XIX
THE LAWS OF THE FLOCKS AND THE HERDS
Through a thousand generations of breeding and living under natural conditions, and of self-maintenance against enemies and evil conditions, the wild flocks and herds of beasts and birds have evolved a short code of community laws that make for their own continued existence.
And they do more than that. When free from the evil influences of man, those flock-and-herd laws promote, and actually produce, peace, prosperity and happiness. This is no fantastic theory of the friends of animals. It is a fact, just as evident to the thinking mind as the presence of the sun at high noon.
The first wild birds and quadrupeds found themselves beset by climatic conditions of various degrees and kinds of rigor and destructive power. In the torrid zone it took the form of excessive rain and humidity, excessive heat, or excessive dryness and aridity. In the temperate and frigid zones, life was a seasonal battle with bitter cold, torrents of cold rain in early winter or spring, devastating sleet, and deep snow and ice that left no room for argument.
At the same time, the species that were not predatory found themselves surrounded by fangs and claws, and the never-ending hunger of their owners. The air, the earth and the waters swarmed with predatory animals, great and small, ever seeking for the herbivorous and traitorous species, and preferably those that were least able to fight or to flee. The La Brea fossil beds at Los Angeles, wherein a hospitable lake of warm asphalt conserved skeletal remains of vertebrates to an extent and perfection quite unparalleled, have revealed some very remarkable conditions. The enormous output, up to date, of skulls of huge lions, wolves, sabre-toothed tigers, bears and other predatory animals, shows, for once, just what the camels, llamas, deer, bison and mammoths of those days had to do, to be, and to suffer in order to survive.
With the aid of a little serious study, it is by no means difficult to recognize the hard laws that have enabled the elephant, bison, sheep, goats, deer, antelope, gazelles, fur-seal, walrus and others to survive and increase. From the wild animal herds and bird flocks that we have seen and personally known, we know what their laws are, and can set them down in the order of their evolution and importance.
The First Law. There shall be no fighting in the family, the herd or the species, at any other time than in the mating season; and then only between adult males who fight for herd leadership.
The destructiveness of intertribal warfare, either organized or desultory, must have been recognized in Jurassic times, millions of years ago, by the reptiles of that period. Throughout the animal kingdom below man the blessings of peace now are thoroughly known. This first law is obeyed by all species save man. We doubt whether all the testimony of the rocks added together can show that one wild species of vertebrate life ever really was exterminated by another species, not even excepting the predatory species which lived by killing.
No one (so far as we know) has charged that the lions, or the tigers, the bears, the orcas, the eagles or the owls have ever obliterated a species during historic times. It was the swine of civilization, transplanted by human agencies, that exterminated the dodo on the Island of Mauritius; and it was men, not birds of prey, who swept off the earth the great auk, the passenger pigeon and a dozen other bird species.
The Second Law. The strong members of a flock or herd shall not bully nor oppress the weak.
This law, constantly broken by degenerate and vicious men, women and children, very rarely is broken in a free wild herd or flock. In the observance of this fundamental law, born of ethics and expediency, mankind is far behind the wild animals. It would serve a good purpose if the criminologists and the alienists would figure out the approximate proportion of the human species now living that bullies and maltreats and oppresses the weak and the defenseless. At this moment "society" in the United States is in a state of thoroughly imbecilic defenselessness against the new type of predatory savages known as "bandits."
The Third Law. During the annual period of motherhood, both prospective and actual, mothers must be held safe from all forms of molestation; and their young shall in no manner be interfered with.
For the perpetuation of a family, a clan or a species, the protection of the mothers, and their weak and helpless offspring is a necessity recognized by even the dullest vertebrate animals. As birth-time or nesting-time approaches the wild flocks and herds universally permit the potential mothers to seek seclusion, and to work out their respective problems according to their own judgment and the means at their command. The coming mother looks for a spot that will afford (1) a secure hiding-place, (2) the best available shelter from inclement weather, (3) accessible food and water, and (4) cover or other protection for her young.
