Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 52.djvu/550

532 with their masters, and are nothing more than selfish auxiliaries in hunting or fierce sentries of the camp or village.

The qualities we prize in our domestic dog are those traits it has acquired by education, and correspond to artificial cerebral impressions not yet made fully permanent; for they are easily effaced when the animal, deprived of human society, relapses into savagery. This development of the dog in so remarkable a manner is the result of his having been the first mammal domesticated; hence man has been more occupied with him, has demanded a greater variety of services from him, and has taken more lively care of his moral and mental education. Other animals, on the other hand, domesticated simply for the butcher's handling, like the ox, the sheep, and the pig, have degenerated rather than gained by the association with man. They have lost the qualities they acquired during their ages of liberty without replacing them by others, and have fallen back toward the vegetative life.

Domestic animals sometimes acquire special educations of themselves, by the mere force of spontaneous imitation. Such are the dogs which, raised by cats, have learned to lick their paws and wash their face and ears, like their nurses. So several birds in a cage will imitate one another's cries, and even those of mammals; and parrots, as we all know, imitate the human voice. The brighter birds even do this spontaneously, without special training. This fact leads us to consider the faculty of language in animals, and the degree of development that may be given it by education.

It can hardly be pretended at this period that spoken language forms an impassable barrier between man and animals. There are many kinds of languages, and human speech does not differ essentially from the tactile and antennal language of ants. The mode of communication, indeed, varies according to the organization of the animal species; but it may always be found to originate in reflex actions, determined by a need, a desire, a feeling, an emotion, or an idea. Spoken language, which has, scientifically, been associated with the cry, the interjection, or the imitative onomatopæia, is at bottom nothing but a reflex action, a laryngeal gesture. A comparison of human and animal language is therefore legitimate, and is of interest in that it shows how the latter can be perfected by exercise and education.

It is evident that the particular form of language will be imposed by the organization of a species. Thus ants, organically aphonal, have devised for communication among themselves the antennal language, which places all the members of their city or nest in intimate communication. With birds, mammals, and men it has been more convenient to acquire a vocal language; but on occasion