Various Works Page 68

  which come into being spontaneously and not from copulation do so at

  first from a formation this nature. I say that the former generate a

  scolex, for we must put down caterpillars also and the product of

  spiders as a sort of scolex. And yet some even of these and many of

  the others may be thought to resemble eggs because of their round

  shape, but we must not judge by shapes nor yet by softness and

  hardness (for what is produced by some is hard), but by the fact

  that the whole of them is changed into the body of the creature and

  the animal is not developed from a part of them. All these products

  that are of the nature of a scolex, after progressing and acquiring

  their full size, become a sort of egg, for the husk about them hardens

  and they are motionless during this period. This is plain in the

  scolex of bees and wasps and in caterpillars. The reason of this is

  that their nature, because of its imperfection, oviposits as it were

  before the right time, as if the scolex, while still growing in

  size, were a soft egg. Similar to this is also what happens with all

  other insects which come into being without copulation in wool and

  other such materials and in water. For all of them after the scolex

  stage become immovable and their integument dries round them, and

  after this the latter bursts and there comes forth as from an egg an

  animal perfected in its second metamorphosis, most of those which

  are not aquatic being winged.

  Another point is quite natural, which may wondered at by many.

  Caterpillars at first take nourishment, but after this stage do so

  no longer, but what is called by some the chrysalis is motionless. The

  same applies to the scolex of wasps and bees, but after this comes

  into being the so-called nymph.... and have nothing of the kind. For

  an egg is also of such a nature that when it has reached perfection it

  grows no more in size, but at first it grows and receives

  nourishment until it is differentiated and becomes a perfect egg.

  Sometimes the scolex contains in itself the material from which it

  is nourished and obtains such an addition to its size, e.g. in bees

  and wasps; sometimes it gets its nourishment from outside itself, as

  caterpillars and some others.

  It has thus been stated why such animals go through a double

  development and for what reason they become immovable again after

  moving. And some of them come into being by copulation, like birds and

  vivipara and most fishes, others spontaneously, like some plants.

  10

  There is much difficulty about the generation of bees. If it is

  really true that in the case of some fishes there is such a method

  of generation that they produce eggs without copulation, this may well

  happen also with bees, to judge from appearances. For they must (1)

  either bring the young brood from elsewhere, as some say, and if so

  the young must either be spontaneously generated or produced by some

  other animal, or (2) they must generate them themselves, or (3) they

  must bring some and generate others, for this also is maintained by

  some, who say that they bring the young of the drones only. Again,

  if they generate them it must be either with or without copulation; if

  the former, then either (1) each kind must generate its own kind, or

  (2) some one kind must generate the others, or (3) one kind must unite

  with another for the purpose (I mean for instance (1) that bees may

  be generated from the union of bees, drones from that of drones, and

  kings from that of kings, or (2) that all the others may be

  generated from one, as from what are called kings and leaders, or

  (3) from the union of drones and bees, for some say that the former

  are male, the latter female, while others say that the bees are male

  and the drones female). But all these views are impossible if we

  reason first upon the facts peculiar to bees and secondly upon those

  which apply more generally to other animals also.

  For if they do not generate the young but bring them from elsewhere,

  then bees ought to come into being also, if the bees did not carry

  them off, in the places from which the old bees carry the germs. For

  why, if new bees come into existence when the germs are transported,

  should they not do so if the germs are left there? They ought to do so

  just as much, whether the germs are spontaneously generated in the

  flowers or whether some animal generates them. And if the germs were

  of some other animal, then that animal ought to be produced from

  them instead of bees. Again, that they should collect honey is

  reasonable, for it is their food, but it is strange that they should

  collect the young if they are neither their own offspring nor food.

  With what object should they do so? for all animals that trouble

  themselves about the young labour for what appears to be their own

  offspring.

