174 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATIONS [Ins 



commence a direct line of march towards the sea, making no 

 stop till they reach the water's edge ; and it is observed, says 

 Humboldt, that though they may have burst the shell of the egg 

 during the day, they are never known to come forth from the 

 nest but at night ; so that they are not assisted by daylight to 

 find their way to the deep. Experiments have been made on 

 the young, says the same writer, by putting them into a bag, 

 carrying them to some distance from the shore, and then letting 

 them out with the tail turned towards the water, but it is 

 always found that they turn about, and take without hesitation 

 the shortest way to the beach, apparently discriminating on 

 which side the air is most humid. R. 



Instinct and Somnambulism. 



Working bees, says Cuvier, have since the beginning of 

 the world constructed the most ingenious edifices, agreeable to 

 principles of the highest geometry, and destined to lodge and 

 nourish a posterity which is not even their own. Solitary bees 

 and wasps also form very complicated nests for their eggs. 

 From the egg there springs a worm, which has never seen its 

 mother, which does not know the structure of the prison in 

 which it is enclosed ; but when once it is changed into a wasp 

 or bee it constructs a similar nest, equally perfect, for its own 

 egg. We cannot form a clear idea of instinct but by 

 admitting that the animals endowed with it have, in the 

 sensorium, continued innate sensations and images, which 

 determine them to act like sensations received through the 

 organs of sense. Instinct is a kind of dream or vision that 

 perpetually haunts them and prompts them to action ; and in 

 everything that respects their instinctive notions we may 

 regard animals as a kind of somnambulists. 8. 



The Prognosticating 1 Instinct. 



Great are the advantages which are possessed by that man 

 who is blessed with the prognosticating instinct ; for thereby he 

 is enabled to observe the signs of the times, prepare prudently 

 for the things which are looming in the future, and to be 



