Devklofment of Animal Intelligence. i8i 



and many of them would take place if the brain of the animal 

 were removed. 



The movements of the snake, after its head has been 

 pounded into a mass beyond recos^nition by the school boy, are 

 reflex, movements which when first seen cause such feelings of 

 the " uncanny" to arise. The mechanism of these movements 

 resides in the spinal cord, the nerves and their endings etc., and is 

 wholly involuntary in such a case. The touch that causes it is 

 the stimulus and the result is a reflex. 



The movements of those newly born animals that are blind 

 for some days are largely if not entirely of this reflex character, 

 and, as has been already observed, they are of the same nature 

 in all mammals thus born blind. This is not because they are 

 blind, or rather because their eyes are closed, but becau.se their 

 blindness is an expression of the fact that their organization, 

 both physical and psychic, is in a comparatively undeveloped 

 condition. It will be observed, however, that these animals 

 have developed at this period such reflexes and instincts as 

 enable them to adapt to their new surroundings after birth. 

 They can get nourishment by sucking — a reflex or an instinct, 

 probably both. They can move sufficiently to huddle together 

 and crawl close to their mother — their source of heat ; for of all 

 the enemies of young animals cold is the greatest. Warmth is 

 a need even more urgent than food itself 



When they have learned to adapt themselves to their new 

 environment somewhat, and so to be prepared for advances, 

 some new developments take place rather rapidly ; their eyes 

 and ears open ; they learn to see and to hear, though it must 

 not be inferred that seeing and the opening of the eyes are con- 

 temporaneous ; for as a matter of fact I have demonstrated in 

 the clearest way that young animals born blind, as dogs, cats, 

 rabbits, etc., do not really see objects for some days after their 



'Part of a paper read before the Natural History Society of Montreal. 



