118 DIVISION OF LABOUR. 



one single bee can do. According to careful calcula- 

 tion, any one bee does not collect more than a tea- 

 spoonful of honey in a season. And yet see what 

 is brought about by all thus working together, and 

 all doing their little, and putting their little stores 

 together. See the full hive as the result. And even 

 the full hive is not all, for they will sometimes make 

 lOO lbs., or even more, of honey — over and above 

 all they store in the body of the hive — which the 

 bee-keeper may take as the reward of his care and 

 trouble. 



But after all, if we only take notice, all nature 

 around us is full of the same great lesson — how much 

 can be done by little workers and care of little things. 



One of the most curious and wonderful examples 

 has been pointed out and explained by Mr. Darwin, — 

 the great naturalist, and perhaps the closest and most 

 ingenious observer of nature who ever lived. We 

 think the little worms the most insignificant of crea- 

 tures ; but he has shown that what the little worms 

 have done, and now are doing, is most astonishing. 

 The worm throws up its tiny 'worm-cast,' and we think 

 nothing of it. It is the most trifling thing possible ; 

 but in the course of ages these little morsels heaped 

 together have been the means of changing in appear- 

 ance large tracts of land. 



It is, perhaps, more wonderful still to look at the 

 lofty chalk cliffs of our sea-shore, and to know that 

 they were formed in the course of countless ages by 

 the work of some of the smallest of insects — insects 

 so minute as only to be seen by a microscope. 



And, yet again, we see the same in the mighty 



