THE APIS AIELLIFICA. 255 



inside old trunks of trees. They make their hive, and their society 

 consists of a crowd of workers and a single female or queen. Cell 

 making goes on, the queen lays, and larvae are born, and a new 

 generation is thus produced ; and thus some hundreds of males 

 may be counted in a hive at one particular period of the year, 

 besides the queen and the workers. 



These three kinds of individuals present striking differences. 

 The fertile females and workers of wasps and humble bees are 

 very much alike ; the fertile females are only slightly larger than 

 the others — but were they not workers at one period of their 

 existence .'* The queen bee is incapable of working ; the workers 

 or neuters are smaller than she is, and are not so large as the 



Worker. 

 DOMESTIC BEES {Apis melUficd). 



drones or males, and it is not necessary to describe them, for they 

 are well known to every one. 



The production of wax is one of the most remarkable physio- 

 logical phenomena of the organisation of these Hynicnoptcra. It 

 was generally thought, formerly, that the bees disgorged their wax 

 from the mouth, and Reaumur certainly held this opinion; but 

 John Hunter discovered the manner in which the wax was formed; 

 and it is now evident that the bees carry within themselves this 

 important building material. The segments of the abdomen of 

 bees overlap from before backwards, but when the margin of one is 

 lifted up, two broad and smooth surfaces will be noticed on the 

 uncovered surface of the next wing ; these surfaces maintain during 

 one part of the year two thin, white, and almost transparent 

 laminse, which are really composed of wax. The -wax is really 

 secreted by some small glands which are within the abdomen, and 

 it transudes through the soft and smooth integument between the 

 rings or segments. It would appear that the sugary matters which 



