28 ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE 



incumbrance. Let me, then, briefly indicate some of 

 the problems that have seemed to myself and others as 

 most urgently demanding solution. 



One of the questions still far from clear is that which 

 we had under discussion last year, viz. : In how far can 

 the lower animals understand man's various forms of 

 expression, especially his spoken words ? A priori, we 

 should not expect that creatures unable to invent words 

 should have the capacity to understand them in the 

 sense in which man himself does. I am inclined to 

 think that more has been claimed for the inferior races 

 of animals in this direction than an exact examination 

 of the subject will warrant. On the other hand, we 

 have probably very much underrated their capacity to 

 comprehend our various forms of unspoken longuage. 

 The subject calls for close observation. A kindred 

 problem is the degree to which various kinds of animals 

 can communicate with one another. This is a much 

 more difficult subject, and it may prove that the 

 creatures we despise as so very much inferior may 

 have modes of subtle communication which we are, 

 possibly, incapable even of comprehending. 



The whole subject of the senses of the lower animals 

 is a field for investigation both by the psychologist and 

 the physiologist ; all the more important, as it is 

 scarcely possible to understand one form or degree of 

 sensation adequately, except by comparison with its 

 lower and higher forms. The field is as yet but little 

 tilled, but enough has been done to suggest this very 

 important question : Do the senses of the lower animals 

 and those of man differ only in degree, or also in kind ? 

 Is the sense of smell, e.g. in the dog, merely more 

 acute, or is it not also characteristically different ? The 

 latter seems the more probable, when we consider how 

 different the hearing of man is in some respects (music) 

 from that of other animals, even the dog. 



