?/• THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESENTED BY PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID TH£ QUESTION CONCERNING THE SENSIBILITY, INTELLIGENCE, AND INSTINCTIVE ACTIONS OF INSECTS, BY DAVID BADHAM, M. D. FELLOW OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS OF LONDON ONE OF THE RADCLIFFE TRAVELLING FELLOWS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, AND MEMBER OF THE ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF FRANCE. Licet irrideat, is qui velit ; plus apud me tamen vera ratio valebit quam vulgi opinio. Cic. There are not many certain truths in this world. It is therefore in the anatomy of the mind as in that of the body ; more good will accrue to mankind by attending to the large, open, and perceptible parts, than by studying too much such finer nerves and vessels as will for ever escape our observation. The disputes are all upon these last.— (Pope's preface to the Essay on Man.) PARIS, PRINTED BY A. BEtIN RTE SAINTE-ANNK, 55- M368505 DEDICATION. To Sir Benjamin Brodie, Bart., etc., etc., etc. My dear Sir, Allow me to dedicate to you a few loose thoughts on a subject which involves discussions far from alien to our common professions, and of which the intrinsic interest might well recommend it to abler hands. I remain, my dear Sir, very truly yours, THE AUTHOR, Paris, 46, Rue Basse du Remparl, September, 1837. ON THE SUPPOSED SENSIBILITY AND INTELLIGENCE OF INSECTS, WE may not positively have impaled a worm ; we are not perhaps initiated in the so accounted cruel mysteries of hook and line ; but few of us would not rather have trodden elsewhere, when we have chanced to crush the worm that was crawling across our path, nor is it with entire indifference that we see him cut in twain by spade, or ploughshare, and writhing (as we call it) at both ends on the up-turned earth. Then, as to the beetle, with his horny covering, the crash of whose extinction unavoidably calls attention to it, the authority of Shakspeare, as to the kind, and amount of his suffering, has made it sacrilege to doubt its reality ! We were, however, not ill- pleased when the thought lately occurred to us, that crea- tures whom in our inadvertence we so incessantly injure or destroy, might be, after all, in much probability, so constituted by benevolent Nature, as to be exempted, if not absolutely, in a great measure, from those painful consequences which wound or contusion inflict upon our- selves. I am sufficiently aware how serious a charge I incur of departure from received opinions, in the pages which are to follow. I know that the humane prejudice of ages is all against me ; Lactantius has assured me that 1 beasts are equal to man in all things but religion : the author of the article on instinct in the Encyclopedic, avers, that to doubt whether beasts have feeling, were as unreasonable as to question whether our fellow-creatures feel : and another writer of the same nation, in a very pleasing treatise on animals, alleges, that he can neither have heart, nor ears, who does not comprehend, and is not affected by those demonstrations of pain to which the voices of hurt animals give utterance. But let all this be ever so true, (and I enter not on that subject at all,) butter- flies and beetles, spiders and cock-chafers, belong not to those orders of intelligent creatures, which cheer our dwellings, and attach us by affection. Rather annoyances than otherwise in their familiarity, insects are neither like the parrot whose education we undertake, the dog who is dreaming at our feet, or the horse that is proud to carry us ; and my concern, be it understood in all that is to follow, is with insects only — their supposed modicum of mind, their sensibility, their instincts, or what not— in short the influence of their psychology, if they have any, on the economy of their lives. Sir Charles Bell has, if I recollect, somewhere written, that when a worm is cut in two, that portion of him which carries his head, makes a decided effort to escape, while the caudal part resigns itself without resistance to its fate, — that is, being interpreted, the half to which the head is attached, being in possession of the brain, contains all the energies of life, and all the capacity of suffering. But what if a worm has no brain, or modification of brain ? without which, what is the use of nerves ? for nerves in- deed he has ; but what sort of thing is the nervous sys- tem of insects, or what would any nervous system be without a brain ? What right can such imperfect struc- tures have, to be regarded as an organ of sensation ? for as to the opinion that sensation is possible without nerves at all, it appears to have been set up, by way of explaining 3 the activity of certain animalculae which exhibit no nerv- ous fasciculi ; and it is in reference to this supposed fact that an ingenious dentist of this city (M. Regnard) has advanced an opinion, that tooth-ache does not require a seat in the nerve, but that it is competent to the bony matter of the tooth itself to incur this penalty. As sensibility however, is incontestably united to a nervous structure through all the races of being in which sensibility is most conspicuous, or can best be traced and verified, we would make light of the exception, if indeed it be such, and hold it more useful to en- quire rather into the character and extent of such a nerv- ous arrangement as insects really exhibit. The nervous system then in insects, to confer so large a title on a medullary cord which runs through the animal, and gives off a few branches to the organs which it visits, is of the simplest character ; it is composed of two sub- stances, an external of darker colour, and an internal of whiter matter, called, from some resemblance to that of the human brain, cortical and cineritious. In examining the nervous rope more closely, it is found to consist of two easily discernible elementary threads, more intimately united at particular points than at others, and that union effected by roundish knobs or ganglions, which appear as so many small inequalities or excrescences, occurring at unequal intervals, in uncertain number, and of irre- gular size. As to external manifestations of an inter- nal nervous centre, in the existence of organs of the par- ticular senses ; it is observable that eyes, which constitute the most remarkable of such organs, are in insects not universal ; but as insect eyes have optic nerves, and as the optic nerves in man proceed from the brain, the first ganglion, from which they proceed in insects, passes with some physiologists for an unequivocal brain ; others being disposed to look on all the ganglia as so many equal brains ; while a third school, consider the supposi- tion of these bodies being of the nature of brain at all, to be altogether repugnant to analogy, and equally unsup- ported by experiment or observation. As to the first, and most popular perhaps, of these three views, I confess for my own part, that I am unable to find any support for it — be the ganglia what they may, I see no reason for believ- ing the extreme one of the series to have any privilege or prerogative whatever, over the others. As to the second, which holds all the ganglia to be so mam; brains, an argu- ment would, I think, be well entitled to a hearing, which, without attempting any thing more precise, should simply trace the legitimate and necessary consequence of suppos- ing a conclave or council of brains in one being, and signalize the prodigious inconvenience of many brains to a single possessor. Position then goes for nothing, and structure being interrogated, the ganglia, in this respect, are all so much alike, that no reason appears to remain for believing the head ganglion, in insects, to be endowed with superior functions to the rest, and to be the brain par excellence ; nor, so far as I know, is there any experi- ment or observation tending to such a conclusion, except Sir Charles Bell's, which, I am satisfied is incorrect. On observing a divided worm, I found that instead of the decollated head and shoulders moving away, and leaving the tail to the fate of dependents in general, both halves began to move in the same progressive manner, and each soon found its way to the borders of the plate. Perhaps, for a few seconds, the headless portion might, of the two, seem least lively, but as soon as it had made up it's mind, it moved off, much in the fashion that the entire worm is wont to do, or the piece to which the head belonged, did. Moreover, if worms be cut into several pieces, the motion is the very same sort of motion in all, with that of the obtruncated head and its piece of body, and the death, or cessation of motion in the different pieces, appears to depend generally upon their masses. When the worm was divided not exactly at the middle, it would be the head piece, or the tail, according to their size, that first ceased to exhibit signs of vitality ; and in poisoning the entire worm by touching it, for instance, with solid citric acid, (which first excites violent action, but quickly destroys mobility altogether,) no difference was noticed in the time in which that result arrived, by applying the poisonous agent to various parts of the ani- mal ; — all showing that there can be no essential difference in the different ganglia, as reservoirs of life, and that one confers no more vitality on the whole, or sensibility on the parts, than another. On making similar experiments on insects, dividing them at the juncture of the corslet with the abdomen, the life of