The Swarm 
29 
These conjectures may, perhaps, be re- 
garded as exceedingly venturesome, and pos- 
sibly 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 import- 
ance. ‘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 conjectures. And yet, were we 
speaking of man in the manner wherein it 
were wise perhaps to speak of the bee, is 
there very much more we could say? He 
too yields only to necessity, the attraction of 
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