PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 191 
only half the number to collect it, that it would amount 
to more than a pound; so that in one season, one such 
hive might collect a hundred pounds?. What a won- 
derful idea does this give of the industry and activity of 
these little useful creatures! And what a lesson do they 
read to the members of societies that have both reason 
and religion to guide their exertions for the common 
good! Adorable is that Great Being who has gifted 
them with instincts, which render them as instructive to 
us, if we will condescend to listen to them, as they are 
profitable. 
While Iam upon this part of the story of bees, I 
cannot pass over the account Reaumur has given from 
Maillet of the transportation of hives in Egypt from one 
place to another, before alluded to”, to enable them to 
make in greater abundance their collections of honey, &c. 
Towards the end of October, when the inundations of 
the Nile have ceased, and the husbandmen can sow their 
land, saintfoin is one of the first things that is sown; 
and as Upper Egypt is warmer than the Lower, the 
saintfoin gets there first into blossom. At this time, 
bee-hives are transported in boats from all parts of Egypt 
into the upper district, and are there heaped in pyramids 
upon the boats prepared to receive them; each being 
numbered by the individual to which it belongs. In 
this station they remain some days; and when they are 
judged to have got in the harvest of honey and pollen 
that is to be collected there, they are removed two or 
three leagues lower down, where they remain the same 
time; and so they proceed till towards the middle of Fe- 
* Reaum. v. 434— => ‘Vor. I. 4th Ed. 331. Reaumur, v. 698— 
