92 ANIMALS AT WORK AND PL A Y 



half-kills it, taking care all the while to keep 

 it moving herself. The beautiful young lion which 

 was given by the Sultan of Sokoto to the Queen 

 would play in exactly the same way with a large 

 wooden ball, growling and setting up its crest and 

 pursuing the ball across the cage. Indeed, play of 

 some kind is so necessary to the health of these 

 big ' kittens ' that they are always supplied with 

 a wooden ball to amuse them. These playthings 

 are evidently greatly appreciated, and the distress of 

 one very tame tiger, 4 Jack/ and his mute appeals for 

 help when his ball slipped down under the bars, 

 where he could no longer reach it, were quite 

 pathetic. 



This * make-believe ' sport, in which half the 

 interest is supplied by the imagination, is by no 

 means confined to quadrupeds. Tame rooks often 

 go through an elaborate performance of ' killing ' 

 a biscuit before eating it, and tame seagulls play 

 a game with stones and sticks, throwing them into 

 the air and catching them in their beaks just as 

 they would a fish. 



It is perhaps a doubtful gain to find a philo- 

 sophical basis for the wide category of children's 

 naughtiness which comes under the head of 

 * mischief/ But is not the motive which prompts 

 boys to smash windows, crack open the nice tight 



