AT THE CITY GATES 63 
come to light. In such an establishment, even if 
it be only an old-fashioned straw skep, perhaps 
more than twenty thousand individuals are located ; 
and obviously some regular system of cleaning and 
scavenging is indispensable. This work can be 
seen now, going on uninterruptedly in the midst 
of all the other busy enterprises. Every moment 
bees come labouring out, bearing particles of refuse, 
which they throw over the edge of the foot-board, 
and at once shoulder their way back for another 
load. Other bees appear, carrying the bodies of 
comrades who have died in the hive; and every 
now and then one comes struggling through the 
crowd, bearing high above her a strange and 
ghastly thing, perfect replica of herself, but white 
throughout, save for its black beady eyes. This 
is the unborn bee, dead in its cradle-cell. Infant 
mortality is an evil not yet overcome even by the 
doughty honey-bee, and many are carried out 
thus, especially in early spring. Watching these 
undertakers of the hive in their gruesome but 
necessary work, a singular fact can be noted. 
While all other debris is merely cast over the 
brink of the entrance-board, where it accumulates 
day by day on the grass below, these dead larve 
are never disposed of thus. They are carried right 
away, their bearers taking wing and flying straight 
off over the hedgerow, to drop them at harmless 
distance from the neighbourhood of the hive. 
There is still another kind of work going briskly 
