DOG GENEBAL INTELLIGENCE. 465 



down, crossed to the opposite side, and diligently explored that 

 bank. Two or three minutes elapsed, and the party was for 

 moving on, when I called their attention to a sudden change in 

 the dog's demeanour. His ' flag ' was now up and going from 

 side to side in that energetic manner which, as every sportsman 

 knows, betokens a hot scent. I then knew that the bird was as 

 safe as if it was already in my bag. Away through the heather 

 went the waving tail, until twenty or thirty yards from the 

 bank opposite to that on which we were standing there was a 

 momentary scuffle ; the bird just rose from the ground above 

 the heather, the dog sprang into the air, caught it, came away 

 at full gallop, dashed across the stream, and delivered it into my 

 hands. Need I interpret all this for the experienced sportsman 1 

 The dog had learned from long experience in Australia and the 

 narrow canadas in the La Plata that a wounded duck goes down 

 stream ; if winged, his maimed wing sticks out and renders it 

 impossible for him to go up, so he will invariably land and try 

 to hide away from the bank. But if the dog enters at the place 

 where the bird fell, the latter will go on with the stream for an 

 indefinite distance, rising now and then for breath, and give infi- 

 nite trouble. My dog had found out all this long since, and had 

 proved the correctness of his knowledge times out of number, 

 and by his actions had taught me the whole art and mystery of 

 retrieving duck. His object, I say without a doubt, because I 

 had numberless opportunities of observing it, was to fling the 

 bird and force it to land by cutting it off lower down the stream. 

 Then assuming, as his experience justified him, that the bird 

 had landed, he hunted each bank in succession for the tra 1, 

 which he knew must betray the fugitive. 



As showing in a higher, and therefore rarer degree, 

 the ratiocinative faculty in dogs, I may quote a brief ex- 

 tract from my British Association lecture : 



My friend Dr. Rae, the well-known traveller and natu- 

 ralist, knew a dog in Orkney which used to accompany his 

 master to church on alternate Sundays. To do so he had to 

 swim a channel about a mile wide ; and before taking to the 

 water he used to run about a mile to the north when the tide 

 was flowing, and a nearly equal distance to the south when the 

 tide was ebbing, ' almost invariably calculating his distance so 

 well that he landed at the nearest point to the church.' In his 

 letter to me Dr. Rae continues : ' How the dog managed to 

 calculate the strength of the spring and neap tides at their 



