APIS.. 337 



domicile, others are collecting honey to store as needful 

 supplies, others are either ventilating or heating the in- 

 terior, others act as sentinels and guard the approaches 

 or patrol the passages within, and will die in that defence 

 like genuine patriots, and others are in attendance upon 

 the queen in her progresses through her dominions, and 

 who may individually act as aides-de-camp to convey her 

 commands to the rest. All these are not fanciful em- 

 hellishments of the narrative, but substantial and well- 

 authenticated facts, supported by the repetition on many 

 sides of careful observations, but perplexing to human 

 intelligence, for not the least wonder of this conventicle 

 of wonders — the hive — is that it confounds the astute 

 reason of man to comprehend it in all its significancies. 

 The first necessity of a new colony is the selection of 

 a locality for habitation, which is usually effected by pre- 

 liminary trustworthy intelligencers determining upon a 

 site suitable from its concurrent conveniences. A suffi- 

 cient supply of sustenance must be conveyed by the 

 emigrants to accompany the preparatory construction of 

 the settlement, until land can be cleared, grain grown, 

 etc., and a year at least will pass, even under the most 

 favourable circumstances of the exertion of the greatest 

 industry, concurrently with the most propitious succes- 

 sion of the seasons, before it can become self-sustaining. 

 But when once the wheel is fairly on the move, round it 

 spins without interruption or relaxation. The colonj' 

 thrives, increasing rapidly in its population; and where 

 all have put the shoulder to the wheel it climbs the steep 

 and rugged hill of prosperity, whilst those who are car- 

 ried onward by its evolutions, from each of the many 

 successive terraces of this noble height, survey a broad, 

 cheerful, and fertile landscape, extending itself with their 



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