INTRODUCTION xiii 



the limit of man's life on the earth, probably the 

 development of other living creatures, as well as 

 most forms of vegetable life, took place immeasur- 

 ably earlier. The chances are that the world of 

 trees and flowering-plants, in which aboriginal 

 man moved, differed in no great degree from the 

 world of green things surrounding human life to- 

 day. It is certain that the apple, pear, raspberry, 

 blackberry, and plum were common fruits of the 

 country-side in the later Stone Age, for seeds of 

 all these have been found in conjunction with 

 neolithic remains. Evidence of the existence of 

 the beech and elm — the latter a famous pollen- 

 yielder — has been discovered at a very much 

 earlier time. All the conditions favourable to 

 insect-life must have been present in the world 

 ages before man appeared in it; and insect-life 

 undoubtedly existed then in a high state of de- 

 velopment. It would be as unreasonable, there- 

 fore, not to infer that the honey-bee was ready on 

 the earth with her stores of sweet-food for man, 

 as that man did not speedily discover that store, 

 and make it an object of his daily search, just as 

 he went forth daily to hunt and kill four-footed 

 game. 



There is, of course, a great deal of difference 

 between a chance discovery of a wild-bee's nest. 



