( t'vi ) 
labours of entomologists. Fabre, Avebury, Wasmaun, Forel 
are names that will occur to everybody as those of men who 
have done much in their several ways to help on an answer to 
these and kindred (juestions, and who have shown the road 
which future investigators may pursue with profit. And the 
study of the social hymenoptera has a further bearing upon a 
development of evolutionary theoi’y of the greatest importance, 
for it introduces us to the conception of the yroitp as the 
selective unit instead of the individual, and so leads on to the 
evolutionary side of sociology and ethics, with their accom¬ 
paniment of organisation within the community, of imitation, 
of tradition and the social sense. 
This is a tempting subject, and I would gladly pursue it 
further did time permit. But I think I have now said enough 
to illustrate my contention that entomologists enjoy peculiar 
advantages in the attack of the great outstanding problems of 
evolution. It is unquestionable that such a mind as that of 
Herbert Spencer, capable of welding together into a con¬ 
cordant whole a mass of facts and conclusions drawn from 
every department of knowledge, is an asset of enormous value 
to the cause of scientific progress. But it should never be 
forgotten that the work of the specialist is equally essential; 
it is he who supplies material without which the generaliser 
and unifier of knowledge could not work. And let us beware 
of undervaluing kinds of work which do not happen to appeal 
to our own individual tastes. I think no one can give atten¬ 
tive considei’ation to the topics that have been touched on 
this evening without seeing that our study has need of the 
morphologist, the physiologist, the field naturalist, the museum 
worker, the laboratory experimenter, the systematist, and— 
shall I add 1 —the arm-chair philosopher. Each one of these 
has his contribution to make to the common fabric of organised 
and unified knowledge. 
