Habit and instinct / by C. Lloyd Morgan.

  • Morgan, C. Lloyd (Conwy Lloyd), 1852-1936.
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Habit and instinct / by C. Lloyd Morgan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    192/402 (page 178)
    How far does it extend? Mr. C. A. Witchell, who has paid much attention to the subject, is unhesitatingly of opinion that though the call-notes, alarm notes, and other such utterances are instinctive, yet the song itself is traditional and the result of imitation. With regard to the former point, I have no doubt whatever, from my own observations, that the notes of young chicks, guinea-fowl, peewits, partridges, pheasants, and moorhens are instinc- tively definite; as are probably those of the young fly- catcher and young jay, though in these cases the birds were brought to me when a few days old. Nor can there be any question that the call-note and the warning note of the hen are also truly instinctive, though deferred. Mr. II. J. Charbonnier, a careful observer, tells me that a young magpie, which was brought to him as a nestling a fortnight old, always chattered and croaked in true magpie language, and was never heard to imitate other birds. Another magpie, however, picked up the note of the sparrow, and generally talked “sparrow,” though it would sometimes introduce a few lower notes of its own proper tongue. With regard to the latter point, there is undoubtedly a good deal of evidence in favour of the contention which Mr. Witchell espouses. One of the oldest observations is as follows. The Hon. Daines Barrington * placed three young linnets with three different foster-parents, the skylark, the woodlark, and the titlark or meadow-pipit, and each adopted, through imitation, the song of its foster-parent. Nor did they abandon this for their own true song when they were placed among songsters of their own species. Mr. Witchell t quotes from a letter of Mr. W. A. P. Hughes, who informed him that “ a young bird (finch) reared by * Phil. Trans., 1773, p. 264. t “ Evolution of Bird Song,” pp. 172, 173.