CHAPTER XI.
MY JOURNEY CONTINUES.--INSTINCT.
It is unnecessary for me to give the details of the first part of mylong journey. My companion was guided by a perceptive faculty that, likethe compass, enabled him to keep in the proper course. He did notquestion those whom we met, and made no endeavor to maintain a givendirection; and yet he was traveling in a part of the country that wasnew to himself. I marveled at the accuracy of his intuitive perception,for he seemed never to be at fault. When the road forked, he turned tothe right or the left in a perfectly careless manner, but the continuityof his course was never interrupted. I began mentally to questionwhether he could be guiding us aright, forgetting that he was reading mythoughts, and he answered: "There is nothing strange in thisself-directive faculty. Is not man capable of following where animalslead? One of the objects of my special study has been to ascertain thenature of the instinct-power of animals, the sagacity of brutes. Thecarrier pigeon will fly to its cote across hundreds of miles of strangecountry. The young pig will often return to its pen by a route unknownto it; the sluggish tortoise will find its home without a guide, withoutseeing a familiar object; cats, horses and other animals possess thispower, which is not an unexplainable instinct, but a natural sensebetter developed in some of the lower creatures than it is in man. Thepower lies dormant in man, but exists, nevertheless. If we develop onefaculty we lose acuteness in some other power. Men have lost in mentaldevelopment in this particular direction while seeking to gain inothers. If there were no record of the fact that light brings objects tothe recognition of the mind through the agency of the eye, the sense ofsight in an animal would be considered by men devoid of it asadaptability to extraordinary circumstances, or instinct. So it is thatanimals often see clearly where to the sense of man there is onlydarkness; such sight is not irresponsive action without consciousnessof a purpose. Man is not very magnanimous. Instead of giving credit tothe lower animals for superior perception in many directions, he deniesto them the conscious possession of powers imperfectly developed inmankind. We egotistically aim to raise ourselves, and do so in our ownestimation by clothing the actions of the lower animals in a garment ofirresponsibility. Because we can not understand the inwardness of theirpower, we assert that they act by the influence of instinct. The terminstinct, as I would define it, is an expression applied by men to aseries of senses which man possesses, but has not developed. The word isused by man to characterize the mental superiority of other animals incertain directions where his own senses are defective. Instead ofcrediting animals with these, to them, invaluable faculties, manconceitedly says they are involuntary actions. Ignorant of their mentalstatus, man is too arrogant to admit that lower animals are superior tohim in any way. But we are not consistent. Is it not true that in thedirection in which you question my power, some men by cultivation oftenbecome expert beyond their fellows? and such men have also given verylittle systematic study to subjects connected with these undeniablemental qualities. The hunter will hold his course in utter darkness,passing inequalities in the ground, and avoiding obstructions he can notsee. The fact of his superiority in this way, over others, is notquestioned, although he can not explain his methods nor understand howhe operates. His quickened sense is often as much entitled to be calledinstinct as is the divining power of the carrier pigeon. If scholarswould cease to devote their entire energies to the development of thematerial, artistic, or scientific part of modern civilization, and turntheir attention to other forms of mental culture, many beauties andpowers of Nature now unknown would be revealed. However, this can notbe, for under existing conditions, the strife for food and warmth is themost important struggle that engages mankind, and controls our actions.In a time that is surely to come, however, when the knowledge of all menis united into a comprehensive whole, the book of life, illuminatedthereby, will contain many beautiful pages that may be easily read, butwhich are now not suspected to exist. The power of the magnet is notuniform--engineers know that the needle of the compass inexplicablydeviates from time to time as a line is run over the earth's surface,but they also know that aberrations of the needle finally correctthemselves. The temporary variations of a few degrees that occur in therunning of a compass line are usually overcome after a time, and withouta change of course, the disturbed needle swerves back, and again pointsto the calculated direction, as is shown by the vernier. Should I err inmy course, it would be by a trifle only, and we could not go far astraybefore I would unconsciously discover the true path. I carry my magnetin my mind."
Many such dissertations or explanations concerning related questionswere subsequently made in what I then considered a very impressive,though always unsatisfactory, manner. I recall those episodes now, afterother more remarkable experiences which are yet to be related, andrecord them briefly with little wonderment, because I have gone throughadventures which demonstrate that there is nothing improbable in thestatements, and I will not consume time with further details of thispart of my journey.
We leisurely traversed State after State, crossed rivers, mountains andseemingly interminable forests. The ultimate object of our travels, alocation in Kentucky, I afterward learned, led my companion to guide meby a roundabout course to Wheeling, Virginia, by the usual mountainroads of that day, instead of going, as he might perhaps have much moreeasily done, via Buffalo and the Lake Shore to Northern Ohio, and thensoutherly across the country. He said in explanation, that the time lostat the beginning of our journey by this route, was more than recompensedby the ease of the subsequent Ohio River trip. Upon reaching Wheeling,he disposed of the team, and we embarked on a keel boat, and journeyeddown the Ohio to Cincinnati. The river was falling when we started, andbecame very low before Cincinnati was reached, too low for steamers, andour trip in that flat-bottomed boat, on the sluggish current of thetortuous stream, proved tedious and slow. Arriving at Cincinnati, myguide decided to wait for a rise in the river, designing then tocomplete our journey on a steamboat. I spent several days in Cincinnatiquite pleasantly, expecting to continue our course on the steamer"Tecumseh," then in port, and ready for departure. At the last moment myguide changed his mind, and instead of embarking on that boat, we tookpassage on the steamer "George Washington," leaving Shipping-PortWednesday, December 13, 1826.
During that entire journey, from the commencement to our finaldestination, my guide paid all the bills, and did not want either formoney or attention from the people with whom we came in contact. Heseemed everywhere a stranger, and yet was possessed of a talisman thatopened every door to which he applied, and which gave us unlimitedaccommodations wherever he asked them. When the boat landed atSmithland, Kentucky, a village on the bank of the Ohio, just abovePaducah, we disembarked, and my guide then for the first time seemedmentally disturbed.
"Our journey together is nearly over," he said; "in a few days myresponsibility for you will cease. Nerve yourself for the future, andbear its trials and its pleasures manfully. I may never see you again,but as you are even now conspicuous in our history, and will be closelyconnected with the development of the plan in which I am alsointerested, although I am destined to take a different part, I shallprobably hear of you again."