§0% . INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 



of the Pays de Waes, an^ consequently all other bees, 

 must be led to their abodes by instinct, as certainly as 

 it is instinct that directs the migrations of birds or of 

 fishes, or domestic quadrupeds to find out their homes 

 from inconceivable distances ''. — When they have 

 reached the hive, another instinct leads them to regur- 

 gitate into the extended proboscis of their hungry com- 

 panions who have been occupied at home, a portion of 

 the honey collected in the fields ; and another directs 

 them to unload their legs of the masses of pollen, and 

 to store it in the cells for future use. 



Several distinct instincts, again, are called into ac- 



* The following strikino; anecdote of this last species of instinct in an 

 animal not famed for sagacity, was related to me by Lieutenant AKler- 

 6on, (royal engineers,) who was personally acquainted with the facts. -rr 

 In March 1816 an ass, the property of Captain Dundas, R. N., then at 

 Malta, was shipped on board the Ister frigate, Captain Forrest, hound 

 from Gibraltar for that island. The vessel having struck on some sands 

 off the Point de Gat, at some distance from the shore, the ass was thrown 

 overboard to give it a chance of swimming to land — a poor one, for the 

 sea was running so high <hat a boat which left the ship was lost. A few 

 days afterwards, however, when the gates of Gibraltar were opened in 

 the morning, the ass presented himself for admittance, and proceeded to» 

 the stable of Mr. Weeks, a merchant, which he had formerly occupied, 

 to the no small surprise of tiiis gentleman, who imagined that from some 

 accident the animal had never been shipped on board tiie ister. On the 

 return of this vessel to repair, the mystery was explained ; and it turned 

 out that Valiante (so the ass was called) had not only swam safely to 

 shore, but, without guide, compass, or travelling map, had found his w^y 

 from Point de Gat to Gibraltar, a distance of more than two hundred 

 miles, through a mountainous and intricate country, intersected by 

 streams, which he had never traversed before, and in so sliort a period 

 that he could not have made one false turn. His not having been stopped 

 on the road was attributed to the circumstance of his having been for* 

 merly used to whip criminals upon, which was indicated to the peasants, 

 who have a superstitious horror of such asses, by the holes in his ears, to 

 which the persons flogged were tied. 



