LOGIC OF RECEPTS. 55 



goes and returns on his steps many times. Without having 

 any immediate cause for his uneasiness, he employs the same 

 artifices which he would have employed to throjv out the 

 dogs, if he were pursued by them. This foresight is an 

 evidence of remembered facts, and of a series of ideas and 

 suppositions resulting from those facts." * 



It is remarkable enough that an animal should seek to 

 confuse its trail by such devices, even when it knows that the 

 hounds are actually in pursuit ; but it is still more so when 

 the devices are resorted to in order to confuse imaginary 

 hounds which md^y possibly be on the scent. Perhaps to some 

 persons it may appear that such facts argue on the part of 

 the anim.als which exhibit them some powers of representative 

 thouo^ht, or some kind of reflection conducted without the 

 aid of language. Be it remembered, therefore, I am not 

 maintaining that they do not : I am merely conceding that 

 the evidence is inadequate to justify the conclusion that they 

 do ; and all I am now concerned with is to make it certain 

 that in animals there is a logic, be it a logic of recepts only, 

 or likewise what I shall afterwards explain as a logic of pre- 

 concepts. 



Again, Leroy says of the fox : — " He smells the iron of 

 the trap, and this sensation has become so terrible to him, 

 that it prevails over every other. If he perceives that the 

 snares become more numerous, he departs to seek a safe 

 neighbourhood. But sometimes, grown bold by a nearer and 

 oft-repeated examination, and guided by his unerring scent, he 

 manages, without hurt to himself, to draw the bait adroitly out 

 of the trap. ... If all the outlets of his den are guarded by 

 traps, the animal scents them, recognizes them, and will suffer 

 the most acute hunger rather than attempt to pass them. I 

 have known foxes keep their dens a whole fortnight, and only 

 then make up their minds to come out because hunger left 

 them no choice but as to the mode of death. . . . There is 

 nothing he will not attempt in order to save himself He 

 will dig till he has worn away his claws to effect his exit by a 



♦ Ibid,, p. 39. 



