Page:Jardine Naturalist's library Bees.djvu/50

 may suppose, of removing to such a distance from the desired object as is suited to the properties or focus of its visual organ. We are led to conclude, therefore, from these well-known facts, that the eye of the Bee has a lengthened focus, and that it must depend on the aid of other organs in those operations wherein its attention is directed to objects close at hand.

Feeling or Touch.—The organs of this sense are supposed, with reason, to reside in the antennæ and palpi or feelers, particularly in the former, Huber concludes that the antennæ supply the want of sight in the interior of the hive, and that it is solely by their means they are enabled to construct their combs in darkness, pour their honey into the magazines, feed the young, judge of their age and necessities, and recognise their queen. Though it does by no means appear clear that the bees are devoid of sight when employed in their in-door operations,—though, on the contrary, there is reason to believe, as already stated, that the stemmata or ocelli serve as orbs of vision,—this naturalist is probably not wrong in ascribing to the antennæ an important share in these operations. That the bees use them as means of communication and recognition, seems readily admitted by apiarians. When a hive has lost its queen, the event, as may well be supposed, causes a high degree of agitation in the colony; the disturbed workers, who have first, by some unknown means, acquired the knowledge of this public calamity, soon quit their immediate circle, and, "meeting their companions," says Huber, "the antennæ are reciprocally crossed, and they slightly strike