ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 883 



development of flowers. While, in many plants, almost invariably 

 with inconspicuous blossoms, the pollen is carried from flower to 

 flower by the wind, in the case of almost all large and brightly coloured 

 flowers this is eflected by the agency of insects. In such flowers the 

 colour, scent, and honey serve to attract insects, while the size and 

 form are arranged in such a manner that the insects fertilize them 

 with pollen brought from another plant. Nevertheless, these views 

 have not escaped criticism. M. Bonnier, for instance, has attempted 

 to show that they are in many respects untenable. I do not propose 

 on the present occasion to follow his general argument, but merely 

 that portion of it relating to colour. 



In order to test whether and how bees are affected by different 

 colours, I tried the following experiment. I took slips of glass of the 

 size generally used for slides for the Microscope — viz. 3 inches by 

 1 inch — and pasted on them slips of paper, coloured respectively blue, 

 green, orange, red, white, and yellow. I then put them on a lawn 

 in a row about a foot apart, and on each put a second slip of glass, 

 with a drop of honey. I also put with them a slip of plain glass with 

 a similar drop of honey. I had previously trained a bee to come to the 

 spot for honey. My plan then was, when the bee returned and had 

 sipped for about a quarter of a minute, to remove the honey, when 

 she flew to another slip. This, then, I took away, when she went to 

 a third, and so on. In this way I induced her to visit all the drops 

 of honey successively. When she had returned to the nest, I trans- 

 posed all the upper glasses with the honey, and also moved the 

 coloured glasses. Thus, as the drop of honey was changed each time, 

 and also the position of the glasses, neither of these could influence 

 the selection by the bee. In recording the results, I marked down 

 successively the order in which the bee went to the different coloured 

 glasses. For instance, on the first journey from the nest the bee lit 

 first on the blue, which, accordingly, I marked one ; when disturbed 

 from the blue, she flew about a little, and then lit on the white ; when 

 the white was removed, she settled on the green, and so successively 

 on the orange, yellow, plain, and red. I repeated the experiment 

 100 times, using two different hives, and spreading the observations 

 over some time, so as to experiment with different bees and under 

 varied circumstances. The precautions taken seemed to me to have 

 placed the different colours on an equal footing ; while the number of 

 experiments appears sufficient to give a fair average. The different 

 series agree well among themselves. The difference between the 

 numbers is certainly striking. Adding together 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, 

 we get 28 as the total number given by each journey ; 100 journeys 

 therefore, give a total of 2800, which, divided by seven, would, of course, 

 if no preference were shown, give 400 for each colour. The numbers, 

 however, are, for the blue, only 275 ; for the white, 349 ; yellow, 405 ; 

 red, 413 ; green, 427 ; orange, 440 ; and plain glass as many as 491. 

 A second mode of testing the result is to take the percentage in which 

 the bees went respectively to each colour — first, second, third, and so 

 on. It is found that out of a hundred rounds the bees took the blue 

 as one of the first three in 74 cases, and one of the last four only 



3 N 2 



