184 Mr. New[)ort on the Habits and Structure 



visited the swarm, but not a single bee was yet engaged in the act 

 of ventillation, either within the hive or at its entrance. They 

 were still hanging from the top in a great cluster of festoons, the 

 whole being gently agitated by a constant, uniform, wavy, or pen- 

 dulous motion, and were perspiring very copiously. The tempera- 

 ture of the external atmosphere was only 52 Fahr. Not a single 

 bee had yet left the swarm since it was hived. At seven o'clock 

 the first bee came to the entrance hole, and, after examining it 

 attentively, left the hive. Having taken two or three circular 

 flights around the bee house, at a little distance in the air, as if to 

 survey the spot, it flew entirely away. A few minutes after this 

 another bee left the hive in a similar manner ; but, after flying 

 around the bee house two or three times, flew directly to the spot 

 where the swarm had settled on the preceding day. Several other 

 bees left the swarm in like manner, and flew to the same spot, 

 and many of them continued flying around in the air for a con- 

 siderable length of time. In about ten minutes one of the bees 

 returned to the swarm, and having surveyed the entrance hole, 

 flew to the entrance hole of the next hive in the same bee house, 

 reconnoitred it, returned again to the swarm, and back again to 

 the entrance of the other hive, and then again departed. From 

 this and similar proceedings of these insects, I was led to the 

 inference that it is by means of vision chiefly that the bee dis- 

 covers its way back to the hive it has left, and distinguishes its 

 own hive from others ; and this opinion is further supported by 

 the fact that bees occasionally mistake one hive for another, within 

 the first few days after swarming, or when the hive has been re- 

 moved to a little distance from a spot on which it has originally been 

 placed, as was the case with many bees of this swarm, which 

 entered the adjoining hive, apparently by mistake. This occurred 

 frequently during the first two days after swarming, and the result 

 of this error on the part of the swarmed bees was that there was 

 much fighting before the hives, on this and the following day, 

 until the intruders had ceased to mistake the proper entrance to 

 their own dwelling. 



Although 1 was unable as yet to discover any comb within the 

 hive which contained the swarm, owing to the crowding of the 

 bees around it, I was satisfied that a portion of comb had already 

 been made, since a number of bees were continually separating 

 themselves from the cluster with little transparent scales of wax 

 in their mouths, and, forcing their way into the mass, were quickly 

 lost sight of. At eleven o'clock there was much activity in the 

 swarm, and one or two bees were now for the first time engaged 



