plantations of the West Indies and the sugar refineries of
Europe, robbery, laziness, and very often drunkenness become
quite usual with the bees. We thus see that anti-social instincts
continue to exist amidst the bees as well; but natural selection
continually must eliminate them, because in the long run the
practice of solidarity proves much more advantageous to the
species than the development of individuals endowed with
predatory inclinations. The cunningest and the shrewdest are
eliminated in favour of those who understand the advantages of
sociable life and mutual support.

Certainly, neither the ants, nor the bees, nor even the
termites, have risen to the conception of a higher solidarity
embodying the whole of the species. In that respect they
evidently have not attained a degree of development which we do
not find even among our political, scientific, and religious
leaders. Their social instincts hardly extend beyond the limits
of the hive or the nest. However, colonies of no less than two
hundred nests, belonging to two different species (Formica
exsecta and F. pressilabris) have been described by Forel on
Mount Tendre and Mount Saleve; and Forel maintains that each
member of these colonies recognizes every other member of the
colony, and that they all take part in common defence; while in
Pennsylvania Mr. MacCook saw a whole nation of from 1,600 to
1,700 nests of the mound-making ant, all living in perfect
intelligence; and Mr. Bates has described the hillocks of the
termites covering large surfaces in the "campos"--some of the
nests being the refuge of two or three different species, and
most of them being connected by vaulted galleries or
arcades.(10) Some steps towards the amalgamation of larger