The Human Side of Animals Part 1

The Human Side of Animals.

by Royal Dixon.

FOREWORD

_"And in the lion or the frog-- In all the life of moor or fen-- In a.s.s and peac.o.c.k, stork and dog, He read similitudes of men."_

More and more science is being taught in a new way. More and more men are beginning to discard the lumber of the brain's workshop to get at real facts, real conclusions. Laboratories, experiments, tables, cla.s.sifications are all very vital and all very necessary but sometimes their net result is only to befog and confuse. Occasionally it becomes important for us to cast aside all dogmatic restraints and approach the wonders of life from a new angle and with the untrammelled spirit of a little child.

In this book I have attempted to bring together many old and new observations which tend to show the human-like qualities of animals. The treatment is neither formal nor scholastic, in fact I do not always remain within the logical confines of the t.i.tle. My sole purpose is to make the reader self-active, observative, free from hide-bound prejudice, and reborn as a partic.i.p.ant in the wonderful experiences of life which fill the universe. I hope to lead him into a new wonderland of truth, beauty and love, a land where his heart as well as his eyes will be opened.

In attempting to understand the animals I have used a method a great deal like that of the village boy, who when questioned as to how he located the stray horse for which a reward of twenty dollars had been offered, replied, "I just thought what I would do if I were a horse and where I would go--and there I went and found him." In some such way I have tried to think why animals do certain things, I have studied them in many places and under all conditions, and those acts of theirs which, if performed by children, would come under the head of wisdom and intelligence, I have cla.s.sified as such.

Life is one throughout. The love that fills a mother's heart when she sees her first-born babe, is also felt by the mother bear, only in a different way, when she sees her baby cubs playing before her humble cave dwelling. The sorrow that is felt by the human heart when a beloved one dies is experienced in only a little less degree by an African ape when his mate is shot dead by a Christian missionary. The grandmother sheep that watches her numerous little lamb grandchildren on the hillside, while their mothers are away grazing, is just as mindful of their care as any human grandparent could be. One drop of water is like the ocean; and love is love.

The trouble with science is that too often it leaves out love. If you agree that we cannot treat men like machines, why should we put animals in that cla.s.s? Why should we fall into the colossal ignorance and conceit of cataloging every human-like action of animals under the word "instinct"? Man delights in thinking of himself as only a little lower than the angels. Then why should he not consider the animals as only a little lower than himself? The poet has truly said that "the beast is the mirror of man as man is the mirror of G.o.d." Man had to battle with animals for untold ages before he domesticated and made servants of them. He is just beginning to learn that they were not created solely to furnish material for sermons, nor to serve mankind, but that they also have an existence, a life of their own.

Man has long preached this doctrine that he is not an animal, but a kinsman of the G.o.ds. For this reason, he has claimed dominion over animal creation and a right to a.s.sert that dominion without restraint.

This anthropocentric conceit is the same thing that causes one nation to think it should rule the world, that the sun and moon were made only for the laudable purpose of giving light unto a chosen few, and that young lambs playing on a gra.s.sy hillside, near a cool spring, are just so much mutton allowed to wander over man's domain until its flavour is improved.

It is time to remove the barriers, once believed impa.s.sable, which man's egotism has used as a screen to separate him from his lower brothers.

Our physical bodies are very similar to theirs except that ours are almost always much inferior. Merely because we have a superior intellect which enables us to rule and enslave the animals, shall we deny them all intellect and all feeling? In the words of that remarkable naturalist, William J. Long, "To call a thing intelligence in one creature and reflex action in another, or to speak of the same thing as love or kindness in one and blind impulse in the other, is to be blinder ourselves than the impulse which is supposed to govern animals. Until, therefore, we have some new chemistry that will ignore atoms and the atomic law, and some new psychology that ignores animal intelligence altogether, or regards it as under a radically different law from our own, we must apply what we know of ourselves and our own motives to the smaller and weaker lives that are in some distant way akin to our own."