the disconnected pieces, as of those of the worm, remained inherent in them for hours, sometimes for days ; different insects however dif- fering in the period of final extinction. In some instances perhaps, the portion to which the head was attached might have appeared to be endowed with a somewhat more enduring vitality, and might have exhibited some feeble indication of life, after the other extremity had al- ready ceased to move ; but, the difference was trifling, (and one should take in the fact that the upper ganglion is generally the larcjest in size, as perhaps sufficient to ac- count for it), nor was the result invariable. Of a Slaps mucronata, for instance, which I had divided in the manner specified, the head and corslet, with their append- ages, ceased to give signs of vitality long before the rest of the beetle had ceased to move. Again, the head cut off from a fly, or any other insect, soon dies, the body still surviving for some time ; so that the head would seem more dependent on the body, than the body on the head. At any rate, the considerable period during which either part of a divided insect continues to manifest signs of life, leads to the inevitable conclusion of their not drawing sup- plies from the head, and of, in fact, their entire indepen- dcnce, as to the possession or conservation of the vital principle. If different parts of the insect be held over sulphur, it makes no difference as to the time when contractility ultimately ceases, nor does the partial applica- tion of heat, or prussic acid, affect that result in any con- spicuous degree ; whereas when the same insects are ex- posed to a very slight general heat, no part of the body being protected, they die almost instantly. To revert to the mere position of this ganglion being the same which brain occupies elsewhere, I suppose nobody would ever have thought of instituting a serious argument from that fact, nor have dreamt, on that account, of advancing for gan- glion No 1, a claim to more cerebral attributes than No. 2, had it not happened to send off, where an organ of vision really exists, the optic nerves. But these nerves must be inserted somewhere into the general nervous matter of the body, and that point would naturally be as near as possible to the eyes ; and when it is added that worms and caterpillars have no eyes, and so are destitute of even this narrow pretension to a brain, or cerebroei'd ganglion, it would appear that nothing could well be more gratuitous than the speculation that the first ganglion is to be re- garded as ihe brain of insects. Or take the other view, and make the extreme gan- glion but one of several brains ; the inevitable conse- quence of having more than one brain, more than one seat of sensation and intelligence, must surely have been overlooked in such an extravagance I for do not sensation, and consciousness that we have it, make up our individuality ? and would not a plurality of seats for these faculties in the same creature disintegrate that creature, and make many individualities, out of, or within one or- ganisation ! * Are the pieces of a worm then, just so many The raighly serpcnl love. Cut by this chance in pieces small, In all still lived ; each little broken part Felt the whole pang of all the heart.— COWI.EY. wtfrms, in virtue of the ganglionic life of each, and yet capable of consolidation into one existence ? To support this theory it will not be enough that each ganglionic cen- tre, whatever cerebral attributes we shall invest it with, be supposed in possession of its own indepen- dence ; for as the worm entire can move his whole body thus composed, we must further suppose an exact har- mony and understanding between these different indivi- dualities, else his actions would have no unity, no rythm, no steadiness of purpose, or uniformity of character. In short, has a worm a will, or a chorus of wills ? To will is one of the first attributes of mind, (and mind is unity, — is indivisible,) as opposed to matter, or to mechanical necessity. When I walk, I will to walk — /have but one brain— when a worm crawls, with his twenty brains, is it his will or their wills that govern him ? Were every ganglion a separate brain, there might come to be, there is no denying it, an insurrection or mutiny of the wills, the balance of power in the ganglionic Republic might be per- petually disturbed, and not only every motion be very dif- ficult to be executed, but even the vital principle be often in exceeding doubt how to distribute itself/ Neither then * If any one shall say that I am perplexing what is extremely simple, and that no one pretends that these ganglionic brains are like our brains, seats of intelligence, but simply depots of sensibility, (and there is no third office that can be suggested), I reply, that a plurality, even of such brains, cannot be supposed in the same in- dividual— bird, beast, reptile, or insect. To enter fully upon the subject would be to anticipate in a great measure what follows in the text; I would merely state here, that as there can be no feeling without consciousness (for I ask whether any one can conceive of feeling separately from consciousness; and whether the words " I am conscious of a pain or uneasiness" are not synonymous with " I feel pain or uneasiness ?") and consciousness is essentially single like all the other phenomena having reference to mind, which is one and single — so there can be but one seat for consciousness, or for feeling, i. e., one brain. That there can be but one brain may be also proved by a compari- son of the phrase, / feel, with that of, / digest, I breathe; or with any other function of organic life. We are conscious that our mind, our inner man, our "I," is involved in the first expression ; and that 8 can the collective ganglia be so many brains,* nor has the head ganglion made out any case to be pre-eminently such, f And if the supposition of a multiplicity of brains be thus absurd, and the assertion of any one ganglion to be chief amongst its fellows, and brain proper, be thus unsup- ported, it would seem to follow, as of course, that insects have, indeed, no centrum commune of sensation and intel- ligence ; and if it be admitted that they are destitute of this, to prove them in the largest possession of nerves, would be of no avail. But, as the possession of a brain, or some equivalent to a brain, by insects, may be still, by some, held not to have been entirely disproved, let us now enquire into the second condition required for the sentient life-, and direct our attention to certain peculiarities of theNervous system, as it has been latterly elucidated in man and the higher ani- mals, in order to compare that nervous system with the nerves of insects, and see if it be a probable doctrine that they have nerves fitted for sensation. It is now generally admitted that in man and the higher animals, there are two distinct orders of nerves, which not only differ in their place of origin, but are subservient to different uses. All physiologists now talk of nerves for sensation and nerves for voluntary motion, in addition to which two orders of nerves, some have thought that there is a necessity for the admission of a third, to administer lo the growth of the body, regulate the transition of food into nourishment, and preside over the intestinal secre- tions, and the defecation of the system. Take all three the other functions are so independent of that mind, that they can be and are carried on without its cognizance. Mind, there- fore, or one of the attributes of mind— consciousness-— is necessary to feeling, which being in its very nature single, the corporeal seat (so to speak) of feeling must be also single, that is, again, there can be but one brain. * See Appendix (A). f See Appendix (B). 9 supposed orders of nerves together, adding to them a brain, and it is certain that we obtain a pretty extensive view of a nervous system— how different from any thing that can be traced in insect anatomy, the least laborious entomolo- gist is aware. Again, that in proportion as a complicated and efficient system of nerves, is susceptible of anatomical demonstration, do the phenomena of mind begin to be manifested ; and that sensation, or that perception of ex- ternal objects which supplies the mind with all practical knowledge, eminently belongs to a certain anatomical de- velopment— these are also conclusions in conformity to actual experience ; for as we descend the scale of animal and find the general organizations less perfect and com- plete, but particularly the distribution of a nervous system less ample, we also find the evidence of mental operations, imperfect and unsatisfactory. It follows, therefore, that when we come to insects, whose nervous system is of the lowest order, we ought really to be prepared, at any rate for a great diminution of the general sensibility, and for an intelligence, so to speak, proportionately defective, in place of insisting on the fineness of their instincts, and their huge capacity for pain. Moreover, if we go into details, and speculate on those parts of our nervous sys- tem, which, in insects, where the whole is of such small dimensions, might seem the least indispensable, the nerves of sensation will probably present themselves, as the least necessary, and the least likely to be found. .Nerves re- quired for motion of organs should belong indifferently to high and low grades of animal existence ; an equal ne- cessity for nerves of the visceral life, is obvious ; and, the nutrition of every animal requiring them, of