WINGS OF INSECTS, AND THEIR CLASSIFICATION. 47 



this insect with the bee. Let us, therefore, lay the two 

 side by side. Here (fig. 2l,b) Fig 21 



is the drone-fly with its 

 bright broad wings it seems 

 no wonder that the creature 

 flies. Now turn to the bee 

 (a) ; four little wisps lie 

 upon its back, and we mar- 

 vel how it uses them.* The 

 bee is heavier than the fly, ; 

 the wings may perhaps be of slightly magnified, 

 equal, or more than equal expanse when unfolded, but 

 how much force is lost by their division ? The drone- 

 fly has one broad wing on each side, the bee has two 

 narrow ones. Why is this ? and how is it compensated ? 

 Let us begin at the beginning. When our drone-fly 

 crept from the egg he found himself an uninviting looking 

 little grub with a most inordinate tail, which although 

 it had its uses, by no means improved his appearance. 

 Besides this, he was unfavourably placed, being in the 

 mud at the bottom of a dirty pool, or perhaps of a more 

 dirty drain. Finding it in vain to try to be ornamental, 

 the little grub set about being useful, and began by 

 seeing what could be done with his tail, which, lengthen- 

 ing it with a sort of telescope movement, and elevating 

 it to the surface of the water (he himself being immersed 

 to the depth of perhaps some inches), he found to be an 

 excellent breathing tube, through which he might obtain 



* It was intended that a worker hive bee should be figured here, but 

 the figure is of a drone, whose wings are larger. The wings are also par- 

 tially expanded in the figure, not closed up into a small space as described. 

 The reader must therefore be referred to a live honey-bee when at rest, 

 and to which the following description applies. 



