On the Tongue (^Lingua) of some Hymenoptera. 49 



above. In Amophila, and the other Avasps, the tongue can not be said 

 properly to be tubular, as the hairy sheath is imperforate at its apex, 

 antl the colorless rod only curves up its sides towards the base, forming 

 what may be called a trough near the base, while towards the apex 

 the}' are not curved up, but widened out, giving to the tongue its 

 furcate-spatulate form, and split up at its apex (the rod I mean) into 

 many little forks, bifurcate and trifurcate, resembling minature hay 

 forks. When the specimen has been macerated in alcohol or glycerine, 

 the hair}' sheath may be readily scraped off, and the structure of the 

 rod shown as above. In the bees, on the other hand, the sides of 

 the rod curve up throughout its entire length, forming by their 

 coalescence above a distinct tube. In CoUetes, and some of the short- 

 tongued bees, and in most (all?) of the long-tongued bees, this rod sud- 

 denl}' dilates at its apex, but instead of spreading out into the spatu- 

 late form of Amophile, the dilated part also curves up its sides, and 

 forms the sucker-like expansion or disk at its end — the "button" af 

 Reaumer. In the Acutilingues, however, it narrows all the wa}- to the 

 apex, and there is no "button." In all (so far as I have examined), the 

 sides do not coalesce above at the base, so that the tube there opens in- 

 to the membraneous sack, by an unclosed slit along its upper surface. 

 Its apex perforates the hair\- sheath at its apex; or, perhaps, I would 

 describe it more correctly' by saving that the hairj' sheath is open 

 along its whole under surface, simpl}' closing around the sack and 

 tube, not including the tube at the apex, attached to it near the apex, 

 and opening beneath, to allow it to pass out for the greater portion of 

 its length, when fully extended. The tongue therefore consists of the 

 hair}^ sheath, to which is attached along its inner surface, the membrane- 

 ous sack, which is itself continuous with the oesophagus, and which is 

 attached to the tubular rod. Along the upper surface of the sack, im- 

 mediately beneath the hairy sheath, pass two parallel trachea, each of 

 which supplies the basal part of the membraneous sack with a num- 

 ber of minute ti'acheal ramifications, which may have something to do 

 with* the change of the nectar into honey, if that change takes place in 

 the sack, instead of in the sucking stomach. Reaumer was A'ery near 

 the demonstration of the presence of the tube. He said that the tongue 

 seemed to be tubular, but instead of dissecting it, he trusted to observa- 

 tions on its mode of feeding, — generalljMn non-natural circumstances — 

 and convinced himself, b}' reasoning thereupon, that the tongue is not 

 tubular, or that if it is, its orifice is so small that it can be of no prac- 

 tical use. I will add here that the perforation in the tongue of the hive 

 bee, at its narrowest part immediateh' before the apex, measures about 

 1.500th of a line, and that of the pharynx is ver\' little largei"; and a con- 

 tinuous flow of fluid through the tube, it seems to me, would All the oeso- 

 phagus much more quickly, and would more quickly exhaust the little 