such nerves, even irtsects ought not to be, nor are they found to be, destitute. For we may, from analogy, almost venture to name, or strongly to presume, the of/ices of certain even of their nerves; and knowing that the function of nutrition is executed by, or is under the control of, nerves in our- 10 selves, and in the higher animals, we may reasonably con- clude, when we see tissues of similar appearance pro- fusely distributed about the reservoirs of aliment, in lower forms of being, that these are the instruments of a similar operation— just as when we see that from different points along the nervous trunk, there proceed branches ^oing to parts subservient to the motions of the creature, we can- not make much mistake in calling these latter expansions of the nervous tissue nerves of motion. So far, some analogy in insects with man's structure really obtains ; but when we come to enquire into their probable possession of nerves of sensation also, let us see how the case lies. First, we have no right to say that it is necessary they should feel at all. Granting sensation how- ever, that is conceding the point to be proved, we should be exceedingly embarrassed to assign particular nerves as their nerves of sensation. The other functions above alluded to must, as we have seen, be executed in insects equally as in man. As to sensibility, however, or its amount, it could not, in the first place, have been assumed from any abundance of nerves ; but the nerves in insects are few, and the duties which those nerves seem to discharge having been inferred from functions actually performed, and from the visible distribution of the nervous matter, the resi- duary legatee, Sensation, will come poorly off, unless we assume that it may be imparted by the same nervous material, wherever found, which has so many other claims to satisfy. So much, then, for the probability of Sensation in insects, from an examination of their system * Swammerdara, who has done so much for entomology, car- ried insect anatomy to a perfection which, before his lime, seemed impossible, and is therefore held in the highest reverence among entomologists; not that I would venture, before the learned Society of which I am a member, to aver my belief in all his discoveries. A great deal of uncertainty as well as instruction must ever attach to reasonings founded upon comparative anatomy ; — only think of differences of opinion as to whether a particular organ in an insect should be called its spleen or liver. 11 of Nerves. But we had already come to the conclusion that they also want that organ, without which we can- not conceive sensation : and if it shall have been rendered not improbable that they also want the rail roads of com- munication with such an organ, we not only can no longer argue that insects feel, from anything known to us in their structure, but from that very structure we seem to be led to exactly the contrary conclusion. Since the argument for sensation in insects cannot then be supported in this way, those who maintain it must shift their ground, which perhaps they may be less reluctant to do, in the possession, as they may conceive, of a much stronger position in the conduct of the living insect, when accidentally or purposely injured. Writhing in a worm, or agitation in the limbs of an insect submitted to experi- ment, have been long held to be certainly expressive of painful sensation. We shall presently see how equivocal such signs are, however generally admitted. Nothing in fact can be less conclusive than the inference of pain felt from motion induced ; and if I were engaged as counsel on the popular side, I would throw up that clause of my brief altogether, and rather take my stand in maintaining the sensibility of insects, on some speculations of Bichat, (ex- ceedingly ingenious ones,) which I shall presently lay be- fore the reader. Abnormal motion — motion under any epithet, is evi- dently not so general a result of pained sensibility in man himself, as to furnish the argument from analogy, which goes for so much in all our conclusions. Strictly considered, motion is purely an affection of the organism, while for sensation, mind, as well as organism, is requisite. All the unconscious movements are but organic ; and the mere organism (which involves matter only,) cannot be essen- tially in possession of, though it may be united to sensa- tion, which necessarily involves the intelligent or imma- terial part of our nature. Motion under pain, ancl sensi- 1-2 bility to pain, arc such different and distinct things, that it is familiar to witness pain endured without abnormal motion at all. On the other hand, young persons affected with St. Vitus' dance, make grimaces which to those not in the secret, might, from their unfamiliarity, be supposed, falsely, to express pain, yet the most unseemly contor- tions notoriously take place without. — The epileptic, the hysterical convulsions are painless ; of tetanic spasm, in- deed the pain is much severer than that of inflammation ; but here, in place of motion, the state is that of rigid immobility. Then, as to these particular motions in some creatures, concerning which so much is said, the little sand-eels that you poke out of their holes in the beach, at low water, wriggle exactly after the fashion of the worm on the fisherman's hook; and perhaps the shape of that Avorm, (like that of the eel, and the serpent,) may in great measure explain the writhing which is so gratuitously supposed to be expressive of its agony. In short, the " winding bout" of the reptile is probably but the consequence of " its linked structure long drawn out." When we have pricked the insect, or wounded the worm, they may indeed move violently, and be thrown into apparent agitation ; but, the only certain conclusion to be deduced from that fact, is, that we have stimulated the inherent irritability of a part of their organisation. It is certain that no proof of the worm's consciousness of the injury, or, in other words, his sensibility under it, can be thus obtained; and motions I will repeat it, can never prove pain, since muscular con- traction, of every kind, and in every direction, is per- formed entirely without consciousness.* * When we move our limbs indeed, we are conscious of (his motion, and by that consciousness we arrive al the iruc stale of Hie position of our muscles, and the ilexure of our members, but \vc derive Ibis knowledge probably from Ibe proper nerves of sensation. which, when we bend the arm for instance, are compressed, and it is the mode and amount of pressure to which these nerves arc sub- ject, that bring the brain acquainted with the slate of muscular conlraclibilitv. In cases loo where muscular motion becomes iu- 13 Motion then, being inadmissible in proof of painful sen- sation, let us next examine that speculation of the French physiologist, to which allusion has been made, which has not been, so far as I know, pressed into this service, and which it is therefore somewhat generous to start for the service of one's adversary. That the organic sensibility, that by which the heart contracts upon the blood, and the viscera on their contents, is the same in hind as the animal sensibility, and so requires no par- ticular order of nerves, was the doctrine of Bichat, an- nounced in a sufficiently remarkable passage, which the medical reader, at least, will not be sorry, from its great ingenuity, to have again placed before him. " There are two kinds of sensibility (says this eminent writer) ; one purely organic, and the other the sensibility of rela- tion. The organic sensibility is that inherent property by virtue of which an organ receives an impression. Thus, glands are sensible, in this sense only, to the stimulus of blood which circulates in them ; and thus excretory ducts react upon the fluids which they convey ; so that upon this kind of sensibility depend the functions of circula- tion, respiration, digestion, secretion, absorption, — in a word, all the functions of organic life. But the sensi- bility of relation is that by which our organs are not only impressionable to stimuli, but are enabled to trans- mit, as well as to receive impressions, to a sensorium commune. It is by this sensibility that the animal holds communion with surrounding objects ; upon it de- pend the phenomena of the brain and senses; it is its peculiar province, and exclusive prerogative, to preside over external, or, as it has been called, (for animals alone possess it,) animal life — the other kind of sensi- tolernbly painful, (as in spasms) still it is probable that we suffer by the nerves of sensation, not by any abnormal exercise of the nerves of motion, — but even allow that this order of nerves were capable of painful sensation or any sensations, this could only be true, pro- vided there were a brain to which to transmit them. 14 bility having been imparted even to vegetable existence. Notwithstanding this distinction, however, the organic sensibility is the principle, the element, so to speak, of the sensibility of relation., and may be considered as its first grade; so that, when it augments much in an organ, it takes the character of the sensibility of relation, and the organ now carries to the common centre certain im- pressions, which before it either did not transmit, or transmitted very imperfectly." Now, then, it maybe enquired, since even insects pos- sess (for no living thing can want it) the organic sensibi- lity, why may they not have, in accordance with this doc- trine, the other sensibility — the sensibility