THE SWARM 49 



not blind them to the existence of their veritable sovereign, 

 immaterial and everlasting, which is no other than their 

 fixed idea. Why inquire as to whether this idea be con- 

 scious or not ? Such speculation can have value only if 

 our anxiety be to determine whether our admiration should 

 more properly go to the bees that have the idea, or to 

 nature that has planted it in them. Wherever it lodge, 

 in the vast unknowable body, or in the tiny ones that we 

 see, it merits our deepest attention ; nor may it be out 

 of place here to observe that it is the habit we have of 

 subordinating our wonder to accidents of origin or place, 

 that so often causes us to lose the chance of deep admira- 

 tion, which of all things in the world is the most helpful to us. 



29 



These conjectures may, perhaps, be regarded as exceedingly 

 venturesome, and possibly also as unduly human. It may be 

 urged that the bees, in all probability, have no idea of the 

 kind ; that their care for the future, love of the race, and 

 many other feelings we choose to ascribe to them, are truly 

 no more than forms assumed by the necessities of life, by the 

 fear of suffering or death, and the attraction of pleasure. Let 

 it be so ; look on it all as a figure of speech ; it is a matter 

 to which I attach no importance. The one thing certain here, 

 as it is the one thing certain in all other cases, is that, under 

 special circumstances, the bees will treat their queen in a 

 special manner. The rest is all mystery, around which we 

 can only weave more or less ingenious and pleasant con- 

 jectures. And yet, were we speaking of man in the manner 



G 



