342 SPECIAL INSTINCTS. [Chap. VIII. 



betoine developed; and the foreign ants thus uninten- 

 tionally reared would then follow their proper instincts^ 

 and do what work they could. If their presence proved 

 useful to the species which had seized them — if it were 

 more advantageous to this species to capture workers 

 than to procreate them — the habit of collecting pupae, 

 originally for food, might by natural selection be 

 strengthened and rendered permanent for the very dif- 

 ferent purpose of raising slaves. When the instinct was 

 once acquired, if carried out to a much less extent even 

 than in our British P. sanguinea, which, as we have 

 seen, is less aided by its slaves than the same species in 

 Switzerland, natural selection might increase and modify 

 the instinct — always supposing each modification to be 

 of use to the species — until an ant was formed as ab- 

 jectly dependent on its slaves as is the Formica rufes- 

 cens. 



Cell-making instinct of the Hive-Bee. — ^I will not 

 here enter on minute details on this subject, but will 

 merely give an outline of the conclusions at which I have 

 arrived. He must be a dull man who can examine the 

 exquisite structure of a comb, so beautifully adapted to 

 its end, without enthusiastic admiration. We hear from 

 mathematicians that bees have practically solved a re- 

 condite problem, and have made their cells of the proper 

 shape to hold the greatest possible amount of honey, 

 with the least possible consumption of precious wax in 

 their construction. It has been remarked that a skil- 

 ful workman with fitting tools and measures, would find 

 it very difficult to make cells of wax of the true form, 

 though this is effected by a crowd of bees working in a 

 dark hive. Granting whatever instincts you please, it 

 seems at first quite inconceivable how they can make all 



