192 THE PLAY OF ANIMALS. 



bears of the Hamburg gardens inside the inclosure of 

 the bath was to run in himself, whereupon they all 

 followed at once, otherwise their interest was absorbed 

 by all sorts of things on the way.* This impulse to imi- 

 tate motion may appear before the animal is able to 

 distinguish between its mother and other objects, but 

 simply follows anything that attracts its attention by 

 moving — a clear proof that the impulse is hereditary. 

 Hudson relates of young lambs that probably develop 

 more slowly on account of domestication: " Its next 

 important instinct (after sucking) which comes into 

 play from the moment it can stand on its feet, impels 

 it to follow after any object receding from it, and, on 

 the other hand, to run from anything approaching 

 it. If the dam turns round and approaches it, even 

 from a very short distance, it will start back and run 

 from her in fear, and will not understand her voice 

 when she bleats to it. At the same time it will con- 

 fidently follow after a man, horse, dog, or any other ani- 

 mal moving from it. ... I have seen a lamb about 

 two days old start up from sleep and immediately start 

 off in pursuit of a puffball about as big as a man's 

 head, carried past it over the smooth turf by the wind, 

 and chase it for a distance of five hundred yards, until 

 the dry ball was brought to a stop by a tuft of coarse 

 grass. This blundering instinct is quickly laid aside 

 when the lamb has learned to distinguish its dam from 

 other objects, and its dam's voice from other sounds." f 

 We often see among dogs how, when one goes over a 

 ditch, his companions follow, and how the bark of one 

 excites the rest at once. Wesley Mills emphasizes the 



* Bilder aus dem Thiergarten in Hamburg, 2. Unsere Baren, 

 Gartenlaube, 1884, p. 12. 



f Hudson, The Naturalist in La Plata, p. 107, 



