488 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



know the results. If, then, there be any merit in our discoveries, I 

 must share the honor with him ; and I have great satisfaction in ren- 

 dering him this act of public justice." 



Huber practised Burneus in the art of observation ; comparing his 

 results with those of other investigators. He directed him by a thou- 

 sand questions, adroitly combined, till fully satisfied of his fidelity and 

 accuracy. At the first issue of the book, which was the record of their 

 joint labor, the naturalists of Europe looked askance at the marvel- 

 ous revelations of bee-economy made by a blind man aided by a 

 peasant ; but, as knowledge upon the subject grew, prejudices melted 

 away, and there is scarcely a fact recorded by Huber which subse- 

 quent investigation has not again and again confirmed. 



The marvelous activity of mind, which to many men would have 

 proved only a torment, was to Huber a source of the deepest delight. 

 His love of music, and proficiency in the art, beguiled many hours, 

 and added greatly to his social enjoyments. He had made himself 

 master of counterpoint, and was able, from the dictation of the bass 

 of a musical composition, to arrange the harmonies. The whole piece 

 or song would be dictated to him, in this way, phrase by phrase, and 

 a single repetition was all-sufficient. 



He invented, for his own use, a printing-machine, by means of 

 which he could correspond with his absent friends ; and he was ena- 

 bled to indulge his fondness for walking in the opon air by means 

 of another contrivance of his own. He caused knotted cords to be 

 stretched along the borders of all the rural paths around his house; 

 by means of the cord he could guide himself, and the knots informed 

 him Avhat point he had reached. 



Soothed by every appliance which ingenuity and ample means 

 could afford, surrounded by the tenderest affection and the keenest 

 sympathy in his pursuits, his darkened life was full of sweet compen- 

 sations. But it is in himself, rather than in the circumstances of his 

 life, that we find the sources of his tranquil happiness. He retained 

 to extreme age the tenderest affection for his friends ; he showed to 

 the last the untouched freshness of delight in Nature, the boyish can- 

 dor and directness, the noble enthusiasm, the quick sympathy with 

 youth and its interests, which so generally characterize men of sci- 

 ence, and which offer one of the most unanswerable arguments in fa- 

 vor of the ennobling influence of such pursuits. 



"When any one spoke to him on subjects which interested his 

 head or heart," says De Candolle, " his noble figure became strikingly 

 animated, and the vivacity of his countenance seemed, by a mysteri- 

 ous magic, to animate even his eyes, which had been so long condemned 

 to darkness. The sound of his voice had always something of the sol- 

 emn. ' I now understand,' said a man of wit to me one day, who had 

 just seen him for the first time ' I understand how young people will- 

 ingly grant to the blind the reputation of supernatural inspiration.' " 



