WARS OF INSECT COMMUNITIES. 327 



syringe, the little bladder, with its muscle, acting 

 the part of the impelling plug*. 



The poison is a transparent fluid, and when 

 tasted is sweetish, followed by a hot acrid sensation, 

 similar to the milk of the spurge (Eu]}horbiu7n). 

 It is soluble in water, but not in spirits of wine, and 

 in this it resembles the poison of the viper, as well 

 as when dry and chewed, appearing tenacious, gum- 

 my, and elastic ; but the poison of the viper is 

 tasteless, and has none of the chemical characteris- 

 tics of acidity. The poison of the bee, however, 

 affects vegetable blues, and hence the Abbe Fon- 

 tana concludes, that it at least contains a portion of 

 some acidf. Dr. Bevan says, "if a humble-bee be 

 irritated to sting paper tinged with litmus, or any 

 other of the vegetable blues, the colour is changed, 

 by the acid of the venom, to a bright red." He adds 

 that it does not seem to differ from the bombic or the 

 formic acids^; but this we should be much disposed 

 to doubt, for the formic is now known to be a mix- 

 ture of the acetic and malic acids§, and can be made 

 artificially, which the bee's poison cannot be||. Be 

 this as it may, the poison of the bee is so very active 

 that Fontana supposes a grain of it would be suffi- 

 cient to kill a pigeon. Mr. Talbot informs us that 

 during the summer of 1820, the Rev. R. Leeming 

 having sent a fine horse to grass at a neighbouring 

 farmer's, who kept about twenty stocks of bees, the 

 animal got upon the lawn, where the hives were 

 placed, and by accident overturned one of them, the 

 bees of which attacked him with great virulence. 

 The horse, rearing and kicking from agony, over- 

 threw another hive, and having thus doubled the 



* Svvammerdam, i. 



f Fontana on Poisons, i. 265 — 9. J On Bees, p. 284. 



§ Nouv. Diet. Hist. Nat. xii. 94. jj Rennie's Sup. to Phar. 



2 f2 



