202 INSECTS AND MAN 



pollen having been removed." It is essential for the bee to 

 keep its antennae clean at all costs, and the operation is 

 performed with the aid of the special cleaning apparatus 

 shown at e in C, and, on a larger scale, at e in D. Just 

 over the hollow e, which is fringed with stiff hairs h, there 

 is a cap or spur s, and when the insect's antennae require 

 cleaning the hollow is passed over the organ, the cap s is 

 pushed over to its place on the open side of the hollow and 

 the leg drawn outwards, so as to clean the whole length of 

 the antennae. As this cleaning apparatus is situate in the 

 elbow of the fore leg, the antenna is within easy reach. 

 The adaptation of the honey bee for collecting pollen is 

 little short of marvellous. 



Why are bees attracted to flowers, in the first place ? It 

 is impossible to give a definite answer, for we are not in 

 a position to read their innermost thoughts, but it is no 

 difficult matter to make a shrewd guess : the purpose of 

 their floral visits is, wholly and solely, to obtain pollen 

 and honey. How they are guided to the right flowers is 

 a still more difficult question. Many naturalists have 

 attempted to show that bright colours are attractive, and 

 have gone so far as to call the markings on certain flowers 

 honey guides, and to argue that nature has placed them 

 there to show the bees the way to the nectaries. Bees, 

 however, are too intelligent to require such natural sign- 

 posts; nor is colour the attraction, as may be seen when 

 these insects are crowding round the lime-tree flowers 

 and paying scarcely any attention to the many brightly 

 coloured garden flowers. If colour is the guide, as some 

 would have it, why do bees invariably pass over the 

 bright yellow Eschscholtzia in favour of the paler yellow 

 CEnothera ? The one contains nectar ; the other does not. 

 Scent is said by other observers to be the bee's sole guide ; 

 but it is not the most strongly scented flowers that are most 

 frequently visited by bees; they rarely visit a strongly 

 scented double rose, because it produces no nectar, and, 



