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STRUCTURE ADAPTED TO WANTS. 



customed to stings that, although they may hurt 

 us when we first begin to keep bees, they will 

 hurt less and less, until at last they hurt so little 

 that many bee-keepers care nothing at all about 

 them. 



But I want to speak of the sting itself, which is a 

 very beautiful little instrument. You have of course 

 seen a sting — ^the very fine little pointed dart which 

 the bee shoots out and which pierces the flesh. This 

 is usually called the sting, but it is not really so, for 



the sting itself is another still 

 finer-pointed dart, which lies 

 hidden in what you see al- 

 most as in a sheath. And 

 this very fine inner dart, — 

 which really consists of two, 

 working side by side, — is 

 barbed with sharp points, 

 which prevent its being easily 

 drawn back out of the wound- 

 Connected with it is a very 

 fine tube, which conveys a 

 very minute drop of strong poison into the wound 

 when the whole sting pierces the flesh. 



On account of the barbs, and the bee being unable 

 to withdraw its sting from the wound, the whole 

 sting, with its adjacent parts, is generally torn from 

 the bee's body, and causes its death. 



' With bite envenom'd they assail the foe, 

 Fastening on his veins they shoot their darts 

 Invisible, and in the wound expire.' 



Bee and its Sting. 



