The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-07-25
From the London Daily Mail.

From the London Daily Mail.
The animal may have other means of
information than our own says Current
Opinion. Our senses do not represent the
sum total of the methods whereby the
animal enters into touch with that which
is not itself. There are others not capable
of comparison, even at a distance. with
those which we ourselves possess. To this
conclusion we find the most ililstrious of
living naturalists. Henri Fabre. arriving
after a long life devoted to entomology
and the sciences akin to it, 1t Is through
the possession of an unknown sense, sus-
poets Henri Fabre, that the insect evades
our influence. To exterminate 1t if it be
harmful, to propagate 1t If it be useful are
impracticable undertakings for US. BY a
singular contrast of strength and weak
ness, man cuts through the neck of con-
tinents to join two seas. He oierces the
Alps. He weighs the sun. Yet he cannot
prevent the wretched maggot from enjoy
ing his cherries nor an odious louise from
destroying his vines. The Titan Is van
quished by the pigmy. To pursue the sub
ject in the brilliant series of papers
translated by Alexander Teixeira de
Mattos.
There is a gray worm that is the nat
ural food of a certain insect. 1t is a
caterpillar without the supply OF which
the insects cannot attain maturity. There
is noting outside. nothing at least percep-
tible to the eye, to indicate its hiding
place. The soil that conceals 1t may be
gras sy or bare, pebbly or earthly, smooth
or scanned with little cracks. These varie-
ties of appearance are matters cf indie-
60, t,a h,,rt rbo aU-
cry spot without showing preference eor
cne more than the others. At no place
where the insect. which Is kind of bee,
stops and digs with some persistency. do
see anything particular, In spite of all
my attention, and yet there must be a
gray worm there, as I have but recently
convinced myself. Sight, therefore, is
certainly out of the question.
What sense. then? That of touch?
Let us inquire. Everything tells us that
the organs of search are the antennae.
With their tips, hent into an arc and
inspired with continual vibration. the
ipsect feels the ground quickly with little
taps. When some crack offers. the quiv-
cring threads enter and sound it; when
some grass tuft spreads it's tangled root
stock along the ground, they rummage
its asperities with increased agitation.
Their tips are applied for q moment,
moulding themselves, so to speak, on the
spot explored, suggesting two tactile fla
merits, two long terminal organs endowed
with Incompatible mobility. which invcst'-
gate by fumbling. But the sense of touch
can play no part in revealing what is
underground; the thing to be found is the
gray worm, and the worm Is lying snug
in its burrow at depth of some inches
below the surface"
We thereupon turn our thoughts to the
faculty of scent. Insects, there is no
denying. possess the sense of smell. often
very highly developed The so-called
bun wing beetles hasten from every side to
The spot whore lies little corpse of which
the ground is TO be purged Guided by
sceBt. these grave diggers hurry toward
the poor dead mole.
But, while the presence of the olfactory
sense in the insect Is Indispensable we
still ask ourselves wnere it is seated.
Many declare that the seat is antennae.
Let us admit this. although it Is difficult
to understand how rod consisting of
hcrry segments. jointed end to end, can
fulfill the office of nostril which is so very
differently constructed. The organization
CT each apparatus having nought in COM
mon with the other can the impressions
received by both be of the same nature ?
When tools are dissimilar. do their :unc-
tiers remain alike?
But there is more to be said T'he olfac-
tory sense goes for nothing whore there
is TO smell. M. Fabre has tested the gray
worm for himself. He has given it to
young nostrils to snifr-nostrils more sem
sitive than his own. No one has perceived
the fainest trace of smell in the cater
pillar. How can TINT which is mod orous
at the very entrance of our nOstris be
cdoriferous to an insv~e through the in :
tervening obstacle of the ground? When
the burying beetles pour into the chalics
of a carrfon scented arum lily, never to
return; when swarms of flies buzz around
a dead logs swollen belly. the
neighborhood reeks with the stencil It
hardly requires q scent of exquisite deh
caey on the Insects part to discover putriI
meat and rotten cheese. Wherever we see
its hoitles together with scent for an un-
doubted guide. we ourselves are aware Of
a smell.
There remains hearing. to which NJ
Fabre fefers in lively fashion:
~ his IA another sense about which en-
tomologists are not adequately informed.
Where is its seat? In the antennac. we
are told. Those fine. Quivering stalks