LXIX

A WISE OURANG-OUTANG

A well-known traveller tells a story about the ourang-outang in its wild state, which shows that it has both a good memory and some ingenuity.

When the fruits on the mountains are gone, these animals often go down to the seacoast, where they feed upon various kinds of sh.e.l.l-fish, but in particular on a large sort of oyster, which commonly lies open on the sh.o.r.e. "Fearful," he says, "of putting in their paws, lest the oyster should close and crush them, they insert a stone as a wedge within the sh.e.l.l. This prevents it from closing, and they then drag out their prey, and devour it at leisure."

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LXX

A GRACEFUL RETURN

A favorite house-dog, left to the care of its master's servants, while he was himself away, would have been starved by them if it had not found a friend in the kitchen of a friend of its master's, which in better days it had occasionally visited. On the return of the master it had plenty at home, and had no further need of food; but still it did not forget the place where it had found a friend in need. A few days after, the dog fell in with a duck, which, as he found in no private pond, he no doubt decided was no private property. He s.n.a.t.c.hed up the duck in his teeth, carried it to the kitchen where he had been so generously fed, laid it at the cook's feet, with many polite movements of his tail, and then scampered off with much seeming joy at having given this real proof of his grat.i.tude.

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LXXI

WRENS LEARNING TO SING

A wren built her nest in a box, so placed that a family had a chance to watch the mother bird teaching her young ones the art of singing peculiar to wrens. She fixed herself on one side of the opening in the box, directly before the young birds, and began singing over her whole song very distinctly. One of the little birds then tried to imitate her.

After singing through a few notes, its voice broke and it lost the tune.

The mother at once began again where the young one had failed, and went very distinctly through the rest of the song. The young bird made a second attempt, beginning where it had stopped before, and kept up the song as long as it was able. If the note was lost again, the mother began anew where it stopped, and finished it. Then the little one resumed the song and finished it.

This done, the mother sang over the whole series of notes a second time with great care, and a second of the young ones tried to follow her. The wren followed the same course with this one as with the first; and so on with the third and all the rest. It sometimes happened that the young bird would lose the tune three or four or more times in the same attempt, and the mother would always begin where they stopped and sing the rest of the song; and when each little bird had sung the whole song through, she repeated the whole strain. Sometimes two of the young birds began together. The mother did just the same as when one sang alone. This practise was repeated day after day, and several times a day.

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LXXII

RARE HONESTY

A mastiff dog, who owed more to the kindness of a neighbor than to his master, was once locked by mistake in the well-stored pantry of his benefactor for a whole day, where there were, within his reach, milk, b.u.t.ter, bread and meat, in abundance. On the return of the servant to the pantry, seeing the dog come out, and knowing the time it had been shut in there, she trembled for fear of the waste which she was sure her carelessness must have brought about; but on close examination, it was found that the honest creature had not tasted of anything, although, on coming out, he fell on a bone that was given him, with all the greediness of hunger.

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LXXIII

DIVISION OF LABOR

The Alpine marmots are said to work together in the collection of materials for the building of their homes. Some of them, we are told, cut the herbage, others collect it into heaps; a third set serve as wagons to carry it to their holes; while still others perform all the work of draught horses. The manner of the latter part of the curious process is this. The animal that is to be the wagon, lies down on its back, and stretching out its four legs as wide as it can, allows itself to be loaded with hay; and those that are to be the horses, drag it, thus loaded, by the tail, taking care not to upset the creature. The task of thus serving as a wagon being, evidently, the least desirable part of the business, is taken by every one of the party in turn.

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LXXIV

A TALKING PARROT

During the time that Prince Maurice was ruling in Brazil, he heard of an old parrot that was much celebrated for answering like a human being, many of the common questions put to it. It was at a great distance; but so much had been said about it that the prince's curiosity was roused, and he directed it to be sent for.

When the parrot was brought into the room where the prince was sitting, in company with several Dutchmen, it at once cried out in the Brazilian language, "What a company of white men are here!" They asked it, "Who is that man?" (pointing to the prince). The parrot answered, "Some general or other." When the attendants carried it up to him, he asked it, through the aid of an interpreter (for he did not understand its language), "Whence do you come?" The parrot answered, "From Marignan."

The prince asked, "To whom do you belong?" It answered, "To a Portuguese." He asked again, "What do you there?" The parrot answered, "I look after chickens." The prince laughing, exclaimed, "You look after chickens!" The parrot in reply said, "Yes, I do; and I know well how to do it;" clucking at the same time in imitation of the noise made by the hen to call her little chicks together.

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The prince afterward said that although the parrot spoke in a language he did not understand, yet he could not be deceived, for he had in the room at the time both a Dutchman who spoke Brazilian, and a Brazilian who spoke Dutch; that he asked them separately and privately, and both agreed exactly in their account of the parrot's conversation.

LXXV

A CHARITABLE CANARY

A pair of goldfinches who had had the misfortune to be captured with their nest and six young ones, were placed in a double cage, with a pair of canaries, which had a brood of little ones also; there being a part.i.tion of wire netting between the cages.

At first the goldfinches seemed careless about their young ones. The father canary, attracted by the cries of the baby goldfinches, forced himself through a flaw in the wire, and began to feed them. This it did regularly, until the goldfinches undertook the work themselves, and rendered the kindness of the canary no longer necessary.

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