THE SUMMIT OF THE YEARS 



spectacle. It was a sight the like of which he had 

 never seen before. 



Stories are told of monkeys that would seem to 

 indicate in them some perception of the humorous, 

 however rudimentary, but I recall nothing of the 

 kind in the other animals. Of course the impulse of 

 play in animals springs from another source the 

 instinct to develop the particular powers that 

 their life-careers will most require. Puppies and 

 kittens fight mock battles and pursue and capture 

 mock game, kids leap and bound, colts run and 

 leap, birds swoop and dive as if to escape a hawk: 

 in each case training the powers that are likely to 

 be the most useful to them in after-life. Our play- 

 instinct is no doubt of animal origin, but not in the 

 same sense is our perception of the humorous of 

 animal origin. It originated in man, as did so many 

 of the higher emotions. 



ii 



One of the best illustrations I ever had of the 

 difference between animal and human behavior un- 

 der like conditions, was afforded me one May day 

 in the woods, when I unwittingly pulled down the 

 stub of a small tree in which a pair of bluebirds had a 

 nest and young. Now, if a man were to come home 

 and find his house gone, and only empty space 

 where it had stood, he would not go up to the place 

 where the door had been and try repeatedly to find 

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