Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 44.djvu/779

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
THE METHOD OF HOMING PIGEONS.
761

animals, by the processes going on in their bodies, must have some notion of time. This would give the "how long" element in the problem. The "how fast" might be given by such an instrument

Fig. 2.
Flight of six pigeons, covered cage.

as we find in the otoliths resting on the sensory hairs of the maculæ acousticæ; these hairs bending under the weight more or less, according to rate of movement. The "which way" could