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But there are cases when one might almost imagine that nature had not had time enough to disentangle her combinations; cases where reward is impossible, and the fate of the victor no less disastrous than that of the vanquished. And of such, selecting an instance that will not take us too far from our bees, I know of no instance more striking than that of the triongulins of the Sitaris colletes.
And another great happiness they conceive in their names, while they call themselves Cordiliers, and among these too, some are Colletes, some Minors, some Minims, some Crossed; and again, these are Benedictines, those Bernardines; these Carmelites, those Augustines; these Williamites, and those Jacobines; as if it were not worth the while to be called Christians.
This becomes very evident if we study another related beetle; it is called the Sitaris colletis, and lives at the expense of the hymenopterous Colletes, as its relative at the expense of the Anthophora. But these two species of the same genus are very unequally aided by chance.
A certain number of her sisters, belonging to species already more skilful and better supplied with utensils, such as the well-clad Colletes, or the marvellous cutter of rose-leaves, the Megachile Centuncularis, live in an isolation no less profound; and if by chance some creature attach itself to them, and share their dwelling, it will either be an enemy, or, more often, a parasite.
But, through some strange inadvertence, the amelioration nature imposes suppresses the life of even the fittest, and the Sitaris Colletes would have long since disappeared had not chance, acting in opposition to the desires of nature, permitted isolated individuals to escape from the excellent and far-seeing law that ordains on all sides the triumph of the stronger.
If the first arrival begins to absorb the egg of the Colletes, a second hungry one may kill it in the midst of its repast and take its place. But the conqueror finds the provisions already reduced and insufficient to enable it to reach the moulting stage, at the end of which it could profit by the honey.
But no sooner has an egg been laid than they all spring upon it; and the innocent colletes carefully seals down her cell, which she has duly supplied with food, never suspecting that she has at the same time ensured the death of her offspring. The cell has scarcely been closed when the triongulins grouped round the egg engage in the inevitable and salutary combat of natural selection.
And it will be seen that, in many details, this story is less foreign to the history of man than might perhaps be imagined. These triongulins are the primary larvae of a parasite proper to a wild, obtuse-tongued, solitary bee, the Colletes, which builds its nest in subterranean galleries.
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