The Northern Pacific farmer. [volume] (Wadena, Minn.) 1878-1885, 1880-11-11

more, it is probable that these smell
memories are consolidated into a regu-
lar succession in his mind, just as
sight memories are consolidated in
ours. If you and I have once been to
place, we find our way back again by
remembering the visible aspect of the
road, the various streets and turnings,
the trees and houses, the hills and val
leys. But if Anacharsis has once been
to a place, and goes there again, YOU
will see him taking notes as he runs
along, not with his eyes, but with his
nose: You will see him give a hearty
Whit of recognition at every corner, or
take Qualitative long breath at an un-
certain cross-road. It has long been
known that dogs conveyed by train to a
strange place, or else carried in cov-
cred casket, have often found their way
nome again at once, and without diff
ticulty. Now Mr.. A. r. Wallace sug-
gests that they probably do so by obsery-
ing and remembering the smells thew
have met with on the way; and Pro
fessor Robertson further points out
that such memory is the sense of
smellin dos is most likely an unbroken
whole: "The dogs world" he says,
E:may be, in the main, a world of sig hts
and smells continuous in space In
other words, while you and think of a
given field as a mass of visible objects.
Anacharsis very probably thinks of it
as a mass of smells. Most likely it
seems no more remarkable to dog
that he can remember a whole string
of odors in their regular order than It
seems remarkable to us that we can
rem ember our way from one point to
another by means of a whole string of
visible objects, observed and recollect-
ed as signs Of the road.
Again, when the dog thinks of any
thing, its smell must be main
part of his thinking about
it. He must remember a man always
to a great extent as a smellable thing
Indeed, the dog even dreams about
smells, as we may see by his shifting
and growing in his sleep. If you watch
him narrowly, you can notice that at
one time he seems to dream of hunt
ing, puts his nose down against the
hearth rug, and draws in his breath
with a kind of quiet satisfaction, as if
engaged in silently tracking down his
game; while at other times he seems to
! dream about an enemy, when he may
be observed to take sharp snorts of
convulsive kind, and to yelp angrily as
he raises his head little from the
ground, in the half assumed attitude of
| battle.
These examples lead us on to the
fact that smells must also be largely
connected in the canine mind with all
kinds of appropriate emotions. S me
of them must rouse associated feelings
of devotion to master, of affection, of
anger, of dislike, of excitement, or of
fear. The least odor of rat or rabbit
will set {: terrier frantic with the hunt
ing fever; the spoor of a negro will
drive a bloodhound wild with the in
stinct of tracking down the fugitive. I
have known many Cuban blood-hounds
in Jamaica which always fawned upon
a white man, friend or stranger, but
could not be trusted for moment by
any black man, including even the SER
wants who ordinarily fed them. That
scent, not color, formed the means Of
discrimination is certain, for they at
tack negroes at night even more than
by day. Everybody must have noticed
thousands of similar instances, where
particular emotions were obviously as
ISOLATED in the minds Of dogs with par
ticular odors.