COMPARATIVE PSYCHOLOGY 37 
Psychology: the nature of the mental processes by 
which animals make their way back by a different 
route to places from which they have been taken. I 
have given the subject considerable attention, and I 
hope before very long to be able to throw some new 
light on this vexed question. At this meeting, a paper 
published by Dr Packard in the American Naturalist, 
for September 1885, on the “Origin of the American 
Varieties of the Dog,” was read, on account of the great 
interest of the subject. When we consider how widely 
the dog has departed from all his supposed ancestors 
in his physical traits, we are amazed at the extent to 
which lower minds can be modified—we might almost 
say radically changed—by contact with the dominant 
mind of man. 
This being the last meeting of the session, the Presi- 
dent proposed certain subjects for study during the 
summer. These were put in the following form: 
To what extent have the lower animals imagination ? 
What animals dream? The persistence and modifica- 
tion of instinct. Is there a “ homing instinct” or a 
“sense of direction” peculiar to animals? What 
groups of animals understand mechanical contrivances, 
and which can use tools? How far do the minds of 
animals become modified by contact with man? Have 
any animals a special aptitude or a peculiar faculty for 
determining where water is to be found? The special 
senses of the lower animals compared with those of 
man ; feigning, catalepsy, etc.,in the lower animals; a 
moral sense in animals below man. 
It is not to be understood that our attention was 
devoted exclusively to the dog during our first year of 
existence as a Society, but it has appeared to me best 
to give a sketch of our investigation of each animal 
separately, so I now continue the account of our study 
of the dog during last year. Before doing so, it may be 
