Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1890-07-23
LOST INSTINCTS.
Sounds. Sights and Colors Known
to Animals and Not to Men.

If the doctrine he true that man is
really the heir of all the various spe-
cieS and genera of the animal king
dom II seems little hard upon US that
even by way of exception. We inherit
none or the more marvellous instincts
of those species and genera, and have
TO be content with those greater but
purely human faculties by which the
most wonderful of animal instincts have
been extlnguIshed. Sir John Lubbock
maintains that there are insects. and
very likely even higher animals, which
perceive colorS of which we have no
gllmpSe5 and hear sounds which to us
are lnaudlble. Yet We never hear of a
human retina that includes in its vision
those colors depending on vibrations or
the ether which are too slow or too
rapid for our ordinary eyes, nor of a
human ear which is entranced with
music that To the great majority of our
species is absolutely inaudible.
Again, We never hear of human
being who could perform the feat of
which We were told only recently of 4
bloodhound. In dark night 1t fol-
lowed up for three miles the trail OF a
thief with whom the bloodhound could
never have been i'll contact (he had Just
purlolned some rolls OF tan from the tam
yard in which the dog was chained up).
AMI finally sat down under the tree in
which the man had taken refuge. Why
We wonder, are those finer powers for
discriminating and following the track
of the scent, which so many of the
lower animals possess, entirely eXtln-
guished III man, If man be the real heir
OF all the various genera which show
powers inferior TO his own?
We See no trace in animals OF that
high enjoyment of the finer scents
which make the bloSSoming OF the spring
flowers so great delight TO human be-
lngs, and yet men are entirely desti-
tute of tLat almost unerring power of
tracking the path of an Odor " hich St eems
10 be one Of the prime pal gifts of n any
quadrupeds and some birds. IL Is the
same with the power Of a dog OF cat to
find its way back To a home to which il
is attached, but from which 1t has been
taken 10y route that it can Lot poss =
bly, follow on its return, even if it had
the power of Observing that route,
which usually It has not. Nothing
could be more convenient than such a
power 10 a lost child. But none ever
heard Cf a child vino possessed it.
Still more enyiable is that instinct
possessed by so many birds of cross
ing great tracts of land and sea W TIL
out apparently any landmarks or sea-
marks 10 guide them, and of reaching
a quarter of the globe which many of
them have never visited before, while
those who have visited 1t before have not
visited it often enough to learn the
way.
The migratory birds must possess
either senses or instincts entirely lee
youd the range of human imagination,
and yet no one ever heard of the sur
yival of such a sense or instinct III any
member of our race. 1t may be said,
indeed, that men have either inherited
or some way reproduced the slave max
ing instinct of some of the military
ants; but this only enhances the iIUny
OF our des tiny if we DO indeed III any
sense inherit from these insect aristo =
racieS one of the most disastrous in
stlhcts or the audacious but indolent
creatures which fight so much better
than they work. What is still more Gu
riOuS is that even where human beings
have wholly exceptional and unheard
of powers they betrsiy no traces of the
exceptional and unAeard of powers OF
the races whose vital oTg2niZai ion We
are said to inherit.
The occasional appearance of very
rare mathematical POWERS, for instance,
80 far from being i'll any sense expli-
cable from below, looks much more
like inspiration from above The cal
culating boy, who could not even give
any account of the process whereby lie
arrived AT correct results which the ed
uc1ted mathematician took some time
To verify, certainly was not reyiving III
himself any of the rare powers OF the
lower tribes of animals. Nor do the
prod gies in music who show such mar
yelOus power i'll infancy recall TO us
any instinct of the bIrd, the only musi-
cal creature except ourselves Still
| less, of course, does great moral genius,
| the genius of Howard or a Clarkson,
suggest any "Reminiscences OF lower AMI
NAL life.