462 
ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE. 
on coming to sinuosities in the coast-line, they spon- 
taneously leave the beaten track and strike out so as 
to 6 cut across the windings by going straight from point 
to point’ of land. This is frequently done even when 
the leading dog ‘ could not see the whole winding of the 
beaten track; he seemed to reason that the route must 
lead around the headlands, and that he could economise 
travel by cutting across.’ 
It will be remembered in connection with these dogs, 
that Mr. Darwin in the 6 Descent of Man ’ (p. 75) quotes 
Dr. Hayes, who, in his work on c The Open Polar Sea,’ 
i repeatedly remarks that his dogs, instead of continuing 
to draw the sledges in a compact body, diverged and 
separated when they came to thin ice, so that their weight 
might be more evenly [and widely] distributed. This was 
often the first warning which the travellers received that 
the ice was becoming thin and dangerous.’ Mr. Darwin 
remarks, 6 This instinct may possibly have arisen since the 
time, long ago, when dogs were first employed by the 
natives in drawing their sledges ; or the Arctic wolves, 
the parent stock of the Esquimaux dog, may have ac- 
quired an instinct, impelling them not to attack their 
prey in a close pack when on thin ice.’ 
Mrs. Horn writes me : — 
One morning, soon after his usual time for starting, I saw 
the dog looking anxiously about, evidently afraid that my 
brother had gone without him. He looked into the room 
where we had breakfasted, but my brother was not there. He 
went up two or three stairs, and listened attentively. Then, 
to my astonishment, he came down, and going to the hat-stand 
in the hall, stood on his hind legs and sniffed at the great-coats 
hanging there, undoubtedly trying to ascertain whether my 
brother’s coat was there or not. 
Another correspondent (Mr. Westlecombe) writes : — 
My cat had kittens, of which two were preserved, the rest 
being drowned. The dog tolerated the two kittens, but did not 
care about them with any friendship. When the kittens were 
a few weeks old, I — finding that I could get but one of them 
off my hands — determined to kill the other, and, as the quickest 
mode of death, to shoot it by a pistol close behind its head. The 
