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easily, which birds have, and being more persecuted by man, they do not often disport themselves unrestrainedly in his presence; it is difficult to watch any wild animal without the watcher's presence being known or suspected. Nevertheless, their displays are not so rare as we might imagine. I have more than once detected species, with which I was, or imagined myself to be, well acquainted, disporting themselves in a manner that took me completely by surprise. While out tinamou shooting one day in autumn, near my own home in La Plata, I spied a troop of about a dozen weasels racing madly about over a vizcacha village--the mound and group of pit-like burrows inhabited by a community of vizcachas. These weasels were of the large common species, Galictis barbara, about the size of a cat; and were engaged in a pastime resembling a complicated dance, and so absorbed were they on that occasion that they took no notice of me when I walked up to within nine or ten yards of them, and stood still to watch the performance. They were all swiftly racing about and leaping over the pits, always doubling quickly back when the limit of the mound was reached, and although apparently carried away with excitement, and crossing each other's tracks at all angles, and this so rapidly and with so many changes of direction that I became confused when trying to keep any one animal in view, they never collided nor even came near enough to touch one another. The whole performance resembled, on a greatly magnified scale and without its beautiful smoothness and lightning swiftness, the fantastic dance of small black water-beetles, frequently seen on the surface of a pool or stream, during which the insects glide about in a limited area with such celerity as to appear like black curving lines traced by flying invisible pens; and as the lines everywhere cross and intersect, they form an intricate pattern on the surface, After watching the weasel dance for some minutes, I stepped up to the mound, whereupon the animals became alarmed and rushed pell-mell into the burrows, but only to reappear in a few seconds, thrusting up their long ebony-
386 Appendix.
black necks and flat grey-capped heads, snarling chattering at me, glaring with fierce, beady eyes.
THE STRANGE INSTINCTS OF CATTLE.
In November and December, 1893, a short correspondence appeared in the Field on the curious subject of "Dogs burying their dead." It arose through a letter from a Mr. Gould, of Albany, Western Australia, relating the following incident:--
A settler shot a bitch from a neighbouring estate that had formed the habit of coming on to his land to visit and play with his dog. The dog, finding his companion dead, was observed to dig a large hole in the ground, into which he dragged the carcase; but he did not cover it with earth. The writer wished to know if any reader of the Field had met with a similar case. Some notes, which I contributed in reply to this letter, bear on one of the subjects treated in the chapter on "strange instincts," namely, the instinct of social animals to protect and shield their fellows; and for this reason I have thought it best to reproduce them in this place.
I remember on one occasion watching at intervals, for an entire day, a large and very savage dog keeping watch over the body of a dead bitch that had been shot. He made no attempt to bury the dead animal, but he never left it. He was observed more than once trying to drag the body away, doubtless with the intention of hiding it; not succeeding in these attempts, he settled down by its side again, although it was evident that he was suffering greatly from thirst and heat. It was at last only with the greatest trouble that the people of the house succeeded in getting the body away and burying it out of his sight.
Another instance, more to the point, occurred at my own house on the pampas, and I was one of several persons who witnessed it. A small, red, long-haired bitch--a variety of