s oceans and continents without compass, it
foreshadows nearly all the arts and trades and occupations of mankind,
it is skilled without practice, and wise without experience. How it
arose, what its genesis was, who can tell? Probably natural selection
has been the chief agent in its development. If natural selection has
developed and sharpened the claws of the cat and the scent of the
fox, why should it not develop and sharpen their wits also? The remote
ancestors of the fox or of the crow were doubtless less shrewd and
cunning than the crows and the foxes of to-day. The instinctive
intelligence of an animal of our time is the sum of the variations
toward greater intelligence of all its ancestors. What man stores in
language and in books--the accumulated results of experience--the
animals seem to have stored in instinct. As Darwin says, a man cannot,
on his first trial, make a stone hatchet or a canoe through his power
of imitation. "He has to learn his work by practice; a beaver, on the
other hand, can make its dam or canal, and a bird its nest, as well or
nearly as well, and a spider its wonderful web quite as well, the
first time it tries as when old and experienced."

An animal shows intelligence, as distinct from instinct, when it takes
advantage of any circumstance that arises at the moment, when it finds
new ways, whether better or not, as when certain birds desert their
old nesting-sites, and take up with new ones afforded by man. This
act, at least, shows power of choice. The birds and beasts all quickly
avail themselves of any new source of food supply. Their wits are
probably more keen and active here than in any other direction. It is
said that in Oklahoma the coyotes have learned to tell ripe
watermelons from unripe ones by scratching upon them. If they have
not, they probably will. Eating is the one thing that engrosses the
attention of all creatures, and the procuring of food has been a great
means of education to all.

I notice that certain of the wood-folk--mice and squirrels and
birds--eat mushrooms. If I would eat them, I must learn how to
distinguish the edible from the poisonous ones. I have no special
sense to guide me in the matter, as doubtless the squirrels have.
Their instinct is sure where my reason fails. It would be very
interesting to know if they ever make a mistake in this matter.
Domestic animals sometimes make mistakes as to their food because
their instinct has been tampered with an