  But, again, it is also unreasonable to suppose that the bees are

  female and the drones male, for Nature does not give weapons for

  fighting to any female, and while the drones are stingless all the

  bees have a sting. Nor is the opposite view reasonable, that the

  bees are male and the drones female, for no males are in the habit

  of working for their offspring, but as it is the bees do this. And

  generally, since the brood of the drones is found coming into being

  among them even if there is no mature drone present, but that of the

  bees is not so found without the presence of the kings (which is

  why some say that the young of the drones alone is brought in from

  outside), it is plain that they are not produced from copulation,

  either (1) of bee with bee or drone with drone or (2) of bees with

  drones. (That they should import the brood of the drones alone is

  impossible for the reasons already given, and besides it is

  unreasonable that a similar state of things should not prevail with

  all the three kinds if it prevails with one.) Then, again, it is also

  impossible that the bees themselves should be some of them male and

  some female, for in all kinds of animals the two sexes differ. Besides

  they would in that case generate their own kind, but as it is their

  brood is not found to come into being if the leaders are not among

  them, as men say. And an argument against both theories, that the

  young are generated by union of the bees with one another or with

  the drones, separately or with one another, is this: none of them

  has ever yet been seen copulating, whereas this would have often

  happened if the sexes had existed in them. It remains then, if they

  are generated by copulation at all, that the kings shall unite to

  generate them. But the drones are found to come into being even if

  no leaders are present, and it is not possible that the bees should

  either import their brood or themselves generate them by copulation.

  It remains then, as appears to be the case in certain fishes, that the

  bees should generate the drones without copulation, being indeed

  female in respect of generative power, but containing in themselves

  both sexes as plants do. Hence also they have the instr
ument of

  offence, for we ought not to call that female in which the male sex is

  not separated. But if this is found to be the case with drones, if

  they come into being without copulation, then as it is necessary

  that the same account should be given of the bees and the kings and

  that they also should be generated without copulation. Now if the

  brood of the bees had been found to come into being among them without

  the presence of the kings, it would necessarily follow that the bees

  also are produced from bees themselves without copulation, but as it

  is, since those occupied with the tendance of these creatures deny

  this, it remains that the kings must generate both their own kind

  and the bees.

  As bees are a peculiar and extraordinary kind of animal so also

  their generation appears to be peculiar. That bees should generate

  without copulation is a thing which may be paralleled in other

  animals, but that what they generate should not be of the same kind is

  peculiar to them, for the erythrinus generates an erythrinus and the

  channa a channa. The reason is that bees themselves are not

  generated like flies and similar creatures, but from a kind

  different indeed but akin to them, for they are produced from the

  leaders. Hence in a sort of way their generation is analogous. For the

  leaders resemble the drones in size and the bees in possessing a

  sting; so the bees are like them in this respect, and the drones are

  like them in size. For there must needs be some overlapping unless the

  same kind is always to be produced from each; but this is

  impossible, for at that rate the whole class would consist of leaders.

  The bees, then, are assimilated to them their power of generation, the

  drones in size; if the latter had had a sting also they would have

  been leaders, but as it is this much of the difficulty has been

  solved, for the leaders are like both kinds at once, like the bees

  in possessing a sting, like the drones in size.

  But the leaders also must be generated from something. Since it is

  neither from the bees nor from the drones, it must be from their own

  kind. The grubs of the kings are produced last and are not many in

  number.

  Thus what happens is this: the leaders generate their own kind but

  also another kind, that of the bees; the bees again generate another

  kind, the drones, but do not also generate their own kind, but this

  has been denied them. And since what is according to Nature is

  always in due order, therefore it is necessary that it should be

  denied to the drones even to generate another kind than themselves.

  This is just what we find happening, for though the drones are

  themselves generated, they generate nothing else, but the process

  reaches its limit in the third stage. And so beautifully is this

  arranged by Nature that the three kinds always continue in existence

  and none of them fails, though they do not all generate.

  Another fact is also natural, that in fine seasons much honey is

  collected and many drones are produced but in rainy reasons a large

  brood of ordinary bees. For the wet causes more residual matter to

  be formed in the bodies of the leaders, the fine weather in that of

  the bees, for being smaller in size they need the fine weather more

  than the kings do. It is right also that the kings, being as it were

  made with a view to producing young, should remain within, freed

  from the labour of procuring necessaries, and also that they should be

  of a considerable size, their bodies being, as it were, constituted

  with a view to bearing young, and that the drones should be idle as

  having no weapon to fight for the food and because of the slowness

  of their bodies. But the bees are intermediate in size between the two

  other kinds, for this is useful for their work, and they are workers

  as having to support not only their young but also their fathers.

