238 GROVE OF LIVE OAKS. [CHAP. XVII. 



times with the fore, and sometimes with the hind foot, according 

 to the situation of the injury inflicted. These movements of the 

 limbs were promptly and determinately performed, and were 

 always confined to the members on the side of the irritating 

 cause. If touched below the posterior extremity on the thick 

 portion of the tail, he would slowly and deliberately draw up 

 the hind foot, and scratch the part, and would use considerable 

 force in pushing aside the offending object. These experiments 

 were repeatedly performed, and always with the same results, 

 appearing to prove that the creature could not have been totally 

 devoid of sensation and consciousness. Dr. Le Conte concludes, 

 therefore, that, although in man and the more highly organized 

 vertebrata, volition is seated in the brain, or encephalus, this 

 function in reptiles must extend over the whole spinal cord, or 

 cerebro-spinal axis. Some, however, may contend that the mo 

 tions observed are merely spasmodic and involuntary, like sneez 

 ing, the necessary results of certain physical conditions of the 

 nervous system, and not guided in any way by the mind. If so, 

 it can not be denied that they have all the appearance of being 

 produced with a perfect knowledge of the end in view, and to be 

 directed peculiarly to that end ; so that, if we embrace the hy 

 pothesis that they supervene simply on the application of stimuli, 

 without any sensations being carried to the brain, and without 

 any co-operation of the mind, must we not in that case suspect 

 that a large proportion of the actions of quadrupeds, usually 

 attributed to the control of the will, may in like manner be per 

 formed without consciousness or volition ?* 



When we got back to Savannah, I found my wife just returned 

 from Bonaventure, about four miles distant, where she had ac 

 companied a lady on a drive to see a magnificent grove of live 

 oaks, the branches of which, arching over head, form a splendid 

 aisle. It was formerly the fashion of the planters of the Caro- 

 lirias and Georgia, to make summer tours in the northern 

 states, or stay in watering-places there ; but they are now in the 

 habit of visiting the upland region of the Alleghanies in their 



* See a paper by J. Le Conte, New York Journal of Medicine, Nov. 

 1845, p. 335. 



