504 INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 



variably release the oldest queens the first from their 

 confinement ; — tiie singular love of monarchical do- 

 minion, by which, when two queens in other circun> 

 stances are produced, they are led to impel them to 

 comlmt until one is destroyed ; — the ardent devotion 

 which binds them to the fate and fortunes of the sur- 

 vivor ; — the distraction v»'hich they manifest "^t her loss, 

 and their resolute determination not to accept of any 

 stranger until an interval has elapsed sufficiently long 

 to allow of no chance of the return of their rightful 

 sovereign; — and (to omit a further enumeration) the 

 obedience which in the utmost noise and confusion they 

 show to her well-known hum. 



I have now instanced at least thirty distinct instincts 

 with which every individual of the nurses amongst the 

 working-bees is endowed : and if to the account be 

 added their care to carry from the hive the dead bo- 

 dies of any of the community ; their pertinacity in 

 iheir battles, in directing their sting at those parts 

 only of the bodies of their adversaries which are pene- 

 trable by it; their annual autumnal murder of the 

 drones, &c. &c. — it is certain that this number might 

 be very considerably increased, perhaps doubled. 



At the first view you will be inclined to suspect some 

 fallacy in this enumeration, and that this variety of ac- 

 tions ought to be referred rather to some general prin- 

 ciple, capable of accommodating itself to different cir- 

 cumstances, than to so many different kinds of instinct. 

 But to what principle? Not to reason, the faculty to 

 which we assign this power of varying accommodation* 

 All the actions above adduced come strictly under ih& 

 description of instinctive actions, being ail performed 



