THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



45 



connection which subsists between the body 

 of man and his soul which animates it ; but 

 this being remembered, we see at once that 

 pleasure and pain, as we know them, cannot 

 be experienced by beings without a rational 

 nature. This nature it is which judges of 

 the quality of the sensations conveyed to the 

 brain by the nerves ; and the truth of our 

 great dramatist's remark is unquestioned, 

 that even — 



" The pain of death is most in apprehension." 

 It is no proof, because we observe in any of 

 the lower animals motions or cries, which 

 would with us indicate suffering, that they 

 are there symptomatic of the same emotions. 



The Mammalia, and more especially cer- 

 tain species, are in structure and in habit 

 more analogous to man than the lower divi- 

 sions of the animal kingdom. As we go 

 from class to class we find not a degradation, 

 but a descent. We arrive at the Insecta ; 

 and though we have, as in the cases of the 

 ant and the bee, certain remarkable instances 

 of apparent intelligence, the habits of the 

 majority prove to us their inferiority in the 

 ranks of existences. 



It may be true, as asserted by Bowerbank 

 and others, that insects have a circulatory 

 system ; but we do not yet know whether 

 that circulation carries sensation. Certainly 

 no central brain exists ; and the structure of 

 the body (in segments) and the usual mode 

 of breathing appear to indicate that no very 

 close bond unites the different parts of the 

 animal. Yet a mysterious something takes 

 intelligence from one part to another ; thus, 

 if you touch the anal extremity of a buff-tip 

 larva even gently, it at once turns its head 

 fiercely in the direction of the disturber. 



The well-meaning, but often injudicious, 

 vindicators of the usual practices of entomo- 

 logists have based some of their arguments 

 on this subject upon premises manifestly 

 unsound. The assertion that the great 

 brevity of insect life shows that its course 

 cannot be marked by much pain or pleasure 

 will scarcely find general acceptation. The 



measure of time is undefined — its length or 

 brevity is according to the experience of 

 each individual ; and to an insect a day may 

 appear as decades of years. We know also 

 that even this period in insects is longer (as 

 we measure it) than many suppose. Take 

 the case of the Lepidoptera. There we might 

 reckon the average length of life, from the 

 hatching the egg to the death of the imago, 

 as being seven or eight months. 



Some cases of insensibility in insects are 

 probably also mere fallacies. It is said that 

 moths may be pinned in the daytime when 

 at rest, and that they will not stir until 

 their time of flight. I cannot but think this 

 can only happen when the moth is partially 

 torpid with cold. I have tried the experi- 

 ment, though not frequently, as I dislike 

 its apparent cruelty ; but whenever I have 

 passed a pin through a living moth I have 

 found that it struggled to escape. Nor 

 does it seem to prove anything that a wasp 

 will sip honey when the abdomen is snipped 

 off, or a dragon-fly seize its prey under like 

 circumstances. A sudden injury may have 

 a stunning effect for a certain time. Cases 

 are very numerous where persons have been 

 stabbed, even fatally, and have felt no pain, 

 and not even known that they were wounded. 



But the greatest mystery of all in relation 

 to insects is this, — what is the nature of the 

 guiding or motive power which directs their 

 actions ; there is an indication of the exer- 

 cise of will which can scarcely be classed as 

 instinct. Hold your finger in front of a 

 small beetle as he is marching along a leaf; 

 he sees the obstacle, and turns to the right 

 or left. Blind instinct would lead him, you 

 would think, straight up against the barrier. 

 Again, insects may sometimes be tamed, if 

 one may be allowed the expression. When 

 at large the larva of A . caja rolls into a ball 

 at the slightest disturbance. Feed this up 

 in captivity, beginning when it is young, and 

 its alarm at the approach of an observer 

 subsides, or is greatly dimished. Were we 