to external hurts — the sensibility of relation — that animal sensibility, concerning which we hesitate ? — for the reason assigned before, — their organic deficiencies — for, grant to insects a nervous system capable, whether in a natural or an exalted state, of transmitting impressions, yet, till the brain can be shown to have any existence, it will be vain for the roads to be open ; there is no metropolis to which all these roads converge ; the existence of a brain, or com- mon centre, being for sensation the ; sine qua non for an impression may even be made on the external organ, and no sensation result. It may aid the apprehension of a difference between mere impressions upon the organs of sense, and the same impressions carried into full sensa- tion, that some of the organs of sense being double, the mere impressions made on them must be also double; whereas sensation, because the brain comes in, is always single. In reading, the two eyes do not see two books ; though the two nostrils convey two impressions, but one smell is the result : nor do two ears disturb the unity of the sense of hearing ; but if the mind, which is single, did not come into play, we should see double objects, and hear two prima Donnas every time we went to the Opera. Though the arguments derived from examination of their 15 structure, might of themselves be held sufficient to raise serious doubts about the sensibility of insects, or at least any considerable degree of it, we are disposed to insist more particularly on the above views respecting sensation itself, which consider it as not entirely an organic, any more than entirely a mental operation. Into sensation, mind as well as body must enter. We entirely adopt the opinion of the encyclopediste, that " the highest exer- cise of the intellectual faculties is not more incom- patible with our conception of matter only, than the simplest sensation ; and that there is infinitely greater distance between the most refined etherialised matter, however organised, and the lowest perception, than be- twixt perception in its simplest form and the most reflec- tive of the acts of intelligence."* It is evident that the mind being strictly incorporeal, and not liable to the demands of the body, or susceptible of the injuries of the body, cannot be the proper seat of pain. Nevertheless, the discussion of sensation, or sen- sibility, necessarily introduces the uncorporeal part of our nature; because sensation involves perception, and perception supposes consciousness. On the other hand, the mind can only perceive what the sense has first duly brought under its cognizance ; a smell to be recognised and distingnished, as of musk, or acetic acid, of assa- fetida, or a rose, must have been transmitted from the corporeal organ to the incorporeal sensory, and nothing can be seen by the mind's eye which has not been origi- nally transmitted by the nerve of vision through the optic apparatus. Sensation, it appears then is, strictly, neither an affec- tion of the mind, nor, exclusively, of the organ, but results from the combined action of the two— perhaps of the mind most ; for that sensation is really more a mental pheno- *Art. Instinct, Encyclopedic. 16 menon than an affection of the apparently sentient organ, is probable, from the fact, that forced attention, pre- occupation, or distraction, of the mind, interfere, to a great degree, with the perception of painful impressions made on the body. The extent of this power of the mind over matter may vary much in different individuals, but we all possess some considerable share of it. When the attention is either voluntarily conceded, or involuntarily drawn off in another direction, we obtain, in requital of the effort, or as the result of the distraction, a greatly diminished consciousness of pain. On the other hand, who does not know that the unceasing attention, the unwearied vigilance which the hypochondriac de- votes to his least symptom, aggravates his malaise into pain. It must be partly from alienated atten- tion, (not entirely, for we know that the smart or the throb require an interval before they supervene on the injury ; and we partly apprehend the reason of this, and call it reaction,) that school-boys and pugilists do not feel their bruises till after the fight. Soldiers occasionally discover gun-shot wounds, of a slighter kind, after the battle is over, and I know a gentleman who held the candle while an operation was performing on him for hernia. The .story related in the " Diary of a late Physician," of a lady who bore the amputation of her breast without flinching, by causing her maid to hold before her the letter she had just received from her husband, about to return from India, on which she rivetted her eyes, while the knife of the surgeon divided her flesh, charms us from its air of truth. Mutius Scasvola is related to have thrust his hand into the fire, velut alienato ab sensu ammo, attentive rather to his glory than his bodily suffering. Could the Cramners and the ]Latimers, the saints and martyrs of old, ever have been such, but from the autocracy of the high motives by which their attention was enchained ? and, to 17 make a sad anticlimax 1 do we not daily experience that even the light distraction of cheerful conversation, or luck at cards, are as good as colchicum in twinges of a second-rate gout. * In order, then, to sensation, an impression (the material, so to speak, out of which the sensation is to be forged) is transmitted to the brain, (more or less vividly, according to the perfection and delicacy of the organism,) and the mind, receiving its intimation from the organ of sense, rejoices or is pained according to the perception it thus obtains. The acuteness, however, of the mind's per- ceptivity— of its full co-operation with that organ, will vary according to the nature, the force, and the duration of the impression itself ; according to the fidelity with which the material instrument, the nerve, may have transmitted the impression; and according as attention has been concentrated, divided, or withdrawn. Thus that some persons bear surgical operations better than others, may indeed involve several circumstances ; of these however it is probably one, to possess a mind capable of considerable effort in forcing the attention elsewhere ; though it cannot be denied that a more obtuse constitu- tion of the nervous system may materially assist. Such, then, seems to be the nature of sensibility, and such the organs it employs ; but as those organs are so scantily, or not at all, developed in insects, if the above statement be correct, the popular and poetical opinion of their high sensibility cannot possibly be just. But these views by no means exhaust the objections that * " And how 's your pain ?" inquired the gentle maid, (For that was asking if with luck she play'd ;) And this she answer' d, as the cards decreed, " O Biddy 1 ask not — very bad indeed ;" Or, in more cheerful lone, from spirit light, ** Why, thank you, Biddy, pretty well to-night." CKAKUK. 2 lie against the belief in the great sensibility of insects. The very existence of an organ of touch — that sense which, in man, is the appropriate organ of general sensibility, and co-extensive with his body itself, being here highly ambiguous — is a fact very unfavourable to the opinion that insects were created with great susceptibility to pain. Their integuments are scarcely ever impression- able by simple contact, and as to those who, by placing touch in the antennce only, restrict it almost to a point, they can hardly be said to allow to insects the possession of this sense, nor, of course, of general sensibility at all. At any rate, where the surface adapted for receiving exter- nal impressions from contact, is so exceedingly limited, in the same proportion, one would think, must that sensibi- lity, (of which external impression is the first condition, though by no means all that is necessary to secure the full result,) also decline, or become very questionable, when we speak of creatures whose bodies are nearly covered with horn, whose breastplate is a sort of cuirass, and whose legs are encased in greaves. These, it must be con- fessed, are unpromising conditions for superficial feeling ; but it may be urged that when we run a pin into an insect, we invade a deeper part of the organization ; and that if upon such an injury, the legs seem to be violently agitated, the conclusion that pain has produced that agitation, is most natural, and indeed little short of certainty. But it has been already objected that motions of this kind, like those of a heart recently taken from the body, of which the pulsations can so easily be renewed, only require that pro- perty of the living solid known to physiologists by the name of irritability. Or, if it be said that though some insects are hard and horny in their integuments, others are the reverse ; that caterpillars, for instance, exhibit such violent and convulsive movements when touched, as to make it exceedingly probable that sensation was painfully excited ; that the sense of touch in the spider is known 19 to be acute; and that worms and slugs will not pa- tiently be handled ; yet there are other and opposite facts which seem to nullify these inferences. Spiders abound on nettle-beds ; and slugs, which are softer than our integu- ments, lie upon them ; the caterpillar crunches, or masti- cates, of course without producing irritation, the whole of this formidable weed ; some insects habitually feed on vegetables of acrid juices, juices which would