Nov. 1, 1S70.1 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCU-(K)SS1P. 



the draper, fairly jumped over his counter, and was 

 deeply engaged in diving into the contents of a 

 mysterious hale on the floor, just as the vicar 

 turned the corner. 



"Ah! they have all seen my circular, and are 

 enjoying the lecture I have thought it my duty to 

 administer," condescendingly explained Dr. Blank 

 to his clerk, the companion of his walk through the 

 village. The man smiled delightedly ; and, at the 

 moment, who should come in sight but the 

 miserable sinner, the object of the vicar's righteous 

 wrath, Mr. Dash. He burst into a loud laugh. 



" Perfectly outrageous ; quite hardened," cried 

 the vicar ; but the rest of his reflections were 

 lost to the public, for his eye fell on a large board 

 carried by one of Dash's men, on which were 

 three of his own printed effusions. 



" Whereas an evil-disposed Pakson," &c, the 

 change of one letter had made a wonderful difference 

 in the circulars ; they were no longer applicable to 

 his neighbour, the cap fitted himself. 



An Irish gentleman, who had been engaged in 

 the national diversion, a row, wrote to the papers 

 complaining of his antagonist, and asserted that the 

 blows given him in the fray had caused a great 

 contusion on his head; the P. D. printed it "con- 

 fusion in his head," and, adding insult to injur}', 

 his foe wrote in reply that "he was right to a T." 



Beaumaris. Helen E. Watney. 



N.B.— How much of the sin lies with the illegible 

 writing of correspondents we dare not calculate. 

 Of course there are some honourable exceptions, but 

 the poor P. D. should not have all the blame. 



Ed. S.-G. 



" DO INSECTS EEEL PAIN ? " 



1MTR. J. B. S. CLIEEORD in last mouth's issue 

 -L"-*- of the Science-Gossip has made what I con- 

 sider both an unwise and unwarrantable attack on 

 certain correspondents of the late "Naturalists' 

 Note-book," upon the question "Do insects feel 

 pain?" The attack is unwise, inasmuch as it will 

 have a tendency to renew a long, well-sifted, and 

 as regards results, a fruitless controversy ; for 

 unless the advocates of the negative side are pre- 

 pared to accept reasonable, experimental, and 

 inductive evidence, a lifetime of controversy will 

 find us standing on the same footprint from which 

 we first started. The attack is unwarrantable, 

 because it is just possible that some of the corre- 

 spondents of the "Naturalists' Note-book " may 

 not see the Science-Gossip, and if they do not, they 

 wiil have no opportunity of defending themselves 

 and their opinions from Mr. Clifford's attack. 

 Setting this aside, however, if it is the desire of the 

 friends of Science-Gossip to take up arms and 

 resume the scientific warfare, I am confident the 



advocates of the affirmative side will not shrink 

 from the engagement. 



We will come now to consider the question before 

 us, " Do insects feel pain ? " But before offering 

 any evidence to show that they do feel pain, I would 

 like to make a few remarks on Mr. Clifford's 

 paper. 



In the first place, lies ays : " As it was remarked 

 by a writer in this controversy, we have no means 

 of forming an opinion at all, except by observing 

 their movements under certain conditions ; " plainly 

 meaning in this expression that by "observing 

 their movements under certain conditions," we can 

 form an opinion, or rather, we have " the means " 

 of forming an opinion whether they do or do not 

 feel pain, and yet in the very next sentence he flatly 

 contradicts his own words by asserting that "from 

 merely seeing these movements toe cannot ascertain 

 what may be the sensations which cause them." In • 

 other words, that by merely " observing their move- 

 ments under certain conditions," we can not form 

 "an opinion as to whether insects experience 

 pain." Such illogical argument as this will not 

 materially advance the position of the negative side 

 of the question. He afterwards goes on to say — 

 " We find" (in insects) "no central brain, no con- 

 centration of nerve-matter, upon which, anatomists 

 tell us, depend all the various sensations experienced 

 by us, and the animals most resembling man. In- 

 sects have nerves scattered over their bodies, and. 

 united in knots or ganglia, yet from these no tele- 

 graphic indications 'are passed to, or received at, 

 a central point, be it ever so small." By this I 

 understand Mr. Clifford to mean, that no sensation 

 of pain is experienced by the various branches of 

 nerves, but only at the spot where those nerves 

 are concentrated, viz., the brain and spinal 

 marrow. Now, I ask Mr. Clifford whether he can 

 point out any part of the human or animal frame, 

 even where the nerves are finest, that is insensible 

 to the touch of a sharp instrument. But even 

 supposing— 1 say supposing, for I by no means grant 

 you the position, but supposing that insects were 

 not possessed of a concentrated system of nerves, 

 of what use in the physiological economy would be 

 those "scattered nerves and ganglia" which he 

 grants are possessed by insects, if not to fulfil the 

 same functions as they subserve in the higher animal 

 organization ? 



But will Mr. Clifford prove that insects have not 

 a concentrated nervous system ? 



The learned Professors Agassiz and Gould, in 

 their work on " Comparative Physiology,"- p. 54, 

 give the following :—" The nervous system of the 

 articulata is arranged different from that of the 

 vertebrata. The absence of an internal osseous 

 skeleton in the former removes the nervous centres 

 into new relations" (not as Mr. Clifford supposes, 

 bamshesthem from the body of the insect altogether) ; 



