Holly Kaufman, age 9, of San Francisco, California, for her question:

Do animals cry?

On a windy day, your dog may come home with tears streaming down his dear, fuxrp cheeks But he is not really crying as you cry when something terrible happens. The wind has irritated his sensitive eyes and his eyes are shedding watery tears to wash out bits of dust and debris. Sometimes you cat may seem to be crying. Her bright eyes shed watery drops, perhaps leaving bits of waxy debris clogged in the corners. She may even sneeze and sniffle a little. But Miss Puss is not crying because her heart is sad. Chances are, she has a cold.

Out on the deep ocean, the kreat blue whale sheds a constant stream of tears down his huge cheeks. But he is not really crying either. The tears are oily liquid and he sheds them to keep salty water and floating ocean scraps out of his eyes. So far as we know, none of the animals cry as we do. Certainly they feel pain and heartache as we do. But none of them, it seems, ever weep tears as we do when they are sad. But, of course, some ani¬mals do make sounds of sadness that are their equivalent of crying.