156 THE HUMBLE-BEE VIII 
and the bees work it skilfully into thin sheets and 
cells. 
This species is one of the best and most interest- 
ing to study. Among its favourite flowers are 
sycamore, sainfoin, birds’-foot trefoil (Lotus cornzcu- 
fatus), and the knap-weeds (Centaurea scabiosa and 
nigra). It is also fond of many of the flowers 
frequented by honey-bees. 
The variety of the queen having a _ greyish- 
yellow band on the front of the thorax is rare in 
Britain. Smith saw only a single specimen taken 
near Sandwich, Kent, and for twenty years I 
have never noticed it. During the cold season of 
1910, however, several undersized workers from 
larvee that had been starved and chilled during the 
early part of their existence developed a prominent 
band.’ In the following year (1911) the band was 
to be seen faintly in a number of normal specimens. 
In one nest taken, the queen and nearly all her 
workers showed it more or less, and in five out of 
eight nests traces of it were to be seen in some of 
the workers. In July r911 a well-developed worker, 
showing a very perfect band, was sent me by Mr. 
H. Ellison from Stromness, Orkney, together with 
three queens, one of which showed faint traces of a 
band. ‘The variation seems to be favoured by in- 
clement weather. When the band is very faint it can 
only be seen by looking at the specimen from in front 
and it is interrupted in the middle. Very faintly- 
1 In 1911 I bred several freak workers of this kind, having also a faint band 
on the back of the thorax. 
