The daily gazette., 1881-08-17
Men and Animals.

Within certain limits the lower
animals are much more skillful In sup.
plying their wants than men. Insects,
birds, fishes, reptiles mammals-one
really does not know which depart
ment of the natural exhibits the most
skill in supplying Its wants. Let me
instance the case Of trap-door spiders.
l refer to their doings, because they
are less familiar than those of ants and
bees and other creatures which
might mention. The trap-door spider
lives in q burrow which he makes in
the ground where the grass grows,
generally in a sloping bank !; he covers
the entrance to his burrow with q
trap door, which works upon hinge,
and which so nearly resembles the
surrounding grass that only a careful
observer can detectit. This, however,
is Iot all if an enemy finds the door
and opens 1t, and enters the SPIDERS
castle, he may very easily fancy that
there is no one at houe, for in the
sides Of the burrow, which is lined
with soft silky substance, there are
other trap-doors communicating with
branches of the burrow, and covering
these branches 80 craftily that they
may easily be passed by unnoticed.--
Nay, if the enemy should be clever
enough to find his way into one of
these branches, he may still find no
one at home, the owner of the castle
being perhaps in a branch of this
branch of the burrow, concealed
by another skillful trap. door. Archi-
lecture Of this kind shuts the mouth
of any one who should say that the in
ferior members Of creation do not
know how to adapt means to ends.-
Nor can it be said that the power of
adaptation does not go to some extent
beyond the wonders of instinct. The
old story Of the bees who destroyed
an intruding mouse with their stings,
aud then covered it over with wax
because they could not get rid of the
body and feared the results of its
continuance in the hive, is only one of
a number which go to prove that in
the lower world of living things there
is unquestionably a power of adapta-
tion to unforeseen circumstances, a
reasoning out of results and acting
accordingly, which cannot possibly be
sci down to the credit of instinct prop
erly 80 called, But the important
point to be observed is this, the infinite
superiority Of the animals operations
when it does not reason and the inf
mite inferiority of its operations to
those of man when it does. 1t has
been said that bird will carry an
oyster into the air and let it drop upon
rock in order to break the she'll and
get at the treasure within a simple
operation this, and yet we stand we'll
nigh aghast at the birds prodigious
superiority above all that we had ex-
pected, and We doubt whether such a
wonderful feat can be positively SUBJ.
stantiated. will not say that there
may not be In insects and birds and
mammals the germ of that faculty
which invented the steam engine but
certainly it seems almost impossible
to contain in one description or def
milton two faculties SO diverse in
the importance oftheir results. Adap-
tation of means to ends is not in the
case OF man something subsidiary to
instinct, and exhibiting itself now and
then in exceptional circumstances, but
it is the very law of his being. The
merest savage contrives machines to
catch his prey he makes his stone
implements till he sees his way to
bronze and iron he constructs his
boat, or floats on his log of timber he
may be and doubtless is rude and ele-
mentery, but he is the genuine ances-
tor of James Watt and George Steph-
enson.-Ihs Bishop Of Carlisle.