On the Threshold of the Hive 



kindred matter I know only Michelet's 

 chapter at the end of his book " The 

 Insect," and Ludwig Biichner's essay in 

 his " Mind in Animals." Michelet merely 

 hovers on the fringe of his subject ; Biich- 

 ner's treatise is comprehensive enough, 

 but contains so many hazardous state- 

 ments, so much long-discarded gossip 

 and hearsay, that I suspect him of never 

 having left his library, never having set 

 forth himself to question his heroines, 

 or opened one of the many hundreds of 

 rustling, wing-lit hives which we must 

 profane before our instinct can be attuned 

 to their secret, before we can perceive the 

 spirit and atmosphere, perfume and mys- 

 tery, of these virgin daughters of toil. 

 The book smells not of the bee, or its 

 honey ; and has the defects of many a 

 learned work, whose conclusions often 

 are preconceived, and whose scientific at- 

 tainment is composed of a vast array of 



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