IMAGINATION. 151 



animals showing by their actions tliat they have in tlieir 

 " mind's eye " a picture or representation of absent objects. 



Every one must have observed, for instance, the greater 

 spirit with which jaded horses return on their homeward 

 journey, as compared with the sluggislniess and lack of 

 energy on tlieir out-going journey. This can only be ex- 

 plained by supposing that the animals have a mental picture 

 of their stables, with its ideal accompaniments of food and 

 repose. Again, tlie desire which many animals show to 

 return to their habitual haunts when removed from them can 

 only be explained by supposing them to retain a mental 

 picture, or imagination, of their previously happy experience. 

 The promptings of this imagination are frequently so strong 

 as to induce the animals to brave the dano-ers and fatigues of 

 hundreds of miles of travel for the sole purpose of returning 

 to the scenes which occupy tlieir imaginations. " Pigeons, 

 dogs, cats, and horses, when removed from their former 

 homes, give repeated and daily instances of the fact. It 

 crushes and overwhelms the faculties of ihe mind, and pros- 

 trates the energies of the body. Thus many birds, when 

 encaged, become so utterly spirit-broken, that they refuse all 

 nourishment, pine for a few days, and die. This is particu- 

 larly the case with song-birds. ... If the Howling 

 Monkey is caught when full-grown, it become melancholy, 

 refuses all food, and dies in a few weeks ; it is also the same 

 with the Puma; and Burdach states that death sometimes 

 ensues so immediately, that it can only arise from a sudden 

 and violent pressure on the mind."* 



Although it may be objected to this interpretation of 

 pining under confinement that the fact may be due to the 

 mere absence of liberty or changed condition of life, without 

 any mental and contrasted picture of previous experience, I 

 think that this objection is precluded in other and analogous 

 cases to which I shall next refer, and which serve in larger if 

 not in full measure to disarm this criticism as applied to such 

 cases as the above. I allude to all those cases so frequently 

 observed among domestic animals where similar pining occurs 

 without there being any change in the conditions of life, 

 except the sudden withdrawal of a master or companion to 

 which the animal is strongly attached. I have myself 

 known a case in which a terrier of my own household, on the 



* Thompson, Fassions of Animals, pp. 64-5. 



