256 UTILITARIAN ZOOLOGY 



For filling up the crevices of the hive bees employ "propolis", 

 which consists of resin collected from the buds and bark of trees, 

 especially horse-chestnuts and pines. It is carried to the hive 

 in the same way as pollen. 



The limbless grubs which hatch out from the eggs in three 

 days' time are fed and tended by the younger workers, and at first 

 receive a soft substance consisting of honey and pollen that have 

 been swallowed and partly digested by their attendants, with 

 which is mixed a fluid secreted by certain glands of the head. 

 This mixture is commonly known as "royal jelly". Larvae 

 hatched from unfertilized eggs always become drones, but those 

 emerging from fertilized eggs may become either workers or 

 queens, according to the way in which they are fed. A larva 

 which the workers intend shall become a queen is nourished 

 entirely upon royal jelly, possibly differing in composition from 

 that which the others at first receive. It would appear to be of 

 stimulating nature, for queens develop more quickly than members 

 of the other castes, requiring only 1 5 days (from the laying of the 

 egg) as against 21 for a worker, and 24 for a drone. The larvae 

 destined to become workers or drones are quickly " weaned ", 

 honey, pollen, and water being substituted for jelly. After being 

 fed for 5 days (or 6 in the case of drones) the larvae attain their 

 full size, when the workers seal the cells with a mixture of pollen 

 and wax, that permits the diffusion of air. Within its cell the 

 larva spins a silken cocoon, imperfect at the hinder-end in the case 

 of queens, and passes into the motionless pupa stage, from which, 

 later on, the perfect insect emerges, to bite its way out into the 

 hive. 



When a hive becomes overcrowded the surplus population, 

 accompanied by the reigning queen, " swarms " out of the hive 

 to seek fresh quarters. This never takes place unless one or 

 more royal cells with inmates are present in the deserted home. 

 When the first young queen emerges from these, her first act 

 is to tear open the remaining royal cells and sting the inmates to 

 death, an operation which is rendered possible by the imperfect 

 nature of the cocoons in which these are enclosed. After a nuptial 

 flight the young queen settles down as the new mother of the 

 community. Sometimes the workers will prevent the first emerged 

 young queen from destroying her sisters, and in that case there 

 is a possibility of the first migration being succeeded by after- 