vesicate our skin, and inflame the mucous membrane. But what is most to the purpose, insects of soft contexture seem not to be harmed by mechanical irritants. If the thousand barbs of the stinging nettle so readily penetrate our comparatively hard integuments, thatpenetration must much more readily take place through the epidermis of the caterpillar ; and if these needles of nature do not hurt him as they hurt us, (and he does not afford even the doubtful evidence of unusual motions that they do,) is it not a presumption at least, that he cannot be much pained by those with which the entomologist transfixes him. Besides, it has been ob- served that the caterpillar does not wince, when the Ich- neumon pierces his flesh to inoculate him with her per- nicious eggs! Those, however, who feel indisposed to abandon the cur- rent opinion respecting insect sensibility, have still some objections to urge, though they can hardly pretend to the name of arguments. Some, perhaps, will say, that as God wills the happiness of his creatures, and as happiness is impossible without feeling, worms and insects must there- fore be supposed capable of suffering ;— that to imagine otherwise, is indeed almost an impiety, involving notions derogatory to the goodness of the Creator. Objections like these scarcely require reply. We do indeed " snatch from His hand the balance and the rod," when we thus presume to create his creatures anew after our own no- tions of the fitness of things, and the general scheme of Providence ! The worm exists according to his kind, and 20 man does no more. The plant, \ve see, was not created to feel at all, — why then should we insist that the worm or insect is full of sensibility ? Is it because worms are animals! but who made this ariificial division into animal and vegetable life? " II n'y a aucune difference essentielle entre les animaux et les vegetaux." * " Animals and vege- tables are, in the eye of Nature, existences of a very similar order." Now, none doubting that the vegetable kingdom is absolutely impassive, and the transition from vegetable into animal life absolutely eluding observation, it becomes impossible to refuse the admission that some animals at least, may be void of sensibility — and we act upon this per- suasion. The oyster is eaten while his heart palpitates, without qualm or scruple ; the Neapolitan batters down the quivering spines of the echinus, and lacerates him alive ! To such however as may still think it becoming to insist that the Creator must needs have willed to impart the ad- vantage of the senses to the whole of His animal creation, the question may perhaps be addressed without offence, whether to have endowed those humble creatures, which VQ so unavoidably crush in myriads at every step we take, with an impassive body, might not in reality be that very dispensation of tenderness for which they contend ? In addition to so many general arguments which I have now endeavoured to stale, against the probability of much sensibility in insects,— arguments I think fairly dedueible from the consideration of what they are in structure, and of what sensation is — it may yet perhaps be by no means void of interest to scrutinise their pretension to each of the senses categorically ; the question of the possession of any one of them, however, so resting upon the same gene- ral grounds, that while, if you can prove anyone of them to exist, the existence of any other becomes possible ; so, if * Biiffon. 421 you make the possession of one improbable, you throw suspicion on the whole. If an insect can feel without a brain — that is, if it can have the general sensibility which is administered by the same organ which imparts the sense of touch, without a brain, he may also see without a brain; but if he cannot feel, because he wants both the external apparatus, and that intelligence which supposes and employs the internal organ, then it will not be possi- ble, from the same defects, for him to see, or hear, or taste, or smell. On this subject it would be easy to en- large, but I must now hasten to whatever specific objec- tions appear to present themselves. 1st. SIGHT of insects ? — Of all the supposed senses in insects, sight is the only one, the existence of which is supported, by our being able to detect its organ — that of any of the others being only matter of deduction. The possession, you will say, of the organ must surely prove the possession of the same identical sense which it admi- nisters in man ; and there is doubtless a much stronger case made out for the full admission of this sense, which appears from analogy so necessary, and of which, in most insects, the organ is manifest, than for those other senses which, however advantageous they might seem, would probably be less so than vision, and which present no organ to our observation, — smell for instance, or hearing. The eye then, in most insects is a thing to be seen; but the question remains, does it confer vision in the accurate and full meaning of the word? -for it may let in light and not do this, and that light may even be the appointed stimulus of an insect's eye, as of ours, and yet sight, as we exercise and enjoy it, (and \\Q can comprehend and speak of it in no other sense,; not be the result— nay, the well known experiment of Reamur, which occurs to me here, and of the accuracy of which I have con- vinced myself, is inconclusive. He smeared the eyes of flies and bees with an opaque paste. The insect set at liberty, instead of making for the hive, the window, or the luminous object, fell immediately to the ground, which proves, undoubtedly, both that in ordinary circumstances an impression is made upon the retina, and that in conse- quence of that impression, the particular act of flying to the . window or the hive takes place. Well ! but this is sight I on the contrary, it is even far from probable that the possession of sight with intelligence, which is what we understand by this word, can be legitimately inferred ; for after all that we are ready to admit, and which indeed is quite undeniable, can we come to the certain conclusion that an insect sees, but by attending to the action which sight determines ? by watching what follows, and is taken by every one as the result of sight ? But who, you will interrupt me, yet ever doubted that a bee sees ? we find him in possession of eyes ; we observe him to go where he lists, and to return unerringly to his home. Nothing seems clearer ! but if you adopt this conclusion you will have to proceed a great deal further before you stop, and make your bee more accomplished than you probably intend ' You cannot disallow that if the bee's flight is directed by vision, it must also be regulated, as to its ex- lent or velocity, by will : follow him awhile in those mazy, giddy, gyrations ! now buzzing about your nose, now out of sight in the blue heaven, loitering over this flower or reposing upon that, to say nothing of courtship, or com- panionship when he finds a better tap than common ! But, however well amused, the bee must intend to return, that is, must note time — must mark the progress of the evening shadows and say to himself, it is time to go home ! At the very moment of going forth he must pro- pose to return to the hive ; and even where that domicile of his household gods remains in sight, he must, in order to return, exercise a will, founded as all volition must be, upon comparison, and a judgment in consequence ! But place him out of si±\t of his hive, and you must now 23 also confer on him an extraordinary memory,— one vastly superior to your own (such a one as you would perhaps hardly concede him without better evidence) as he flies by object after object in endless succession, to be noted, observe ! (if he be guided by sight) as land-marks on his re- turn ! Or take another instance in another insect— you attempt to approach a fly— he escapes, — you say from fear — he saw you and was afraid 1— why it looks like it ! but have you made up your mind to allow a passion or moral emotion to a fly? Consider what generates fear. Is it not the remembered experience of something hurtful? If a fly, instructed by his eyes, did indeed fear your ap. proach, or was afraid to trust you, how is it that the very next minute he settles upon your hand ? Do others of the insect race, who have so much more reason to expect in- evitable retribution, exhibit fear ? — is a flea afraid ? But if a moth flies to the light, he must see the light, and be guided thither by vision ! Here then, observe, you again allow volition, and with volition, intelligence! — but could intelligence — intelligence sharpened by plentiful experience, determine to this act of phrenzy, this suicidal exercise of will ? Surely had any, the lowest intelligence been im- parted to the winged fire-worshipper, it would deter him from rushing on his fate, which, however, he does with the determination of a Malabar widow ! scorched never so severely, (one should like to know, at least, if he feels pa!n.) back he goes to the fatal wick 1 " Nil ergo est sibi tot olfecisse lacernas I " I presume not .to conjecture the nature of that ex- terior agency, (for exterior it must be,) that compels, or conducts the bee to the inevitable hive, and the moth to the inevitable candle ;* but assuredly I cannot go the * They have just lighted the Boulevards with gas , and it is curi- ous, these snminer nights, to see the myriads of insects of various kinds that beset the glass lanterns, seemingly angry that they can- not fly in ! length of admitting an intelligent