

SOCIETY OF ANIMALS. 247 



them with another guide for regaining their habitations. We 

 pave our streets with stones ; but the caterpillars cover all 

 their roads with silken threads. These threads make white 

 (racks, which are often more than a sixth of an inch wide. 

 It is by following these silken tracks, however complicated, 

 that the caterpillars never miss their nests. If the road is 

 broken by a man's finger drawn along it, or by any other 

 accident, the caterpillars are greatly embarrassed. They 

 stop suddenly at the interrupted space, and exhibit every 

 mark of fear and of diffidence. Here the march stops, till an 

 individual, more bold or more impatient than his companions, 

 traverses the gap. In his passage he leaves behind him a 

 thread of silk, which serves as a bridge or conductor to the 

 next that follows. By the progression of numbers, each of 

 which spins a thread, the breach is soon repaired. We can- 

 not suppose that these stupid animals cover their roads to 

 prevent their wandering. But they never wander, because 

 their roads are covered with silk. In this, as well as in many 

 other instances, nature obliges animals to embrace the most 

 eifectual means of self-preservation, and even of conveniency, 

 without their perceiving the utility of their own operations. 

 The caterpillars, whose manners we have been describing, 

 spin almost continually, because they are continually obliged 

 to evacuate a silky matter, secreted from their food by ves- 

 sels destined for that purpose, and included in their intes- 

 tines. In obeying this call of nature, they effectually secure 

 their retreat to their nests, and perhaps their existence. It 

 may be said that caterpillars associate for no other reason 

 but because they are all produced at the same time from eggs 

 deposited near each other. But many other species of cater- 

 pillars, which are brought to life in the very same circum- 

 stances, never associate or act in concert in the performance 

 of any mutual labor. The silkworms afford a familiar exam- 

 ple. It is true they spontaneously remain assembled in the 

 same place, which is of great advantage to manufacturers. 

 But the individuals of other species disperse immediately 

 after birth, and never reunite. Spiders, when newly hatched, 

 begin with spinning a web in common ; but they soon termi- 

 nate this association by devouring one another. 



As caterpillars do not engender till they arrive at the but- 

 terfly state, their associations have no respect to the rearing 

 t>r education of young. Self-preservation and individual con- 

 venience are the only bonds of their union. A perfect equal- 

 ity reigns among them, without any distinction of sex or even 



