t the vigorous
adult broke herself of it to lead an easier and more prosperous life.
Thus, gradually, was formed the Philanthus of our day; thus was acquired
the twofold diet of the various predatory insects our contemporaries.

The Bee has done better still: from the moment of leaving the egg she
delivered herself completely from food-stuffs the acquisition of which
depended on chance. She discovered honey, the grubs' food. Renouncing
the chase for ever and becoming an agriculturalist pure and simple,
the insect attains a degree of physical and moral prosperity which the
predatory species are far from sharing. Hence the flourishing colonies
of the Anthophorae, the Osmiae, the Eucerae (A genus of long-horned
Burrowing Bees.--Translator's Note.), the Halicti and other
honey-manufacturers, whereas the predatory insects work in isolation;
hence the societies in which the Bee displays her wonderful tendencies,
the supreme expression of instinct.

This is what I should say if I belonged to that school. It all forms a
chain of very logical deductions and proffers itself with a certain air
of likelihood which we should be glad to find in a host of evolutionist
arguments put forward as irrefutable. Well, I will make a present of my
deductive views, without regret, to whoever cares to have them: I don't
believe one word of them; and I confess my profound ignorance of the
origin of the twofold diet.

What I do understand more clearly, after all these investigations, is
the tactics of the Philanthus. When witnessing her ferocious feasting,
the real reason of which was unknown to me, I heaped the most
ill-sounding epithets upon her, calling her a murderess, a bandit, a
pirate, a robber of the dead. Ignorance is always evil-tongued; the
man who does not know indulges in rude assertions and mischievous
interpretations. Now that my eyes have been opened to the facts, I
hasten to apologize and to restore the Philanthus to her place in my
esteem. In draining the crops of her Bees the mother is performing the
most praiseworthy of all actions: she is protecting her family against
poison. If she happens to kill on her own account and to abandon the
corpse after making it disgorge, I dare not reckon this against her as a
crime. When the habit has been formed of emptying the Bee's crop with
a good motive, there is a great temptation to do it again with no other
excuse than hunger. Besides, who knows? Perhaps there is always at the
back of