exercise of vision, or discern in these acts the evidence of mental operations. Is it possible to do so, when the actions which prima facie might appear to result from sight, are found in one instance, to involve a complicated, and salutary exer- cise of intellect, in another a perverse and ruinous fatality ? Or, shall it be said of the moth which thus perishes by myriads, Quos Deus vult perdere prius de- mentat ! No! the bee is too wise, the moth too foolish, to allow them the possession of intelligent vision ! and the explanation of what they do must therefore be sought for elsewhere. Meanwhile, what would be folly, as an act in- tended by the insect, may be simply its fate, — an inexpli- cable appointment of the wisdom of God. HEARING. — The same difficulty occurs as in the pre- ceding case. Insects are believed to act as though they heard, and are therefore supposed to hear : but as any act, consequent upon intelligent vision, proves will, which throws us back on the necessity of a sensorium, and of a brain, its seat, to which all the organs of sense corres- pond, and report their discoveries — hearing can alone be supposable on the same conditions. But a swarm of bees follows the tinkling of a bell, or the more discordant clang- ing of a cymbal! That loud harsh sounds generally inti- midate animals, rather than allure them, is sufficiently certain ; but that some hundreds of bees, (who may have no ear for music, to judge from their own monotony,) should have a positive taste for discord, and all consent in a common action, to which that discord disposes them, would be particularly remarkable. But we need not rest here : neither the bee, nor any other insect, has any organ to which the name of ear can be applied, so that if you still determine to suppose such a sense in insects, from a solitary instance — for to be led by hearing, or alarmed by hearing is not. as far as we recollect, even alleged of any other ;— if you still maintain that, at any rale, bees hear, 25 you first attribute to them an organ which is absolutely undiscoverable, and then allow them intelligence, and all that it supposes, or requires, into the bargain! SMELL. — We have seen that those who would assign to insects the full complement of the senses, are in diffi- culty where to lodge some of them ; and well they may ! In the case of smell, to detect the ordinary organ is so impossible, that it has recently been conjectured by Audouin, to consist in a porosity of the whole body, thus rendering it accessible every u-here to volatile ema^ nations. As to the a priori argument for the necessity of such a sense, it is alledged that insects, in an apart- ment, never fail to detect and resort to those substances of which the properties delight them; and that as this could not be accomplished by sight (supposing them to have it,) nor by taste, before they have tasted, it can only be by smell that the discovery is made; and that with them, the invisible nostril, as in man, the visible, must be purveyor to the palate. Yet how often do insects precipi- tate themselves with greediness on substances without odour ? What smell is there in sugar, treacle, honey, flour, and the many vegetable substances on which insects swarm, and even travel from a distance to seek? How many tribes of them hover around flowers perfectly void of odour 1 The fact is that its own insect lodges and boards within almost every corolla, and that there is hardly any thing in nature, alive or dead, animal, vegetable, or even mineral, which does not invite and support its insect popu- lation. The forest fly slings the impatient herd; the bot burrows in the carrion ; the moss-rose is powdered with its green parasites ; the cabbage is eaten by the caterpillar; $e galeruca rides upon the water lily ! — in most of which 'instances, to suppose the allurement of smell would be perfectly gratuitous. It is not even necessary to conclude that the larvae of Dermestes, Necrophores, Anthrajnae, Staphylini, etc. are invited by the smell of putrefaction; 26 nay, that circumv dilation of cow-dung, of which every specimen, as Mr. Geoffrey has observed, contains a per- fect treasure for the entomologist, supplies but doubtful proof that its effluvia constitute the attraction. Flies, however, abound near sugar ; and the saccharine principle, in almost any shape, invites the wasp into our rooms. But can you make it out to be the organ of smell that conducts them ? To us sugar has no smell ; and to suggest that wasps have a finer nostril than ours, loses sight of a very obvious objection ; which is, that before we invest the insect with such gratuitous delicacy in the perception of odours,lhe existence of the odour itself should be something more than a mere supposition, for it is only by our own senses, which are here at fault, that we can judge of the properties of bodies. Think you that the minute and swarming hordes of Apions, whose burnished blue and green relieve the else unvaried yellow of the flaming sun- flower, do really insert those long snouts of theirs into the plant in quest of an unknown aroma, or not rather to extract its well known honey ? The OEdemera haunts the perfectly scentless wild flower. Those minute insect gems, the Alticce, do they for this lie blazing in the hearts of so many flowers quite inodorous to us, and, we will presume, to them ? Do such general flower fanciers as the punctuated Donacea, the Necydalis, or the Cistela Sulphur ea, do the blue and scaly Hoplice, or the lovely sisterhood of the Leptura*, take lodgings amidst scentless petals, when others are to be had, and yet pretend to noses ? — as if it was not their mothers' doing, who placed every one of them there before they had any pretensions to a nostril 1 We have now written certain pages, which of course we expect the candid reader so to examine as to merit this epithet at our hands. Perhaps he will think we expect too much. Eyes, he will say, and not to see with !— to what end the orr/an, if not to execute the function^ Yet ex- 27 ercised it cannot be, in the sense in which alone it can be understood by our experience of it, as the instances ad- duced may perhaps have sufficiently shown. Not that I entertain any doubt that the eye, and so, that other organs, of which the particular office in insects is less certain, may be regarded as avenues by which impressions come into their bodies ; but such impressions are clearly not, as with us, destined to become interwoven with the phenomena of mind. If in some of the more remarkable passages of insect life, acts are done which certainly imply design and intention, yet many others, in their economy might be suf- ficiently explained by stimuli acting upon organism, as in plants where this explanation would be held sufficient. And as to those actions which are placed beyond, far beyond this explanation, since there can only be two possible hy- potheses on the subject, whereof the one endows the insect with powers that belong to mind essentially, and by impli- cation, confers not only skill and intelligence, but immor- tality, on a bee or a wasp — for mind is indistructible : while the second considers him only as a machine moved unerringly by au intelligence not his own. — I cannot choose, but adopt the latter. Apparenily, but not really intelligent, that is, not intelligent with intelligence of theirs, insects seem to me to come under some such denomination as that of machines, beautifully contrived within, but worked from without. The comparatively simpler objects of the mere sustentation of the individual and the secure perpetuation of the race, have been provided for in the helpless and passionless plant, and might be in insects, by no other than the first of the methods suggested, by stimuli acting on organism ; and as to those more striking wonders in their economy which excite our admiration, and are the results of mind, they obtain an equal explanation, whether we suppose insects to think and care for themselves, and to be wise, and skilful, and frugal, and industrious, or what not, in their own Behalf, or to be immediately thought for and cared for by the Supremo 28 intelligence I Surely the creator may have suitably en- dowed the insect that perishes, for all its corporeal necessities, without conferring on it the nobler boons of sensation, memory, imagination, and judgment ; nor need we impose on ourselves the necessity of maintaining as often as a beetle runs across our path, that he fol- lows this or that course Intentionally, or that when our heedless footstep tramples upon his osteology, it is at the expense of as much suffering as "as when a giant dies !" But it happens that among the many marvels recorded and perpetually reproduced, about the wonders of insect life, there are some, to explain which, without the admis- sion, not only of intelligence, but of inherent intelligence, would be nearly impossible, if they be authentic. Inter- communication between insects of ihe same species which has been seriously asserted by sorno imaginative writers, did it really exist, could not be explained but by the admission of the innate intelligence of the creature endowed with it. Now, what a blessing it would be to it, and to us, if the common //?