348 THE BEE-KEEPER’S MANUAL. 
an affair evidently of very great labour, as the female bee, who 
is the sole architect in this instance, frequently comes to the 
opening of the burrow to rest, when the male commences flying 
rapidly round and round his mate with great rapidity, as though 
to encourage her to renew the task. 
IT am not aware whether the nest of the little bee of the 
gravel walk is subject to the visits of a parasitic cousin, but 
among those most subject to intruders of this kind is that 
of the common garden humble-bee, Bombus hortorum. In 
the encraving above, this pretty bee (Fig. 1) is engraved side 
by side with its parasite, Apathus barbutellus (Fig. 2). These 
bees bear such a generally close resemblance to each other, 
that one may easily be mistaken for the other, even by the 
initiate 1, till after a close cxamination, as colour, size, and 
general form are almost identical. There is, however, one 
marke difference, which is easily perceived when the trained 
eye has been taught where to look for it: the hind legs of the 
honey or pollen collector are invariably furnished with an en- 
larged tibia, the flattened and somewhat hollowed breadth of 
which serves as a reservoir, in which the pollen collected from 
flowers is carried to the nest. This peculiarity of formation 
will be observed in the engraving, Fig. 1, whilst in Fig. 2 the 
