IN THE HONEY-BEE. 49 



is awakened in the highest degree in these otherwise so sluggish 

 drones. They rove through the genial air high over their hives 

 with a loud humming to attract the attention of a queen, who 

 would be impelled to take her wedding-flight by the same 

 favourable weather. At any rate, very few of the many thousand 

 drones attain the longed-for happiness of being selected and 

 accepted by a queen for a husband, it being well known that 

 the number of female Bees is very small in proportion to the 

 great number of male individuals. But by means of this dispro- 

 portion, the few female Bees, on taking their wedding-flight, are 

 always sure of attaining their object, as from the number of 

 drones roving through the air with the same intent, it will not be 

 difficult for a queen to make choice of an agreeable consort. 



That the copulation of the Bees takes place in the open air, is 

 certainly nothing remarkable, as we see so many other insects 

 perform the act of copulation whilst flying freely about in the 

 air. It is true that the copulative act is very quickly completed 

 by the Bees, and this is proper to all those insects in general, 

 which, with the Bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera ; whilst 

 the males and females of insects of other orders usually remain 

 for days closely united in copulation. For this reason it is one 

 of the rarest events for even the most observant entomologist to 

 surprise a pair of Hymenoptera in flagranti*. The Bee-keepers 

 therefore must not be surprised that the act of copulation in 

 Bees has hitherto been so little observed. However, it has acci- 

 dentally been seen now and then by human eyes, when a pair of 

 bees, united in the act of copulation, dashed down upon the 

 earth from the upper regions of the air. Such isolated observa- 



* This is the reason why we find so many individual females or males 

 placed as separate species in no other order of the class of Insects as in the 

 Hymenoptera ; as in these insects the male and female individuals are often 

 quite differently coloured and marked, and as no trouble has been taken with 

 the rearing of them, as has been done with the Lepidoptera, it has hitherto 

 been impossible with many of these Hymenoptera to discover the sexes 

 belonging to the same species. Gravenhorst is therefore to be excused if he 

 has established a quantity of species of Ichneumons (in his Ichneumonolo<ji<i 

 Buropcea) which only consist of males or females. This certainly did not 

 happen from that desire which is carried so much too far by many entomo- 

 logists, of having the fame of giving a name to species which are new, but not 

 founded in nature. 



E 



