424 Animal Depravity. [October, 
the ground with his neck, as if to kill the victim: he then 
looked up at me with a triumphant air of success. So well 
was the whole process simulated that I should have been 
quite deceived had I not seen that the fly was still upon the 
window. Accordingly I drew his attention to this fact, as 
well as to the absence of anything upon the floor, and when 
he saw that his hypocrisy had been detected, he slunk away 
under some furniture, evidently much ashamed of himself.” 
This last point is most significant, fully overturning the 
vulgar notion of the absence of moral life in brutes, and of 
their total want of conscience. 
That animals steal is a familiar expression. But we 
must here distinguish two different cases. We speak of 
hares stealing our corn, and of blackbirds plundering our 
cherries ; but in neither case have we any reason to conclude 
that the offenders can distinguish between the crops in cul- 
tivated lands, and the spontaneous produce of woods and 
wastes. But not a few species both of birds, quadrupeds, 
and insects evidently recognise the idea of property. This 
is proved by the fact that they display far greater courage 
and pertinacity in defence of their nests, their haunts, and 
their accumulations, than under other circumstances. A 
dog, that when trespassing is put to flight by a gesture or a 
shout, becomes a formidable opponent in his own yard. If, 
then, such animals know what property is, and yet at times 
make free with it, we may justly pronounce them conscious 
thieves. Rooks are apt to purloin sticks from each other’s 
nests; but if the offender is dete¢ted and cuffed by the 
rightful owner, conscience makes a coward of him. and he 
merely defends himself by flight. More than this—rooks 
have some rudiments of criminal law. Inveterate thieves 
are sometimes banished from the rookery, severely beaten, 
or even killed outright.* But law pre-supposes the notions 
of right and wrong, and could never, therefore, have arisen 
among beings incapable of making this distin¢tion. 
As another vice, we may take quarrelsomeness—a term 
which we need surely not define. This attribute is highly 
conspicuous in the human species, nowhere perhaps more 
strikingly than in that part of the English nation who 
inhabit the borders of Yorkshire and Lancashire. But cer- 
tain dogs show the very same disposition, and without the 
smallest provocation take every opportunity of attacking 
horses, cows, sheep, and human beings. There is a well- 
* A most interesting account of the habits of rooks was given by Mr. 
Ashley, of Sheffield, in a le@ure delivered before the Mechanics’ Institute of 
that town about twenty years ago. 
