Animal Intelligence Part 24

Mr. Pennant says that this snake (rattle-snake) will frequently lie at the bottom of a tree on which a squirrel is seated. He fixes his eyes on the animal, and from that moment it cannot escape; it begins a doleful outcry, which is so well known that a pa.s.ser-by, on hearing it, immediately knows that a snake is present. The squirrel runs up the tree a little way, comes down again, then goes up, and afterwards comes still lower. The snake continues at the bottom of the tree with its eyes fixed on the squirrel, and his attention is so entirely taken up, that a person accidentally approaching may make a considerable noise without so much as the snake turning about. The squirrel comes lower, and at last leaps down to the snake, whose mouth is already distended for its reception. Le Vaillant confirms this fascinating terror by a scene he witnessed. He saw on the branch of a tree a species of shrike, trembling as if in convulsions, and at the distance of nearly four feet, on another branch, a large snake that was lying with outstretched neck and fiery eyes, gazing steadily at the poor animal. The agony of the bird was so great that it was deprived of the power of moving away; and when one of the party killed the snake, it (_i.e._ the bird) was found dead upon the spot--and that entirely from fear; for, on examination, it appeared not to have received the slightest wound. The same traveller adds that a short time afterwards he observed a small mouse in similar agonising convulsions, about two yards from a snake, whose eyes were intently fixed upon it; and on frightening away the reptile, and taking up the mouse, it expired in his hand.[142]

Many other observations, more or less similar, might be quoted; but, on the other hand, Sir Joseph Fayrer tells me that 'fascination is only fright;' and this appears to be the opinion of all persons who have had the opportunity of looking into the subject in a scientific manner. The truth probably is that small animals are occasionally much alarmed by the sight of a snake looking at them, and as a consequence of this more easily fall a prey. In some cases, it is likely enough, strong terror so unnerves the animal as to make it behave in the manner which the witnesses describe; in making half-palsied efforts to escape, it may actually fall or draw nearer to the object of its dread. Perhaps, therefore, Dr. Barton, of Philadelphia, is a little too severe on previous observers when he says that--

The report of this fascinating property has had its rise in nothing more than the fears and cries of birds and other animals in the protection of their nests... .

The result of not a little attention has taught me that there is but one wonder in the business--the wonder that the story should ever have been believed by any man of understanding and observation.

But, be this as it may, it is certainly remarkable, as Sir J. Fayrer in his letter to me observes, 'how little fear some animals show until the moment that they are seized and struck.'

As for snake-charming, the facts seem to be that cobras and other serpents are attracted by the sound of a pipe to creep out of their hiding-places, when they are captured and tamed. It is certain that the fangs are not always drawn, and also that from the first moment of capture, before there has been time for any process of training, a real snake-charmer is able to make the reptile 'dance.' Thus, for instance, Sir E. Tennent publishes the following letter from Mr. Reyne. After describing all his precautions to ensure that the snake-charmer had no tamed snakes concealed about his person, Mr. Reyne proceeds to tell how he made the man accompany him to the jungle, where, attracted by the music of a pipe which the man played, a large cobra came from an ant-hill which Mr. Reyne knew it to occupy:--

On seeing the man it tried to escape, but he caught it by the tail and kept swinging it round until we reached the bungalow. He then made it dance, but before long it bit him above the knee. He immediately bandaged the leg above the bite and applied a snake-stone to the wound to extract the poison. He was in great pain for a few minutes, but after that it gradually went away, the stone falling off just before he was relieved.[143]

Thus the only remarkable thing about the charming of a freshly caught snake seems to be that the charmer is able to make the animal 'dance'--for the fact of the snake approaching the unfamiliar sound of music is not in itself any more remarkable than a fish approaching the unfamiliar sight of a lantern. It does not, however, appear that this dancing is anything more than some series of gestures or movements which may be merely the expressions, more or less natural, of uneasiness or alarm. Anything else that charmed snakes may do is probably the result of training; for there is no doubt that cobras admit of being tamed, and even domesticated. Thus, for instance, Major Skinner, writing to Sir E.

Tennent, says:--

In one family near Negombo, cobras are kept as protectors, in the place of dogs, by a wealthy man who has always large sums of money in his house. But this is not a solitary case of the kind... . The snakes glide about the house, a terror to the thieves, but never attempting to harm the inmates.[144]

Thus, on the whole, we may accept Dr. Davey's opinion--who had good opportunities for observation--that the snake-charmers control the cobras by working upon the well-known timidity and reluctance of these animals to use their fangs till they become virtually tame.

FOOTNOTES:

[130] _Account of the United States_, vol. ii., p. 9.

[131] April 11, 1870.

[132] See Bingley, _Animal Biography_, vol. ii., p. 406.

[133] Smiles, _Life of Edwards_, p. 124.

[134] _Pa.s.sions of Animals_, p. 229.

[135] _Naturalist on the Amazon_, pp. 285-6.

