A TALE OF COWS AND SHEEP.
CTo THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."]
Sia,—From time to time you publish for our edification tales of animal intelligence. May I contribute two, both of which have come under my personal observation? First, relating to cows. A good many years ago a friend, no longer with us, with an estate lying a little north of the Downs, decided to sell some cows, finding that amateur farming was more costly and less amusing than he cared for. I was staying at my friend's house at the time of the sale. There were six or eight cows. In a direct line across the Downs was a watering-place of some size, and from this place came a butcher who bought the cows. Next day followed a herdsman to drive the cows across country to their destination. Unfortunately there arose one of those soft, white, but extraordinarily opaque, sea fogs which hug the surfaces of the vast featureless curves of the hills, and, unless you are already on a known road, place you in the greatest perplexity. The herdsman lost himself and lost the cows. After a time he abandoned hope and was glad to find a track which happily landed him on a main road. The following morning I came down a little before breakfast. My host, with an incomprehensible smile, asked me to come out and see the cows which were gone( In their customary places there they stood comfortably munching their breakfast; but they should have been some fifteen miles away. The yardeman told me that, he supposed from force of habit, he had that morning, soon after 5 a.m., opened the yard gates, and there, to his astonishment, stood the cows. They at once walked in and assumed their accustomed places in the cow house.
In the course of the morning appeared the herdsman, telling his part of the story, and not a little astonished to see his charges. These cows had not been purchased by my host in a group; some came from one place, some from another; they had on leaving the farmyard to be driven along a hard metalled road, then to turn aside into a lane leading to a borstall or ancient trackway up the face of the hill, and then to be driven by the herdsman across the grass in the direction he thought best. Out on the bare downs he lost them. Yet they turned about, as the events proved, kept together, and arrived, as they clearly intended to do, at the old home. My other tale relates to sheep. A good many years since I was sailing to the island of Madeira. This was so long ago that the ship was not provided with cold storage. She had an excel- lent dining saloon on the deok amidships, and on this a promenade deck, not a little exposed. Up here were kept the livestock, and amongst these five or six sheep. At our port of departure, and but little before we left, there came on board a large, showy woman with daughters to match, followed by a dejected youth of about seventeen, clearly lacking in a balanced intelligence. It was rumoured that the mission of the showy lady was to induce the captain to take the lacking youth as a passenger to his father at a remote destination. The temptress over-persuaded the captain. The youth became a passenger. On the second or third day out I went up to the breezy promenade deck and there found the youth. He stood somewhat at one end, but in front of the sheep pen. His back was towards me. He had assumed a bent attitude, with his hands on his knees, which knees were not a little turned out- ward. He was in a frog-like position, but quite quiet. The poor sheep, trembling with fear, were huddled together as far from the youth as they could squeeze, gazing on him with terror. I waited some time, but there was no violence of move- ment on his part. He seemed to have hypnotized the poor brutes. Walking quietly forward, I saw that the youth had twisted his features and was rolling his eyes, scowling horribly. He had no stick or other implement, only his horrid self. Seeing me, he straightened himself and strolled away. It being suggested to him that he was practising a cruel trick, and that he would find himself in the wrong box, he scoffed a little. Next day he repeated his performances, and the wrong box followed. It was certainly curious to observe how the " silly" sheep were impressed with the extremity of terror, and yet without the use of any apparatus.—I am, Sir, &o., Hilmia, Zeitun, Egypt, April 6th. Somas Wan.
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