AliTlitALS' LIMITATIONS.
rfcleverness of animals is so much more striking than heir limitations that it is surprising to note the wide differences in the brain-power, not of different species, but of creatures of the same kind. We have little opportunity of comparing wild animals' intelligence, but among domesti- cated animals there is no difficulty in doing so. - Some are astonishingly quick, others hopelessly stupid, and where the intelligence is quite normal it seems not infrequently to be totally in abeyance. Horses show these differences between sense and senselessness perhaps more than other animals. They will most of them take leave of any sense they may bare, wholly and entirely, when fear or novelty upsets their balance. The omnibus horses sent out to draw the guns in South Africa showed all the patience, obedience, and trust in man which these courageous creatures generally do when well trained and well treated. They were shot down behind batteries in action, and pierced with Mauser bullets when advancing and retreating, yet the teams did not stampede, but died in the traces. Yet the same horses if they fall in harness in the London streets will act in the most obviously foolish and panicky manner. One slipped in Piccadilly the _ other day, and lay on its side with its feet under the off-horse's legs, It immediately began to kick, or rather to work its legs as it would if it had fallen on its knees instead of on its side, bringing its hind legs under it and striking out violently. At almost every other kick it struck the feet and fetlocks of the off-horse. The latter showed good sense, as it seemed to know when the next kick was coming, and jumped off the ground to clear the iron-shod hoofs. Another horse fell with its neck on the curb. In struggling it struck its head a violent blow on the stone pave- ment. It might have been supposed that after this it would have lain quiet. But not so. It did exactly the same thing three times afterwards.
Horses were born to be the joy of people with mechanical minds, to persons of the drill sergeant order. They are naturally much the oleverest of the hoofed animals. But they have also far more " conscience," and are curiously willing to submit their will to that of man. They soon take a pleasure in doing this, and what was at first docility becomes obedience, and then something very like duty. Our cavalry horses are taught, among other things, always to keep with the troop. Consequently, if a man is shot or wounded his horse leaves him and joins the troop, and charges or retreats with it. The classic instance was in the charge of Balaclava, when riderless horses in twos and threes galloped on each side of the officers leading. It had its advantage in regular war, or rather old-fashioned war, for the horses were not lost, and no doubt, though riderless, aided the shock of the charge. But as Mr. Rose-Ines in his pleasant story of his adventures with Paget's Horse points out, it is a very bad education for horses used in the widely extended order of modern mounted infantry. The unhappy " remount " horses learn just enough to know that they must keep with the troop. A Yeoman gets a fall, and lies half-stunned, or is knocked off his horse by a not serious wound. Down he dror a, and lies perhaps some minutes before he can get up. Off goes the horse and joins the nearest group of horses it can see, perhaps a hundred yards or more away. We shall have to teach our horses individual resource as well as the men. An Indian or Boer or Gaucho pony would probably wait quietly till its master mounted again, and if he did not would graze near until taken up by some one. Our system does not so completely take the wits out of a horse as do the foreign riding-schools, of one of which a story is told that the manager asked for three months in which to train a horse to ride down the street with a letter which he was requested to post. The horse was perfect at cantering backwards, but had never been out in the street, and would not know what to do when it got there. Captain Hayes, who tells the story in his "Horses in Russia," believes that hunters are our cleverest horses, and that the
best
b of these are those which are interfered' with as little 'Cs possible.' This is certainly a tribute to their natural goo's sense. Volunteers back from South Africa have often had the misfortune to lose many horses in their term of service through no fault of their own. Consequently they have had abundant experience) of the variable qualtity of equine brain. They all agree that no two horses are Alike; and the privatee, who got the last choice, declare that as a rale they only found one horse in three or four that seemed to have any brains!. But the poor animals simply had no chance to show their capacity. Shipboard muddled them and. made them ill starvation or unusual food upset them further, and over- work did the rest. But some were absolutely impossible from the first.
This " oafishness " is quite commonly seen among the cleverest of all domestic animals,—namely, dogs; it appears e /en in cats, though rarely. and its chief forms of expres- sion are an inability to understand in the least what is wanted of them, and an utter disregard for the approval of man, or his wants or wishes. Of the oafish dogs, some are quite useful when out shooting, but only to please themselves They are not in the least bad, only utterly hopeless, and would be canine outcasts were it not for the pity their limitations excite in those who know they cannot help it. The writer knew a dog which during the fifteen years of its life never did a pleasant thing; yet no one ever had a bad word for it, and it often was brilliant in the shooting field. It was a big, well-bred black-and-white setter dog, and from its first appearance as a very handsome puppy was pitied by every woman about the house, exactly as with their unerring instinct they would have pitied the same class of boy. It had no manners, and if it had had fingers they would all have been thumbs. When it had a nice mat to curl up on, or the kitchen hearthrug, it would go to sleep on a heap of onions in a cupboard. When taken out for a walk it saw a goose in a pond, and just waded in and strangled it. Beating was no good. It shook itself, and then forgot. After a day's shooting, when it had had enough it would run home, and when within a mile of the house on the return from a day's sport always " dropped " the party and " sloped off " as if utterly sick of them. Once when it had particularly distin- guished itself on the hills it did this as usual, and the writer followed through the village a few minutes later, with a boy carrying many brace of partridges. The village innkeeper was standing, evidently with a grievance, before his door, and said, " See what your dog has done to my Tom." Horrid visions of a bitten boy were dismissed with the remembrance that in Berkshire a "Tom" is a cock, whether in the poultry yard or pheasant cover. The wretched dog, trotting through the village, had suet the " Tom " in the road and just killed it off hand, for no reason whatever. The victim was sent round to the house, and when the writer arrived in London was found to be fastened up with the other game,—a horrid, haunting carcass, like the mariner's albatross. The dog never cared to be petted, and only when wet and very miserable would make some uncouth whimpers and stand with his muddy feet on your boots. He was always rather ill, and had no enemies. Another setter, which succeeded this one, was as much "all there" as her predecessor was hopeless. In her second season she taught herself to retrieve both birds and rabbits, to range a wood with the beaters, to point game of all kinds in hedgerows, to flush it when told, and many other accomplishments ordinarily allotted to about three classes of dog. She was so pleased with herself for retrieving that after her first ventures in this line she " nosed" out a field mouse, put her paw on it as it bolted, then slipped her muzzle under the paw, picked up the mouse, and brought it to the keeper alive!
Elephants are among the most severely drilled'of animals; their intelligence does not have free play in conseqaence. But all English trainers agree that there is a great differeiice in capacity between them, and that some will learn and remember a lesson far more quickly than others. Cats have very "level" brains, and are too self-centred and self-contained, as a rule, to show the distinctions which exist between them. Their strongest instinct is towards a kind. of domestia comfort not exactly shared with human beings, but enjoyed in their company, to iihich the cat perfectly adapts itself. Yet there are misanthropic cite, which make no secret. of their
dislike and contempt for mankind in general, only come into the house under protest, and would prefer to sleep in a coal-cellar to taking their nap in good society. These are the exceptions
in_ are
the cat world, but every one has met with them. Birds a usually regarded as possessing brains in " classes," not as iudividuala, the origin of the belief being probably the fact that birds of one species usually build exactly the same kind of nest. The generalisation is not correct. The same species may have brains of all capacities. The writer has known a domestic pigeon, kept by a lady and constantly in her society, to develop brain-power quite beyond any other pigeons. It had also a very considerable force of will, and was in fact a "character," and quite a remarkable bird. Yet pigeons are generally regarded as ranking rather low in animal Weill- gen,ce.
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