THE PSYCHIC DEVELOPMENT OF YOUNG ANIMALS 115 
disease have been made the subject of considerable 
speculation and some valuable research, but the 
subject is vast, and will unfold but slowly till our 
knowledge of many things is greatly increased. 
Much depends on the philosophical or scientific 
attitude of the worker, as to the views he holds on such 
a subject, or the interpretations he puts on observed 
facts. 
Nevertheless, to him who can lay aside prejudices— 
sanctioned, it may be, by ages of belief—it is possible 
to see that old interpretations fail, and that problems 
of the mind, which the world has either ignored or 
grappled with in vain, must be attacked from new 
standpoints. 
History and Objects of the Present Research. 
In consequence of the foregoing and many other 
convictions, some ten years since, I suggested to the 
students of the Faculty of Comparative Medicine and 
Veterinary Science of M‘Gill University the desirability 
of forming a Society for the study of Comparative 
Psychology, more especially for the study of the psychic 
nature of those animals with which they would be 
professionally most brought into contact. During this 
period, more than formerly, | myself bred and reared 
large numbers of the smaller of the domestic animals 
and pets with a view of understanding them in all 
their varied aspects. 
The longer, however, I continued my studies, the 
more I became convinced that, as in every other case 
to succeed best, one must begin at the beginning, 
Accordingly I have for a few years kept full, and I 
hope accurate, notes of the development, psychic and 
physical, of individuals belonging to several different 
groups of the above-mentioned animals. 
