388 



INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 



This is as extraordinary and inexplicable as if a litter of 

 rabbits produced in spring were impelled by instinct to eat 

 vegetables, while another produced in autumn should be as 

 irresistibly directed to choose flesh. 



It is, however, into the history of the hive-bee that we 

 must look for the most striking examples of variation of 

 instinct ; and here, as in every thing relating to this insect, 

 the work of the elder Huber is an unfailing source of the 

 most novel and interesting facts. 



It is the ordinary instinct of bees to lay the foundation of 

 their combs at the top of the hive, building them perpendicu- 

 larly downwards ; and they pursue this plan so constantly, 

 that you might examine a thousand (probably ten thousand) 

 hives, without finding any material deviation from it. Yet 

 Huber in the course of his experiments forced them to build 

 their combs perpendicularly upward 1 ; and, what seems even 

 more remarkable, in an horizontal direction. 2 



The combs of bees are always at an uniform distance from 

 each other, namely, about one third of an inch, which is just 

 wide enough to allow them to pass easily and have access to 

 the young brood. On the approach of winter, when their 

 honey-cells are not sufficient in number to contain all the 

 stock, they elongate them considerably, and thus increase their 

 capacity. By this extension the intervals between the combs 

 are unavoidably contracted ; but in winter well-stored maga- 

 zines are essential, while from their state of comparative inacti- 

 vity spacious communications are less necessary. On the 

 return of spring, however, when the cells are wanted for the 

 reception of eggs, the bees contract the elongated cells to 

 their former dimensions, and thus re-establish the just distances 

 between the combs which the care of their brood requires. 3 

 But this is not all. Not only do they elongate the cells of 

 the old combs when there is an extraordinary harvest of honey, 

 but they actually give to the new cells which they construct 

 on this emergency a much greater diameter as well as a 

 greater depth. 4 



The queen-bee in ordinary circumstances places each egg 



i Huber, ii. 134. 

 3 Ibid. i. 348. 



2 Ibid. ii. 216. 

 ♦ Ibid. ii. 227. 



