A Gun-Dog's Intelligenee
SIR,—Mr. Ian Niall's reference to the cleverness of Labrador retrievers brings to mind an incident many years ago in Norfolk. We were driving partridges over a high belt, and were standing in a fify-acre close-cut stubble field. Early in the drive I winged a partridge, which came down in a long slanting fall about fifty yards behind me and immediately ran fast to the hedge on the far side of the field. My Labrador (no collar and no lead) sat watching the proceedings as usual without moving. When I gave him the signal to pick up at the end of the drive he went off at full speed, without taking any notice of several dead birds within twenty yards of him, to where the winged partridge had fallen, picked up the scent, and presently reappeared a long way off with the bird, still alive, which he brought me. He then picked up the other dead birds which we had purposely left untouched.
There were numerous witnesses of this, and the incident has been used in favour of the theory that dogs have reasoning powers in the full sense of the words, which, however, I still take leave to doubt.—
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