That insects have a real sensorium or brain, would seem to be proved by their having _memory_, and a _capacity to receive instruction_, and _acquire new habits_. Such functions in higher animals are regarded as functions of a cerebral system. That they are endowed with memory cannot well be doubted. +Huber+ relates a remarkable instance of it in bees, which illustrates what will hereafter be said on their having a method of communicating information to each other. "Honey," says he, "had been placed in a window in autumn, where the bees resorted to it in multitudes. It was removed, and the shutters closed during winter; but when opened again, on the return of spring, the bees came back, though no honey was there. Undoubtedly they remembered it, therefore an interval of several weeks did not obliterate the impression they had received." "But the most striking fact evincing the memory of bees has been communicated to me," says +Mr. Kirby+, "by my intelligent friend +Mr. W. Stickney+, of _Ridgemont, Holderness_. About twenty years ago, a swarm from one of this gentleman's hives took possession of an opening beneath the tiles of his house, whence, after remaining a few hours, they were dislodged and hived. For many subsequent years, when the hives descended from this stock were about to swarm, a considerable party of scouts were observed, for a few days before, to be reconnoitring about the old hole under the tiles; and _Mr. Stickney_ is persuaded, that if suffered, they would have established themselves there. He is certain that for eight years successively the descendants of the very stock that first took possession of the hole, frequented it as above stated, and _not_ those of any other swarms; having constantly noticed them, and ascertained that they were bees from the original hive by powdering them, while about the tiles, with yellow ochre, and watching their return. And even at the present time, there are still seen every swarming season about the tiles, bees, which _Mr. Stickney_ has no doubt are descendants from the original stock." Some anecdotes of the spider prove that insects are capable of instruction. +M. Pelisson+, when he was confined in the Bastille, tamed a spider, and taught it to come for food at the sound of an instrument. _A manufacturer_ also, in an apartment _at Paris_, fed 800 spiders, which became so tame, that whenever he entered it, which he usually did with a dish of flies, they immediately came down to receive their food. That insects are susceptible of a change of habits, or rather that they may acquire civilized habits, if I may say so, is shown by the domestication of bees, and occasionally by that of ants and wasps. +Huber's+ experiments, with leaf-hives, show the existence of this faculty in an eminent degree, for he assures us that it renders the bees quite tame and tractable.