“Three things that mark the intelligence of the horse are shown by this incident,” remarked Mr. Graham. “In the first place, he had the sense to understand that his mate was in serious trouble; secondly, he knew his master could relieve him; and thirdly, he realized that he must exert all his strength to break his own rope, a thing he had never done before and never tried to do afterwards.”
Next Charley read a little incident which he said was written by Charles L. Edwards for the American Naturalist. It was in these words:
“While riding along a country road in the environs of Cincinnati, Ohio, about the first of last October, I noticed a remarkable and very amusing display of animal intelligence. In a field beneath some trees, at the bottom of a very high hill, stood facing each other a donkey and a young bull. The bull was standing very patiently, slightly nodding his head up and down, while the donkey, with a rather heavy stick about two feet long in his mouth, was scratching his companion's forehead. Once the donkey dropped his instrument, but, without hesitation, lowered his head, picked up the club again with his teeth, and continued scratching very gravely, to the evident satisfaction of the bull. We often see two cows 'rubbing horns,' and whether this was a return for a similar favor from the bull or not, the donkey very clearly realized his poverty in the matter of horns and happily supplied the deficiency.”
“Folks call the donkey stupid,” said George, “but certainly that one showed a great deal of intelligence. Is the donkey really as stupid as he is said to be?”
“He is not,” answered Mr. Graham, “and there are plenty of anecdotes to show his intelligence. He has been known to open a gate by carefully lifting the latch, and after returning to the yard, he would shut the gate, so that any trespass of which he had been guilty during his absence would not be laid to his charge.
A donkey will follow a kind master or mistress just like a dog, and he fully equals the horse in showing his appreciation of kind treatment.”
Gen. John A. Dix owned a donkey that lived to the age of forty-two years, and endeared himself to his master and the members of the family by his docility and almost human intelligence.