Part 7

How far a dog, or indeed how far any animal is capable of using an instrument for effecting its purposes is an undecided question; but I have heard on near authority of a dog scraping a mat up against a swing door through which he had to pass so that the door was kept open. To use an instrument involves a complicated mental process, in which not only association but reflection on the nature of the thing is required. Taffy associated his muzzle with his walk, and fetched it with pleasure when the association was established; but reflection did not sufficiently come into the process to prevent him from fetching a clothes brush or a Bible instead if convenient.

One clear point of superiority in the dog is his rudimentary sense of humour. Almost any good-tempered dog, when well treated, will try from time to time to laugh off a scolding. If he is encouraged, the fooling is repeated again and again with growing exaggeration as he rolls over with wide mouth and absurd contortions, or flies at one’s face to lick it. He appreciates humour in others at his own expense, a thing which not every human being is capable of doing; if he is teased laughingly, he too will play the fool; if he is teased cruelly he is cross or wretched. No dog likes one to blow in his face or ear, but Taffy, though not wholly good-tempered, will allow the bellows to be placed even in his mouth if he is assured that it is a game. When the puff of air comes he darts up, jumps at and licks the person who is teasing him, and barks with a wagging tail. If he is really bored or tired he licks the nozzle of the bellows, or the hand that holds them, deprecatingly; he declines the game, but in perfect good humour.

Now a cat has no sense of humour at all. Its very comedies are serious; and to tease it is to outrage its dignity. The better bred a cat is the more easily it takes offence. But after all the “sense of the ridiculous” is a gross quality, and the humour of one age or of one class seems vulgarity to another a little in advance. A cat is never vulgar.

IV

“_The tumult of unproved desire, the unaimed, Uncertain yearnings, aspirations blind._”

If the scope of life and the qualities of intelligence differ from race to race of animals, the strictly moral qualities appear to differ from individual to individual.

Cats are called “selfish”; but even on the undiscriminating view such qualities differ from cat to cat. Ra was certainly self-absorbed, but I attribute this greatly to unhappy family circumstances when he was young. Persis and Mentu were not selfish in this sense at all. Again and again they have been found in the room with food untouched. When one came in there was a greeting and short display of affection, and not till then would the cat go to its food, and eat with good appetite. Few people think of accusing a straightforward genial collie of selfishness; yet if I left Taffy alone with his dinner, or even with some one else’s dinner, there is a strong presumption that I should find the plate clean and shining on return.

What people usually mean by this assertion is that the cat does not, like the dog, depend entirely on human companionship; there are no touching stories of faithfulness to a departed master; there is no overwhelming interest in the human race. A cat has more of what the average Briton calls “self-respect,” a quality he likes far better in himself than in others.

On the other hand, a cat has more interest in other races of beings than a dog. The only creatures in which most dogs show spontaneous interest, unsolicited and untaught, are horses; and even here the interest rests on association. But we have all known cases of cats which deliberately set themselves to woo dogs; Ra and his grandmother, unlike in all else, adored the same fox-terrier. I have indeed seen a dog which had lost her puppies nurse a half-grown cat, but the cat seemed to take the initiative. On the other hand, a Manx cat, in a house where I was staying, allowed a beloved terrier to take food out of her mouth. A cat has been known to bring up squirrels; a tom-cat of our own fondled and protected chickens; finally, a cat has been known to bring a half-starved friend to share its dinner.

So-called “animal instincts” cannot account for the greater part of these cases, which involve rather definite sacrifice. Dog friendships, on the other hand, rarely involve sacrifice except for the sake of man.

This instinct of benevolence may be noticed among birds. I have heard on good authority of an Uncle canary bringing up a deserted brood, and even with apparent embarrassment taking his place on the nest; of sparrows bringing up young starlings, which, taken from their own nest and placed on a window-ledge, sought refuge in the sparrows’ nest; and finally, of a sparrow helping a wagtail to feed a young cuckoo. Unless birds absolutely enjoy filling each other’s mouths, such operations involve sacrifice; but in any case there is a large social instinct shown; and when, as I sit in the garden, the bean poles and seed sticks near me begin to blossom into robins, I find I am suddenly the centre towards which such social instincts are directed.

Temper differs in the same way from individual to individual, in extent and quality. Ra had a cross temper; it irritated him if one took liberties, and he struck without warning; but with regard to other animals cowardice kept his temper in check. Mentu had the occasional irritability of a nervous temperament, whether animal or human; he often kept a bold front upon danger, when fear made him afterwards positively sick and unable to eat for some time. Persis was a very fiend to other animals, but had an utterly sweet and grateful temper towards human beings unless jealousy came into play.

