8 PHYSIOLOGY OF THE HONEY-BEE. 



number of experiments on the antennae, and aBcertained that 

 thej are the organs of smell and feeling. 



Before citing his discoveries, we must pay our tribute of 

 admiration to this wonderful man. (Plate III.) 



Huber, in early manhood, lost the use of his eyes. His 

 opponents imagined that to state this fact would materially 

 discredit his observations. And to make their case still 

 stronger, they asserted that his servant, Francis Burnens, by 

 whose aid he conducted his experiments, was only an igno- 

 rant peasant. Now this so-called " ignorant peasant " was a 

 man of strong native intellect, possessing the indefatigable 

 energy and enthusiasm indispensable to a good observer. 

 He was a noble specimen of a self-made man, and rose to be 

 the chief magistrate in the village where he resided. Huber 

 has paid a worthy tribute to his intelligence, fidelity, pa- 

 tience, energy and skill.* 



Huber' s work on bees is such an admirable specimen 

 of the inductive system of reasoning, that it might well be 

 studied as a model of the only way of investigating nature, 

 so as to arrive at reliable results. 



21. Huber was assisted in his researches, not only by 

 Burnens, but by his own wife, to whom he was betrothed be- 

 fore the loss of his sight, and who nobly persisted in marry- 

 ing him, notwithstanding his misfortune and the strenuous 

 dissuasions of her friends. They lived longer than the ordi- 

 nary term of human life in the enjoyment of great domestic 

 happiness, and the amiable naturalist, through her assiduous 

 attentions, scarcely felt the loss of his sight. 



22. Milton is believed by many to have been a better 

 poet in consequence of his blindness ; and it is highly prob- 

 able that Huber was a better Apiarist from the same cause. 



* A single fact -will show the character of the man . It became necessary, in a 

 certain experiment , to examine separately all the bees in two hives. ' 'Burnens 

 spent eteuen days in performing this work, and during the whole time he scarcely 

 allowed himself any relaxation, but what the relief of his eyes required. " 



