Page:Territory in Bird Life by Henry Eliot Howard (London, John Murray edition).djvu/40

18 enable us to picture, on the one hand, the precarious situation of an individual that was incapable of winning or holding a position at the accustomed breeding station, and, on the other, the plight of the species as a whole if each one exercised authority over too large an area. With the majority of species it is difficult to do this. So many square miles of suitable breeding ground are inhabited by so few ReedBuntings that, even supposing certain members were to establish an ascendency over too wide an area, it would be impossible to discover by actual observation whether the race as a whole were being adversely affected. Competition doubtless varies at different periods and in different districts according to the numerical standing of the species in a given locality and according to the numerical standing of others that require similar conditions of existence; at times it may even be absent, just as at any moment it may become acute. These examples show how profoundly the evolution of the breeding territory may have been influenced by relationships in the inorganic world, and they give some idea of the intricate nature of the problem with which we have to deal.

I mentioned that the first visible manifestation of the revival of the sexual instinct was to be found in the movements undertaken by the males at the commencement of the breeding season. Such movements are characterised by a definiteness of purpose, whether they involve a protracted journey of