INSECTA. 353 



usually one female, the queen, (the king of the ancients). The working 

 bees are smaller than the queen, which is also distinguished by a larger 

 abdomen. The drones are as large as the queen, or larger, (the wings 

 especially are larger) ; they have no sting, and the first joint of the tarsus 

 of the posterior feet is neither invested with a woolly covering, nor length- 

 ened into a point ; the eyes are larger and close together. 



The working bees are, as was first discovered by SCHIRACH, nothing else 

 than imperfectly developed females. If the larvae of workers in the first 

 three days after leaving the egg receive a more abundant and more fluid 

 nutriment, and be transferred to the larger royal cells, there proceed from 

 these, according to observations, which have been often distrusted, but, as 

 it seems, are not deceptive, fruitful females or queens. The instinct of the 

 working bees is consequently the instinct of female animals ; they accomplish 

 a part of the maternal duties and take care of the larvae, the progeny of 

 their more highly preferred sister. Some of the working bees have the 

 charge of collecting food and material for building ; others, apparently 

 weaker, remain in the hive, care for the feeding of the larvae, and fulfil 

 domestic duties. 



These insects live originally in hollow stems of trees. Our domestic bees 

 build in hives, to which different forms have been given. When a swarm 

 of bees first comes into a hive, they cover it internally with an adhesive, 

 resinous fluid, to keep out the cold air. This substance the ancients named 

 propolis ; the bees obtain it from the clammy buds and young leaves of 

 willows, elms, &c. Next they build with the wax (which was formerly 

 thought to be prepared from the pollen of flowers, but is a true secretion 

 from the honey 1 ) perpendicular flat cakes or combs, beginning from above. 

 These cakes consist of hexagonal cells, placed horizontally on each side, and 

 opposed to each other by their tops, which are formed of three rhombs that 

 meet in a solid angle. Each of these cells has 5^ millimeters in mean diameter, 

 and, the royal cells excepted, the rest are nearly of the same size. Between 

 the cakes they leave spaces, which serve as passages, and in which two bees 

 can creep at the same time. Some cells contain eggs, others larvae or 

 pupae, others again honey or pollen. The cell for the future queen is more 

 spacious, almost cylindrical; its outer surface is rough, from impressed 

 angular cavities, resembling imperfect cells. The number of these royal 



1 As early as the middle of the last century (1774), a german priest (HORNBOSTEL), 

 nder the name of MELITTOPHILUS THEOSEBASTUS, published observations on the sepa- 

 ation of wax, which however were rescued from oblivion by TKEVIRANUS only twenty 

 ears ago. The observations of JOHN HUNTER, Phil. Trans. 1792, p. 143, are better 

 nown. The secretion of wax occurs in very thin transparent little plates on the 

 bdominal surface of the working bees, and is collected in the folds between the rings. 

 >ee G. R. TREVIRANUS in FR. TIEDEMANN, G. R. and L. C. TREVIRANUS Zeitschr. f. 



xiol. in. 1829, s. 6271 ; comp. on the chemical question of the production of 

 ?ax, a note in LIEBIG'S Organ. Chem. s. 307 315, from W. F. GUNDLACH'S Natur- 

 esch. der Bienen, Cassel, 1842, and the observations of DUMAS and MILNE EDWARDS, 

 upported by accurate weighing, communicated to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, 

 inn. des Sc. not. ie SeYie, xx. Zool. pp. 174 181. 



VOL. I. 23 



