The Universal KinshipMoore, J. Howard (John Howard)
Philosophy
The Universal Kinship
Moore, J. Howard (John Howard)
Evolution; Human beings; Sociology
Fishes have been taught to assemble at the ringing of a bell, and
toads and tortoises to come at the call of their favourite friends.
An alligator which was kept tame for several years became so much
attached to its master that ‘it followed him about the house like
a dog, scrambling up the stairs after him, and showing much
affection and docility.’ The favourite friend and companion of
this alligator was the cat; and, whenever the cat stretched herself
on the floor in front of the fire, the alligator would lie down
beside her, with its head on the cat, and go to sleep. ‘When the
cat was absent, the alligator was restless, but it always appeared
happy when the cat was near it’.[8]
Wolves and foxes sometimes cooperate with each other in their
hunting expeditions, somewhat as men do in theirs. One of their
number will crouch in ambush by the side of a road known to be used
by hares or other small animals, and leap on the unsuspecting
fugitives when driven that way by others of the hunting band. Many
animals post sentinels when they eat or sleep or engage in other
hazardous undertakings, and these sentinels show a good deal of
discrimination in distinguishing between animals that are friendly
and those that are not. Beavers not only build lodges to live in,
but also construct dams to keep the water in which the villages are
located at a certain height. The outlet of these dams is carefully
regulated, being regularly lessened and enlarged to suit the supply
of water in the stream. The trees used by the beavers in their
enterprises are felled by them along the margins of the stream, and
floated to the place where they are used. In old communities, where
the supply of timber near the stream has been exhausted, artificial
canals are cut by these indomitable engineers for use in the
transportation of their materials. These excavations are made at a
great cost of labour and for the deliberate purpose of enabling the
builders to accomplish that which they could not accomplish in any
other way. ‘In executing this purpose,’ says Romanes, ‘there
is sometimes displayed a depth of engineering forethought over
details of structure required by the circumstances of special
localities which is even more astonishing than the execution of the
general idea’.[6] When, for instance, a canal has been carried so
far from the original water-supply that, owing to the rising ground,
it cannot be continued without a very great expenditure of effort in
digging, a second dam is built higher up-stream, and with water
drawn from this the canal is continued on at a higher level.
Sometimes a third dam is built above the second, and the canal again
continued at a still higher level before the valuable timber of the
higher grounds is reached. These enterprising rodents also carve
sometimes enormous channels across the necks of land formed by
winding rivers, to serve as cut-offs in travel and transportation.
And yet all of these things—all of the intelligence, feeling, and
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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