The Life of the Bee 
more. He fully appreciated the marvellous 
architecture of the hive; and what he said 
on the subject has never been better said. 
It is to him, too, that we owe the idea of 
the glass hive, which, having since been 
perfected, enables us to follow the entire 
private life of these fierce insects, whose 
work, begun in the dazzling sunshine, re- 
ceives its crown in the darkness. To be 
comprehensive, one should mention also the 
somewhat subsequent works and _investi- 
gations of Charles Bonnet and Schirach 
(who solved the enigma of the royal 
egg); but I will keep to the broad lines, 
and pass at once to Francois Huber, the 
master and classic of contemporary apiarian 
science. 
Huber was born in Geneva in 1750, and 
fell blind in his earliest youth. The ex- 
periments of Réaumur interested him; he 
sought to verify them, and soon becoming 
passionately absorbed in these researches, 
he eventually, with the assistance of an 
intelligent and faithful servant, Francois 
Burnens, devoted his entire life to the 
study of the bee. In the annals of human 
b fe) 
