SCIENTIFIC CURIOS I VIES. 
> 53 - 
SCIENTIFIC CURIOSITIES. 
Under the above headinof, M, Henri de Parville writes as 
follows in the Independance Beige : — - 
Animal Understanding. 
NIMALS are decidedly so intelligent that it frightens me 
sometimes. An observer, very clear and precise, that 
I know well, sends me two fresh proofs of the intelli- 
gence of animals ; they are most curious, and, if they 
did not come from him, I should doubt their authenticity. 
Here are the facts : — 
My attention was often drawn, he writes, during a stay in the 
country of some months, to a cow lying upon the grass ; multi- 
tudes of flies wandered over her nostrils and the balls of her 
eyes. Now, a fowl came always at the right time, the same one 
every day ; she mounted upon the head of the cow and passed 
hours in picking from the eyes and nose the importunate flies. 
The cow and the fowl here found evidently each their reward ; 
the cow allowed this, without fear of the pecks of the beak, and 
the fowl installed itself there quite at home without the least 
fear. How did this little arrangement originate ? Was it the 
cow who devised this means of ridding herself of the flies ? 
Was it the fowl that started the idea ? Do animals possess a 
special language ? How do they make themselves understood ? 
It is always the fowl that comes during these months to the help 
of its large neighbour of the cow-shed. One has always need 
of someone smaller than one’s self. 
The second observation of my correspondent : — 
There was. said he, at the Luxembourg, in the interior court, 
when the prefecture of the Seine, afterwards the Commune, 
occupied the premises now devoted to the Senate, a cage in 
which a parrot strutted about. One day I noticed a sparrow, 
who perched on top of the cage. Straightway the parrot 
mounted slowly from perch to perch, then he placed his head 
against the top of the cage. The sparrow thrust his beak 
through the bars and set to work to scratch gently the head of 
his friend. When the parrot had had enough of this, he 
descended again gravely from perch to perch, and the sparrow 
received the reward for service rendered. The parrot, with his 
claw, pushed the scattered grains close to the bars and the bird 
took them one by one, enchanted with the good windfall. Is it 
chance which has presided over these complex operations ? 
Evidently not, they are too well connected. There was an 
amiable convention between the two birds, and a reciprocal 
loyalty in the execution of an engagement. These little beings 
have evidently, adds my correspondent, equally with human 
beings, intelligence, and with them are examples of honesty in 
their transactions which may well be always followed. 
Apropos of foretelling the weather, many agriculturists admit 
