PSYCHICAL FACULTIES OF ANTS AND OTHER INSECTS. 591 



ive power, memory and habit follow in general the same elementary 

 laws as they do in vertebrates and in man. 



On the other hand, inherited automatism greatly preponderates with 

 them. The abilities just mentioned are very weak indeed outside the 

 range of instinctive automatism peculiar to the species. 



An insect is extraordinarily stupid and unadaptable for everything 

 that does not relate to its instinct. I once taught a Dytiscusi mar- 

 ginaUs (water ))eetle) to eat upon my table. In doing this he always, 

 by stretching out his fore legs, made an awkward movement which 

 brought him upon his back. He indeed learned to continue to eat 

 while in that position, but not to abstain from this movement. On 

 the other hand he tried to spring out of the water (no longer to flee to 

 the depths of the bucket) as soon as 1 entered the room, and gnawed 

 quite familiarl}" at the tip of my extended linger. This was certainly 

 a plastic variation of instinct. In the same way the large Algerian 

 ants which I transferred to Zurich, learned in the summer months 

 how to close up the wide opening of their nest with balls of earth, 

 because they were followed and annoyed by our small Lasius niger. 

 In Algiers I alwaj^s saw the nest openings widely open. 



That ants, bees, and wasps communicate to each other information 

 which is understood is so well attested that it is unnecessary to waste 

 a word upon the subject. The observation of a single robber raid of 

 Polyergiis would suffice to show this. Yet this is not speech in the 

 human sense. There is no corresponding abstract conception attached 

 to these signs. We are dealing with inherited, instinctive, automa- 

 tized signs (pushing with the head, rushing at each other with open 

 jaws, vibrating the antennse, disturbing the ground with the body, and 

 man}' others). Imitation also plays a great part — ants, bees, etc., 

 imitate and follow their companions. It is therefore an entire mis- 

 take (in this Wasmann, Von Buttel, and myself are entirely agreed) to 

 think that this insect speech indicates anything like human delibera- 

 tion and human power of apprehension. It is even somewhat doubtful 

 whether a so-called general notion (for example, the notion "ant," 

 ""enemv," "nest," "pupa") can arise in the brain of the ant. The 

 matters about which we are sure are certainly interesting and impor- 

 tant enough in themselves. They give us a glimpse of the cerebral 

 life of these animals. 



A good example will illustrate what has been said better than all 

 generalities: 



Plateau has stated that if one covers dahlia crowns with green leaves 

 the bees still return to them. He first covered his dahlias incompletel}' 

 (only the outer or ra}^ flowers), afterwards completely, but still scan 

 tily, and concluded from the result that bees are attracted by odor and 

 not by sight. 



