51 
teristic of the man, shows in the same paragraph in which he reports 
his Lobelia experiment. Bees, he says, visited Geramum plucum 
after the petals had fallen, finding by experience that there was some 
nectar secreted by the apetalous flower. And he repeats that color 
IS only an " approximate " guide. But, for all this, I think Mr. Dar- 
wm fails to give full credit to the bee's sagacity. To my mind much 
that has recently been written about the relation of insects to the 
color of flowers is but an illustration of the popular idea of "running 
a thing into the ground,*' and I think science is served when an ex- 
aggeration is— again in popular language— "sat down upon.*' I thought 
of this distorted view of Darwin's Lobelia experiment to-day W^hile 
watching honey-bees at work on the flowers of the common snow-drop 
tree — Haleda tetraptera. We know now that there is scarcely a flower 
with the lower portion tubular, or which offers any obstacle, however 
slight, to the entrance of the humble-bee, that is not rifled of its sweets 
by being bored from the outside. Indeed, if bees were really in- 
tended to cross-fertilize flowers, the experience of Mr. Darwin with the 
European humble-bee would excite a smile in those with only an 
American experience, for indeed the American species are frauds of 
the first magnitude. They shirk their duty on the shallowest pre- 
■ tence, ^ But though I have had suspicions, I have never been able 
to satisfy myself that the honey-bee does not perform its duties 
honestly. Whenever I have noticed it getting honey from the 
outside I have been unable to decide whether the hole was not there 
before and the honey-bee was not satisfying itself on the crumbs 
left from the stranger's table. On this occasion all the honey-gath- 
erers were collecting from the outside, the pollen-gatherers only en- 
tered by the mouth. And I was satisfied, in all cases, that the holes 
had been made the day before by the humble-bee. 
The corollas Avere now beginning to fall. The slightest jar of the 
tree sent numbers — literal snow^-flakes — to the ground, and the bees 
were as busy as I ever saw them on the most favorite flowers collect- 
'^gthe nectar from the base of the now naked pistils. On branches 
where not a' single corolla remained they were as active as if the 
perfect blossoms were still there. They had learned by experience 
that they cGuld find what they wanted there. Though there w^as 
nothing but a slender pistil from a very inconspicuous base, the total 
absence of any bright color did not prevent them from alighting at 
^^ ^P*^t most convenient to them ; and it \vas evident that if the 
Halesia had never had a corolla at all, the bees would have been there 
fll the same. Of course, color is an "approximate" guide to a bee as it 
^s to us. In a basket of green apples that we had never seen before 
we should most likely try the most rosy-cheeked specimen first, only 
9^perience would teach us that a greening was as good as a Bald- 
^^"- It is so with bees. Accustomed to associate nectar with a 
blue Lobelia, and none with the faded flower, Mr. Darwin, if he had 
possessed as much faith as I have in the value of experience to a 
bee, would not have expected the creature to visit it after it had been 
*ed to believe the petals had fallen. If there had been honey in the 
be 
Halesta 
e would not have been so easily deceived ; and, as it was, I have 