Dogs are more often misjudged in respect to temper than cats, probably because their ill-temper is more formidable; and the nervous excitability of the collie is often mistaken for bad temper. I have known a bad-tempered collie, but the clergyman who owned him did not keep him long, as it was apt to make difficulties in the parish if the congregation of the mission church was kept at bay on a dark, windy evening.

Pugnacity is perhaps a different thing from ill-temper, and appears to be a very wide-spread quality in bird-life. A great robin-tamer told me that no robin could support his position unless he was very pugnacious. Those who have tried to tame wild birds, or even those who feed birds in the winter, will notice the extraordinary displays of temper among them; how the blackbird loses half his meal through trying to chase other birds away; how the tits play with him, reckoning on this pugnacity; how the robin after he has made a hearty meal lies in wait for late comers. Barn-door cocks are too universally condemned in respect of temper; my patriarch has been several times reported to me as having placed himself between two young combatants; and he lives on excellent terms with a younger replica of himself, the only point of quarrel being the distance to which the young cock may chase a hen of the other’s harem which has strayed into his own yard. Pugnacity is indeed apt to develop into ill-temper with caged birds, but gentle handling in taming and increased freedom would probably go far to obviate this.

I have spoken of moral qualities, but the centre of all these is the question of conscience. It is impossible to deny that at any rate the higher animals have conscience, if conscience means the recognition of a law or principle higher than the immediate personal desire and sometimes antagonistic to it.

Even if we allow that the sense of duty in human beings is based on the “sanctions” of pleasures and pain, this makes no difference to the quality of the sense once evolved; neither can it make any difference in the quality of the sense in animals whether this is produced by the “sanction” of nature or of the human race.

The more intelligent domestic creatures accept to some extent a standard given by the power above them. The human standard is to them in a sense as the law written on stone to us; and all know the law has gone forth against the indulgence of ill-temper. Joey recognises this law, and it is a moral effort he makes (very seldom) to refrain from biting; he, too, has a conscience, though a singularly bad one. Taffy with the nozzle of the bellows in his mouth can choose whether to accept the situation cheerfully or crossly.

But the dog accepts his moral code more entirely from the human being than the cat does. In this respect the cat is as the Gentile, without the law, but a law unto himself. There is sacrifice of the lower desires to the higher when the cat brings a friend to share her dinner; when she lets a dog take food out of her mouth; when she carries on towards her kittens, after the immediate needs and desires of motherhood have ceased, a course of conduct more or less consistently educative. A cat, the Egyptians said, reasoned like a man, and this is true in that she determines, like a man, her own ends and purposes in life. It is not approbation but admiration that the cat demands from man; the dog accepts the purposes of life as given from above. But he recognises, as clearly as he recognises the sanction of the ginger-bread and the whip, the sanction of moral appreciation or disapproval. He claims applause when he has done well, and when the whip has been endured he still clings with renewed trust to his diviner friend, and seeks by affection to win back approval.

Such animals have wills essentially free as our own, but with dimmer intelligence these wills are more at the mercy of their passions; and the blinder intelligence leaves them, too, more at the mercy of spiritual influences which flow out from us to them. There is a quick response, as with children, not only to our treatment, but to the spirit of our treatment, for they reward our trust with trust, and answer our cheerfulness with heart and courage. And we, too, war with principalities and powers, and are helped in the high and hidden places by influences unseen. We call these creatures blind and unconscious, but our consciousness, too, is dim, and our eyes blinder to things divine than theirs to things human; we both move gropingly and feebly in a great world and battle against the Will that made us and has mercy on us--“so many men that know not their right hand from their left, and also much cattle.” [Illustration: Kitten by Madame Ronner]

Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co. London & Edinburgh

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

Unusual, archaic and obsolete spellings and word usage have been maintained as in the original book. Obvious printing errors have been fixed as detailed below. The Table of Contents was expanded to cover portions of the book other than the stories.

Illustrations of cats and kittens by Madame Ronner were not captioned in the original book. The placement of the drawings of cats by Madame Ronner made more sense in the printed book, where they filled blank space.

Details of the changes:

Page 35 asparagus bed; the walked[**walk] quickened as he got nearer, Page 79 it as clearly; if [**he] has done well, he goes Page 84 to give it board and longing[**lodging], and it surely