iSocidJ Inscctx. 39 



iiideeil miglit be expected when we consitler the part tliey have 

 played in the deveh)piiieiit of llowers. While tliese experiments 

 seem to sliow that blue is the bees" favorite color, this does not 

 accord with Albert Miiller's experience in nature, nor with the 

 general e-\perience of apiarians, who, if asked, would very gener- 

 ally agree that bees show a preference for white flowers. 



Touch. — The sense of touch is su})posed to reside chiefly in 

 the antenna' or feelers, though it re(pfires but the simplest ol)ser- 

 vation to show that with soft-bodied insects the sense resides in 

 any portion of the body, very much as it does in other animals. 

 In short, this is the one sense which, in its manifestations, may 

 be conceded to resemble our own. Yet it is evidently more 

 specialized in the maxillary and labial palpi and the tongue than 

 in the antenna', in most insects. 



Taste. — V^ery little can be positively proved as to the sense of 

 taste in insects. Its existence may be contidently predicated 

 from the acute discrimina,tion which most monopluigous species 

 exercise in the choice of their food, and its location nniy be as- 

 sumed to be the mouth or some of the special ti'ophial organs 

 which have no counterpart among vertebrates. Indeed certain 

 pits in the epipharynx of many mandibulate insects, and, in the 

 ligula and the maxilht) of bees and wasps are conceded, by the 

 authorities, to be gustatory. 



Smell. — That insects possess the power of smell is a matter 

 of common observation, and has been experimentally proved. 

 The many experiments of Luljbock upon ants left no doubt in 

 his mind that the sense of smell is highly develo])ed in them. 

 Indeed it is the acuteness of the sense of smell which attracts 

 ina,ny insects so unerringly to given (jbjects, ;ind which has led 

 many persons to believe them sharp-sighted. Moreover, the in- 

 numerable glands and special organs for secreting odors, furnish 

 the strongest indirect proof of the same fact. Some of these, of 

 which the osmaterium in Papilionid larvae and the eversible 

 glands in I'arorgyia are conspicuous examples, are intended for 

 pi'otection against inimical insects or other animals; while others, 

 l)ossessed bv one only of the sexes, are obivously intended to 

 l)lease or attract. A notable development of this kind is seen 

 in the large gland on the hind legs of the males of some species 

 of Hepialus, the gland being a niodilication of the tibia, and 

 sometimes involving the abortion of the tarsus, as in the Euro- 



