1872.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



281 



of conscious beauty, to catch the eye of the sun, 

 as well as 



" Daffodils, that come before the swallow dares, 

 And take the winds of March with beautj\" 



The yellow catkins of the sallow, too, are al- 

 ready swarmed around by bees, the latter being 

 our Northern rei^resentative of the palm, which 

 heralded " i^eace to earth and good will to man." 

 The bees thus announce that the business of the 

 year has begun, and that the lethargy of winter 

 is superseded by energetic activity. 



The instinctive impulse of the cares of mater- 

 nity prompt the wild liees to their early assidu- 

 ity, urging them to their eager quest of these 

 foremost indications of the renewed year. The 

 firstling bees are forthwith at their earnest work 

 of collecting hoiley and pollen, which, kneaded 

 into paste, are to become both the cradle and 

 the sustenance of their future progeny. 



Wherever we investigate wonderful Nature, 

 we observe the most beautiful adaptation and 

 arrangement ; everywhere the correlations of 

 structure with function. In conlirmation of 

 which I may here briefly notice in anticipation, 

 that the bees are divided into two large groups — 

 the short-tongued and the long-tongued -and it 

 is the short-tongued which are first abroad, the 

 corolla of the first flowers being shallow, and the 

 nectar depositories obvious, an arrangement 

 which facilitates their obtaining the honey al- 

 ready at iiand. These bees are also amply fur- 

 nished, in the clothing of their posterior legs, or 

 otherwise, witii the means to convey home the 

 pollen which they vigorously collect, finding it 

 already in superfluous abundance, and which, 

 being borne from flower to flower, impregnates 

 and makes fruitful those plants which require 

 external agents to accomplish their fertility. 

 Thus nature duly provides, by an interchange of 

 offices, for the general good, and by simple, al- 

 though sometimes obscure means, gives motion 

 and persistency to the wheel within wheel which 

 so exquisitely fulfil her designs, and roll for- 

 ward, unremittingly, her stupendous fabric. 



The way in which bees execute this object and 

 design of nature, and to which they, more evi- 

 dently than any other insects, are called to the 

 performance, is shown in the implanted instinct 

 which prompts them to seek flowers, knowing, 

 by means of that instinct, that flowers will fur- 

 nish them with what is needful both for their 

 own sustenance and for that of their descend- 

 ants. Flowers, to this end, are furnished with 

 the requisite attractive qualifications to allure 

 the bees. Whether their odor or their color be 

 the tempting vehicle, or both conjunctively, it is 

 scarcely possible to say, but that they should 

 hold out special invitation is requisite to the 

 maintenance of their own perpetuity. This, it 

 is supposed, the color of flowers chiefly eftects 

 by being visible from a distance. Flowers, 

 within themselves, indicate to the bees visiting 

 them, the presence of nectaria by spots colored 

 differently from their petals. This nectar, gath- 

 ered by the bees as honey, is secreted by glands 

 or glandulous surfaces, seated upon the organs 

 of fructification ; and Nature has also furnished 

 means to protect these depositories of honey for 



the bees from the intrusive action of the rain, 

 which might wash the secretion away. To this 

 end it has clothed the corollse with a surface of 

 minute hairs, which effectually secures them 

 from its obtrusive action, and thus displays the 

 importance it attaches to the co-oi>eration of the 

 bees. That bees should vary considerably in 

 size is a further accommodation of Nature to 

 promote the fertilization of flowers, which, in 

 some cases, none but small insects could accom- 

 plish. Many plants could not be perpetuated 

 but for the agency of insects, and especially of 

 bees ; and it is remarkable that it is chiefly those 

 which require this intervention that have a nec- 

 tarium and secrete honey. By thus seeking the 

 honey, and obtaining it in a variety of ways, 

 bees accomplish this great object of Nature. 

 It often, also, happens that flowers which even 

 contain within themselves the means of ready 

 fructification, cannot derive it from the pollen 

 of their own anthers, but require that the pollen 

 should be conveyed from the anthers of younger 

 flowers. In some cases the reverse takes place, 

 as, for instance, in the Euphorbia Cyparissias, 

 wherein it is the pollen of the older flower 

 which, through the same agency, fertilizes the 

 younger. In those occasional cases where the 

 nectarium of the flower is not perceptible, if the 

 spur of such a flower which usually becomes the 

 depository of the nectar, that has oozed from 

 the capsules secreting it, be too narrow for the 

 entrance of the bee, and even beyond the reach 

 of its long tongue, it contrives to attain its ob- 

 ject "by biting a hole on the outside, through 

 which it taps the store. The skill of bees in 

 flnding the honey, even when it is much with- 

 drawn from notice, is a manifest indication of 

 the prompting instinct which tells them where 

 to seek it, and is a matter of extreme interest to 

 the observer, for the honey marks surely guide 

 them ; and where these, as in some flowers, are 

 placed in a circle upon its bosom, they work 

 their way around, lapping the nectar as they go. 

 To facilitate this fecundation of plants, which is 

 Nature's prime object, bees are usually more or 

 less hairy ; so that if even they limit themselves 

 to imbibing nectar, they involuntarily fulfil the 

 greater design by conveying the pollen from 

 flower to flower. To many insects, especially 

 flies, some flowers are a fatal attraction, for 

 their viscous secretions often make these insects 

 prisoner*, and thus destroy them. To the bees 

 this rarely or never happens, either by reason of 

 their superior strength, or possibly from the in- 

 stinct which repels them from visiting flowers 

 which exude so clammy a substance. It is 

 probably only to the end of promoting fertiliza- 

 tion by the attraction of insects that the struc- 

 tui'e of those flowers which secrete nectar is ex- 

 clusively conducive, and which fully and satis- 

 factorily explains the final cause of this organi- 

 zation. 



To detect these things it is requisite to observe 

 Nature out of doors^an occupation which has 

 its own rich i-eward in the health and cheerful- 

 ness it promotes— and there to watch patiently 

 and attentively. It is only by unremitting per- 

 severance, diligence and assiduity, that we can 

 hope to explore the interesting habits and pecu 