  And it agrees with our views that the bees attend upon their kings

  because they are their offspring (for if nothing of the sort had been

  the case the facts about their leadership would be unreasonable), and

  that, while they suffer the kings to do no work as being their

  parents, they punish the drones as their children, for it is nobler to

  punish one's children and those who have no work to perform. The

  fact that the leaders, being few, generate the bees in large numbers

  seems to be similar to what obtains in the generation of lions,

  which at first produce five, afterwards a smaller number each time

  at last one and thereafter none. So the leaders at first produce a

  number of workers, afterwards a few of their own kind; thus the

  brood of the latter is smaller in number than that of the former,

  but where Nature has taken away from them in number she has made it up

  again in size.

  Such appears to be the truth about the generation of bees, judging

  from theory and from what are believed to be the facts about them; the

  facts, however, have not yet been sufficiently grasped; if ever they

  are, then credit must be given rather to observation than to theories,

  and to theories only if what they affirm agrees with the observed

  facts.

  A further indication that bees are produced without copulation is

  the fact that the brood appears small in the cells of the comb,

  whereas, whenever insects are generated by copulation, the parents

  remain united for a long time but produce quickly something of the

  nature of a scolex and of a considerable size.

  Concerning the generation of animals akin to them, as hornets and

  wasps, the facts in all cases are similar to a certain extent, but are

  devoid of the extraordinary features which characterize bees; this

  we should expect, for they have nothing divine about them as the

  bees have. For the so-called 'mothers' generate the young and mould

  the first part of the combs, but they generate by copulation with

  one another, for their union has often been observed. As for all the

  differences of each of these kind from one another and from bees, they

  must be investigated with the aid of the illustrations to the

  Enquiries.

  11

  Having spoken of the generation of all insects, we must now speak of

  the testacea. Here also the facts of generation are partly like and

  partly unlike those in the other classes. And this is what might be

  expected. For compared with animals they resemble plants, compared

  with plants they resemble animals, so that in a sense they appear to

  come into being from semen, but in another sense not so, and in one

  way they are spontaneously generated but in another from their own

  kind, or some of them in the latter way, others in the former. Because

  their nature answers to that of plants, therefore few or no kinds of

  testacea come into being on land, e.g. the snails and any others,

  few as they are, that resemble them; but in the sea and similar waters

  there are many of all kinds of forms. But the class of plants has

  but few and one may say practically no representatives in the sea

  and such places, all such growing on the land. Fo
r plants and testacea

  are analogous; and in proportion as liquid has more quickening power

  than solid, water than earth, so much does the nature of testacea

  differ from that of plants, since the object of testacea is to be in

  such a relation to water as plants are to earth, as if plants were, so

  to say, land-oysters, oysters water-plants.

  For such a reason also the testacea in the water vary more in form

  than those on the land. For the nature of liquid is more plastic

  than that of earth and yet not much less material, and this is

  especially true of the inhabitants of the sea, for fresh water, though

  sweet and nutritious, is cold and less material. Wherefore animals

  having no blood and not of a hot nature are not produced in lakes

  nor in the fresher among brackish waters, but only exceptionally,

  but it is in estuaries and at the mouths of rivers that they come into

  being, as testacea and cephalopoda and crustacea, all these being

  bloodless and of a cold nature. For they seek at the same time the

  warmth of the sun and food; now the sea is not only water but much

  more material than fresh water and hot in its nature; it has a share

  in all the parts of the universe, water and air and earth, so that

  it also has a share in all living things which are produced in

  connexion with each of these elements. Plants may be assigned to land,

  the aquatic animals to water, the land animals to air, but

  variations of quantity and distance make a great and wonderful

  difference. The fourth class must not be sought in these regions,

  though there certainly ought to be some animal corresponding to the

  element of fire, for this is counted in as the fourth of the

  elementary bodies. But the form which fire assumes never appears to be

  peculiar to it, but it always exists in some other of the elements,

  for that which is ignited appears to be either air or smoke or

  earth. Such a kind of animal must be sought in the moon, for this

  appears to participate in the element removed in the third degree from

  earth. The discussion of these things however belongs to another

  subject.