told him he had
known for years. His employment in the fields revealed to his observing
mind wonderful facts in nature and in the animal world. The wisdom of
the vine-weevil gave him ho difficulty. He looked again in Frank's
deep-sunken eyes and noticed a peculiar expression, and in his
countenance great anxiety.

He concluded that the work of the vine-weevil must have some connection
with the young man's condition.

"You see actions of reflection and design where I see only unconscious
instinct."

Frank became nervous.

"The common evasion of superficial examination!" cried he. "Man must be
just even to the animals. Their works are artistic, intelligent, and
considerate. Why then deny to animals those powers which operate with
intelligence and reflection?"

"I do not for a moment dispute this power of the animals," replied the
proprietor quickly. "You find mind in the animals?" interrupted Frank
hastily. "This conviction once reached, have you considered the
consequences that follow?"--and he became more excited. "Have you
considered that with this admission the whole world becomes a fabulous
structure, without any higher object? If the spider is equal to man,
then its torn web that flutters in the wind is worth as much as the
crumbling fragments of art which remain from classic antiquity. Virtue,
the careful restraining of the passions, is stark madness. The
disgusting ape, lustful and brutish, is as good as the purest virgin
who performs severe penances for her idle dreams. It is with justice
that the criminal scoffs at the good as bedlamites who, with fanatical
delusion, strive for castles in the air. Every outcast from society,
sunk and saturated in the basest vices, is precisely as good as the
purest soul and the noblest heart; for all distinction between right
and wrong, good and evil, is destroyed."

Angela's father gazed with solicitude into the perplexed look and
distorted countenance of the young man.

"You deduce consequences, Herr Frank, that could not be drawn from
my admissions," said he mildly. "There is no conscious power in
animals--no reflecting soul. The animal works with the power that is in
it, as light and heat in the fire, as in the lightning the destructive
force, as the exciting and purifying effects in the storm. The animal
does not act freely, like man; but from necessity--according to
instinct and laws which the Almighty has imposed, upon it."

"A gratuitous assumption! A shallow