INSTINCTS OF BEES. 323 



If few those Instincts, to the destin'd goal, 

 With surer course, their straiten'd currents roll.'* 



EVANS. 



One writer, and that a very ingenious one, has 

 endeavoured to resolve all instincts into reason, 

 and has boldly hazarded the following conjecture. 

 "If we were better acquainted with the histories 

 of those insects that are formed into societies, 

 as the bees, wasps and ants, we should find that 

 their arts and improvements are not so similar and 

 uniform as they now appear to us, but that they 

 arose in the same manner (from experience and tra- 

 dition) as the arts of our own species ; though their 

 reasoning is from few ideas, is busied about fewer 

 objects, and is exerted with less energy*." 



Since the Doctor wrote this passage, much light 

 has been thrown upon those very subjects on 

 which he laments our defective knowledge : but 

 whilst it strengthens what I have said as to the 

 possession of reason by insects, it confirms my 

 observations respecting their instinctive powers. 



There are facts recorded, in HUBER'S researches 

 respecting ants, which exhibit in some at least 

 of those insects, (the Amazons,) a power of ac- 

 quiring habits and characters which cannot well 

 be regarded as merely instinctive. The Amazons 

 take advantage of an improvement in their con- 



* Darwin. 



