The colour of Riquet’s hair is changing sensibly: the grey-white now preponderates on his face. The velvety black of his neck, back, and sides is silvered with whitish tints, which have spread since the morning.
Often when they are alone, or even if their mother is with them, they will mistake no matter what part of their bodies for teats and begin to suck it, as a child of six months will suck its finger or even the tip of its foot.
15th May—To-day I held Riquet on my hand for three minutes. I was smoking a cigar; the little creature stretched out its neck, poked its nose up in the air, and sniffed with a persistent little noise. A sparrow, whose cage was hung up over us, frightened at my smoking-cap, began to fly round the cage and beat at it with its wings. At the sound of this noise Riquet was seized with a sudden fit of trembling, which made him squat down precipitately in my hand. Movements of this kind are reflex ones, the production of which is associated in the organism with certain auditory impressions; but the animal is necessarily more or less conscious of them, or will soon be so. From five minutes’ observation I have thus learnt that Riquet is sensible to strong smells, and that he already goes through the consecutive movements of sentiment and fear.
