258 INSTINCTS AND HABITS: 



up, for instance, to the third stage, and were put into 

 one finished up to the sixth stage, so that much of its 

 work was already done for it, i'ar from feeling the 

 benefit of this, it was much embarrassed, and, in order 

 to complete its hammock, seemed forced to start from 

 the third stage, where it had left off, and thus tried to 

 complete the already fiuished work."* 



Another very interesting series of observations which 

 we owe to M. Fabre has reference to the question of 

 sex, and it would really seem that the mother can 

 regulate the sex of the egg at will. In many of our 

 wild bees, the females are much larger than the maleg. 

 The male lives a life of pleasure, idle but short. 

 "Quinze jours de bombance dans un magasin a miel, 

 nn an de sommeil sous terre, une minute d'amour an 

 soleil, puis la mort." 



But the female " C'est la mere, la mere seule qui, 

 peniblement, creuse sous terre des galeries et des 

 cellules, petrit le stuc pour enduire les loges, maponne 

 la demeure de ciment et de graviers, taraude le bois et 

 subdivise le canal en etages, de 'oupe des rondelles de 

 feuilles qui seront assemblees en pots a miel, malaxe 

 la resine cueillie en larmes sur les blessures des pins 

 pour edifier des voutes dans la rampe vide d'un es- 

 cargot, chasse la proie, la paralyse et la traine au 

 logis, cueille la poussiere poUinique, elabore le miel 

 dans son jabot, emmagasine et mixtionne la patee. 

 Ce rude labour, si imperieux, si actif, dans lequel se 

 depense toute la vie de I'insecte, exige, c'est evident, 

 une puissance corporelle bieu inutile au male, I'amou- 

 leux desoeuvre." 



In the hive bee the drone cells differ materially in 

 shape from those of the queens and workers. 



' Darwin, " Origin of Species." 



