Origin of Species Variorum

Comparison with 1860

for the mother-hen has almost lost by disuse the power of flight.

Hence, we may conclude, that domestic instincts have been acquired and natural instincts have been lost partly by habit, and partly by man selecting and accumulating during successive generations, peculiar mental habits and actions, which at first appeared from what we must in our ignorance call an accident. In some cases compulsory habit alone has sufficed to produce such inherited mental changes; in other cases compulsory habit has done nothing, and all has been the result of selection, pursued both methodically and unconsciously; but in most cases, probably, habit and selection have acted together. ↑

We shall, perhaps, best understand how instincts in a state of nature have become modified by selection, by considering a few cases. I will select only three, out of the several which I shall have to discuss in my future work,— namely, the instinct which leads the cuckoo to lay her eggs in other birds nests; the slave-making instinct of certain ants; and the comb-making power of the hive-bee; these two latter instincts have generally, and most justly, been ranked by naturalists as the most wonderful of all known instincts. ↑

It is now commonly admitted that the more immediate and final cause of the cuckoos instinct is, that she lays her eggs, not daily, but at intervals of two or three days; so that, if she were to make her own nest and sit on her own eggs, those first laid would have to be left for some time unincubated, or there would be eggs and young birds of different ages in the same nest. If this were the case, the process of laying and hatching might

for the mother-hen has almost lost by disuse the power of flight.

Hence, we may conclude, that under domestication instincts have been acquired, and natural instincts have been lost, partly by habit, and partly by man selecting and accumulating, during successive generations, peculiar mental habits and actions, which at first appeared from what we must in our ignorance call an accident. In some cases compulsory habit alone has sufficed to produce such inherited mental changes; in other cases compulsory habit has done nothing, and all has been the result of selection, pursued both methodically and unconsciously; but in most cases, probably, habit and selection have acted together.

Special Instincts.

We shall, perhaps, best understand how instincts in a state of nature have become modified by selection, by considering a few cases. I will select only three, out of the several which I shall have to discuss in my future work,— namely, the instinct which leads the cuckoo to lay her eggs in other birds' nests; the slave-making instinct of certain ants; and the comb-making power of the hive-bee: these two latter instincts have generally, and most justly, been ranked by naturalists as the most wonderful of all known instincts.

Instincts of the Cuckoo. —

It is now commonly admitted that the more immediate and final cause of the most remarkable of the instincts of the cuckoo is, that she lays her eggs, not daily, but at intervals of two or three days; so that, if she were to make her own nest and sit on her own eggs, those first laid would have to be left for some time unincubated, or there would be eggs and young birds of different ages in the same nest. If this were the case, the process of laying and hatching might