The following remarkable instance of the communication of ideas among the
lower animals is narrated by the Rev. C. Otway:
"At the flour mills of Tubberakeena, near Clonmel, while in the possession
of the late Mr. Newbold, there was a Goose, which by some accident was left
solitary, without mate or offspring, gander or goslings. Now it happened,
as is common, that the miller's wife had set a number of Duck eggs under a
hen, which in due time were incubated; and of course the ducklings, as soon
as they came forth, ran with natural instinct to the water, and the hen was
in a sad pucker--her maternity urging her to follow the brood, and her
instinct disposing her to keep on dry land.
"In the meanwhile, up sailed the Goose, and with a noisy gabble, which
certainly (being interpreted) meant, 'Leave them to my care,' she swam up
and down with the ducklings, and when they were tired with their aquatic
excursion, she consigned them to the care of the hen.
"The next morning, down came again the ducklings to the pond, and there was
the Goose waiting for them, and there stood the hen in her great
flustration. On this occasion we are not at all sure that the Goose invited
the hen, observing her maternal trouble; but it is a fact that she being
near the shore, the hen jumped on her back, and there sat, the ducklings
swimming and the Goose and hen after them, up and down the pond.
"This was not a solitary event; day after day the hen was seen on board the
Goose, attending the ducklings up and down, in perfect contentedness and
good humor--numbers of people coming to witness the circumstance, which
continued until the ducklings, coming to days of discretion, required no
longer the joint guardianship of the Goose and Hen."--_Witness._
[Illustration: EGGS.]
1. Great Crested Fly-catcher.
2. King Bird.
3. Night Hawk.
4. Crow.
5. Red-headed Woodpecker.
6. Yellow-billed Cuckoo.
7. Audubon's Caracara.
8. Black-billed Magpie.
9. Kingfisher.
10. Screech Owl.
11. Turkey Vulture.
12. Gamble's Partridge.
13. Bob White.
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