468 ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE, 



when he left the carriage and waited on the platform for the 

 return train to Harlech. If Nero did not make use of * abstract 

 reasoning ' we may as well give up the use of the term. 



Miss M. C. Young writes to me : — 



You may perhaps think the following worthy of notice, as 

 illustrating the comparative failure of instinct in an animal 

 which has begun to reason. A friend of mine has a mongrel 

 fox-terrier of remarkable intelligence, though undeveloped by 

 any training. This dog has always shown a great fondness for 

 accompanying any of the family on a railway journey, often 

 having to be taken out of the train by force. One morning in 

 the summer of 1877 the groom came, in great distress, to say 

 that Spot had followed him to the station, and jumped into the 

 train after a visitor's maid who was going to see her friends, 

 and he (the groom) felt sure the dog would be stolen. The 

 railway is a short single line, with three trains down and up 

 each day, and my friend is well known to all the officials, so she 

 sent to meet the next train, when the guard said the dog 

 (apparently finding no friend in the train) had jumped out at 

 a little roadside station about five miles distant. Most dogs 

 would have found their way home easily, though the place 

 itself was strange, but Spot did not appear till late in the 

 evening, after ten hours' absence, and dead tired. On inquiry 

 we found that the guard had seen nothing of her at 9 a.m., at 

 12 A.M., at 1 P.M., nor at 4 p.m. ; but when he reached the little 

 station on his return at 5.30, * she was walking up and down 

 the platform like a Christian,' jumped into his box, and jumped 

 out again of her own accord at the right station for her home. 

 She had evidently spent the interval in trying to find her way 

 home on foot, and not succeeding, had resolved on returning 

 the way she came. 



Lastly, for the following very remarkable case I am 

 indebted to my friend Mrs. A. S. H. Eichardson : — 



The Rev. Mr. Townsend, incumbent of Lucan, was formerly 

 an engineer on the Dundalk line of railway. He had a very 

 intelligent Scotch retriever dog, which used to have a habit of 

 jumping into any carriage in which Mr. Townsend travelled; 

 but this had been discontinued for a year when the following 

 incident happened. Mr. Townsend and the dog were on the 

 platform at Bundalk station; Mr. Townsend went to get a 

 ticket for a lady, and during his absence the dog jumped into 

 a carriage, and when the train started, was carried down to 



