been able to discover even the

ship.'

appearance of a

It will, I think, hardly be contended that the preceding examples of acuteness in the natural senses, whether in man or in the brute, belong to Instinct as it is above explained. Boyle, I observe, makes a clear distinction between Instinct and what he calls "a tenderness or quickness of sense." And from all that has been said, I think there is ground for such a distinction.

SECT. III.

On some singular acts of the lower Animals, particularly their migrations from one place to another.

It is well known that different tribes of animals are endowed with a sense or faculty which enables them to steer their course with astonishing precision from one place to another, through trackless regions of the air, and even of the ocean, and through strange and unknown countries. For it is a sense common to birds and fishes as well as to beasts.

We have numerous anecdotes of dogs and cats, which, after being conveyed to distant places, have found their way home, and often by a different route, or through a country they had never traversed before.

Dr. Adam Smith on the External Senses.

The carrier pigeon affords a striking example of the facility and speed with which this bird pursues its flight from one place to another: but some might explain the fact by referring it to a degree of instruction, and by supposing that its extensive view would aid the bird in fixing on objects by which its course might be directed.

But that an ass, a serpent, and a sheep,-animals one would suppose to be naturally dull and stupid, in regard to their power of outward observation,-should each be able to transport itself through a strange country to a considerable distance, and to reach some known spot, with scarcely any delay, is hardly to be accounted for on any natural principles.

Dr. Good entertains a question whether there be any other than the five senses common to man and the higher classes of animals; and remarks, "that we occasionally meet with peculiarities of sensation that can hardly be resolved into any of them. Thus, the bat appears to be sensible of the presence of external objects and obstructions that are neither seen, smelt, heard, touched, nor tasted: for it will cautiously avoid them, when all the senses are purposely closed up. And hence many naturalists have ascribed a sixth sense to this animal. It is equally difficult," he adds, "by any of the known senses of fishes or birds, to account for the accuracy with which their migratory tribes are capable of steering their annual course through the depths of the ocean or the trackless regions of the atmosphere,

so as to arrive at a given season on a given coast or a given climate, with the precision of the expertest mariner."

Bees return home to their own hive after an excursion of some miles, though, from the convexity of their eye, it is supposed that they cannot see more than a yard distant.

Dr. Beattie mentions that he knew an instance of a dog which had been carried in a basket thirty miles through a country he never saw, finding his way, a week after, to his former dwelling. I have heard of a dog which had been conveyed from London to Scotland by sea, making his way by land the whole distance back again to London: and a still more remarkable case was related to me of a dog that had been transported across the Atlantic-not liking his new abode-actually taking a passage in another vessel, and again finding his master in England.*

Although sheep are considered so stupid in their domesticated state, yet, we are told, that a sheep which was driven from Scotland into Yorkshire, made its escape, and after passing through towns, crossing rivers, &c. revisited its native spot in the hills of Annandale. And another from Perthshire came back

*The following anecdote is taken from the Times newspaper :-" A terrier dog, belonging to Mr. Watkins, was taken on Friday to London by his servant, in a close covered cart, and was left tied up in a yard near Grosvenor-square that evening; in the night it broke from its confinement and came home through London, and was at its master's door in Arundel the next afternoon, a distance of near 60 miles.—Jan. 1823."

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to a farm twenty miles from Edinburgh. When it reached Stirling, it was fair day: the animal would not venture through the town among the populace, but rested itself at the north side till the fair dispersed, and came through late in the evening.

In "Instinct Displayed" we have several interesting anecdotes to this point, which appear to be well authenticated,

A sparrow which had been conveyed to London from Fulham in a covered cage, found its way back again, after some time, having flown out of the window, looking towards Northumberland Gardens, in quite a contrary direction.

Pennant tells us, that after the Earl of Southampton, the friend of Essex, in his fatal insurrection, had been confined a short time in the Tower, he was agreeably surprised by a visit from his favourite cat; which, according to tradition, having found her way thither, descended the chimney of his apartment, and seated herself by her master.

A cat was taken to the West Indies, and when it returned to the port of London, made its escape from the vessel, through the intricacies and windings of the metropolis to its former residence at Brompton. And another was taken from a place near Saffron Walden to Hampshire, from which it returned to its former mistress, as was supposed through London.*

Cats which had been transported in bags and baskets, have returned in this way from considerable

* See Letter xxv.

distances. By what sense, or faculty, this is effected, we are quite ignorant and yet there is nothing in the act which assumes the character of Instinct.

With respect to mankind, we sometimes meet with persons who are so peculiarly affected by the presence of a particular object that is neither seen, smelt, tasted, heard, nor touched, as not only to be conscious of its presence, but to be in great distress till it is removed. The presence of a cat not unfrequently produces such an effect; and Dr. Good remarks that he has himself been "a witness of the most decisive proofs of this in several instances, and thinks it possible that the peculiar sense, may, in such cases, result from a preternatural modification in some of the branches of the olfactory nerve, which may render them capable of being stimulated in a new and peculiar manner: but the individuals thus affected are no more conscious of an excitement in this organ of sense than in any other; and from the anomaly and rare occurrence of the sensation itself, find no terms by which to express it."*

Boyle tells us that a lady assured him, she could very readily discover, whether a person who visited her in winter came from a place where there was any considerable quantity of snow: and this not by feeling any unusual cold, but from some peculiar impression, which, she thought, she received by the organ of smelling.+

* Good's Study of Medicine, vol. 3. ch. 4.

+ Boyle's works, vol. 1. p. 429.