196 IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



A dog is chasing a rabbit upon which his attention is fixed. 

 He hears the whistle of his master, which is at first marginal to 

 his consciousness; upon repetition it becomes focal. Indeed, if 

 the wave theory applies to the consciousness of animals at all, 

 nothing becomes focal without first becoming marginal in the 

 dawning consciousness that constitutes the front of the wave. 

 This point would, of course, be admitted by Professor Morgan. 



Now, admitting as he does, that the relation as such is mar- 

 ginal in the mind of the dog, what warrant has he to assume 

 that it never becomes focal? If this is true, what earthly rea- 

 son would this be for the dog wlio is chasing the rabbit to leave 

 that interesting occupation to go to the drain? He could not 

 eat the drain, and so far as ihe story shows has never attained 

 any satisfaction from the drain in his past experience. On the 

 contrary, the drain must be associated in his mind, not only 

 with the rabbit, but with repeated disaj^pointment and chagrin. 

 Hence, on the very principles which Mr. Morgan insists upon 

 throughout the work, the drain being associated in the dog's 

 mind with unpleasant experiences, would be an object of aver- 

 sion, and, if sense impressions alone controlled him, he would 

 run away from it as soon as it was present in consciousness 

 through association. Personally, I am unable to avoid the con- 

 clusion that the dog knows perfectly well why he leaves the 

 direct trail of the rabbit and takes the short cut to the drain. 

 He knows from past experience that he cannot catch the rabbit 

 by following him into the drain. He knows that the short cut 

 is the nearest to the drain. He takes the short cut and 

 expects to see the rabbit. I cannot avoid the conclusion that he 

 has reasoned in the most exact sense of the word. That he 

 has focused the relation between the longer and ^horter paths 

 and also that between the rabbit and the drain. He has 

 focused the how to outwit the rabbit, and the how cannot be 

 focused without a definite perception of relation. 



As before intimated, my personal knowledge of the pyschol- 

 ogy of dreams is too limited to permit of my discussing it with 

 confidence, but it appears to me that dreams are governed by 

 association of ideas alone, or nearly so, and that here we have 

 a case of mental action in which the relation is not focal. I 

 should, therefore, expect an animal unable to focus the rela- 

 tion, unable to reflect, to act as does a person in a dream. This 

 animals seldom do. Their actions are consecutive. They 



