WAYS OF NATURE 
In interpreting the action of the animals, we so 
often do the thinking and reasoning ourselves 
which we attribute to them. Thus Mr. Beebe in the 
paper referred to says: “ Birds have early learned to 
take clams or mussels in their beaks or claws at low 
tide and carry them out of the reach of the water, 
so that at the death of the mollusk, the relaxation 
of the adductor muscle would permit the shell to 
spring open and afford easy access to the inmate.” 
No doubt the advancing tide would cause the bird 
to carry the shell-fish back out of the reach of the 
waves, where it might hope to get at its meat, but 
where it would be compelled to leave the shell un- 
opened. But that the bird knew the fish would 
die there and that its shell would then open — it 
is in such particulars that the observer does the 
thinking. 
Two other writers upon our birds have stated 
that pelicans will gather in flocks along the shore, 
and by manceuvring and beating the water with 
their wings, will drive the fish into the shallows, 
where they easily capture them. Here again the 
observer thinks for the observed. The pelicans see 
the fish and pursue them, without any plan to cor- 
ner them in shoal water, but the inevitable result 
is that they are so cornered and captured. The 
fish are foolish, but the pelicans are not wise. The 
wisdom here attributed to them is human wisdom 
and not animal wisdom. 
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