Animal Intelligence: The International Scientific Series, Vol. XLIV.Romanes, George John
Science
Animal Intelligence: The International Scientific Series, Vol. XLIV.
Romanes, George John
Animal behavior; Animal intelligence
The celebrated parrot that belonged to the Buffon family and of which
the Comte de Buffon wrote, exhibited in a strange manner the association
of its ideas. For he was frequently in the habit of asking himself for
his own claw, and then never failed to comply with his own request by
holding it out, in the same way as he did when asked for his claw by
anybody else. This, however, probably arose, not, as Buffon or his
sister Madame Nadault supposed, from the bird not knowing its own voice,
but rather from the association between the words and the gesture.
According to Margrave, parrots sometimes chatter their phrases in their
dreams, and this shows a striking similarity of psychical processes in
the operations of memory with those which occur in ourselves.
Similarly, Mr. Walter Pollock, writes me of his own parrot:--
In this parrot the sense of association is very
strongly developed. If one word picked up at a former
home comes into its head, and is uttered by it, it
immediately follows this word up with all the other
words and phrases picked up at the same place and
period.
Lastly, parrots not only remember, but recollect; that is to say, they
know when there is a missing link in a train of association, and
purposely endeavour to pick it up. Thus, for instance, the late Lady
Napier told me an interesting series of observations on this point which
she had made upon an intelligent parrot of her own. They were of this
kind. Taking such a phrase as 'Old Dan Tucker,' the bird would remember
the beginning and the end, and try to recollect the middle. For it would
say very slowly, 'Old--old--old--old' (and then very quickly) 'Lucy
Tucker.' Feeling that this was not right, it would try again as before,
'Old--old--old--old--old Bessy Tucker,' substituting one word after
another in the place of the sought-for word 'Dan.' And that the process
was one of truly seeking for the desired word was proved by the fact
that if, while the bird was saying, 'Old--old--old--old,' any one threw
in the word 'Dan,' he immediately supplied the 'Tucker.'
_Emotions._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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