We, too, are animals, and can no more refuse to infer
reason from certain visible actions in their case than we can in our
own. If Professor Max Muller's plea were allowed, we should have to
deny our right to infer confidently what passes in the mind of
anyone not ourselves, inasmuch as we are not that person. We never,
indeed, can obtain irrefragable certainty about this or any other
matter, but we can be sure enough in many cases to warrant our
staking all that is most precious to us on the soundness of our
opinion. Moreover, if the Professor denies our right to infer that
animals reason, on the ground that we are not animals enough
ourselves to be able to form an opinion, with what right does he
infer so confidently himself that they do not reason? And how, if
they present every one of those appearances which we are accustomed
to connect with the communication of an idea from one mind to
another, can we deny that they have a language of their own, though
it is one which in most cases we can neither speak nor understand?
How can we say that a sentinel rook, when it sees a man with a gun
and warns the other rooks by a concerted note which they all show
that they understand by immediately taking flight, should not be
credited both with reason and the germs of language?
After all, a professor, whether of philology, psychology, biology,
or any other ology, is hardly the kind of person to whom we should
appeal on such an elementary question as that of animal intelligence
and language.
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