364 HAT.F HOURS WITH INSECTS. [Packaiid. 



are we to prove that they have an intellect? Simply by 

 observing whether they make a choice between two acts. 



On entering a closet, ants unhesitatingly direct their steps 

 to the sugar bowl in preference to the flour barrel ; one sand 

 wasp prefers beetle grubs to caterpillars to store up as food 

 for her young. In short, insects exercise discrimination, and 

 this is the simplest of intellectual acts. They try this or 

 that method of attaining an object. In fact, an insect's life 

 is filled out with a round of trials and failures. That they 

 have the quality of perseverance in a high degree is proved 

 l)y the statements of many observers. In building her nest 

 how many unsuccessful attempts the spider often makes 

 before she finally succeeds in properly fastening her threads, 

 the frame work of her web. Robert Bruce is said to have 

 admired the perseverance of a spider after repeated failures ; 

 indeed, the persevering labors of the ant, ihe bee, or the fly 

 are matters of daily observation. . 



As an illustration of the perseverance shown by ants 

 combined with the faculty of the communication of ideas 

 which they possess to such a high degree, is the experiment 

 performed by Mr. Jesse. "I have often put," he says, "a 

 small green caterpillar near an ant's nest ; j'ou may see it 

 immediately seized by one of the ants, who, after several 

 ineffectual efforts to drag it to its nest, will quit it, and go 

 up to another ant, and they Avill appear to hold a conversa- 

 tion togctlicr by means of their antennne, after which they 

 will return together to the caterpillar, and, bj^ their united 

 efforts, drag it where they wish to deposit it." 



Another fact in illustration of the same qualities is af- 

 forded by Kirby and Spence. "A German artist, a man of 

 strict veracity, states that in his journey through Italy he 

 was 'an eye-witness to the following occurrence. He ob- 

 served a species of Scarabaeus (Atetichus pilularius?) busily 

 engaged in making, for the reception of its egg, a pellet of 

 dung, which when finished it rolled to the summit of a small 



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