INTERNAL ANATOMY OF INSECTS. 23 
before described a , shows this more evidently : but one 
of the most remarkable stories to our purpose upon re- 
cord, is that of M. Pelisson, who, when he was confined 
in the Bastile, tamed a spider, and taught it to come for 
food at the sound of an instrument. A manufacturer 
also in Paris, fed 800 spiders in an apartment, which 
became so tame that whenever he entered it, which he 
usually did bringing a dish filled with flies but not al- 
ways, they immediately came down to him to receive 
their food b . 
All these circumstances having their due consideration 
and weight, it seems, I think, most probable, that as in- 
sects have their communication with the external world 
by means of certain organs in connexion with their ner- 
vous system, and appear to have some degree of intel- 
lect, memory, and free will, all of which in the higher 
animals are functions of a cerebral system, and at the 
same time in other respects manifest those which are 
peculiar to the sympathetic system, — it is most probable, 
I say, as was above hinted, that in their system both are 
united. 
I must bespeak your attention to a circumstance con- 
nected with the subject of this letter, which merits parti- 
cular consideration : I mean the gradual change that 
takes place in the nervous system when insects undergo 
their metamorphoses ; so that, except in the Orthoptera, 
Hemiptera, and Neuroptera Orders, in which no change 
is undergone, the number of ganglions of the spinal chord 
is less in the imago than in the larva. There seems an 
exception indeed to this rule in the case of the rhinoceros- 
n Vol. II. p. 204. b N. Did, d'Hisi. Nat, ii. 279—. 
