BEES AND ANTS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4386, 10 April 1875, Page 3

BEES AND ANTS.

(By CEdipus, in tlie Melbourne Leader.) The wonderful sagacity for which bees have obtained credit has been impugned by a high authority—Sir John Lubbock. These insects have not only been credited with the ability to communicate to each other anger, fear, and other emotions, but a knowledge of events and facts. To test this, Sir John put out some honeycomb in such a situation as would not readily be found by bees. At noon he took a bee to the honey and watched its proceedings. It continued sucking for thirtysix minutes, when it flew off to the hive, returning in fourteen minutes afterwards, sucked again for five minutes, and flew off. These visits backward and forward were continued at the same intervals till nearly eight o'clock, but no other bee came to the honey, xlt six o’clock next morning the bee commenced work, and carried on in the same way so long as a watch was kept up. On the third day Sir John put a second bee to the honey, and this one paid fifty visits to the comb between seven and three o’clock. By this time two other bees had discovered the treasure. These be was satisfied were mere stragglers who were prospecting on their own account, ami had not been brought or sent by the bees he had taught. On the fourth day only one bee came, and on the fifth, three. The facts are the more remarkable as bis bees worked longer hours than the others, commencing sooner and leaving off later. Sir John then proceeded to put to the test the affection which bees are supposed to hear for each other. He had seen bees lick each other, hut that was when they were covered with honey. He had never seen one attempt to rescue another from drowning. He killed a bee so close to another that its dead body came in contact with a living bee, but the latter kept on feeding and took not the slightest notice of what had occurred. He had held a bee by the leg with pincers close to where others were feeding, but they took no notice whatever,' and he had come to the conclusion that they were devoid of sisterly affection. He also believed that what had been said and written about the devotion of bees to their queen had no foundation. He once exchanged a black bee for a Ligurian bee. He put the old queen iu a box, and next day he found that all had deserted her, and he could not even tempt them back by putting honey in her box. Sir John found that there was not the uniformity in the intelligence of bees which is generally ascribed to them. He found that some were clever and some stupid. He could teach some of them to go in at a new entrance in a single lesson, while others had to be shown a dozen times. He bad not been able to satisfy himself that bees had auy seuse of hearing. He could attract them by odors, and teach them colors, but he could neither attract nor scare them by any kind of noise or music. There was no more sense in hammering on a warming-pan to induce bees to swarm than there was in the Chinese gongbeating to frighten away an eclipse of the moon. His observations on ants led him to believe that they were rightly credited with the ability to communicate to each other the knowledge of where food was to be had. After putting an ant to some honey, it would generally bring other ants with it at its next visit, sometimes only one, and sometimes as many as twenty. But this does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that ants are more intelligent than bees. The difference is most likely attributable to the fact that, although bees are social iu the hive, they are solitary as hunters, while auts are gregarious at all times.