THE PLEASURES OF A NATURALIST 



outside material through which it passed. But 

 if we know anything, we know that the human mind 

 or spirit is a vital part of the human body; its 

 source is in the brain and nervous system; hence, 

 it and the organ through which it is manifested 

 are essentially one. 



The analogy of the brain to the battery or dyna- 

 mo in which the current originates is the only 

 logical or permissible one. 



IX 



Maeterlinck wrote wisely when he said: 



The insect does not belong to our world. The other 

 animals, the plants even, notwithstanding their dumb 

 Hfe, and the great secrets which they cherish, do not seem 

 wholly foreign to us. In spite of all we feel a sort of 

 earthly brotherhood with them. . . . There is some- 

 thing, on the other hand, about the insect that does not 

 belong to the habits, the ethics, the psychology of our 

 globe. One would be inclined to say that the insect 

 comes from another planet, more monstrous, more 

 energetic, more insane, more atrocious, more infernal 

 than our own. 



Certainly more cruel and monstrous than our own. 

 Among the spiders, for instance, the female eats 

 the male and often devours her own young. The 

 scorpion does the same thing. I know of nothing 

 like it among our land animals outside the insect 

 world. 



The insects certainly live in a wonderland of 



23 



