10 HISTORY AND PHYSIOLOGY. 



welcome morsels of which, it eagerly opens its two 

 lateral pincers. It is the opinion of Reaumur and 

 others that farina does not constitute the sole food 

 of the bee-larvae, but that it consists of a mixture 

 of farina with a certain proportion of honey and 

 water, partly digested in the stomachs of the nurs- 

 ing * bees 9 the relative proportions of honey and 

 farina varying according to the age of the young. 

 It is insipid whilst they are very young, and be- 

 comes sweeter and more acescent the nearer they 

 approach maturity. 



Schirach imagined that the semen of the male 

 was the food of the larvae : Bonnet entertained 

 the same opinion, founded upon his observation 

 that the drones, in going across the combs, pass 

 by those cells that contain no maggots, but stop 

 at those which do, giving a knock with the tail at 

 them three times. Upon this Mr. Hunter observes 

 that three is a famous number ! and we know very 

 well that the development is complete in hives 

 that do not contain a single drone. 



The larva having derived support in the man- 

 ner above described, for four, five or six days, 

 according to the season -)*, continues to increase 

 during that period, till it occupies the whole 



* For an account of these see Part II. "Nature and 

 Origin of Bees- wax." 



j- Schirach asserts, that in cool weather the development 

 takes place two days later than in warm. 