During this period the males often herd together, and they serve a protective function by attracting to themselves the attacks of their enemies. For the mothers, the bearing time is a truce time. There are fox-hunters who roundly assert that in spring fox hounds have been known to refuse to attack and kill foxes about to become mothers.
The Fourth Law. In union there is strength; in separation there is weakness; and the solitary animal is in the greatest danger.
It was the wild species of mammals and birds who learned and most diligently observed this law who became individually the most numerous. A hundred pairs of eyes, a hundred noses and a hundred pairs of listening ears increase about ten times the protection of the single individual against surprise attacks. The solitary elephant, bison, sheep or goat is far easier to stalk and approach than a herd, or a herd member. A wolf pack can attack and kill even the strongest solitary musk-ox, bison or caribou, but the horned herd is invincible. A lynx can pull down and kill a single mountain sheep ram, but even the mountain lion does not care to attack a herd of sheep. It is due solely to the beneficent results of this clear precept, and the law of defensive union, that any baboons are today alive in Africa.
The grizzly bear loves mountain-goat meat; but he does not love to have his inner tube punctured by the deadly little black skewers on the head of a billy. It is the Mountain Goats' Protective Union that condemns the silvertip grizzly to laborious digging for humble little ground-squirrels, instead of killing goats for a living. The rogue elephant who will not behave himself in the herd, and will not live up to the herd law, is expelled; and after that takes place his wicked race is very soon ended by a high- power bullet, about calibre .26. The last one brought to my notice was overtaken by Charles Theobald, State Shikaree of Mysore, in a Ford automobile; and the car outlived the elephant.
The Fifth Law. Absolute obedience to herd leaders and parents is essential to the safety of the herd and of the individual; and this obedience must be prompt and thorough.
Whenever the affairs of grown men and women are dominated by ignorant, inexperienced and rash juniors, look out for trouble; for as surely as the sun continues to shine, it will come. With an acquaintance that comprehends many species of wild quadrupeds and birds, I do not recall even one herd or flock that I have seen led by its young members. There are no young spendthrifts among the wild animals. For them, youthful folly is too expensive to be tolerated. The older members of the clan are responsible for its safety, and therefore do they demand obedience to their orders. They have their commands, and they have a sign language by which they convey them in terms that are silent but unmistakable. They order "Halt," and the herd stops, at once. At the command "Attention," each herd member "freezes" where he stands, and intently looks, listens and scents the air. At the order "Feed at will," the tension slowly relaxes; but if the order is "Fly!" the whole herd is off in a body, as if propelled by one mind and one power.
My first knowledge of this law of the flock came down to me from the blue ether when I first saw, in my boyhood, a V-shaped flock of Canada geese cleaving the sky with straight and steady flight, and perfect alignment. Even in my boyish mind I realized that the well-ordered progress of the wild geese was in obedience to Intelligence and Flock Law. Later on, I saw on the Jersey sands the mechanical sweeps and curves and doubles of flying flocks of sandpipers and sanderlings, as absolutely perfect in obedience to their leaders as the slats of a Venetian blind.
A herd of about thirty elephants, under the influence of a still alarm and sign signals, once vanished from the brush in front of me so quickly and so silently that it seemed uncanny. One single note of command from a gibbon troop leader is sufficient to set the whole company in instant motion, fleeing at speed and in good order, with not a sound save the swish of the small branches that serve as the rungs of their ladder of flight.
In the actual practice of herd leadership in species of ruminant animals, the largest and most spectacular bull elk or bison is not always the leader. Frequently it has been observed that a wise old cow is the actual leader and director of the herd, and that "what she says, goes." This was particularly remarked to me by James McNaney during the course of our "last buffalo hunt" in Montana, in 1886. From 1880 to 1884 he had been a mighty buffalo-hunter, for hides. He stated that whenever as a still-hunter he got "a stand on a bunch," and began to shoot, slowly and patiently, so as not to alarm the stand, whenever a buffalo took alarm and attempted to lead away the bunch, usually it proved to be a wise old cow. The bulls seemed too careless to take notice of the firing and try to lead away from it.
