380 



LETTER XX. 



SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 

 PERFECT SOCIETIES concluded. 



HAVING given you a history sufficiently ample of the queen or female bee, 

 I shall next add some account of the drone or male bee ; but this will not 

 detain you long, since " to be born and die " is nearly the sum total of 

 their story. Much abuse, from the earliest times, has been lavished upon 

 this description of the inhabitants of the hive, and their indolence and 

 gluttony have become proverbial. Indeed, at first sight, it seems extraor- 

 dinary that seven or eight hundred individuals should be supported at the 

 public expense, and to common appearance do nothing all the while, that 

 may be thought to earn their living. But the more we look into nature, 

 the more we discover the truth of that common axiom, that nothing is 

 made in vain. Creative Wisdom cannot be caught at fault. Therefore, 

 where we do not at present perceive the reasons of things, instead of cavilling 

 at what we do not understand, we ought to adore in silence, and wait 

 patiently till the veil is removed which, in any particular instance, conceals 

 its final cause from our sight. The mysteries of nature are gradually 

 opened to us, one truth making way for the discovery of another ; but 

 still there will always be in nature, as well as in revelation, even in those 

 things that fall under our daily observation, mysteries to exercise our faith 

 and humility ; so that we may alwa} r s reply to the caviller, " Thine own 

 things and those that are grown up with thee hast thou not known ; how 

 then shall thy vessel comprehend the way of the Highest ? " 



Various have been the conjectures of naturalists, even in very recent 

 times, with respect to the fertilisation of the eggs of the bee. Some have 

 supposed, and the number of males seemed to countenance the suppo- 

 sition, that this was effected after they were deposited in the cells. Of 

 this opinion Maraldi seems to have been the author ; and it was adopted by 

 Mr. Debraw of Cambridge, who asserts that he has seen the smaller 

 males (those that are occasionally produced in cells usually appropriated 

 to workers) introduce their abdomen into cells containing eggs and fer- 

 tilise them : and that the eggs so treated proved fertile, while others that 

 were not remained sterile. The common or large drones, which form the 

 bulk of the male population. of the hive, could not be generally destined to 

 this office, since their abdomen, on account of its size, could only be in- 

 troduced into male and royal cells. Bonnet, however, saw some motions 

 of one of these drones, which, while it passed by those that were empty, 

 appeared to strike with its abdomen the mouth of the cells containing 





