What kind of strange behavior did gulliver see in brute beasts? Why did he feel comforted?

Check out the quote from the book,

"They went some paces off, as if it were to confer together, walking side by side, backward and forward, like persons deliberating upon some affair of weight, but often turning their eyes towards me, as it were to watch that I might not escape. I was amazed to see such actions and behaviour in brute beasts; and concluded with myself, that if the inhabitants of this country were endued with a proportionable degree of reason, they must needs be the wisest people upon earth."

Although their behaviour was different, there was something civilized and honourable about them.