231 
the problem suggested by new conditions, there may be 
here and there one who can. A good illustration of 
this point is to be found in an incident described by 
Mr. Hudson. During a plague of mice which occurred 
in a region of La Plata, every long hollow stalk of the 
giant thistle had a mouse in it. Some children found 
that some excitement and fun were to be got by placing 
one of the stalks with a mouse in it before a cat. 
“ Smelling her prey, she would spring at one end of the stalk, the 
end towards which the mouse would be moving at the same time, 
but would catch nothing ; for the mouse, instead of running out, 
would turn back to run to the other end ; whereupon the cat, all 
excitement, would jump there to seize it ; and so the contest would 
continue for a long time, an exhibition of the cleverness and stupidity 
of instinct both of the pursuer and the pursued. There were several 
cats at the house, and all acted in the same way except one. When 
a stalk was placed before this cat, instead of becoming excited like 
the others, it went quickly to one end and smelt at the opening, 
then, satisfied that its prey was inside, it deliberately bit a long piece 
out of the stalk with its teeth, then another strip, and so on pro 
gressively, until the entire stick had been opened up to within six 
or eight inches of the further end, when the mouse came out and 
was caught. Every stalk placed before this cat was demolished 
in the same business-like way ; but the other cats, though they 
were made to look on while the stick was being demolished by their 
fellow, could never learn the trick.”—(The Naturalist in La Plata, 
ftp. 61-2.) 
Clearly the inference from this story is that many cats 
are sometimes stupid, but not that all cats are always 
unintelligent. 
Some of the experiments which are made on the sub 
ject of animal intelligence seem to me to be particularly 
unfair; because the conditions are such as could scarcely 
have taken place in nature, and must have had the effect 
of confusing the mind of the animal. If that interpre 
tation of the phenomenon is true, the trial is not so much 
a scientific experiment as a practical joke, intended to