292 LIFE OF SIR JOHN LUBBOCK 



CH. 



illuminating things for us in your richly-gifted 

 Japan. Wishing to find out the sense of colour, 

 and to estimate the preference for different 

 flowers displayed by bees, you see Sir John sitting 

 with watch and pencil in his garden at High Elms. 

 On the turf lie pieces of paper, all equal in size 

 and smeared with an exactly equal amount of 

 honey, but variously tinted. In the summer 

 sunshine the bees come and go, attracted by the 

 honey. Selecting their favourite hue — because 

 they take the coloured paper for flowers — they 

 alight in numbers upon one of the squares, leaving 

 the others comparatively neglected, and thus in 

 a few hours we have obtained an answer from 

 the hive itself, as clear and businesslike as the 

 popular vote which you will soon give for your 

 new Imperial Parliament. 



" Sir John showed me, not long ago, the little 

 apparatus where his ant cities were kept. Tier 

 above tier in shallow boxes, isolated by water, 

 and closed by a double lid of glass and wood, he 

 feeds and studies there the various species of 

 that wonderful insect. He drew back the wooden 

 lid from one large ant city, which revealed to me 

 through the glass its tiny people in their daily 

 life. There, in the central cell, was the Queen, 

 imposing, majestic, isolated ; courtier ants stood 

 round, always respectfully facing her majesty ; 

 and attendants brought the pupae, or ant babies, 

 in procession before the sovereign. Slave ants, 

 dark of hue, performed in gangs the hard work of 

 the city for the lighter coloured kwazoku and 

 shizoku of the community ; and small white 

 wood-lice, quite blind, ran about the by-ways 



