Page:Territory in Bird Life by Henry Eliot Howard (London, John Murray edition).djvu/349

Rh a ceaseless energy directed towards a definite end which for us, who can perceive its prospective value, is isolation in an appropriate environment. The emphasis here is on "isolation," for it involves competition, and there cannot be competition without some change in the relative positions occupied by different individuals; so that in each recurring season there will be not only a re-arrangement of ground formerly occupied but an arrangement of ground formerly deserted.

(2) That the older birds return to the locality wherein they had formerly reared offspring, and the younger to the neighbourhood of their birthplace, was always deemed probable. But in recent years evidence which cannot be rebutted has been supplied by the marking of birds. This evidence, details of which can be found in the summary of results published annually by Mr Witherby in British Birds, demonstrates that the adult frequently returns not only to the same locality in which it formerly bred, but even to the same station; that it does so year after year; that this mode of behaviour is not peculiar to one sex; and that many of the young breed in the locality in which they were reared. Such being well-established facts, we can infer the existence of an innate ability to revisit the place wherein the enjoyment of breeding, or of birth, had formerly been experienced. Of its nature we know little or nothing. It would almost seem as if there must be some recollection of past