amazons among Prawns—Brine-shrimps and Water-fleas—“Natural” v. “Sexual” Selection 236

CHAPTER XIII. Some Strange Marriage-Customs: and Virgin Births

SOME STRANGE MARRIAGE-CUSTOMS: AND VIRGIN BIRTHS

The Courtship of the Cuttle-fish—The Sumptuous Cradle of the Argonaut—The Love-darts of the Snail—Hermaphrodites and the Dangers of Self-fertilization—Oysters and Beauty—Sex reduced to its Lowest Terms—Parthenogenesis and Virgin Birth—The Story of the Hive-Bee—The Departure of the Queen—The New Queen and her Marriage-flight—The Celebration of the Nuptials and its Surprising Sequel—The Widowed Queen turns Executioner—The Queen as Mother—The Queen’s Daughters—Nursemaids’ Duties—Change of Work—The Drones and their Career—Food and Sex—The Bumble-bee and its Life-story 265

CHAPTER XIV. Parthenogenesis and Its Sequel

PARTHENOGENESIS AND ITS SEQUEL

Courtship among the Ants—The Great Renunciation—Maternity carried to Extremes—Where Males are Superfluous—Degenerate Males—Keeping Death at Bay—Where Females are Unknown 296

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Love-making Frontispiece

Facing page

The Gorilla preparing for hostilities 42

The barometer of maleness—among the Apes 44

Weapons of offence 52

Manchurian Wapiti “calling” 54

Group of Beisa Oryx 60

Eland Cows 64

American Bison 64

Elephants 70

Head of male Wart-hog 72

Male and female Babirusa 72

Somali Zebras 72

Giraffe 72

Californian Sea-lions, or Eared Seals 82

Elephant Seal 88

Northern Elephant Seal 88

“The Peacock in his pride” 96

Peacock Pheasant 96

Patterns which puzzled Darwin 98

The “Strutting Turkey” 100

The display of the Great Bustard 100

Some of Fortune’s favourites 104

The love-making of the Prairie Hen 110

Grades of evolution in the syrinx or organ of voice in the males of Surface-feeding and Diving-ducks 126

Fighting for territory 140

The display of the Grasshopper Warbler 142

The display of the Sun-bittern 142

The Kagu in display 142

A male-Savi’s Warbler 152

Another aspect of the Kagu’s “display” 154

Some strange accompaniments of courtship:

The White-headed Bell-bird 156

The Umbrella-bird 156

Skull of the American white-beaked Pelican 156

Head of a Puffin, showing the moulting of the beak sheath 156

The Satin Bower-bird and its bower 158

The “bower” of the Bower-bird 158

The Bearded Lizard 166

Bright colours which cannot be attributed to “sexual selection” 200

Stridulating organs, etc. 218

Crickets and May-flies 220

Male Astia displaying before the less brilliant female 242

Male Icius displaying 242

Scorpions 252

Death of the male Scorpion 254

The female Mantis devouring her mate 254

The “Fiddler-crab” among mangrove roots 258

The “Fiddler-crab” 258

Some remarkable devices 262

Some remarkable methods of “courtship” 268

THE COURTSHIP OF ANIMALS

CHAPTER I. Introduction

INTRODUCTION

The nature of Life and its power of reproduction—The stuff of which Life is made—The Emotions—The simplest living things—Where is neither Birth nor Death yet the Population increases—The First Marriage—The beginning of sex—The two dominating instincts—The conditions of survival—The Oyster’s narrow world—“Fiddling work”—Amorousness—The superior Male—Where Death begins—“Germ-plasm” and what it means—Sex and “Secondary sexual Characters”—Some theories—“Hormones” what are they?

