Page:Territory in Bird Life by Henry Eliot Howard (London, John Murray edition).djvu/116

78 behave as if they were continuously attentive, looking forward beyond the immediately present experience in preparation for what is to come. They apparently watch, wait, search, are on the alert. They also behave exactly as if they appreciated a difference between relative success and failure, trying again when a certain perceptible result is not attained and varying their procedure in so far as it has been unsuccessful. All these characters are found in the first nest-building of birds as well as in the second; they are found also in courses of conduct which occur only once in the lifetime of the animal." Both these writers would. I imagine, contend that, even when a female is absent, the idea of the female, as the end in view throughout, is present; and they would argue that the fact of her absence during the fighting in no way disposes of the belief that she is the condition under which the pugnacious instinct of the male is rendered susceptible to stimulation. What reason is there to think that this interpretation is applicable to the case under consideration? When a female is present, we observe that the males are pugnacious, and, when she is absent, that they still continue to be hostile—that is to say, they behave as if she were present. Now, as far as I can ascertain, the "as if" is the only ground there is for supposing that the female is represented in imaginal form—there is no evidence of the fact, if fact it be. On the contrary, the behaviour of the male affords some fairly conclusive evidence