THE DRONE. 



89 



have taken enough, return home, and gorge themselves with 

 honey. ' ' 



"The drone," says quaint old Butler (1609) "is a gross, 

 stiugless bee, that spendeth his time in gluttony and idleness. 

 For howsoever he brave it with his round velvet cap, his side 

 gown, his full paunch, and his loud voice, yet is he but an idle 

 companion, living by the sweat .of others' brows. He worketh 

 not at all; either at home or abroad, and yet spendeth as much 

 as two laborers: you shall never find his maw without a drop 

 of the purest nectar. In the heat of the day he flieth abroad, 

 aloft and about, and that with no small noise, as though he 

 would do some great act; but it is only for his pleasure, and to 

 get him a stomach, and then returns he presently to his cheer. ' ' 



191. The bee-keepers in Aristotle's time were in the habit 



of destroying the excess 

 of drones. They ex- 

 cluded them from the 

 h i v e— when taking 

 their accustomed airing 

 — by contracting the 

 entrances with a kind 

 of basket work. Butler 

 recommends a similar 

 trap, which he calls a 

 "drone-pot." 

 One of the modem inventions to destroy them is Alley's 

 drone-trap* improved by J. A. Batchelder; but it is much 

 better to save the bees the labor and expense of rearing such 

 a host of useless consumers. This can readily be done, when 

 we have the control of the combs ; for, by removing the drone- 

 comb, and supplying its place with worker-cells, the over- 

 production of drones may be easily prevented. Those who 

 object to this, as interfering with nature, should remember 

 that the bee is not in a state of nature; and that the same 

 objection might, with equal force, be urged against killing off 



Fig. 40. 



ALLEY'S DEONE-THAP. 



* The perforated zinc, used in drone-traps, which we think was in- 

 vented by Collin, ("Guide," p. 3, Paris, 1865), is so cut, that neither 

 queen nor drone but only the worker bee can pass through its opening. 



