ON THE ANIMAL KINGDOM. 205 



the title of brain, hardly deserves it more than that which 

 is said to be placed at the other extremity of the body, and 

 certainly not so much as the cerebral ganglion in the nervous 

 system of the Crustacea and other annulose animals. Those 

 Mollusca which possess a distinct head with tentacula and 

 other organs of sense have undoubtedly a true brain, but 

 that of an oyster has no other right to the name than the ob- 

 vious analogy which its position is said to bear to that of the 

 brain of a gasteropod. Such analogies, however, are al- 

 most always incontrovertible ; and the naturalist, when 

 anatomical demonstration is so powerful, had better ac- 

 cede to.M. Cuvier's opinion that the acephalous Mol- 

 lusca possess a brain and a general construction which, upon 

 the whole) makes a nearer approach to that of the Verte- 

 brata than is made by any annulose animal, but particu- 

 larly those undergoing metamorphosis. When however 

 we have admitted this, it cannot, I conceive, be therefore 

 contended that an Ascidia has any superiority over the 

 bee. No person, on comparing the two animals, will 

 assert that the Mollusque has any quality that can be put 

 in competition either with the intelligence or the compli- 

 cated mechanism of the Insect. If we are to estimate 

 by their anatomy the importance which different material 

 beings are entitled to in the scale of creation, it may 

 readily be supposed that with this object in view we 

 ought to consider the complication of mechanism as the 

 test of perfection, and not any fancied and often forced 

 resemblance to the human structure. Nay, if this last 

 rule be employed, the rudest artificial imitation will often 

 deserve the praise of ingenuity in the construction supe- 

 rior to that of some of the most extraordinary productions 

 of nature. The absurdity of such a conclusion may then 



