252 THE FEELINGS AND EMOTIONS 
at this way and that way, from above, from below, from the 
side. Now one, then another, loose object is picked up and 
dropped, turned over, carried about, pulled at, hammered at, 
stuffed into this corner and into that, and experimented with 
in all possible ways. Then the wise bird goes to sleep, and 
wakes up again only to resume with new zest its persistent 
and varied efforts, by which it becomes acquainted with all 
the details of its environment. Watch young birds on the 
wing gaining their mastery of the air in flight, young seals 
tumbling in the water, young foals scampering and kicking 
up their heels in the meadows. A little observation, as occasion 
serves, a little attention to the progress towards an adequate 
experience of the meaning of things, towards more com- 
plete control, and increased nicety of behaviour, whether in 
reference to their surroundings, or in powers of finished 
locomotion, will serve to bring home what Professor Groos 
includes under experimentation and movement plays. He 
regards it all as play, since it seems to have no serious end, 
and is just a preparation for the sterner realities of adult life. 
And for human beings, whose work is so largely enforced, 
the freedom and evident joy of it all suggests the play 
which has acquired for us the meaning of relaxation from 
irksome effort, and glad abandonment to less constrained 
modes of behaviour. But in young animals such play is, after 
all, the serious business of their time of life. Its import 
for their future welfare can scarcely be overestimated. 
And its import is in large degree psychological. If we 
watch a young puppy or kitten learning gradually to deal 
effectively with some difficulty in its extending environment, 
we see that it puts forth its efforts at first in a somewhat 
random and indefinite fashion. It is one of those animals 
in which intelligence has been evolved to supersede and 
become the more plastic substitute for instinct. The random 
and indefinite movements, are in detail reflex responses to 
stimuli. But whereas, in a piece of highly elaborated instinc- 
tive behaviour, such reflexes are grouped into a whole which 
is co-ordinated through inherited nervous mechanism ; in the 
