258 ANIMAL SKETCHES. CHAP. 



lating effects of a liberal supply of royal-jelly she becomes 

 a queen-mother. Not only are her egg-producing organs 

 thus stimulated into full development, but this change is 

 accompanied by all those other differences which serve to 

 distinguish the queen-mother from her infertile but, in 

 most other respects, superior sister. 



Thus the development of the worker and the queen- 

 mother is identical till the third day of larval existence 

 identical, that is to say, during the three days of egg- 

 development previous to the hatching of the grub, and 

 during the first three days of grub-life. Then, under the 

 influence of different nourishment, the " queen " and the 

 worker develop along different lines, the one to be the 

 fertile mother of thousands, the other to minister to the 

 queen-mother and her larval offspring. After about two 

 more days of larval life the little grubs cease feeding and 

 spin a cocoon of silk elaborated from glands in the mouth. 

 This process takes from one (queen-mother) to one and 

 a half days (worker), after which the larva remains 

 quiescent for one or two days before passing into the 

 chrysalis condition, from which the " queen " emerges 

 sooner than the worker ; the total period from the laying 

 of the egg to the emergence of the perfect bee extending 

 to fifteen days for the queen-mother, twenty-one days for 

 the worker, and twenty-four days for the drone. 



Nothing in natural history is more wonderful than the 

 changes which are undergone by one of the higher insects 

 during the chrysalis sleep. When the bee-larva falls into 

 this momentous trance it is a white grub without legs or 

 feelers, with a dull grey head and two dark eye-spots. 

 Behind the head are a dozen rings or body-segments 

 differing but little from each other. In this condition 

 it is when it becomes a quiescent chrysalis. A few days 

 pass by during which its whole organic being is anew 



