426 



BEE. 



Bee. in rearing them should be divided among several indi- 

 1 viduals residing in different districts. The trade of 

 foreign countnes in wax is very considerable ; and the 

 increasing demand for it may render the culture of 

 bees more worthy of notice at home. In the year 

 1806, there was exported from the port of Mogadore, 

 in Africa, 234,555 pounds of bees wax. 



The honey bee is frequent in the wild state in 

 warmer climates, but is very rarely to be found in 

 Britain ; nevertheless it is said to exist, and that a 

 hive was discovered within these some years. Thus 

 the animal may have either been domesticated at a 

 very remote period by the inhabitants, or it may have 

 been brought from abroad. Naturalists doubt whe- 

 ther the wild hopey bee is a native of America, 

 though existing in numbers in the woods. It is ra- 

 ther supposed to have been carried thither in the six- 

 teenth or seventeenth century. Honey is said to be 

 a great article of subsistence in Madagascar, and in 

 other places where bees are common in the clefts of 

 trees. In Africa, there is a small bird called cuculus 

 indicator, or the honey bird, which, uttering a pecu- 

 liar note, and flitting from bough to bough, will in- 

 fallibly lead the traveller to a swarm in some hollow 

 of a tree. See Swammerdam Biblia Naturce. Ma- 

 raldi sur les Abeilles, Mem. de I' Academic des Sciences, 

 1712. Reaumur, Memoires pour servir a I' Histoire 

 des Insectes, torn. v. Schirach, Histoire Naturelle de 

 la Reine des Abeilles. Bergman, De Ambus et Mel- 

 lificii vicissiludinibtis ex Alveorum ponderatione ces- 

 limandis: Opuscula, torn. v. Ray, Memoire sur I' His- 

 toire des Abeilles, Journal de Physique, torn. xxiv. 

 Bonnet, (Euvres, torn. v. Delia Rocca, Traite com- 

 plet sur les Abeilles. Butler, The Feminine Monar- 

 chy. Hartlib, Commonwealth of Bees. Thorley, In- 

 quiry into the Nature, Order, and Government of 

 Bees. Wildman On the Management of Bees. Brom- 

 wich, The Experienced Bee Keeper. Bonner, A new 

 plan for speedily increasing the number of Bee Hives 

 in Scotland. Hubcr, New Observations on the Na- 

 tural History of Bees. See also Apis. 



The indistinct descriptions which some travellers 

 give of the bees of different foreign countries, render 

 it difficult for us to determine whether the real honey 

 bee is meant or not. It is true, they describe such 

 bees as being the same ; but they maintain, that one 

 species wants a sting, and that another nestles in the 

 earth with its honey. So far as naturalists have yet 

 ascertained, neither of these peculiarities belong to 

 the honey bae ; but it is extremely probable, that be- 

 sides the single species which we keep in hives, others 

 might be domesticated. One kind is found in Suri- 

 nam, which hives in very numerous societies. These 

 construct a nest eight or ten inches in diameter, and 

 eighteen or twenty long, towards the top of trees of 

 moderate height. Within are found large cells of 

 a fine reddish liquid honey, in great abundance. The 

 nests, which resemble a lump of earth applied against 

 the tree, cannot be procured unless the tree be cut 

 down, when the natives of the country, after using 

 the honey, and making a kind of mead, roll the wax 

 around matches. 

 Humble- There is a species of bee which collects the honey 



"bee. of plantB, and stores it up in cells, though we may 



doubt if this is intended for its winter provision. This 

 7 



is called the humming or humble bee ; an insect so 

 common in Britain as to have attracted the attention 

 of every one. Like the honey bee, it lives in societies, 

 consisting of from twenty to an hundred males, fe- 

 males, and what are supposed neuters. We have never 

 found the society more numerous in Scotland, and the 

 continental authors seem to describe it as smaller. 

 These societies either dwell in cavities of the earth, or 

 in tufts of moss collected together on the surface ; or 

 sometimes those whose proper habitation is in such 

 cavities, are content with a hollow of the ground, 

 where they cover themselves with moss and bits of 

 leaves ; or we have seen them effect a lodgement in a 

 wooden box, some feet above the ground, in which they 

 appeared to have themselves collected moss and leaves, 

 and there bred a considerable colony. In reverting to 

 the origin of these societies, we are opposed by very 

 considerable difficulties. It seems probable, that a 

 single female, which has been accidentally preserved 

 through the winter, is the parent of the whole, and 

 that she selects the spot, or cavity, for her posterity. 

 No naturalist has, we believe, yet beheld a nest in its 

 origin, though it has been seen when consisting of 

 few cells. Reaumur relates, that on one occasion he 

 removed the whole combs from a nest, and complete- 

 ly evacuated the interior. Nothing was visible for 

 several days ; but after the bees had remained eight 

 days undisturbed, a lump of paste and farina the size 

 of a nut was found in it, attached to which was a pot 

 of honey ; that is, a half made cell, which the bees 

 at times construct, and in which some of their honey 

 is kept. Thence, and from other circumstances, it 

 is conjectured, that the mother proceeds to collect a 

 quantity of farina or pollen, in the midst of which 

 her eggs are laid ; and by their coming to maturity 

 after a certain time, the colonv is constituted and en- 

 larged. Several females inhabit the same nest, living 

 in harmony together. They are occupied in collect- 

 ing honey ; and are easily known, from being the 

 largest of all the three species. The males are next 

 in size ; always of a lighter colour ; and are capable 

 of making wax. The workers are of various sizes 

 in the same nest, some not being half the size of 

 others. Nature does not require the like sacrifice in 

 the males of humble bees as in those of the honey 

 bee to propagate the species ; the sexual union takes 

 place according to the common mode of insects : nei- 

 ther is there any massacre among them. Females and 

 workers are much less disposed to use their stings 

 than the honey bee : here, also, the males have 

 none. 



On opening a nest containing a colony of humble 

 bees, a confused and mishapen aggregate of ovoidal 

 substances is disclosed, interspersed in various parts 

 with crude masses of wax, and cells of honey. The 

 ovoidal substances are the young coming to maturity, 

 within a silken coccoun coated with wax ; and amidst 

 some of the lumps of wax arc found larvx, which one 

 author thinks are there for the purpose of being fed, 

 and another for being preserved from cold and humi- 

 dity. The eggs are deposited in cells, which the 

 workers lend their aid to construct ; and the mother 

 herself completes them, smoothing and polishing the 

 interior. When she prepares to lay in a cell, the work- 

 er?, unlike that care which those of common bees bffi-- 



Bee, 



