Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-02-03
WHAT DO ANIMALS KNOW?
Sharp Contrast Between Cleverness
and Stupidity of Brutes.

FROM 'HrreHl lsiIeFature
John Burroughs is now expressing regret
at having made too much of the CLEANS of
intelligence of birds and beasts that have
come under his observation. He fears he
has given them credit for more sense than
they possess. The nature lover Is always
tempted to do this, he writes in the course
of his latest work on nature study His
tendency Is to humanze the wild life about
him and to read his own traits and moods
into whatever he looks upon. The every
day life of fields and woods has thus
contends, Mr. Burroughs, been misrepre-
scented:
1.-THE animals unite such ignorance with
such apparent knowledge, such stupidity
of them we are likely to rate their wit
either too high or too low. With Them
knowledge does not fade into ignorance as
1t does in man. the contrast is like tina.
between night and day. with no twilight
between SO keen one moment. blind
the next!
Think of the ignorance of the horse after
all his long association with man; of the
trifing things along the street at which he
will take fright, till he rushes off in a wild
panic of fear. endangerng his own neck
and the neck of his driver One would
think that IL he had a particle of sense
he would know that an old hat or a bit of
paper was harmless. But fear is deeply
implanted In his nature; 1t has saved the
Il is still one of his ruling passions
Thus Mr.. Burroughs has known COW to
put her head between two trees and not
have wilt enough to get free by simply
lifting her head. But the best example Of
the "grotesuae ignorance" of a COW OF
which Mr.. Burroughs knows anything Is
found in Hamerton's work on animals:
THE cow would not give down her milk
unless she had her calf before her. But
her calf had died, so the herdsman took the
skin of the calf. stuffed it with hay and
stood 1T up before the inconsolable mother
Instantly she proceeded to lick 1t and to
yield her milk One day, in licking it. she
| ripped open the seams and out rolled the
hay. This the mother at once proceeded
to eat, without any look Of surprise or
alarm. She liked hay herself, her ac-
| quaintance with it was Of long standing
that her calf should turn out to be made
of hay! Yet this very cow that did nos
know her calf from a bale of hay would
have defended her young against the at
tack of a bear or wolf In the most skilful
and heroic manner. and the horse that
was nearly frightened out of it's skin by q
white stone or by the fiutter of a piece, of
| newspaper by the roadside would find its
| way back home over a long stretch OF
country find its way TO water In the
desert with a certainty you or I could not
approach.
"rte hen hawk that the farm boy finds
| so difficnit to approach with his gun viii
yet aiight@ upon his steel trap fastened te
| the top OF a pole In the fields. The rabbit
| that can be so easily caught In snare or
| IN a box trap win yet conceal Its nest aud
young In the most ingenious manner Where
instinct or inherited knowledge can come
| Into play. the animals are very wise: bui
new conditions new problems, bring on;
/ their ignorance,
The ignorance OF one OF the lower AMI