290 FURNESS : THE MENTALITY OF CHIMPANZEES. 



of actions, with a definite object in view. It would seem that the 

 inabiHty to compare one object with another or one action with 

 another preckides their mind from either deductive or inductive 

 reasoning, and that their brains are as incapable of reasoning as 

 we do, as a dog's paw (for instance) is incapable of holding a pen as 

 we do. They undoubtedly can be taught, owing to their physical 

 resemblance, to imitate human actions to a remarkable degree, but 

 their highest notch of mentality after four or five years of training 

 is hardly comparable to that of a human child of a year and a half. 

 Rev. Sydney Smith in the introduction to one of his lectures on 

 moral philosophy says : 



" There may, perhaps, be more of rashness and ill-fated security in my 

 opinion, than of magnanimity or liberality; but I confess I feel myself so 

 much at my ease about the superiority of mankind — I have such a marked and 

 decided contempt for the understanding of every baboon I have yet seen — I 

 feel so sure that the blue ape without a tail will never rival us in poetry, 

 painting and music — that I see no reason whatever, why justice may not be 

 done to the few fragments of soul and tatters of understanding which they 

 may really possess. I have sometimes, perhaps, felt a little uneasy at Exeter 

 'Change from contrasting the monkeys with the 'prentice boys who are teas- 

 ing them ; but a few pages of Locke, or a few lines of Milton, have always 

 restored me to tranquility." 



I regret that I am forced to admit, after my several years ob- 

 servation of the anthropoid apes, that I can produce no evidence that 

 might disturb the tranquil sleep of the reverend gentleman. 



Wallingford, Pa., 

 April, 1916. 



