HEARING. 243 



all animals have for gormandizing, which is not the 

 case. For one ought to recollect that the musical 

 quality peculiar to birds proceeds less from the del- 

 icacy and taste of their ear than from the disposi- 

 tion of their throat. They farthermore, in this par- 

 ticular, resemble musicians, who give pleasure to 

 others without partaking of any themselves. We 

 hear a dog howl, we see him weep, as it were, at a 

 tune played upon a flute ; when, on the contrary, 

 this animal is all alive in the field at the sound of a 

 French horn. The horse takes fire at the sound of 

 a trumpet, in spite of the thick muscular texture 

 his auditory organ is encompassed with. Without 

 the cochlea these animals are provided with, one 

 would by no means discover in them this sensibility 

 for harmony. We should rather find them, in this 

 respect, as stupid as fish, which are destitute of the 

 cochlea as well as birds ; but without the advan- 

 tages which birds have, of a head sufficiently disen- 

 gaged, sufficiently sonorous, to supply this defect."* 

 For the sake of illustration, we may remark that 

 many other animals besides birds are observed to 

 be singularly affected with certain sounds. Among 

 these, the elephant is not a little remarkable, though 

 Sir Everard Home is disposed to think it does not 

 possess a musical ear. Suetonius, for example, tells 

 us that the Emperor Domitian had a troop of ele- 

 phants disciplined to dance to the sound of music, 

 and that one of them who had been beaten for not 

 having his lesson perfect, was observed, the night 

 afterward, practising by himself in a meadow. 

 Outrageous bulls have likewise, in several instances, 

 been calmed into gentleness by music. Of this 

 musical feeling in oxen Dr. Southey mentions a 

 very singular instance. " The carts," he says, " of 

 Corunna make so loud and disagreeable a creaking 

 with their wheels for want of oil, that the governor 



* Le Cat on the Senses, Eng. trans. 



