38 INSANITY IN THE LOWER ANIMALS. 



Thus among beavers there are individuals known to trap- 

 pers as c les pa,resseux,' or * idlers,' which are more easily cap- 

 tured than the others, and which appear to be exiled males, 

 leading purposeless and somewhat lonely lives. They lose 

 sociality and wariness, and ( walk into traps without seeming 

 to know their danger ; ' while old, experienced, healthy ani- 

 mals at once detect traps and baits, and destroy the efficiency 

 of both by sinking them under water (Wood). In this case 

 banishment, solitude, the want of society and its conse- 

 quences physical and moral have no doubt begotten a 

 morbid mental condition similar to that which is much more 

 familiar, and much more dangerous, in the rogue elephant. 



Again, s it is said by the natives of South Africa that the 

 gnu is a mad animal ; and the manner in which they rush 



about would certainly impress you with this idea.' 



With their flowing tails * they lash themselves perpetually, 

 whirling and rushing about in all directions from and to- 

 wards you' (Bisset 1 ). But it is contrary to all analogy to 

 suppose that any animal species, as a species in other words, 

 that all the individuals of a species are normally mad, how- 

 ever eccentric their behaviour may appear to be to those who 

 probably are ignorant of its cause or motive. A similar ex- 

 planation of the singular behaviour of the Tasmanian devil, 

 viz. that it is the subject of a chronic mania, has been offered 

 by the late Professor Day, of St. Andrews, but on what seem 

 to me to be equally untenable grounds. 2 And there are no 

 doubt many other animals reputedly mad that are so only in 

 appearance, that owe their evil repute simply to some eccen- 

 tricity of behaviour to which man has not at present the key. 



The excitement of bees previous to swarming amounts, 

 according to Figuier, to mental derangement, the queen set- 

 ting a bad example by being the first, figuratively, to lose her 

 head. The ' mad ant ' of the Malays is characterised by its 

 objectless movements (Darwin). 



The range of insanity in the animal kingdom has yet to 

 be determined ; what species and genera are subject to in- 

 sanity and to what forms of insanity ; how low down in the 



' Sport and War in South Africa,' 1875. P. 262. 

 2 ' Scottish Naturalist,' vol. iii. p. 60. 



