Somewhat farther there is a curl upon the water, not constant, but coming every few seconds in obedience to the increase or decrease of the volume of the stream, which there meets with some slight obstacle out of sight. For, although the water appears level and unvarying, it really rises and sinks in ever so minute a degree with a rhythmic alternation. If you will lie down on the sward, you may sometimes see it by fixing a steady gaze upon the small circular cave where the gallery of a water-rat opens on this the Grand Canal of his Venice. Into it there rises now and again a gentle swell—barely perceptible—a faint pulse rising and falling. The stream is slightly fuller and stronger at one moment than another; and with each swell the curl, or tiny whirlpool, rotates above the hidden irregularity of the bottom. If you sit by the dam higher up the brook, and watch the arch of the cataract rolling over, it is perhaps more visible. Every now and then a check seems to stay the current momentarily: and at night, when it is perfectly still, listening to the murmur of the falling water from a distance. Under the apple-trees in the garden it runs a scale—now up, then down; each variation of volume changing the musical note. This faint undulation is more visible in some brooks than others.
A third mark is where a branch, as it was carried along, grounded on a shallow spot; and one mast, as it were, of the wreck protruding upwards, catches the stray weeds as they swim down and holds them. Thus, step by step, the mind of the man measures the distance, and assures him that it is a little beyond what he has hitherto attempted; yet will not extra exertion clear it?—for having once approached the brink, shame and the dislike of giving up pull him forward. He walks hastily twenty yards up the brook, then as many the other way, but discovers no more favourable spot; hesitates again; next carefully examines the tripping place, lest the turf, undermined, yield to the sudden pressure, as also the landing, for fear of falling back. Finally he retires a few yards, and pauses a second and runs. Even after the start, uncertain in mind and but half resolved, it is his own motion which impels the will, and he arrives on the opposite shore with a sense of surprise. Now comes the dog, and note his actions; contrast the two, and say which is instinct, which is mind.
The dog races to the bank—he has been hitherto hunting in a hedge and suddenly misses his master—and, like his lord, stops short on the brink. He has had but little experience in jumping as yet; water is not his natural element, and he pauses doubtfully. He looks across earnestly, sniffs the air as if to smell the distance, then whines in distress of mind. Presently he makes a movement to spring, checks it, and turns round as if looking for advice or encouragement. Next he runs back a short way as if about to give it up; returns, and cranes over the brink; after which he follows the bank up and down, barking in excitement, but always coming back to the original spot. The lines of his face, the straining eye, the voice that seems struggling to articulate in the throat, the attitude of the body, all convey the idea of intense desire which fear prevents him from translating into action. There is indecision—uncertainty—in the nervous grasp of the paws on the grass, in the quick short coursings to and fro. Would infallible instinct hesitate? He has no knowledge of yards, feet and inches—yet he is clearly trying to judge the distance. Finally, just as his master disappears through a gateway, the agony of his “mind” rises to the highest pitch. He advances to the very brink—he half springs, stays himself, his hinder paws slip down the steep bank, he partly loses his balance, and then makes a great leap, lights with a splash in mid-stream, and swims the remainder with ease. There is, at least, a singular coincidence in the outward actions of the two.
The gamekeeper, with dogs around him from morning till night, associated with them from childhood, has no doubts upon the matter whatever, but with characteristic decision is perfectly certain that they think and reason in the same way as human beings, though of course in a limited degree. Most of his class believe, likewise, in the reasoning power of the dog: so do shepherds; and so, too, the labourers who wait on and feed cattle are fully persuaded of their intelligence, which, however, in no way prevents them throwing the milking-stool at their heads when unruly. But the concession of reason is no guarantee against ill-usage, else the labourer’s wife would escape.
The keeper, without thinking it perhaps, affords a strong illustration of his own firm faith in the mind of the dog. His are taught their proper business thoroughly; but there it ends. “I never makes them learn no tricks,” says he, “because I don’t like to see ’em made fools of.” I have observed that almost all those whose labour lies in the field, and who go down to their business in the green meadows, admit the animal world to a share in the faculty of reason. It is the cabinet thinkers who construct a universe of automatons.
No better illustration of the two modes of observation can be found than in the scene of Goethe’s “Faust” where Faust and Wagner walking in the field are met by a strange dog. The first sees something more than a mere dog; he feels the presence of an intelligence within the outward semblance—in this case an evil intelligence, it is true, but still a something beyond mere tail and paws and ears. To Wagner it is a dog and nothing more—that will sit at the feet of his master and fawn on him if spoken to, who can be taught to fetch and carry or bring a stick; the end, however, proves different. So one mind sees the outside only; another projects itself into the mind of the creature, be it dog or horse or bird.
Experience certainly educates the dog as it does the man. After long acquaintance and practice in the field we learn the habits and ways of game—to know where it will or not be found. A young dog in the same way dashes swiftly up a hedge, and misses the rabbit that, hearing him coming, doubles back behind a tree or stole; an old dog leaves nothing behind him, searching every corner. This is acquired knowledge. Neither does all depend upon hereditary predisposition as exhibited in the various breeds—the setter, the pointer, the spaniel, or greyhound—and their especial drift of brain; their capacity is not wholly confined to one sphere. They possess an initiating power—what in man is called originality, invention, discovery: they make experiments.
I had a pointer that exhibited this faculty in a curious manner. She was weakly when young, and for that reason, together with other circumstances, was never properly trained: a fact that may perhaps have prevented her “mind” from congealing into the stolidity of routine. She became an outdoor pet, and followed at heel everywhere. One day some ponds were netted, and of the fish taken a few chanced to be placed in a great stone trough from which cattle drank in the yard—a common thing in the country. Some time afterwards, the trough being foul, the fish—they were roach, tench, perch, and one small jack—were removed to a shallow tub while it was being cleansed. In this tub, being scarcely a foot deep though broad, the fish were of course distinctly visible, and at once became an object of the most intense interest to the pointer. She would not leave it; but stood watching every motion of the fish, with her head now on one side now on the other. There she must have remained some hours, and was found at last in the act of removing them one by one and laying them softly, quite unhurt, on the grass.
I put them back into the water, and waited to see the result. She took a good look, and then plunged her nose right under the surface and half-way up the neck completely submerging the head, and in that position groped about on the bottom till a fish came in contact with her mouth and was instantly snatched out. Her head must have been under water each time nearly a minute, feeling for the fish. One by one she drew them out and placed them on the ground, till only the jack remained. He puzzled her, darting away swift as an arrow and seeming to anticipate the enemy. But after a time he, too, was captured.
They were not injured—not the mark of a tooth was to be seen—and swam as freely as ever when restored to the water. So soon as they were put in again the pointer recommenced her fishing, and could hardly be got away by force. The fish were purposely left in the tub. The next day she returned to the amusement, and soon became so dexterous as to pull a fish out almost the instant her nose went under water. The jack was always the most difficult to catch, but she managed to conquer him sooner or later. When returned to the trough, however, she was done—the water was too deep. Scarcely anything could be imagined apparently more opposite to the hereditary intelligence of a pointer than this; and certainly no one attempted to teach her, neither did she do it for food. It was an original motion of her own: to what can it be compared but mind proceeding by experiment? They can also adjust their conduct to circumstances, as when they take to hunting on their own account: they then generally work in couples.