HISTORY OF INSECTS, &c. 



BOOK IV. 



INSECTS OF THE FOURTH ORDER. 



CHAP. I. 



OF THE FOURTH ORDER OF INSECTS IN 

 GENERAL,. 



IN the foregoing part we treated of caterpillars 

 changing into butterflies; in the present will 

 be given the history of grubs changing into 

 their corresponding winged animals. These, 

 like the former, undergo their transformation, 

 and appear as grubs or maggots, as aurelias, 

 and at last as winged insects. Like the for- 

 mer, they are bred from eggs ; they feed in 

 their reptile state ; they continue motionless 

 and lifeless, as aurelias ; and fly and propa- 

 gate, when furnished with wings. But they 

 differ in many respects : the grub or maggot 

 wants the number of feet which the caterpillar 

 is seen to have ; the aurelia is not so totally 

 wrapped up, but that its feet and its wings 

 appear. The perfect animal, when emanci- 

 pated, also has its wings either cased, or trans- 

 parent like gauze ; not coloured with that 

 beautifully painted dust which adorns the 

 wings of the butterfly. 



In this class of insec's, therefore, we may 

 place a various tribe, that are first laid as 

 eggs, then are excluded as maggots or grubs, 

 then change into aurelias, with their legs and 

 wings not wrapped up but appearing ; arid, 

 lastly, assuming wings, in which state they 

 propagate their kind. Some of these have 

 four transparent wings, as bees ; some have 

 two membranous cases to their wings, as bee- 

 tles ; and somu have but two wings, which 

 are transparent as ants. Here, therefore, we 

 will place the bee, the wasp, the humble-bee, 

 -the ichneumon fly, the gnat, the tipula or long 

 legs, the beetle, the may-bug, the glow-worm, 

 and the ant. The transformation 9 which all 

 these undergo, are pretty nearly similar ; and 



though very different animals in form, yet are 

 produced nearly in the same manner. 



CHAP. II. 



OF THE BEE. 



To give a complete history of this insect in 

 a few pages, which some have exhausted vol- 

 umes in describing, and whose nature and 

 properties still continue in dispute, is impossi- 

 ble. 1 It will be sufficient to give a general 

 idea of the animal's operations ; which, though 

 they have been studied for more than two 

 thousand years, are still but incompletely 

 known. The account given us by Reaumur 

 is sufficiently minute ; and, if true, sufficient- 

 ly wonderful : but I find many of the facts 

 which he relates, doubted by those who are 

 most conversant with bees : and some of them 

 actually declared not to have a real existence 

 in nature. 



'It is unhappy, therefore, for those whose 

 method demands a history of bees, that they 

 are unfurnished with those materials which 

 have induced so many observers to contradict 

 so great a naturalist. His life was spent in 



1 The varieties of the bee are figured in the coloured Plate 

 70. Figs. 1, 2, and 3 show the three different kinds of the 

 honey-bee ; namely, the worker, the male or drone, and the 

 queen. Figs. 4 and 5 are examples of the common humble- 

 bee. Figs. 6 and 7, the male and female of the lapidary- 

 bee, so named from its habit of forming its nest amongst 

 loose heaps of stones. Fig. 8 is the moss or carder-bee, 

 so named from the moss which it employs to cover its 

 dwelling, and that mechanical process by which it seems 

 to card or comb it, to render it suitable for its purposes. 

 Fig. 9, Donovan's humble-bee. Fig. 10, Harris' humble- 

 bee. Figs. 11 and 12 exhibit the Apathus vestalis and the 

 Apathus rupeslris, or false humble-bees, whose characteristic 

 is their apathy, by which they are led to appropriate the 

 nests and stores of other bees to their own use. 



