EXTOilOLOOY. 119 



rOMPILIDJE. 

 PolIPILUS DOUSALIS, St. Farj?. 



,, PEKEUHiNUs, Smith. Tenassonra. 



,, vrrioscs, Smith. Tunasserim. 



Macromf.eis tiolacea, St. Farg. 



Ml'GSIMIA AUREOSEUICEA, Gutir. 



It caanot be contended that wa.sps arc favourite insects with any people, as 

 the damage tliey cause to our fruit, and tlie troublesome way tliey obtrude themselves 

 within our dwelliugs in the long summer days, is compensated for by no sort of 

 advantage derivable from tliem. At the same time, they display to the careful 

 observer many estimable traits of character, and, if not so useful as bees, are irom 

 their greater diversity of habits even more interesting than these useful insects. 

 For maternal solicitude and anxious devotion to the general welfare, for unwearied 

 industry in building tlieir combs and m foraging for supplies, and for reckless 

 courage, they yield to no insects whatever. Their' courage was so fully recognized 

 by the Greeks that Homer (so judicious and careful with his similes) likens the 

 Myrmidons, when led against the Trojans by I'atroclus, to wasps in the memorable 

 sixteenth Jiook of the Iliad, the passage being thus rendered by Lord Derby : 



" They who in arms round brave Patroclus stood, 

 Their line of battle formed, with courage high 

 To dasli upon the Trojans, and as Wasps 

 That have their nest beside the public road, 

 "Whom boys delight to vex and irritate, 

 In wanton play, but to the general liarm ; 

 Them, if some passing traveller unawares 

 Disturb, with angiy courage forth they rush 

 In one continuous swarm to guard their nest ; 

 E'en with such courage poured the Myrmidons 

 Forth from the ships." 



Sub-order MELLIFERA. 



Males, females, and neuters winged, the two last armed with stings. The basal 

 joint of the posterior tarsi dilated, and adapted for storing and carrying pollen. The 

 Uees arc cither solitary or social. The social communities (exemplified by the 

 domestic bee) consist of a single fertile queen, several males, whose sole function is 

 to furnish a partner for the virgin queen of a fresh swarm, and workers or sexually 

 undeveloped females. The nuptial flight of the virgin queen is her first and last 

 departure from the hive. Eggs laid by her before she has selected her mate, or if 

 separated from the male, produce males only. In default of a perfect queen, the 

 larva of a ' neuter ' is selected, and by being reared in a tliiferently formed cell to the 

 ordinary ' neuter ' cells and well fed, is convei'ted into a queen, though this fact is 

 less extraordinary than the last, as neuters are merely females whose ovaries are 

 undeveloped, and which are by this mode of education stimulated into functional 

 activity. 



Apis indica, Fabr. Tenasserim. 



,, FL0R.ALIS, Kirby. 

 ,, FLOEEA, Fabr. 

 ,, DOESATA, Fabr. 

 ,, LABOEiosA, Smith. 



Domestic Bees are not kept in Burma, and the Burmese receive with polite 

 incredulity the accoimts of Bees being kept domesticated in the walls of dwelling- 

 houses, as is the case in the Himalayas. A favourite place for a wild bees' comb is 

 the angle formed by the branch of some gigantic wood oil or other tree, as not only 

 is the position sheltered fi-om sun and rain, but it is not easily accessible by bears, 



