192 VARIOUS OPINION'S ON THE ADVANCED GUARD. 



the night ; at the very moment when I the least expected it, 

 they flew away in a body to the woods." 



We dissent from one part of these remarks of St. Jean 

 de Crevecceur, as in numerous instances we have retained 

 a swarm in a hive, which we were fully aware had sent forth 

 its advanced guard for several days previously. There may 

 be other causes operating on the bees to induce them to 

 leave the hive prepared for them, such as there being two 

 queens, or perhaps no queen at all ; and it is certain that 

 the bees will take a particular dislike to a certain hive, in 

 which no skill nor force can retain them. It is also con- 

 sistent with experience, that bees kept in an apiary in the 

 vicinity of woods, when they send forth their swarms, have 

 always a propensity to lodge themselves in a tree which 

 is in their vicinity, because it is their natural and primitive 

 habitation. 



Duchet, in his work on bees, printed at Vivay in 1771, 

 says, page 25, "I have seen more than once that swarms, 

 before leaving the hive, have sent forth their foragers to 

 provide a dwelling in the cavity of a tree, about a quarter 

 of a mile distant, and the swarm repaired to it by the nearest 

 road, and with a celerity which would have defied the 

 fleetest horse." 



Mr. Ducarne says, " that he has seen this advanced guard 

 sent forth before the swarm j" we can only reply to Mr. 

 Ducarne, that although we may be positively convinced of 

 the fact, yet we will venture to assert that the actual verifica- 

 tion of its departure never yet took place. 



Dubost, in his work on bees, says, page 69, " Let it not 

 be supposed that a swarm departs on mere hazard ; it 

 would be forming an erroneous opinion of those insects 

 which, to the eye of the observer, present so many proofs 

 of intelligence. This assertion is not mere conjecture; it 

 is founded on facts, of which I have been an eye witness ; 

 and the following is the most striking. I was walking one 



