any such help out of the account. The basis on which we may fairly start our proposal is the fact that, of the forty-three and a half millions of francs employed in Paris in a single year, forty-one millions were borrowed from the general public, mainly on the security of the concern and the vast property committed to its charge. It is true, indeed, that the Assistance Publique is likewise responsible for the debts of the Mont-de-piété, but it may be held that the real security consists in the pledges held by the establishment. The whole of the above amount was not required at one time, and the rate of interest averaged something under 4 per cent. Let us assume that a number of benevolent Englishmen desired to try the experiment of establishing a Mont-de-piété in London. I apprehend that the following might be regarded as something like the best modus operandi:—A hundred persons should agree (as is always done in France when a Mont-de-piété is started) to guarantee a sum of 1,000l. each; or two hundred 500l. each, of which only one-fifth should be paid up at once without interest. These should be shareholders in a limited liability company, and their risk would not therefore go beyond the 1,000l. or 500l. advanced. If thought advisable I am convinced that the concern could even afford to pay interest to the guarantors. When operations are commenced and half the capital in hand-10,000l.— has been advanced to pledgers, a sum of, say 8,000l., may be borrowed on debentures at probably 4 per cent., or perhaps 5 per cent., until the confidence of the public had been gained. As transactions increase, the property of the Mont-de-piété would increase, and therefore pari passu the power of issuing debentures; for it must be remembered that, adopting the foreign system, no advance would be made exceeding four-fifths or three-fourths respectively of the easily realisable value of the different classes of property. If the institution flourished, it might be expected that in a few years the balance sheet of capital would stand thus:

and in a very short time longer a profit would begin to accrue. This profit should, I think, be added to the capital of the institution, which would thus in course of time become a wealthy and selfsupporting institution. The Mont-de-piété of Paris earned 26,000l. in 1875, after paying interest on a vast amount of borrowed capital, and no less than 3,400l. for rent. It is difficult to see why an English institution of the same kind should not be equally successful. It would of course be carried on under the existing Pawnbrokers' Act.

The advantage to the poor would be very great, even if the English Mont-de-piété charged as high a rate of interest as that of Paris; even then little more than one-third of the pawnbroker's charges for loans of 21. and under would have to be paid. Next, a

considerable proportion of the property of those who are unable to redeem their pledges would no longer be confiscated, as is now the case. The managers would have to exercise the greatest care to avoid the reproach which is so often brought against the lower class of English pawnbrokers of assisting the operations of persons who have come by property dishonestly. This would not be so easy as in France, as no system of police registration by means of the carte de séjour exists with us. It may be observed, however, that every pledger in England is now required to give his name and address.

But is the foundation of a Mont-de-piété in England advisable ? If the borrowing classes were to combine to establish a self-supporting institution of the kind, there could be no doubt as to the answer to this question. But the needy are the last persons in the world to whom combination is possible; and the idea, however admirable it may be in conception, must, it is to be feared, be dismissed as impracticable. The only way in which a start can be made is by private philanthropy. Nor in such a cause can there be any reason to hold back. It is true that there is a tendency to do a great deal too much for the poor in the present day. There is hardly a phase of his life in which a poor man may not, if he choose, avail himself of

public or private charity to procure those necessaries which he finds

The remedy for this state of a great deal more than they Above all, a constant protest

it irksome to provide for himself. things is, no doubt, to leave the poor are now left to their own resources. should be raised against the growing and pernicious habit of looking to the State to undertake functions which are properly beyond its scope, and are much better performed by those who are personally concerned in them. But in the case of the Mont-de-piété it is the really poor and the necessitous of all classes who are to be assisted. In such a case charity may properly intervene, at any rate to a limited extent. The assistance which is afforded is of the best kind, for it helps the needy to help themselves.

LIST OF AUTHORITIES.

W. WALTER EDWARDS.

Histoire des Monts-de-piété, par Dr. Cerreti. Padoue, 1752.

Situation administrative et financière des Monts-de-piété. Rapport présenté au nom du Conseil des Inspecteurs Généraux par M. O. Claveau. Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1876 (not published).

Budget des Recettes et Dépenses de l'Exercice, 1879. Paris, 1879.

Dictionnaire de l'Administration Française. Par M. Maurice Block. Paris, 1878. Verslag van den Toestand der Gemeente Amsterdam gedurende het Jaar 1878. Am

sterdam, 1879.

Reglement voor de Stads Bank van Leening te Amsterdam, 1867.

Pawnbrokers' Act, 35 and 36 Vict. ch. 93.

Aperçu Historique sur les Etablissements de Bienfaisance de la Ville de Bruxelles. Par J. F. Vander Rest. Bruxelles, 1860.

Loi sur la Réorganisation des Monts-de-Piété. Bruxelles, 1868.

INTELLIGENCE OF ANTS.

I.

I HAVE frequently been much struck by the absence of information, even among professed naturalists and professed psychologists, concerning the intelligence of ants. The literature on the subject being scattered and diffused, it is not many persons who have either the leisure or the inclination to search it out for themselves. Most of us, therefore, either rest in a general hazy belief that ants are wonderfully intelligent animals, without knowing exactly in what ways and degrees the intelligent action of these animals is displayed; or else, having read Sir John Lubbock's investigations, we come to the general conclusion that ants are not really such very intelligent animals after all, but, as was to have been expected from their small size and low position in the zoological scale, it only required some such methodical course of scientific investigation to show that previous ideas upon the subject were exaggerated, and that, when properly tested, ants are found to be rather stupid than otherwise. I have therefore thought it well to write a paper for this widely circulated Review, in order to diffuse some precise information concerning the facts of this interesting branch of natural history.

