HYMENOPTERA. 331 
body of the insect. As the larve increase in size, their food is 
made to acquire a more decided taste of honey, and to become 
even slightly acid. It seems, then, that the bees know how to 
graduate the food of their larvee in such a manner as to bring it 
nearer by degrees to honey. 
In the space of five days, the larve are developed; they Taek 
absorbed all their pap, and have no need from that 
time of any nourishment, for they are about now to 
change into pupe. Now the nurses pay them a last © 
attention. They wall them up in their cells, closing fig. 321—1Larva of 
the openings with a waxen covering. The larve fey. Oe” 
then get close to the wax covering. In thirty-six hours they have 
spun for themselves a silky cocoon, in which they undergo their 
transformation into pupe. The moult, which precedes their 
metamorphosis, constitutes a crisis, as with the caterpillars of 
Lepidoptera. 
The perfect insect is hatched seven or eight days after its trans- 
formation into a pupa, the organs being developed little by little, 
and the young bee is then ready to appear in the broad daylight. 
It breaks through the thin transparent covering in which it is 
still swathed ; then, with its mandibles, it pierces the operculum, 
or door, of its prison, and opens a way for itself by which it can 
issue forth. With the assistance of its front legs, it clings to the 
rim of the cell, and draws itself forward, till it has set free the - 
whole of its body. ‘The other bees lavish upon this newly-arrived 
little stranger all possible attention to make its entrance into the 
world easy and agreeable ; assisting and supporting it till it has 
become quite strong. It very soon becomes strong. If it is a 
working bee, it is not long in getting to work and in mixing with 
its companions in labour. 
This is the way in which the hatching of ordinary bees takes 
place, workers and males; the first, twenty days after they are 
laid ; the second, twenty-four days after. The rearing and birth 
of the young queens is slightly different. In proportion as the 
larvee increase in size, do the workers enlarge the cells which 
contain them ; and then again gradually diminish their size as 
the moment of their last metamorphosis approaches. A special 
and peculiar food is given to the larve of the queens; it is quite 

