APIS. 355 



The hive is, of course, quite dark within, and to carry on 

 the numerous operations which we have noticed are done 

 there, either sight of a peculiar nature must lend its aid, 

 or some faculty residing in a sensation analogous to 

 touch, but which it may be cannot be known, nor where 

 it may lie, but if it exist its organ is most probably the 

 antennae. We can, it is true, compute their eyes, which 

 comprise more than sixteen thousand, namely, about 

 eight thousand in each of the compound organs placed 

 laterally upon the head, each separate eye being an 

 hexagonal facet furnished with its separate lens and 

 capillary branch of the optic nerve, and also edged with 

 short hair ; in this hair, therefore, may lie the particular 

 sensation which guides them, for we cannot be sure that 

 this large congeries of hexagonal facets facilitate sight in 

 the dark, as in number and position they do not exceed 

 or differ from the analogous structure and number of the 

 same organs in many other insects which we know to be 

 only seers by day, and which repose at night ; but the 

 hairy addition to the eyes of these bees is a structure 

 not observed in them. 



This constitution of the hive and its various opera- 

 tions continues during the remainder of the season until 

 the approach of winter cautions them from venturing 

 abroad, when, if the temperature of the hive is much 

 lowered, they hibernate and remain in a torpid con- 

 dition until the sunshine of the following spring, and 

 with it the flowering of plants, rouses them again to re- 

 sume their suspended labours. The popiilatiou of the 

 hive having continued to increase, although not so 

 vigorously as at first, up to the very intrusion of winter, 

 and the renewed year giving renewed energy to the 

 queen, the population thence rapidly further increasing, 



2a3 



