266 ANIMAL SKETCHES. CHAP. 



in vibration." The same writer continues, "Moreover, 

 those auditory hairs are most affected which are at right 

 angles to the direction from which the sound comes. 

 Hence, from the position of the antennae and the hairs, a 

 sound would act most intensely if it is directly in front of 

 the head. Suppose, then, a male gnat hears the hum of 

 a female at some distance. Perhaps the sound affects one 

 antenna more than the other. He turns his head until 

 the two antennae are equally affected, and is thus able to 

 direct his flight straight towards the female." 



In other kinds of insects organs of hearing have been 

 found elsewhere than on the antennae, in 

 grasshoppers and ants on the front legs, in 

 locusts on the first segment of the abdomen, 

 in flies on the rudimentary hind wings or 

 'ty balancers, and so on. 



In the bee itself Sir John Lubbock found 

 it difficult to awake any response to sounds. 

 LEG OF GRASS- It is scarcely probable, however, that bees 

 HOPPER. are deaf. Popular belief, at any rate, main- 

 membrane. C tains that they are not insensible to the 

 soft melody that may be evoked by a door- 

 key from a frying-pan; but here, as Sir John Lubbock 

 has suggested, the bees may hear acute overtones in- 

 audible to us. Mr. Cheshire is clear that bees can hear 

 such sounds as interest them, like the call of the queen- 

 mother. Dr. Hicks described in the antennae certain cups, 

 differing from the covered smell hollows, into each of 

 which projects a cone reduced at the apex to a fine hair- 

 like point. These he regarded as auditory. 



When we turn from hearing to sight we find that the 

 difficulties take a new form, and concern, not the existence 

 nor the nature of the recipient organ, but its mode of 

 action. Sir John Lubbock has shown that bees are 



