134 THE LIFE OF THE BEE 



the light — for the departure of the swarm is by no means 

 inevitable ; on one occasion only, perhaps, will she make use 

 of her wings, but then it will be to % to her lover. It is 

 strange to see so many things — organs, ideas, desires, habits, 

 an entire destiny — depending, not on a germ, which were 

 the ordinary miracle of the plant, the animal, and man, but 

 on a curious[jinert substance : a drop of honey.^ 



70 



About a week has passed since the departure of the 

 old queen. The royal nymphs asleep in the capsules are not 

 all of the same age, for it is to the interest of the bees that 

 the births should be nicely gradationed and take place at 

 regular intervals, in accordance with their possible desire for 

 a second swarm, a third, or even a fourth. The workers have 

 for some hours now been actively thinning the walls of the 

 ripest cell, while the young queen, from within, has been 

 simultaneously gnawing the rounded lid of her prison. And 

 at last her head appears ; she thrusts herself forward, and, 

 with the help of the guardians who hasten eagerly to her, who 

 brush her, caress her, and clean her, she extricates herself 

 altogether and takes her first steps on the comb. At the 

 moment of birth she, too, like the workers, is trembling and 

 pale ; but after ten minutes or so her legs become stronger, 

 and a strange restlessness seizes her ; she feels that she is not 



1 It is generally admitted to-day that workers and queens, after the hatching of the 

 egg, receive the same nourishment — a kind of milk, very rich in nitrogen, that a special 

 gland in the nurse's head secretes. But after a few days the worker larvas are weaned, 

 and put on a coarser diet of honey and pollen ; whereas the future queen, until she be fully 

 developed, is copiously fed on the precious milk known as " royal jelly. " 



