On the Threshold of the Hive 



patient collaboration, wherein the one 

 who saw only with immaterial light 

 guided with his spirit the eyes and hands 

 of the other who had the real earthly 

 vision ; where he who, as we are assured, 

 had never with his own eyes beheld a 

 comb of honey, was yet able, notwith- 

 standing the veil on his dead eyes that 

 rendered double the veil in which nature 

 enwraps all things, to penetrate the pro- 

 found secrets of the genius that had made 

 this invisible comb ; as though to teach 

 us that no condition in life can warrant 

 our abandoning our desire and search for 

 the truth. I will not enumerate all that 

 apiarian science owes to Huber ; to state 

 what it -does not owe were the briefer 

 task. His " New Observations on Bees," 

 of which the first volume was written in 

 1789, in the form of letters to Charles 

 Bonnet, the second not appearing till 

 twenty years later, have remained the 

 . 13 



