6438 



Reason and Instinct. 



more highly developed ; and, at the same time, a gradual advance in 

 both particulars as we ascend from the lower to the higher members 

 of the class. And once more, in perfect analogy with what we have 

 advanced in speaking of fishes, we meet with stronger instinctive im- 

 pulse—stronger, that is, in the aggregate, or sum-total of instinct-in- 

 fluence — and correspondingly stronger developments of Intelligence. 

 It is a sufficiently well-known fact that toads and frogs, tortoises, 

 lizards and snakes* are all capable of domestication; and the mere 

 fact of susceptibility to such influences as are implied in the word 

 "domestication 1 ' at once invests those creatures to whom it can be 

 correctly applied, with something very distinct from, and much in ad- 

 vance of, mere Instinct. The domesticated creature evinces in such of 

 its actions, or series of actions, as give rise to the declaration that it is 

 domesticated, the presence of memory, of confidence, of attachment. 

 The confidence it manifests results, beyond doubt, from a process of 

 reasoning founded on continued experiences recorded by means of 

 memory, and becomes developed into personal attachment: and this, 

 altogether independent of the fact, that a certain course of training is 

 necessarily carried on, by which the domesticated creature is per- 

 manently affected in other ways besides those of its affections. And the 

 inevitable inferences, thus deduced from a portion of the history of the 

 reptile tribe, are sufficiently confirmed by a reference to the observed 

 habits and peculiarities of others of the tribe still in the state of nature, 

 and unsubjected to any influences beyond those which are, strictly 

 speaking, natural to them. For the purpose of illustrating this remark, 

 I must be content with a reference to observations made by Dr. Living- 

 stone on some of the habits of the alligator, and a brief notice of the 

 power of fascination undoubtedly possessed by many species of snakes. 

 The alligators not only, like the fish already noticed, manifest con- 

 siderable judgment in selecting favourable places as feeding-grounds, 

 but display evidences of careful design in their attempts to seize their 

 prey ; thus one of these reptiles, on one bank of a river, is observed to 



* I pass by without comment in the text the exaggerated idea of the craftiness 

 and so-called wisdom of the serpent, which seems to have prevailed universally in the 

 ancient world. Such expressions as " wise as serpents" are probably due to this idea 

 as their origin, as also the fabulous tales recorded by Pliny and others as to the 

 subtlety and astuteness of those creatures. I may observe also that whatever the 

 reputation of those creatnres for cunning or wisdom in these old myths, the enormous 

 magnitude and might, as commonly attributed to them in ancient fable or tradition, 

 is equally remarkable. Whence the origin of this popular and wide-spread impression 

 of the attributes of the serpent is a question opening an ample field for a most 

 interesting and instructive enquiry. 



