The Progress of the Race
combs of foundation-wax been offered to the Meliponitæ? Would they accept them, would they make use of them, would they conform their habits to this unwonted architecture? Questions, these, that we put to very tiny creatures; and yet they contain the great word of our greatest secrets. We cannot answer them, for our experience dates but from yesterday. Starting with Réaumur, about a hundred and fifty years have elapsed since the habits of wild bees first received attention. Réaumur was acquainted with only a few of them; we have since then observed a few more; but hundreds, thousands perhaps, have hitherto been noticed only by hasty and ignorant travellers. The habits of those that are known to us have undergone no change since the author of the "Memoirs" published his valuable work; and the humble-bees, all powdered with gold, and vibrant as the
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