530 PSYCHOLOGICAL PHYSIOLOGY. 



but it lias so much analogy in its favour, and is related by such credible 

 observers, that it may really be considered as a fact. Thus, therefore, 

 the hive receives a new queen when the old one dies. This new 

 queen quits the dwelling, in company with the drones, in the middle 

 of summer, pairs with some of them, and then returns impregnated to 

 the hive ; she is here then treated with greater respect than before, she 

 is stroked with the antennae, licked with the tongue, and they on all 

 sides offer her honey. Forty-six hours after pairing she lays her first 

 egg, and then continues uninterruptedly until the 1st of November, 

 from whence until April she ceases, but which she again resumes in 

 April, upon the return of fine Breather, when the workers again collect. 

 Now, after having laid none but the eggs of neuters, she lays about 

 2,000 male eggs, whence, at their appointed time, the drones proceed. 

 From this time until their pairing with the female they live undis- 

 turbedly in the hive ; they fly out for food and again return, but they 

 do not form cells or collect honey, and do nothing else than go out to 

 feed for their own support. At the time of pairing, which takes place 

 in June, a great multitude of them fly out with the queen, and return 

 again after she has paired with one of them, for which it sacrifices its 

 life ; for, according to Huber and Audouin, the penis torn off remains 

 for some time in the vagina of the female, fixed in the neck of the 

 spermatheca. The remaining drones quietly rest until August, even 

 after the remaining young queens which lead out the subsequent 

 swarms have been impregnated by them, but at this period the general 

 slaughter of the drones commences, in which, in the course of three 

 days, all the males are destroyed by the neuters, and even whilst still 

 living are cast from the hives. Thus, without males, and provided 

 with one female, who is however impregnated, and without any pro- 

 geny for males and females, the inhabitants of the hive hybernate 

 as well as the young maggots of the workers, all subsisting upon 

 the collected provisions. It is then also the time to destroy the hive, 

 to remove the bees, and to take their honey. 



The instincts developed by the bees during their life are extremely 

 remarkable and surprising. Their attachment to the queen, their 

 endless anxiety for her welfare, the affection and self sacrifice with 

 which they rear the young, have ever excited the greatest admiration, 

 and also well merit it. No individual bee cares for herself, her whole 

 anxiety is for the entire community, and so long as she perceives that 

 her labours do not miss their aim the preservation and prosperity of 



