greatly discomposed, and perhaps seriously injured about the base of the
wings. I was rather surprised that they were not cut quite off, for a
leaf-cutting bee can use its teeth as deftly as a tailor can his shears.

Doubtless to bees, as to men, revenge is sweeter than honey. But, in the
face of mental science, can a creature as low down in the scale of
organization as a leaf-cutting bee be credited with anything so
intelligent and emotional as deliberate anger and revenge, "which
implies the need of retaliation to satisfy the feelings of the person
(or bee) offended?" According to Bain _(Mental and Moral Science)_ only
the highest animals--stags and bulls he mentions-can be credited with
the developed form of anger, which, he describes as an excitement caused
by pain, reaching the centres of activity, and containing an impulse
knowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being. Here, if man
only is meant, the spark is perhaps accounted for, but not the barrel of
gunpowder. The explosive material is, however, found in the breast of
nearly every living creature. The bull--ranking high according to Bain,
though I myself should place him nearly on a level mentally with the
majority of the lower animals, both vertebrate and insect--is capable of
a wrath exceeding that of Achilles; and yet the fact that a red rag can
manifestly have no associations, personal or political, for the bull,
shows how uniutcllectual his anger must be. Another instance of
misdirected anger in nature, not quite so familiar .as that of the bull
and red rag, is used as an illustration by one of the prophets: "My
heritage is unto me as a speckled bird; the birds round, about are
against it." I have frequently seen the birds of a thicket gather round
some singularly marked accidental visitor, and finally drive him with
great anger from the neighbourhood. Possibly association comes in a
little here, since any bird, even a small one, strikingly coloured or
marked, might be looked on as a bird of prey.