ANOTHER WORLD DOWN HERB. 49 



If the difference of development between the human and 

 canine internal antennas produces all this difference of func- 

 tion, what a gulf may there be between our powers of per- 

 ceiving material emanations and those possessed by insects! 

 If my anatomical hypothesis is correct, some insects have 

 protruding nasal organs or out-thrust olfactory nerves as 

 long as all the rest of their bodies. The power of move- 

 ment of these in all directions affords the means of sensory 

 communication over a corresponding range, instead of being 

 limited merely to the direction of the nostril openings. In 

 some insects, such as the plumed gnat, the antennae do not 

 appear to be thus moveable, but this want of mobility is 

 more than compensated by the multitude of branchings of 

 these wonderful organs, whereby they are simultaneously 

 exposed in every direction. This structure is analogous to 

 the fixed but multiplied eyes of insects, which, by seeing 

 all round at once, compensate for the want of that mobility 

 possessed by others that have but a single eyeball mounted 

 on a flexible and mobile stalk; that of the spider, for 

 example. 



Such an extension of such a sensory function is equiva- 

 lent to living in another world of which we have no knowl- 

 edge and can form no definite conception. We, by our 

 senses of touch and vision, know the shapes and colors of 

 objects, and by our very rudimentary olfactory organs form 

 crude ideas of their chemistry or composition, through the 

 medium of their material emanations; but the huge exag- 

 geration of this power in the insect should supply him 

 with instinctive perceptive powers of chemical analysis, a 

 direct acquaintance with the inner molecular constitution 

 of matter far clearer and deeper than we are able to obtain 

 by all the refinements of laboratory analyses or the hypo- 

 thetical formulating of molecular mathematicians. Add 



which were thick? It could scarcely have been the odor of the 

 boot soles themselves that he followed, as he recognized me after- 

 wards at some distance. This suggests an interesting experiment, 

 that anybody owning one of these dogs may easily try. Make a 

 similar track to mine, but when on the way, take off the boots you 

 wore on starting and change them for some one else's boots, or a 

 new pair, and watch the result from the window. 



