47(1 



BEES AiSTD FLOWERS. 



Perhaps M. Perez exaggerated tlieir importance a little when he 

 said, with Dodel-Port, that ''a hundred thousand species of i)lants 

 would disai)pear from the face of the earth " if the bees ceased their 

 visits, but no one can doubt that such a -contingency would cause a 

 very great disturbance in the vegetable kingdom. 



We have now arrived at two facts of the first importance: Flowers 

 are necessary to bees, and bees, on their side, are very nseful or even 

 necessary to the fertilization of flowering plants. It now^ remains 

 to inquire whether this reciprocity of service has had as a consecpience 

 any reciprocal adaptation in the two sorts of beings. 



It is generally admitted that all living things are subject to greater 

 or less variation, and that among these variations those which are 

 advantageous to the species are fixed and further developed b}^ hered- 

 ity and natural selection. So if flowers are necessary to the bees 

 and bees are useful or necessary in the fertilization of flowers, it is 



FlQ. 5.— Side view of a honeybee. 



only natural to suppcse that all the variations which favoi- food col- 

 lection in the former and reproduction in the latter will in the coin-se 

 of time be acquired and amplified. This is strictly ivasonable: but 

 science will not rest content with a priori gen(M-alizations, and we 

 nnist discoA'er how far this logical conclusion is justified by actual 

 facts. 



The adaption of the Mellifei'a to the collection of ])ollen and 

 nectar appears in various degrees through the whole series from tlu' 

 Prosopis to the honeybee Apis 7nellifcr((. Th(> structure of the for- 

 mer does not differ essentially from that of the wasps, only if the 

 •jaw appendages have been a little elongated and the hairs a little 

 more numerous we are at the beginning of the real evolution of the 

 ]\Iellifera. In the honeybee, on the other hand, the evolution has 

 reached its highest point and shows itself i)lainly in the adaptations. 

 For the collection of pollen there ar(> the collecting hairs Avhich cover 

 every part of the body and which, on the inside of the first tarsal joint 



