Chap. II. 
MENTAL POWEES. 
39 
exactly similar actions instinctively performed by the 
lower animals ; in this latter case the capacity of 
performing such actions having been gained, step by 
step, through the variability of the mental organs and 
natural selection, without any conscious intelligence on 
the part of the animal during each successive genera- 
tion. No doubt, as Mr. Wallace has argued , 5 much of 
the intelligent work done by man is due to imitation and 
not to reason ; but there is this great difference between 
his actions and many of those performed by the lower 
animals, namely, that man cannot, on his first trial, 
make, for instance, a stone hatchet or a canoe, through 
his power of imitation. He has to learn his work by 
practice ; a beaver, on the other hand, can make its dam 
or canal, and a bird its nest, as well, or nearly as well, 
the first time it tries, as when old and experienced. 
To return to our immediate subject : the lower 
animals, like man, manifestly feel pleasure and pain, 
happiness and misery. Happiness is never better exhi- 
bited than by young animals, such as puppies, kittens, 
lambs, &c,, when playing together, like our own children. 
Even insects play together, as has been described by 
that excellent observer, P. Huber , 6 who saw ants chasing 
and pretending to bite each other, like so many puppies. 
The fact that the lower animals are excited by the 
same emotions as ourselves is so well established, that 
it will not be necessary to weary the reader by many 
details. Terror acts in the same manner on them as on 
us, causing the muscles to tremble, the heart to pal- 
pitate, the sphincters to be relaxed, and the hair to 
stand on end. Suspicion, the offspring of fear, is emi- 
nently characteristic of most wild animals. Courage 
5 1 Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection/ 1870, p. 212. 
6 4 Eecherches sur les Mceurs des Fourmis,’ 1810, p. 173. 
