e, and
turned his face southward again. Through the fence he went into a
plowed field. Presently another stone fence crossed his path; along
this he again turned toward the highway. In a few minutes he found
himself in a corner formed by the meeting of two stone fences. Then he
turned appealingly to me, uttering the soft note of the mallard. To
use his wings never seemed to cross his mind.

Well, I am bound to confess that I helped the drake over the wall, but
I sat him down in the road as impartially as I could. How well his
pink feet knew the course! How they flew up the road! His green head
and white throat fairly twinkled under the long avenue of oaks and
chestnuts.

At last we came in sight of the home lane, which led up to the
farmhouse one hundred or more yards from the road. I was curious to
see if he would recognize the place. At the gate leading into the lane
he paused. He had just gone up a lane that looked like that and had
been disappointed. What should he do now? Truth compels me to say that
he overshot the mark: he kept on hesitatingly along the highway.

It was now nearly night. I felt sure the duck would soon discover his
mistake, but I had not time to watch the experiment further. I went
around the drake and turned him back. As he neared the lane this time
he seemed suddenly to see some familiar landmark, and he rushed up it
at the top of his speed. His joy and eagerness were almost pathetic.

I followed close. Into the house yard he rushed with uplifted wings,
and fell down almost exhausted by the side of his mate. A half hour
later the two were nipping the grass together in the pasture, and he,
I have no doubt, was eagerly telling her the story of his adventures.

V

FACTORS IN ANIMAL LIFE

The question that the Californian schoolchildren put to me, "Have the
birds got sense?" still "sticks in my crop."

Such extraordinary sense has been attributed to most of the wild
creatures by several of our latter day nature-writers, that I have
been moved to examine the whole question more thoroughly than ever
before, and to find out, as far as I can, just how much and what kind
of sense the birds and four-footed beasts have.

In this and in some following chapters I shall make an effort to use
my own sense to the best advantage in probing that of the animals,
which has, as I think, been so vastly overrated.

When sentiment gets over