DRONE BEES. 90 



Let us suppose ourselves, one moonlight evening in May, 

 taking a garden stroll beside a range of Bee-hives. Instead of 

 the nightly stillness which is wont in Bee cities to succeed the 

 daily hum, there arises from one of these a loud uneasy 

 murmur, which instead of lessening, continues to increase with 

 the lateness of the hour. Our hive is not of glass, but if it 

 were, the restlessness thus audible without would become 

 apparent within, by the evidences of crowding, confusion, and 

 jostling, by all the tokens, in short, usually attendant on 

 some grand event in expectation. From so violent a ferment 

 of vitality something must of necessity arise ; but through the 

 livelong night nothing comes of it, and the morning sun rises 

 on nothing but the same scene and sound of agitated turmoil. 



From tokens such as these an ordinary keeper of Bees 

 would merely surmise that a swarm was coming, and an old- 

 fashioned village dame would be sure by this time to be getting 

 in readiness her frying-pan and iron ladle, to bring the parting 

 colony to their new abode. 



Mid-day now approaches, and the body of emigrants rush 

 forth, headed, or, it may be, followed by their sovereign lady. 

 These, however, we mean not to accompany even to the adja- 

 cent bough on which they have settled, most likely for a tem- 

 porary rest, because we shall see better by keeping to the parent 

 hive, the effect of the loss of its queen with a large proportion 

 of its population. Row upon row of hexagonal houses hang 

 suspended in clusters from a common roof. Most of them are 

 occupied, some as store-houses for honey and Bee-bread, others 

 as nurseries for Bee-infancy, and, where not otherwise engaged, 

 as dormitories for Bee-labourers, who, with heads and shoul- 

 ders ensconced within their cells, are accustomed, at intervals, 

 thus to turn their backs on labour, and recruit for fresh 

 exertions. But few enough are the slumberers now taking 

 their repose; the grand event of the morning has raised a 

 general commotion by no means subsided with the absence of 

 its immediate cause; from which mighty effects are yet about 

 to spring. 



