INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 493 



this astonishing variation of instinct to any mere change 

 in the sensations of the bees; and to what far-fetched 

 and gratuitous suppositions we must be reduced, if we 

 adopt any such explanation. We can but refer it to 

 an instinct of which we know nothing-; and so referring 

 itj can we help exclaiming with Huber, " Such is the 

 grandeur of the views and of the means of ordaining 

 wisdom, that it is not by a minute exactness that she 

 marches to her end, but proceeds from irregularity to 

 irregularity, compensating one by another : the admea- 

 surements are made on high, the apparent errors ap- 

 preciated by a divine geometry ; and order often results 

 from partial diversity. This is not the first instance 

 which science has presented to us of preordained irre- 

 gularities which astonish our ignorance, and are the 

 admiration of the most enlightened minds: So true it 

 is, that the more we investigate the general as well as 

 particular laws of this vast system, the more perfection 

 does it presents" 



It is observed by M. P. Huber, in his appendix to 

 the account of his father's discoveries relative to the 

 architecture of bees, that in general the form of the 

 prisms or tubes of the cells is more essential than that 

 of their bottoms, since the tetrahedral-bottomed trans- 

 ition cells, and even those cells which, being built 

 immediately upon wood or glass, were entirely with- 

 out bottoms, still preserved their usual shape of hexa- 

 gonal prisms. But a remarkable experiment of the 

 elder Huber shows that bees can alter even the form of 

 their cells when circumstances require it, and that in a 

 way which one would not have expected. 



■ilubei, ii. 'i30. 



