THE PERFECT SOCIALISM 59 



wings. In appearance she is larger than the largest 

 workers — evidently a queenlier bee. Her first act, ii 

 unhindered by the workers, is her one claim to similar- 

 ity to human royalty : she starts at once on a hunt for 

 other queens in the hive, for our queen is jealous and 

 will brook the presence of no other claimant to her 

 throne. Her sting is a noble weapon kept sacred to the 

 slaying of her peers. She hunts for other queen-cells, 

 tears them open with great fury, and assassinates the 

 helpless young princesses within them. But she is 

 quite as ready for fair fight as for assassination, for 

 when she finds another queen fully developed she will 

 fight her until one or the other is killed. The stark 

 bodies of fifteen unfortunate queens we found one day 

 thrown oat of one of the hives ; grim witnesses to the 

 prowess of the royal lady in possession of the colony. 



In a few days after maturity the queen takes her 

 marriage flight in the sunshine. As soon as she returns 

 from her honeymoon the queen proceeds at once to 

 business, moving around upon the comb and gluing her 

 eggs to the. bottoms of the cells. When the honey 

 season is at its height she works with great rapidity, 

 sometimes laying eggs at the rate of six per minute, 

 accomplishing the feat of laying over three thousand 

 eggs per day — nearly twice her own weight. She is 

 a wise queen, moreover, and has an eye to the dangers 



