Faculties of Vision in Birds 89 



which they have been carried, though at the distance of 

 many miles, and even across rivers, where they could not 

 possibly have had any knowledge either of the road or of 

 the direction that would lead them to it. " The nature of 

 the beast " is to love the place of her breeding ; neither 

 will she tarry in any strange place, although carried far, 

 being never willing to forsake the house for the love of any 

 man, and most contrary to the nature of a dog, who will 

 travel abroad with his master ; but, although their masters 

 forsake their houses, yet will not these beasts (cats) bear 

 them company, and, being carried forth in close baskets 

 or sacks, they will return again. A cat has been known 

 to travel from London to Chatham, in Kent, a distance of 

 thirty miles, and most persons can relate similar incidents. 

 But then dogs do the same. 



A mastiff, which a gentleman had brought up in India 

 from two months old, accompanied him and a friend from 

 Pondicherry to Bangalore, a distance of more than three 

 hundred leagues. " Our journey," he goes on to relate, 

 ' ' occupied nearly three weeks, and we had to traverse 

 numerous plains and mountains, ar>d to ford rivers and go 

 along several by-paths. The animal, which had certainly 

 never been in that country before, lost us at the extreme 

 end of our journey, and immediately returned to Pondi- 

 cherry. He went directly to the house of a friend with 

 whom I had formerly lived. Now, the difficulty is not so 

 much to know hew the dog subsisted on the road (for he 

 was very strong and well able to procure for himself food), 

 but how he could so well have found his way after an 

 interval of more than a month." 



A still more extraordinary instance of returning is 

 recorded on the authority of the late Lieutenant Alderson, 

 of the Royal Engineers, who was personally acquainted 

 with the facts. An ass, the property of Captain Dundas, 

 R.N., then at Malta, was shipped on board the " Ister " 

 frigate (Captain Forrest), bound from Gibraltar for that 

 island. The vf ssel having struck on some sands off the 

 Point de Gat, at some distance from the shore, the ass 

 was thrown overboard to give it a chance of swimming to 

 land — a poor one, for the sea was running so high that a 



