234 
“We cannot reasonably suppose insects to be gifted with instincts 
adapted for occasions that are never likely to happen. If, therefore, 
we find them in these extraordinary and improbable emergencies 
still availing themselves of the means apparently best calculated 
for ensuring their object, and if, in addition, they seem in some 
cases to gain knowledge by experience, if they can communicate 
information to each other, and if they are endowed with memory, 
it appears impossible to deny that they are possessed of reason.”— 
(Spence, pp. 559S6o.) 
The caddice-fly belongs to the order Neuroptera. Does 
Mr. Romanes maintain that this order is unintelligent 
though other orders are intelligent? If so, dragon-flies, 
may-flies, scorpion-flies, ant-lions and termites are unin 
telligent. Let us take as a test the case of the larva of 
the ant-lion. 
“ It feeds upon the juices of insects, particularly of ants, in order 
to obtain which it excavates with the greatest ingenuity a funnel- 
shaped hole in sandy ground, and lies in wait at the bottom, all but 
its mandibles buried in the sand. Insects which approach too near to 
the edge of the hole then become its prey, by the loose sand giving 
way, so that they fall down the steep slope. If they do not fall quite 
to the bottom, but begin to scramble up again, the ant-lion throws 
sand upon them by jerking its head, and so brings them back. It 
employs its head in the same way to eject their bodies from its pit, 
after their juices have been sucked, and casts them to a considerable 
distance; and by the same means throws away the sand in excavating 
its hole, first ploughing it up with its body and then placing it upon 
its head by means of one of its forelegs. It always begins by working 
round the circular circumference of its future hole, and gradually 
narrows and deepens it, turning quite round after each time that 
it works round the hole, so as to employ next time the foreleg of the 
other side. When it meets with a stone which it cannot remove, 
it deserts the excavation and begins another.”—(Chambers 1 En 
cyclopaedia—A rt: A nt-lion.) 
Or shall we interpret Mr. Romanes to assert that the 
caddice-fly is alone unintelligent among insects of the 
order to which it belongs? The particular action which 
Mr. Romanes selects as an illustration of his argument 
appears to me to exhibit all the signs of intelligence.