AKIMAL DEPRA VITY. 



185 



It is a great mistake to suppose that herbiv- 

 orous animals are necessarily milder than the 

 carnivora. The contrary is often the case. The 

 flesh-eater attacks and kills for food. The grass- 

 eater, e. g., the Cape buffalo, and even the do- 

 mestic bull, indulges in wanton outrages aud 

 " unprovoked assaults." His tendency to these 

 peculiarly English offenses is, perhaps, the reason 

 why he has been, under the name of John Bull, 

 chosen as the type of the nation. 



The true question is, Does a brute, like man, 

 ever violate "the laws of its own nature?" 

 If it is found incapable of departing, whether to 

 the right hand or the left, from one fixed line, 

 we must then pronounce it, according to the 

 commonly-received notion, alike incapable of vice 

 and of virtue, void indeed of moral life, in as far 

 as this is deemed to be dependent upon choice. 1 

 But if it can deviate more or less from the norm 

 of its existence, and especially if by such trans- 

 gression it entails suffering upon itself and oth- 

 ers, we are then, we submit, warranted in regard- 

 ing its actions as morally good or evil — good in 

 as far as it conforms to the laws of its being ; 

 evil when it goes astray. 



We may then judge it, just as man judges his 

 own actions and those of his fellows ; the full 

 likeness of the cases justifying us in drawing like 

 conclusions. It will be admitted that " brutes " 

 have wills of their own which vary in intensity 

 among individuals of any given species in the 

 same manner as in man, if not to the same ex- 

 tent. Among domestic animals there are some 

 which, in spite of kicks and cuffs, and general 

 maltreatment, persevere in their own way. Such 

 creatures man, taking as usual, himself for the 

 law of the universe, pronounces " vicious." 

 There are others, again, which, under all circum- 

 stances, unhesitatingly submit their will to his, 

 and these he praises. 



The same method of judging, by-the-way, is 

 applied to dependents and children. A child 

 deficient in vital power implicitly obeys his par- 

 ents and " betters " from want of energy to dispute 

 their commands. He is, accordingly, held up 

 to general admiration ; his early death is pro- 

 nounced a " mysterious dispensation of Provi- 

 dence," and his virtues and precocity are duly 

 chronicled in a tract. On the contrary, the 

 healthy and vigorous child, full of life and ac- 

 tion, is apt to rebel against authority. It is, 

 therefore, set down as a tiny incarnation of evil, 



1 If there were no evil, would there he also no good ? 

 If all matter were absolutely transparent aud incapa- 

 ble of throwing a shadow, would light cease to exist ? 



and if it finds its way at all into a pretty story- 

 book, is made to serve as an awful warning for 

 the rising generation. There is wonderful virtue 

 in listlessness, and in impotence lies an incon- 

 ceivable amount of purity. Perhaps if we take 

 the latter term in its modern cant sense the two 

 may be regarded as practically synonymous. 



The existence of a will, capable of acting at 

 times in defiance of circumstances, is as clearly 

 manifest in the horse, the ass, and the pig, as in 

 man himself, though in the three former it is 

 little appreciated. Strange that what in animals 

 is branded as stupidity should in man be deemed 

 almost divine. 



Were brutes devoid of freedom, unable to 

 choose between two lines of conduct, we should 

 find them in all cases simply obedient to their 

 propensities, and intent only upon immediate 

 gratification without any regard to ulterior conse- 

 quences. Were such the case, for man to train 

 them would be an impossibility. Yet we know 

 that dogs, cats, hawks, etc., are trained to con- 

 duct quite different from their natural inclina- 

 tions. A cat, though one of the most self-willed 

 of animals, can be taught to abstain from molest- 

 ing chickens, pigeons, and cage-birds, or from 

 stealing, scratching furniture, etc. A dog can be 

 brought to point to a covey of partridges instead 

 of obeying his natural impulse to rush forward 

 and endeavor to seize them. The following case 

 is very significant : " A fine terrier in the pos- 

 session of a surgeon at Whitehaven about three 

 weeks ago exhibited its sagacity in a rather amus- 

 ing manner. It came into the kitchen and began 

 plucking the servant by the gown, and in spite 

 of repeated rebuffs, it perseveringly continued in 

 its purpose. The mistress of the house, hearing 

 the noise, came down to inquire the cause, when 

 the animal treated her in a similar manner. 

 Being struck with the concern evinced by the 

 creature, she quietly followed it up-stairs into a 

 bedroom whither it led her ; there it commenced 

 barking, looking under the bed and then up in 

 her face. Upon examination a cat was discov- 

 ered there quietly demolishing a beefsteak, which 

 it had feloniously obtained. The most curiou3 

 feature is that the cat had been introduced into 

 the house only a short time before, and that bit- 

 ter enmity prevailed between her and her canine 

 companion." ] 



This is a capital case. " Instinct " might un- 

 deniably have led the terrier to attack the cat 

 and attempt to deprive her of her booty. But 

 we find this natural impulse here completely re- 

 1 Zoologist, p. 2131. 



