THE SPEECH AND REASON OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS.

Dash and the Baby—Two Collies talk—Eunice understands her Mistress—Two Dogs and the Phonograph—A Canine Family—Cats and Dogs—Insects—Signs and Sounds.

To those who are familiar with rural life, there can be nothing strange in hearing it said that all animals can talk among their kind. Among the daily incidents of farm life, there occur so many proofs of this as to place the question beyond debate. The cattle have means of conveying ideas to other cattle, and sheep and hogs understand other sheep and hogs, and the means employed are sounds. These sounds are used in the same way that man uses them to convey his thoughts, and since they discharge all the functions of speech, in what respect are they not speech? The types of speech differ in different genera, as their physical types do, but they are not any the less speech on that account. Among the domestic animals, I think the dog has, perhaps, the highest type of speech; and this is doubtless, in some measure, due to his intimate relations with man, from whom he has learned and added a little to his mental store, and this must find an outlet through speech. That dogs think and reason is not to be doubted by the most stupid observer, and they often make known their thoughts so that even man can interpret them with certainty; but the speech by which they express those thoughts is of course rudimentary. Dogs often discharge certain duties with such promptness that bigots declare that it is mechanical and done without motive, but there are many thousands of cases where the dog has assumed and performed duties of others, entirely outside of his own sphere, which nothing but reason could have prompted.

When I was only a few weeks old, my father had given to him a little white poodle, which he called Dash. He was about my own age, and we grew up together. In those days, children were rocked in the old-time cradle, and I, like other babies, had a cradle. When I was a few months old, on one occasion I was left asleep in my cradle, and no one was in the room but Dash and myself. Having been disturbed in my sleep, I woke up and cried, and Dash, seeing the condition of things, came to the cradle, and, rearing on his hind feet, rocked it with his paws, and whined and barked until I had gone to sleep again. My mother has often told me of this, and assured me that he had never been taught to do this, but always after practised it, not only with myself, but with my younger brothers and sisters, until, at the age of thirteen, he came to an untimely death at the hands of a bull-dog, whose name and tribe I have never ceased to hate. I gave Dash the burial that he deserved, and had a long procession of mourning children follow his remains to the grave, where I delivered the funeral sermon, and we all sung a hymn. About three years ago, in company with an older sister, I visited the spot for the first time in nearly thirty years, but no sign of the little grave remained.

What else but reason could have prompted this act? The dog had seen it done by human beings, and had noted the result. Whether his whining was intended as singing or not, I am unable to say, but from my recollection of seeing him do this with the younger children, I believe that it was intended to soothe or entertain, and his barking to call some one into the room.

A farmer by the name of Taylor, living in East Tennessee, some years ago owned two very fine collies, and they had been trained to drive the cattle and sheep about the farm, to drive strange cattle away from the premises, to guard the gates or gaps opened temporarily for hauling about the farm, and many similar duties. On one occasion, in haymaking time, as night was approaching, the waggon made its last homeward trip for the day, and the men working in the meadow prepared to go home. The driver of the waggon, supposing the men from the meadow were following and would close the gates, left them open, and one of these was between the corn-field and a pasture containing a number of cattle. The men, however, did not follow the waggon, but took a near way across the field, and the gate was left open. While the family was at supper, one of the collies was restless and barked continually, and gave such signs of uneasiness as to assure all that something was wrong. His master went to the door, and the dog ran to the gate in the front of the house, and continued barking and lashing his tail with great energy. The master followed to the front gate, and the dog immediately ran barking down the road, but looking back from time to time to see that his master followed, which he did, and was thus led to the open gate, where he found the other collie on guard and keeping the cattle from passing, which they were trying to do. What less than reason could have prompted these dogs to such an act? And what less than speech could have enabled them to execute this feat? They observed the neglect or error of the driver, and foresaw the evil consequences, and it could only have been by agreement reached through an interchange of thoughts that one of them watched while the other gave the alarm. I have known some of these dogs that knew certain cattle by name, and would go into the herd and drive out the one whose name was designated, while it is true in other cases that the dog would only drive out such as were pointed out to him. But many instances proved that they are able to learn the names of the cattle. It is certain that in many instances dogs know the names of the children belonging to the family, and often distinguish them by name. I presume no one doubts that they learn their own names, so that each dog may know when he is called. I know a dog, now living near Leominster, Mass., that extinguished an accidental fire which had been caused by the hired man carelessly dropping a burning match in some straw in the barn-yard after lighting his lantern. The dog had to fight the fire with his paws, and by the time he had extinguished it they were much singed. His loud barking was sufficient to warn the family that something unusual was taking place. They soon responded to his call, and found that he had the fire quite under control. He had thus saved his master's barn and house from the flames, and since that time, as I have witnessed myself, will not allow any one to light a cigar with a match in his presence. The peculiar sound which he makes under such circumstances appeals to the sense of fear or apprehension, and I have observed that the significance of all speech depends much upon intonation. It is less so with man, perhaps, than with other animals, because of the great number of words which amplify and shade his meanings. But by a single word of human speech we can express many shades of meaning simply by modulation; but having at our command so many words to qualify our meaning, we lose sight of the value and power of intonation. The difficulty of discerning the delicate shades of meaning imparted by intonation, depends upon the mode of thought, and the simpler this is the keener the power to interpret inflections. One very important fact is that a dog only learns to interpret one sound on one subject at any one time. He cannot put together in his mind a great number of sounds, nor interpret complex ideas in detail. I know a dog in Charleston, South Carolina, that would fly into a rage and bark fiercely if you say, "Chad, where is that big black dog that whipped you so badly?" But repeated experiments proved to my mind that the dog did not interpret any part of the sentence except the words "black dog," and even this seemed to depend chiefly upon the sound "black," and by saying this sound you would get the same results as to use the entire sentence. He had been whipped by a dog of this description, and had been so often reminded of it that he had associated the sound with the incident.

