110 NATURAL HISTORY. 



smelt them, he follows the scent until he arrives at his destination. There is no doubt that the 

 olfactory sense is wonderfully acute, but this is certainly carrying it too far. Moreover, as has 

 remarked, the direction of the wind was quite likely to change between the Dog's two journeys, 

 and if one of his odoriferous landmarks happened to be movable, like a flock of ISheep, where would 

 he be 1 But the one fact which completely disposes of the smell theory of the phenomenon is, that 

 there is no evidence of a Dog's ever returning to bis old home by the way he was taken from it ; 

 invariably takes a different route, usually a short cut. For instance : " A Hound was sent by Charl 

 Cobbe, Esq., from Newbridge, county Dublin, to Maynalty, county Meath, and thence, long afterwards, 

 conveyed to Dublin. The Hound broke loose in Dublin, and the same morning made his way back 

 his old kennel at Newbridge, thus completing the third side of a triangle by a road he had nev< 

 travelled in his life." Again, Mr. Romanes narrates the case of a Dog who, when taken by his mas 

 from Oban to Greenock, by sea, was grievously sea-sick. The next time the journey had to be made, 

 the Dog, remembering his former trouble, jumped off the boat and disappeared. His master continued 

 his voyage, and was greatly surprised, when he arrived at Greenock, to find the Dog waiting for him on 

 the wharf ! The distance from Oban to Greenock is fifty miles in a straight line, and this straight 

 course the Dog is not likely to have taken, as his way would then have lain across mountains, a lake, 

 and an arm of the sea. Thus it would seem that the Dog must have some soi-t of notion of directio: 

 must possess, as it were, a special sense of the nature of a mariner's compass, and that, so far from h 

 sense of locality being due in any way to power of smell, it is perhaps the most striking example of 

 pure instinct which it is possible to conceive. 



We have not given many instances of instinct in the Dog, for it is a faculty of which no on 

 denies the existence, but of reasoning power it is necessary to treat more fully, as many persons ar 

 disposed wholly to deny the presence of that faculty in all the lower animals, and to make it th 

 exclusive prerogative of man. Every one who has kept a Dog must have seen it perform actio 

 which, in a human being, would unhesitatingly be put down to reason ; every one must have heard 

 cases in which a choice of two or more courses was presented to a Dog, and in which he has, afl 

 due reflection, chosen the best. 



We are indebted to Mr. Hugh Miller, F.G.S., for a good instance of reasoning power in a D 

 belonging to his brother, Captain Miller. This Dog, " Tara " by name, a Greyhound with a dash 

 Pointer, was one day taken out with a carriage for a run of forty miles. Now, it is estimated that 

 Dog, by his uncontrollable habit of " meandering," usually goes over about three times the groun 

 of the horse or man he accompanies, so that on this occasion Tara must have run considerably ov 

 a hundred miles, and was in consequence rather done up when she reached home. She usually sle 

 in the dining-room, whence she was always ejected at 7 A.M. by the housemaid who cleaned the roo 

 On this occasion, however, no amount of persuasion could indiice Tara to occupy her accustom 

 sleeping-place ; she positively insisted upon following her master upstairs to his bedroom, where sh 

 evidently expected she could remain undisturbed for a good long rest, and where she did actualh 

 remain till 2 P.M. on the following day. 



Another and more striking instance of the exercise of reasoning power is given in the Quarterly 

 Journal of Science for April, 1876. It is there stated that a Newfoundland Dog was "sent across 

 stream to fetch a couple of hats, whilst his master and friend had gone on some distance. The Dog wen 

 after them, and the gentlemen saw him attempt to carry both hats, and fail, for the two were too muc. 

 for him. Presently he paused in his endeavour, took a careful survey of the hats, discovered tl 

 one was larger than the other, put the small one in the larger, and took the latter in his teeth by th 

 brim !" 



In the face of facts such as these, the question as to whether Dogs possess the power of reasoni 

 becomes merely one of words. No one would say that a human being who did as this Dog did ac 

 from blind instinct. One can easily call to mind several persons of one's acquaintance, to whom i 

 would be the height of presumption to deny the possession of reason, and who yet would never hav 

 thought of putting the hats one inside the other. It is related that the great Newton made, in hi 

 study door, a big hole for his Cat and a little one for the kitten. In doing this he showed far less exerci 

 of reason than the Dog ; and it is quite conceivable that if he had been sent to fetch the hafcs he woul 

 have brought them over separately ! We shall give other instances of reason in the Dog when w< 



