THE PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 55 



either in adapting means to ends or otherwise. But if we adopt 

 any such definition is it possible for an unprejudiced observer to 

 keep a pet dog or cat without seeing by its everyday actions that 

 it reasons, that it learns by experience how to get what it wants, 

 and even its owner's habits ; and that it can be taught, sometimes 

 more, sometimes less, but always something. Putting aside all 

 wonderful stories it is the constant little ways, generally charac- 

 teristic of the individual, which impress me most. When I was a 

 boy I had a Skye terrier, which slept in the kitchen but as soon 

 as the servants opened the door ran upstairs and jumped on to my 

 bed. Two bells were rung — one when it was time to get up, the 

 other for breakfast : at the first the dog never stirred, although I 

 got up, but at the second the dog instantly jumped off the bed 

 and left me no peace until I let it out to go down to breakfast. 

 This surely was not inherited instinct. Space will not allow me 

 to multiply instances. It may be said that these are animals 

 altered by generations of association with man ; this only 

 amounts to saying that they have learnt, which seems to me to be 

 the essence of the whole thing ; but let us look at wild crea- 

 tures even low in the scale. Oysters taken from deep water, if 

 left dry, soon open their shells, lose the water within, and perish ; 

 but if placed in shallow tanks and occasionally left uncovered by 

 water for a short time they learn to keep their shells shut, and 

 live longer. This is turned to great practical account, the oysters 

 brought to the Paris market from long distances being thus edu- 

 cated in oyster schools. The razor shells dislike salt ; if it be 

 sprinkled above their burrows- they come to the surface and quit 

 them, but if once seized when they do so, and allowed to escape, no 

 amount of salt will bring them to the surface again (Bingley). 

 Sir John Lubbock found that both ants and bees could be taught 

 their way to honey, &c, by repeated journeys, but that if it were 

 complicated they most of them lost their way the first few jour- 

 neys, but afterwards went correctly and with apparent confidence. 

 Forel found that young ants do not know enemies (strange ants), 

 but that as they grow up they immediately attack an intruder. Lub- 

 bock found that bees know the hive by its position, and fly to the 

 place where it had stood if it be removed in their absence. The 

 mason-bee, according to Blanchard, does not make a nest of its own 

 if it can possess itself of one belonging to a neighbour, it some- 

 times even utilizes an empty snail-shell. A wasp, if it finds a piece 



