478 ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE. 



commencement of inflammatory softening of the brain, uncon- 

 sciously imitate every word that is uttered, whether in their 

 own or in a foreign language, and every gesture or action which 

 is performed near them. 



The same sort of tendency is often observable in 

 young children, so that it seems to be frequently dis- 

 tinctive of a certain stage or grade of mental evolution, 

 and particularly in the branch Primates. Other animals, 

 however, certainly imitate each other's actions to a certain 

 extent, as I shall have occasion fully to notice in my next 

 work. 



As for the sterner emotions, rage may be so pronounced 

 as to make a monkey exhaust itself with beating about its 

 cage, or a baboon bite its own limbs till the blood flows.^ 

 Jealousy occurs in a correspondingly high degree, while 

 retaliation and revenge are shown by all the higher 

 monkeys when injury has been done to them, as any 

 one may find by ofifering an insult to a baboon. The 

 following is a good case of this, as it shows what may be 

 called brooding resentment deliberately preparing a satis- 

 factory revenge. Mr. Darwin writes : — 



Sir Andrew Smith, a zoologist whose scrupulous accuracy 

 was known to many persons, told me the following story of 

 which he was himself an eye-witness. At the Cape of Good 

 HopC; an officer had often plagued a certain baboon, and the 

 animal, seeing him approaching one Sunday for parade, poured 

 water into a hole and hastily made some thick mud, which he 

 skilfully dashed over the officer as he passed by, to the amuse- 

 ment of many bystanders. For long afterwards the baboon 

 rejoiced and triumphed whenever he saw his victim. * 



General Intelligence. 



Coming now to the higher powers, I shall give a few 

 cases to show that monkeys certainly surpass all other 

 animals in the scope of their rational faculty. Professor 

 Croora Robertson writes me : — 



I witnessed the following incident in the Jardin des Plantes, 

 now many years ago ; but it struck me greatly at the time, and 

 I have narrated it repeatedly in the interval. A large ape — I 

 » Descent of Man, 71 . « Ihid., p. 69. 



