HYMENOPTERA. —— ACULEATA. 181 
tion converted into a sting, connected with poisonous glands ; com- 
posed of a slender horny acute dart, channelled beneath, and inclosing 
two spiculz, which are retro-serrated at the tips, and connected at the 
base with a poison bag* in both females and neuters, and also with 
the ovaries in the females. This organ is defended, when at rest, by 
a pair of lateral plates, articulated in the centre, and forming together 
a kind of scabbard, or sheath, as in the Terebrantia. My jig. 79. 
15—20. represent the details of the sting of the common wasp. - 
Fg.15. exhibits the terminal segments of the abdomen laid open, and 
exhibiting the sting im situ; s p is the terminal spiracle of the abdo- 
men; b, the basal, and b b, the terminal parts of the lateral sheaths 
of the sting ; c being the sting itself, and ec the basal muscles of the 
spicule ; the dotted part of this figure shows the action of the sting, 


admirable historian of the ants, has confirmed this, having observed an occasional 
sexual intercourse between the males and workers, which was, however, followed by the 
death of the latter, their organisation not allowing them ordinarily to bring forth eggs: 
although in certain cases the workers have even been recorded to produce male eggs, 
the instinct of the males having thus proved them to be of the opposite sex. It is only 
amongst the social tribes that these imperfectly developed females are found; and 
when we consider first, the necessity which exists for the performance of the multi- 
tudinous labours of the community; and second, the immense numerical excess of 
these neuters over the females (which latter it will be remembered are merely nor- 
mally perfect animals), we cannot but be struck with surprise at the remarkable 
instinct evinced by these insects, which compels them by an artificial process to 
render the greatest part of thecommunity abortive. It is true that the neuters, which 
are for the most part the feeders of the society, are not the parents of the objects of 
their charge; whence we might at first entertain the notion that they cannot possess 
the sense of philoprogenitiveness in its full extent; but their laborious assiduity in 
support of the community, together with other circumstances, contradicts such a 
suppesition. 
* This poisonous secretion emitted by the sting is soluble in water, but not in 
alcohol, and separable from the former in the state of white powder; and, when 
the latter is added, giving a slight red tinge to paper stained with vegetable blue 
(Kirby and Spence, vol. iv. p. 139.); and Dr. Bevan states, that, if.a humble-bee be 
made to sting litmus paper, the colour is changed toa bright red. Hence, 
Fontana ( On Poisons, vol. i. p. 265.) considers that it is mixed ina very small degree 
with an acid, and not with an alkali: so that spirit of hartshorn is one of the most 
effectual remedies against the stings of these insects. Its effects are produced when 
introduced into a wound made by a needle, thus proving that it is not the sting 
itself which causes the pain. If a bee be made to strike a piece of glass with its 
sting, and leave a drop of poison, the Jatter, under the mjcroscope, gradually pro- 
duces oblong pointed crystals. (Bevan, Honey Bee, 2d ed. p. 331.; and see also 
Blot, in Mém. Soc. Linn. de Calvados, vol. i. in which, the nature of the poison and 
its effects in the different families is treated upon in detail. ) 0 
N 3 
