i84 



INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 



probability attribute to bees could be competent t^ the performance of 

 labors so complicated as those we have been considering, and which, if the 

 result of reason, would involve the most extensive and varied knowledge 

 in the agents. Suppose a man to have attained by long practice the art 

 of moddelling wax into a congeries of uniform hexagonal cells, with pyra- 

 midal bottoms composed each of three rhombs, resembling the cells of 

 workers among bees. Let him now be set to make a congeries of similar 

 but larger cells (answering to the male cells), and unite these with the 

 former by other hexagonal cells, so that there should be no disruption in 

 the continuity or regularity of the whole assemblage, and no vacant inter- 

 vals or patching at the junctions either of the tubes or the bottoms of the 

 cells ; — and you would have set him no very easy task — a task, in short, 

 which it may be doubted if he would satisfactorily perform in a twelvemonth, 

 though gifted with a clear head and a competent store of geometrical 

 knowledge, and which, if destitute of these requisites, it may be safely 

 asserted that he would never perform at all. How then can we imagine 

 it possible that this diflicult problem, and others of a similar kind, can be 

 so completely and exactly solved by animals of which some are not two 

 days old, others not a week, and probably none a year ? The conclusion 

 is irresistible — it is not reason but instinct that is their guide. 



The second head, under which I proposed contrasting the instinct of 

 insects with those of the larger animals, was that of their number in the 

 same individual. In the latter this is for the most part very limited, not 

 exceeding (if we omit those common to almost all animated beings) eight 

 or ten distinct instincts. Thus in the common duck, one instinct leads it 

 at its birth from the egg to rush to the w^ater ; another to seek its proper 

 food ; a third to pair with its mate ; a fourth to form a nest ; a fifth to sit 

 upon its eggs till hatched ; a sixth to assist the young ducklings in extri- 

 cating themselves from the shell ; and a seventh to defend them when in 

 danger until able to provide for themselves : and it would not be easy, as 

 far as my knowledge extends, to add many more distinct instinctive actions 

 to the enumeration, or to adduce many species of the superior classes of 

 animals endowed with a greater number. 



But how vastly more manifold are the instincts of the majority of insects ! 

 It is not necessary to insist upon those differences which take place in the 

 same insect in its different states, leadin"- it to select one kind of food in 

 the larva and another in the perfect state — to defend itself in one mode in the 

 former, and in another in the latter, &,c. ; because, however remarkable 

 these variations, they may be referred with great plausibility to those strik- 

 ing changes in the organic structure of the animal which occur at the two 

 periods of its existence. It is to the number of instincts observable in 

 llie same individual of many insects in their perfect state that I now con- 

 fine myself; and as the most striking example of the whole I shall select 

 the hive-bee, — begging you to bear in mind that I do not mean to include 

 those exhibited by the queen, the drones, or even those of the workers 

 termed by Huber ciricres (wax-makers) ; but only to enumerate those 

 presented by that portion of the workers termed by Huber nourriccs or 

 petitcs abcillcs (nurses), upon whom, as you have been before told, with 

 the exception of making wax, laying the foundation of the cells, and col- 

 lecting honey for being stored, the principal labors of the hive devolve. 



