Animal that Weep.

Otago Witness, Issue 2456, 10 April 1901, Page 62

Animal that Weep.

The wceinng "mock turtle"' in "Alice in Wonderland" and walrus in the same classic, who held "his pocket handkerchief before his streaming eyes,"' are not wholly creatures of the imagination, observes the Literary Digest, if we may believe Mr Henri Coupin, writing in La Nature. He quotes numerous authorities to show that many animals shed real tears, and for the same reasons that cause human beings to weep. Jle intimates also that there is a fruitful field for investigation along this and similar lines. Says Mr Coupin : "Laughing is believed to be peculiar to man ; but the same is not true of weeping, which is a manifestation of emotion that is met with in divers animals.

"Among the creatures that weep most easily we may first mention the ruminants, with whom the act is so well known that it has given rise to a trivial but accurate expression, 'to weep like a calf.' Among these animals the facility of shedding tears is explained by the presence of a supplementary lachrymal apparatus. . , . "All hunters know that the stag weeps

. . . and we are also assured that the bear sheds tears when it sees its last hour approaching. The eriraffe is not less sensitive, as might be expected in so gentle a creature, and regards with tearful eyes the hunter who has wounded it.

"If we are to credit Gordon dimming, the eland (African antelope) acts in the same way. He says of one of these animals that he had pursued for a long time : 'Flecks of foam flew from his mouth ; abundant sweat had "given to its grey skin an ashy blue tint. Tears fell from its great black eyes, and it was evident that the eland felt that its last hour had come.'

"Dogs weep quite easily. If their master goes away for instance, leaving them tied, they bark with tears in their voices. The same is true of certain monkeys. The Cebus azarae weeps when its wishes are opposed or when it is frightened, and the eyes of the Callithrix sciureus fill at once with tears when it is seized with terror.

'"The aquatic mammals, too, are able to weep. Thus all authors agi*ee in saying that dolphins, at the moment of death, draw deep sighs and shed tears abundantly. A young female seal has also been seen to weep when teased by a sailor. St. Hilaire and Cuvier assure us that, on the authoiity of the Malays, when a young dugong is captured the mother is sure to be taken also. The little ones then cry out and shed tears. These tears are collected with care to make a lover's affection lasting. "As for the elephant, there is aburdant evidence of the ease with wLkh it weeps. Sp«irrman assures us that ifc sheds tears when wounded, or when it sees that it cannot escape. Its tears roll from its eyes like those of -a human being in affliction. Tennent, speaking of captured elephants, fays that ' .^omc remain quiet, lying on the ground without manifesting their grief otherwise than by the tears that bathe their eves and run conslantlv down.'

"Such are the piincipal animals that have bsen reported as shedding tears ; doubtless they will become more numerous when jre have taken the trouble to observe the

same phenomena in other species. I advise those who wi^h to give attention to the matter to note carefully the circumstances in winch the tears have manifested themselves From the exavnpks given above it v 'H be .-een that teai-& liave about the same emotional significance in animals as in man, but to chibh-h the certainly of this we should have many more mstance^ '