Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 11.djvu/191

 180 C. L. MORGAN : planets in mirrors of varying and unknown curvature? Harder still is the task of framing a science of Comparative Psychology out of our ejective knowledge of the mental faculties of animals, liable as they are to inevitable errors of unknown amount. What then is our best course in face of this difficulty ? I venture to suggest that we should only make use of ejective inferences in so far as they may aid us in the scientific study of the habits and activities of animals. We cannot get on without occasional reference to motives and underlying mental states. But let us use them as sparingly as possible, remembering the inherently untrustworthy nature of our inferences. I am aware that, if we adopt this course, avast amount of carefully collected anecdote will have to be excluded as scientific evidence. But will science be the loser ? I ven- ture to think not. Take for example the great number of stories illustrative of revenge, jealousy, sense of humour, sense of justice, consciousness of guilt, deceitfulness, cruelty, and so forth in the higher mammalia. There is hardly one of these stories that does not admit of a different interpreta- tion than that given by the narrator. A cat's treatment of a mouse is adduced by a number of witnesses as illustrative of cruelty. But others see in this conduct, not cruelty, but practice and training in an important part of the business of cat-life. Mr. Eomanes quotes as typically illustrative of " an idea of caste," the case of Mr. St. John's retriever, which struck up an acquaintance with a rat-catcher and his cur, but at once cut his humble friends, and denied all acquaint- ance with them, on sight of his master. I, on the other hand, should regard this case as parallel to that which I have noted a hundred times. My dogs would go out with the nurse and children when I was busy or absent ; but if I appeared within sight they raced to me. The stronger affection prevailed. A dog is described as " showing a deliberate design of deceiving " because he hobbled about the room as if lame and suffering pain from his foot. I would suggest that there was no pretence in this case, but a direct association of ideas between a hobbling gait and more pity and attention than usual. A friend of my own, whose dog was fond of the forbidden pleasures of the drawing-room arm-chair, used to say, when he found the dog standing sheepishly on the rug while the arm-chair was preter- nattirally warm, that Turk had a strong sense of guilt and always knew when he had done wrong. I fancied that, if we could see into the dog's inind, we should find there, not a