/ could be quoted in proof of so excellent a gift ! for flies to be able to impart their mutual experience would save many of their lives, and make us much more comfortable ; and it would be enough to make a snatch or two at a handful, or having chastised a few scores by diligent flapping, which must be attended with abundant loss of life and limb, permit the survivors to exhibit themselves, like Djezzar Pacha's patients, — dismissed with loss of nose or ear, or some other ingenious mutilation — to encourage others. But a fly never takes warning — in that community capital punishments never succeed ! It may also, I fear, be safely concluded that butterflies hold no intercourse with one another ! a score of papilionaceous beaux may be seen besetting a female of their species, pinned to a card, of whose durance they appear to be far from having any adequate notion. With ants indeed, the 29 case is different, as we shall find by the following nar- rative. Some one had placed a pot of molasses in a bureau in- fested by ants, which they soon found out and ate away I The proprietor of the treasure drove them off. and slung up his pot to the ceiling, but in doing so, left by negli- gence, one of the tiny thieves behind. The overlooked culprit having first taken as much as he thought good for him, for ants are too prudent of course to commit excess, at length thought it time to depart. To effect this object, as ants do not fly, it was necessary to crawl up the cord, across the ceiling, and down the walls of the room— all which he duly and diligently did, and so in brief time rejoined his comrades. All this was straight- forward work ; ants of very ordinary capacity might have been equal to it. Presently, however, a whole regiment of ants, rank and file, is seen to leave its barracks, and direct its march upon the same object, by the self same course, making the most accurate use of the carte du pays which the spy had communi- cated ! They scud along the ceiling, and by means of the rope-ladder descend into the happy valley, in which their friend had rioted before. The whole manoeuvre was exe- cuted, according to the historian, in the best style— no jostling, no impeding each other's progress, like your foolish human crowds ! The fasting descend into the pot in one column, the fed make their exit in another, and the rythm of march and countermarch is uninterrupted, till they have licked the pot clean ! Now, all I have to say concerning this story, which Mr. Ed wards relates as irrefragable proof of intercommunication, is, that we must henceforth give ants credit for all the following privileges. We must admit that they not only feel, but remember— not only remem- ber, but compare— not only compare, but conclude, — not only conclude, but remember their conclusion I and con- sequently we have settled the point, that ants have ideas, 30 and therefore must be capable of mental hallucination, and be liable to go mad or melancholy ! But all this is not yet enough \ Having conferred on them ideas, and, together with ideas, of strict necessity all the senses by which ideas are obtained, we must still — as ants are found to communicate with others — extend their privileges ! The shipwrecked mariner may have made his wants intelligible to savages -but only his mere wants — he certainly could not enter into the details of his mishap, or make the manner of his escape apprehended by signs and gesticulations. But as to the Protagonist in our tale, why none but a Mime in those latter days, when Drama had become Pantomime, and the stately Iambic was no longer acceptable to the mob, could have done as much as he did, in a few seconds, without the aid of the flexible features, or the hands and the fingers, in which man rejoices ! by which of his sema- phoric organs is an ant to tell a story, which it requires a printed page to record, even after conceiving a wish, or in- tention to set about it ? Not by his eyes!— they are fixed in their sockets, and about as unintellectual as the glass eyes in a doll ; he could not even look up, if he would. I pre- sume he could not improvise his part, by the inven- tion of new signs, and as to the employment of old ones, traditional in the ant republic, one would as soon believe they had a language at once. Intercourse of mind between insects! No 1 no! an exchange of intelligent signs for the execution of particular ends, in this order of cre- ated beings, must be deemed impossible in the face of whatever supposed examples, or you must at once concede to insects a full set of senses, and an intellect capable of employing them in the acquisition and advancement of knowledge? I know that to engage in the task of depreciating the reputation either of man or fly, is not the way to increase our own. Every difficulty raised will be considered as a cavil by those who wish to believe what their child- 31 hood accepted as orthodox concerning the luisdom of ants and the (economy of bees, but most of all, con- cerning the endowments which we are accustomed to admire in the higher animals. Why love a dog better than a watch, asks the Jesuit Bugeant, if we did not believe the dog had a heart, and a mind, and was capable of reciprocity of affection. But, — to indulge in a mo- ment's digression from the affair in hand, — not only, my dear Jesuit ! do nuns love canaries ; not only do the Lesbias of all ages exhibit red eyes, and exact elegies when tame sparrows die, but such are the imperative besoins du cceur, that revolting things, and inanimate, become indisputable objects of attachment, for want of something better. The inmates of the dungeon have been glad to court the society of the spider ; sailors become impas- sioned in reciting the wreck of their favourite ship ; and oh ! with what saddening delight does the man of a few years' standing, revisit the scenes of his youth I with what emotion would he interrogate the trees, those silent witnesses of early affections, or still earlier ventures ! — how he gazes on the still crumbling, still resisting bank of some unsung stream, to him worth all the rura, quae Liris quieta Mordet aqua, tacilurnus amnis And grasps, alas, it is with hands of full stature ! the trusty and rusty chain which he has so often furtively loosed from its moorings I — All this, it may be said, is from early association ; it shows however, my dear Jesuit, that our hearts do not in all their pursuits exact reciprocity, nor needs there the eloquence of a Tully to assure us, that now modo in Jioc, quod est animal, sed in Us efiam, quce sunt inani- mata, consuetude valet. And it must, I conjecture, my equally dear reader 1 be somewhere about this passage that you will come upon me with an overwhelming question— " What do I mean to 3*2 do with that amazing faculty exhibited in the higher ani- mals in such uncial characters that all who run may read ! whether, you will tell me, we can, or cannot detect, organs, in these minute forms of being, which are so appreciable in the higher ones, it will remain certain, that even insects do often exhibit the same marvels, which under the name of instinctive, we enlarge upon in the dog or the elephant ?" "Thou wondrous Faculty," (let us try our hand at an apostrophe), " that art far less fallible than that Reason of which we are so unreasonably vain, what a Giaour must he be that hesitates to recognise thee as the sufficient and inscrutable guide of the microscopic myriads that go forth under no other auspices, and fulfil their destiny under no other inspirations ? Is it not thou that teachest the vora- cious rat, by some mysterious intimation, to anticipate the moment when the centre of gravity which gave security to the walls he haunted, and to himself, is about to be lost, and makest him scan, like a surveyor, the suffi- ciency of beam and rafter ? Led by whom (and never since creation dawned, misled) the swalloiv continues to depart, almost to a fixed day in the calendar, the same for the same place, since Aristotle, in quoting that primaeval proverb that " one swalloiv does not make a summer" at- tested also that even the bright autumns on the banks of the Peneus had no charms to detain the migrative bird ? * Prompted by thee, the thirst-stricken camel is seen to mend his flagging pace, and rejoice his weary master by * "Who taught the nations of the field and wood To shun their poison, and to choose their food ? Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand, Build on the waves, or arch beneath the sand, Who bid the Stork, Columbus-like, explore Heavens not his own, and worlds not known before Who calls the councils, slates the certain day ? Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way ?" POPK. 33 the dumb announcement that the well cannot be distant ! and canst thou have forgotten the insect tribes, that so much excel in number and variety, all the rest of creation ? Is not that miracle of winged creatures, whose aromatic honieshave imposed the celebrity of their name, alike upon the Canaans and the Atticas of old, have nourished pro- phets in the wilderness and armies on the march,* an ob- ject of thy peculiar care ! and though that silly moth, who hastens to his own funeral pile with such precipitate im- petuosity will not attend to thee, (for such fatuity can be no work of thine !) who shall deny that the Silpha, the Phalcena Cossus, and the Carabus are directed by thy hint, to discharge, on suitable provocation, that caustic venom which one of the family, f (a sharp shooter is he !) is mischievous enough to direct into the eye of the prying en- tomologist? What though the songstress Cicada, careless of thy lessons, involves herself in froth in the vain hope of eluding observation, (for her froth is more observ- able than herself) yet there can be no mistake in attri- buting it to thy suggestion that Tortrices roll themselves in leaves, that the Grillus (that Schcenobatist of the insect reign), escapes us by a series of jumps which make the chase hopeless; that the Cicendella, deeming "discretion the better part of valour," runs out of harm's way, leaving the Cimex, motionless and knowing that he is loathed, to stink in security ! Incited by thy resistless oestrum, see where that amorous spinster, the Lampyris, hangs out her beacon light, to lure the winged gallant to her bower, from that ocean of air which he is navigating ! Tribes without number, and without name, are instructed by thee to wait for the evening star, and go forth into the " all-eyed firmament" § to the positions best adapted for defence, snare, or subterfuge! Thou admonishest the Bornbix to * Xcnophon Anabasis. f The Procrustes Corinceus. § Cowley, not Coleridge. 