Not having any observations of my own to communicate, I have no special right to be heard on this subject; but as I have recently had occasion to read through the literature connected with it, I am able to render what I may call a filtered abstract of all the facts which have hitherto been observed by others. It is needful, however, to add that the filter has been necessarily a close one; if I had a large volume instead of a short paper as my containing vessel, the filtrate would still require to be a strongly condensed substance.

Powers of Special Sense.-Let us take first the sense of sight. Sir John Lubbock made a number of experiments on the influence of light coloured by passing through various tints of stained glass, with the following results. 1. The ants which he observed greatly disliked the presence of light within their nests, 'hurrying about in search of the darkest corners' when light was admitted. 2. Some colours were much more distasteful to them than others; for while under

a slip of red glass there were on one occasion congregated 890 ants, under a green slip there were 544, under a yellow 495, and under a violet only 5. 3. The rays thus act on these ants in a graduated series, which corresponds with the order of their influence on a photographic plate. Experiments were therefore made to test the effect of the rays on either side of the visible spectrum, but with negative results. In considering these experiments, however, it is important to remember that other observers (especially Moggridge in Europe and M'Cook in America) have described other species of ants (genus Atta) as fond of light. It would be interesting for any one who has an opportunity to try whether ants of this genus do not show towards the rays of the spectrum a scale of preference the reverse of that which Sir John Lubbock describes.

As regards hearing, Sir John found that sounds of various kinds do not produce any effect upon the insects, nor could he obtain any evidence of their emitting sounds, either audible or inaudible to human ears.

It has long been known that the sense of smell in ants is highly developed, and it appears to be the sense on which, like dogs, they mainly rely. Huber proved that they track one another's footsteps in finding their way to food, &c.; for he observed on drawing his finger across the trail so as to obliterate the scent, that the ants became confused and ran about in various directions, till they again came upon the trail on the other side of the interrupted space. By many ingeniously devised experiments Lubbock has amply confirmed Huber's statements, and concludes that in finding treasure they are guided in some cases by sight, while in others they track one another by scent,' depending however more upon scent than upon sight.

There can be little doubt that ants have a sense of taste, as they are so well able to distinguish sugary substances; and it is unquestionable that in their antennæ they possess highly elaborated organs of touch.

Sense of Direction. It is certain that ants, in common with many other animals, possess some unaccountable sense of direction, whereby they are able to find their way independently of landmarks, &c. Sir John Lubbock tried a number of experiments in this connection, of which the following is perhaps the most conclusive. Between the nest and the food he placed a hat-box, in each of two opposite sides of which he bored a small hole, so that the ants, in passing from the nest to the food and back again, had to go in at one hole and out at the other. The box was fixed upon a pivot, where it could be easily rotated, and when the ants had well learnt their way to the food through the box, the latter was turned half round as soon as an ant had entered it; but in every case the ant turned too, thus retaining her direction.'

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Sir John then placed in the stead of a hat-box a disc of white

paper. When an ant was on the disc making towards the food, he gently drew the paper to the other side of the food, so that the ant was conveyed by the moving surface in the same direction as that in which she was going, but beyond the point to which she intended to go. Under these circumstances the ant did not turn round, but went on to the further edge of the disc, when she seemed a good deal surprised at finding where she was.'

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These results seem to indicate that the sense of direction is due to a process of registering all the changes of direction which may be made during the out-going journey, and that this power of registration has reference only to lateral movements; it has no reference to variations in the velocity of advance along the line in which the animal is progressing.

Powers of Communication.-Huber, Forel, Kirby and Spence, Dujardin, Burmeister, Franklin, and other observers have all expressed themselves as holding the opinion that ants are able to communicate information to one another by some system of language or signs. The facts, however, on which the opinion of these earlier observers rested, have not been stated with that degree of caution and detail which the acceptance of their opinion would require. But the more recent observations of Bates, Belt, Moggridge, Hague, Lincecum, M'Cook, and Lubbock, leave no doubt upon the subject. Two or three instances will be enough to select in order to prove the general fact. Hague, the geologist, kept upon his mantel-shelf a vase of flowers, and he noticed a file of small red ants on the wall above the shelf passing upwards and downwards between the latter and a small hole near the ceiling. The ants, whose object was to get at the flowers, were at first few; but they increased in number during several successive days, until an unbroken succession was formed all the way down the wall. To get rid of the ants, Hague then tried frequently brushing them off the wall upon the floor in great numbers; but the only result was that another train was formed to the flowers ascending from the floor. He therefore took more severe measures, and struck the end of his finger lightly upon the descending train near the flower-vase, so killing some and disabling others. The effect of this was immediate and unexpected. As soon as those ants which were approaching arrived near to where their fellows lay dead and suffering, they turned and fled with all possible haste, and in half an hour the wall above the mantel-shelf was cleared of ants.' The stream from below continued to ascend for an hour or two, the ants advancing 'hesitatingly just to the edge of the shelf, when, extending their antennæ and stretching their necks, they seemed to peep cautiously over the edge until beholding their suffering companions, when they too turned, expressing by their behaviour great excitement and terror.' Both columns of ants thus entirely disappeared. For several days there was a complete absence of ants: then a few began to