INTELLIGENCE, ETC., IN LOWER ANIMALS 71 



tail. This observation anticipates a better-known 

 example taken from the economy of the hive-bee by 

 Pierre Huber, which is mentioned below. 



Buffon^ heard with impatience all expressions of 

 admiration for the works of insects. His poor eyesight 

 and his repugnance to minutiae disinclined him to pay 

 much attention to creatures so small, and he had set 

 himself up as the rival of Reaumur in physics and 

 natural history. To pour contempt upon insects grati- 

 fied both feelings at once. Bees, he said, show no 

 intelligence at all ; their actions are purely automatic, 

 and their much-vaunted architecture is merely the result 

 of working in a crowd. The cells of the honeycomb are 

 hexagonal, not by reason of forethought or contrivance, 

 but because of mutual pressure ; soaked peas in a con- 

 fined space form hexagonal surfaces wherever they touch. 



The elder Huber seems to have denied to bees every 

 trace of intelligence, but his son Pierre found it hard 

 to go so far.2 He remarked that the storage-cells 

 of a honeycomb are not always exactly alike ; they may 

 be lengthened, cut down, or curved, when requisite. 

 Cells which had been rudely trimmed with a knife were 

 repaired with such dexterity and concert as to suggest 

 that even the hive-bee has " le droit de penser." Bees 

 would under compulsion build upwards or sideways, 

 instead of downwards, as they like to do. Finding that 

 they sought to extend their combs in the direction of 

 the nearest support, he covered the support with a sheet 

 of glass, on which they could get no footing. They 

 swerved at once from the straight line, and prolonged 



» Hist. Nat, Vol. IV. 



» The first edition of the Noiivelles Observations sur les Abeilles 

 (1792) was the work of Francois Huber alone ; the second (1814) 

 was prepared by Pierre with the co-operation of his father, and 

 is here credited to the son. 



