How Animals Talk 



him across the square and back again to the 

 hitching-post. 



When I asked how the thing was done, the man 

 answered with entire frankness that he did not 

 know. It "just came natural" to him, he said, 

 to understand horses, and he had always been able 

 to make them do almost anything he wanted. 

 But he had no remarkable power over other ani- 

 mals, so far as I could learn, and was uncommonly 

 shy of dogs, even of little dogs, regarding them all 

 alike as worthless or dangerous brutes. 



Some of my readers may recall, in this connec- 

 tion, the shabby-genteel old man who used to 

 amuse visitors in the public gardens of Paris by 

 playing with the sparrows, some twenty-odd years 

 ago. So long as he went his way quietly the birds 

 paid no more attention to him than to any other 

 stroller; but the moment he began to chirp some 

 wild and joyous excitement spread through the 

 trees. From all sides the sparrows rushed to him, 

 alighting on his hat or shoulders, clamoring loudly 

 for the food which they seemed to know was in his 

 pockets, but which he would not at first give them. 

 When he had a crowd of men and women watching 

 him (for he was vain of his gift, and made a small 

 living by passing his hat after an entertainment) 

 he would single out a cock-sparrow from the flock 

 and cry, "What! you here again, Bismarck, you 



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