1 58 NATURE STUDIES 



It is somewhat singular, we may remark in passing, 

 that Darwin and Huxley, whose views in some 

 respects are so similar, and who are regarded by the 

 general public as standing side by side in their 

 advocacy of the theory of the relationship of man to 

 the lower animals, should seem to uphold almost 

 exactly opposite opinions respecting the cerebral 

 qualities of animals, one maintaining that in some 

 cases animals reason, while the other (if we rightly 

 apprehend what Huxley has said about animal auto- 

 matism) will scarcely allow that animals even possess 

 consciousness. 



We propose here to consider some cases in "which 

 animals have seemed to reason. The importance of 

 the subject will be recognised if we remember 

 Darwin's admission that, had no organic being except 

 man possessed any mental power, or if man's powers 

 had been of a wholly different nature from those of 

 the lower animals, we should never have been able to 

 convince ourselves that our high faculties had been 

 gradually developed. Darwin expresses his belief 

 that there is no fundamental difference of this kind. 

 " We must also admit/' he says, " that there is a 

 much wider interval in mental power between one of 

 the lowest fishes, as a lamprey or a lancelet, and one 

 of the higher apes, than between an ape and a man ; 

 yet this immense interval is filled up by numberless 

 gradations.' 1 But this has not been so generally 

 admitted, despite the evidence advanced by Darwin, 

 as might have been expected. The feeling is still 



