A Bee's Eevenge.
but the big wasp now kept a jealous watch on its neighbour's movements, and would not allow it to come within several inches of the flower without throwing itself into a threatening attitude. The defeated bee retired to sun itself once more, apparently determined to wait for the big tyrant to go away; but the other seemed to know what was
166 The Naturalist in La Plata.
wanted, and spitefully made up its mind to stay where it was. The leaf-cutter then gave up the contest. Suddenly rising up into the air, it hovered, hawk-like, above the Monedula for a moment, then pounced down on its back, and clung there, furiously biting, until its animosity was thoroughly appeased; then it flew off, leaving the other master of the field certainly, but 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
A noble Wasp. 167
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.