195 



THE HIVE-BEE 



Is celebrated for its ingenuity and industry, in forming 

 its habitation, and providing food for the winter season. 

 The young swarms come out about June, and being settled 

 in a hive, they immediately begin to form the comb. The 

 cells are sexagonal, placed in rows of two deep, their bases 

 together. Each set forms a roundish plate covered up, and 

 gradually rounded at the edges ; these are placed in layers, 

 with their edges towards the top and bottom ; the upper 

 cells are smaller and neater than the lower. These cells 

 are destined for three different contents; the eggs, the 

 honey, and bee-food. One egg is deposited by the queen 

 in each cell, and there hatches into a little worm, which 

 feeds on the jelly-like substance on which it is placed, till 

 in about six days it attains its full size , the labouring 

 Bees then close the entrance of the cell, which the Maggot 

 lines with silky threads. In its pupa state it differs but 

 little from the perfect Bee ; on its first leaving its cell, it 

 is weak and feeble, and attended and fed with great assi- 

 duity by the other Bees. There is but one queen in each 

 hive, to whom the greatest attention is paid. The males 

 are few in number, and are destroyed by the others in a 

 month or two from their birth. The males are larger than 

 the others, but not so long as the queen. The labourers 

 are the smallest, and are generally 16 or 18,000 in one hive. 

 They perform all the labours, building the comb, and 

 gathering honey, &c. The wax is an oily secretion of 

 their own bodies, found between the scales of the abdomen. 

 The Bee-food is formed of the farina of flowers, and some 

 animal juice in their own mouths. The honey is also 

 obtained from the flowers by some peculiar process. It is 

 said, that the queen larva is fed with a different food. 

 The swarming is supposed to arise from the want of room 

 in the hive. 



THE POPPY BEE. 



Forms a cell in the ground, which she carefully lines 

 with curiously cut pieces of the petals of the scarlet poppy. 

 On the bottom she piles a store of a paste mixed of honey 



