28C A BOOK OF INSECTS 



to another, fixing an egg to the inner wall of each at the 

 rate of one hundred or more per hour. The eggs hatch 

 in about three days, and the young larva? are at first fed 

 upon a kind of pap (" chyle-food ") which is regurgitated 

 by the nurse workers ; but in three days weaning takes 

 place, pollen and honey being added to the regime. In 

 five days the larva is full-fed, and ready to spin its cocoon. 

 Its cell is then sealed down by the workers with a porous 

 capping of wax mixed with pollen. Pupation occupies 

 thirteen days ; then, about twenty-one days after the egg 

 was laid, the perfect worker bee bites round the roof of 

 her nursery and mingles with the teeming population of 

 the hive. She is at first weak and wan, but at the ex- 

 piration of four-and-twenty hours is ready to commence 

 work as a nurse. She does not venture from the hive to 

 collect nectar and pollen until ten or twelve days later. 



As the season advances, from three to four hundred 

 drones are reared in the larger cells specially prepared for 

 the purpose. The eggs which the queen lays in these 

 cells are unimpregnated, and invariably produce male 

 insects. Drones take twenty-four days from the laying 

 of the egg to reach maturity. 



When the increase of the worker population threatens 

 to overtax the capacity of the hive, a few royal cells are 

 prepared. The eggs laid therein are identical with those 

 which are supplied by the queen to worker cells ; but 

 these royal grubs are fed exclusively upon chyle-food. 

 The effect of this is to promote full and rapid physical 

 development, so that a young princess can be reared in 

 from fifteen to seventeen days. 



Now commences that remarkable series of phenomena 

 known as " swarming." The old queen evinces signs of 

 ungovernable excitement when she hears the young prin- 

 cesses piping in their ceils. The work of the community 



