56 THE SENSES OF BEES. 



honey- harvest. Very striking proofs of the acuteness 

 of this sense may be observed within the limits of 

 the apiary. Early in spring, when the bee-master 

 begins feeding his colony, he has reason to marvel 

 at the instantaneous notice which this organ gives 

 "hem of his approach. Arriving amongst his hives, 

 hough from the dullness of a spring morning, not a 

 bee is seen stirring out of doors, he has not time t 

 fill the feeding-troughs from the vessel in his hand 

 >efore he is surrounded by hundreds; and in the 

 space of five minutes or less, the float-board of every 

 trough is covered with a dense mass of eager feeders. 

 In feeding a newly-lodged swarm during unfavour- 

 able weather in summer, it is curious to observe 

 through the glass, in pushing in the sliding- trough 

 which runs flush with the floor, the motionless hemi- 

 spherical mass at the ceiling of the hive, becoming 

 instantaneously elongated, and changed into the form 

 of an inverted living pyramid, having its apex resting 

 on the float-board, while a score or two of stragglers, 

 who have in the confusion been separated or have 

 fallen from the mass above, hasten along the floor, 

 snuffing the grateful fragrance, ranging themselves in 

 i line on the edge of the trough, and eagerly plung- 

 ing their probosces into the liquid. It is to their ex- 

 quisite sense of smell also, in all likelihood, that we 

 must attribute their capability of distinguishing friend 

 from foe among their own species. If a stranger-bee 

 by mistake enter a hive, and this sometimes happens 

 in consequence of some slight alteration in the arrange- 

 ment of the apiary, his close resemblance to his 