The nature of life is generally regarded as affording a theme which possesses no more than an academic interest: but there is one aspect of this great subject which must attract us all, and that is its power of reproducing itself. Life begets Life, as Love is said to beget Love. The nature of this mysterious power we can only dimly realize, and the forces which underlie its manifestations few even suspect, save perhaps in a vague way. Yet the tree of Knowledge bears no fruit more vitally important to our well-being, than that which will make us “as Gods, knowing good and evil” in all that concerns the processes of reproduction. But curiously enough, this is a forbidden fruit, and those who eat thereof are expected to maintain a discreet silence on the subject. These enlightened ones, however, cannot remain altogether dumb. But they speak, in the veiled language, of Art and Poetry, Literature and the Drama. They talk round the subject rather than of it. Love, Hate, Jealousy, and Envy, are but attributes thereof. We profess to believe that “Knowledge is Power” and to desire to increase its force among us by raising the standard of our system of education. But education which does not, of set purpose, reveal the sources of our being and of our emotions, good and evil, is no more than a travesty of education; and they who seek to foist upon the community Knowledge thus emasculated, are unworthy to wield the power which has been placed in their hands. If social well-being be the aim of the high-priests of Education, then something more than copybook maxims like “Be good and you will be happy” must henceforth be preached. Of what avail is it to exalt the name of Knowledge, while the straightest road thereto is barred across and marked “No thoroughfare!” These blind leaders of the blind seem to imagine that the social well-being they profess to desire can only be attained by side roads, leading anywhere, save in the direction of this Pool of Siloam.

The stuff of which living things are made is called “Protoplasm.” Text-books of Physiology give its chemical constituents with fearsome accuracy, and each of these constituents can be isolated in the laboratory, but “all the king’s horses and all the king’s men” cannot build these up again into living matter. Its consistent inconsistency defies us; every statement we make of it has to be qualified by reservations and saving clauses. Its permanency is attested by the fact that it has endured through millions of years, yet we are daily reminded of its evanescent nature. Its power of reproducing itself according to type, none can doubt, yet no two individuals are exactly alike.

The purely physical phenomena of life, to be rightly appreciated, must always be considered in relation to the psychical phenomena which are the soul of life. These subtle and intangible forces cannot be experimented with in the laboratory, or expressed in formulæ; we cannot denote their strength in horse-power. Just as the physical manifestations of life begin with lowly types, so the psychical begin, and they gather strength and complexity with the bodies they pervade. These manifestations we call behaviour, and in their more intense developments, “emotions.”

These emotions present an infinite range of variety in the higher animals, and they attain their maximum of intensity wherever the reproductive activities are concerned. The part which these activities play in controlling behaviour is by no means always apparent, and is commonly not even suspected. Even man himself is subject to this control. And it is this fact which lifts the “Courtship” of the lower animals out of the category of merely curious phenomena. For the springs of his conduct, his behaviour and “emotions” under varying circumstances, can only be understood, and even then but imperfectly, by comparison with other creatures lower in the scale, so far, of course, as comparison is possible.

This line of inquiry, then, takes one back to the simplest living things, among which there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage, neither birth nor death. Life is reduced to its simplest terms—a speck of animated jelly is all that confronts one, and this is only to be seen under a high power of the microscope. It has neither mouth nor organs of digestion, no visible means of locomotion are traceable, and the special senses of sight and hearing are wanting; but taste and smell, of a nebulous kind, are there. Shape it cannot be said to have, for its bodily outline is constantly changing, thereby it moves. A long tongue of its jelly-like substance, or “protoplasm” as it is called, is thrust forwards, and the rest of the body is, as it were, dragged after it. Whatever animal, or vegetable, matter it passes over, in the course of its wanderings, is drawn up into the semi-fluid substance of this diaphanous body, and its juices extracted, the undigestible residue is left behind in the course of the morning’s walk! In due time it becomes adult; further growth is impossible. When this stage is attained a strange thing happens. A certain minute, more solid portion of this body, which lies in the very centre of the mass and is known as the “nucleus,” begins to assume an hour-glass shape. Speedily the constriction becomes apparent across the whole body and rapidly increasing, cuts it in two, as if by the tightening of some invisible thread. Here Death is cheated, and records of births are unknown! And just as there are no parents so there are no children. But a foreshadowing of what is to be occurs even here. For every now and then two individuals, to all appearances identical, meet and promptly begin to merge the one into the other till they twain become one flesh in very truth. Here is the most primitive form of marriage in Nature. And here, in this union, or fusion, of separate entities of Germ-plasm, we have the beginning of sex. Such unions are common among these primeval forms of life. In many cases this “marriage” takes place between two particles of Protoplasm of which one is rather larger than the other. In such case the smaller is regarded as male, the larger as female. Here we have the first sign of “sexual differentiation” or the evolution of “male” and “female” individuals.

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