TEE TRANSFORMATIONS OF THE BEE. 363 



The egg, which is of an elongated form, and slightly curved, is deposited on the bottom of the 

 cell by one of its ends. The cell is then furnished by the workers with a small mass of a 

 peculiar jelly elaborated by the workers from a mixture of honey and pollen, and disgorged 

 by them into the cells. On the fourth day the larva is hatched, and, having consumed 

 the food placed ready for it, stretches itself towards the mouth of the cell, and is then 

 abundantly supplied with food by the workers. Under these favourable circumstances it grows very 

 rapidly, and in six or seven days attains its full size, and rills up the whole cell. The workers then 

 cover the cell with a sort of lid, composed of wax mixed with pollen, and thus protected the larva 

 soon spins a silken cocoon, within which it casts its skin for the first time, and becomes a pupa, with 

 the wings and limbs enclosed in separate cases. On the twenty-first day the perfect insect emerges, 

 and after a delay of a few hours, during which the various parts of its body dry and karden, it at 

 once begins to take part in the various labours of the hive, but does not venture out for a week or a 

 fortnight. As soon as the insect has emerged from its cell, the latter is cleaned out and prepared for 

 the reception of a new inmate ; but as the cocoons are left behind, and a certain amount of dirt 

 clings to the used cells, these gradually become dark in colour and reduced in size by the accumulation of 

 cocoons, an effect speedily made perceptible by the smaller size of the workers produced from the old 

 combs. The workers, which generally live only about six weeks in the height of the season, continue 

 to be produced, when the weather is favourable, until October. The business of these workers, besides 

 the building of the cells and care of the young, as already indicated, consists chiefly in the bringing 

 in of supplies of honey and pollen, both for immediate consumption and to be stored against the 

 flowerless season of the year. In pursuit of these substances, the worker-bees are incessantly 011 the 

 wing during fine weather, passing busily from flower to flower, and when loaded flying straight home 

 to their own hive, to which they are directed by an instinct of locality which is perfectly marvellous. 

 At the end of the year, and during the winter, parts of the combs are entirely filled with honey, 

 which is also found occupying the upper rows of cells in most of the combs, while the remainder are 

 either empty, waiting for the next season's brood, or filled with pollen, or "Bee-bread," as it is 

 called, carefully laid up, and, like the honey, shut into the cells by little waxen lids. The pollen 

 is carried home chiefly upon the dilated hind legs, the honey in the sucking-stomach, from which 

 it is disgorged either for the supply of the larvae or into the store-cells. 



During the winter the Bees remain congregated in the hive, where they keep up their heat by 

 close packing and a certain amount of exercise. The temperature of the hive rarely falls below 

 45 Fahr. Activity usually recommences in April, and the first business is a general "house- 

 cleaning," including the removal of the bodies of those Bees which have died during the winter, 

 the repair of any damage that may have happened to the combs, and the clearing out of the 

 numerous wax-lids, detached from the cells of which the honey has been consumed, which lie about as 

 they fell upon the floor of the hive. These necessary operations having been performed, the Bees, if 

 the hive has not suffered much during the winter, set about the preparations for a new phase in their 

 existence, namely, the emigration of a portion of the population to found a new hive. Drone cells are 

 prepared, and in each of them the queen lays an egg. The workers furnish the larvae with the 

 necessary food. They become full grown on the eighth day of their existence, and the cells containing 

 them are then closed up with a lid in the same way as those of the worker-bees. On the twenty-fourth 

 day after the laying of the egg the lids open, and the drones or males come forth. 



As the drones begin to make their appearance another form of cell is produced, generally on 

 the margins of the combs. Here the workers make a more or less irregular chamber, usually with its 

 mouth turned downwards, in which, instead of endeavouring to be sparing of material, they seem 

 recklessly to employ a quite unnecessary quantity. In this cell the queen also lays an egg,* and the 

 larva, when hatched, is fed by the workers throughout its life in that state with the peculiar jelly-like 



* This is the general impression ; but some bee-masters, and among them Mr, John Hunter, whose " Manual of Bee- 

 keeping " is one of the most intelligent books on the subject, is of opinion that the queen does not lay in the royal cells, but 

 that the workers, when they consider it necessary to produce new queens, take eggs already laid in worker cells, or even 

 young worker larvre, and enclosing them in royal cells, feed them witli royal jelly, and thus produce the young queens. That 

 a new queen can be produced in this way should the hive be accidentally deprved of its sovereign is a perfectly well-known 

 fact. 



