1859—1863] bees' cells 123 



I will keep your suggestion in mind whenever I return to Letter 74 

 experiments on living bees ; but that will not be soon. 



As you have been considering my little discussion in 

 relation to Lord Brougham, 1 and as I have been more 

 vituperated for this part than for almost any other, I should 

 like just to tell you how I think the case stands. The 

 discussion viewed by itself is worth little more than the paper 

 on which it is printed, except in so far as it contains three or 

 four certainly new facts. But to those who are inclined to 

 believe the general truth of the conclusion that species and 

 their instincts are slowly modified by what I call Natural 

 Selection, I think my discussion nearly removes a very great 

 difficulty. I believe in its truth chiefly from the existence 

 of the Melipona, which makes a comb so intermediate in 

 structure between that of the humble and hive-bee, and 

 especially from the new and curious fact of the bees making 

 smooth cups or saucers when they excavated in a thick piece 

 of wax, which saucers stood so close that hexagons were built 

 on their intersecting edges. And, lastly, because when they 

 excavated on a thin slip of wax, the excavation on both 

 sides of similar smooth basins was stopped, and flat planes 

 left between the nearly opposed basins. If my view were 

 wholly false these cases would, I think, never have occurred. 

 Sedgwick and Co. may abuse me to their hearts' content, but 

 I shall as yet continue to think that mine is a rational 

 explanation (as far as it goes) of their method of work. 



To W. H. Miller. Letter 75 



Down, Dec. 1st [1859]. 

 Some months ago you were so kind as to say you would 

 measure the thickness of the walls of the basal and side 

 plates of the cell of the bee. Could you find time to do 

 so soon ? Why I want it soon, is that I have lately heard 

 from Murray that he sold at his sale far more copies than he 

 has of the Origin of Species, and that I must immediately 

 prepare a new edition, which I am now correcting. By the 

 way, I hear from Murray that all the attacks heaped on my 

 book do not seem to have at all injured the sale, which will 



1 Lord Brougham's paper on "The Mathematical Structure of Bees' 

 Cells," read before the National Institute of France in May, 1858. 



