The record-union., 1896-12-15
ARITHMETIC OF ANIMALS.
Examples Proving That Four-Legged Pets
Can Count.
Horses and Dogs Are Better Arithme-
tiCianS Than CatS-A Doctors
Experiments.

One day the celebrated ornithologist
Audubon same out of his cottage with
four of his friends to go for walk, says
Animal Friends The next instant
they saw a parrot fly in at a window.
Audubon and one of his friends returned
indoors, and Immediately the bird flew
out in fright, and went circling about
overhead. Audubon came out again,
but the bird refused to re-enter until
the other gentlemen had also left the
house. 1t seemed to remember that two
persons had gone in and only one had
come out. Curious to discover how far
the parrot could count, he returned in
doors with his four friends and made
them go out, one at a time, while he
himself remained inside. In a few min
utes the bird flew in again. 1t was evi-
dent that it's powers of arithmetic ended
at the number four.
A Russian doctor named Timofieff
tried the same sort of experiment few
years ago with birds, cats, dogs and
horses. He declared that the crow is
capable of counting as far as ten, and
Is in that respect superior to many
tribes of men in Polynesia, who compre-
hend hardly anything of mathematics.
Dr. T1mofleff'S account of the behavior
OF his own dog is amusing. This dog
never buried several bones in one spot
put always hid each one away Separ-
ately. One day his master presented
hlm with twenty-siX large bones, which
he Immediately proceeded to bury in
twenty-six different places. On the
morrow Doctor Timofiet did not feed
the animal at all. In the afternoon he
let his pet out into the garden and from
a window watched him attentively The
dog set to work at once and dug I'D ten
OF the bones. Then he stopped, seemed
to reflect for a minute, and began dig
ging again until he had found nine 9TH
ers. Here he stopped to consider as be-
fore, and then returned to work,
scratching perseveringly until he had
unearthed six more bones. This seemed
TO satisfy him; he sat down and began
his dinner. Suddenly he raised his head.
stopped eating, and looked around with
thoughtful air. Then, as if quite sure
that he had forgotten something, he
started up, trotted round the garden,
found the twenty-sixth bone, and re-
turned, with a look Of satisfaction. to
his meal. The doctor believed that the
number twenty-six was too much for
the canine mind to grasp, and that the
dog had therefore divided the proven
der into three groups, counting the
bones in each lot separately, but that
the mental process was so COMPLICATED
that he had made a miscalcuIatiou and
only rectified it after prolonged reflec-
ton.
Inc same Writer tells us that the cat
is less expert In arithmetic than the
oog, not being capable of counting
farther than six. He used to hold a
piece OF meat to his cats nose and draw
&c away suddenly, always repeating the
actnon five times before allowing the
animal to take the morsel. Puss soon
grew accustomed to the performance.
and waited with dignity and calmness
until the sixth offer was made when
she sprang UP and seized the piece Of
meat with her teeth
for some weeks the doctor. repeated
TINS experiment, and the cat did not
make single mistake When, how
ever, he tried to increase her knowled ge
by making four more approaches and
retreats before letting her take the
meat, she lost the count completely and
jumped at the wrong moment
Proofs Of the horses power of count
ing are even more curious. DR. Timo-
heff mentions a peasants horse, which.
when plowing, invariably stopped to
rest after the twentieth furrow. 1t did
not matter how long the field happened
10 be, nor how tired the animal might
feel, it never stopped until the twenti-
eth furrow had been made, and so exact
was the count that the farmer could tell
the number of burrows by noting how
many times the horse halted.
In another village there was a horse
which reckoned the distances by posts.
and knew what hour it was by the
striking Of the clock. DR.. Timofieff was
driving from one town to another. and
at the twenty-second verst (two- thirds
of a mile) one of the horses stopped
suddenly. The driver got down from
his seat and gave the animal a meas
ure of oats, at the same time explain
ang to the passenger that the horse was
accustomed to being fed after every
twentyfifth verst. This time 1t had
made a mistake, but it could not be
blamed. as 1t did not judge of the dis
Tance traversed by its own fatigue or
hunger, but by counting the ver-st posts
along the road. 1t had mistaken for
some of these posts three others which
greatly resembled them, but which
merely saved to make the boundary OF
the State forest
This same horse was always fed in
the stable at noon, and DIR. Timofieff
himself observed that. whenever a
neighboring church clock began 70
strike, the animal raised its head and
listened attentively. When the strokes
Were less than twelve Ii put down its
head sadly, but it displayed every sign
of joyful expectation when it heard
twelve strokes. and knew that dinner
time had arrived
LOSS OF HORSES I'M WAR