BLENDED ORIGIN, OR PLASTICITY OF INSTINCT. 207 



find that in this case the variation is determined by an event 

 (the o\dposition of male eggs) which we may suppose all the 

 bees simultaneously to perceive. But in the present connec- 

 tion the important thing to note is that during even the 

 ordinary work of bees occasion frequently arises to modify 

 the construction of their cells, so that the instincts of the 

 animal are not, as it were, rigidly set to the undeviatincr 

 formation of the ordinary cell ; there is a "moving harmony" 

 in the operation of the instinct which secures plasticity in 

 the formation of the comb, so that when occasion arises the 

 " moving harmony " as it were, changes its key ; and it does 

 so in obedience to an intelligent perception of the exigencies 

 of the occasion. 



The same thing is shown iu a higher degree by some other i 

 experiments of Huber, which consisted in making the bees ' 

 deviate from their normal mode of building their combs from 

 above downwards, to building them from below upwards, and 

 also horizontally. Without describing these experiments in 

 detail, it is enough to say that his contrivances were such 

 that the bees had either to build in these abnormal directions 

 or not to build at all ; and the fact that under such circum- 

 stances they built in directions which none of their ancestors 

 or none of themselves had ever built before, is good evidence 

 of a primary instinct being greatly modified by intelligence — 

 better evidence, be it observed, of modification than that 

 which is furnished by the previously cited cases, inasmuch as 

 bees often require in a state of nature to change the shape of 

 their cells, but cannot ever have required to reverse the 

 direction of building them. 



The same remarks apply to the following observations, 

 which are also due to Huber. A very irregular piece of 

 comb, when placed on a smooth table, tottered so much that 

 the humble bees could not work on so unsteady a basis. To 

 prevent the tottering, two or three bees held the comb by 

 fixing their front feet on the table, and their hind feet on the 

 comb. This they continued to do, relieving guard, for tiiree 

 days, until they had built supporting pillars of wax. " Kow," 

 as Mr. Darwin observes in his MSS, " such an accident as 

 this could hardly have occurred in nature." 



Some other humble bees when shut up, and so prevented 

 from getting moss wherewith to cover their nests, tore threads 

 from a piece of cloth, and " carded them with their feet into 



