Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 33.djvu/645

Rh positions reversed, after a bloody struggle. In this test the difference in disposition was exactly what it would have been in human beings under like conditions. Some were eager to venture a peck at the apparently yielding tyrant, and would quickly jump at the conclusion that he was overthrown. But the confidence with which a cockerel of this sort chased his indignant but hungry master was only exceeded by the briefness of his resistance when the outraged victim of our tricks was allowed to turn and fight. Young roosters of another stamp could only rarely be deceived into mistaking the movements of a superior in rank, but when, after long and careful manoeuvring, in which the one of us whose business it was to keep away a swarm of hungry spectators generally grew very tired, the subject did conclude that he had somehow changed places with his former tyrant, there was a fierce fight, and the rebel often won. It was the old story of the terrors of pugnacity, hard to arouse, and the strength of purposes slowly formed.

It is in fighting that some of the most curious traits are manifested by fowls of all kinds. Notice the coops of Cochins and brahmas in a poultry-show, and you will find many of the cocks with combs bloody and scarred from pecking one another's heads. They thrust their necks out between the side of the coop and the first slat in front and clumsily punish each other. In long rows of coops of games, placed in exactly the same way, not a peck is given. It is not that the slow and easily whipped Asiatics are fonder of fighting than the ideal gladiators of the animal world, but simply that no game-cock will put himself at a disadvantage by getting his head in reach first. When game-cocks look out, it is through one of the middle spaces. Fighting is too serious a business with these high-spirited birds to be mixed with foolishness. Other breeds than games, however, occasionally produce natural fighters that show remarkable cunning. A light and graceful young dominique, one of the proudest and most intelligent of our pets, belonged to a neighbor, but was very fond of coming over to a barn-yard which was about as near his home as the house where we boarded. He was very reluctant to endure punishment in fights, but he was also loath to retreat before any antagonist, and dearly loved to have us feed him and "bide and doctor wi' 'im," as the Devonshire farm-hand put it. The consequence was, that he would try a round with any foe, and if he found himself overmatched he generally managed to retreat with a brave show of fight and get off without much loss of blood or prestige. One day he was attacked by a turkey, and at the very beginning of the combat he happened to light on its back. No descendant of the race which lived, in a wild state, in terror of the downward swoop of the great horned owl, can bear to be attacked from