carrying them to places of safety in their mouths, and feeding them till
full grown; and this they do not only for their own young, but to any
young who may be brought in contact with them. We have known a male
mierkat so assiduous in feeding young that were quite unrelated to
himself, taking to them every morsel of food given him, that we have
been compelled to shut him up in a room alone when feeding him, to
prevent his starving himself to death: the male mierkat thus exhibiting
exactly those psychic qualities which are generally regarded as
peculiarly feminine; the females, on the other hand, being far more
pugnacious towards each other than are the males.

Among mammals generally, except the tendency to greater pugnacity shown
by the male towards other males, and the greater solicitude for the
young shown generally by the female form, but not always; the psychic
differences between the two sex forms are not great. Between the male
and female pointer as puppies, there is as little difference in mental
activity as in physical; and even when adult, on the hunting ground,
that great non-sexual field in which their highest mental and physical
activities are displayed, there is little or nothing which distinguishes
materially between the male and female; in method, manner, and quickness
they are alike; in devotion to man, they are psychically identical. (It
is often said the female dog is more intelligent than the male; but I
am almost inclined to doubt this, after long and close study of both
forms.) It is at the moment when the reproductive element comes fully
into play that similarity and identity cease. In the intensity of
initial sex instinct they are alike; the female will leap from windows,
climb walls, and almost endanger her life to reach the male who waits
for her, as readily as he will to gain her. It is when the bitch lies
with her six young drawing life from her breast, and gazing with wistful
and anguished solicitude at every hand stretched out to touch them, a
world of emotion concentrated on the sightless creatures, and a whole
body of new mental aptitudes brought into play in caring for them, it is
then that between her and the male who begot them, but cares nothing for
them, there does rise a psychic difference that is real and wide. Alike
in the sports of puppydom and the non-sexual activities of adult age;
alike in the possession of the initial sexual instinct which draws the
sex to the sex, the moment