406 Animal Life and Intelligence, 



In this connection I will give two anecdotes of Carlo, 

 communicated to me by Mrs. Mann. " Once I came upon 

 Carlo sitting in the dining-room doorway, Dulceline, the 

 cat, angrily watching him from the stairs, and also 

 evidently having an eye on a leg of mutton half dragged 

 off the dish on the dining-table. Carlo had clearly caught 

 the thief in the act. He was on guard ; and he seemed 

 much relieved when higher powers came on the scene. 

 Honesty seemed part of Carlo's nature. In this matter 

 we never had to give him any lessons. Nor could he hear 

 to see dishonesty in others. One Sunday, one of the little 

 girls saw Carlo coming along looking so anxiously at her 

 that she knew he wanted her to come. She therefore 

 followed him, and Carlo took her to the store-room, the 

 door of which her sister had left open. In the doorway 

 Carlo stopped, and looked first up at his mistress and then 

 into the store-room, as much as to say, ' What can we 

 think of this ? ' And truly there was a certain little black- 

 and-tan terrier, whose principles were by no means of a 

 high order, regaling himself with some cold meat that he 

 had dragged on to the floor. Toby knew he was in the 

 wrong, and tried to flee. But Carlo stopped him as he 

 endeavoured to fly past. And when Toby was thereupon 

 duly slapped, Carlo sat straight up, with a face of conscious 

 rectitude." 



These anecdotes, communicated to me by a lady of 

 culture and intelligence, illustrate how, in describing the 

 actions of animals, phraseology only, in strictness, applic- 

 able to the psychology of man, is unwittingly and almost 

 unavoidably employed. Toby's "principles were not of a 

 high order," yet he " knew he was in the wrong," while Carlo 

 watched him receive his punishment, and " sat straight up, 

 with a face of conscious rectitude." 



Coming now to a sense of humour or a sense of the 

 ludicrous, Darwin himself said,* "Dogs show what may 

 fairly be called a sense of humour, as distinguished from 

 mere play ; if a bit of stick or other such object be thrown 



* " Descent of Mau," quoted by Romanes, p. 445. 