It is possible to explain away all the marvellous things the animals do, but after you have finished, there will still remain something over and above, which quite defies all mechanistic interpretation. An old war horse, for instance, lives over and over his battles in his dreams. He neighs and paws, just as he did in real battle; and cavalrymen tell us that they can sometimes understand from their horses when they are dreaming just what command they are trying to obey. This is only one of the myriads of animal phenomena which man does not understand. If you doubt it, try to explain the striking phenomena of luminescence, hybridization, of eels surviving desiccation for fourteen years, post-matrimonial cannibalism, Nature's vast chain of unities, the suicide of lemmings, why water animals cannot get wet, transparency of animals, why the horned toad shoots a stream of blood from his eye when angry. If you are able to explain these things to humanity, you will be cla.s.sed second only to Solomon. Yet the average scientist explains them away, with the ignorance and loquaciousness of a fisher hag.

By a thorough application of psychological principles, it is possible to show that man himself is merely a machine to be explained in terms of neurones and nervous impulses, heredity and environment and reactions to outside stimuli. But who is there who does not believe that there is more to a man than that?

Animals have demonstrated long ago that they not only have as many talents as human beings, but that under the influence of the same environment, they form the same kinds of combinations to defend themselves against enemies; to shelter themselves against heat and cold; to build homes; to lay up a supply of food for the hard seasons. In fact, all through the ages man has been imitating the animals in burrowing through the earth, penetrating the waters, and now, at last, flying through the air.

When a skunk bites through the brains of frogs, paralysing but not killing them, in order that he may store them away in his nursery-pantry so that his babes may have fresh food; when a mole decapitates earth-worms for the same reason and stores them near the cold surface of the ground so that the heads will not regrow, as they would under normal conditions, only a deeply prejudiced man can claim that no elements of intelligence have been employed.

There are also numerous signs, sounds and motions by which animals communicate with each other, though to man these symbols of language may not always be understandable. Dogs give barks indicating surprise, pleasure and all other emotions. Cows will bellow for days when mourning for their dead. The mother bear will bury her dead cub and silently guard its grave for weeks to prevent its being desecrated. The mother sheep will bleat most pitifully when her lamb strays away. Foxes utter expressive cries which their children know full well. The chamois, when frightened, whistle; they might be termed the policemen of the animal world. The sentinel will continue a long, drawn-out whistle, as long as he can without taking a breath. He then stops for a brief moment, looks in all directions, and begins blowing again. If the danger comes too near, he scampers away.

In their ability to take care of their wounded bodies, in their reading of the weather and in all forms of woodcraft, animals undoubtedly possess superhuman powers. Even squirrels can prophesy an unusually long and severe winter and thus make adequate preparations. Some animals act as both barometers and thermometers. It is claimed that while frogs remain yellow, only fair weather may be expected, but if their colour changes to brown, ill weather is coming.

There is no limit to the marvellous things animals do. Elephants, for example, carry leafy palms in their trunks to shade themselves from the hot sun. The ape or baboon who puts a stone in the open oyster to prevent it from closing, or lifts stones to crack nuts, or beats his fellows with sticks, or throws heavy cocoanuts from trees upon his enemies, or builds a fire in the forest, shows more than a glimmer of intelligence. In the sly fox that puts out fish heads to bait hawks, or suddenly plunges in the water and immerses himself to escape hunters, or holds a branch of a bush over his head and actually runs with it to hide himself; in the wolverine who catches deer by dropping moss, and suddenly springing upon them and clawing their eyes out; in the bear, who, as told in the account of Cook's third voyage, "rolls down pieces of rock to crush stags; in the rat when he leads his blind brother with a stick" is actual reasoning. Indeed, there is nothing which man makes with all his ingenious use of tools and instruments, of which some suggestion may not be seen in animal creation.

Great thinkers of all ages are not wanting who believe that animals have a portion of that same reason which is the pride of man. Montaigne admitted that they had both thought and reason, and Pope believed that even a cat may consider a man made for his service. Humboldt, Helvitius, Darwin and Smellie claimed that animals act as a definite result of actual reasoning. Lord Brougham pertinently observes, "I know not why so much unwillingness should be shown by some excellent philosophers to allow intelligent faculties and a share of reason to the lower animals, as if our own superiority was not quite sufficiently established to leave all jealousy out of view by the immeasurably higher place which we occupy in the scale of being."

