PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 185 



round their hive for their ordinary excursions ; yet from 

 this distance they will discover honey with as much cer- 

 tainty as if it was within their sight. To prove that it is 

 by their scent that bees find it out, he put some behind 

 a window-shutter, in a place where it could not be seen, 

 leaving the shutter just open enough for insects, if they 

 liked, to get at it. In less than a quarter of an hour 

 four bees, a butterfly, and some house-flies had disco- 

 vered it. At another time he put some into boxes, with 

 little apertures in the lid, into which pieces of card were 

 fitted, which he placed about two hundred paces from 

 his hives. In about half an hour the bees discovered 

 them, and traversing them very industriously, soon found 

 the apertures, when, pushing in the pieces of card, they 

 got to the honey. That contained in the blossom of 

 many-plants is quite as much concealed, yet the acute- 

 ness of their scent enables them to detect it. 



These insects, especially when laden and returning to 

 their nest, fly in a direct line, which saves both time and 

 labour. How they are euiibled to do this with such 

 certainty as to make for their own abode without devia- 

 tion, I must leave to others to explain. Connected with 

 this circumstance, and the acuteness of their smell, is 

 the following curious account, given in the Philosophical 

 Transactions for 1721, of the method practised in New 

 England for discovering where the wild hive-bees live 

 in the woods, in order to get their honey. The honey- 

 hunters set a plate containing honey or sugar upon the 

 ground in a clear day. The bees soon discover and at- 

 tack it : having secured two or three that have filled 

 themselves, the hunter lets one go, which rising into the 

 air, flies straight to the nest : he then strikes off at right 



