THR BEE. 341 



pervious to the sting. Thus encased in coat of mail, 

 they often engage for a long time in bloodless battles. 

 The intervals however between the rings of the belly are 

 vulnerable. In this point their attention is directed to 

 their battles. And the bee which succeeds in thrusting 

 its sting between these rings, lays his antagonist in an 

 instant lifeless at his feet. 



GENERATION. 



* How numerous soever the multitude of bees may ap- 

 pear in one swarm, yet they all owe their origin to a sin- 

 gle parent, which is called the queen bee. It is indeed 

 surprising that a single insect should in one summer give 

 birth to above twenty thousand young. But upon open- 

 ing her body the wonder will cease, as the number of 

 eggs appearing at one time amounts to five thousand. 

 This animal whose existence is of such importance to 

 her subjects, may easily be distinguished from the rest, 

 by her size, and the shape of her body. On her safety 

 depends the whole welfare of the commonwealth, and the 

 attentions paid her by all the rest of the swarm evidently 

 show the dependence her subjects have upon her securi- 

 ty. If this insect be carefully observed she will be seen 

 at times attended with a numerous retinue, marching from 

 cell to cell, plunging the extremity of her body into 

 many of them and leaving a small egg in each. 



When the queen bee has deposited the number of eggs 

 necessary, in the cells, the working bees undertake the 

 care of the rising posterity. They are seen to leave off 

 their usual employments, to construct proper receptacles 

 for eggs, or to complete those already formed. They 

 purposely build little cells extremely solid, for the young, 

 in which they employ a great deal of wax. Those de- 

 signed for lodging the males, as was already observed, 

 are larger than the rest, and those for queen bees, largest 

 of all. There is usually but one egg deposited in every 

 ce-I. When the fecundity of the queen is such that it ex- 

 ceeds the number of cells, already prepared, there are 

 sometimes three or four eggs crowded together in the 

 same apartment. But this is an inconvenience which 



VOL. II. NO. XV.. 29* 



