144 THE BEE keeper's MANUAL. 



in regular colonies, are such as to secure an ample increase 

 of numbers. The same is true in the case of hornets, 

 wasps and humble-bees which live in colonies only during 

 the warm weather. In the Fall of the year, all the males 

 perish, while the impregnated- females retreat into winter 

 quarters and remain dormant, until the warm weather re- 

 stores them to activity, and each one becomes the mother of 

 a new family. 



The honey bee differs from all these insects, in being 

 compelled, by the laws of its physical organization, to live 

 in communities, during the entire year. The balmy breezes 

 of Spring will quickly thaw out the frozen veins of a torpid 

 wasp ; but the bee is incapable of enduring even a moder- 

 ate degree of cold : a temperature as low as 50° speedily 

 chills it, and it would be quite as easy to recall to life the 

 stiffened corpses in the charnel house of the Convent of the 

 Great St. Bernard, as to restore to animation, a frpzen bee. 

 In cool weather, they must therefore associate in large 

 numbers, in order to maintain the animal heat which is 

 necessary to their preservation ; and the formation of new 

 colonies, after the manner of wasps and hornets, is clear- 

 ly impossible. If the young queens left the parent 

 stock in Summer, and were able, like the mother- wasps, to 

 lay the foundations of a new colony, they could not main- 

 tain the warmth requisite for the development of their 

 young, even if they were able, without any baskets on their 

 thighs, to gather bee-bread for their support. If all these 

 difficulties were surmounted, they would still be unable to 

 amass any treasures for our use, or even to lay up the stores 

 requisite for their own preservation. 



How admirably are all these difficulties obviated by the 

 present arrangement ! Their domicile is well supplied 

 with all the materials for the rearing of brood, and long 



