.30 OUTLINES OF ENTOMOLOGY. 



Thus we see that while Bees could not live without flowers, many 

 flowering plants would soon cease to exist but for the agency of Bees 

 in assisting them to a vigorous development. 



It is said there are over two thousand species of bees, the majority 

 of which are small-sized and plainly-colored insects. They are distin- 

 guished from other Hymenoptera by the structure of the mouth and 

 legs, which are peculiarly adapted for collecting and conveying nectar 

 and pollen. The mouth of the Honey Bee, for example, is quite differ- 

 13.] ent from that of other biting insects. To the naked 



eye it appears like a bundle of flat, pointed bristles, 

 but when examined under the microscope these take 

 the forms represented in Fig. 13. The outer jaws 

 are large and strong, adapted for use as tools, such 

 as scissors, knives, trowels, and so forth. The inner or 

 lower jaws (maxillae), of which there are two pairs, 

 consist of long, slender jointed blades, which are 

 used for piercing and probing, while the under lip 

 (labium) is prolonged into a sort of hairy tongue. 

 Head of Bee. very flexible, with which the nectar of flowers is 

 lapped up, and with the aid of the maxillae drawn back and deposited 

 in the k ' honey crop " or provenculus where, by some mysterious chemi- 

 cal process, the crude nectar is transformed into the delicious substance 

 known as honey. Such proportion of it as is required by the insect 

 for food passes onward through the digestive tubes, while the surplus 

 is regurgitated into cells and stored for food for itself or the young of 

 which it has the care. 



When not in use, all these lengthened mouth parts are drawn close 

 together and bent under the chin. 



The modification of the legs, especially of the hinder pair, is to 

 adapt them to the work of gathering and carrying pollen. The shank 

 {tibia) is broad and somewhat hollowed out on the inner surface, and 

 has a rim of stiff hairs, thus forming a sort of basket in which the 

 pollen is piled when it has been gathered by the feet, the basal joints 

 of which are enlarged and otherwise especially adapted for the pur- 

 pose, and when also it has been brushed by the front and middle legs 

 from other parts of the hairy body on which it has accumulated in the 

 repeated divings of the insect into the cup of flowers. 



The sting is a slender tube formed of three blades, which may be 

 protruded from the abdomen, the tip of which has a needle-like point 

 and in some species is barbed. It serves not only as an ovipositor, but 

 at the will of the insect, as a weapon, in the latter case conveying into 

 the wound made by it a minute portion of an acrid fluid the pediceled 



