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PSYCHOLOGY AND COMPARATIVE PSYCHOLOGY 47 



theorising without very great regard to them was so 

 tempting in framing explanations of organic nature, is a 

 work that the world long undervalued, and the import- 

 ance of which it is to be feared all psychologists at the 

 present day do not adequately appreciate. 



In this, at all events, our unpretentious Association 

 may claim to have trodden in the safe path. At the end 

 of our first decade of existence it may be profitable to 

 review what has been accomplished. It could scarcely 

 be expected that the members of this Association, being 

 for the most part undergraduates, whose time is largely 

 taken up with professional studies, should be able to 

 make elaborate original researches worthy of publica- 

 tion. From the first, however, our proceedings have 

 been given to the public in condensed form by the local 

 Press, and evidence has been abundant on every hand 

 that one of the results has been an altered attitude of 

 mind on the part of many intelligent persons in this city 

 towards the animal world about us, notably our domestic 

 species. This is not a work to be despised, for the wel- 

 fare of our fellow-creatures lower in the scale is largely 

 dependent on the views we entertain of their psychic 

 nature. 



It is surely not to be supposed that such studies as 

 have engaged the members of our Association are with- 

 out a value of a professional kind ; for in the handling 

 of sick animals, in diagnosing their exact condition, in 

 appreciating their sensations, and generally in under- 

 standing their entire nature, the man who observes and 

 reflects on such things must be more competent as a 

 veterinarian, other things being equal, and certainly a 

 more agreeable visitor to both patients and clients. 



But it is difficult, in my opinion, to over-estimate the 

 good to the individual who, in the right spirit, studies 

 animals. A frame of mind is established which, even 

 when one exaggerates animal intelligence, is rarely 