From the facts enumerated in this book I find that animals are possessed of love, hate, joy, grief, courage, revenge, pain, pleasure, want and satisfaction--that all things that go to make up man's life are also found in them. In the attempt to establish this thesis I have been led mentally and physically into some of Nature's most fascinating highways and hedges, where I have had many occasions to wonder and adore. I will be happy if I have at least added something to the depth of love and appreciation with which most men look upon the animal world.

ROYAL DIXON.

New York, April, 1918.

THE HUMAN SIDE OF ANIMALS

I

ANIMALS THAT PRACTISE CAMOUFLAGE

_"She was a gordian shape of dazzling line, Vermilion-spotted, golden, green and blue; Striped like a zebra, freckled like a pard, Eyed like a peac.o.c.k, and all crimson barr'd, And full of silver moons, that, as she breathed, Dissolved, or brighter shone, or interwreathed Their l.u.s.tres with the glorious tapestries...."_

--KEATS (_on Lamia, the snake_).

The art of concealment or camouflage is one of the newest and most highly developed techniques of modern warfare. But the animals have been masters of it for ages. The lives of most of them are pa.s.sed in constant conflict. Those which have enemies from which they cannot escape by rapidity of motion must be able to hide or disguise themselves. Those which hunt for a living must be able to approach their prey without unnecessary noise or attention to themselves. It is very remarkable how Nature helps the wild creatures to disguise themselves by colouring them with various shades and tints best calculated to enable them to escape enemies or to entrap prey.

The animals of each locality are usually coloured according to their habitat, but good reasons make some exceptions advisable. Many of the most striking examples of this protective resemblance among animals are the result of their very intimate a.s.sociation with the surrounding flora and natural scenery. There is no part of a tree, including flowers, fruits, bark and roots, that is not in some way copied and imitated by these clever creatures. Often this imitation is astonishing in its faithfulness of detail. Bunches of cocoanuts are portrayed by sleeping monkeys, while even the leaves are copied by certain tree-toads, and many flowers are represented by monkeys and lizards. The winding roots of huge trees are copied by snakes that twist themselves together at the foot of the tree.

In the art of camouflage--an art which affects the form, colour, and att.i.tude of animals--Nature has worked along two different roads. One is easy and direct, the other circuitous and difficult. The easy way is that of protective resemblance pure and simple, where the animal's colour, form, or att.i.tude becomes like that of its habitat. In which case the animal becomes one with its environment and thus is enabled to go about unnoticed by its enemies or by its prey. The other way is that of bluff, and it includes all inoffensive animals which are capable of a.s.suming att.i.tudes and colours that terrify and frighten. The colours in some cases are really of warning pattern, yet they cannot be considered mimetic unless they are thought to resemble the patterns of some extinct model of which we know nothing; and since they are not found in present-day animals with unpleasant qualities, they are not, strictly speaking, warning colours.

Desert animals are in most cases desert-coloured. The lion, for example, is almost invisible when crouched among the rocks and streams of the African wastes. Antelopes are tinted like the landscape over which they roam, while the camel seems actually to blend with the desert sands. The kangaroos of Australia at a little distance seem to disappear into the soil of their respective localities, while the cat of the Pampas accurately reflects his surroundings in his fur.

The tiger is made so invisible by his wonderful colour that, when he crouches in the bright sunlight amid the tall brown gra.s.s, it is almost impossible to see him. But the zebra and the giraffe are the kings of all camouflagers! So deceptive are the large blotch-spots of the giraffe and his weird head and horns, like scrubby limbs, that his concealment is perfect. Even the cleverest natives often mistake a herd of giraffes for a clump of trees. The camouflage of zebras is equally deceptive.

Drummond says that he once found himself in a forest, looking at what he thought to be a lone zebra, when to his astonishment he suddenly realised that he was facing an entire herd which were invisible until they became frightened and moved. Evidently the zebra is well aware that the black-and-white stripes of his coat take away the sense of solid body, and that the two colours blend into a light gray, and thus at close range the effect is that of rays of sunlight pa.s.sing through bushes.

