PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 305 



bees, which, before I enter upon the history of them in their perfect form, 

 I shall now detail to you. Sixteen days is the time assigned to a queen 

 for her existence in her preparatory states, before she is ready to emerge 

 from her cell. Three she remains in the egg ; when hatched she continues 

 feeding five more ; when covered in she begins to spin her cocoon, which 

 occupies another day ; as if exhausted by this labour, she now remains per- 

 fectly still for two days and sixteen hours ; and then assumes the pupa, 

 in which state she remains exactly four days and eight hours making in 

 all the period I have just named. A longer time, by four days, is required 

 to bring the workers to perfection ; their preparatory states occupying 

 twenty days, and those of the male even twenty-four. The former con- 

 sumes half a day more than the queen in spinning its cocoon, a circum- 

 stance most probably occasioned by a singular difference in the structure 

 and dimensions of this envelop, which I shall explain to you presently. 

 Thus you see that the peculiar circumstances which change the form and 

 functions of a bee accelerate its appearance as a perfect insect ; and that 

 by choosing a grub three days old, when the bees want a queen, they ac- 

 tually gain six days ; for in this case she is ready to come forth in ten days, 

 instead of sixteen, which would be required was a recently laid egg fixed 

 upon. 1 



The larvae of bees, though without feet, are not altogether without 

 motion. They advance from their first station at the bottom of the cell, 

 as I before hinted, in a spiral direction. This movement, for the first three 

 days, is so slow as to be scarcely perceptible ; but after this it is more 

 easily discerned. The animal now makes two entire revolutions in about 

 an hour and three quarters ; and when the period of its metamorphosis 

 arrives, it is scarcely more than two lines from the mouth of the cell. Its 

 attitude, which is always the same, is a strong curve. 2 This .occasions the 

 inhabitants of a horizontal cell to be always perpendicular to the horizon, 

 and that of a vertical one to be parallel with it. 



A most remarkable difference, as I lately observed, takes place in spin- 

 ning their cocoons, the grubs of workers and drones spinning complete 

 cocoons, while those that are spun by the females are incomplete, or open 

 at the lower end, and covering only the head and trunk and the first seg- 

 ment of the abdomen. This variation is probably occasioned by the dif- 

 ferent forms of the cells : for if a female larva be placed in a worker's cell, 

 it will spin a complete cocoon ; and, vice versa, if a worker larva be placed 

 in a royal cell, its cocoon will be incomplete. 3 No provision of the Great 

 Author of nature is in vain. In the present instance, the fact which we 

 are considering is of great importance to the bees ; for, were the females 

 wholly covered by the thick texture of a cocoon, their destruction by their 

 rival competitors for the throne could not so readily be accomplished ; 

 they either would not be able to reach them with their stings, or the 

 stings might be detained by their barbs in the meshes of the cocoon, so 

 that they would not be able to disengage them. On the use of this in- 

 stinctive and murderous hatred of their rivals I shall soon enlarge. 



1 Huber, i. 215. Schirach asserts, that in cold weather the disclosure of the 

 imago takes place two days later than in warm ; and Riein, that in a bad season 

 the eggs will remain in the cells many months without hatching. (Schirach, 79. 



a Schirach, t. 3. f. 10. 3 Huber, i. 224. 



