THE AMEEICAN BEE JOUENAL. 



95 



Yet the education of tlie young brood is their 

 chief object, and to this they constantly sacrifice 

 all personal and selfish considerations. In a 

 new s\rarm the first care is to build a series of 

 cells to serve as cradles; and little or no lioney 

 is collected until an ample store of bee-hread^ as 

 it is called, has been laid up for their food. 

 This bee-bread is composed of the pollen of 

 flowers, which the workers are incessantly em- 

 ployed in gathering, flying from flower to 

 flower, brushing from the stamens their yellow 

 treasure, and collecting it in the little baskets 

 with which their hind legs are so admirably 

 provided; then hastening to the hive, and having 

 deposited their booty, returning for a new load. 

 The provision thus furnished by one set of 

 laborers is carefully stored up by another, until 

 the eggs which the queen-bee has laid, and 

 which, adhering by a glutinous covering, she 

 places nearly upright iu the bottom of the cell, 

 are hatched. With this bee-bread, after it has 

 undergone a conversion into a sort of whitish 

 jelly by being received into the bee's stomach, 

 where it is probably mixed with honey and re- 

 gurgitated, the young brood immediately upon 

 their exclusion, and until their change into 

 nymphs are diligently fed by other bees, which 

 anxiously attend upon them and several times 

 a day afi'ord a fresh supply. Dift'erent bees are 

 Been successively to introduce their heads into 

 the cells containing them, and after remaining 

 in that position some moments, during wliich 

 they replace the expended provision, pass on to 

 those in the neighborhuod. Others often imme- 

 diately succeed, and in like manner put in their 

 heads as if to see that the young ones have every 

 thing necessary ; whic i being ascertained by 

 a glance, they immediately proceed, and stop 

 only when they find a cell almost exhausted of 

 food. That the office of these purveyors is no 

 very simple aflixir will be admitted when it is 

 understood that the food of all the grubs is not 

 the same, but that it varies according to their 

 age, being insipid when they are young, and, 

 when they have nearly attained maturity, more 

 sugary and somewhat acid. The larvae destined 

 for queen-bees, too, require a food altogetbor 

 difl"erent from that appropriated to those of 

 drones and workers. It may be recognized by 

 its sharp and pungent taste. 



So accurately is the supply of food pro- 

 portioned to the wants of the larvae, that when 

 they have attained their full growth and are 

 ready to become nymphs, no't an atom is left 

 uncousumed. At this period, intuitively known 

 to their assiduous foster-parents, they terminate 

 their cares by sealing up each cell with a lid of 

 wax, convex in those containing the larvte of 

 drones, and nearly flat in those containing the 

 iarvte of workers, beneath which the enclosed 

 tenants spin in security their cocoon. In all 

 these labors neither the queen nor the drones 

 take the slightest share. They fall exclusively 

 upon the workers, who, constantly called upon 

 to tend fresh broods as those brought to maturity 

 are disposed of, devote nearly the whole of 

 their existence to these maternal offices. 



Humble-bees, which inrespectof their general 

 policy, must, when compared Avith bees and 

 wasps, be regarded as rude and untutored villa- 



gers, exhibit, nevertheless, marks of affection 

 for their young quite as strong as their more 

 polished neighbors. The females, like those of 

 wasps, take a considerable share in their edu- 

 cation. When one of them has with great labor 

 constructed a commodious Avaxen cell, she next 

 furnishes it Avith a store of pollen moistened 

 Avith honey; and then, having deposited six or 

 seven eggs, carefully closes the orifice and 

 minutest interstices with Avax. But this is not 

 the Avhole of her task. By a strange instinct, 

 AA'hich, hoAvever, may be necessary to Ivcep the 

 population within due bounds, the workers, 

 Avhile she is occupied in laying her eggs, en- 

 deavor to seize them from her, and, if they 

 succeed, greedily devour them. To prevent 

 this violence, her utmost activity is scarcely 

 adequate ; and it is only after she has again and 

 again beat off the murderous intruders, and pur- 

 sued them to the furthest verge of the nest, that 

 she succeeds in her operation. When finished, 

 she isstillunderthenecessity of closely guarding 

 the cell, Avhicli the gluttonous Avorkers would 

 otherwise tear open, and devour the eggs. 

 This duty she performs for six or eight hours 

 Avith the vigilance of an Argus, at the end of 

 which time they lose their taste for this food, 

 and Avill not touch it even when presented to 

 them. Here the labors of the mother cease, 

 and are succeeded by those of the workers. 

 These know the precise hour when the 

 grubs have consumed their stock of food, and 

 from that time to their maturity regularly feed 

 them Avith either honey or pollen, introduced 

 in their proboscis through a small hole in the 

 cover of the cell opened for the occasion, and 

 thencarefuUy closed. 



They are equally assiduous in another 

 operation. -As the grubs increase in size, the 

 cell which contained them becomes too small, 

 and in their exertions to be more at case they 

 split its thin sides. To fill up these breaches as 

 fast as they occur with a patch of Avax is the 

 office of the AVorkers, who are constantly on the 

 watch to discover Avlien their services are 

 wanted ; and thus the cells daily increase in 

 size, in a way Avhich to an observer ignorant 

 of the process seems very extraordinary. 



The last duty of these afTectiouate foster- 

 parents is to assist the young bees in cutting- 

 open the cocoons which have enclosed them in 

 the state oi pu-pce. A previous labor, hoAvever, 

 must not be omitted. The workers adopt 

 similar measures Avith the hive-bee for main- 

 taining the young pupa? concealed in these 

 cocoons in a genial temperature. In cold 

 weather and at night they get upon them and 

 impart the necessary warmth by brooding over 

 them in clusters. Connected with this part of 

 their domestic economy, M. P. Huber, a Avorthy 

 scion of a celebrated stock, and an inheritor of 

 the science and merits of the great Huber as 

 Avell as of his name, in his excellent paper on 

 tliese insects in the sixth A'olume of the Linnean 

 Transactions, from Avhich most of these facts 

 are draAvn, relates a singularly curious anec- 

 dote. 



In the course of his ingenious and numerous 

 experiments, M. Huber put under a bell-glass 

 aljout a dozen humble-bees Avithout any store 



