343 



THE SENSES OF INSECTS. 

 By J. Arkle. 



The criticisms from home and abroad, hostile and friendly, 

 scientific and lay, which have been made upon my remarks 

 under this head (Entom. xxvii. 336 ; xxviii. 243) have been a 

 source of much personal gratification. The subject has even 

 been reviewed by Mr. Tutt (Entom. Kecord, vii. 178). If this 

 acknowledgment should appear to come somewhat tardily, I 

 would say I have been waiting for additional light on the views 

 and experience of some of my critics. Like Mr. Marshall's 

 ''anomaly," however, I have still to wait. 



I am by no means the author of the objection to hearing in 

 insects. Among scientific men, Linne and Bonnet thought 

 insects had no hearing. It would scarcely be fair to retort that 

 I seek cover under fossil authorities. For I have been rather 

 surprised to find that some of the experiences quoted by present- 

 day writers in support of hearing in insects are decidedly 

 ancient rather than modern. The word "hearing" implies a 

 sensitiveness to sounds in general. It is a human conception, 

 and defines a sense common to man and other vertebrates. 

 Whenever I look for evidence of this sense in insects, I look in 

 vain. That is my position with reference to all insects I know. 



Mr. Marshall observes (Entom. xxix. 42): — " I should con- 

 sider that the difference between the sense of hearing and that 

 of touch is only one of degree and not of kind." I cannot 

 agree with him. I believe hearing and touch are distinct 

 senses. We no more use the organs of touch for the purpose 

 of hearing than we use for the purpose of touch the internal ear. 



Let us travel a little with the theory of concussion or vibra- 

 tion as applied to insects — even though that theory, as yet, be 

 but a parasite on what is admittedly an inexact science. It is 

 something more than the concussion or vibration set up by a 

 blow on a tree. Let us seek for something like a definition; 

 see if there can be room for such a theory; leave it for the 

 present as a thing we know little about ; and seek consolation 

 in the thought that if we knew everything we should think far 

 too much of ourselves. By way of definition here is what Kirby 

 and Spence say : — '' The hearing in insects may be something 

 related to hearing as ive understand it. Antennae, for example, 

 may collect notices from the atmosphere, receive pulses or vibra- 

 tions and communicate them to the sensorium, which, though 

 not precisely to be called hearing, may answer the same 

 purpose" ('Introduction to Entomology,' vol. iv. p. 240). And 

 here is scope even from Mr. Marshall : — " There is little doubt 

 that such auditory powers as are possessed by insects are of a 

 very different character from those possessed by man, as they 



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