The Bee-eating Philanthus 



certain air of likelihood which we should be 

 glad to find in a host of evolutionist argu- 

 ments put forward as irrefutable. Well, I 

 will make a present of my deductive views, 

 without regret, to whoever cares to have 

 them: I don't believe one word of them; 

 and I confess my profound ignorance of the 

 origin of the twofold diet. 



What I do understand more clearly, after 

 all these investigations, is the tactics of the 

 Philanthus. When witnessing her ferocious 

 feasting, the real reason of which was un- 

 known to me, I heaped the most ill-sounding 

 epithets upon her, calling her a murderess, 

 a bandit, a pirate, a robber of the dead. 

 Ignorance is always evil-tongued ; the man 

 who does not know indulges in rude asser- 

 tions and mischievous interpretations. Now 

 that my eyes have been opened to the facts, 

 I hasten to apologize and to restore the Phi- 

 lanthus to her place in my esteem. In drain- 

 ing the crops of her Bees the mother is per- 

 forming the most praiseworthy of all ac- 

 tions: she is protecting her family against 

 poison. If she happens to kill on her own 

 account and to abandon the corpse after mak- 

 ing it disgorge, I dare not reckon this against 

 her as a crime. When the habit has been 

 formed of emptying the Bee's crop with a 

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