NATURE AND NATURAL HISTORY 



fraction of the cunning and sagacity that they 

 showed in the Hne of their inherited instincts would 

 have led them to do this. But the chain was a new 

 thing; artificial conditions had been imposed upon 

 them; there had been no chains and collars in the 

 fox traditions; hence their inability to extricate 

 themselves from the conditions in which these 

 things involved them. 



And yet the fox knows pretty well how to deal 

 with a new thing in the shape of a steel trap. Yes, 

 because the trap awakens his inborn cunning and 

 suspicion, while the chain that held Dan Beard's 

 foxes got them into difficulties that had no such 

 effect, and that called for powers of reflection rather 

 than traits of cunning. 



The lower animals do not reflect, do not return 

 upon themselves and consider the means to an end. 

 When they use the means it is from an impulse, 

 and not from a thought. Do you suppose, for in- 

 stance, that the oriole has considered the advantage 

 of strings and horsehairs in the building of its nest.^* 

 or the cliff swallows the advantage of clay mud over 

 muck or other materials .^^ 



Who that has seen trained seals has not been 

 struck with what appears to be their remarkable 

 intelligence.? Yet the Bering Sea seal commissioners 

 had this experience with them: At the killing time 

 they tried to separate the young males or "kill- 



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