I know a little dog in New York that understands the same sound in a similar way and for similar reasons. She also recognises the name of the lady who owns the black dog. A family, with whom I am on close terms of friendship, owns an ugly little mongrel, to which two of the daughters are very devoted. They have reared her with great care, and lavished upon her many luxuries, far better than most human beings enjoy. The young ladies declared to me that Eunice (which is the dog's name) could understand every word they said on any subject that she had been accustomed to hear.

Mattie would say to her, "Eunice, go tell Miss Kate to get on her hat and let us go take a walk." The little dog would run to Miss Kate's room and bark and jump until the young lady would comply. I found that the dog associated the sounds "hat" and "walk" with the act of taking a stroll in the company of the young ladies; but she would act just the same when either one of these words were said to her as she would if one were to repeat a whole canto of Milton; and I think the young ladies have never quite forgiven me for trying to prove to them that Eunice was not a fine English scholar.

I find, by means of many experiments, that much depends upon the manner of delivering these sounds; but that the animal is largely guided by the sound alone is proven by the fact that some dogs understand English, others French, German, or some other language, and they do not really understand unless addressed in the speech with which they are familiar.

A short time since I tried a novel experiment with the phonograph and two black-and-tan terriers, mother and son. The son was a notorious talker in the way of barking almost continuously at everything, and on all occasions and at all times, while the mother was naturally taciturn, good-natured, and fairly intelligent. I first took the son to a room where I had the phonograph, and I made a record of a number of sounds of his voice. The children aided me in the experiment by getting him to talk for food, bark at his image in the mirror, and by various other ways they induced him to other sounds in the presence of the phonograph. A few days later I had them bring the mother to the same place, where I discharged the contents of my phonograph cylinder in her presence. She gave every evidence of recognising the sounds of the young dog, and in a few instances responded to them. She was naturally perplexed at not being able to find him, and searched the horn and various parts of the room in quest of the young dog. I delivered to her at the same time the record of another dog, to which she paid little attention except by an occasional growl and a look into the horn to see what it meant. She evidently recognised the sounds of the young dog with which she was familiar and seemed to interpret their meanings, whereas the sounds from the other cylinder did little more than attract her attention.

Last summer I stopped at a small town in Northern Virginia. A young man at the same hotel had two setters and a black-and-tan terrier. I experimented extensively with these three dogs during my stay, and deduced therefrom some conclusions which were inevitable. The hotel verandah opened on the street, and was a place of resort for gentlemen of leisure about town. There was also a side entrance through a large yard. I have frequently observed the dogs lying asleep on the verandah, when the owner would enter the side yard on a flagstone walk, often in the midst of conversation of a dozen men. The terrier would recognise the footsteps of his master, would utter a low sound and spring to his feet, and rush at once in the direction whence he heard the steps. The setters invariably seemed to know what it meant, would raise their heads, lash their tails upon the floor, showing evident signs of understanding the situation. I have seen this terrier recognise the steps of his master when the latter was accompanied by two or three other persons. The delicate precision of his hearing was marvellous, and in no instance, so far as I observed, was he deceived in the approaching footsteps. I cannot believe that he was guided by the sense of smell, as it is evident that the setters, whose habits of hunting have developed in them a much more sensitive olfactory power, would naturally have been the first to have detected their master's approach, and yet it was equally evident that the terrier's ears were the first to catch the sounds.

I have observed among dogs associated with each other that where one should bark in the distance, as though he had something at bay, his companion, hearing him from the house, would prick up his ears, listen for a moment, and then dash off in the direction from whence the sounds came; whereas the bark of a strange dog, even having something at bay, would only cause him to listen, utter a low sound or grunt, and lie down again and take a nap, as much as to say "That's nothing to me!" I have known many instances where dogs would follow the farm waggon to town, and faithfully guard the waggon and its contents all day long, with a fidelity that we seldom see in the most devoted servants. The attachment of a dog to his master has been a subject of remark from time immemorial, until the saying has crystallised into a maxim—"As faithful as a watch-dog." A friend of mine had a little terrier, whose name was Nicodemus, that had a habit of sitting in the kitchen window to watch people pass the street. She assures me that on washdays, when the steam condensed on the window-panes, Nicodemus would lick the moisture from the glass in order to see through it more clearly. Could instinct be the guide in such an act?

If man would only pause and calmly view the facts, he would find that he is but a joint heir of Nature; and why not so? From a religious point of view I cannot doubt that the wisdom and mercy of God would bestow alike on all the faculties of speech and reason as their conditions of life require them, and from a scientific point of view I cannot charge the laws of evolution with such disorder. In either case it were a harsh and jarring discord in the great harp of Nature, whether played by the hand of Chance or swept by the fingers of Omniscience.

Printed by Ballatyne Hanson & Co.
London and Edinburgh

MR. WILLIAM HEINEMANN'S LIST.