LAMARCK 91 



The possibility that the queen may be lost exposes a hive of 

 bees to great danger, for their social organization requires a queen. 

 The danger is met by a reserve of queen-larvae ; but the presence 

 in the hive, at one time, of a number of royal larvae is a new source 

 of danger; for the presence of two reigning queens, at one time, 

 when there is no need to send out a swarm, to found a new hive, 

 would be demoralizing. Queens are developed from larvae which, 

 under ordinary treatment, would have become workers, and the 

 worker-bees themselves cause the selected eggs to develop into 

 queens, by placing them in large cells which they construct for the 

 purpose by tearing down partition walls, and by feeding the larvae 

 with an abundance of the highly nutritious food known as queen- 

 jelly. The workers tend the royal larvae with unceasing care, 

 until they are nearly ready to escape, when they gnaw away the 

 wax until it becomes transparent and so thin as to permit ventila- 

 tion; but if the queen-mother be still in the hive waiting for 

 favorable weather to lead forth a swarm, the young queen is not 

 permitted to leave her cell. The royal guard of workers is re- 

 enforced, and the cell is thickened by new layers of wax, per- 

 forated by a small opening, through which the prisoner thrusts her 

 tongue, in order that her attendants may feed her ; for the old 

 queen is impelled by an implacable instinct to destroy all the 

 young queens she can reach. For this reason the workers use 

 every means to keep her away from the royal cells so long as 

 there is a prospect of swarming. They guard every approach to 

 the cell, and even, forgetting their allegiance, bite and strike and 

 push her, and beat her off whenever she tries to approach. When 

 the old queen has left the hive with a swarm, and one of the young 

 queens is permitted to escape and take her place, she at once seeks 

 to destroy her sisters, but is bitten, pulled, and shoved without cere- 

 mony until she is driven off. As the season advances, until it be- 

 comes too late for swarming, the impulses of the workers change 

 completely. They cease to resist her, and even incite her to destroy 

 her rivals. She now attacks the royal brood, and stings them to death, 

 one after another, in their cells, while the workers, who are spectators 

 of the carnage, share in the spoil, greedily devouring any food they 

 may find in the cells, and even sucking the fluids from the carcasses 

 before they toss them out of the cells and drag them away. 



