The Life of the Bee 
abode they have but this moment quitted, 
they would seem, be the disaster never so 
great that shall now have befallen them, to 
have wholly forgotten the peace and the 
happy activity that once they had known 
there, the abundant wealth and the safety 
that had then been their portion; and all, 
one by one, and down to the last of them, 
will perish of hunger and cold around their 
unfortunate queen rather than return to the 
home of their birth, whose sweet odour of 
plenty, the fragrance indeed of their own 
past assiduous labour, reaches them even in 
their distress. 
17 
That is a thing, some will say, that men 
would not do; a proof that the bee, not- 
withstanding the marvels of its organisation, 
still is lacking in intellect and veritable 
consciousness. Is this so certain? Other 
beings, surely, may possess an intellect that 
differs from ours and produces different re- 
sults without therefore being inferior. And 
besides, are we, even in this little human 
so 
