WHAT DO ANIMALS KNOW? 



lias a chapter entitled "Animal Materia Medica." 

 The writer, to make out his case, is forced to treat 

 as medicine the salt which the herbivorous animals 

 eat, and the sand and gravel which grain and nut- 

 eating birds take into their gizzards to act as mill- 

 stones to grind their grist. He might as well treat 

 their food as medicine and be done with it. So far 

 as I know, animals have no remedies whatever for 

 their ailments. Even savages have, for the most 

 part, only "fake" medicines. 



A Frenchman has published a book, which has 

 been translated into English, on the " Industries of 

 Animals." Some of these Frenchmen could give 

 points even to our "Modern School of Nature 

 Study." It may be remembered that Michelet said 

 the bird floated, and that it could puff itself up so 

 that it was lighter than the air ! Not a little contem- 

 porary natural science can beat the bird in this 

 respect. 



The serious student of nature can have no interest 

 in belittling or in exaggerating the intelligence of 

 animals. What he wants is the truth about them, 

 and this he will not get from our natural history 

 romancers, nor from the casual, untrained observers, 

 who are sure to interpret the lives of the wood-folk 

 in terms of their own motives and experiences, nor 

 from Indians, trappers, or backwoodsmen, who give 

 such free rein to their fancies and superstitions. 



Such a book as Romanes's " Animal Intelligence " 

 147 



