168 CONVERSATIONS ON 



fingers ; and what would you have done 

 then ?" 



" Tried to cut it out with the point of my 

 penknife ; but the tweezers are better for such 

 work ; and that reminds me, boys, to tell you 

 that there are insects with tweezers." 



" Why, what tool is it that you cannot find 

 among them, Uncle Philip ? It really seems 

 as if you found almost every kind among the 

 lower animals." 



" Oh, no no, boys. There are a great 

 many which I cannot find ; but there are sev- 

 eral, too, which, as you know, we have dis- 

 covered." 



" And, Uncle Philip, we suppose that men 

 learned to make their tools and work at many 

 of their trades from these dumb creatures." 



" Stay, boys I never said that, because I 

 think that it is not true. We know that in 

 some things men did not learn from the in- 

 sects, though they might have done so. 

 There is paper, for instance. How could men 

 learn to make it from the wasps, when it was 

 a thing in common use a long time before Mr. 

 Reaumur, of whom I told you, found out how 

 the wasp made it ? So, too, with a great many 

 tools ; men invented them, and afterward, 

 perhaps, it was found out that insects had in- 