[136] _Ibid._ The astonishing facts relating to the migration of turtles in the laying season will be treated under the general heading 'Migration' in my forthcoming work.

[137] _Gleanings_, vol. i., pp. 163-4.

[138] The tortoise which has gained such immortal celebrity by having fallen under the observation of the author of the _Natural History of Selborne_, likewise distinguished persons in this way. For 'whenever the good old lady came in sight, who had waited on it for more than thirty years, it always hobbled with awkward alacrity towards its benefactress, whilst to strangers it was altogether inattentive.'

[139] This gentleman was Lord Arthur Russell.

[140] The _Times_, July 25, 1872.

[141] See _Annas. and Mag. of Nat. Hist._, 2nd series, vol. ix., p. 333.

[142] Thompson, _Pa.s.sions of Animals_, p. 118; see also Bingley, _Animal Biography_, vol. ii., pp. 447-8.

[143] _Natural History of Ceylon_, p. 314.

[144] Tennent, _loc. cit._, p. 299.

CHAPTER X.

BIRDS.

ADEQUATELY to treat of the intelligence of birds a separate volume would be required; here it must be enough to deal with this cla.s.s as I shall afterwards deal with the Mammalia--namely, by giving an outline sketch of the more prominent features of their psychology.

_Memory._

The memory of birds is well developed. Thus, although we are much in the dark on the whole subject of migration--so much so that I reserve its discussion with all the problems that this presents for a separate chapter in my next work--we may at least conclude that the return of the same pair of swallows every year to the same nest must be due to the animals remembering the precise locality of their nests. Again, Buckland gives an account of a pigeon which remembered the voice of its mistress after an absence of eighteen months;[145] but I have not been able to meet with satisfactory evidence of the memory of a bird enduring for a longer time than this.

As it is a matter of interest in comparative psychology to trace as far as possible into detail the similarities of a mental faculty as it occurs in different groups of animals, and as the faculty of memory first admits of detailed study in the cla.s.s which we are now considering, I shall here devote a paragraph to the facts concerning the exhibition of memory by birds where its mechanism best admits of being a.n.a.lysed; I refer to the learning of articulate phrases and tunes by talking and musical birds. The best observations in this connection with which I am acquainted are those of Dr. Samuel Wilks, F.R.S., and therefore I shall quote _in extenso_ the portion of his paper which refers to the memory of parrots: other portions of this paper I shall have occasion to quote in my next work:--

When my parrot first came into my possession, several years ago, it was quite unlettered, and I therefore had an opportunity of observing the mode in which it acquired the accomplishment of speech. I was very much struck with its manner of learning, and the causes for its speaking on special occasions. The first seemed to resemble very much the method of children in learning their lessons, and the second to be due to some a.s.sociation or suggestion--the usual provocative for set speeches at all periods of human life. A parrot is well known to imitate sounds in a most perfect manner, even to the tone of the voice, besides having a compa.s.s which no human being can approach, ranging from the gravest to the most acute note. My bird, though possessing a good vocabulary of words and sentences, can only retain them for a few months unless kept constantly in practice by the suggestive recurrence of some circ.u.mstance which causes their continual utterance. If forgotten, however, they are soon revived in the memory by again repeating them a few times, and much more speedily than any new sentence can be acquired. In beginning to teach the parrot a sentence, it has to be repeated many times, the bird all the while listening most attentively by turning the opening of the ear as close as possible to the speaker. After a few hours it is heard attempting to say the phrase, or, I should say, trying to learn it. It evidently has the phrase somewhere in store, for eventually this is uttered perfectly, but at first the attempts are very poor and ludicrous. If the sentence be composed of a few words, the first two or three are said over and over again, and then another and another word added, until the sentence is complete, the p.r.o.nunciation at first being very imperfect, and then becoming gradually more complete, until the task is accomplished. Thus hour after hour will the bird be indefatigably working at the sentence, and not until some days have elapsed will it be perfect. The mode of acquiring it seems to me exactly what I have observed in a child learning a French phrase; two or three words are constantly repeated, and then others added, until the whole is known, the p.r.o.nunciation becoming more perfect as the repet.i.tion goes on. I found also on whistling a popular air to my parrot that she picked it up in the same way, taking note by note until the whole twenty-five notes were complete. Then the mode of forgetting, or the way in which phrases and airs pa.s.s from its recollection, may be worth remarking. The last words or notes are first forgotten, so that soon the sentence remains unfinished or the air only half whistled through. The first words are the best fixed in the memory; these suggest others which stand next to them, and so on till the last, which have the least hold on the brain. These, however, as I have before mentioned, can be easily revived on repet.i.tion. This is also a very usual process in the human subject: for example, an Englishman speaking French will, in his own country, if no opportunity occur for conversation, apparently forget it; he no sooner, however, crosses the Channel and hears the language than it very soon comes back to him again. In trying to recall poems learned in childhood or in school days, although at that period hundreds of lines may have been known, it is found that in manhood we remember only the two or three first lines of the 'Iliad,' the 'aeneid,' or the 'Paradise Lost.'[146]

