piece, or else they were hung upon a string a man's
height above the ground. This method was also employed when placards of
like size with written symbols were used. The horse stood ten paces away
and opposite the middle of the series, while Mr. von Osten stood at his
right. Hans was asked to go and point out the cloth of a certain color
or the placard with a certain word upon it. If the cloth lay upon the
ground, Hans picked it up with his mouth and carried it to the
questioner. If the cloth, like the placards, hung from the cord, he
approached, pointed it out with his nose and then backed up to his
original position. Before approaching the objects, Hans was required to
indicate, by tapping, the number of the place in the series (counting
from left to right), which the cloth or placard occupied. Mr. von Osten
never omitted this requirement. Then the command "Go!" was given, and
Hans obeyed. (As a matter of fact, a slight directive movement of the
head or hand was just as effective as the spoken command).

The following cases, chosen in a haphazard fashion, show that the
horse's indication of the object's place in the series, by means of
tapping, was by no means a guarantee that he would point it out
correctly. Five placards hung from the cord. Mr. von Osten asked: "What
is the position, counting from left to right, of the placard which has
the word 'aber' inscribed upon it?". Hans answered: 3. (It was indeed
the middle placard.) Then he was commanded: "Go!". Thereupon Hans went
straight to the fourth placard. On another occasion Hans happened to
drop a brown cloth upon a black one. His master asked him: "In which
place are there two cloths?". Hans responded correctly, "In the second
place". To the question "Which of the two is the black one?" he also
answered rightly: "The lower one". Upon being asked to get it, he
brought the white cloth.

The large number and the irregularities of the errors showed that there
was no manner of intelligence involved in the pointing out process. Thus
during the two months of our experimentation Hans was asked twenty-five
times by Mr. von Osten to bring the green cloth. Only six times did he
succeed in the first attempt, while in five instances he selected an
orange-colored cloth, four times a blue, three times a white one.

The fact that the errors were equally distributed over the tests with
the colored cloths and those with the placards is strong evidence that
the horse's response