-THiE mv^mmi€m.n wmm joJUMnKi^. 



583 





The old diseased bees continued to 

 die off until they were all gone, after 

 which the colony became health}-, 

 strong and vigorous, and have never 

 shown any signs of disease since. The 

 cure appears to have been complete 

 and permanent. 



The other diseased colony, which 

 was not medicated with salt, all 

 dwindled away and became extinct, 

 queen and all. 



Then, to demonstrate whether or not 

 this disease is contagious, I put a 

 healthy colony on the same combs in 

 the same hive where the diseased col- 

 ony had died, to see what the result 

 would be ; and they are to-day healthy 

 and vigorous, and have never had any 

 symptoms of disease, so far as I know, 

 and the disease has not appeared in 

 any other colony in my yard, except 

 those two having the imported queens. 



Without doubt it was the salt that 

 effected the cure. The object in put- 

 ting the salt into the honey, is in order 

 to get the bees to feed it to the queen 

 and the young larvje. 



If any one has bees affected with 

 this disease, I hope that he will try 

 feeding salt, and report the result in 

 the American Bee Journal, for the 

 benefit of the fraternity. 



Seymour, Wis., Aug. 19, 1890. 



INSTINCT-REASON. 



Are Bees Guided by Instinct, or 

 by Reason t 



Written for the Australasian Bee Journal 



BY T. J. MULVANY. 



The question is frequently raised, 

 when treating of the habits and actions 

 of the inferior animals (more especially 

 those of insects in general, and of bees 

 in particular), whether those actions 

 are guided by instinct only, or a cer- 

 tain degree of reasoning power ; and 

 the discussion is, as it appears to me, 

 often carried on in a loose manner,and 

 consequently ends without any satis- 

 factory conclusion, owing to that pro- 

 lific cause of irreconcilable difference 

 of opinion — battling about words, the 

 actual meaning of which we have not 

 fii'st taken some trouble to agree upon. 



These remarks, which are common- 

 place enough, have been suggested at 

 present by an article which appeared 

 lately in a leading German newspaper 

 (Kolnische Zeitung), which publishes 

 occasionally essays of "Natural Science 

 Gossip." The one to which I now re- 

 fer is headed, "How do Bees and In- 

 sects of their Class Find their Way 

 Home ?" and as it maybe of interest 

 to the bee-keeping readers of this 

 journal, I append a translation of that 

 portion which refers more particularly 



to the honey-bee, only offering these 

 few observations by way of preface : 



About the meaning of the word 

 " instinct," there is perhaps little room 

 for misunderstanding ; it is pretty gen- 

 erally accepted as it is defined in a 

 good dictionary to be " a certain 

 power or disposition of mind by which, 

 independent of all instruction or ex- 

 perience, and without deliberation, 

 animals are unerringly directed to do 

 spontaneously whatever is necessai-y 

 for the preservation of the individual 

 or the continuation of the kind." 



This applies not only to inferior ani- 

 mals, but also to man, who is clearly 

 gifted with instincts quite apart from 

 his higher intellectual faculties. It is 

 instinct which causes the newly-born 

 babe, as well as the young of any of 

 the inferior mammalia, to turn to its 

 mother's breast for its first noui'ish- 

 ment, and it is instinct which sets in 

 operation the complicated system of 

 nerves and muscles essential to the 

 performance of the ordinary functions 

 of walking, eating, drinking, etc. It 

 is sometimes tei'med " a blind in- 

 stinct," which is an inappropriate ex- 

 pression, meant, no doubt, to convey 

 only that it acts without foresight or 

 premeditation on the part of the in- 

 dividual, but which is liable to the 

 misconstruction that the results are 

 likely to be clumsy or uncertain as 

 compared with those attained by the 

 exercise of reason. The very reverse 

 of this is, however, in reality the case. 

 As the definition above quoted pro- 

 ceeds to say, " Instinct differs from in- 

 tellect by the unerring certainty of the 

 means it emploj'S, the uniformity of its 

 results, and the perfection of its works 

 prior to and independent of allinstruc- 

 tion or experience." 



The word "reason" on the other 

 hand, is one open to more diversity 

 of meaning. It is used in different 

 senses by philosphers, as well as by 

 ordinary people, some taking it as 

 almost synonymous with intelligence 

 or with understanding, while others 

 draw five distinctions between these 

 terms, and define reason to be "the 

 highest faculty of the human mind, by 

 which man is distinguished from 

 brutes, and which enables him to con- 

 template things spiritual as well as 

 material." 



In this sense Locke says, "Reason is 

 natural revelation whereby the Eternal 

 Father of Light and Fountain of all 

 Knowledge communicates to mankind 

 that portion of truth which He has 

 laid within the reach of their natural 

 faculties." Now, taken in this high 

 sense, it would, of course, be a mis- 

 application of the word to say that the 

 inferior animals exercise their reason 

 under any circumstances ; but as re- 

 gards the act of reasoning, one of its 



admitted definitions is the power of 

 " deducing inferences or conclusions 

 from premises," and although no one 

 will claim for the lower animals the 

 exercise of his power in the way of ab- 

 stract reasoning, there can be no doubt 

 that they often do practically draw 

 conclusions from facts presenteil to 

 them by their senses, and act in what 

 we may call a rational manner in ac- 

 cordance with those conclusions so as 

 to enable them to effect some object 

 which they have in view. It is surely 

 unnecessary to specify instances. 



Every lover of animals will know a 

 variety of cases in which the dog. for 

 instance, displays this power of obser- 

 vation, and of suiting his action to the 

 exigencies of the case. We all know 

 what a complete understanding can be 

 established between him and his mas- 

 ter ; how he learns to comprehend, if 

 not the actual words, at least the 

 meaning of what is said to him ; how 

 he can, in fact, to use a common 

 phrase, " Do everything but speak." 

 We talk of the sagacity of the dog, of 

 the elephant, and of other animals, and 

 although some may define this word 

 when applied to animals to mean only 

 "quickness or acuteness of scent," I 

 cannot look upon that definition as a 

 logical one, or as correctly indicating 

 the sense in which the word is actually 

 used. The animals named, and many 

 others, are capable of being taught, 

 that is, of acting upon a knowledge 

 gained by experience and education ; 

 and they thei'efore exercise a quality, 

 call it what we will, which differs ma- 

 terially from the definition of instinct, 

 and resembles much more that form of 

 intelligence which in man is called 

 "reason." 



In the insect division of the animal 

 kingdom the life of the individual is so 

 short that no time can be allowed for 

 the acquirement of experience, and it 

 is here, accordingly, that the operation 

 of instinct is most wondei'fully appar- 

 ent. What bee-keeper has not en- 

 joyed the pleasure of seeing a queen- 

 bee emerge from her cell, perfect and 

 " fully armed," as Minerva is said to 

 have sprung from the head of Jove, 

 ready on the moment to take her al- 

 lotted place in the hive, to fight a mor- 

 tal combat with a rival queen, if any 

 such should put in an appearance, to 

 take in a few days her so-called wed- 

 ding-flight, and then to settle down to 

 her work of laying worker or drone 

 eggs, the right sort in the right kind 

 of cell, and ultimately to provide for 

 her own successor by depositing eggs 

 in the peculiar cells prepared by the 

 worker-bees for that purpose ; all this 

 without the slightest preparatory 

 teaching or experience, and all in the 

 same manner as queen-bees have done 

 since the world began, no better and 



