396 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



We have two things to say in reference to this. In the 

 first place, we take the subject as it was left for us by our 

 late distinguished member, Prof. Agassiz. We know that he 

 ascribed high powers to some animals, and would not have 

 acknowledged that there was any error in the wording of this 

 subject. But to save controversy, we state in the beginning, 

 that we mean by the mental powers of our domestic animals, 

 those powers by which they imitate man in action and expres- 

 sion and come into relations to him. 



We find among the species of the vegetable kingdom a 

 certain power of adaptation. There are sudden movements 

 of some plants and other changes for the benefit of the indi- 

 vidual or species that simulate the action of animals, — what 

 we might call instinctive or intelligent action. Like results 

 are reached through the physiological forces of the animal 

 organization, as the physiological changes by which animals 

 are adapted to the seasons. Such changes, through mere 

 physiological functions of organs, should render us cautious 

 in attributing intelligence to any of the lower animals, simply 

 because a specific act of theirs commends itself to our intelli- 

 gence. The results of vegetable and animal physiology do 

 the same. We must judge of the nature of an act of an 

 animal by all the conditions of the act, and not simply from 

 the result reached. 



If we compare our higher animals, among which our domes- 

 tic animals are found, w r ith man, we shall find the likeness so 

 great, so far as the mere animal nature is concerned, that we 

 cannot deny to them the possession of the same kind of phys- 

 ical susceptibilities and some of the same supersensuous powers 

 as man possesses, without rejecting all those principles of 

 Reasoning upon w r hich we rest in all scientific investigations 

 and conclusions. If a dog howls when he is struck with a 

 whip, we believe that he feels pain, as a man would feel it, 

 when thus struck ; and when he shrinks at the sight of that 

 whip again, we believe that he remembers it as the instrument 

 that caused suffering, as the man who uses it remembers its 

 use. 



Comparing, then, the physical structure of the higher ani- 

 mals with that of man, we find it essentially the same. A 

 man and a dog are built on the same general plan. The com- 



