The Life of the Bee 
ably of some kind of tactile language or 
magnetic intuition, corresponding _ per- 
haps to senses and properties of matter 
wholly unknown to ourselves. And such 
intuition well might lodge in the myste- 
rious antenne — containing, in the case 
of the workers, according to Cheshire’s 
calculation, twelve thousand tactile hairs 
and five thousand “ smell-hollows,” where- 
with they probe and fathom the darkness. 
For the mutual understanding of the bees 
is not confined to their habitual labours ; 
the extraordinary also has a name and 
place in their language ; as is proved by 
the manner in which news, good or bad, 
normal or supernatural, will at once spread 
in the hive; the loss or return of the 
mother, for instance, the entrance of an 
enemy, the intrusion of a strange queen, 
the approach of a band of marauders, the 
discovery of treasure, etc. And so char- 
acteristic is their attitude, so essentially 
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