Page:BirdWatcherShetlands.djvu/320

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290
THE BIRD WATCHER

known it trouble about an absent parent whilst it had one by it. I have never, that I remember, seen the chick seek to be fed before one or other of its dams had flown in with a fish, and I attribute the anxiety which this one showed to reach the bird in question, to its distress at finding itself in so precarious a situation. In this, however, I may be wrong, but since it is beyond doubt that one stranger bird caressed the chick, it is not very essential to prove that another did. The likelihood is that one would be as willing to as another, and I did, indeed, notice that all the birds on the ledge to which the chick was brought back, seemed to take a kindly interest in it, especially another white-eyed one, which the mother several times drove away from it—being jealous, as I suppose. The state of affairs appeared to me to be this, that all the birds had a tender feeling towards the chick, that the chick, if left to itself, was inclined to go to any one of them, and that whatever one it did go to was ready to jodel over it, and caress it. Not having been able to note down every little thing at the time, I cannot now give the general evidence on which this impression was founded, but I have recounted the special incidents.

An interesting question arises here—at least it seems interesting to me. Is the conduct that we have been considering the result of mistake or confusion on the part of either the grown birds or the chick—or of both of them—or does it spring from an extension of sympathy in the one, and of Kinderliebe,