60 NATURAL HISTORY 



It is curious to see how the female is employed while the male is 

 abroad; especially when the young are very young. She sits occa- 

 sionally on them ; but occasionally goes off and looks over the nest, 

 removes any excrements and cleans their feathers ; for, at an early 

 period, the young are not able to throw their dung over the nest. The 

 mark of distinction between the male and female is the voice. The one 

 that stays at home has by much the softest voice. 



When we examine Nature in her operations in things that have an 

 affinity, we find this affinity not only in one thing but in many, if not 

 (in a less degree) in all. Let us take the rook, for example, and see 

 how far in their economy they have not a very near affinity to the 

 human kind ; however, so far only as their instinctive principles are 

 allowed to act. 



Rooks are instinctively social animals : they herd together, have 

 their distinct colonies or villages ; and the only distinction betwixt the 

 economy of the rook with her house and the human is, that the rook 

 only uses it in the breeding season, having no other use for it. 



Rooks not only associate with one another, but they in some degree 

 associate with Man. They often build their villages near or in towns 

 or villages. • 



Economy of Humble-bees. 



This insect is a striking instance of the union of the different parts 

 of nature with each other, each part acting immediately for itself, yet 

 collecting for others, and each depending on another, making in the 

 whole one uniform machine, although made up of many and various 

 parts. 



An early spring brings forth a vast variety of things upon which 

 there is a vast variety of animals to live : it brings forth flowers, it also 

 brings forth the humble-bee, <fcc. 



The history of this bee [Bombus terrestris] does not interest us nearly 

 so much as that of the common bee 1 [Apis mellificd], neither as to 

 curiosity nor profit : therefore it is not necessary to be so circumstantial 

 in the facts ; for the humble-bee does not deserve the admiration 

 (when known) that we would naturally bestow upon it from a slight 

 acquaintance ; for there are some things wc should suppose belong to 

 its labours which in reality do not. 



I imagine it is not so universal as the common bee, for it is not worth 

 cultivating or transporting from one country to anotber. They have 

 the same bee in Newfoundland, both the dark cross striped with brown, 



1 [See ' Observations on Bees,' Animal Economy, p. 422.] 