The arctic animals, with few exceptions, are remarkable for imitating their surroundings; their colour of white blends perfectly with the snow around them. The polar bear is the only white bear, and his home is always among the snow and ice. The arctic fox, alpine hare, and ermine change to white in winter only, because during the other seasons white would be too conspicuous. The American arctic hare is always white because he always lives among the white expanses of the Far North. Both foxes and stoats are carnivorous and feed upon ptarmigan and hares, and they must be protectively coloured that they may catch their prey. On the other hand, Nature aids the prey by providing them with colours that enable them to escape the attention of their enemies.

The young of many of the arctic animals are covered with fluffy white hair, so that while they are too young to swim they may lie with safety upon the ground and escape the attention of polar bears; but in the antarctic regions, where there are few enemies to fear, the young seals, for instance, are exactly the colour of their parents.

The most remarkable exception of mimetic colouring among the animals of the polar regions is the sable. Throughout the long Siberian winter he retains his coat of rich brown fur. His habits, however, are such that he does not need the protection of colour, for he is so active that he can easily catch wild birds, and he can also subsist upon wild berries.

The woodchuck of North America retains his coat of dark-brown fur throughout the long, cold winters. The matter of his obtaining food, however, is easy, for he lives in burrows, near streams where he can catch fish and small animals that live in or near the water.

A number of the old-school naturalists believed that when an animal's colouring a.s.sumed the snowy-white coat of its arctic surroundings, this was due to the natural tendency on the part of its hair and fur to a.s.sume the colourings and tints of their habitat. This, however, is absolutely false; and no better proof of it can be offered than the case of the arctic musk-ox, who is far more polar in his haunts than even the polar bear, and is therefore exposed to the whitening influence of the wintry regions more than the bear. Yet he never turns white, but is always brown. The only enemy of this northern-dweller is the arctic wolf, and against this enemy he is protected by powerful hoofs, thick hair, and immense horns. He does not need to conceal himself, and therefore does not simulate the colour of his surroundings.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _American Museum of Natural History, New York_

THE INDIANS CLAIM THAT THE MOTHER BISON FORCED HER CALF TO ROLL OFTEN IN A PUDDLE OF RED CLAY, SO THAT IT MIGHT BE INDISTINGUISHABLE AGAINST ITS RED CLAY BACKGROUND.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _American Museum of Natural History, New York_

THE ZEBRA IS ONE OF THE CLEVEREST OF CAMOUFLAGERS. THE BLACK-AND-WHITE STRIPES OF HIS BODY GIVE THE EFFECT OF SUNLIGHT Pa.s.sING THROUGH BUSHES.]

Mimetic resemblances are worked out with great difficulty, except in such cases as the nocturnal animals, which simply become one with their surroundings. Mice, rats, moles, and bats wear overcoats that are very inconspicuous, and when suddenly approached they appear almost invisible. Some of the North American Indians claimed that buffaloes made their calves wallow in the red clay to prevent them from being seen when they were lying down in the red soil.

The kinds of protection from these mimetic resemblances are many and varied: the lion, because of his sandy-colouring, is able to conceal himself by merely crouching down upon the desert sands; the striped tiger hides among the tufts of gra.s.s and bamboos of the tropics, the stripes of his body so blending with the vertical stems as to prevent even the natives from seeing him in this position. The kudu, one of the handsomest of the antelopes, is a remarkable animal in several ways. His camouflage is so perfect that it gives him magnificent courage. With his spiral horns, white face, and striped coat tinted in pale blue, he is almost invisible when hiding in a thicket. The perfect harmony of his horns with the twisted vines and branches, and the white colourings with blue tints in the reflected sunlight conceal him entirely.

The snow-leopard, which inhabits Central Asia, is stony-grey, with large annular spots to match the rocks among which he lives. This colouration conceals him from the sheep, upon which he preys; while the spotted and blotchy pattern of the so-called clouded tiger, and the peculiarly-barred skin of the ocelot, imitate the rugged bark of trees, upon which these animals live.

One of the most unusual and skilled mimics is the Indian sloth, whose colour pattern and unique eclipsing effects seem almost incredible to those unfamiliar with the real facts. His home is in the trees, and he has a deep, orange-coloured spot on his back, which would make him very conspicuous if seen out of his home surroundings. But he is very clever, and clings to the moss-draped trees, where the effect of the orange-coloured spot is exactly like the scar on the tree, while his hair resembles the withered moss so strikingly that even naturalists are deceived.