14 
Canine Intelligence. 
[January 
peg upon which we hang those abstract qualities which by 
means of* words wo licivc lsols-tod* i*rr « 
But it may be said that, although their language differs 
from ours, animals, too, have their language,— lmperfefti 
is true, but still a language of their own -a means of com 
munication with their fellows; and this is perfedtly tr . 
It is true, too, that my dogs can understand much t ha 
sav to them— can understand my language. But all that a 
dog can communicate to his fellow— all that I can com ^’ 
niifate to my dog— is a sign which he has learnt to associate 
with certain feelings or with certain actions to be performed. 
The communication deals, too, with immediate feeling 
action ; its sphere is the here and the now. There can be 
no doubt that dogs associate with barking in certain tones 
special emotional states in their companions. . In fact it 
probable that dogs can in this way communicate to eacli 
other a wide range of states of feeling. But these states 
are present states, not states past or future ; they are 
own states, not the states of others. A dog can call hi 
companion’s attention to a worriable cat, or he may have 
his attention roused by my exclaiming “ Cat.” But no dog 
could tell his companion of the successful worry he had 
just enjoyed, or suggest that they should go out for a “ worry 
to-morrow morning. And here we. come upon what seems 
to me the faCt which raises man so immeasurably above the 
level of the brute. The brute has to be contented with the expe- 
rience he inherits or individually acquires. Man, through 
language shaken and written, profits by the experience of his 
fellows Even the most savage tribe has traditions extending 
back to the father’s father. And the civilised man— has he 
not in his libraries the recorded results of many centuries ot 
ever-widening experience and ever-deepening thought ? I hus 
it is that language has made us men ; by means ot language, 
and language alone, has human thought become possible. 
This it is which has placed so enormous a gap between the 
mind of man and the mind of the dog. _ Through language 
each human being becomes the inheritor of the accumu- 
lated thought and experience of the whole human race ; 
through language has the higher abstract thought become 
possible. . , 
Still the question remains, How far can we comprehend 
the nature of canine thought ? There is only one way, as 
it seems to me, of getting at any sort of answer to this 
question ; and that way is, by patiently and carefully con- 
sidering what is the nature of the subjects on which that 
thought is exercised. To get any accurate notion of our 