The Sixth Law. Of food and territory, the weak shall have their share.
While this law is binding upon all the members of a wild flock, a herd, a clan or a species, outside of species limits it may become null and void; though in actual practice I think that this rarely occurs. Among the hoofed animals; the seals and sea-lions; the apes, baboons and monkeys, and the kangaroos, the food that is available to a herd is common to all its members. We can not recall an instance of a species attempting to dispossess and evict another species, though it must be that many such have occurred. In the game-laden plains of eastern Africa, half a dozen species, such as kongonis, sable antelopes, gazelles and zebras, often have been observed in one landscape, with no fighting visible.
With all but the predatory wild animals and man, the prevailing disposition is to live, and let live. One of the few recorded murders of young animals by an old one of the same species concerned the wanton killing of two polar bear cubs in northern Franz Joseph Land, as observed by Nansen.
The Seventh Law. Man is the deadliest enemy of all the wild creatures; and the instant a man appears the whole herd must fly from him, fast and far.
In some of the regions to which man and his death-dealing influence have not penetrated, this law is not yet on the statute books of the jungle and the wilderness. Sir Ernest Shackleton and Captain Scott found it unknown to the giant penguins and sea leopards of the Antarctic Continent, I have seen a few flocks and herds by whom the law was either unknown or forgotten; but the total number is a small one. There was a herd of mountain sheep on Pinacate Peak, a big flock of sage grouse in Montana, various flocks of ptarmigan on the summits of the Elk River Mountains, British Columbia,—and out of a long list of occurrences that is all I will now recall.
It is fairly common for the members of a vast assemblage of animals, like the bison, barren-ground caribou, fur seal, and sea birds on their nesting cliffs, to assume such security from their numbers as to ignore man; and all such cases are highly interesting manifestations of the influence of the fourth law when carried out to six decimal places.
The Eighth and Last Law. Whenever in a given spot all men cease to kill us, there may we accept sanctuary and dwell in peace.
This law comes as Amendment 1 to the original Constitution of the Animal Kingdom. The quick intelligence of wild animals in recognizing a new sanctuary, and in adopting it unreservedly and thankfully as their own territory, is to all friends of wild life a source of wonder and delight. With their own eyes Americans have seen the effects of sanctuary-making upon bison, elk, mule deer, white-tailed deer, mountain sheep, mountain goat, prong-horned antelope, grizzly and black bears, beavers, squirrels, chipmunks, rabbits, sage grouse, quail, wild ducks and geese, swans, pelicans brown and white, and literally hundreds of species of smaller birds of half a dozen orders.
In view of this magnificent and continent-wide manifestation of discovery, new thought and original conclusion, let no man tell us that the wild birds and quadrupeds "do not think" and "can not reason."
The Exceptions of Captivity. When wild animals come into captivity, a few individuals develop and reveal their worst traits of character, and much latent wickedness comes to the surface. A small percentage of individuals become mean and lawless, and a still smaller number show criminal instincts. These Bolshevistic individuals commit misdemeanors and crimes such as are unknown in the wild state. One male ruminant out of perhaps fifty will turn murderer, and kill a female or a fawn, entirely contrary to the herd law; and at long intervals a male predatory animal kills his mate or young.
Occasionally captivity warps wild animal or wild bird character quite out of shape, though it is a satisfaction to know that the total proportion of those so affected is very small. Long and close confinement in a prison-like home, filled with more daily cares and worries than any animal cage has of iron bars, has sent many a human wife and mother to an insane asylum; but the super- humanitarians who rail out at the existence of zoological parks and zoos are troubled by that not at all.