I do not suppose my horse had the same mental
process about it that I had; an effect without an
apparent cause could have been nothing to him.
He was moved simply by the strangeness of the
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THE SUMMIT OF THE YEAKS

spectacle. It was a sight the like of which he had
never seen before.
Stories are told of monkeys that would seem to
indicate in them some perception of the humorous,
however rudimentary, but I recall nothing of the
kind in the other animals. Of course the impulse of
play in animals springs from another source — the
instinct to develop the particular powers that
their life-careers will most require. Puppies and
kittens fight mock battles and pursue and capture
mock game, kids leap and bound, colts run and
leap, birds swoop and dive as if to escape a hawk:
in each case training the powers that are likely to
be the most useful to them in after-life. Our play-
instinct is no doubt of animal origin, but not in the
same sense is our perception of the humorous of
animal origin. It originated in man, as did so many
of the higher emotions.