The following is communicated to me by Mr. Venn, of Cambridge, the well-known logician:--

I had a grey parrot, three or four years old, which had been taken from its nest in West Africa by those through whom I received it. It stood ordinarily by the window, where it could equally hear the front and back door bells. In the yard, by the back door, was a collie dog, who naturally barked violently at nearly all the comers that way. The parrot took to imitating the dog. After a time I was interested in observing the discriminative a.s.sociation between the back-door bell and the dog's bark in the parrot's mind. Even when the dog was not there, or for any other cause did not bark, the parrot would constantly bark when the back-door bell sounded, but never (that I could hear) when the front-door bell was heard.

This is but a trifle in the way of intelligence, but it struck me as an interesting a.n.a.logous case to a law of a.s.sociation often noticed by writers on human psychology.

The celebrated parrot that belonged to the Buffon family and of which the Comte de Buffon wrote, exhibited in a strange manner the a.s.sociation of its ideas. For he was frequently in the habit of asking himself for his own claw, and then never failed to comply with his own request by holding it out, in the same way as he did when asked for his claw by anybody else. This, however, probably arose, not, as Buffon or his sister Madame Nadault supposed, from the bird not knowing its own voice, but rather from the a.s.sociation between the words and the gesture.

According to Margrave, parrots sometimes chatter their phrases in their dreams, and this shows a striking similarity of psychical processes in the operations of memory with those which occur in ourselves.

Similarly, Mr. Walter Pollock, writes me of his own parrot:--

In this parrot the sense of a.s.sociation is very strongly developed. If one word picked up at a former home comes into its head, and is uttered by it, it immediately follows this word up with all the other words and phrases picked up at the same place and period.

Lastly, parrots not only remember, but recollect; that is to say, they know when there is a missing link in a train of a.s.sociation, and purposely endeavour to pick it up. Thus, for instance, the late Lady Napier told me an interesting series of observations on this point which she had made upon an intelligent parrot of her own. They were of this kind. Taking such a phrase as 'Old Dan Tucker,' the bird would remember the beginning and the end, and try to recollect the middle. For it would say very slowly, 'Old--old--old--old' (and then very quickly) 'Lucy Tucker.' Feeling that this was not right, it would try again as before, 'Old--old--old--old--old Bessy Tucker,' subst.i.tuting one word after another in the place of the sought-for word 'Dan.' And that the process was one of truly seeking for the desired word was proved by the fact that if, while the bird was saying, 'Old--old--old--old,' any one threw in the word 'Dan,' he immediately supplied the 'Tucker.'

_Emotions._

As regards emotions, it is among birds that we first meet with a conspicuous advance in the tenderer feelings of affection and sympathy.

Those relating to the s.e.xes and the care of progeny are in this cla.s.s proverbial for their intensity, offering, in fact, a favourite type for the poet and moralist. The pining of the 'love-bird' for its absent mate, and the keen distress of a hen on losing her chickens, furnish abundant evidence of vivid feelings of the kind in question. Even the stupid-looking ostrich has heart enough to die for love, as was the case with a male in the Rotund of the Jardin des Plantes in Paris, who, having lost his wife, pined rapidly away. It is remarkable that in some species--notably pigeons--conjugal fidelity should be so strongly marked; for this shows, not only what may be called a refinement of s.e.xual feeling, but also the presence of an abiding image in the mind's eye of the lover. For instance,--

Referring to the habits of the mandarin duck (a Chinese species) Mr. Bennett says that Mr. Beale's aviary afforded a singular corroboration of the fidelity of the birds in question. Of a pair in that gentleman's possession, the drake being one night purloined by some thieves, the unfortunate duck displayed the strongest marks of despair at her bereavement, retiring into a corner, and altogether neglecting food and drink, as well as the care of her person. In this condition she was courted by a drake who had lost his mate, but who met with no encouragement from the widow. On the stolen drake being subsequently recovered and restored to the aviary, the most extravagant demonstrations of joy were displayed by the fond couple; but this was not all, for, as if informed by his spouse of the gallant proposals made to her shortly before his arrival, the drake attacked the luckless bird who would have supplanted him, beat out his eyes, and inflicted so many injuries as to cause his death.[147]

Similarly, to give an instance or two with regard to other birds, Jesse states the following as his own observation:--

A pair of swans had been inseparable companions for three years, during which time they had reared three broods of cygnets; last autumn the male was killed, and since that time the female has separated herself from all society with her own species; and, though at the time I am writing (the end of March) the breeding season for swans has far advanced, she remains in the same state of seclusion, resisting the addresses of a male swan, who has been making advances towards forming an acquaintance with her, either driving him away, or flying from him whenever he comes near her.

How long she will continue in this state of widowhood I know not, but at present it is quite evident that she has not forgotten her former partner.