Notwithstanding bees are thus occasionally animated by a most vindictive spirit, against what they regard as a public enemy, they are not found to display any peculiar hostility in the revenge of a private injury, committed upon them at a distance from their homes. This is a fact which has been noticed both by +Mr. Hunter+ and +Mr. Knight+. The former observes also, that bees never sting but in the neighbourhood of their property, unless hurt; that they never contend with each other for honey, unless it be placed within the boundary of their own right,--but that what they have collected they defend. The indisposition of bees to attack or be angry at a distance has been confirmed by +Mr. Knight+, who says, that, though the most irritable of animals near home, he has seen them suffer themselves to be patiently robbed of their loads by other bees, and that he has witnessed this in the same bee three times in succession. He says likewise, that if the wasps in a nest have their communication cut off from those that are abroad, the latter, on their return, will not make any attack; but that if one escape from the interior, it evinces a very different temper, and is ready to sacrifice its life to avenge the injury. This +Mr. Knight+ discovered when a boy, and he has no doubt but that if a similar proceeding were adopted towards bees, they would observe the same conduct. +The Language of Bees.+ All creatures that live in society seem to possess the power of communicating intelligence to one another. "Brutes," says +Mr. Knight+, "have language to express sentiments of love, of fear, and of anger; yet they seem unable to transmit any impression they have received from external objects. But the language of bees is more extensive: if not a language of ideas, it is something very similar." This faculty has been very remarkably illustrated by +Huber+ in his Treatise on Ants; and the bee exhibits many strong evidences of it. +Huber+ clearly shows that the communications of Ants are made through the medium of their antennæ; he has also proved very satisfactorily, that these organs serve the same purpose in bees.