3 34 cling to his cord till the danger is gone by ; thou per- suadest the Elater to pretend to be dead, and whisperest to the whole hypolithic community to crouch like hares at the approach of human foot step1. As to the higher animals — the cerebral part of the creation — they indeed may have heads and hearts, and minds, and conduct themselves like half-reasoning creatures ; but in the economy of insect life. Legislator, Tactician, Geometer, and Layer-up in barns, thou reignest paramount and alone! To this Feu de joie, which T have out of politeness per- mitted my opponent to let off, what can I reply? Verily what he has alleged is sufficiently formidable ! but I shall decline the rhetoric, in which I feel he has the advantage of me, and throw into the notes chiefly, a few instances a little out of the common way — cases, no doubt, in which he would suppose the personal intelligence of his protegees beyond suspicion; and if it shall appear thereafter, that the promptings of this ubiquitous Captain Rock, whom merely to name, has hitherto either silenced objection or satisfied inquiry, are sometimes of a very ambiguous cha- racter— that, for instance, the instinct of an animal is often positively foolishness, as far as its own security is con- cerned,— why we must either modify our creeds accord- ingly, or cling to that " mentis gratissimus error" which led the dreamer of the orchestra to be angry at those who woke him. It is far from our object to invalidate a single fact either of those we have, or may not have related ; but we are not all compelled to look at facts in the same way ; and though, like others, we can endure to hear of "ilie ants' republic and the realm of bees,91 we have taken leave to doubt, if the Supreme Intelligence hath indeed lodged such pro- found wisdom in the small frame of which the motions are directed by it. We desire to " sing praises uith understanding ;" and without vain conjectures concerning what we take upon us to call final causes, to study, as 35 best we may, the operations of that Power, which " Changed in all, and yet in all Ihe same, Lives through all life, extends through all extent, Spreads undivided, operates unsponl." POPtf. Though the word "Instinct" be familiar to men's ears as "household gods," there is, it would appear, no unity of opinion as to what is to be understood by it. For while some would oppose instinct to reason, and others would have it something beyond reason, all agree, by the very invention and employment of the word, to make instinct and reason different. To my notion instinct is reason ; but it is rea^ son acting from without. Is it explaining any thing, to use the language of a French philosopher respecting bees, and say that they fulfil their destiny ** par un sentiment aveugle." What, in the name of French philosophy, is un sentiment aveugle'l A blind sentiment is a contradic- tion in terms : define sentiment, which cannot be organic, as you will, some element of mind will adhere to it. Sen- timent is the result of a conception, and what conceives but the mind? wherever we see what is called Instinct displayed, God forbid that we should doubt the hand of God to be at work! but is it necessary to suppose that wisdom to be concrete, as it were, and resident in the insect that displays it. If it is his own knowledge that a bee dis- plays in what you call his instinctive actions ; if it is his ou-n mind that he exercises in the construction of his cell, or the economy of the hive, I contend that you allow more knowledge than man himself can muster, for that particu- lar task, to a bee ! A profound problem is proposed to the society of the hive for the first lime, and understood at once by all I But this is only the intellectual part : now comes the , practical. The school of mathematicians has become a colony of architects, of whom each not only performs his own share of the task previously concerted together, but also works 36 in reference to his neighbour's, which if he did not, the parts would not tally, and the work, as a whole, would be an amorphous failure, in place of a geometrically ac- curate model ! This labour completed, the Commissariat department is to be placed in activity, and the work of provision forthwith commences. But, does innate intel- ligence, then, guide the bee to make more honey and wax than can ever be necessary for his own or his family's consumption? and, if he acts by his own sagacity, of course he does not intend to elaborate it for yours : but make the operation not the instinct of the bee for his own sake, and it may well be conceived, and agreeably to the strictest analogy, that the wisdom which created, may have imposed the task upon the insect of performing this recondite che- mistry for the use of man. " Sic vos non vobis mellificatis apes !" The more I reflect on the subject— of the facts on which I ground my reflections I have thought it best to place the greater number in the notes that are to follow — the more am I led to believe that, whatever there is of wonder in the economy of insects, (and where is there so much ?) is the result of an exterior agency, and that, alike in their wisest and their most foolish actions, they intend nothing. The first thing they do is as perfect as the last. They never profit by misfortune, or modify their actions from experience ; and as all knowledge, except that of the pure intellect, (which is not in question here, where things are to be done as well as conceived) comes from experience, therefore can they accu- mulate no knowledge ; without knowledge, it follows that they can have no will, and so, that their supposed instinct- ive actions, cannot be the result of choice; and all this is strictly in conformity to conclusions at which we had long since arrived, by another process, in the first pages of this * I}ct$*!tua]ct ou pa.bwu\ct. Crrosus apud Herod. 37 Essay, where we endeavoured to show the very small pro- bability, that insects are in possession of the orgatiixm, ex- ternal, internal, or both, which is indispensable to sensibility, and which, if they had, they must also have those perceptions out of which all practical knowledge is formed, and expe- rience acquired.* Or, in other words, without the power of comparing and combining ideas, which requires a brain, it would be gratuitous to suppose ideas at all, or organs of sense, by which to get them:— for of what use would ab- stract truths be to a beetle, or wherefore should he be placed in a condition to acquire the elements of knowledge, which from want of the power of combination could never serve him — thus anatomy supports our metaphysics, and meta- physics our anatomy. And the argument which proves them incapable of ac- quiring ideas, does it not also show them to be impassive creatures ? And such I conclude them to be ; for con- clude I must, that the moth, who burns himself over and over again in my candle, as if he could not have enough of it, does not feel pain ; or, if you will not listen to this conclusion, you at least will admit that he is not a volun- tary agent, and is incapable of obedience to the salutary warning which would save his life. Am I then forced to be the expositor of the law by which he burns him- self? The whole insect race is comparatively epheme- ral ! they do not all die (very few do) a natural death, f but are destined, some to perish by flood, and some by field ; some in the mustard-pot, and some in the * All knowledge is from sensation and reflection, as Locke, or from sensation, memory, and judgment, as the Scotch Metaphysi- cians say ; at any rate the practical knowledge concerning which we enquire is doubtless so derived. f It may be said of them as of the short-lived despots of antiquity , Ad generem Cereris sine cwde tt sanguine, pauci Descendant sugar-bowl ; some to devour one another, and some, like our moth, to perish painless in the fire. The super- fcetatioii of insect life, as it seems, must be kept under; indeed, we do not know why insects, except a very few,* were made at all, as to any thing they produce for our ad- vantage ; but the folly of supposing every thing made for us and our advantage ! " Has God, thou fool ! work'd solely for thy good, Thy joy, thy paslirae, thy attire, thy food ?" The ingenious author (I do not know who he was) of a treatise " sur Cdme des bdtes," after having confuted the Cartesian doctrine of the automatism of the whole animal kingdom, finds less difficulty in bringing into discredit that Aristotelian anomalous " something betwixt soul and body," which was certainly not the brightest excogitation of the great Stageirite. Having expressed as his own immediate and strong conviction that animals have minds, he proceeds to inquire what sort of minds they are, — with what felicity or infelicity we shall presently see.