£18 
ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE. 
which he used to draw objects from nature, reversed on wood. 
The cat seeing her image in this glass made several attempts to 
investigate it, striking at it, &c. Then coming apparently to the 
conclusion that there was something between her and the other 
animal, she very slily and cautiously approached it, keeping her 
eye on it all the while, and struck her paw around behind the 
mirror, becoming seemingly much surprised at finding nothing 
there. This was done repeatedly, until she was at last convinced 
that it was beyond her comprehension, or she lost interest in. 
the matter. 
Mr. T. B. Groves communicates an almost precisely 
similar observation to 6 Nature’ (vol. xx., p. 291), of a cat 
which, on first seeing his own reflection in a mirror, tried 
to fight it. Meeting with resistance from the glass, the 
cat next ran behind the mirror. Not finding the object 
of his search, he again came to the front, and while keep- 
ing his eyes deliberately fixed on the image, felt round 
the edge of the glass with one paw, whilst with his head 
twisted round to the front he assured himself of the per- 
sistence of the reflection. He never afterwards conde- 
scended to notice a mirror. 
The following is communicated to me by a corre- 
spondent whose name I cannot obtain permission to pub- 
lish. I am sure, however, that it is communicated in 
good faith, and the incident can scarcely be supposed to 
have been due to accident. After describing the cat and 
the parrot in their amiable relationship, my correspondent 
proceeds i — 
One evening there was no one in the kitchen. Cook had 
gone upstairs, and left a bowl full of dough to rise by the fire. 
Shortly after, the cat rushed up after her, mewing, and making 
what signs she could for her to go down ; then she jumped up 
and seized her apron, and tried to drag her down. As she was 
in such a state of excitement cook went, and found ‘ Polly * 
shrieking, calling out, flapping her wings and struggling 
violently, 4 up to her knees ’ in dough, and stuck quite fast. 
No doubt if she had not been rescued she would have sunk 
in the morass and been smothered. 
I shall here introduce two or three cases to show the 
ingenious devices to which clever cats wall resort for the 
purpose of capturing prey. 
