experiment, in just the same condition as when I moved it. The open
cell half-filled with honey was still open and was surrendering its
contents to the pillaging Ants; the cell that was building had
remained unfinished, with not a single layer added to it. The Bee,
obviously, may have returned to it; but she had not resumed work upon
it. The transplanted dwelling was abandoned for good and all.

I will not deduce the strange paradox that the Mason-bee, though
capable of finding her nest from the verge of the horizon, is
incapable of finding it at a yard's distance: I interpret the
occurrence as meaning something quite different. The proper inference
appears to me to be this: the Bee retains a rooted impression of the
site occupied by the nest and returns to it with unwearying
persistence even when the nest is gone. But she has only a very vague
notion of the nest itself. She does not recognize the masonry which
she herself has erected and kneaded with her saliva; she does not know
the pollen-paste which she herself has stored. In vain she inspects
her cell, her own handiwork; she abandons it, refusing to acknowledge
it as hers, once the spot whereon the pebble rests is changed.

Insect memory, it must be confessed, is a strange one, displaying such
lucidity in its general acquaintance with locality and such
limitations in its knowledge of the dwelling. I feel inclined to call
it topographical instinct: it grasps the map of the country and not
the beloved nest, the home itself. The Bembex-wasps (Cf. "Insect
Life": chapters 16 to 19.--Translator's Note.) have already led us to
a like conclusion. When the nest is laid open, these Wasps become
wholly indifferent to the family, to the grub writhing in agony in the
sun. They do not recognize it. What they do recognize, what they seek
and find with marvellous precision, is the site of the entrance-door