ANIMAL EATIOCINATION 25 



from a specific action he had been taught to a similar one, 

 but in a different plane, bringing different results and not 

 founded upon experience. He was able to generalize, that 

 is to say, from the experienced particular to the unforeseen 

 general. He inferred that if you can get one thing you 

 want by begging, you can likewise get another. Perhaps 

 1 may be allowed to refer once more to my own little 

 rufous spaniel, a true canine logician. I gave him half 

 an hour's lesson in begging for food in his earlier career, 

 and that was his entire education. Begging is not only 

 an expression of desire with him now, but it has become 

 something which I am tempted to call a religious rite. 

 He begs for any mortal thing he wants for loofahs, beet- 

 root, recreation with his human foster-parent, going for 

 a walk, having the door opened, chasing away a bird- 

 hunting cat, for kettle-holders, stones, gloves, etc., etc. 

 But the point is that of his own volition he has 

 extended the whole science of begging. I often look 

 round and find him begging, for apparently no reason, 

 under the mantelpiece, and I remember that his ball is 

 there. He has suddenly remembered that I put it there 

 the night before. And his begging practices really seem 

 to have gone beyond the expression of want. If a friend 

 calls whom he likes, he will, in the middle of our talk, get 

 up and solemnly beg at him, and I can find no reason for 

 it except just courtesy and friendliness. When I am out, 

 I often see him on my return begging at the window look- 

 ing on the street. It is partly, I conjecture, to see better 

 and partly a silent plea for my return. But his begging 

 has more mysterious motives than this. I often come 

 into the room where he happens to be and find him beg- 

 ging with his back to me, quite silent and quite alone. 

 I have cudgelled my brains in vain to penetrate the mean- 

 ing of this, for there is nothing in the past or present to 

 cause it. I am not concerned in it, arid he is not begging 

 for any concrete object. I think he is praying. Being 

 largely self -instructed, he begs in any position, sitting 



