One could find much more to tell of the wrath of the bees and their
singular antipathies. These antipathies are often so strange that they
were for long attributed, that they are still attributed, by the
peasants, to moral causes, to profound and mystic intuitions. There is
the conviction, for instance, that the vestal vintagers cannot endure
the approach of the unchaste, above all of the adulterous. It would be
surprising if the most rational beings that live with us on this
incomprehensible globe were to attach so much importance to a trespass
that is often very harmless. In reality, they give it no thought; but
they, whose whole life sways to the nuptial and sumptuous breath of the
flowers, abhor the perfumes which we steal from them. Are we to believe
that chastity exhales fewer odours than love? Is this the origin of the
rancour of the jealous bees and of the legend that avenges virtues as
jealous as they? Be this as it may, the legend must be classed with the
many others that pretend to do great honour to the phenomena of nature
by ascribing human feelings to them. It would be better, on the
contrary, to mix our petty human psychology as little as possible with
all that we do not easily understand, to seek our explanations only
without, on this side of man or on that side; for it is probably there
that lie the positive revelations which we are still awaiting.