WAYS OF NATURE 



not ideas. The child perceives things, discriminates 

 things, knows its mother from a stranger, is angry, 

 or glad, or afraid, long before it has any language 

 or any proper concepts. Animals know only through 

 their senses, and this "knowledge is restricted to 

 things present in time and space." Reflection, or a 

 return upon themselves in thought, of this they are 

 not capable. Their only language consists of vari- 

 ous cries and calls, expressions of pain, alarm, joy, 

 love, anger. They communicate with one another, 

 and come to share one another's mental or emo- 

 tional states, through these cries and calls. A dog 

 barks in various tones and keys, each of which ex- 

 presses a diflferent feeling in the dog. I can always 

 tell when my dog is barking at a snake; there is 

 something pecuUar in the tone. The hunter knows 

 when his hound has driven the fox to hole by a 

 change in his baying. The lowing and bellowing of 

 homed cattle are expressions of several different 

 things. The crow has many caws, that no doubt 

 convey various meanings. The cries of alarm and 

 distress of the birds are understood by all the 

 wild creatures that hear them; a feeling of alarm 

 is conveyed to them — an emotion, not an idea. 



How could a crow tell his fellows of some future 

 event, or of some experience of the day ? How could 

 he tell him this thing is dangerous, this is harmless, 

 save by his actions in the presence of those things ? 

 Or how tell of a newly found food supply save by 

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