With respect to feral pigeons--for Juan Fernandez see Bertero in 'Annal.
In New Zealand according to Dieffenbach, the feral cats assume a streaky grey colour like that of wild cats; and this is the case with the half-wild cats of the Scotch Highlands.
This is the only known case in which rabbits have becomeferal in a hot country.
The domestic rabbit readily becomes feral in these same countries, and when variously coloured kinds are turned out they generally revert to the ordinary grey colour.
From the several foregoing facts we see that reversion in the feral state gives no indication of the colour or size of the aboriginal parent-species.
Mr. Hill remarks to me, in his letter, on the colour of the legs of the feral birds in Jamaica.
Those found in the Pellew Islands Crawfurd) are believed to be feral; and lastly, it is asserted that they have become feral in New Zealand, but whether this is correct I know not.
The rabbits which have become feral on the island of Porto Santo, near Madeira, deserve a fuller account.
The savages of North and South America easily reclaim the feral horses, so that there is no improbability in savages in various quarters of the world having domesticated more than one native species or natural race.
In these habits the feral dogs of La Plata resemble wolves and jackals; both of which hunt either singly or in packs, and burrow holes.
This subject of the checks to increase has been ably treated by several authors, and I hope in a future work to discuss it at considerable length, more especially in regard to the feral animals of South America.
No careful description has been given of the feral goat.
LABAT, on the tusks of feral bears in the West Indies, i.
MUSK duck, feral hybrid of, with the common duck, i.
A return of any species to its natural conditions of life, as with feral animals and plants, favours reversion; though it is certain that this tendency exists, we do not know how far it prevails, and it has been much exaggerated.
We have seen that the feral rabbits of Jamaica, and especially of Porto Santo, have assumed new colours and other new characters.
Thus, with feral pigs, exposure to the weather will probably favour the growth of the bristles, as is known to be the case with the hair of other domesticated animals, and through correlation the tusks will tend to be redeveloped.
We know that {373} changed conditions have the power of evoking long-lost characters, as in the case of some feral animals.
This subject has been ably treated by several authors, and I shall, in my future work, discuss some of the checks at considerable length, more especially in regard to the feral animals of South America.
What conclusions do you derive from the study of the cases of feral men?
Only second in importance to the cases of feral men are the investigations which have been made of the results of solitary confinement.
This law or, more correctly, hypothesis, applied to an individual case explains the so-called feral man.
The cases of feral men, in the absence of contradictory evidence, seem adequate in support of Aristotle's point that social contacts are indispensable for human development.
According to Rauber, this is one of the most frequently quoted of feral cases.
On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to keep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these animals a great deal and presume they are much like feral dogs and wolves in their habits.
The literature upon cases of feral men is practically all of the anecdotal type with observations by persons untrained in the modern scientific method.
Feral Men[99] What would the results be if children born with a normal organism and given food and light sufficient to sustain life were deprived of the usual advantage of human intercourse?
LABAT, on the tusks of feral boars in the West Indies.
But the reappearance of coloured longitudinal stripes on youngferal pigs cannot be attributed to the direct action of external conditions.
With uncrossed breeds the same result follows, under conditions which favour the multiplication and development of certain dormant gemmules, as when animals become feral and revert to their pristine character.
It has been repeatedly asserted in the most positive manner by various authors, that feral animals and plants invariably return to their primitive specific type.
She is one of those women men make a quarrel about and fight to the death for,--the old feral instinct, you know.
But even then, as she stood leaning against the wall, motionless save for the surging of her breast, there was about her the same strange, feral inscrutableness.
Travis' own tongue ran across his lips as an impression hit him withferal force.
The tribesmen sat their horses, facing Travis, watching him with the feral eyes of the wolves they claimed as forefathers, wolves that possessed the cunning of the wild, cunning enough not to rush breakneck into unknown danger.
The instinct for the feral spring could no longer be denied.
It had its cunning too, but it was being almost too severely tried since the feral solution of a growl and a spring was forbidden by the problem.
Though his movements were deliberate, his feral instincts had such sway that if he had met Heyst walking towards him, he would have had to satisfy his need of violence.
She was even able to meet his eyes, oblique, apt to glide away, throwing feral gleams of desire.
An old hunter then mounted a tame elephant, went up to the feral one, seized his ear and ordered him to lie down.
This readiness of cats to become feral is a strong expression of the shallow psychological influence which prolonged domestication has here exerted, in comparison with that which it has produced in the case of the dog.
A night, where darkness lays her chains and bars, And feral fires appear instead of stars.
An animal or plant which becomes feral in one small territory might be destroyed by climate, but I can hardly believe so, when once feral over several large territories.
In a feral state he would doubtless have left the herd and become a solitary wanderer.
The country they frequent is much covered with jungle and intersected with salt-water creeks and back-waters, and the cattle are as wild and wary as the most feral species.
He writes: "It has been repeatedly asserted in the most positive manner by various authors that feral animals and plants invariably return to their primitive specific type.
As regards the tendency to resume feral habits, Mr. Darwin, though apparently of opinion that the tendency to do this has been much exaggerated, yet does not doubt that such a tendency exists, as shown by well authenticated instances.
The ordeal through which he had passed had left him shaken in a frenzy of passion, and he stood looking about him with the gaze of a wild beast fretting under the feral urge of blood-lust.
He had reverted to the feral instincts of desperation--and was suddenly sobered.
This feral pig was called barraco in the vernacular, and was about a third less in size than the domestic animal, with longer legs and more pointed face, and of a uniform deep rust-red in colour.
They were of the wild-pig breed, descended originally from the European animal introduced by the early Spanish colonists, but after two or three centuries of feral life a good deal changed in appearance from their progenitors.
Corsican vendetta or Kentucky feud--what are language and race against age-long isolation and an environment that keeps humanity feral to the core?
