250 FACT AGAINST FICTION. 



CHAPTER IX. 



REASON IN THE DOG. 



Difficulty of drawing the line between Instinct and Reason — 

 Instance of Reason in a Wild Duck — Bird in the Zoological 

 Gardens — My Retriever Neptune — Retriever Dog in the New 

 Forest and the Jack Snipe — My dog Brutus and the Heron — 

 Smoker the Deer-hound — Brenda in the First-Class Railway 

 Carriage and the Irate Man — The Doe Rescued and the Thieves 

 Discovered — The Irish Setter Nellie — Wolf — Instances of 

 Reasoning Powers in Hounds, Dogs, Birds, Fishes, &c. — Skim 

 and Cress. 



It is, as I have said here, there, and everywhere, 

 ahnost impossible to draw the line between instinct 

 and reason. The size of the creatures offers us 

 no guide by way of solution to the difficulty, even 

 placing by the side of each other the elephant and 

 ihe ant ; nor does the class to which each creature, 

 insect, bird, or animal belongs, suggest any course 

 by which man, in his investigations, can be guided. 

 From the elej)hant to the beetle, the bee, and the 

 ant, we find reason and instinct run so much the 



