608 



KNO^A/'LEDGE • 



[ApRif. U, 1882. 



\n\ff,. "j{r<)w fn m more to moru," sonmingly without liitiii 

 In line, we limy my (os our Kriidually widening vision 

 shown us the initliinKiwss of what wc havo soon, of what 

 w« »«•<•, i>f what wi> mil cvit s.i>), not, as I^placn Raid, '/'/"• 

 Knnirn in l.illh', hut TllK Knowv 18 NoTlllNO ; not Thn 

 /■'tikiiuini U /mnifUHf, but TnK UXKSOWN 18 InfISITK. 



Till-: HICETLE'S VIEW OF LIFE. 



l?v Grant Ai.lf.n. 



HI';Ki'; on a ycUow oroous, hiiricd dofij) in tlic lieaiitifiil 

 ;;(.l(lrn riip, I have found a litth^ hionxo mailed 

 hreth', stoaliriR tlip pollen as hard as he can eat it, and 

 hugely enjoying his plentiful morning feast. 1 have picked 

 him carefully out with a little hit of stick, and I have 

 got him here now crawling about suspiciously upon my 

 hand, and trying to find out what is the l>est way down 

 from that unpleasantly wann and dangerously niohile 

 valley— the hollow of my palm. I often wish I could 

 discover how the world looks to that small creature here ; 

 and, perhaps, the question is not quite so unanswerable as 

 it appears at first siglit. When one remembers that lirain 

 and nervous system are on the whole a good index of mind, 

 and that feelings and ideas depend upon the arrangement 

 of the various sense-organs and their connected central 

 parts, it will be clear that, after all, we may make a fair 

 guess at what is passing in this little beetle's head, espe- 

 cially since his notions about things generally must in all 

 probability be a good deal simpler and more directly de- 

 pendent upon his sensations than our own. 



Now, what, in the first place, are the beetle's senses'? 

 lie can see, that we all know ; and his sight is on the 

 whole a good deal like our own. His eye can discriminate 

 form, and that accurately, for in all flying creatures this 

 sense is necessarily highly developed ; it has been evolved 

 and perfected side l>y side with their wings, or else they 

 could never have learned to fly at all. They can doubtless 

 distinguish colour, too ; for we know positively from Sir 

 John Lubbock's experiments that this is the case with 

 bees, and there are good grounds for believing that the same 

 thing is true of all flower-feeding insects as well, since all 

 alike seem to be guided to the flowers by their brilliant 

 hues. Sir John put drops of honey on slips of glass above 

 bits of coloured paper ; and when he had once taught 

 a bee to feed from one slip, say the liluc, he found that it 

 would return straight to that slip, even when the relative 

 places of the colours had been transposed. Now, almost 

 all flowers which contain honey have also bright petals ; 

 and Mr. Darwin has shown that l)oth honey and petals 

 have been developed tiy the flowers for the sake of attract;- 

 ing insects, whicli carry their jiollen from head to head, 

 and so fertilise and impregnate the seeds. Moreover, the 

 colours of the petals dilFer in dilFerent species, according to 

 the kind of insects which they each wish to attract. Thus 

 beo- flowers are usually blue or red ; and Sir John Lul)bock 

 has proved that bees show a distinct preference for these 

 folours, while beetle- flowers are often yellow, and small 

 tly-flowers are generally white. Such facts, and othei-s like 

 them, show that the Ijeetle has sensations of sight essen- 

 tially identical with our own, and also that he has cei-tain 

 spocial ta.stes for certain special hues and blossoms. 



It is much the same with the other .senses. The beetle 

 certainly hears sounds ; and his hearing appears to be 

 analogous to our own : for though he himself is not musical, 

 yet many other insects are ; and these produce special 

 notes and melmlies to charm the ladies of their kind. He 

 can also taste, and is fond of sweet things, like most other 



nnimals, for the flowers which seek to allure him lay by a 

 ilrop of honey for his use ; ond this liking for sugary juices 

 is shared by almost all insects, from the flie.? which crowd 

 around a barrel of treacle at a grocer's door, to the ants 

 which suck the honey-dew from the little green aphides 

 that they keep as we keep cowg. Last of all, he can smell, 

 for the flowers which depend on him for fertilization are 

 usually perfumed, and both beetles and other in.sect3 are 

 often attracted by scent, as all collectors well know^ ; 

 indeed, they fr(>quently catch rare insects by enclosing 

 one of their mates in a box, when the quick-scented 

 and eager lovers soon sail up from leeward, evidently 

 attracted by the distinguishing odour tiorne upon the 

 breeze. Indeed, some butterflies have special scent-glands 

 among the feathery scales on their wings, to make them 

 more charming to their pretty spouses, just as so many of 

 the higher animals have a peculiar musky perfume. I may 

 mention that Mr. Darwin similarly sets down the brilliant 

 colours and ornamental spots of butterflies, as well as the 

 curious horns and excrescences of many beetles, to the long 

 selective action of their fair lady-loves, who always choose 

 the handsomest and strongest among their numerous rival 

 suitors. It is to this same cause that we prol>ably owe the 

 bright iridescent hues and bossy headpiece of the little 

 creature who has now just escaped from my hand by 

 clumsily transferring himself to yonder tall blade of rank 

 meadow-grass. 



Thus, as far as his outward picture of the world goes, 

 the V)eetle's ideas must really be very similar to our own. 

 The universe of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and touches 

 through which he moves must present the same general 

 effect as that which we ourselves experience in our inter- 

 course with outer things. But when we come to consider 

 the relations which the beetle establishes between these 

 primordial sense-impressions, the little ideas and emotions 

 which he elaborates out of them, we find signs that the 

 difference is vast indeed. Though the material is the same, 

 the product is as unlike as the letters of the alphabet are 

 to the "Iliad" or "Paradise Lost" The elements of 

 human thought are there, but the organising and co- 

 ordinating power is wanting. 



If you were to cut open the beetle's head, you would 

 find in it a small knot or lump of nervous matter, roughly 

 answering to our own brains. To this lump the various 

 sense-organs send up bundles of nerves ; and in it the im- 

 pressions derived from the different senses are compared 

 and arranged, so as to produce the common impulse upon 

 which the beetle acts. But the size of this nervous knot is 

 vastly smaller in proportion to the insect than the human 

 brain is to the body of a man. Our brain consists of num- 

 berless cells, arranged and united in definite subordination 

 to one another, and so disposed that every part of our 

 nervous mechanism can be brought into relation with every 

 other ; while in many cases we are not concerned in our 

 mental operations with actual sense-impressions at all, or 

 even with memories of such impressions combined into the 

 shape of ideal objects, but with wholly abstract conceptions, 

 elaborated out of them by the action of the brain itself in 

 its higher parts. The beetle, however, can do nothing 

 analogous to this. Its mental life is wholly made up of 

 direct impressions, and actions immediately dependent 

 upon them. Memories it doubtless possesses in a slight 

 degree, especially in the form of mere recognitions ; but it 

 is not probable that it can think of an oViject in its absence, 

 or voluntarily recall it ; while it certainly cannot reflect as 

 we can about abstract ideas, or even about things which do 

 not concern its immediately present needs and actions. 



Indeed, the whole nervous system of the beetle is so 

 loosely Ixiund together — so little co-ordinated, as Mr. 



