GENERAL HISTORY OF BEES. 53 



drone, where they converge on the vertex, and throw the 

 stemmatadown upon the face. T have before alluded to 

 special peculiarities in the legs when treating of those 

 limbs. In the wings there are occasional differences, 

 but so slight as not to require, in a general survey, spe- 

 cial notice ; but wherever they occur it is always in the 

 male that the greatest extension of those limbs is found. 

 The differences in the termination of the abdomen I 

 have noticed above, and these sexual peculiarities in 

 some genera are very marked. The spines which arm 

 it in Anthidium and Osmia, and its peculiar structure in 

 Chelostoma we can account for; but we have not the 

 same clue to their uses in Ccelioxys, in which the action 

 of the abdomen is upward, and not downward, as in the 

 others. 



The association of the legitimate partners of our native 

 species has been to a great extent already accomplished 

 and recorded ; therefore, in this case, with the requisite 

 guides to further instruction at hand, the commencing 

 entomologist will find no obstruction, but may register 

 the observations of his own experience to verify the dis- 

 coveries of his predecessors. 



It would seem from the facts that have been recorded, 

 and the close investigations made, that in some instances 

 the next year's bee is already disclosed and in the imago 

 state, in the autumn of the existing year, so that it is 

 ready, upon the first genial weather in the spring, to 

 work its way out of its nidus, and take its part in the 

 duties it has to perform. Whether this be for the eco- 

 nomy of the food to the larva, or the saving of labour 

 to the parent in gathering it, or that it would be preju- 

 dicial for it to lie dormant in the pupa state during the 

 winter is not known, but thus in many instances it is. 



