PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 213 



Huber, the thermometer stood in the hive at about 92**. 

 In colder climates, however, tlie bees will jjrobably be 

 less active in tlie winter. They are then generally si- 

 tuated between the combs towards their lower part. 

 But when the air grows milder, especially if the rays 

 of the sun fall upon the hive and warm it, they awake 

 from their lethargy, shake their wings, and begin 

 to move and recover their activity ; with which their 

 wants returning, they then feed upon the stock of 

 honey and bee-bread which they have in reserve. The 

 lowest cells are first uncovered, and their contents 

 consumed ; the highest are reserved to the last. The 

 honey in the lowest cells being collected in the autumn, 

 probably will not keep so well as the vernal. 



The degree of heat in a hive in winter, as I have 

 just hinted, is great. A thermometer near one, in 

 the open air, that stood in January at 6|o below the 

 freezing point, upon the insertion of the bulb a little 

 way into the hive, rose to 22y° above it ; and could it 

 have been placed between the combs, where the bees 

 themselves were agglomerated, the mei;cury, Reaumur 

 conjectures, would have risen as high as it does abroad 

 in the warm days in summer*. Huber says that it 

 stands in frost at 86" and 88° in populous hives^. In 

 May, the former autlior found, in a hive in which he 

 had lodged a small swarm, that the thermometer indi- 

 cated a degree of heat above that of the hottest days of 

 summer". He observes that their motion, and even 

 the agitation of their wings, increases the heat of their 

 atmosphere. Often, when the squares of glass in a hive 

 appeared cold to the touch, if either by design or 



'v. 671. " i. 351. Note *. " ubi snpr. 



