42 THE HUMBLE-BEE u 
This difference is really an important one, for 
the placing of pollen in contact with the brood 
is a vestige of the method of feeding employed by 
the solitary bees, which lay their eggs on lumps of 
pollen that they have collected, the larve feeding 
themselves on the pollen; and I have no doubt that 
© POLLEN. POCKETS. wong ho 
s oe 
page >. 
—_—- 
Fic. 14.—Comb of B. agrorum, showing pollen-pockets in the sides of 
the bunches of larvae. 
the larve of the pocket-makers do partly feed on 
the pollen placed in the pockets, at least during the 
earlier stages of their growth. It is only the pollen- 
storers that, after the first batch has been reared, 
quite abandon supplying their young with solid 
pollen, and completely adopt the honey-bees’ more 
advanced method of feeding with liquid food pre- 
pared in the body of the bee. 

