Experience would entirely deny any such assertion. And this not only with reference to the superior animals, for this faculty appears to be extended even to the invertebrata. The well-known experiments of P. Huber seem to have proved in the most decisive manner that ants,[87] like bees, are able to transmit certain signs or indications from one to the other; even if the mere act of living in a republic, of joining together in one common work, did not offer the strongest presumption of a language peculiar to these creatures. If anyone dares to deny to animals the spontaneous exercise of a restricted language, limited in whatever way that may be desired, at least it cannot be denied that many of the vertebrate animals are not capable of receiving from it an equal education, of understanding the signification of certain sounds, of certain signs, and of producing in their turn such as may be understood by us, of communicating to us any of their thoughts, or any of their appreciations. We are not speaking here of animals who can reproduce certain sounds belonging to the vocal organs of man; that is a fact of an entirely material character, and which has no reference to the question of language. It is evident that the animal which articulates any word whatsoever does not understand it a whit more than the man who imitates the cry of an animal, and, in a general way, neither comprehends its sense nor its signification. Maupertuis alleges[88] that if animals were capable of understanding we could teach them to make themselves understood by other signs in default of a voice. A strange aberration of intellect for such a studious and learned man. This is the man who makes an impossibility out of an everyday occurrence; for, first of all, most animals _have_ some sort of voice, and if they had it not, there are few persons who are ignorant of the way in which certain mute dogs make themselves understood when they particularly desire it. What would really be absurd would be the hope of imparting ideas to animals, matters relating, indeed, to a higher order, since we see that even all _men_ are not capable of grasping them. Man has been able to train animals, and to train implies precisely the idea of communicating a thought from man to an animal, and from the animal to man. “Jump,” says the shepherd to his dog, and the dog knows that this vocal articulation orders him to make a given muscular effort. The man has _spoken_ to the dog. During the night some one opens the gate of the farm-yard, and the watch-dog barks; he thus _tells_ his master that something unusual is happening.[89]