WAYS OF NATURE 



ledge, or the communication of emotion ? It seems 

 to me that by teaching we mean the former. Man 

 alone communicates knowledge; the lower animals 

 communicate feeling or emotion. Hence their com- 

 munications always refer to the present, never to the 

 past or to the future. 



That birds and beasts do communicate with each 

 other, who can doubt ? But that they impart know- 

 ledge, that they have any knowledge to impart, in 

 the strict meaning of the word, any store of ideas 

 or mental concepts — that is quite another matter. 

 Teaching implies such store of ideas and power to 

 impart them. The subconscious self rules in the 

 animal ; the conscious self rules in man, and the con- 

 scious self alone can teach or communicate know- 

 ledge. It seems to me that the cases of the deer and 

 the antelope, referred to by President Roosevelt in 

 the letter to me quoted in the last chapter, show the 

 communication of emotion only. 



Teaching imphes reflection and judgment; it 

 implies a thought of, and sohcitude for, the future. 

 " The young will need this knowledge," says the hu- 

 man parent, " and so we will impart it to them now." 

 But the animal parent has consciously no knowledge 

 to impart, only fear or suspicion. One may affirm 

 almost anything of trained dogs and of dogs gener- 

 ally. I can well believe that the setter bitch spoken of 

 by the President punished her pup when it flushed a 

 bird, — she had been punished herself for the same 

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