HONEY 393 



queen-mother goes from one to another, dragging 

 with much effort her fruitful womb. The nurses 

 form a respectful retinue. One egg, one only, is 

 laid in each cell. In a few days from three to six 

 there comes from this egg a larva, a little white 

 worm, without legs, bent like a comma. Now begins 

 tlu- nurses' delicate work. 



"They must every day, and several times a day, 

 distribute nourishment to the little worms, not honey 

 or pollen in its natural state, but a preparation of 

 increasing strength such as delicate stomachs need at 

 first. It is, in the beginning, a liquid paste, almost 

 tasteless; then something sweeter; and finally pure 

 honey, nourishment at its full strength. Do we of- 

 fer a slice of beef to a crying baby? No, but milk 

 first and then pap. Bees do the same: they have 

 honey, strong food, for the strong ; and weaker nour- 

 ishment, tasteless pap, for the weak. How do they 

 prepare these more or less substantial foods? It 

 would be hard to say. Perhaps they mix pollen and 

 honey in different proportions. 



"In six days the larvse, called brood-comb, have 

 attained tlu-ir development. Then, like the larvae of 

 other insects, they retire from the world to undergo 

 metamorphosis. In order to protect its suffering 

 flesh at the critical moment of its transfiguration, 

 each larva lines the inside of its cell with silk, and 

 the workiiiL lose the cell with a cover of wax. 



In the silk-lined ease the skin is cast off and the 

 passage to the state of nymph accomplished. 

 Twelve days later the nymph awakes from the deep 

 sleep of the second l.irth: it shakes itself, tears its 



