24 HABITS OF WORMS. CHAP. I. 



or consciousness of the animal, as if it were 

 an automaton. But the different effect 

 which a light produced 011 different occasions, 

 and especially the fact that a worm when in 

 any way employed and in the intervals of 

 such employment, whatever set of muscles 

 and ganglia may then have been brought into 

 play, is often regardless of light, are opposed 

 to the view of the sudden withdrawal being 

 a simple reflex action. With the higher 

 animals, when close attention to some object 

 leads to the disregard of the impressions 

 which other objects must be producing on 

 them, we attribute this to their attention 

 being then absorbed ; and attention implies 

 the presence of a mind. Every sportsman 

 knows that he can approach animals whilst 

 they are grazing, fighting or courting, much 

 more easily than at other times. The state, 

 also, of the nervous system of the higher 

 animals differs much at different times, for 

 instance, a horse is much more readily startled 

 at one time than at another. The comparison 

 here implied between the actions of one ot 

 the higher animals and of one so low in the 

 scale as an earth-worm, may appear far- 



