Note AG — Chapter V · EXPLANATION OF THE OBSERVATIONS

Professor Flügel,[82] basing his statements on an article appearing in "Schorer's Familienblatt" (Berlin, 1890, No. 8, p. 128), gives an account of similar experiments which were supposed to have been conducted by the Zoological Society for Westphalia and Lippe, and presumably showed that "the horses of the military do not understand the bugle calls." No matter how well trained a horse may have been, it would not respond to a signal. This report, however, is due to a mistake. Such experiments have never been made by the society mentioned, so I am told by its director, Dr. Reeker. Nor do I know of any one else who has made experiments of this kind. However, Professor Landois,[83] the eminent zoologist, now deceased (founder of the scientific society mentioned), tested four circus-horses for their musical ability and specifically for their sense of musical time. He arrives at the conclusion that horses "have no feeling for time, whatsoever." With but few [84, 85] all experts to-day are of the same opinion. Horse-trainers, especially, are universally agreed on this point. It is easy to see in any circus performance that it is not the horses that accommodate themselves to the music, but that the music accommodates itself to them, and that the trained horses[86] are induced to do their artistic stepping only by the aids given by their riders. Furthermore, all these horses are trained without the use of music.——It would therefore appear that the time had arrived when the tales of the dancing horses of the Sybarites ought no longer to gain credence. Two Greek writers, Athenaeus[87] and Ælian,[88] tell us that the inhabitants of Sybaris, far-famed for their luxurious habits, had trained their horses to dance to the music of flutes during their banquets. Building upon this, the men of Crotona, in one of their campaigns against the Sybarites, ordered the flute-players to play the tunes familiar to the Sybarite horses. Immediately the well-trained steeds began to dance, thus throwing the whole Sybarite army into confusion, and the men of Crotona won the day. (The same story is told in more detail concerning the horses of the inhabitants of Cardia. Both accounts, somewhat mixed, are to be found in Julius Africanus,[89] a writer of the third century of the Christian era.)—In recent years a French veterinary surgeon, Guénon,[90] experimented on the effect of music upon the horses of the military. He entered their stalls, playing upon a flute, and noted their behavior. Four-fifths of the animals, he says, were deeply moved, yes, delighted, even, ("charmés." One interpreter[91] calls it a case of hypnosis!). This emotional excitement was expressed—somewhat unaesthetically—by the dropping of excrementa. Guénon characterizes the feeling-state of these animals as being a mixture of pleasure and astonishment, of satisfaction and excitement ("mélange de plaisir et d'étonnement, de satisfaction et de trouble.") He also asserts that the horse's musical taste is similar to our own. But I can find nothing in his whole exposition which might prove this. Indeed there is nothing that could be interpreted as anything other than a purely sensuous effect upon the horses. I may go a step farther and say that thus far the sense of music, i. e., understanding of melody, harmony and rhythm, has not been shown to exist in any animal. Some animals may, however, be susceptible to the sensuous pleasantness of the tones themselves.