THE AUSTRALIAN BEEKEEPERS’ JOURNAL. 
155 
I ana not intending to deny to the bee the 
possession and use of some power very closely 
resembling reason, but I am endeavouring to 
show that amongst many of the wonders written 
down to its credit, that of the use of a power we 
call language does not exist. 
We commonly suppose that if, in its morning’s 
wanderings, a worker comes across a find in the 
shape of a lime-tree, a clover field in an adverse 
wind, or even an ill-guarded hive, she rushes 
home, communicates her discovery, and is 
followed away by a numerous company. Not a 
bit of it ; I think she greedily gorges, like a 
glutton, on semi-intoxicating nectar, until she 
can only just land home (or into some one else’s 
home), and is met on the threshold by one or two 
affectionate janitors who welcome everybody 
possesing anything to their taste, and proceed to 
relieve the incomer of its surplus wealth, whilst 
we poetically imagine a lively conversation is 
being carried on by means of the antennas as to 
the whereabouts of this new El Dorado. No, 
they themselves propably determine to follow in 
the wake of the nectar-scented bee when she 
quietly sneaks out for another load, the surplus 
of which she has hidden away in a cell. Like 
Sin, her guilt leaves behind it a betraying trail, 
and when the outward journey is taken ; without 
the necessity for a single word, divers members of 
the family circle, aye, and neighbours too, 
accompany her like wreckers on the coast. 
Believe me, the wise provision (prevision) for 
winter which alone asserts the superiority of the 
honey-bee over most other insects, will, in time 
have to be consigned to that limbo of romantic 
and poetical myths with which an inventive and 
fanciful aucestry has surrounded our science. 
Selfish greed leads them to gather much more 
than they require for the time being ; so it is 
build and store, store and build, as long as the 
honey glut lasts, under the wise guidance of the 
same Almighty hand which sends the grub 
downwards as the frost intensities, and draws the 
sap upwards in return of spring. Therein is the 
wisdom and wondrous mystery, not in the 
will of the creature, but in the omnipresent 
power of the Creator. 
Admitting that bees have the means of uttering, 
and the power of hearing and interpreting certain 
sounds made by others of their kind, this is 
propably as unreasoning a sort of language as 
that of the dog baying the mooon or howling at 
the sound of music. The instinctive piping of 
of the queen always means the same thing ; the 
agitated, irritated worker puffing out of the 
spiracles its currents of air impinging on the 
rapidly moving wing-edges tells us thus of its 
anger : the steady, business-like regularity, the 
happy hum of the worker working, tell its mates 
that if they are to do much work they must not 
make much noise about it (especially is this the 
case at early morn and dewy eve, when the wing- 
edges are moister than in the full heat of noon- 
time. at which time the noise of humming sounds 
sharper and louder than at others) : the music of 
swarming, the tones of flying drones so exciting 
to the bee-keeper who hurries forward preparation 
for swarms, these are mechanical notes which 
only accompany various phases. What others 
there may be is a matter of conjecture, and they 
can only be admitted to exist by analogy. 
Let us now turn to that enchanter s wand, the 
antenna, wherein, to my mind, resides more of 
wonder, more of mystery and beauty, than in any 
other part of the bee’s body. We must admit 
that highly developed touching, smelling, and 
hearing organs all find their place on this flail- 
like rod, but 1 doubt very much that the bee 
converses by its means ; indeed, I will be 
venturesome enough to deny it altogether. My 
reason for this heresy is, that for the bee to use its 
antennte as the medium of languaage, tapping on 
the head of its companion (over that part known 
as the oesophageal ganglion), demands the 
existence ol a code of signals understood by both, 
and codes (unlike poets) are made, not born. A 
code demands not only a raional intellect to 
invent and prefect it into a system, but an 
assistant language for its elucidation and 
explanation. Semaphores, or the Morse method, 
necessitate that other wonder of the world — a 
written language. For a newly hatched bee to 
receive a series of taps on the head according to 
an organized system requires first that it should 
be master of such an arrangement before it can 
comprehend it, and it would call on us for as 
great a stretch of imagination to believe the 
young bee capable of understanding a language 
of code signals as to believe an infant capable of 
t:legraphing round the globe in its mother (!) 
tongue. We have probably slipped gradually 
into this great gulph of error in noticing the 
movements of the antenme : we have perhaps 
mistaken mere olfactory courtesies, when bee 
meets bee, for gossipy inquiries, whereas we 
might be nearer the mark if we put such move- 
ments down to a morbid inquisitiveness after 
what ‘isn’t his’n’. 
1 believe the greatest difficulty in the way of 
the student of bee-physiology at this day is the 
vast amount of error imbibed in his early lessons, 
and this has to be unlearned before he can see 
the beautiful simple truth. Veils of allegorical 
fiction about kings, queens, and so on, have been 
woven from time to time, until now, covered 
with the dust of antiquity, they appear as 
disgusting festoons of cobweb, hiding much that 
is beautiful and true, amongst which X fear we 
must class the common belief as to their talking 
! to each other by the antennas. As an instance 
of error to unlearn, let me call to your mind the 
assertion of Butler's, that just before the issue of 
a swarm ‘ the candidate for the new throne is 
then with earnest entreaties, lamentations and 
groans, supplicating the queen-mother of the 
hive to grant her permission to lead the intended 
colony. This is continued for two days, when the 
old queen reluctantly gives her fiat in a fuller 
and stronger tone.’ What nonsense ! Surely 
there should be nothing left in the hive for us to 
learn when the ancients found out, or rather 
imagined, so much about them, and their pretty 
conceits have, in course of time, come to be 
accepted as matters of wonderful fact! The famous 
experiment of Huber really is in support of the 
theory that bees do not converse by means of the 
