Well, I _know_ Fido could feel and think, that he loved and feared and longed and dreaded and dreamed and hated and grieved and sympathised and reasoned and rejoiced—in short, that he was moved by about the same passions and considerations as human beings usually are. He gave the same evidence of it precisely as a human being does. The dog is the oldest of human associates. Long before the historical period the dog was domesticated in Europe, Asia, and Africa. No race of men is too primitive to be without the dog. The bones of the dog are found in the middens of the Baltic, and rude representations of it are chiseled on the oldest monuments of Egypt and Assyria. The dog was the servant of man away in paleolithic times, when the mastodon was on earth, and man was a naked troglodyte, and Europe extended westward to the Azores. And he has been a faithful friend, a tireless ally, and an enthusiastic slave of a thankless and inhuman master ever since. Birds are pre-eminently emotional and artistic. This is shown by their fondness for singing, their fine dress, their pining for their dead, their dainty architecture, their pretty forms and manners of life, their joyousness, and their love for their young. Birds are the most beautiful and engaging of all terrestrial beings. Endowed with the power of flight, eminently active, light-hearted and free, attired in all the colours of the rainbow, and with voices of unrivalled richness and melody, birds are the admiration and envy of all of those that dwell on the earth. Birds possess naturally and in marvellous perfection that power of locomotion which has been so long sought for by slow-shuffling man. Birds are also incomparable musicians, no other animals, not even men, approaching them in the surpassing brilliancy and sweetness of their song. No human musician in high-sounding hall can equal the artless lay of the wild bird ringing melodiously through the leafy colonnades of the woods. Like men, birds sing chiefly of love; but they also sing for pastime or pleasure. Their singing is sweetest during the season of courtship, and attains its highest development in the males. Birds are ardent lovers. To win their brides, the males contend with each other, and display their charms of plumage and song with the wildness of human Romeos.